Burn (Pure #3)(119)

PRESSIA





SACRED




Pressia and Lyda are running along the streets of the Dome toward the war room. Their spears are tucked into their belts. Pressia took one that was small and sharp, just six inches long and easier to hide. Lyda is wearing her armor. Everyone is so panic-stricken, so dazed and angry and hopeful and lost, that they don’t even notice. A shop window has been shattered, and people are on the street, fighting over flashlights and batteries. Another group has blocked an official Dome truck and is looting gas masks, blankets, bottled water. Pressia remembers the stories her grandfather told her about what happened just after the Detonations—fights in mini-marts and sprawling superstores. The posters announcing Iralene and Partridge’s engagement, plastered in storefront windows, have been defaced, their faces x-ed out, DIE written in thick ink above their heads, along with nooses and skulls.

“He’s the goat,” Lyda says. “Partridge is the goat!”

“What do you mean?”

“The scapegoat. They’re going to blame him for everything!”

Pressia’s scared. These people want blood. She knows that look in their eyes. She remembers it from the survivors who took to the streets during the Death Sprees. People can only suffer for so long before someone must pay.

She and Lyda cross the street to avoid the Pures, who are brawling in their overcoats and pantsuits and sliding around in their thin-soled loafers.

They head into a cloud of smoke. It’s billowing up from a crowd in front of a church up ahead, roiling and roiling with nowhere to go.

“It’s starting to smell like home,” Lyda says. “Not just the smoke but the desperation.”

They cover their mouths and noses with their sleeves and press on.

As they pass the church, Pressia sees that the crowd is burning an effigy—a stuffed suit with a crackling face. “Partridge! Partridge! Partridge!” they shout. Pressia can barely breathe. She’s lost faith in her brother, but burning him in effigy?

She looks at Lyda, who’s stricken. Pressia shoves her away from the crowd. “Just keep your head down,” Pressia says. “Keep going.”

Lyda stumbles a little, but they press on.

When they turn the final corner, Pressia slams into a guard. He grabs her by the arm. “Where the hell are you going?”

A woman is standing nearby. She sees the doll head before the guard does, and she screams.

“They’re here already!” she screams. “Wretch!” the woman screams louder. “Wretch!”

The guard sees the doll head and falls backward, clawing for the rifle on his back. “Stop!” he shouts through the thickening smoke. “Stop now!”

But they keep sprinting as fast as they can. Pures around them are running and shouting. A gunshot goes off. Was it from the guard shouting at them through the smoke? Someone else?

Lyda pulls Pressia into a building, and they run across a broad, airy lobby with mirrored walls and beautiful gold trim. Another guard shouts, “This way!” They run to a sole elevator and step inside.

The guard hits a button. “He’s been waiting for you.”

“Which one of us?” Lyda asks.

The guard shrugs as if he doesn’t even really know who they are, and now Pressia can tell that he’s young—younger than she is. “Do you think I should stay?” he asks quietly. “I’m worried about my sisters. Should I leave? It’s getting bad, isn’t it?”

“Are you related to the Flynn girls?” Lyda says. “Did you go to the boys’ academy?”

“Aria and Suzette,” he says. “My parents are gone. They didn’t make it much past”—he lowers his voice—“the speech. They did it in a good way—really well planned. No blood, and they arranged it so the maid would find them, not us. They were good parents.” The boy shivers.

“Of course they were good parents,” Pressia says. “I’m sure they loved you very much. They’d be proud of you now, thinking of your sisters.” She knows what she always wanted to hear from her mother and father—I love you. I’m proud of you. She’s hung on to the idea of them watching over her for so long… She can’t imagine if they’d killed themselves.

Lyda reaches out and grabs the boy’s sleeve. “You should go. Now’s the time for people to talk about love. There might not be much time left.”

Pressia thinks of Bradwell. She can’t help it. Love. There it is. She’ll always love him. Will they have more time together?

The elevator rocks to a stop. Pressia will never get used to elevators. The doors open, and Lyda and Pressia step out.

“This way!” another guard calls to them down the hall.

“I’m sorry about your parents,” Pressia says, turning to the boy in the elevator.

His eyes tear up. “No one ever says anything like that here. No one talks about them anymore. It’s like they disappeared.”

“They aren’t gone,” Pressia says.

The guard lowers his head, and the doors glide shut. Pressia knows she’ll probably never see him again. This is how everything feels now—a first time and a last, all in one.

Lyda runs down the hall. Pressia follows after her. As they pass a series of doors, Lyda ducks into a hall and presses her back against the wall.