Chapter 2

Darkness.

Nothing but a heavy, pitch-black void.

But something was wrong.

Something . . . but it was consumed by the void. Nothing existed but the sense that there was . . . something . . .

Then, very gradually, her consciousness began to surface.

Slowly, she became aware of her body. Could feel her nerve endings.

Her left arm started to ache. Then throb. Her heart rate increased.

Something was wrong.

Emil—!

She tried to move, but her entire body felt so heavy. A moan escaped her as she forced her eyes open. Her vision was hazy. She blinked hard. The room swam into view, but it was darkened and difficult to make out. She tried again to move, but her legs felt as though they were dead. She would have feared that very thing if she couldn't feel them just fine. Slowly, she raised her right arm. Squinting in the sparse light cast from behind the drawn curtains, she could make out the discoloration on the side of her hand—from breaking her fall. She closed her eyes against an intense, searing throb from her left arm, choking back a sob. Without adrenaline, it was harder to bear. She tried not to think about how bad the wound must be. Instead, she took a deep, steadying breath, and tried not to think of anything at all. Not the pain, not Emil, not how badly she wanted to set out that instant and find him. For now, none of it would cause her anything but turmoil. For now, she was helpless—though it pained her greatly to admit it—and ruminating on things that she could do nothing about would only be torture. So she breathed, willing her body to heal, thinking of nothing but that.

Until the door opened.

Her eyes flew wide.

The hallway let in only a small amount of light, but it was enough to silhouette the figure who stood there.

Elise could immediately tell that it was a girl, not only due to her rather short, slight frame, but even in the sparse light, she could see the long blonde hair that fell to her waist. The girl didn't move at first. Then, a voice—a male voice—hissed from somewhere near the door, "What are you doing?! Didn't your dad say not to go near her?"

"Shh! Just for a minute! I'm just going to see if she's awake."

The girl crept into the room and took a few steps toward Elise's bed, peering at her with what seemed to be curiosity more than caution. Elise watched her warily. The girl stopped, smiled, then looked back to the doorway and whispered loudly, "She's awake!"

Another figure appeared in the doorframe, more hesitantly than the girl: a boy with darker hair, which Elise determined to be red as he slowly entered the room. "Ruby, we shouldn't be in here! They're going to check on her any minute, and your dad'll be mad if he knows you were here!"

"Hmm . . ." The girl took a step closer, looking at Elise quizzically. "She doesn't seem dangerous. You know he worries too much."

The boy mumbled, so low that Elise could barely make it out, "I think he worries a reasonable amount . . ."

The girl either failed to hear him or simply disregarded what he had said. "If she were infected, we'd know by now, right?"

"Would we?" the boy replied, coming to stand beside the blonde. "If your dad's worried, there must be a reason . . ."

"Hmm . . ." the girl mumbled again, cocking her head and bending forward, as if scrutinizing Elise, though her large doe eyes betrayed no sign of concern.

Something pricked at the back of Elise's mind—something about what the girl had said . . .

"We'd know by now, right?"

Her pulse kicked up.

"How—" she started, her voice rough, but she forced out the words. "How long have I been here?"

The girl's eyebrows raised, and she straightened, seeming pleasantly surprised that Elise had spoken. "A couple of days," she answered.

Elise's stomach turned. Days. What could those freaks have done to Emil in that time?

Desperation began to overcome everything else, but she battled against the rising sense of despair. It wasn't a hopeless situation. They had been sure to take him without hurting him—she had been the expendable one. Surely they wouldn't have been so careful in their treatment of him if they just planned on doing him harm anyway.

But still, they hadn't exactly seemed like stable individuals. Who knew what they were capable of—beyond what they had already demonstrated—or what their whims might dictate. She couldn't afford to assume that he would be safe.

With every passing moment, she was feeling less and less like resting.

She was about to ask the boy and the girl whether she could speak to someone in a position of authority when the boy stiffened, turning suddenly toward the door, which was several inches ajar.

"Someone's coming!" he hissed, grabbing the girl's arm and hauling her toward the exit. He peered through the crack, cursed under his breath, then quickly and silently pulled the door closed before dragging the girl into the nearest shadowed corner of the room.

The sound of footsteps grew steadily closer. Seeing no real harm in the teenagers' visit, she played along and closed her eyes, ignoring their corner.

The door opened again.

Then closed.

The pair of light footsteps approached the bed more slowly than they had traversed the hall.

Elise debated whether or not to open her eyes. Pretending to remain asleep might delay whatever interrogation surely awaited her at the hands of her saviors, though that would also mean delaying her petition to find Emil. In addition, it could also prove difficult if whoever had just entered was planning to examine her arm. After a moment's indecision, she slowly cracked her eyelids, inhaling slowly, as though having only just regained consciousness.

It took a few seconds for her eyes to refocus in the low light. A woman in a white coat stood beside the bed. "Finally awake, I see." Her tone was pleasant and gentle, but Elise could have sworn that there was something in her eyes . . . a hint of misgiving, perhaps? Or maybe it was just the room's shadows.

The woman peered down at a tablet in her hand. "How are you feeling?"

Elise considered for a moment. "My arm hurts . . ." As soon as she managed those feeble words, they felt silly. Surely the doctor would have been surprised to hear that it didn't hurt. "And I feel heavy," she added.

"Well, you have been asleep for two days." The woman circled around the bed, her head still bowed to the tablet. Elise took the opportunity to glance into the corner of the room. Her senses may not be as sharp as they usually were, but she could clearly see that the boy and the girl were no longer there. She hadn't even heard them leave. Impressive.

"I can give you a small boost of painkiller, but I'm afraid that's all that I can do," the doctor informed Elise. "Fortunately, the wound wasn't as terrible as we had initially suspected, so it shouldn't be too long before you can use your arm again."

This relieving news lit a spark of hope inside Elise. She could be out looking for Emil sooner than she'd thought. Another wave of relief followed at the prospect of the constant deep throbbing in her arm being allayed.

As the doctor prepared a syringe, Elise asked, "Can I speak to someone in charge?"

The doctor began to inject the syringe's concoction into an IV drip, which Elise had failed to notice before now. "You would have to even if you didn't want to," she replied frankly. "But not yet. You should have your faculties a bit more in order first." She stepped away and disposed of the syringe. "Just keep resting for now; questions will come later."

"No, I mean—I . . ." The heaviness in Elise's body was suddenly washed over by a strange lightness, and her head filled with haze. She had slept for so long already, but the desire to fall unconscious again was growing quickly. Her mind struggled against the threat of blackness as it crept inside, but it quickly smothered her, weighing her down once more, pressing her deeper into the mattress.

Her eyes fell closed.

At least she wouldn't have to try not to worry for a while.

A soft, low sound reached through the darkness to tug at her consciousness. It pulled her closer, its deep timbre flowing rhythmically through the heavy blanket that enshrouded her. Another sound replaced it, this one higher in pitch, but the deeper tone returned moments later. She followed it until it grew louder, more clear.

"I'm just telling you what she told me."

A voice.

"She won't wait much longer."

A familiar voice . . .

Elise pushed through the darkness until she felt her limbs tingle, her senses returning.

"I just don't want her to push her too hard too quickly," the higher, feminine voice replied. After a few moments, Elise recognized it as that of the doctor.

The other voice sighed.

Silence.

Elise thought that perhaps they had gone.

Until—

"Can I talk to her, then?"

"Oh, uh—she's unconscious right now," the doctor replied, sounding a touch apprehensive.

"I'll wait."

"Um . . . but Lisa—"

"She'll be happier with some information rather than none."

A few seconds of silence followed.

This time, the doctor was the one to sigh. "Alright. Take a seat. Don't bombard her."

Footsteps crossed the floor, and Elise heard the man settle his weight into a chair somewhere to her left.

"You might be waiting a while."

No response.

The lighter footsteps of the doctor traveled to the door, which was opened, then closed.

Somehow, the silence that followed felt just as oppressive as the thick blanket of drowsiness from the pain medication.

Elise's arm gradually began to throb, but she disregarded it, her mind focused on the man. He wanted to speak with her. Finally, she would be able to explain her situation and ask for help. But the doctor had been right: She needed her faculties together. So she took a few seconds to embrace the increasing pain, which began to sharpen her senses just a bit more, enough so that she felt capable of opening her eyes and, hopefully, holding a decent conversation.

She took a slow, deep lungful of air, and blinked her eyes open.

She waited a few seconds, but the man didn't speak. Finally, she turned her head to look at him.

His ice-blue eyes stared back at her.

It was him: the man who had rescued her.

Despite that fact, he was a stranger. And yet, she felt an odd sense of comfort from his presence. How fortunate that he should be the first to speak with her. Perhaps it would be easier to talk about Emil—

"How are you feeling?"

It was the same question that had first been posed to her by the doctor, but this time it was less formal. She could have imagined the touch of concern in his tone, however, for there was something in his eyes that felt rather . . . distant. The room was still cast in a veil of shadow, but the longer she looked at him, the more he seemed like a man who had seen too much—been through too much—and strove to conceal the effect that it had on him. She wasn't a stranger to that notion.

"I'll live," she replied, her voice not feeling any stronger than before.

The man gave the slightest of nods. "'Good. What's your name?"

"Elise," she answered, then swallowed in an attempt to moisten her throat.

"Elise," he repeated. In the back of her mind, she concluded that she liked the way that her name sounded when spoken in that deep timbre. "How did you get shot?"

A bundle of nerves sparked in her gut. The time had come to plead her case, to ask these people, who had already saved her life and owed her absolutely nothing, for help in tracking down a freakish gang of kidnappers—without any leads. Though, with any luck, perhaps Amina was already familiar with them.

She took a steadying breath.

"There were some people . . . they attacked us—" Her throat began to close up, the bundle of nerves in her stomach making it more difficult to speak of the event than she had anticipated.

"Us?"

She swallowed and forced the words out. "My brother and me. They wanted to take him with them—I don't know why. But they shot me as a warning, to make him comply . . ." The absolute terror that she had felt as she'd watched Emil being dragged away from her, fear in his eyes, crying out her name as the rifle was trained on her—it all crashed over her again. In a smaller voice, she added, "I thought I was dead . . ."

A few seconds of somber silence reigned.

Then, sensing that the man was about to speak, and not wanting to miss her window, Elise took the plunge. "I came here straight after—I didn't know what else to do—" She cut off her words as her voice had begun to rise, calmed herself, then tried again. "I didn't know where else to go, but we had heard about Amina and this safe zone, and their technology . . ." The man was still staring at her with those cold blue eyes, patient, calculating. She quelled the intimidation that began to creep into her, focusing on Emil's horror-struck face and the ache in her heart. "I hate to ask this after you just saved my life—Mr. . . ." Uncomfortably, she realized that she had neglected to ask for his name.

But after a short pause, the man supplied it.

"Bevrian."

The word hung in the air.

Elise's lips moved the tiniest fraction, silently testing out the name. It felt like his eyes, cold yet deeply feeling, but it also held a warmth—such as how she had felt in his arms.

She swallowed as a new heat gathered in her chest at the recollection. She continued on, picking up where she had left off before the memory made itself known on her face.

"Mr. Bevrian—if there is any way that Amina could help me find my brother— I would do anything to repay you." She did not have to reinforce her plea with exaggerated desperation. It was all that she could do to swallow down the rising lump in her throat.

Bevrian's brows knitted, and she held her breath, awaiting his response, preparing for an outright refusal.

But he didn't get the chance to refuse.

Footsteps approached rapidly from the hall, and moments later, the door opened.

Another man stood there—another familiar face: the blonde who had been accompanying Bevrian when he had saved her life. His striking eyes, a similar blue to Bevrian's, skated over Elise, somewhat curious, somewhat passive, before landing on the other man.

"Bevrian, we've gotten word of another zombie sighting."

"Where?"

"Zone 1."

Bevrian scowled. "Another one, huh?" he muttered, getting to his feet. He turned his eyes to Elise, and she tried in vain to read his thoughts through his gaze, feeling as though her chance to find Emil was slipping farther away. But she wasn't about to beg. This man clearly had a duty to perform, and she wouldn't hinder that, not when that duty had spared her a horrible death.

With one look, she tried to communicate to him her understanding, but also her determination on the subject of her brother. And she understood his look in return: The conversation was not over.

With that, Bevrian strode from the room after his friend, closing the door behind him and leaving Elise to her troubled thoughts and the renewed pain in her arm.