The dash back to the Imp-hut feels strange and unprocessed, like a piece of film that’s been stretched in places and grazed in others, dreamlike and fragmented. The wind numbs my cheeks and fills my ears, but it can’t drown out that one line: my best friend has betrayed me.
I throw open the door of the Imp-hut, my expression acting like a siren, drawing looks from every slave inside.
Saskia dashes towards me, her spiky facade momentarily dropped. ‘Violet? What is it?’
‘Alice,’ I say, almost to myself.
Matthew guides me to a chair.
‘Alice,’ I repeat, like saying it again can somehow make it hurt less.
Nate scoots across the room, pushing through the gathering crowd. ‘What about her?’ he asks, his face a mixture of concern and pain.
Saskia snarls at the bystanders. ‘The next Imp to stare at stuff that don’t concern ’em will have to deal with me. Got it?’
They go about their business, pretending we don’t exist.
‘Well?’ Nate says.
I take a great, shaky breath, for once barely noticing the stink of damp. ‘I saw them, together. Willow and Alice. In bed, they were, you know . . . or at least they had been . . .’
‘Bitch,’ Nate says.
‘Nate, mind your language,’ I mumble out of habit.
Saskia leans into the table and exhales slowly. ‘OK, OK, this isn’t so bad. Alice is on our side, right? She’s working for Thorn? I’m guessing she’s his fallback in case you fail to seduce Willow.’
‘It’s not just about seducing Willow.’ I place my hand on hers, wishing I could somehow make her understand. She snatches it away, but I carry on regardless. ‘There are more important things than getting Jeremy Harper’s secrets.’
‘Like what?’ Saskia spits.
Like completing the canon and going home. The words remain heavy on my tongue, causing my mouth to hang open.
Saskia turns so I can’t see her expression, but she holds herself stiff and balls up her fists. ‘OK, well if Alice is doing her job, we’re best off removing you from the equation. Let’s head back to headquarters and see what Thorn wants to do.’
I can’t bear the thought of letting Alice win. I can’t bear the thought of leaving Ash. And I just can’t bear the thought of never going home. I can feel the panic rising inside. ‘No. I want to stay.’ My voice sounds stronger than I feel. ‘I want to win him back and put this right.’
‘I ain’t asking you, I’m telling you.’ Saskia turns to face me, a tic developing just below her right eye. ‘You think I’m happy about this? Months in the bloody making this plan was, and all me and Matthew’s own work, and then doll-face-bloody-long-legs comes swanning in and steals the show.’ She turns and says to herself, ‘This would never have happened if Rose were here.’
If I thought I couldn’t feel any more inadequate, I was wrong. Her words wither my insides. And it just seems so unfair – I was so close. If only Alice hadn’t interfered. Nate rests his hand on my shoulder, which helps stem the tears for at least a moment.
Matthew finally speaks. ‘Come on now, Saskia. We don’t know that.’
She puts her hands on her hips and looks me up and down. This bitter laugh erupts from her mouth.
The panic hardens, turns to anger, my insides still raw from my run-in with Alice. ‘You think I wanted this? To come to this awful place and get strung up by that controller, and nearly assaulted by a squaddie, and watch Nate almost get his hands cut off, and get called an ape and treated like I’m barely human and get no sleep and be permanently hungry and watch my best friend betray me.’ I tug at my clothes. ‘And these God-awful overalls, how can you even bear them, it’s like having nits or something.’
The skin around her eyes tightens. ‘Steady now, princess. The way you’re talking anyone would think you’re not really an Imp.’
‘Of course I’m an Imp. I’m five foot bloody four!’
‘We leave on the next bus. Now gather your things.’ She storms from the hut, slamming the door so hard it groans on its hinges and dislodges the dust and muck from the beams.
‘What things?’ Nate gestures to our empty bunks, his voice sarcastic, full of bravado, but he leaves his hand on my shoulder like I’m some sort of crutch.
Matthew disappears behind a cloth divider. I hear him roll on to a bunk. ‘The next bus isn’t till dawn, better get some sleep. We’ve got some walking ahead.’
Even though I’ve hardly slept, I don’t feel tired. I can still feel the remnants of the adrenalin, and my body’s forgotten whether it’s night or day. Eventually, I move to the kitchenette. Nate follows, and we begin stuffing bread in our pockets, filling bottles with cloudy water.
‘How could she do this?’ I whisper over the rumble of the taps.
‘What? Alice? Do something completely selfish? Shag the man of her dreams? It’s a mystery.’
‘Nate, language.’
He laughs. ‘Shag doesn’t count.’ He screws the lid on to one of the bottles, his knuckles blanching, and when he looks up, he looks serious. ‘She clearly wants to stay.’
‘That’s what she said.’
‘You talked to her?’
‘More like yelled.’
He nods in approval. ‘Did you remind her about Katie?’
‘Yeah. She’s hell-bent on ruining the canon so she can stay.’ I think about the paper chain, the glinting scythe, the Dupes suspended in fluid. ‘How could she want to be one of them?’
Nate sighs. ‘It’s like those Zimbardo experiments Dad told us about.’
I shake my head, slightly irritated by the tangent.
‘You know, they took a bunch of students and made half of them prisoners and half of them guards. Within days, they were acting like it was real.’
I smile. ‘How do you remember this shit? You’re only fourteen.’
‘Because I clear my brain of all other clutter, like where I live and what my name is.’
For a moment, it feels normal again – just me and Nate carrying on. But it quickly fades. I sigh. ‘What are we going to do?’
‘Baba will know.’
‘She didn’t know this.’
He doesn’t reply.
We leave the estate on the first bus that morning, the four of us shivering in the dew-soaked air. I stare at the battered headrest in front of me, letting the fibres pixelate before my tired eyes, and I don’t risk glancing out of the window until the Harper estate lies far behind – a world spun from sugar. Beautiful, sweet, and yet painfully brittle.
I’d tried to find Ash, but he’d done his vanishing act again. I never got the chance to tell him goodbye, or even part of the truth. Now, he will always think I wanted Willow. I swallow back the tears.
The hypnotic rhythm of the bus eventually rocks me into a world of dreams. Alice, Katie and I stand on the school stage – the one in the sports hall which never gets used because it’s too small and manky. Alice wears this amazing Elizabethan gown, all silvers and greens, like she’s the Queen of Slytherin. She really does look like an hourglass – the fullness of the skirt narrowing into her tiny waist, only to flare out into an elaborate, white lace collar. Katie and I look more like wenches, dressed in dour black smocks and aprons, our dirty hair tucked into equally dirty mop hats.
‘Come now, servants,’ Alice says, addressing us in a regal tone. ‘Do not keep the audience waiting.’
I notice for the first time that spectators fill the hall, each one of them gawping at us. It’s my line. I know it’s my line, but I can’t for the life of me remember what I’m supposed to say.
‘Vi,’ Katie hisses. ‘Vi, come on, I’m depending on you.’
The crowd begins to whisper, but they’re quickly drowned out by the pounding of my heart. I prise open my jaw, force down some air, beg the words to form in my brain and migrate to my tongue. But it’s like my mind has been stripped down, left bare.
The crowd begins to laugh. That’s when I spot Mum, standing in the midst of the audience. She shakes her head like she’s disappointed, that same shake she did when I came home drunk and puked on the sofa. Then, her lips begin to move. And even though she’s thirty-odd feet away, it’s as if she whispers straight into my ear. Come on, sweetheart. Say something. For me. Please just say something and wake up.
I wake with a start, Nate beside me.
‘You OK?’ he asks.
‘Yeah.’ My hand settles on my overalls, just above the place where Katie’s letter should nestle. I left it at the Imp-hut, stuffed down the back of a crumbling sideboard. I was worried the guards would find it when we crossed the borders. It would rouse suspicion and put us in the firing line, a supposedly illiterate Imp carrying a letter. But it seems those words sunk through my skin and into my veins, like my blood would flow ink-black if you cut me open. I feel like crying. All the world’s a stage, and I am the shittest actor ever.
Leaving the Pastures proves a lot easier than entering. There’s no decontamination process, because you can’t contaminate a city already filled with disease and raw sewage. Just a quick pat down from some apathetic squaddies, who throw my bread in the bin and laugh when my stomach snarls.
We trail through the city gates with the rest of the slaves and I brace myself for that rotting bird smell. But this time, rather than overwhelm me, it seems strangely reassuring. At least it knows it stinks. And being surrounded by the misshapen, badly proportioned physiques of the Imps, not a Gem in sight, I get this strange feeling like I’ve returned home from the zoo.
Regardless, the trudge through the city is soul destroying. I spend half of the journey recalling how at this point in canon, Willow was secretly following Rose across the city – dressed in a pair of grey overalls, hair mussed up and dirt rubbed into his face – and the other half preparing for my future conversation with Thorn. I knew you wouldn’t be able to replace Rose. It’s a good job I sent Alice too. Now you will all have to stay in this place for the rest of your lives.
At least I’ll see Katie again. I’ve missed her soft Scouse accent, her grounded approach to life, the way she always makes me laugh. I want to tell her about Ash, about the Dupes, about what a bitch Alice has been. Katie will call her a twatwomble, and I’ll momentarily forget how crap everything is.
Katie, I suddenly think. Thorn will kill Katie. I begin to unravel – my hands begin to shake, my joints seize up, my gut clenches. I’ve always known this was true, but only as we near headquarters does the reality sink in. Maybe, just maybe, Alice was right, and he fancies her too much to hurt her.
‘Violet? What is it?’ Matthew asks.
‘Katie,’ I say. ‘I failed the mission.’
‘We’ll try and talk to him,’ Saskia says.
Matthew nods. ‘He listens to Saskia.’
‘He doesn’t listen to anyone, arrogant jerk.’ Saskia glances at my tense face and tries to smile. ‘But he won’t kill your mate, promise. He likes her I reckon, as much as Thorn can like anyone.’
I hold on to these words, and just hope Katie managed to befriend him, at least enough to stop him from killing her, but not so much that he tried it on. I shudder when I think of what a difficult position Katie’s been in, the role she may have had to play. And I just can’t lose Katie. These past few days, I’ve realized just how much she means to me. Not just because of Alice’s betrayal, but because it’s always Katie I’ve longed to tell when something’s gone wrong. It’s her voice, punctuated with hilarious swear words, that I’ve imagined telling me it will all come good. Alice has been my best friend since I was four, a history which can’t be ignored, a history which practically elevates her to sister status. But if I were to walk into a room completely oblivious to the past thirteen years, my friendship slate wiped clean, it would be Katie I’d choose to slam tequila with, not Alice.
I let my eyes skim over the forgotten, ghostly street signs, the monotony of the grey and the thwack of my step eventually stilling my mind. The sun slowly moves across the sky, its rays barely penetrating my skin. That’s when I first notice it, a flash of grey fabric in my peripheral vision. The tiny hairs on my arms stiffen and I have this overwhelming sense that somebody’s watching me, following me. I get a soft flicker of hope in my chest. Maybe, just maybe . . . but I can’t bring myself to even think it, because if I’m wrong, I will experience that crushing disappointment all over again.
Nate fishes some undiscovered bread from inside his overalls and hands it out. Saskia grabs a piece and gives half to Matthew. ‘We can eat as we walk,’ she says.
A few crumbs fall from Nate’s mouth. He looks at me and grins. ‘Hansel and Gretel made it home, didn’t they?’
‘Yeah, but the birds ate the crumbs,’ I reply.
Saskia jabs me in the back. ‘Who said you could speak?’ It sounds aggressive even for her – she’s worried about seeing Thorn too.
‘So how did they get home?’ Nate whispers, after a tokenistic pause.
‘They killed the witch,’ I whisper back.
‘Shhh.’ Saskia jabs me in the back again.
‘Tempting,’ Nate says.
We both giggle.
By the time the church spire comes into view, hunger and tiredness have weakened my limbs, and I have to concentrate really hard not to cry. That flash of grey hasn’t reappeared and I left the flicker of hope behind with Nate’s breadcrumbs.
We approach the church, the scent of fish thick in my nostrils. Just the sight of those porthole windows, the gothic spire, and I get this pain in my stomach, this tightness in my throat. Saskia and Matthew push through the wooden doors and I follow, Nate’s hand wrapped in mine. Thorn leans against the altar, just like in canon. I’d forgotten how beautiful he looks, his dark skin gleaming in the evening light.
‘I hear you’ve arrived empty-handed, Violet,’ he says.
He must have received word from Alice. All the fear and tiredness seem to lift, and that anger hardens in my ribcage again. He’s the one who sent her. If it wasn’t for him, the canon would be on track and the rebels would be about to discover Willow peering through the rusted keyhole in the church door. It was a heart-wrenching scene – Willow all roughed up and hauled into the church to face Thorn. The hurt expression on Willow’s face when he saw Rose with the rebels and finally realized her true identity.
My brow sets in a determined line. Because of Thorn, Willow is currently feeling up my bestie. ‘I take it you mean those Gem secrets?’ I say. ‘He chose Alice, by the way.’
He laughs. ‘Ah, so the Gem lookalike won in the end. I thought she might.’
I weave through the desks and stride up to him, pushing myself on to my tiptoes so I can meet the glare of that single, lavender eye. ‘Do you remember your conversation with Baba?’ I whisper so the others can’t hear. ‘This is bigger than just getting those Gem secrets. It had to be me that Willow fell for. You sabotaged me.’
Thorn places two heavy hands on my shoulders, forcing me to take a step away. ‘I see your stay in the manor has made you bold.’
I catch myself. He’s a brutal psycho after all. ‘Sorry . . . I – I just thought Baba explained it all.’
‘She spoke in riddles. She always does.’
‘But she knows things—’
‘I am the rebel leader, not Baba, and when a Gem lookalike fell into my lap, I chose to cover my bases. You failed this mission, not me, and certainly not Alice.’
It sometimes amazes me how quickly I can feel weak again – all the strength draining from my body, my arms dangling by my side, my eyes itching with tears. I look at my boots and clutch my head, trying to think of what to say next. I need to see Baba. I swallow hard and open my mouth, but the sound of the door bursting open silences me.
A group of rebels haul someone into the building, muffling his shouts and steadying his blows. That soft flicker of hope returns ten, twenty, thirty times stronger, beating its wings like it’s going to burst from my chest. I look at Nate and can’t help but smile. In spite of Alice, in spite of everything, I did it. Willow chose me. The canon is back on track.
Thorn looks at me and begins to laugh. ‘I take it back, Violet. You aren’t empty-handed at all.’
The tussle ends and the rebels part. But it isn’t Willow bowed on his knees, a ribbon of blood streaming from his mouth. It’s Ash.