25

Ihurried from the hall, through the vestibule, and rocked back onto the heels of my bare feet in an abrupt stop when I saw my mom clacking up the stairs. Her hair was styled in a waterfall of curls clipped to the crown of her head. She was wearing her evening winter coat, the velvet red with a faux fur collar, high-heeled ankle boots, and she had a rifle cradled in the crook of her arm.

"Georga," she exclaimed as she reached the porch. "I heard there was an incident. General Bickens was shot! I was so worried about you, darling."

I stood there, too stunned to say anything for a moment.

She cupped my cheek, with the hand not resting on the butt of the rifle cradled in her arm! "Are you okay?"

I gave my head a rattle shake and stepped back. "Yes, I'm okay, but…what? Did you know this was going to happen? You're part of it?"

And she'd never breathed a word to me.

"The call went out through the network this morning," she said, her voice growing more animated the longer she spoke. "Be Prepared. We had no idea, darling. I certainly had no idea you were at the center of it, but we knew something was about to happen."

"I didn't get any message," I muttered. "I didn't have a clue about anything, until my face lit up on the screen!"

"You didn't know?" Her expression troubled, then brightened. "I'm just thankful you're okay. You know the Sisterhood. They like to play their cards extremely close to their hand."

While Roman had spilled his hand wide open, to save me.

I had so many more questions for my mom, but Roman was my top priority right now. "They took Roman. And Daniel."

"Oh, that can't be right."

You don't say! "Do you know where the Sisterhood is holding them?"

"We're using the Guard Stations." Mom paused to think, then said, "Knowing Geneva, she'll want to keep the prestigious prisoners close. Probably the Guard Station across from Berkley House."

The administration offices just off the main square? "Why Berkley House?"

"That's where we've set up our temporary headquarters."

Of course the Sisterhood had already set up headquarters. And of course everyone knew about it except me.

"I have to go," I said and started down the steps.

"Wait!" Mom called frantically.

I turned to her and threw my hands up. What now?

"You can't go out into the night like that," she said. "Where's your coat? And for goodness sake, you aren't wearing shoes."

I stared at her blankly.

"You'll catch your death of cold," she stated in her no-nonsense mother voice. "Here, take mine."

I wasn't cold, I wasn't hot, I wasn't anything that didn't involve getting Roman out of Geneva's clutches, but Mom was undoing the buttons of her coat to reveal a black chiffon dress beneath with absolutely no substance.

"I'll get my own coat," I sighed irritably and raced back up the steps, passing her into the vestibule.

It took me about five minutes to find the room where our coats had been taken hostage and to rummage through the rack for my faithful black, long-line coat. To spare Mom's sensibilities, I even went hunting for my shoes.

That was five minutes to absorb the impact of seeing my mom carry that rifle, and assimilate what it meant. It wasn't everyone except me who knew what was going on. My mom knew, because she was an active Sister. Not only that, she must be an integral cog in the Sisterhood wheel. She had to be, unless they were handing out rifles to everyone, and I doubted that was the case.

The Capra Foundation Building was a short walk from the square, although on the opposite end from Berkley House. I considered taking the side streets to skirt the square, but I wanted to get a measure of the mood and half of Capra would likely be in the square.

Mom walked with me. "I'm supposed to be patrolling the square, anyway."

I side-eyed her rifle. "Do you know how to use that?"

"Of course not, darling." She patted the weapon like it was a baby in her arms. "It's not even loaded."

Well, that was a relief.

At a glance, the festivities in the square resembled every other year. Citizens were out in full force. Popup stalls rimmed the cobbled area, selling everything from ciders to candies to bears carved out of wood with an Eastern Foundation flag sticking from their armpits. Red, black and gold bunting decorated the bandstand.

After that initial glance, however, the differences came fast and furiously. A group of early teens were on the bandstand, playing around the abandoned musical instruments. No street performers entertained the crowd. As for the crowd, they were almost exclusively congregated around the large screen on the clock tower.

My face was on the screen, although I couldn't hear what I was saying until we drew closer to the rear stragglers of the crowd.

"It's all lies," I was saying, my voice coming at me from multiple speakers. "Our eggs don't start off rotten. We are healthy for the first couple of years, until we reach the age of fourteen, maybe a few months more. That's where Capra gets its supply of eggs from, harvested from young girls in The Smoke. It could be harvested from us. It should be harvested from us. There's no reason we couldn't have children of our flesh and blood."

Obviously I'd been playing on a loop all this time, but the crowd seemed spellbound, as if they were watching for the first time.

Then I saw why.

My face panned out, and Geneva panned in with her crop of ash-silver curls and a sincere, deeply concerned expression softening her features.

"Geneva's message only started playing a short while ago," Mom informed me. "That was our signal that the Guard and the council had been contained, and to bring us out from the shadows with our show of weapons, naturally. But there hasn't been much trouble."

"Citizens of Capra," Geneva said, her eloquent voice a smooth, calming presence that settled over the square. "The Eastern Coalition was founded on the fundamental principles of securing the future of mankind. We are committed to our cause. We always will be. But we have been children. We have dutifully believed, we have sacrificed so much without question, and we have been deceived by our council. The time has come for mutual consent. The time has come for mutual respect. The time for change is now, my fellow citizens. The time for the Sisters of Capra is here."

The crowd didn't erupt into an angry mob or a riot. But they didn't raise a cheer of celebration, either.

I looked around, and started counting the number of Sisters milling around the edges of the crowd with rifles cradled in their arms. "Where is Dad?"

"He's around here somewhere, I'm sure," Mom said. "I left him to get to Berkley House a little after seven."

"You told him what was happening? Does he know you're part of the uprising?"

"Of course not, darling. I said I was meeting a group of ladies in the tearoom. He didn't think anything of it. The curfew laws are loosened on the night of the Foundation Ball."

"He shouldn't be out here," I insisted. "You should have sent him home."

"Your father will be fine, Georga. There hasn't been any trouble on the streets."

"General Bickens' knee was shot out."

"That was terrible, but an anomaly, darling."

"You're patrolling the square with rifles," I said, totally not understanding how she didn't see the severity of the situation. My dad was a good man. He wasn't part of the problem. "What happens when Sisters start shooting?"

Mom humored me with a smile. "I told you, darling, the weapons are just for show."

"Geneva's wasn't."

"Yes, well, it seems some Sisters came more prepared than others, but you needn't worry about it. This isn't war on the streets. We all have husbands and children on the square tonight."

I dragged a hand over my brow, massaging the tension at my temples. Maybe Mom was right. Maybe General Bickens was the anomaly. Geneva had seized control, and no one appeared to be resisting—much to my utter amazement. Maybe this wasn't the violent, blood-thirsty revolution I feared.

My dad would be fine. Besides, Mom wouldn't allow any harm to come to him, and right now, Roman needed me more.

I left Mom patrolling in the square, working my way unnoticed around the crowd to the off-shoot street where the Guard Station was located.