Recruits (Keeper of the Water Book 2) (6 page)

“She’s right, I’m okay,” he assures me weakly. “I don’t have
medical
insurance, either. And if he presses charges against me, I’m in trouble. If I go to the hospital, they won’t let me participate in my fight this weekend.”

He turns to walk toward his car but barely takes a few steps before stumbling. I start to rush toward him but Celeste holds up a hand to stop me. She obviously wants him long gone from us –
and
our many secrets – but I can’t just let him walk away without saying something.

“You can’t fight
anyone
in that condition,” I tell him.

“I
have
to,” he says, leaning against the truck again. “I just got kicked out of my apartment. I have nowhere to live and no money to my name. Everything I own is in my old clunker parked over there. But if I win my next fight, I could make 300 bucks and I
need
that money.”

“It’s none of our business what he does,” Celeste says. “The cops are only a few miles back and they’ll be here soon. We need to figure out what to do with the soldier before anyone shows up.”

The young man sways again as he lets go of the truck and I refuse to let him collapse. The soldier is still unconscious and Celeste keeps her bow aimed at him anyway. I rush over to the young man and drape his arm around my shoulder before he falls. I’m not so good at comforting or helping the injured and once I catch him, I’m not sure what to do.

“That bloody rag isn’t doing you any good,” I tell him. “Don’t you have something else that can stop the bleeding?”

He nods and takes his arm off me. The young man proceeds to remove his black T-shirt and hand it to me. The rest of his torso is just as hard and well-defined as his arms. I can’t help but be distracted for a moment before I start ripping the T-shirt into strips. I’m about to place a piece of cloth against the gash when I see blackness rubbed into my fingers. I look down at his hands and see they’re also covered in grease and soot.

“Sorry about that,” he mutters. “Something’s always breaking on my old car. My name’s Jack, by the way.”

“I’m Nia,” I say, which earns me a glare from Celeste.

I rifle through the ripped strips of cloth until I find the cleanest one – at least clean by comparison to the others. He grimaces as I push the cloth firmly against the wound, trying to stop the flow of blood. Pushing against his body is like pushing against a brick wall. A wave of guilt suddenly crashes over me. John has barely been dead for a few hours and I’m already getting this close to another guy. I want to cry when I think of John but I hold myself together since there’s too much to be done.

“Can we please leave before he wakes up?” Cassie asks, looking uncomfortable being so close to her captor. She backs away a few steps but nearly trips over my bow leaning against the truck.

“We can’t just leave him here,” Celeste says. “I think we’ve learned that he’ll stop at nothing to find us.”

I know exactly what she means but this statement finally jars Cassie out of her shocked silence.

“But
why
does he want to find us?” she asks. Her usual whiny tone is replaced with one of desperation and I wish we could tell her the truth. “Why would he kidnap me? Are you going to tell me what’s going on?”

Celeste’s hardened expression softens when she looks at Cassie. I can tell the burden of keeping such a secret is bothering her, too. But Celeste turns her attention to me and shakes her head just enough to remind me not to say anything. Cassie must notice this because her shocked blankness changes to a sneer when she looks at me, at least for a moment. It’s almost a relief to see that look again.

“I don’t know why he’s coming after us,” Celeste lies. “He’s obviously a lunatic.”

“That’s the
only
reason?” Cassie asks.

This time,
she’s
the one who exchanges a glance that seems to speak volumes. Cassie looks in my direction but I realize it’s not
me
that she’s looking at. Jack returns her gaze, once again raising a questioning eyebrow through his grimace. I feel like there’s something else Cassie
wants
to say but is holding back.

“It can’t be anything but mental instability,” Celeste says though I’m certain
everyone
realizes that’s a lie. “We’ll just have to tie him up and take him with us, try and figure out what to do with him later. It’s important that we keep his mouth shut.”

I continue tending to Jack’s wound as Celeste unties Cassie’s hands and uses that rope to start tying up the soldier. His hands are no sooner bound when he begins to cough and stir on the ground. Jack and I step forward to help even though the huge man is slow to regain consciousness. His eyes start to flutter open as Celeste is on her hands and knees, rifling through his pockets.

“What are you looking for?” Cassie asks.

“Wa… weapons,” Celeste says. “I don’t want any more surprises from him.”

“Weapons,” Cassie repeats, slowly nodding her head.

But I clearly know different. Despite how tough he tries to act, Jack’s wound looks pretty nasty and a splash of special water would do him wonders. Not that Celeste would ever allow a man to use it, even if that man happened to save her daughter’s life. Unfortunately, that’s not a debate we need to have since she finds nothing. The soldier’s eyes finally focus and he wriggles on the ground in anger, grunting as he tries to break free of the rope.

“Stop fighting it or I swear I’ll put an arrow through your heart,” Celeste warns.

The soldier stops moving and struggles to sit up; none of us helps him. He glares at Cassie and then looks to Jack, staring at him with murderous intensity. Even though the soldier is tied up, Jack still looks at him nervously. Surely Jack would have an easier time subduing him again if the need arose…

“Why did you…” the soldier starts to growl before pausing. An expression of dumbfounded realization hits him before he turns even angrier. “You set me up.
He
set me up.”

The rest of us turn to Jack, who does not take his eyes off the soldier.

“I wasn’t just going to pull over and exchange insurance information with you,” Jack yells back, though his response seems to confuse the soldier. “You kidnapped a helpless girl.”

“We
all
know she’s not so helpless,” the soldier yells back.

The big man’s eyes go wide with dread. He opens his mouth to scream but there’s suddenly a
thud
and nothing more than a grunt comes out. I’m shocked to see an arrow sticking out of his chest.

“Nobody talks about me like that,” Cassie says, the attitude returned to her voice.

We all turn toward her and see that she’s holding my bow, staring down at the soldier with utter contempt. I… I don’t know what to say or what to think or how to react. I look down at the soldier, whose eyes roll into the back of his head as he collapses back. He’s dead before his head hits the grass. Celeste, Jack and I are in utter shock. Celeste opens her mouth to say something but no words come out – even
she’s
shocked into silence.

Cassie is the only one who hasn’t lost her ability to speak.

“He deserved it.”

“She doesn’t deserve it,” the same voice says. “She turned down the chance to join our tribe before so I don’t believe she should be rewarded with a second chance.”

A combination of moonlight and a bluish glow from the nearby spring illuminates the surrounding forest but all I see are shadows of women holding weapons. The Amazon who speaks out against me is positioned in the trees ahead of me, just out of my view. Still, I can almost imagine the sneer on her face from what she says against me. This is the first time I’ve heard the angry voice but I’m certain it won’t be the last.

I stand just beside the spring of magical water, surrounded in a big circle by the group of Amazons. Most of them remain in the shadows but I can feel their eyes turned on me, studying every part of me. I can even sense that a few of the women are glaring at me with just as much vitriol as the woman speaking against me. I’m super nervous but my eyes spot a faint flash of red among the circle. I feel better knowing that Anne is so close. I can’t see her face but I’m sure she’s smiling at me, trying to send positive vibes in my direction.

It comes as little surprise that the other
woman who came to retrieve me now stands among the group
against
my inclusion into the tribe.

Anne, her partner and I arrived in camp only minutes earlier. We ran due east for nearly a day and a half straight – resting for only a few minutes at a time – but I’m more energized than ever. I feel like I could run for a week without stopping but that might just be my nervous energy.

Anne didn’t tell me much along the way – running at breakneck speeds doesn’t exactly make it easy to have in-depth conversation – so I wasn’t expecting my character to be put on trial this soon. I know so little about these women –
nothing
about the large majority of them – but they seem to know plenty about me. Anne wasn’t kidding when she said they’d been following my life.

Still, not every feeling I sense from the women is negative. Anne told me how impressed most of the women were with how I lived my life and I feel a sense of acceptance from most in the group. This is especially evident from the woman closest to me, the only one I see clearly.

She’s not part of the circle with the rest of the Amazons and instead stands just inside the spring, the water up to her ankles. But that’s not the most obvious difference about her. She’s old; not just old
er
but
really
old, her hair a shock of white, her skin covered with wrinkles. But she doesn’t appear weak and frail like so many of the elderly from my former tribe. This woman’s hair is long and flowing, her body lithe and muscular beneath the wrinkles. Her eyes might seem distant and spacey, but there’s strength in them that can’t be missed.

I never saw the woman in my life. But as I think back to this memory, I can totally see that she’s Celeste. She is the one they call the Keeper.

“If there’s anyone here who should appreciate joining our group in an untraditional manner, it’s you,” the Keeper tells the woman who spoke out against me.

The woman takes a few steps forward into the light, where I lay my eyes on her for the first time. Just as I recognize Celeste from my past life, I now recognize the first moment I saw Cassie. She looked different back then, rougher and dirtier without makeup or the use of a hairdryer. But there’s still something prissy about the way she carries herself, nowhere near as casual as Anne.

Our eyes meet for a brief instant, all the time needed for her hatred to shine through. It’s the first sneer she ever gives me – at least she stays consistent with that over the years.

“My Keeper, my loyalty to the group, to you, and to the water has never wavered,” she says. “But I can’t shake the bad feeling I receive from this
new
recruit. She will bring trouble and strife to our group.”

“I do not interpret the situation the same way you do,” the Keeper says. “Only time will determine such matters but I expect you to open your heart and your mind to the possibility of our group becoming stronger.”

If she’s anything like the Cassie I know now, she won’t accept the Keeper’s retort without an argument. But things were obviously different in the past.

“Yes, my Keeper,” the woman says and backs away into the darkness. Still, I realize the Amazons might not be the cohesive tribe I always assumed since my memories first started returning as dreams.

“Like every potential newcomer to our group, Sacajawea will merely observe our traditions and our routines, watch what we do to protect the water and keep it safe from mankind. A time will soon come when she will then decide if she wants to become part of the Amazons for good – and
we
will decide if we want to allow her that honor,” the Keeper says.

“Yes, my Keeper,” the Amazons echo in unison.

“Yes, my Keeper,” I repeat respectfully.

The Keeper smiles warmly. The Amazons circled around us respond like this is a formal atmosphere but I get the feeling from the Keeper that she doesn’t demand such formality. She winks at me and I remember to breathe again.

“Don’t worry, I’m sure you will fit right in,” she whispers to me.

“I hope so, my Keeper.”

“I have served this duty for a very long time and have been privileged to welcome many new recruits,” she says, speaking low enough so the others can’t hear. “And while I trust every woman here with my life, I can tell when someone has more potential than others. Your story has captivated me, your background and way or life has connected with my very soul. In the few minutes I’ve seen you and witnessed how you handle yourself, I can tell there are great things to come from you.”

My heart swells with pride, my eyes well with tears. For years, I was treated harshly by my husband, made to feel inferior and useless like I was merely a piece of property that didn’t matter. Even when I joined my tribe, I was treated differently because I could not bear children and did not fulfill their expectations of how a woman should be. But after hearing the Keeper’s words, I’ve never felt better about myself.
This
is where I’m supposed to be,
this
is my new home, and I plan to do whatever it takes to ensure I’ll be accepted.

The Keeper raises her hands toward the sky and the water glows brighter around her feet. The Keeper slowly turns in a circle and when she addresses the women, her voice is loud and clear with great strength.

“My protectors, the New World of the United States has served as our home for the last several hundred years. We have seen many parts of this wonderful country; at first, living in lands settled by the natives and then heading toward the setting sun. When that area became filled with thrill-seekers pursuing gold, we headed back east and farther north until we reached the great waterfalls. But with more people settling in this area of the country, I am afraid we can no longer safely call this home.

“Our trackers returned a few nights ago after being gone for many moons. They journeyed farther than we’ve gone since our voyage across the Great Waters hundreds of years ago. But I’m told they found a potential spot for a new home, one untouched by man, a dangerous and harsh environment that will keep us hidden for many years to come. It will not be an easy life and we will face difficult times just surviving on a daily basis. But we are a strong group. I have every confidence that we will learn to thrive. Every woman around me joined to protect the water; this is our best chance to do that.

“Now that our recruiters have returned with a potential new member to strengthen our numbers, it is time for us to begin our journey south. We will try to avoid contact with others along the way but this country is now in a time of great strife. We must be very careful.”

I feel like I’m in the way so I back up a few steps from the spring. The Keeper kneels in the water and removes a small vial on a string around her neck. She begins to chant softly. I try to hear what she’s saying but can’t make out the words. Still, I feel a static in the air around me and the water glows so brightly that the Keeper appears to become lost in the light. The spring water swirls and I worry that the old woman might be in danger. I want to run in and save her but none of the other Amazons budge so I don’t either.

The glowing finally fades enough for me to see the Keeper dip the vial into the water. Only a few drops enter the vial before she pulls it out and puts the lid back on. No sooner does she return the rope around her neck when it’s like a burning candle is blown out. The forest is plunged into darkness and it takes my eyes a moment to adjust. The only remaining bluish glow emanates from the vial around the Keeper’s neck, though she quickly tucks it under her clothing.

The Amazons rush forward and surround her even closer. A few women that clearly dislike me nudge me out of the way. The Keeper begins to walk away and the others mimic her movement, remaining close as she heads through the forest.

“Sacajawea!” Anne calls out. “Come with me!”

I rush to the front, where Anne is among the Amazons leading the group. She holds her long spear at the ready, as if looking for any excuse to use it. She’s always been so kind and nurturing to me so I find it strange to see her ready for action.

“Normally, new recruits aren’t given weapons until they’re fully accepted into the tribe. But you’re the first recruit I can remember who’s been with us during such a lengthy trek through dangerous lands. Even though there are a few women that don’t trust you yet – pay them no mind, by the way – the Keeper believes in you enough to want you well-armed,” Anne explains. “Most Amazons select their weapon of choice upon initiation but I took the liberty of choosing for you.”

She hands me a weapon and I smile. I’m already proficient with a bow and arrow; with the youth and strength and speed I now possess, I’m certain my skill level will only improve. Suddenly Anne isn’t the only one looking forward to action. But it’s dark and our path avoids most signs of civilization. Unlike my run to the Amazon’s camp, this trip is slow going, none of the women moving faster than the Keeper. I try to remain focused on the world in front of us, looking for any sign of danger, but all is quiet so my mind wanders.

Everything about my new life is perfect so far except for the few women that don’t trust me. As the hours of silent travel pass, I’m nagged by the words of the lone woman who spoke out against me, nagged by the way she distrusted me. She was right about one thing: I
did
turn down the Amazons once before. I have an awful feeling like that will be something I regret for years to come. When I mention this to Anne, she tries to stress the importance of ignoring those women. I can already sense a fundamental division between some of the women. Still, I don’t want to be the cause of any further rifts.

“I want to speak with her,” I whisper to Anne. “Maybe she’ll trust me more if she talks to me and understands how much I want to be part of the group.”

“I admire the thought, foolish as it may be,” Anne says. “Our pasts are left behind us once we become Amazons; we are all equal in the sisterhood of the water. But that doesn’t mean the Queen Clan will ever trust any of us common folk.”

“The Queen Clan?” I ask.

“Royalty sticks together, you’ll see. They think they’re better than us, especially their
outspoken
leader. But by all means, go talk to them and learn for yourself,” Anne tells me.

Now I feel like Anne is challenging me. Being the newest woman to the group, I feel the need to prove myself. Besides, I’m figuring out more and more how gruff Anne can be so it’s not surprising she might clash with those women once a part of the higher class. As far as I can tell, though, all the women live the same here so there’s no reason why I can’t make peace with everyone.

Anne snorts as I head toward the back of the group. Along the way I pass by the Keeper – closely guarded by half the tribe – who strolls peacefully along as if she doesn’t have a care in the world. The Keeper also looks all around at her surroundings but doesn’t appear to be nervous like her Amazon protectors. Instead, she’s wide-eyed and open-mouthed, staring in wonder at the darkness. She reminds me of a small child seeing the outside world for the first time…

“What is
she
doing coming to
our
area?” I hear a voice say.

We’ve been walking all night and the black sky is turning a lighter shade of dark purple. The sun will creep over the horizon shortly. I can just make out the women at the back of the pack. They wear similar sneers of contempt, though I’m sure things would be different if the Keeper was closer. It’s disappointing that so many Amazons have already formed an opinion of me; it’s even worse that amongst them is one of the women I thought might be an ally.

Twin blades
clang
together, forming an X in front of me and blocking my path.

“What are you doing back here?” asks my other recruiter.

I figured she was just easily annoyed but apparently her crankiness had everything to do with her hatred of me.

“I wanted to let you know how much I want to be here and how sorry I am for not coming sooner,” I tell my recruiter. “But isn’t someone else missing from the group?”

The woman who spoke out against me is nowhere to be seen. I spot one of the Queen Clan who glances back.