Wulf looks at Ragnor, who nods in agreement. Ellen is sold for a goat. The man who bought her walks up to Ragnor and hands him a token, which is nothing more than a round and smooth piece of wood, no bigger than my palm, with an insignia of some sort carved in it. The man is one of the older ones, definitely older than Ellen. He has only a few wisps of hair on his head and one of his front teeth is gone. His clothing, like everyone else’s, is a hodgepodge of hide and cloth, yet his looks a bit more ragged than the rest. Ellen is brought off the platform and the rope around her wrists given to the man. She tries to jerk away and is promptly slapped.
Pace explodes beside me, driving through the guards and trying to reach his mother. One of Ragnor’s men drives the butt of his rifle into the back of Pace’s head and he falls forward.
“No!” I cry out. I try to get to him, to shelter him from their blows as the rest circle around him and kick him and jab him with their guns. Janna shoves me aside. “Stop them!” I cry out. Ragnor wades into the melee and pushes them off while Janna grabs their ears and turns them around. I try to keep my eyes on Pace, who I am afraid will be beaten to death before Ragnor can save him.
Ellen cries as she is led away, and I hear Jilly choking back sobs. Someone jostles me, one of the men who was beating on Pace, and I stumble. As I try to right myself I catch Levi out of the corner of my eye. He stands behind Colm and Tobias, and I catch the glint of the knife in his hand. Was this their plan? Surely not. It is too much of a risk, especially for Pace.
Ragnor finally hauls Pace to his feet and both their faces are livid. Pace’s already shows the bruises from his beating and blood drips from the side of his mouth.
“Where is she?” Pace yells. “Where did he take her?”
I shake my head. “I couldn’t see.” I reach out to touch the blood on his lip, and he pushes my hand away, searching the crowd for signs of Ellen. Meanwhile Ragnor thumps his men in the chest and shoves them into place.
“Ye fools,” he yells. “He is ah-profit for all of us.”
“Is that how you see us?” I ask, and he turns his head in surprise. “Nothing more than profit? We are people, just like you and Janna. How would you feel if your mother was sold? Or your wife?”
Ragnor comes perilously close to me, so close that I can see the gold flecks in his pale blue eyes. “Ye are not to ah-speak.” Within his eyes I see doubt. I do not back down, and it is Ragnor who is the first to turn away.
I finally look up at Wulf. His eyes are on me, and he smiles evilly. There is no doubt in my mind he is enjoying this. Every bit of it. Wulf points to Tobias.
Tobias’s sale, followed by Colm’s, goes through fairly quietly. I do not understand some of the things that are bid for them, but the process goes on. Ragnor is given markers by the bidders, and Colm and Tobias are led away.
I steal a look at Levi. What has he done with the knife? As far as I can tell his hands are still bound.
Wulf points to Jilly, and Ragnor carries her up the platform and leaves her standing with her weight on one foot. Jilly is still dressed in my pants, socks, and the remnants of her dress with the shawl wrapped around her bare shoulders.
“Whuts she ah-waring?” someone yells out.
“We need to ah see whut we’re ah-buying,” someone else yells.
Wulf stands and raises his hands over the crowd to quiet them. Then he goes to Jilly and the crowd seems to take a collective breath.
“No,” I say. I look at Levi, who shakes his head. “No!” I yell again, looking at Janna. She shrugs.
Wulf rips the shawl from Jilly’s shoulders with a flourish, and the crowd cheers. Jilly flinches. I am afraid that she will crumble, but she stays strong.
“Oh God.” We need a miracle, and there is no place for it to come from. Still I pray, because there is nothing else I can do.
Wulf grabs the tail of her dress and teasingly lifts it to more yells and screams. Jilly crosses her arms and Wulf smirks. A breeze teases her hair and lifts it so that is streams across Wulf’s face and the crowd laughs.
He doesn’t like that. Not at all. He whips a knife from his belt and Jilly shrieks in fear. He lifts her skirt and with his knife quickly cuts my pants away from her body and flings them into the crowd, who fight over the pieces as if they are the last morsels of food and they are dying of hunger.
Animals. And to think I thought we were alike. They are nothing more than animals.
Wulf grabs Jilly’s dress at the nape and holds his knife to it. I thought the screams from the crowd were loud before. Now they are deafening. All because they want to shame a young girl. I look to the sky, because I cannot stand to watch what will happen next.
I see a flash of yellow. To my utter amazement, Pip swoops down over our heads, chirping madly. He quickly circles us and then soars upward, landing on the post where they tied the man who was beaten.
A shadow covers us, surprising because there was not a cloud in the sky when we came out. Wulf stops what he is doing and looks to the east. Explosions suddenly fill the air. The crowd screams and yells. Some fall to the ground with their hands over their heads. Others run, shoving weaker and smaller ones out of their way. Before I have time to react, Levi has my hands and has sliced through the ropes. Pace is next and we scoot under the platform.
“I’ve got to get my mother,” Pace says.
“Is it Lyon?” I ask.
“It is,” Levi says with a wide grin.
I can’t believe it. Lyon. I can’t help but grin back at Levi. It is a miracle, and I send up a quick thank-you like shooting an arrow into the sky. He’s here. Lyon is here to save us.
The encampment is in chaos. Levi pops up, grabs one of Ragnor’s guards, who is looking at the sky, and slits his throat before anyone sees what is happening. He drags him beneath the platform and gives Pace his rifle. The ground shakes beneath our feet and shakes again. It is rhythmic, like a thousand people or more marching in time or like the hammering in the tunnels.
“What is that?” I ask Levi.
“More than likely something Dr. Stewart has put together.” Levi replies.
Shots ring out and people scream and run in confusion. I can hear Wulf shouting on the platform and the stomping of feet.
“We’ve got to get Jilly down from there,” I say.
“I’m working on it,” Levi says. He nods to Pace. They both reach out at the same time and grab two men by the ankles. They drag them under. Levi stabs the knife into the base of his victim’s neck and then takes out Pace’s man with a quick slice of his throat. We now have three guns. I quickly look at the victims. I am not averse to killing rovers, but I don’t want Ragnor to be one of the dead. For some reason I think he can still be of help to us.
The pounding is louder now, heavier, so much so that the ground shakes beneath us. People scream in terror as shots continue to come from the Quest. I see it now, floating above, well out of range of the rovers’ guns. The sun’s rays wink off of it, almost blinding me, so I slide my goggles over my eyes. I can see two of Lyon’s men on the deck around the cabin, picking off the rovers who are trying to shoot back.
“Go find your mother and see if you can find the rest,” Levi says. “Wren and I will go after Jilly.”
“Wren?” Pace looks at me, his lovely blue eyes torn with indecision.
“Go,” I say. He nods, takes up his gun and slides from beneath the platform before he disappears into the crowd.
Levi darts his head out and back under before I can blink. “He’s using her as a shield,” he says.
“Bastard.”
“You got that right.”
“What do we do?”