I don't realise how much my friends have been discussing the Trials until I finally rejoin them, both physically and mentally. Considering that I've been pushing them away for days, I expect them to cold-shoulder me, but Taffy gives me a nod and a smile, and I realise that she must have told the others that I'm struggling with something private.
Guilt is a quick bolt to my heart.
Maybe I can't tell my friends everything that's going on, but that doesn't excuse cutting them out, either. It doesn't excuse dismissing them. I can't dip in and out of their lives when it's convenient for me, and that's what I have been doing lately. That can't happen again.
At dinnertime, Priya is noticeably off her food, pushing a piece of chicken around her plate with her fork.
Sonny watches her with big, worried eyes.
"What if I don't pass?" she says at last, looking up at us.
My first instinct is to assure her that she will, same as I do whenever Taffy worries, but . . . Priya's fears are justified.
We still have no idea what the Trials entail, but they're at least partly physical or we wouldn't have trained for years for them. Our health wouldn't be carefully monitored.
Priya is already at a disadvantage, having joined the CC so much later than everyone else, but more than that, she simply isn't built for this. She's as small and delicate as a baby bird, not yet growing into her feathers. How can she be expected to compete against people who are so much bigger and stronger than her, people who have trained for this so much longer?
"What if you all pass and I don't, and then we get separated and we never see each other again?" Priya says, blinking back tears.
"That's not going to happen," says Sonny at once.
Priya sinks her teeth into her lip. "But it is."
Pointing out that there's no guarantee any of us will pass is not the comfort she needs. I itch to tell her that, no matter what happens, the Trials will not be the end of us. I want to tell her that she's right – we shouldn't have to take tests to prove our value as human beings. I want to tell her that even if we can't stop the Trials, Rosie will still disable our Trackers and get us out of here.
But I have to keep my mouth shut, however difficult it is. I can't tell them what's going on, and I can't draw attention to myself from anyone else who might be listening.
Priya's eyes shine with tears and she gulps down a sob. "Sorry," she mumbles, wiping her eyes. "I'm just . . . I'm scared."
I think of the wooden bird I smuggled up to my bedroom. I'm not the only one who wants to fly away from here. I'm not the only one desperately trying to find her way out of a cage.
But, unlike Priya, I know that there is hope. I hold it close to my heart every day, bright and shining. I have to share some of that light with her.
I cover her small hand with mine. "No matter what happens, even if it we are all separated, we will find a way back to you," I tell her.
I don't care what it takes; I will not leave her alone in the wide open sky.
Priya sniffles a bit, but she's smiling too as she looks up at me, and I really hope that I've lit up some of her darkness.
I'm suddenly very aware of someone watching me, and I look up to see Cole, staring at us from further down the table. I'm not sure if she's close enough to have overheard anything, but it's pretty clear that Priya's upset.
I tense, waiting for Cole to sneer or insult us, but she doesn't say anything. She's not even looking at Priya; her eyes are fixed on me, and I have no idea how to interpret her expression
When dinner is over and everyone starts to clear out of the mess hall, she surprises me by grabbing my hand.
She pitches her voice low so that only I can hear it. "You shouldn't give them false hope. You shouldn't comfort them."
I try to pull away, but she's stronger than I realise; she holds me firm, her fingers grinding my bones together.
"Go away, Cole," I say, trying to sound bored, but my heart is racing.
Cole knows something.
She has information that I need.
If she's trying to tell me something, I should probably listen.
"I am trying to help you," Cole whisper-snaps, glancing around.
Instinctively I look too – for Fletcher. He's the real threat, not Cole.
But I don't see him.
By now my friends have realised something is wrong, and they're coming back to defend me, Taffy in the lead. I hold up a hand to stop them.
"What do you mean?" I ask.
Indecision flashes across Cole's face, and for a hopeful moment I think she's actually going to tell me something useful. Then she glances at my friends. Her expression shuts down and she lets go of my hand.
"Forget it," she says.
I lean close, getting into her personal space. "Cole, what do you mean?"
I wish I could tell her that I know something, that she can trust me to fill in the blanks, that maybe we can help each other, but then I remember the quiet threat in Fletcher's voice when he caught her snooping in Records. He has a greater hold on her than I ever could. She will be loyal to him, which means I can never trust her.
So when she walks away, I don't try and stop her.
But I can't stop thinking about what she said.
Why would Cole want to help me?
Cole and I have never liked each other, even before her attitude took a really nasty turn these last few months, so why the sudden concern?
Why shouldn't I comfort my friends?
That, more than anything else, makes me uneasy.
"Maybe I should tell her that I know she knows something," I say to Roan the next day, as I lie on the grass with my head in his lap, looking up into the beautiful blue sky of his eyes.
"It's too risky," he says at once.
I've thought the same thing ever since finding out about her and Fletcher, and for good reason. I still do think that, but I haven't been able to shake Cole's words from my mind. As a result, I didn't sleep much last night, and maybe my common sense is starting to fray.
"It's just so frustrating," I say, pressing a fist to my forehead. "She's right there with information we need, and we can't get it out of her."
"We don't need her or her info. We have Rosie," Roan reminds me.
"How's she getting on?" I ask.
"You can ask her yourself if you like." He fishes his phone out of his pocket.
I know that these things are commonplace on the outside – everyone has one – unlike the devices that Rosie is building, but they are still so alien to me. My only experience with them comes from the times that Roan used his to show me pictures of the world.
Roan taps the glass screen, and a little picture of Rosie pops up. A faint ringing noise comes from the phone.
Once, watching something like this would have made me feel stupid – not knowing something that is so normal and basic on the outside. Now I'm just eager to learn.
The ringing stops and the little picture of Rosie on the screen is replaced by the real Rosie, waving at us. She looks tired; her eyes are smudged with dark makeup, and her hair is escaping the messy knot on top of her head.
It looks like she's in a small room with metal shelves on the wall behind her, and she's surrounded by . . . I don't even know what. I see wires and bits of metal and plastic, and things with little lights, and tools of all shapes and sizes that I can't begin to identify.
"Hi guys," she says.
I wave at her.
"Caia wants to know how you're getting on," says Roan.
Rosie brightens, her tired eyes coming more alive. "I have been a very busy little bee. I still haven't worked out a way of killing your tracker yet, but I've made a couple of breakthroughs with the bugs to plant on the cameras. We're not fully there yet, there are some alterations to do, some tests to run, but we're close. I'll get it done on time, don't worry about that."
"Show her what else you've been working on," says Roan, grinning proudly at his best friend.
Rosie reaches for something off-screen, then brings it into view. It's a small metal canister with a button on the front, and I've never seen anything like it.
"Okay, so this is a little baby I like to call the Rosie Camera-Killer," she says.
"You need better names for your toys," Roan tells her.
"My names are awesome, and these are not toys," says Rosie with dignity.
She focuses on me. "Okay, so the CC is full of cameras, recording everything that everyone does, right? And that's why you can't plant my little babies on any of the cameras."
I nod.
Rosie taps a bright green fingernail next to the button. "That's where the Rosie Camera-Killer comes into play. When I press this button, the whole of the CC will be hit with a pulse that will short-out every single camera and electronic lock. Think of it like an EMP, but specific to certain kinds of tech."
She does a little bobbing motion on the spot. "Oooh, I should call it an RP – a Rosie Pulse? That's good, right?"
"That's terrible," Roan tells her.
She makes a pfft noise and turns back to me. "Now, the effects of an RP are only temporary, so you will have to work quickly. It won't work on the trackers – they're a whole different kind of tech – but they will shut down everything else, so you'll be able to get around."
"EMP? Pulse?" I repeat. "I don't understand."
Rosie waves a hand. "Don't worry about the technical side of stuff. Just trust me, okay? I will make sure the cameras are all down and the locks on the front door are disabled."
"You said I would need a distraction," I remind her. "Do you have any special Rosie inventions for that?"
"Actually I thought we could go down the old-fashioned route," Rosie says. "You have fire alarms in that place, right?"
"Yes."
"Great. As soon as the cameras go off, I need you to set off the fire alarm. If everyone leaves the CC, you will have free run of the place. You can access the cameras without anyone seeing."
"That does still sound a bit risky," Roan objects.
"It is," Rosie cheerfully agrees. "The whole thing is a risk, but we have to accept that. We only have a few days left until the Trials, and then we only get one shot at this. Screw it up, and we'll have to wait till they come around again, which could be two years away. We have to risk it."
"Except Caia's the one who'll actually be taking the risks," he points out.
Presumably he and Rosie will be here, to activate her . . . RP, but they will be safely on the other side of the fence. Pulling the fire-alarm will create some panic, but not enough that no one will miss a pair of complete strangers in their midst. If this all goes wrong, the CC won't know that Roan and Rosie were ever here. But if they catch me . . .
I refuse to finish that thought.
"I knew it was a risk when I agreed to it," I say. "But I'm still doing it."
The thought of it makes me sick with nerves, but there's a strange sense of excitement too, fluttering uncertainly in my chest.
If we can pull this off, we have a real chance of smashing the cage.
"Atta girl," Rosie says, but she's distracted now, looking at something that we can't see. "Sorry guys, I'm going to have to go. One of my babies is malfunctioning."
Hopefully not one of the bugs for the cameras.
"See you later," Roan says, and taps the screen again.
Rosie disappears.
"I suppose it's no good asking you to stop worrying about me," I say.
"Absolutely." He plants a feather-soft kiss on my scarred cheek. "Welcome to love, Caia. It means worrying about the other person all the time."
I don't register what he just said at first, and then it hits me like a bolt of lightning.
Love?
Love?
We've never said those three words to each other, but suddenly it's out there, and I have no idea how to broach it. I'm afraid to say it, afraid to feel it, because it's too big and too beautiful.
Roan blinks very fast, his own words catching up to him.
"I –" he starts, but I put a finger on his lips and shake my head.
Maybe he meant it, maybe it just slipped out, but if he did mean it, I can't hear it yet. I don't know why. The pieces of my heart have been fused back together, my wings have grown, and there are bright stars in my blood.
But those three words carry so much meaning.
They're words my parents should have said to me.
Maybe they did and I was just too young to remember.
They are words that I have should have said to my parents, to the brother or sister that I will never know.
I've read those words so many times in books, or heard them in Priya's stories, but they are words that, as a Second, I never thought anyone would say to me.
And I want someone to say them to me, just . . . not yet.
I'm not ready.
I don't know how to put all this into words, and I don't have to, because Roan, my sweet, wonderful Roan understands already.
He kisses the tip of my finger, the one still pressed against his lips, and neither of us say another word.