Stolen (9 page)

And now the boy—the
idiot
boy—was panicking. He shouted Blaine’s name, paled at the sight of his bloody scalp. Bree watched him lay an ear to Blaine’s heart—still beating, it seemed—and bandage the head wound. Finally, as he should have done from the beginning, the boy scurried through the gap in the rock alone.

Now
, she told herself.
So you don’t have to watch his face blow over with shock when you shoot his brother.

Bree ran, rifle gripped tightly. She stepped over Blaine’s unconscious body and let her aim settle on the Franconian emblem of his uniform.
Act first, question later
. But with her finger resting on the trigger, Bree hesitated.

The boys were indeed identical—she’d been right to suspect brothers, if not twins—but up close, the resemblance to Lock was lost. Instead, Bree was reminded of Owen Weathersby, a Rebel captain. Owen had sons in Claysoot. Right around this age, if Bree remembered correctly. She wished she’d asked for their names. These boys could be them, Heisted and working for Frank because they didn’t know the truth.

Her finger lifted off the trigger.

Muttering a curse, Bree climbed through the gap in the rock. The air was full of mist on the other side, cool and clean, and the sound of the waterfall hitting the pool echoed off the steep, surrounding walls. The boy was kneeling before the water’s edge, filling a canteen.

“Stop right there,” she ordered. Her words bounced off the rock, making her sound more demanding then she felt.

The boy raised his hands overhead and slowly turned to face her.

“You,” Bree said. “What’s your name?”

He stared, head tilted, and Bree got the impression that he was about to call her bluff, that he could tell she didn’t want to shoot him unless absolutely necessary. She marched forward and pressed the muzzle of her weapon to his chest. It was only now, with her eyes barely level with his collarbone, that she realized how truly unlike Lock he was. The physical similarities stopped at the dark hair, as this boy was taller—maybe over six feet—with a jaw set like a cliff, harsh and demanding. His hair was wet from the water he’d splashed on his face, and dirt still caked the creases of his skin, creating rough lines. Everything about him seemed harsh, really. Everything but his eyes, which were gray. As gray as the skies that hung over Saltwater before a rainstorm, deep-set and cast in shadow.

Bree faltered, then cursed herself for it.

She was stupid. Sloppy and unfocused.

She pressed the weapon against the boy’s breastbone a bit harder. “I asked you what your name is.”

He stared. Blinked.

“The boy outside. Is he your brother?”

And finally, words.

“You’re just going to kill us anyway.” His voice was steadier than she expected, no sign of nerves. “You’re going to murder us, the way you murdered that Order team.”

“Murder?” Of course he had to make this difficult. He was stupid enough to let his brother crack his head, and now he was stubborn enough to throw up walls when someone tried to help him. “It’s not murder when we’re fighting for our lives,” she snarled. “Now, your name.”

“You were really good. All quiet like that. How long have you been following us?”

Like she’d tell him.

“You’d make a good hunter,” he added. “Especially where I came from. I don’t think we had a single girl as stealthy as you.”

“Where you came from?” Hope spiked in Bree’s chest. Maybe he was Owen’s after all. She nudged him again with her rifle. “Are you with the Order or are you from somewhere else?”

“What’s it matter? You
are
going to shoot me, right?”

And then he had the gall to smile. It lit up his entire face, made every last feature soften.

Bree watched triumph spread over the boy’s lips, like he believed he’d won. Like he thought he
knew
her.

She brought her knee up, catching him between the legs. He gasped, and his shocked expression was so priceless that Bree couldn’t help but smirk as she knocked him out with her rifle. She dragged him out of the water so that he wouldn’t drown his pretty face, and pulled a radio from her pack.

“Fallyn, I’m at the waterfall. I’ve got two unconscious Order members—potential recruits. Send Luke or someone from the Interrogation Center to help me haul these idiots in.”

The boy looked so harmless now, one of his arms pinned beneath his chest. Bree hoped she wouldn’t come to regret sparing him. He was stupid and cocky and potentially undeserving of the Rebels’ aid, but she’d looked him in the eye and heard his voice. She’d caught a glimpse of his personality. She’d seen his smile.

If she ended up having to shoot him later, it would no longer be easy.

And right then, Bree knew it, a truth as unforgiving as the sun beating down overhead: This boy was going to be a major thorn in her side.

Read on for a sneak peek
at the heart-pounding sequel to
Taken

WE HAVE BEEN WALKING FOR two weeks. Nothing tails us but snow and crows and dark shadows of doubt. The days grow shorter, the evenings frigid. I thought I’d be able to handle the cold.

I was wrong.

Back in Claysoot, our winters were hard, but while our homes were drafty and crude, we still had shelter. Even if I had to bundle up and head into the woods for a day of hunting, I could always return to a house. I could light a fire and put on clean socks and cling to a cup of hot tea as though my life depended on it.

Now it is just endless walking. Endless cold. At night we have only tents. And exposed fires. And blankets and jackets and countless additional layers that are never enough to chase the chill from our bones.

It’s funny how Claysoot actually looks good on some days. When it’s freezing and no amount of blowing on my hands seems to warm them, I can’t help but think of the comforts of my old home. I have to remind myself that Claysoot was never a home. A home is a place you are safe, at ease, able to let down your guard. Claysoot is none of these things. It will never be these things. The Laicos Project made sure of that, starting the day Frank locked children away to serve his own needs, corralling them like cattle, raising them to create the perfect soldiers: Forgeries. Human machines to do his bidding. Perfect replicas of the people he imprisoned.

And now we march to one of those prisons, a forgotten group in the Western Territory of AmEast’s vast countryside. We’ll look for survivors at Group A, invite them to join us in the fight against Frank. See what secrets they’ve learned in all their years of hiding. Ryder’s holding out hope that Group A might make a decent secondary base, help us extend our reach to the opposite end of the country.

I look at my hands, dry and chapped. Snow is falling again, drifting through the early-morning light as delicate, gray flakes. I’m supposed to be doing something. What am I supposed to be doing?

I see the footprints, and I remember. Clipper.

He’s been drifting from our team lately. We’ll settle down for the night, or pause for a water break, and then someone will notice that he’s missing. I always get saddled with the honor of retrieving him.

I stand and pull my gloves back on, return my focus to tracking him. I crest a small rise and there he is, leaning against a pale birch tree.

“We need to keep moving. You ready?”

“Gray,” he says, turning to face me. “I didn’t hear you.”

I force a smile. “You never do.”

“True.” There’s an unmistakable heaviness to Clipper’s voice. He sounds older. Looks it, too. After Harvey died—was murdered by Frank—the boy took over as the Rebels’ head of technology. All the added responsibility seems to have aged him.

“I miss her,” Clipper says, touching a twine bracelet I watched his mother give him when they said their good-byes two weeks earlier. “And Harvey.” He kicks at a snow-dusted rock at his feet. “He was . . . I don’t know how to put it. I just feel lost without him.”

Harvey was like a father to Clipper. That’s what he means to say. I know it, and so does the rest of our team. It’s painfully obvious.

“You’ve got me, at least,” I offer. “I’m the one who races after you every time you take off. That has to count for something, right?”

He laughs. It’s a short, quick noise. More of a snort than anything.

“Come on. Everyone’s waiting.”

Clipper straightens and takes one last look into the endless forest of tree trunks. “You know I’ll never actually leave you guys, right? Sometimes I just need some space.”

“I understand.”

“But you always come after me.”

“It makes my father feel better. We’d be lost without you, and as our captain, he sleeps better knowing you’re not running away.”

Clipper frowns. “I might get scared, but I’m not a coward.” He folds his arms around the location device, clutching it to his chest as we head for camp. Clipper’s spent so much time staring at the thing lately, I’ve started to think he believes Harvey is out here somewhere, waiting in a snow-filled gully that Clipper can get to if he only plugs in the right coordinates.

Even though my father has been pressing us at a grueling pace lately, the camp is still not broken down when it comes into view. Tents as bright as grass speckle the snow, and a fire sends a thin line of smoke through the tree branches. Xavier and Sammy are pulling their tent stakes from the frozen earth, but everyone else is huddled around September, a mean-looking girl in her early twenties who is actually far sweeter than her angled features let on. She’s dishing out a breakfast of grits. This has been our fare since we set out. Grits in the morning. Whatever meat we manage to catch throughout the day for dinner. And little rest in between.

Bree spots Clipper and me first. She shoots me a smile, wide and shameless. It’s a good look on her. Refreshing, even, since she seems bent on scowling most of the time. She elbows Emma, who stands beside her, a wool hat pulled over wavy hair. Even from a distance I can hear Bree’s energetic words. “They’re back. I told you not to worry.”

Emma looks up and raises a hand in a shy sort of greeting. I don’t return the wave. I wish I could forgive her. For replacing me so quickly when we were separated earlier this year—me on the run from Frank, her stuck under his watch in Taem. For moving on as if what we had was meaningless, as if we never talked about birds and pairs and settling into something that feels right. I know it’s foolish to hold a grudge, but I’ve never been the forgiving type. I’ve never been able to look past people’s faults or bite my tongue or be generally decent. I am not my brother.

Clipper runs ahead to retrieve a cup of grits from September and my father shouts to me from across camp. “Took you long enough!”

“The wind covered his footprints,” I lie. I don’t want to mention that, like Clipper, I experienced a moment of weakness alone in the woods. That I stopped to ponder it all: the grimness of what we face, the bleakness of our journey so far.

My father swallows a spoonful of his breakfast before narrowing his eyes at Clipper. “I won’t have this anymore, Clayton.” Hearing Clipper’s true name makes the entire team freeze. “We waste time whenever you take off. Gray has to find you. We all have to wait. And we can’t afford delays like that—not when our mission’s details could be spilled at any moment.”

Just three days after we left Crevice Valley, Rebel headquarters, Ryder radioed to tell us one of our own fell into enemy hands. We’re now well out of communication range, with no way of knowing how much information, if any, the Order acquired. Still, we spend a lot of time glancing over our shoulders as we hike. Fear is an ugly thing to have chasing you.

“I need you to start acting like a soldier,” my father adds, jerking his chin toward Clipper. “You hear me?”

“Oh, go easy on him, Owen,” Xavier calls out, securing his broken-down tent to the underside of his pack. The act reminds me of when he taught me to hunt in Claysoot, him loading up his gear and signaling for me to follow him into the woods. “He’s just a kid.”

Clipper frowns at this, obviously disagreeing that a boy of almost thirteen is nothing but a child.

Sammy stops wrestling with his pack. “Yeah, he’s just an immature, no-good, brainless computer whiz who can take any piece of equipment and make it do his bidding. Actually, on that note: Clipper, can you fabricate a time machine so we can get to Group A already? My toes are about to fall off, and I could really benefit from an accelerated schedule.”

This gets a light chuckle from the group. I met Sammy over a game of darts back in Crevice Valley, but it wasn’t until this mission that I truly came to know him. He’s good-natured, endlessly sarcastic, and has a quick-witted sense of humor that’s been a welcome distraction.

“We all know you’re cold, Sammy,” my father says sternly.

“I’m not just cold, I’m freezing,” he responds, wrestling a hat down farther over his pale hair. “And think of what this wind is doing to my face! How am I going to win over any girls when I have these windburned cheeks?” He pats them with his palms.

“The only girls you’ll be seeing for the foreseeable future are the three in our group. And they’re not interested.” Sammy raises his eyebrows as if he means to accept Owen’s words as a challenge, and my father adds, “Don’t get any ideas.”