Dread Nation (Dread Nation #1)(43)
“I’m going to kill her,” I say, my voice low. I use the fine material of my skirt to scrub my face of the snot and tears, the chains around my wrists digging into the soft skin. I take a deep, shuddering breath. “I’m going to kill her, and Miss Preston and the mayor. All of them. I’m going to gut them like fish and use them as shambler bait, then I’m going to burn both the school and the mayor’s house to the ground and dance upon the ashes.”
“That’s good, Jane, that’s good. It’s good to have goals,” Katherine says, her voice trembling. She hiccups and begins to cry. I should offer her some soothing words, but I am a knot of rage and violence, and I ain’t got anything like her platitudes.
Outside, the train whistle blows, and I settle in for the long haul, planning my bloody revenge. On one side of me Katherine cries quiet tears and on the other Jackson says nothing, the sound of his heavy breaths the only indication that he is even there.
Life at Rose Hill is much the same as when you were here, although I must admit that we all sorely miss your sunny disposition. . . .
Chapter 17
In Which I Am Welcomed to Summerland
The next few days are a lesson in slow torture. The train car is an oven, and the vibration of the wheels rattles our bones until I’m positive we will arrive out west little more than a bowl of jelly. Every so often the train jerks to a stop, throwing us violently to the side, the door opening up to reveal Mr. Redfern. He gives us water and hard bread before taking us out to relieve ourselves along the track. We have no weapons, so it’s nerve-racking to squat amongst the tall weeds and do our business. The movement and the fresh air are a brief respite before we are loaded back onto the train and we begin our journey once more.
I lose all track of time, although I do eventually pick up the packet of letters. It’s too dark in the gloom to read them, but there’s no mistaking my name scrawled across the front in my mother’s handwriting. I hide them in my skirt pocket next to Tom Sawyer. I ain’t sure when the last letter arrived, but just looking at them is enough to ignite my rage all over again.
One day I will return to Baltimore, and when I do, there will be hell to pay.
We don’t talk much on the trip. I suppose we’re all stuck in our own dark thoughts. At night, when the train car cools enough for us to sleep a little, I hear Katherine crying softly, trying to hide the sound of her tears by burying her face in her knees. I feel bad for her. She really did get the worst kind of deal. Here she is, following the rules for years, working toward nothing more than being some lady’s Attendant, and the powers that be decide she’s too pretty for such drudgery and ship her out west. It’s the worst kind of betrayal.
The third night that I wake to her crying, my guilt gets the better of me. “I’m sorry you got caught up in this. I’m sorry you won’t be an Attendant,” I say. Katherine laughs in the dark, the sound flat.
“Oh, Jane, I never much cared about being an Attendant. All I ever wanted was to be free.”
Her words give me too much to think about.
“Why do you think the Survivalists lied about Baltimore being safe?” she continues.
“Power,” Jackson says, bitterness lacing his voice. “It’s the only thing that men like them want.”
“People wanted to believe them,” I mutter, thinking about poor Othello from the lecture and his willingness to die for Professor Ghering’s delusions. “They wanted everything to go back to the way it was before the war. Before the killing, the shamblers, the walls, all of it. That’s how men like the mayor maintained control. You believe strongly enough in an idea, nothing else much matters.”
“If everything the Survivalists have been saying is a lie, then no one is safe,” Katherine says.
“We never were,” I say. The memory of Miss Preston’s betrayal stings anew.
There ain’t much to say after that.
After what seems like months, but in reality is only about five days, the train stops once again. This time when the door opens wide, and my eyes finally adjust to the too-bright light, there are three rough-looking fellows holding shotguns.
“Welcome to the great state of Kansas. Wonder how long you’ll survive,” one says, his voice high and squeaky. He gives us a gap-toothed grin.
It’s all I can do not to roll my eyes. After nearly a week of being cooked alive and shaken out of my skin I’m irritable and in no mood to deal with a bunch of toothless bullies. I hold my chained hands up. “One of you gonna unlock these, or are you just going to stand there wasting daylight?”
Squeaky takes a step back, his grin fading to a look of surprise. I reckon most folks show up scared as a mouse in a trap after such a brutal trip, but Miss Anderson’s revelation and the long, slow ride to mull it over has just given me a mean feeling. Right now, I don’t care about much else but the two tasks before me.
First, find my momma. My mother is alive and probably thinks I am dead. I have to find her and tell her the truth. That means I have to find a way back to Rose Hill, and quick-like.
But I have to bring Katherine and Jackson along as well. I can’t leave them stranded on the prairie. Plus, I’m going to need their help to survive the trip.
Before I can do any of that, though, I have to survive. By any means necessary. And from the stories I’ve read of the Western frontier, that ain’t going to be easy.