The Deathless Trilogy

2.10. Engineered

I'm dressed in a short, gold dress, with white gems circling my neckline and over my stitches. Jane said she would be back soon to get me ready for day one of Cooper's brainwashing seminar, my first full day as a Comforter, and I dressed myself so she would only have to worry about my make-up. I haven't learned how to do that on my own yet, but I can handle putting on a dress.

From the long, shut windows in Daniel's room, I watch as black birds fly over the estate wall. It's high—high enough to keep Prowler droids patrolling the yard—but not high enough to keep me from seeing the mountains. The peaks are pointier and rockier than the ones back in Pennsylvania. Daniel told me last night that we're in Wyoming, near what used to be Yellowstone National Park. I'm not supposed to know that, though. He said the other leaders don't trust me with any information.

My eyes focus on a reflection in the glass: Daniel buttoning up a black shirt over his chest. He's still thin, but he's definitely gained some muscle since before he was taken. He comes up behind me until all I can see in the reflection are his eyes on me in the foreground and the mountains beyond him.

"Can I... teach you how to skip stones?" he asks, resting his hands on my hips, and I catch him smile in the reflection.

"Shut up," I laugh.

He smooths his hands over my arms and turns me around to face him. "Are you going to tell me what your nightmares were about?"

"I didn't have a—"

"C'mon, Isla. I can tell you didn't sleep last night. I used to have night terrors too, after we were taken and my parents were killed. You can tell me."

The truth is I was up most of the night in fear of the Prowlers beneath us and the people among us, but Daniel's partially right. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw the same faces flash in my mind. Faces of people we've lost, looking to me for help.

I don't want to talk about it, I don't even want to think about it, so I lie, "I didn't have any nightmares. I was just so excited about my meeting with the girls, I couldn't relax my mind long enough to sleep."

He examines my face, waiting for me to give in and tell him the truth, like he used to when I'd fib to him back home. "Fine," he concedes, "don't tell me. But if you decide you did have nightmares after all, you can tell me. You know that, right?"

I nod.

There's a knock at the door.

"That'll be Jane to get me ready," I say, slipping past him and crossing to the door.

"Good morning, Ms. Blume," Gunther says, as I open the door, two drones buzzing at his side.

My heart lurches in my chest. "Gunther... what are you doing here?"

Jane emerges from behind him and walks past me into the room, her head down.

"Jane is going to put some make-up on you, and then you and I need to take a little trip down to the infirmary."

"Why?"

"Time to take those stitches out."

***

"Don't you think the restraints are a little overkill?" I ask Gunther, who is leaning against the door frame of the exam room.

I'm lying back on an exam chair beneath the most painfully bright light I've ever seen. The doctor, Dr. Wilkes, is tightening a belt around my legs after he has already fastened one around my torso.

"All this for stitches?" I ask.

"Nope," Gunther says, pushing himself off the wall. "Dr. Wilkes will also be taking some blood while we're here."