Masks (17 page)

Hyram shrugged again. “In my whole life, the only boats I’ve ever seen out there are ours,” he said. “Stony Beach is the nearest village and their fishermen don’t come this far north. There are dangerous rocks and shallows along the coast south of us.”

“That doesn’t mean one won’t show up tomorrow,” Mara said.

“We have plans for such an eventuality,” Hyram said. “But I doubt they’ll ever be needed.” He clapped his hands. “Now. You’ve seen everything except the source of our gold. This way.”

He led her north along the beach. It narrowed rapidly, and Mara looked uneasily at the waves rolling in to her left. “Does the water ever come this high?” she ventured, as an extra-large breaker spent itself at her feet.

“In storms,” Hyram said. “But remember, it’s high tide now. The water will be receding for the rest of the day. Don’t worry, you’re not going to be swept away.” He grinned. “Well, not by the water.”

Mara felt herself blushing again.
Stop that! It doesn’t mean anything. He’s just being a boy.
But she stayed silent for the rest of the walk, which ended in—why was she not surprised?—yet another cave.

Stepping from sunlight into darkness, at first she couldn’t see anything; but her eyes quickly adjusted—and then widened. White rock veined the cavern’s walls, and within that rock glistened . . .

“Is that really gold?” she breathed.

Hyram nodded, as proud as if he’d put it there himself. “It really is. Before we found it, when my father was a boy, things were a
lot
grimmer in the Secret City. Nothing could be bought; very little could be stolen without risk; the unMasked Army had to live entirely on what it could grow, hunt, or fish. Which we still mostly do, but things are easier now that we can at least occasionally purchase tools and things we can’t make, like wine.”

Or the fine furniture in Catilla’s room
, Mara thought, but didn’t say. “And the Autarch knows
nothing
of this?” She didn’t try to keep the skepticism out of her voice.

“Rumors of black market dealings in the remote villages may have reached his elevated ears,” Hyram said, “but I doubt it. The Autarch does not, by all accounts, personally concern himself much with anything that happens outside the walls of Tamita. He leaves that to his Watchers, and out here, his Watchers are mostly fat and lazy. We can’t prove it, but we think they’re mostly unGifted: they can’t read Masks, all they care about is that they haven’t cracked. So they let little things slide.” He snorted. “The Autarch has become
too
dependent on the Masks, my father says. The Autarch and his Circle think that because the Masks will reveal to the Watchers anyone who might act against them, they’ve got nothing to worry about.”

“No,” Mara said; because, suddenly, she thought she understood. “They don’t think that at all. And that’s why the Masks have changed.”

Hyram turned from running a finger along one of the seams of gold. “What?”

“The Masks are changing people . . . changing the way they think. They didn’t used to. So that means the Autarch is worried. Maybe he’s been listening to the rumors about the unMasked Army. Maybe he’s beginning to think you’re real. Maybe he’s just old and scared he’s going to end up like his father. So he’s changed the Masks to
force
everyone to be loyal. Even though it means more Maskings are failing.”
And Father knew it
, she thought.
He must have. He’s been making these new kinds of Masks. He wouldn’t have any choice but to comply. The one he made for Sala . . .

...and the one he made for me.

And suddenly, belatedly, she thought she understood why her father had seemed so strangely distant during the days leading up to her Masking. He’d known the Mask he was making would change his daughter forever, take away her freedom of thought, make her no more than a compliant cog in the machinery of the Autarch’s state . . .

...
and so he deliberately made a Mask that would fail! He thought I’d be better off unMasked than forced into the mold the Autarch wanted.

Better off suffering whatever horrible fate awaited me at the labor camp?
she thought angrily.
Better off in the hands of that fat spider drawing naked girls in the warehouse by the walls? By making your Mask fail, he put you in that wagon with Grute, heading to a whole
camp
full of Grutes! He didn’t know you would be rescued.

Or did he?

“Are you all right?” Hyram asked, and she realized she’d been staring blankly off into space, for several seconds.

“Yes,” Mara said automatically. Then, “No.” Then, “I don’t know.” She shook her head. “It’s just . . . can we go back now? I’ve seen enough.”

Hyram nodded. They walked back to the Secret City in silence. Once they were in the Broad Way, Mara said, “Thank you for the tour. I think I’d like to be alone for a while.”

“Of course,” Hyram said. “I—”

Tishka suddenly dashed in from outside, flushed and out of breath. “Hyram, you were walking along the beach. Did you see Grute?”

“Grute?” Hyram looked confused. “That sack of horse shit my father dragged back? Of course not. He’s locked up.”

Tishka shook her head. “He
was
locked up,” she panted. “He’s escaped.”

“How?”

“Pulled the door right off its hinges. Wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it.”

“Nobody was guarding him?” Mara demanded.

“He was locked up,” Tishka repeated. “We didn’t think we needed to guard him, too.” But she looked a little shamefaced. “We don’t usually have prisoners here. In fact we’ve
never
had a prisoner here. He was just locked up in one of the small storerooms. And bags of meal don’t try to escape.”

Mara looked around uneasily. “He could be anywhere.”

“He’s not in the Secret City,” Tishka reassured her. “We’ve searched every room and hallway, all the way down to the lake. He’s out there, somewhere.” She waved toward the tunnel entrance.

“But he knows where the Secret City is!” Hyram exclaimed. “If he tells the Watchers—”

“You think nobody else has thought of that?” Tishka snapped. “Jarl has the garrison out looking for him, but with so many out on patrol or off to Stony Beach we need everyone we can get. So—”

“Of course,” said Hyram. He gave Mara a quick, worried smile. “Duty calls.” Then he rushed off with Tishka, back out into daylight.

Mara stared after them. Grute on the loose
again
, she thought. You had to hand it to him. He might be a “sack of horse shit”—
she
wasn’t about to argue with that description—but he was certainly resourceful.

But the risk to the Secret City if he got away . . . She shuddered. The village Watchers might be fat and lazy, but the ones in Tamita most assuredly weren’t,
especially
the Autarch’s elite Sun Guards.
They
were said to have magic capable of wiping an entire village off the map. The unMasked Army would stand small chance against
them
. If Grute revealed the Secret City’s existence, and even its approximate location, they’d have no choice but to run.

Run where?
Mara wondered, and had no answer.

She climbed up to the girls’ room. It was empty; she still didn’t know where the others were.
Probably doing chores somewhere
, she thought; she didn’t get the feeling anyone was allowed to sit around feeling sorry for themselves in the Secret City.

Except, apparently, her.

She had been longing for one thing since they’d arrived, one thing that had always made her feel better, one thing, she hoped, that might also help her think more clearly.

She was going to take a bath.

She grabbed the towel that had appeared with her clean clothes that morning, and descended to the Broad Way.

For a moment she hesitated, looking up and down its length, a little uneasy at being alone when Grute was at large. Tishka had said they’d searched the entire City, right down to the lake where she was headed, but still . . .

Maybe I should wait
, she thought, but then she caught a whiff of herself, wrinkled her nose, and decided she really couldn’t, not and live with herself.
What must Hyram have thought?
she wondered, and blushed again.

That settled it. Grute or no Grute, she had to have a bath.

She headed down the tunnel.

Kidnapped

S
HE MET NO ONE
along the way, and that suited her fine. She really,
really
wanted the bath for its own sake—she was tired of her own scent following her around like a stinky stray puppy—but she also wanted it for a chance to be alone with herself and her thoughts.

The lanterns still glowed on their poles near the entrance to the vast water-filled chamber. More lamps burned to left and right along the shore. Mara listened carefully. Even though she had seen that the men’s and women’s bathing areas were separated and completely out of sight from one another, the thought of bathing when there were naked men splashing around within earshot, even if she couldn’t see them, made her uneasy. She peered into the darkness at the far side of the lake. Nothing disturbed the water: it could have been a single, enormous sheet of glass.

Finally feeling certain she was quite alone, she went around the corner to the girls’ bathing area, put her towel and soap down on the rock, slipped out of her boots and clothes, picked up her soap again, and waded into the surprisingly warm water.

She sighed as the liquid wrapped itself around her limbs. She scrubbed herself thoroughly with the crude soap until her skin tingled, then plunged her head under the water and worked more of the soap into a lather in her hair, running her fingers through it over and over again until all the tangles were gone. Finally she ducked her head once more and scrubbed her scalp again to rinse the soap away.

Clean at last, she tossed the soap onto the rocky shore, put her head back, and let her feet come off the stony floor. With her ears underwater, all she could hear was the low rumble of her own blood coursing through her veins. She closed her eyes.

Floating free, only her own body and thoughts for company, she felt completely disconnected from the world. Still, she’d felt that way now for several days, ever since the horror of the Masking. That moment of blood and terror had removed her from her old life as abruptly—and painfully—as a blade amputating a limb. Her parents, the center of her short life, had been ripped away and were now separated from her by an impassable gulf. More than just her face had been crushed and mutilated by the horrible twisting of the failed Mask. So had her plans, her hopes, her dreams—everything that had defined who and what she was. She’d gotten her face back, thanks to Ethelda, but she would
never
get her old life back.

So I guess I’ll have to make do with this new life
, she thought, floating in the underground lake with her eyes closed.
And my new family. Keltan. Simona and Kirika. Alita and Prella and Hyram. Edrik and, I guess, Catilla. There’s no going back.

And if there’s no going back, then there should be no
looking
back. It doesn’t do me any good to pine for Daddy and Mommy and Stoofy and everything else the Masking stole from me. I can’t get them back. Ever. The Autarch has seen to that.

If the unMasked Army hadn’t grabbed me on Catilla’s orders, who knows what would be happening to me, or about to happen to me, in the labor camp? So why am I resisting what she wants from me? It’s stupid. I should do everything I can to help the unMasked Army try to get rid of the Autarch, even if it seems impossible. Because they’re all I have now. If they fail—if the Autarch finds and destroys them—then he will destroy me, too. And there will be no one to rescue me a second time.

She took a deep breath.
So be it. I’ll—

Someone grabbed her ankle.

She jackknifed, went under, gulped water, then surged to the surface, spluttering. Her sudden movement had pulled her ankle free, but as she straightened someone seized her arm and twisted it behind her. A thick arm crushed her breasts and pinned her tight against a hard, muscular body. “Guess who?” said a voice in her ear, and she stiffened in terror.

Grute!

“What are you doing here?” she demanded. It was a stupid question, but she couldn’t believe that she was literally in his grasp.
Naked and in his grasp,
a part of her mind reminded her, but modesty seemed the least of her concerns. “They searched the Secret City! They said you’d fled outside—”

“Left some clues so they’d think that,” Grute said. “And spent the night making this.” He released the arm behind her back, but kept her pressed so tightly against him she still couldn’t move. She could feel him fumbling in his pocket; then he held in front of her eyes a glistening cylinder: a candle, she realized, carefully hollowed out to make a tube. “Broke the door, dropped some bits of it along the Broad Way in the direction of the entrance, then turned around and came this way; popped myself under the water and breathed through this until they went away.” He tossed the tube aside; it hit the water with a splash. “Deep in the heart of the ‘Secret City.’” He snorted. “Won’t be much of a secret once I get to the labor camp. Won’t be much of a city, either, not long after that!”

“You’re crazy if you think you can get out of here without being seen,” Mara said.

“Oh, I can get out of here,” he said. “Count on it. And
you’re
coming with me.”

“I’m not—”

Grute barked a laugh. “You are. Didn’t plan on it before, but since you plopped right into my hands . . .” He propelled her toward the shore, never letting go. Once they’d waded up onto the rocks, he shoved her toward her clothes so hard she splashed onto her hands and knees in the shallows. She glared back at him. He wore the green and brown clothes the unMasked Army had provided, sodden and dripping. “Get dressed,” he said.

“I’m surprised you wouldn’t rather keep me naked,” Mara said defiantly, but she scrambled to her feet and snatched up her clothes just the same, holding them in front of her.

“Too cold in the woods,” Grute said. “I want you healthy when we get where we’re going.” He snorted. “Besides, it’s not like you’ve got a lot to look at.”

Mara blushed at that, then was furious at herself for blushing, especially when there wasn’t the slightest possibility of hiding it. She dressed slowly, hoping someone else would enter, but Grute stepped forward and yanked her hair so hard she gasped. “Stop dawdling,” he growled.

Defeated, she pulled on her boots and turned to face him. “You can’t get out of here without going down the Broad Way,” she said. “Someone
will
see you. And this time they’ll hang you.”

Grute laughed. “Do I look like an idiot? I wouldn’t have come down here if I hadn’t known I could get out.” His grin faded. “And it’s time we were getting.” He strode forward, seized her arm, and half-dragged her along the shore. They passed the opening into the Broad Way. Mara looked down it, hoping someone else might be coming for a bath or fresh water, but the passage was empty as far as she could see.

“Don’t even think about screaming,” Grute breathed in her ear. “No one will hear you, and then I’ll kill you.”

He’s only a boy
, she told herself.
He’s the same age as me.

She believed his threat all the same.

He dragged her past the men’s bathing area, and kept going, splashing into the lake and wading through its shallows. She heard a rushing noise; and then, in the flickering shadows ahead, saw a dark opening, water from the lake pouring into it. “You’re insane!” she whispered. “You can’t mean—”

“Yes, I can,” Grute said.

“In the dark? You don’t even know where it comes out—”

“Yes, I do,” Grute said. “It pours out into the ocean a half mile from here, out of sight from the cove.”

Mara blinked. “How?”

“I asked.” Even in the near-darkness, she could see his smirk. “No harm telling the prisoner something like
that
.”

Mara said nothing. Her mouth had gone dry; her heart raced. “I’ll drown,” she whispered. “I can’t swim.”

“You can float,” Grute said. “I saw you.”

“I can’t float down
that
.”

“So hang on to this.” Grute bent over; when he straightened he was holding a log, cut and trimmed for the hearth. “Brought a couple with me when I ran,” he said. “Lucky for you I thought I should have a spare.”

“But . . . rocks . . . waterfalls . . .”

“That’s enough!” Grute spat. “Shut up, take it, and jump in. Or I’ll throw you in without it.”

Trembling, Mara took the log. She hugged it to her breast as tightly as she used to hold Stoofy, wishing with all her might that it
was
Stoofy, that she was safely asleep in her own bed, that everything that had happened and was about to happen was just a bad dream. She stared down at the water rushing past her feet into darkness.

And then Grute’s hands slammed into her back and she toppled like a felled tree.

She hit face first, almost lost the log, pulled it close instead, spluttered to the surface, and screamed as she hurtled through absolute darkness in the grip of the powerful current. She screamed again and again, over and over, as she spun this way and that.

A rock slammed into her leg, numbing it. Spray filled the air with so much water she choked as she breathed . . .

...and then the current strengthened and pulled her under.

Immersed in cold water, unable to see, unable to breathe, all she could do was hold on to the log while the pressure mounted in her lungs, the urge to breathe grew more and more unbearable, and the moment raced nearer when she would have to open her mouth, suck in water, and die, drowning in darkness and silence deep beneath the Secret City, her body doomed to float out to sea, a feast for fish and gulls . . .

But just when she knew that fatal moment was upon her, as her vision filled with stars and the pain in her chest could no longer be denied, she burst out into the open air and gulped a huge, wonderful, surprised breath before she hit the water once more and spun away into still-unrelieved blackness, clutching the log in a death grip.

She sensed a larger space around her. The current had eased. She could float on the surface now, taking deep breaths, and she thought she’d never felt anything half as wonderful as the unimpeded rush of air into and out of her lungs, breath after breath. But then she realized there was something almost as wonderful as breathing, and that was seeing: the darkness was no longer absolute. Shadowy rock walls slipped past, growing brighter and brighter . . . and then nearer and nearer as the passage narrowed.

The stream took her around a sweeping corner and suddenly she was blinking in full daylight, pouring through an opening in the rock, so bright she could see nothing beyond it. But that hardly mattered, because the stream hurled her at that opening as though anxious to be rid of her, and a moment later she spun out through the open air in a welter of spray and the sound of thunder, fell twenty feet, and hit so hard the impact finally broke her grip on the log that had borne her so far. She tasted salt as she struggled to the surface. She gulped air, flailed, sank . . . and then felt strong hands grab her.

Fighting the urge to kick those hands away, she let Grute pull her back to the surface, then swim both of them into water shallow enough to stand up in. Then she pushed him away with revulsion and staggered up onto the beach, turning and sinking down into the sand to sit, shaking, staring out at the endless lines of breakers rolling toward her across the blue expanse of ocean. She glanced up at the waterfall that spouted from the cliff and plunged into the sea; looked down and saw the sharp rock-teeth she must have just missed; then looked up at Grute, standing over her, hands on his hips, grinning his infuriating, leering grin.

“Still alive, are you? I figured it was even money you’d panic and pop out of the cave as a waterlogged corpse.”

“We could have both been killed!” Mara snarled. “Don’t you
care
?”

Grute shrugged. “Why should I? I’d
rather
be dead than a prisoner of that bunch,” he jerked his head back toward the waterfall, “and I don’t care about
you
at all except for what you’ll be good for once I get you to the camp.” His grin widened. “Not everyone’s going to care you’re almost as flat as a pressed fish. They’re just going to care you ain’t got scars on your pretty face.”

“You’re going to sell me.” Mara’s stomach churned and she thought she might throw up. “Like a . . . a piece of meat!”

“You got it,” Grute said. “And it’s time I got you to market.” He spat on the beach. “The unMasked Army is a joke, but that don’t mean they’re all brainless.” He lifted his shirt, and Mara saw he’d wrapped a length of rope around his belly; he undid it, then, holding it loosely in both hands, stepped toward her. “Up!”

Mara got to her feet.

“Turn around.” She glared at him. “
Turn around
,” he snarled, and this time he grabbed her arm, spun her hard, and yanked her back toward him. His arms went around her waist. She felt a tug and a sense of pressure as he tied the rope around her. He stepped back, and she glanced over her shoulder to see that he now had her on a leash.

She raised her eyes to give him a glare she hoped was defiant, but he just smirked. “You won’t be running away now,” he said. “Let’s move.” He flicked the leash as though it were the reins of a horse. She gave him another glare, but really had no choice but to turn and start struggling south through the sand.