Glow

  Anne Mather was waiting for her, sitting on the chair next to the hospital bed, writing on a notepad. She smiled when Waverly came in.

  “You’re looking much better. How are you feeling?”

  Waverly flexed her hand. The edges of her burn pulled and stung a little, but the pain was bearable. “I’m fine.”

  “I’m so glad. I wanted to have a chat with you before you rejoin the rest of the girls.” The pastor patted the bed, meaning for Waverly to sit next to her. Waverly sat, but much farther away than the woman had indicated, at the foot of the bed.

  “Come closer, dear, I won’t bite.”

  Waverly did not move; she looked at the woman, who was staring over the wire rims of her spectacles, eyes locked on hers.

  Pastor Mather’s brow hardened, but her voice remained soft and lilting. “Dear, I’m afraid I have terrible news. Our sensors have been unable to find any survivors from the Empyrean.”

  Waverly imploded, entered negative space. A gray film moved over her eyes.

  But no. This woman was a liar, and Waverly wouldn’t accept anything she said. Kieran and her mother were alive.

  Pastor Mather studied Waverly’s blank face. Something clicked behind her gaze, and she said, “You must be in terrible shock.”

  “I must be,” Waverly said, her voice breathy.

  “Dear, I know this is a blow to you, but we need you to help with the younger girls. They need a familiar authority figure, someone they can trust. Felicity has helped as much as she can, but, well…” Mather smiled warmly. “I fear she doesn’t possess your strength of character.”

  Waverly made herself smile humbly at Pastor Mather’s compliment. “Well, I am the oldest,” she said.

  “That’s right. And with that comes some responsibilities, right?”

  “I’ll try,” Waverly said.

  Anne Mather studied her until she seemed satisfied. “Then I’ll let you announce that we’re still sweeping the area, looking for your parents. They’ll like knowing we haven’t given up.” She stood up and took hold of Waverly’s hand. “They’ll be having their breakfast, I suspect. You can make the announcement there.”

  Anne Mather led Waverly down a hallway into a large mess hall filled with oblong tables. Mather seemed exhausted and out of breath simply walking down the corridor. There must have been a sickness here, Waverly thought.

  All one hundred and thirty girls from the Empyrean were sitting at the tables, eating. They were wearing variations on the same frilly pink dress that Waverly wore, and their hair was pulled into pigtails. There was hardly any chatter. Only the clink of silverware against metal trays broke the silence in the room.

  Little Briany Beckett looked up from her full plate, saw Waverly, and let out a squeak. The other girls noticed, and there was a general cry as they rushed at Waverly, who was suddenly crushed by the crowd, all reaching, touching, and grabbing, patting her back, yelling questions. She held up her hands. “I’m fine, I’m fine!”

  Anne Mather had moved away, but she was sitting to the side where she could watch Waverly’s face. When she caught Waverly’s eye, she raised her eyebrows expectantly.

  Waverly forced her voice to sound calm, and she said, “Everyone, I have an announcement to make!” She waited until they quieted, watching her with wide, hopeful eyes. They all looked the same, in their ribbons and dresses, as they stared at Waverly, waiting for her to speak. Serafina Mbewe approached Waverly in her quiet way and wrapped her chubby fist around Waverly’s pointer finger, looking up at her face to read her lips. “Pastor Mather gave me some information…”

  “Auntie Anne?” asked Ramona Masters, waving her tiny fat hand over her head. She looked around the room, saw where Mather was seated, and toddled over to the woman’s lap. Other young girls followed, leaning against the woman or simply sitting next to her on the bench. Surrounded by children, Mather looked like a kindly old grandmother. She seemed aware of the effect and chuckled, eyes sparkling.

  This woman was a master manipulator. In the few days Waverly had been unconscious, she had managed to make most of the girls think she was their friend. The thought chilled Waverly.

  “The crew here is trying very hard to find our parents.” She nearly choked on the sorrow that rose in her throat. “They haven’t given up, and neither should you.”

  She heard a scoff and saw Samantha Stapleton staring at her with open contempt. Sarah Hodges stood next to her, shaking her head. Waverly would talk to them later.

  “When will we see our mommies?” asked Winnie Rafiki. She was one of the youngest children. Her black curls hovered over her head like a chocolate cloud. “I miss my mommy.”

  “I do, too,” Waverly said. An image of her own mother’s smile flashed before her, and suddenly she needed to scream.

  Pretend. Pretend. Pretend, she told herself. Be strong.

  The room was so quiet that all the girls were able to hear her whisper, “I don’t know when we’ll see our families again. We just have to hope.”

  “And pray,” Anne Mather said. She held her hands as if cupping something precious and invisible in the air. Her voice rose in a singsong: “Dear Lord, please protect the crew of the Empyrean. Wrap Your love around them, hold them close, keep them safe. And if it is Your will, Lord, please show us the way to them. Help us find our lost brethren, and bring them into our fold. Until then, help these dear children know that they are precious beyond measure. Each of these girls will be cared for as our own daughters. We will love them and keep them safe until the day they can be reunited with their families, either in this life or the next. Amen.”

  In this life or the next. Waverly heard the words, wanted to spit on them. But she swallowed her sickening grief and smiled at Anne Mather. Samantha and Sarah stared angrily at her, and she let her gaze linger on theirs until Samantha’s eyes softened. Then she said, “Now where do I get some breakfast? I’m starved.”

  Serafina led her by the hand to the kitchen area, where trays of bread and fruit and cold chicken were laid out. Waverly fixed herself a plate and went back to the cafeteria, where she found Anne Mather making conversation with Samantha and Sarah, who were staring quietly at their own hands. Waverly sat so that she could see Samantha and waited until the other girl looked at her. Waverly made no gesture, she only stared, very seriously, showing that she hadn’t given in. When Samantha’s eyes shifted back onto Pastor Mather’s face, they glinted with steel.

  Waverly felt less alone knowing that she wasn’t the only one who didn’t trust Mather. If the woman was lying, she was doing it well, and her story was almost plausible. But Waverly couldn’t forget that her “rescuers” had shot people. Felicity had seen the shooting with her own eyes and could help her talk to the other girls, make them understand that Mather was a fraud.

  She had to find a way to talk to Felicity alone.

  ALLIES

  Anne Mather’s prayer rang in Waverly’s ears as she tried to sleep that first night in the dormitory. Something the woman said had chilled her. Each of these girls will be cared for as our own daughters. There was something sinister beneath these words, turning like a gear, edging Waverly nearer to some frightening truth. It was on the borders of her mind the entire night, and it seeped into her dreams.

  As our own daughters.

  Waverly sat up in her cot with a start. She knew what Mather’s next move would be.

  She had to talk to Felicity immediately.

  Waverly looked toward the doorway, where she could see a smallish, pudgy woman sitting in a chair. Anne Mather had called her a “matron,” but Waverly knew the woman was really a guard. Though Waverly couldn’t see her face, she thought the woman might be sleeping. As quietly as she could, Waverly slid out from under her covers and edged along the length of the cots, toward the outer wall where she’d seen Felicity.

  Crawling, the whisper of her nightgown against her legs sounding unbearably loud, she finally reached Felicity and shook her shoulder. When Felicity’s eyes flew op
en, Waverly put a hand over her mouth and whispered, “Quiet.”

  “What are you doing?” Felicity hissed.

  “I think they’re going to split us up. They’re going to put us with families.”

  “What?”

  “They’re going to separate us, so we can’t talk to each other.”

  Felicity’s jaw clenched as she took this in. “How can you be so sure?”

  Waverly tried to think why she felt certain, but in the end, all she could say was, “Because it’s what I would do if I wanted to control a bunch of kids.”

  Felicity nodded pensively, but when she looked at Waverly, her eyes were hard. “Well, so what?”

  Waverly shook her head. “What do you mean?”

  “What can we do about it?”

  Waverly sat back on her heels.

  “Waverly, they have all the power,” Felicity said. “I don’t care if you think I’m a coward. I mean to survive. I’m not going to start anything with you, do you understand?”

  “But what they’ve done—”

  “What have they done? Really? They took us away from a ship that was about to explode.”

  “I don’t believe that.” Waverly glanced at the guard, but the woman hadn’t moved. “You saw what happened in the shuttle bay.”

  “I saw a panic. That’s all I know.”

  “How can you—”

  “Stop! Stop it!” Felicity balled her fists against her eyes.

  “Felicity—” Waverly’s voice broke, and she pushed her fingers into her lips to keep from crying. When she felt calm, she whispered, “I need you. I can’t do this alone.”

  “Do what? There’s nothing to do.”

  “We can’t stay here,” Waverly said tearfully. “You see that, don’t you?”

  Felicity wrapped her arms around Waverly and pulled her into a hug. Waverly rested her head on Felicity’s shoulder, inhaled her friend’s sweet milky scent.

  “There has to be a way,” she said.

  Felicity pulled back and spoke through her teeth. “I’m not going to let you get me killed.”

  “If you believe their story about what happened, why are you afraid they’ll kill you?”

  Felicity’s mouth straightened like a steel pin. “If you don’t believe their story, why aren’t you afraid?”

  I am afraid! thought Waverly. A cot creaked, and she saw Samantha Stapleton leaning up on her elbow, listening to the conversation. Their eyes met, and Samantha nodded.

  The woman by the door cleared her throat. She hadn’t moved, but she sounded awake. Waverly pointed her finger at Felicity. “Fine. Give up. But stay out of my way.”

  She didn’t wait for a response. As quickly as she could, she crawled over to Samantha’s bunk. Waverly whispered, “You don’t believe their story either?”

  “No. When do you think they’ll split us up?” Samantha asked, her face stern.

  “Soon. We’ll need a way to communicate after we’re separated—”

  The lights blinked on. Waverly ducked to the floor. When she looked up at Samantha, the girl seemed to have lost her mind. She was rubbing her eyes, her mouth stretched across her face in apparent agony. “What are you—,” Waverly started to ask, but a sharp voice interrupted.

  “What do you think you’re doing?”

  The matron stood over her, short arms folded over her puffy chest, eyes on Waverly.

  “It’s my fault for crying. She was trying to comfort me!” Samantha cried out. Somehow she had produced actual tears. “She heard me crying and she came over to see if I was okay.”

  The woman sat on the cot and wrapped her arms around Samantha, who dissolved into the most convincing crocodile tears Waverly had ever seen.

  “There’s a love,” the woman crooned, rocking Samantha back and forth. “There’s a dear heart.”

  The woman nodded reassuringly at Waverly, so she went back to her own cot, watching as Samantha sobbed into the old woman’s shoulder. The sight almost made her smile, and she buried her face into her pillow. By the time Samantha’s tears had stopped and the woman turned off the lights, Waverly’s fear had subsided into something else. Something hard and wily.

  Soon, it was time to wake up and get dressed. The girls were all seated at the breakfast tables, eating quietly, when Anne Mather came into the room, a mournful expression on her face. She leaned heavily on the first man Waverly had seen since coming aboard the New Horizon. It was the man with the scar who had taken the girls to the shuttle bay. He smiled at Waverly with oily lips. Waverly shrank away with her plate of food.

  Anne Mather held up a hand. “Girls, I have some news about the Empyrean.”

  The room faded into silence, and all the girls looked at her, waiting. Waverly thought everyone must be holding their breath, for the only sound in the room came from the man with the scar as he brushed his fingertips back and forth along the thigh of his pants.

  “We’ve located some wreckage, dears,” Anne Mather said. “I’m afraid it’s not looking good.”

  Several girls melted into mournful cries.

  “What do you mean, wreckage?” Sarah asked, her face perfectly neutral.

  “I think it’s best if we simply show you. Please follow me,” Anne Mather said. She held up her hands until a few of the youngest girls came up to her, and she shepherded them out of the room.

  Waverly picked up Serafina Mbewe, who was crying. Other girls ran to catch up with Mather, pulling on her tunic, asking desperate questions. The procession felt like a dream. The girls followed Mather and her companion through the corridor, which looked identical to the corridors of the Empyrean. It was the first time Waverly had been let out of the converted cafeteria, and it hurt her to be walking hallways that looked so much like home. They made a left toward the port side of the ship. Double doors slipped open before them, and once again they were in a shuttle bay.

  Waverly gasped. This place was identical to the shuttle bay on the Empyrean, down to the placement of the shuttles and OneMen. Memories of the shooting flooded through her as she walked toward the air lock doors. She looked at the shuttle nearest the air lock, which was where she’d stood when she last saw Kieran, when he and Seth begged her not to go aboard. If only she had run the way they’d told her to do.

  Suddenly she missed Kieran so much, she could hardly breathe.

  Anne Mather gestured for the girls to stand in a circle surrounding what at first looked to be a rock, but which, Waverly realized, was a hunk of melted metal. Serafina kicked her legs to be let down and Waverly lowered her to the floor.

  “Before I tell you what this is, girls,” Mather said, “I want to say that we’re still looking for your families.”

  The girls formed a circle around the lump on the floor and were all staring at it. The man pulled a stool toward the center of the circle, and Anne Mather sat down, hands on knees, a regretful expression on her face.

  “This is the first bit of debris we’ve been able to locate. We’ve run some tests, and it’s quite clear to us that this is from the hull of the Empyrean. I’m so sorry, but this is confirmation that the Empyrean has been destroyed.”

  Someone cried out. Waverly thought it sounded like Felicity, but she didn’t want to look. She felt so sickened that she had to concentrate on standing up and breathing. The metal sucked at her mind, forced her to consider that perhaps her home really was gone.

  Anne Mather clapped her hands to get everyone’s attention. “We haven’t given up on the hope that there may be survivors aboard shuttles, and we’re still searching, but I think we all must be prepared for the worst. The way this metal was denatured suggests a thermonuclear explosion. They may not have had enough warning for a shipwide evacuation.”

  The walls echoed with cries from the girls. Waverly’s mother, Kieran, Seth, everyone she’d ever known, vaporized into ash. Did they suffer? She couldn’t hold it back anymore. Days of fear and sorrow crowded in on her, and she covered her face with her hands and wept.

  “Gi
rls, you must have faith,” Anne Mather said. “It can be hard to search this nebula. Our radar has a limited range, but we’re still looking for shuttle craft. They might still be out there. In fact, I believe they are.”

  The girls quieted. They looked at Mather with hope in their eyes. Even Waverly felt herself clinging to this story, wanting Mather and her crew to succeed.

  A stern look from Samantha tugged at the corner of Waverly’s vision. Don’t you believe it, she seemed to be saying. Waverly nodded, wiped away her tears, and willed herself to hang on to hope. Not the intoxicating hope Anne Mather was offering. Her own hope.

  She felt a tug on her collar. Serafina was biting on her lip so hard that blood spread in a thin red line between her lips. Waverly mouthed, “It’s going to be okay.”

  Serafina looked doubtful, but her teeth released her bloody lip.

  Anne Mather held up a hand to gather the girls’ attention. “Until we find the survivors, I wonder, are you really comfortable in the cafeteria? How are those cots serving you?”

  Some of the girls shook their heads. Amanda Tobbins raised her hand and said, “My blankets are itchy.”

  “Wouldn’t you like to have your own beds? Your own rooms? With nicer blankets?”

  Waverly raised her hand and spoke loudly. “I like being with my friends. I don’t want to be apart from them.”

  As she expected, a cry rose among the girls, and Waverly could see several friends clutching each other, terrified of being separated. Anne Mather studied Waverly, detached and calculating.

  “All right,” the woman said indulgently. “That sounds fine for now. You can stay in the dormitory until a more permanent situation can be arranged. In the meantime, how would you like to see the other parts of the ship? I think a tour is long overdue.”

  Waverly watched as Mather struggled to her feet with help from the scarred man. The man himself moved sluggishly, like the nurse, like Mather, like the matron last night. Every adult aboard this ship seemed weak and tired out.