46 - JASINA

CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

I struggle with Donal , getting back up on my feet. He grabs at me again, and I manage to elbow him in the mouth. He groans, but doesn't go down. The injury just makes him angrier, and he's still got a hold of me. No matter what I do, I cannot get free.

I kick, and scratch, and try and bite his hand when it gets too close to my mouth. He slaps me and throws me back on the ground with such force, all the breath rushes out of my body, leaving me gasping for air.

He stands over me, grinning, blood from his split lip dripping down his chin. And there is an evil hunger in his eyes that terrifies me. I shrink back, putting my hands in front of my face, because I can see it coming. His foot is rising and he's about to stomp on me when a familiar voice calls through the darkness.

"That's enough, Donal! Stop what you're doing right now."

"Auntie!" I moan. "Auntie, help me!"

It's a stupid hope. Because I know better. I know better. She paired me up with Donal for a reason. She knows he's mean. She knows he would kill me right now if she wasn't here.

But Auntie Bell doesn't care about me. She has never cared about me. I am… a tool. Nothing more than a hammer. Hell, hammer is far too lofty a role for me because a hammer implies power. And I have no power. It becomes very clear to me as I lie on the ground, looking up at Donal as he considers the idea that he might just stomp on my face anyway, that I am a nail. Something to be hit.

But then Auntie is there, pulling him back with her two strong hands on his shoulders. "We don't have time for this, boy. You need to get into position."

"She came down from there!" He points down the hallway, indicating that I came down the stairs from the tower. "We can get in now."

"It's far too late for that, Donal. That Looking Glass is out of our reach. But this one—" Auntie motions down the left-hand passageway with her head. "This one can still be coaxed into working. We must proceed with the plan." Then she pauses to look at me. "And we need my niece here. She has spark in her. We need every bit of spark we can get our hands on."

Donal huffs. "She's a traitor. She needs to pay for what she's done."

Auntie places a hand on his cheek and smiles. It's… a touching smile. Like she actually cares for this evil boy. "What do you think happens to her next, dear boy?" An evil grin plays across Auntie's face. And when I glance at Donal, I see a matching one on his.

"Get her up off the floor and bring her along, Donal. It's time."

Donal comes at me so quickly, I flinch and cover my face with my hands again, fearful that he will get in one last blow before submitting to my aunt's demands. But he doesn't hit me. He grabs me by the hair and starts dragging me along the hallway after my auntie.

I scream, and he stops, turning to sneer. "One more sound out of you, and I'll rip all this pretty hair out of your head. Auntie doesn't care about your hair, do you, Auntie?"

"Come along, Donal!"

"Auntie?" I whimper. What does he mean?

Donal sneers at me. "Oh, you didn't know? How fun! Your Auntie isn't a Bell, Jasina. Bells are down-city half-breed whores like yourself. She's an Oslin."

"What?" He's still dragging me by the hair, but I've got a hold of his arms now, so it doesn't pull so much. And I manage to get to my feet and stumble after him.

"That's right, Jasina. She's my auntie, not yours. She's not related to you at all. She only married your great-uncle because the Matrons told her to. They needed to breed you, ya see." He stops walking so he can lean down into my face and spit his words out. "So I can eat ya ."

"What?"

"Donal!" Auntie yells this time. "Keep up, boy. We need to get this started!"

Donal yanks me and starts running, so I have to run too. But I trip and fall and he keeps going. So when we get to the end of the hallway, I enter a large room filled with people being dragged across a smooth shiny floor by my red hair.

Suddenly there is a lot of murmuring and Donal lets go, walking away from me like I never mattered in the first place.

I sit up, my head burning and my body already sore from the attack, and look around. But it takes whole, long seconds for my mind to even form thoughts that can explain what the hell I am looking at.

The people are the easy part. There are—well, every Matron who ever existed appears to be in here with us. And the Little Sisters are all here too, all wearing their blue tunics and cream aprons.

"Jasina!" Auntie barks my name so loud, all the hushed murmuring immediately stops. Like just her voice is enough to scare the piss out of people. "Get in your line!" She points to the Little Sisters, who are backed up against a wall on the far side of the room.

I scramble to my feet and stumble in that direction, looking for friendly faces. All of the up-city girls turn their gazes away from me. But I was expecting that.

What I wasn't expecting is for my friends to do the same.

"Lucindy," I say, still stumbling as I reach out for support.

"Don't!" she snaps at me. "Don't touch me, Jasina."

"What?" I look at Harlow. And she doesn't even bother with words. Just shakes her head. Then I look at Britley. "Brit?"

"Jasina, just shut up and stand in line."

"Here." Ceela moves over a little bit. "You can stand by me."

I want to say thank you—should probably say thank you—but this isn't a genuine offer. I've known Ceela too long. I know her too well. But I slip into the space anyway because there's no other place for me.

As soon as we're shoulder to shoulder, she starts in, her words just a whisper so as not attract the ire of Auntie. "You're in big trouble. And don't look to us to save you, Jasina."

"What did I do?"

"What did you do ?" Ceela turns to side-eye me, her lip actually curling up to show her teeth. "Are you joking ? You're a traitor! You?—"

"Listen up!" Auntie Bell roars, her voice echoing off the high ceiling of the underground room. "Matron Lightly and Matron Scott are going to explain your roles in the ritual. Do not speak, or ask any questions. This must be done and you all are here to do your part in saving this great city."

The word ‘ritual' is what snaps my attention back to the room I'm in. It didn't make any sense to me at first, because I didn't have the proper context for it. But now I see.

It's a church .

We have chapels, of course. Places where we pray to the god. But the church of the Tau City tower god is… well, the tower. Only Extraction Maidens enter the tower, so it's not a place for regular people.

But we're in the Tower District. It's above us, but we're still in it. And even though I've never seen a proper church, this is a church. There are symbols everywhere. Circles with stars inside them. Not stars like the five-pointed ones that kids draw, but even simpler than that. Just eight lines radiating out from a central point. They are all over the room in every size imaginable. And when I look up at the ceiling, it's painted to look like a night sky.

I squint my eyes, trying to get a better focus on the stars above me, when suddenly, they twinkle.

"What the…" I whisper. "That's not… paint. It's…" No one is paying attention to me. Ceela doesn't even snap at me to shut up, she's so engrossed in what the old Matrons are saying about the city. How great it is, or whatever.

It's not paint on the ceiling. And I'd bet coin—all the coin I have—that if the lights came on right now there would be a dome covered in white triangle tiles on this ceiling. And they would be blank. Just like the Looking Glass Room up in the Extraction Tower.

This is when I start listening again. Because I realize that Matron Scott is Finn's mother .

Finn!

I know I left him behind, but… shouldn't he be here? I mean, everyone who's anyone in Tau City is in this room right now. Something big is happening.

It's practically treason to not invite the Extraction Master.

"The god is dying!" These words, said by Matron Scott, refocus my attention on what's happening around me. Mostly because all the Little Sisters gasp in unison. They didn't know.

I am not surprised, of course. But I'm keenly interested in what follows this revelation.

"But don't worry, good people of Tau City." Matron Scott smiles—and wow, even as an older woman, she is still very beautiful. It's her beauty, I think, that settles the traumatized Little Sisters. Not so much her words, though her tone is soft and comforting.

Until the next part comes out.

"You don't need to worry about the dying god because we have grown a new one." She pans her hand to… my mouth drops open.

"No." I even say it out loud. "No way."

"Donal Oslin," Matron Scott says, "is our new god. As the only young resident of the Tower District, he has lived his entire youth inside the spark and this unique upbringing will allow him to ascend to god status. This morning's ritual will elevate him and everything you love and enjoy about Tau City will be preserved."

There is a sigh of relief from many of the girls around me.

But there's a hefty level of skepticism too. Because… why are we here, if it's all going so well for Donal's ascension into godhood?

"There is one small thing we need from each of you, however."

"Well, here it comes," I say.

Ceela elbows me in the ribs. Not gently, either. "Shut up. Listen!"

"Listen to what, Ceela? Don't you understand what she's saying? They need something from us? Are you that stupid? What do you think that something is?"

Her cheeks go bright red. But she doesn't look at me when she growls her words out. "You are the most selfish girl."

"What?"

"That's right." Ceela looks me straight in the eyes for this part. "You want all the glory. You want to be the Extraction Master's courtesan. You want to be the Rebel who does it all. You want everything, Jasina!" These words seethe out of her like poison. "You are selfish, narcissistic, and you will get that glory over my dead body."

She really is that stupid. "Ceela." I use my mature-leader tone of voice. "They're gonna take our spark. They're gonna drain us and give it to Donal, who is, obviously, not a fucking god because he's an evil teenage boy !"

I scream this last part. Which is a mistake. A very big mistake.

Because my scream interrupts two things happening at the same time.

The ancient Matron, who I have never ever seen before—Matron Lightly—is in the middle of saying Gemna's name. And a large, heavy curtain is being pulled back to reveal a room separated from us by glass so thick, you can see the woman screaming on the other side, but not hear her.

This screaming woman is Gemna. And she is somehow hovering in the middle of a radiating star circle that is easily twenty feet in diameter. Her arms and legs are spread wide, attached to rays with chains and cuffs. And she's wearing a gala gown. Like this is one of the most important events of her life.

"Well, I see we have our first volunteer." The ancient Matron's voice cuts through the silence like a hot knife through butter.

I look over at the Matrons and realize everyone is looking at me. "What?"

"We need two Little Sisters to help Gemna prime the Looking Glass. And Jasina Bell has just volunteered!"

She starts clapping. And then everyone is clapping.

And the next thing I know, Donal is coming at me with a wicked grin on his face.

I step back, trying to disappear into the crowd of Little Sisters all around me, but they push me forward and a moment later, Donal has me and he's dragging me over to the massive glass room. And now I see that there are two more circles in there. Two more spaces on either side of Gemna, where two more women should be.

It couldn't be more obvious who belongs inside this trio of circles even if they had engraved brass nameplates.

The radiating circles were meant for Spark Maidens, not Little Sisters.

Except these days Tau City is two Spark Maidens short of a trio.

This is when I realize what Aldo really told us last night. He did mention that the Extraction Master controls the tower doors. But he neglected to specifically spell out that he was the one who called Haryet and Clara inside.

Which I get, I guess. It makes sense. Because he knew they had this Looking Glass down here. And he knew it needed three Spark Maidens to work. He knew that, even if he destroyed the Extraction Tower, they could use this one to… well, I'm not really sure what they're doing. But he didn't approve and he made sure that even if they used it, the result would be unpredictable.

Aldo sent Clara into the tower.

Aldo ruined his son's life.

I wonder if Finn figured this part out yet.

I wonder if Finn is even awake.

Suddenly, I understand why he's not here. They were calling me a traitor. So Finn was a traitor too. They cut him out because they saw us as a team.

And then I cut him out too.

Now I'm sorry about that. I'm sorry for leaving him up there to die. And not because I'm stuck here inside this nightmare where Spark Maidens are drained to feed an evil teenage boy who thinks he is a god, but because Finn and I actually were a team.

They are going to drain me of spark until I die and give it to Donal for his ascension. And the ironic part is… it's all my fault.

"All of you, of course," Matron Scott is saying, "will be used in the ritual. You will all give him your spark, but you will not be consumed in the reaction like Gemna and Jasina. We still need one more girl. One more Little Sister who would like to go down in history. Who will it be?"

Well, the irony is overflowing today. That's what I get, I suppose. I wanted my name in the history books, didn't I?

It's not exactly playing out the way I had hoped.

Suddenly, there is a voice above the murmur of others. "I'll do it! I'll volunteer!"

It's Ceela. And I wail, "No, Ceela! No! Don't you see? Don't do it!"

Donal slaps me. "Shut up, Jasina. It's an honor to give me spark for my ascension!"

Ceela has stepped out of the line of Little Sisters and is walking towards us as the Matrons praise her for her unselfish ways.

I want to throw up, but we're at the door to the glass room now, and when it opens all other voices and noise is drowned out by the screams of Gemna Hatley.