Page 83 of Land of Shadow

Smashing glass wakes me up, my head aching as I open my eyes. What happened? I blink several times to clear my vision. My wrists hurt, my hands numb.

“Wha—” I realize my hands are above my head. I’m tied to one of the chandeliers far overhead. The tips of my shoes drag the ground, and I stand on tiptoe to relieve the pain in my wrists.

“She’s awake.”

“What did you do?” I wipe my face on my sleeve as best I can, but the movement puts more strain on my wrists.

“You met Josie.” The woman who’d found me earlier holds up a rifle. “Well, Josie’s butt, anyway.” She smiles, one of her front teeth missing. A patch has been sewn onto the front of her bulletproof vest, the image of a halo, light shining from it.

She puts her fingers in her mouth and whistles high and sharp. The room quiets, which is when I look around. Dozens of people are gathered in the atrium. I don’t see the soldiers from earlier, but a sinking sensation hits me as I realize they must be dead.

A man pushes through the crowd. He’s tall with gray hair and weathered, tan skin, a rifle hung over his shoulder. A deep scar cuts along his throat, as if someone tried to kill him and almost succeeded.

“So, you’re the president’s sister.” He pulls my badge from one of the pockets of his paramilitary gear, and I notice he bears the same halo emblem as the woman. “A doctor, no less.”

A ripple goes through the crowd, mistrust in every face.

I focus on the leader. “I’m working on a cure. I’m—” My words are cut short by a hard slap.

“No one said you could talk.” The woman snarls in my face.

“All right, Gina. At least let her have some last words before we execute her.” The leader grins and pulls the woman back.

“Why?” I swallow hard, my throat suddenly tight. “Why are you doing this?”

“Why are you sending good Americans into whatever woodchipper these blood camps are?”

“I’m not.”

“You just said you’re researching. That’s what these bullshit camps are for. At least, that’s what your sister keeps saying. But we know people—good fucking people—who’ve gone in and never come out. Not another word from them.Nothing. It’s like they disappeared. Why do you think that is?”

I press up higher on my tiptoes, the chandelier overhead shaking and tinkling from the movement. “It doesn’t have anything to do with the work we do here. I’m trying to help. I’m researching the plague and?—”

“Juno’s Miracle.” He chuckles darkly.

“Yes.”

“Fucking witchcraft.” Gina spits on the fine hotel carpet.

“Bunch of bullshit is what it is,” someone else says.

“You’re killing us. Using us like test monkeys so you can cure the rich and leave the rest of us dead or dying.”

“Taking our clean blood and putting it in them, killing us to do it!” A man at the front yells, a pistol in his hand.

“That’s not what we’re doing!” I cry, but there are too many voices, most of them yelling. “I’m trying to save you!”

A man to my left rears back, then spits in my face. Something hits me in the side of the head and shatters. I blink as blood runs into my eyes. Another glass whizzes past me and smashes against the bar. They’re moving closer, some of them pointing their guns at me.

I try to move back, but it hurts so badly I think the rope might sever my hands. “Stop!” I scream, but my plea is lost in a rising tide of uncontrolled rage.

“My cousin went in and never came out!” A blonde woman shouts and points. “You fucking killed her. You goddamn monsters!”

Another man pushes through the angry crowd to the leader who holds his hand up. The restless group quiets as silent tears well in my eyes and slip down my cheeks.

“Clay, reinforcements are approaching. We need to get this done and get out,” someone calls from behind me.

“Kill this one. Send a message. We’ll come back for the others.” Gina draws a long hunting knife from a sheath at her side. “Let me do it.”

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