Journey of a Girl

Polite Society: Chapter Four

Dawn came quickly, and Credence was shaken from a troubled sleep by Rose.

"Wake up. They're moving us."

They were ushered outside with the rest of the red stripes, where the other groups were already waiting. There was a strange calm over everyone, as if they all accepted their predicament.

Everyone, that is, save the black stripes.

They were clearly agitated, shifting on their feet and mumbling. The night had not passed easily for them it seemed, and Credence's heart went out to the doomed lot. 

She caught a brief glimpse of Wonda. The girl's shirt had been torn almost clean off, suggesting she'd been in a fight, and one eye was puffed and black and blue. Her expression was blank, like all the fire in her was truly gone.

It was a terrible thing to see.

Feeling eyes on her, Wonda looked up and caught Credence's stare. She gave a tired but proud smile, showing a missing tooth.

Credence quickly averted her gaze.

They re-entered the carts in their respective groups, and Credence was pleasantly surprised to find that before they climbed in to take their seat each person was handed a chunk of bread with considerably less mold and a mug of water.

As before, the black stripes got nothing.

"No use giving them anything," Rose explained. "It would be a waste to feed what's already dead."

Credence couldn't understand such cruelty.

How could people have the capacity to treat each other this way?

No cover was thrown over the cart this time, a mercy Credence was endlessly grateful for. Some of the younger children in her group began to sing short rhymes or play hand games, and a part of Credence longed to join them. Rose chatted with another girl around her age, sometimes trying to engage Credence in the conversation, but Credence could no more will herself to make idle chatter than she could break the iron grating with her teeth.

Two fights broke out in the cart holding the black stripes, and the men who guarded the caravan did nothing to stop them, but cackled and poked through the iron bars with sharpened sticks. Credence spotted the man who had beaten Wonda—the one she'd called her brother—and she winced at the nasty treatment he gave them, taunting and insulting the downtrodden captives, even spitting at them on several occasions.

His sister is in there, Credence thought, on her way to death, and he does nothing.

With family like that, it was no great mystery why Wonda was so mean and rude.

Her thoughts turned to Josiah. He would have fought to free his sister, even to his own end, and she would have done the same for him.

She turned to Rose, a nasty question nagging her.

"Rose, you said the black stripes would be entertainment. Will we have to watch?"

Rose broke from her conversation to give Credence a confused glance.

"Of course we get to watch. They warm up the crowd at the Auction. Some at the beginning and the rest at the end."

Noting the look of disgust on Credence's face, Rose smiled, and her eyes held a gentle pity.

"You can close your eyes if you don't want to see it. And you might want to put your fingers in your ears so you can't hear it, either."

"Have you watched people get killed?" Credence asked, horrified by Rose's nonchalance

"Many times. It's just sport, Credence. Folks need to be entertained."

Credence went silent and turned her attention to the trees. Each one passed closed the distance between her and the place she'd been warned against her whole life. A chill settled into her bones, and it felt like a message from something greater than the tangible world; an intuition of a future drowned in blood.  

She thought she had seen terrible things. She'd survived the woods, after all, with danger at her heels every step of the way.

But Credence had a grim premonition that the monsters of the woods would pale in comparison to what awaited her at the towns.