Deprived

Chapter 20

Maize held one hand on her chest as she coughed, trying desperately to catch her breath.

After a few deep breaths, she began to settle down and breathe normally again, though her heart still raced in her chest.

Someone grabbed her arm and stripped the comm device off her wrist. She turned to see who it was.

A tall shadowy figure peered down at her.

She screamed out loud and immediately regretted it because she knew she had just given up her position to the agents already in the orchard.

She tried to twist her hand out of his grip, but it only grew tighter. Before Maize knew it, her body was jerked up into the air and draped over his sturdy shoulder. They were on the move and fast.

With her head hanging down, all the pressure in her body seemed to gather in her already throbbing head. She closed her eyes to relieve the dizziness creeping up on her.

Behind them, agents were shouting. A myriad of boots stomping on soggy earth headed in their direction. They were trapped. The walls of the capital were too high to scale and ran for miles and miles around the city.

The man's stride remained stable and strong on the soggy grass and mud.

She wanted to get a good look at his face. Maybe she had seen him before, somewhere. And maybe if she had seen him, it would put some perspective on what was going on and who he was. She brushed her face against his wet coat as she turned her head and peered upwards to get a good look at his face. But all she saw was the back and sides of his wide-brim hat. He wasn't wearing the mandatory light gray suit they all had to wear in the city. Which meant that he wasn't a citizen of Wisteria. A rebel maybe, come to rescue her?

Her throbbing head, the stranger carrying her away, the agents chasing them, the sour taste of vomit draining in her throat, her worries about her family and William—all these things crashed down her, threatening to overwhelm her. She thought she might be hallucinating. Was her body still lying under the apple tree next to Henry's lifeless body? Was this man the spirit of death carrying her off into the land of Creet where she would climb the mountain Tal to meet her dead loved ones? Everything in her world seemed a jumbled mess.

No matter how fast he went, he held her firm over his shoulder as he ran, her head and feet bouncing in opposite directions like a cloth doll.

They left the cover of the rain clouds, and Maize could see the stars blinking at her as if to say, "We see you, we're here for you."

They were now out of the orchards and passing through a grassy path. A little while after, they were surrounded by thick, towering trees.

How the capital managed to grow such tall, lush trees in the desert fascinated her. If only Wisterian's hearts were as beautiful as this place, life would be better for everyone. But their hearts weren't made of flesh. At least President Aberdeen's wasn't. They were using the villagers to prolong their lives. Harvesting organs from the poor to give to the rich. Chopping the limbs off kids and teenagers as if they were reshaping dead twigs. All for their own experiments to keep the rich alive.

In the room where the naked bodies hung on metal hooks, Maize had recognized one of the bodies hanging, it was one of the girls missing from her village. Maize had fought back the horror and the tears in order to keep up the facade in front of Jack, the façade that what she was seeing didn't faze her. Her reason for acting cool about what she was seeing was to keep him talking. If she seemed enthralled by the horror, he would think she was one of them and keep on talking. Give her more information she could pass on to Henry.