Aimee Carter - Pawn

He wasn’t there. I squinted in the darkness, pushing the jackets aside, but all that was behind them was wall.

“Up here.”

I jumped. Above me Knox leaned out of a hole in the ceiling with a flashlight in hand. The opening was too big to be the air vent I’d discovered the day before, and Knox dropped down a rope ladder.

“How did you find this?” I said as I hauled myself up. He reached down to help me, but I pushed his hands away.

“Someone else showed me,” he said. “It doesn’t see much use, but it’ll get us out of Somerset.”

I pulled myself up into the ceiling. It was an entire walkway, high enough for me to stand, and I spotted a railing a few feet away. “Are the other rooms connected, too?”

“Just this one,” he said, covering the hole with what looked like a piece of ceiling. “C’mon, and keep quiet. If someone’s on the other side of the walls, they could hear us.”

The layer of dust on everything made my nose itch, but I held in my sneeze. Knox and his flashlight led the way, and we headed down a rickety staircase that creaked underneath my feet. It wasn’t until we reached a heavy wooden door several levels below the basement that Knox spoke again.

“The tunnel goes on for about a mile underground, and when it ends, we’ll be on the other side of the wall. Think you can manage it?”

I gave him a dirty look and snatched the flashlight from him. As I marched into the tunnel, which was dark and dank and smelled of earth, he chuckled.

There were no turns, so I didn’t have to ask Knox for directions. Except for the shuffle of our footsteps, it was eerily silent, and I could hear him breathing behind me. Finally I couldn’t take the quiet anymore, and I glanced over my shoulder to look at him.

“What are we going to do?” I said. “Hang around a club for hours and drink ourselves stupid?”

“Something like that. Don’t you want to be surprised?”

“I hate surprises.”

He smirked. “I don’t blame you.”

We walked along in silence for a few more seconds. “You said we’re meeting friends,” I said. “Shouldn’t I at least know their names?”

“Lila didn’t.”

“But they were her friends.”

“When you’re as famous and powerful as Lila was, you have lots of friends,” he said. “Don’t worry about it. Lila hated them as much as you will.”

I didn’t ask. If all went well, I wouldn’t have to spend more than a few minutes with them before I had the chance to slip away.

When we reached the other end of the tunnel, Knox took the flashlight back and led me up another old staircase. This time the door was made of metal, and though it looked rusted, the hinges must have been well oiled, because it didn’t squeak when he opened it.

As soon as I stepped through the doorway, I understood why. We were in an alleyway somewhere beyond the walls of Somerset, less than ten yards away from a busy and brightly lit street. Knox pulled the door shut behind him, and this time he took my arm without asking. His flashlight was gone.

“Just act natural,” he said, leading me to the street. Despite the late hour, there were people everywhere, laughing and chatting as they leaned against the moving walkways. When Knox and I stepped on, heads turned our way, and Knox’s grip on my arm tightened.

The walkway made me feel like I was floating. There was a rail to hold on to, but Knox was sturdy, and I’d seen pictures of him and Lila out together. They were always arm in arm, so letting go of him wasn’t an option even if I could’ve wriggled away. With any luck, he wouldn’t be as strict about it in the club.

Above us, screens lit up with the same kind of news scrolls that appeared at the bottom of the television. The monitors secured on the sides of buildings loudly advertised different products for things that as a III I could never afford and as Lila I would never need, and I attempted to look as bored as possible. Lila had probably been down this street hundreds of times before.

We passed shop after shop, some with magnificent window displays showing off the latest in fashion or electronics, and others that belonged to the intimate cafés where only the rich could eat. They were the same kind of places I’d mocked before, knowing full well I would never be ranked high enough to get in. Now that I was Lila, every door was open to me.

Across the street stood the smoldering remains of a small building, the only reminder that this wasn’t paradise. From the way it still smoked, I was sure it was one of the buildings that had been bombed the night before. Orange barriers blocked the walkway beside it, and at least a dozen Shields lined the perimeter, each holding a rifle.

Panic slithered through me. The Shields in the Heights were always on the lookout for someone to arrest or kill, and we avoided them at all costs. But here, everyone walked right on by as if they weren’t even there. Was that what being a V and VI meant? Never having to fear the Shields?

“A testing center,” said Knox, so close his breath tickled my skin. “The other two places were ministries.”

“Which ones?”

“The Ministry of Ranking—my father’s,” he said. “And the Ministry of Wealth and Distribution. Neither of them were destroyed, but the bombs took out a nice chunk.”

“Did it make any difference?” I said, and Knox shook his head.

When we stepped off the walkway, he led me down a side street. A line of people dressed in outrageously tight and colorful clothes wound around the corner, and as we passed, every eye was on us. I spotted a few more Shields in the distance and tensed, but Knox squeezed my hand, and I forced myself to relax. I wasn’t a III anymore. They weren’t going to arrest me just for breathing the wrong way.

The doorman lifted a velvet rope blocking the entrance to the club, and Knox ushered me inside a dark hallway. Deafening noise pulsated around us, and even the floor shook in time to the beat. There was no hope of conversation here.

At last the hallway opened up into a large room packed with people writhing to the music. Colored lights flashed green and blue, and half-dressed girls who couldn’t have been much older than me danced ten feet in the air, suspended by wires or some magic trick I couldn’t see. As Knox led me down a raised walkway that bridged the front of the club with the rear, everyone stared at us.

It was quieter in the back, which was cluttered with tables and couches, but I still had a hard time hearing. Our table was behind another velvet rope, guarded by a man nearly as big as the one at the door. By the time Knox and I sat down, a crowd had gathered, and Knox gestured for them to join us. Within seconds I was squished between Knox and a girl whose eyelids were covered in thick green glitter, and one by one, they leaned over to kiss me on the cheek. When they were done, the urge to wipe it with a napkin overcame me, but too many people were watching.

Talking wasn’t necessary, since everyone seemed determined to do it for me. I was told about how much I’d been missed, how D.C. hadn’t been the same without me, and next time I went to Aspen, I had to take them with me. Waiters came and went, providing the table with an endless supply of drinks, but I didn’t touch any of it. I had to be clearheaded when I snuck out.

It was hard to tell how much time passed with the incessant chatter and pounding music, and after a few songs, my head throbbed along with the beat. I sank lower and lower into my seat until finally Knox touched my arm and leaned in close enough for me to hear him.

“Do you want to dance?”

I would rather have banged my head against the table repeatedly, but when the alternative was listening to a dozen people talk at once, dancing didn’t seem so bad after all.