I pushed my plate away from me.

  “Let’s get out of here,” he said, lacing his fingers through mine.

  The dining hall was nearly empty. Only a few of the younger students sat at the back, still pushing around today’s supper of mystery stew and stale bread.

  Our guards waited in the hallway when we exited and began following us back to our quad.

  We almost made it there.

  Something hard and heavy hit the back of my head, and my vision went black before I hit the ground.

  When I woke, the first thing I realized was I was being dragged. My eyes opened to darkness. I took a sharp breath in and found a dark cloth over my head covering my eyes and mouth so I couldn’t see, and my breathing was labored.

  A pair of arms held me up under my shoulders, lugging me across a concrete floor. I tried to move my feet, but they were tied tightly together. My hands were also tied and secured at my back, so I couldn’t move. On my left wrist, a sharp pain flared when I flexed my hand, right where Em’s tracker had been inserted. I didn’t have to see my wrist to know there would be an open wound there. They had removed our trackers.

  I stirred and pulled against the restraints despite the pain, but the people dragging me held tighter.

  “Where am I? What’s going on?” I asked.

  No response.

  “Where’s Theo?” I tried again.

  Still silence.

  “If you’re going to kill me, just get it over with already,” I shouted.

  The feet stopped. A hand reached the bottom of the hood covering my face and lifted it up and over my head. The fluorescent lights stung my eyes, and I had to blink away the spots before the figure standing before me came into view.

  “I’m not going to kill you, Sienna, but I’d appreciate it if you just shut up for once in your life.” Instructor Yarik sneered before turning back around and continued to lead the two guards who carried me into a room.

  My eyes began scanning for a way out, an exit, but all that surrounded me were the depressing grey walls. This room was unfamiliar to me, but the location was undeniably somewhere within the DEZ. It wasn’t large—only two chairs filled the empty space. A glass window covered one wall. I looked to the window, but only saw my own reflection looking back. Dried blood crusted on my brow, likely from the blow I’d taken when I was knocked unconscious.

  One of the guards pulled me to stand. The ropes tight around my ankles made it hard to balance, and I teetered back and forth, unsteady. The other guard pulled a chair from against the wall and placed it in the middle. Together, they pushed me into the seat and used more rope to tie my legs and waist to the chair so I couldn’t move. They tightened the ropes, and I winced at the wound exposed at my wrist. Warm blood slid down my hand.

  Instructor Yarik grabbed another chair and pulled it across the floor, making it screech the entire way. She placed it in front of me and sat down. Crossing her arms, she leaned back and surveyed me. It was only then I noticed her hair was down. She never had her hair down. It was always up in a strict bun. The top button of her blouse was undone, and she smelled like wine or some other kind of fruity alcohol.

  “Curious thing you had in your wrist. Care to tell me about it?” she asked.

  I kept my mouth closed. A determined look on my face was the best I could muster.

  She blinked slowly, almost bored. “Didn’t think so. For another time, I suppose.” A small piece of hair fell over her brow, as she tilted her head to the side and smiled. “Do you know why you were chosen to graduate last?”

  “Because I needed the most help to succeed?” I quoted what she’d said multiple times.

  “Wrong.” Her lips pursed. “You were chosen last because you’re a lot more observant than the other mindless Marked kids. Camilla would be a close second, but she’s too much of a wild card to trust. But you… you wouldn’t accept change without questioning why. So, why?”

  I blinked, wondering if she was waiting for an answer from me. When I didn’t respond, she sighed.

  “Have you ever wondered why we train you so hard here in the DEZ? Why we push you all past what you think you’re capable of doing? Why we teach you combat skills, tactics, and proficiency with various weapons?”

  “They aren’t teaching you skills that other kids your age are taught…you’re being trained like soldiers,” Jayla had told us. Still, I didn’t trust Yarik to say as much, so I shook my head.

  Yarik huffed through her nose. “I thought you were smarter than that, Sienna. I thought if you saw the outside, you might question why you would need tactical training when Cytos seems to be a fairly safe place.” I tried to keep my composure and my face neutral. “But I guess you were too focused on your own tasks when you left this place, night after night, to use the very skills we’d given you…isn’t that right, Blaze?”

  My throat was too dry to even swallow back my shock.

  “For more than a year, I watched you leave the DEZ every weekend and I waited. I waited for the questions to surface. For things to not add up in your mind, but it seems I might have misjudged you. Maybe you aren’t different; maybe you aren’t smarter than any of the others.” Yarik shrugged. “So, I will give you one last chance. Go on, ask me why.”

  I glanced towards the door where the two guards stood with their guns at their side, listening to every word Yarik said to me. Waiting for me to say something. I looked back at Yarik. “Why?”

  She leaned in, her voice low. “Why what?”

  “Why are you training us? What do you want from us?”

  Instructor Yarik shook her head and clicked her tongue with disappointment. “You’re asking the wrong questions.”

  My jaw tightened, and behind my back I clenched my fist hard enough more blood seeped from the incision at my wrist. She was toying with me. It was almost as though she was wasting time, but why? What did she want me to ask? Why was I even here?

  I glanced down to my lap. What was the question I’d been asking myself for the last three weeks? What could I not figure out, no matter how hard I tried?

  Then it came to me. My eyes flashed up and from the smile on Yariks face, she knew I had figured it out. My breath was rushed as I asked, “Why aren’t there any Marked kids from the DEZ in Cytos?”

  It was a question I had never directly asked myself, but it was the one that covered everything I didn’t know. Where was Vic? Why, after all this time, had I not heard from her or Jayla or Em? The citizens of Cytos believed a rumour that the Marked Kids were crazy and dangerous, but the way they treated me the few times I’d been noticed—drunken idiots looking to pick a fight with the Marked freak—told me we weren’t being integrated into their society like we were being told. The citizens had never had any interaction with a Marked kid at all, only the Pur, who they accepted.

  When Em told us of her sister and the fear her story brought to the people in Cytos, I had assumed our trainers in the DEZ would be working harder to help us fit in and not be feared. I believed they had a way to allow us to live in Cytos among the people and be accepted, but that wasn’t happening.

  There was only one reason, one answer I hadn’t even noticed until right now. I was the only Marked kid they’d ever seen. I was different, which made me dangerous to them. It made them scared because they didn’t know what I would do or if I’d hurt them somehow. The last Marked they’d seen before me was painted out to be a crazed murderer who’d killed five guards and nearly burned down the school.

  Yarik smirked, nodding. “Now, you’re asking the right question.”

  Chapter 30

  Sienna

  The room was too small, and the ropes felt like they were tightening even more around me. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t speak. Yarik watched me from her seat a few feet away. Watched me panic as the truth set in.

  Everything we thought we knew was a lie.

  A single knock sounded on the door, and Yarik glanced to it quickly, nodding at the two guards. They left the room.

  She stood up and pulled the chair back against the wall. Pulling her hair up and away from her face, she secured it in the usual severe bun I’d become accustomed to. She watched herself in the reflective window as she did up the top button of her blouse before she turned back to me.

  “It seems our time alone is up, so I am going to tell you one last thing.” Her footsteps were loud and echoed across the small space. She stopped a few feet away. “If you ask the wrong questions or if you give the wrong answers, you will lose. Things will not be clearly laid out for you, and if you expect to make it out alive, I suggest you play the game smartly. I cannot help you any further than I already have, so pay attention.”

  “Help me?” I pulled at the ropes tight around me. “This is your idea of helping me?”

  Yarik narrowed her eyes. “Yes. If you take note of the details, you might see what’s hiding in plain sight.”

  The door banged open, and two guards I didn’t recognize entered. Between them, they carried a large metal chair with thick armrests and behind them…

  “Theo!” I yelled, and his head whipped up. Two guards carried him between them, and he thrashed against their hold. They had placed a gag over his mouth, so his words were undecipherable. “What are you doing with him?”

  Yarik placed a finger to her temple where she tapped it twice before inclining her head to Theo. “If you take note of the details, you might see what’s hiding in plain sight.”

  The two guards shoved Theo into the metal chair and strapped his hands to the armrests. They tied a rope around each ankle, securing him to the chair legs, before stepping away.

  “Are we ready then, Instructor Yarik?” A voice sounded from a speaker somewhere in the room.

  “Yes.” Yarik nodded to the window we couldn’t see through.

  “Then proceed,” the voice ordered, and I suddenly realized who was behind the voice: Governor Grayson.

  “Sienna, welcome to your graduation test.” Instructor Yarik twisted around to face me again, her posture back to the strict instructor I was used to. Her voice filled with authority, not warning, like before.

  “Graduation test?” I mumbled. “But we aren’t supposed to be tested for two more days.”

  “Schedules change.” Yarik shrugged. “Now. I am going to ask you a series of questions to see how much you have learned in your time here at the DEZ.”

  I blinked. A series of questions? That was my test?

  I watched Yarik’s eyes glance to Theo for only a second, but I caught it, and her words hit me again. “Pay attention.” Why was Theo here? And why was he gagged? It couldn’t be as simple as them not wanting him to answer a question for me or give a hint… it was for another reason.

  “Are you ready?”

  I released a long breath before I nodded.

  “First question. How long ago was the Peace-Making?”

  Again, I blinked. This was too easy. “One hundred and fifty years ago.”

  Yarik nodded. “And who survived the final battle before the Peace-Making?”

  “Uh, the humans and the Carbons.”

  Theo suddenly jolted; his entire body went tense and fought against the ropes, and some invisible force seemed to be coursing through him, causing pain. Then his body relaxed, and he slumped back into the chair, his breathing heavy.

  “Wrong,” Yarik said.

  “What was that? What did you do to him?” I demanded.

  Yarik shrugged and whispered low enough only I could hear. “I told you to have the right answers.”

  “Next question.” Yarik paced a few steps before me, her hands clasped behind her back. “Where did a historic piece of the Space Station that was destroyed during the final battle before the Peace-Making land?”

  I took my time, making sure I was confident I was right before I said, “The Void.”

  My eyes shot to Theo, but he was still slumped in his chair, his eyes heavy as they watched me.

  “Good. Why was a wall put up around the Void?”

  My brow scrunched. These were all simple questions; things we’d learned at a young age. Why was she asking this?

  “To preserve the piece of the Space Station, a historic monument symbolizing victory against evil and the following Peace-Making,” I stated, as though reading it straight from one of our textbooks.

  Theo’s head whipped back as his body shook and seized. Every muscle clenched tight, and his eyes watered against a pain I couldn’t see.

  “Stop it! You’re hurting him,” I screamed.

  Yarik tilted her head at me. “I’m not doing this to him. You are.”

  The invisible torture stopped, and Theo slumped back again. His body trembled, and sweat coated his brow.

  “Next question—”

  “Wait,” I nearly shouted. I needed more time to figure out what was going on. What I was missing.

  Yarik paused, her brows raised as she waited. Waited for me to ask…“If you ask the wrong questions, or if you give the wrong answers…you will lose.” That statement implied I was allowed to ask questions, if they were the right ones.

  I narrowed my eyes on her. “If this is meant to be a lesson, meant to teach me what I do or don’t know, then don’t I deserve to know why I got the question wrong?” I asked.

  Yarik smirked and gave me a bare nod of approval. “Good question.” She glanced back to the window.

  “Go ahead,” Governor Grayson said over the speaker again.

  Yarik took a few steps closer before she began. “Humans and Carbons are not the only ones who survived the war because they were not the only ones there. There were other things there that our history books didn’t mention, and many have somehow forgotten their very existence. Any idea what they might be?”

  I pressed my lips together and shook my head.

  “No is not an answer in here today,” Yarik said. “What else was there?”

  I swallowed, my lungs burning with every sharp breath I took. “I don’t know…the Ladies of the Muted Forest?”

  Theo grunted against the gag, and his body pulled against the ropes. I closed my eyes. I couldn’t watch it any longer. When the sound of him struggling stopped, I opened my eyes to find him leaned back in the chair. Blood dripped down his wrists from where the rope tying him to the chair had cut through his skin. I shook my head, my mouth fumbled open, and my eyes filled with tears. “I’m sorry,” I whispered.

  “The Ladies of the Muted Forest are essentially humans with advanced abilities, much like you are essentially human.” Yarik drew my attention back, and I aimed a heavy glare. “There was something else there, something more evil and devastating than anything else you could ever imagine. Worse than your worst nightmare, these things were a living nightmare.”

  The way she said, things, sparked my memory. “The black figure…”

  “Correct.” Yarik smiled. “Why would there be a wall around the Void?”

  I gasped. “There’s more? And they’re behind that wall?”

  Yarik nodded.

  My body began to shake. There were more of them, more of those things. I didn’t even know what they were. One of them had been haunting my dreams since that day it had chased Theo and me. If there were more…

  “Back to my questions now.” Yarik brought my attention to her. “What makes a genetic kid unique?”

  “We’re part human and part Carbon. Created, not born. Made to be perfect, to look perfect,” I answered, glancing immediately to Theo, but he hardly moved.

  “And why would someone want a human with Carbon DNA in them?”

  I shook my head. I had no idea why someone would want that. Why would anyone want something perfect for any other reason than vanity and social status?

  I didn’t even get to make up an answer before I heard the muffled screams of Theo. His neck was tense, and every vein stood out as he shook and pulled and thrashed. When it stopped, his chin slumped to his chest. He was so utterly exhausted he couldn’t hold himself up any longer.

  “Please, just stop. No more. Hurt me instead,” I cried.

  “See, that’s always been your weakness, Sienna. You care too damn much about others.” Yarik moved over to Theo and lifted his chin up, so I could see his face. His eyes were so heavy and tired he could hardly keep them open, but they found mine. “You couldn’t withstand the pain any more than he could, but you’d gladly take it if it spared him. Can you watch the ones you love in pain if it means saving their lives? Can you figure this out before he dies from the pain?”

  “Figure what out?” I screamed and pulled against the ropes. They cut my own wrists and reopened the wound at the base of my palm. Bruises surely formed underneath. “Why are you doing this?”

  “You have learned so little in your time here, Sienna. It’s only fair that we educate you one last time before we set you loose,” Instructor Yarik crooned. “If you leave us not knowing what’s out there, you risk wasting all our hard work. You become a liability to us and that can’t happen.”

  I shook my head. Why now? Why had no one ever told us any of this? Everything we thought we knew, everything the rest of the world thought they knew, was a lie.

  “Why are you here, Sienna?” Yarik asked. She paused, waiting as she cocked an eyebrow. When I didn’t respond, she moved closer, resting her hands on the armrests of my chair as she leaned in. “Why are you here?”

  I shook my head again, and Theo screamed in pain. I shut my eyes tight, screaming with him until he went silent. Tears streamed down my cheeks.

  “This is a test, Sienna, to see how much you have learned. Why are you here?” Her voice was lethal and laced with impatience.

  “That’s enough,” said Governor Grayson over the loud speakers. “She doesn’t know anything, just as the others didn’t. This was a waste of time, and whatever source you had clearly lied to you. The girl hasn’t spoken to anyone outside of this place, and if she has, she’s told them nothing of any use. She’s just as clueless as everyone else.”