Recompense Books 1-3

By Michelle Isenhoff

Includes the first 3 (of 6) books in the Recompense series:

RECOMPENSE:

In a nation built upon lies, the truth is a dangerous secret.

Born into Capernica's lowest social tier, Jack Holloway gambles on the one chance available to advance—testing into Military caste. But if she fails the stringent physical standards and her friend Will succeeds, she won't be allowed to see him again for twenty years. Meanwhile, Capernican girls are vanishing. Jack's score lands her on an investigative team where she is to serve as bait. The case leads back forty-seven years to a series of high-profile cover-ups linked to Capernica's tumultuous formation. But nothing prepares Jack and her partner Ethan for the face that emerges from the lawlessness of the past. 

BETRAYAL:

The Provocation's over, but the Recompense has just begun.

Jack and her teammates have stopped the widespread abduction of Capernica's teenage girls and neutralized the operatives living among them. Now it's time to enter the portal and take the fight to the Bruelim. Even as they prepare, disgruntled Lowers hang on the brink of revolution. Their rebellion has the potential to split Capernica along its caste lines just when the nation should be pulling together against a common enemy. Meanwhile, Jack remains crazy hopeful that upcoming Military maneuvers might once again throw her into contact with her best friend Will, while Ethan, her capable Axis partner, strongly hopes they do not. Neither she nor Ethan are prepared for the testing their partnership is about to undergo. Or the revelation of their most immediate threat.

RETRIBUTION:

A slave in Brunay. A revolution in ashes.

Jack was supposed to assassinate Governor Andromeda Macron and revert Capernica back to Capernican control. But she failed, the revolution lies in ashes, and the one person she loves more than anyone in the world has betrayed her. Alone in Brunay, she becomes an anonymous cog in the vast Bruelim slave economy, where callous wardens aren't the only threat to her safety. Then Jack discovers the key to freeing Capernica from Bruel aggression forever. But even if she managed an escape, how could she leave Will in Brunay, trapped in the body of a Berkam?

The Recompense series contains high stakes, sweet romance, and unforgettable characters. Got time for a binge read? You've just found your next dystopian indulgence.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michelle Isenhoff
• Release date: Jan 18, 2019
• ISBN: 9781540163707

Michelle Isenhoff

MICHELLE ISENHOFF's work has been reader-nominated for a Cybils Award, the Great Michigan Read, and the Maine Student Book Award. She's also placed as a semi-finalist in the Kindle Book Review Book Awards, a finalist in the Wishing Shelf Book Awards, and earned multiple Readers' Favorite 5 Star seals of approval. A former teacher and longtime homeschooler, Michelle has written extensively in the children's genre and been lauded by the education community for the literary quality of her work. These days, she writes full time in the adult historical fiction and speculative fiction genres. To keep up with new releases, sign up for her newsletter at http://hyperurl.co/new-release-list.

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Table of Contents

RECOMPENSE

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

NINE

TEN

ELEVEN

TWELVE

THIRTEEN

FOURTEEN

FIFTEEN

SIXTEEN

SEVENTEEN

EIGHTEEN

NINETEEN

TWENTY

TWENTY-ONE

TWENTY-TWO

TWENTY-THREE

TWENTY-FOUR

TWENTY-FIVE

TWENTY-SIX

BETRAYAL

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

NINE

TEN

ELEVEN

TWELVE

THIRTEEN

FOURTEEN

FIFTEEN

SIXTEEN

SEVENTEEN

EIGHTEEN

NINETEEN

TWENTY

TWENTY-ONE

TWENTY-TWO

TWENTY-THREE

TWENTY-FOUR

TWENTY-FIVE

TWENTY-SIX

RETRIBUTION

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

NINE

TEN

ELEVEN

TWELVE

THIRTEEN

FOURTEEN

FIFTEEN

SIXTEEN

SEVENTEEN

EIGHTEEN

NINETEEN

TWENTY

TWENTY-ONE

TWENTY-TWO

TWENTY-THREE

TWENTY-FOUR

TWENTY-FIVE

TWENTY-SIX

EPILOGUE

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Also by Michelle Isenhoff

About Michelle

RECOMPENSE Books 1-3. Copyright © 2019 by Michelle Isenhoff. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Cover images by Steven Novak of www.novakillustration.com.

All rights reserved.

Edited by Amy Nemecek.

Candle Star Press

www.michelleisenhoff.com

RECOMPENSE

RECOMPENSE BOOK ONE

Michelle Isenhoff

RECOMPENSE. Copyright © 2018 by Michelle Isenhoff. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Edited by Amy Nemecek.

All rights reserved.

Candle Star Press

www.michelleisenhoff.com

ONE

I should have twisted my hair into a braid.

The thought flits through my head as I step into the darkness of the covered porch and pull the door closed behind me. It’s a frivolous thought. Useless, really, when you consider that breaking curfew could land me in some backwoods lockup facility where they’d shave off every long brown strand. And it wouldn’t matter that I haven’t received a single demerit since coming to live with Opal. Leniency is seldom applied to someone with a record like mine.

The porch smells of damp and rot. I pad down the wooden steps in my stocking feet, avoiding the broken one, and lace up my trainers in the dirt of the front yard. Out here, the breeze is cool, pushing off the ocean and raising goosebumps on my bare arms. I decide nighttime offers far more suitable temperatures for running than the heat of a June afternoon.

I inhale deeply. The air is laced with the spicy odors of brine and bayberries, the sturdy, gnarled shrubs that grow everywhere along the shore. Sometimes when I wake early enough, I weave through their branches down to the tidal pools and watch the lights of the fishing trawlers heading out to sea. They’re crewed by men as hardy and weather-beaten as those bayberries. Rugged, resilient, tenacious, battered—that’s the nature of life in Settlement 56, where survival means a lot of hard work and a little bit of luck. Those of us who outgrow infancy develop a certain staying power.

Settlement 56 is nearly as far north as you can travel and still remain in Capernica. The country is separated into sectors defined roughly by geography—Coastal, Mountain, Basin, and Plains—each with a set number of settlements. Only the largest cities have names. The rest just get a number. Officially, I live in Coastal Zone 56. You can’t really call 56 a town. More of a village with a few blocks of houses, a school, and the fish cannery. Anyone who doesn’t catch fish works in the cannery.

Cities hold a few more opportunities for someone like me, a Lower with keen intelligence. If I could, I’d migrate to one, but no one’s allowed to leave their area of residence without governmental permission. And usually permission is only granted in the form of a reward or punishment. Fall into favor? You move to the city. Fall out of favor? It’s a settlement for you. And for your kids. And their kids. There’s a permanency to the way things work in Capernica. Without the freedom to move, we lack the freedom to advance. Geography locks us into the same lives our parents lived. And in the settlements, we’re bottom tier.

One of the kids cries out in his sleep as I finish double knotting my laces, and I freeze. I’ve chosen my patch of ground well, behind a clump of scrub brush and out of view of the house, but the reaction is instinctive. I can’t afford to take chances with three little sets of eyes on the premises. There’s never a guarantee they’ll all be closed. And if Opal learns I sneaked out…

Actually, Opal Wildon is the kindest, most trustworthy adult I’ve ever lived with. Her punishments are fair and dealt out only when I deserve them. That’s why I’ve stayed with her so long—a whole eight years—ever since I was a skinny-legged kid of ten. I don’t want to worry or disappoint her, but she isn’t really the one setting my senses on alert.

The house has grown still again and I rise soundlessly to my feet. A shiver of apprehension grips me, but I chalk it up to the night breeze. I have to do this. Friday’s Examination is too important. Besides, I won’t be jogging alone if I can convince Will to go with me. And Will Ransom convinces pretty easily, at least when I’m the one doing the asking.

I brush the grit from the seat of my shorts and make my way across the brick-hard lawn, ducking through the scraggly undergrowth that separates our cabin from the one next door. I rap softly on the south-facing window. Will’s room.

The smudge of his face appears behind the warped glass before the sill works its way upward and he leans outside. Jack, what are you doing out there?

I smile sweetly up at his familiar face. His hair can be called brown too, but there our physical similarities end. His is as dark as walnut hulls, while mine tends to lighten to honey in the summertime. My eyes are dark; his are the crisp blue of a winter sky. His skin is olive; mine is fair. He’s strong as a bear; I have the slender lines of a doe. But we are an equal match in honesty, loyalty, and all the other traits that seal a friendship.

I’m going for a run, I say. Want to join me?

Jaclyn Holloway, are you insane?

I grin. It’ll be fun. Besides, you know I have to knock another twenty seconds off my five-mile time, and I thought dodging Greencoats might be the best way to drop it.

You’re serious. His tone is as flat as the face of the stopwatch I backlight.

You have two minutes. I’m going with or without you.

He pulls inside and I hear his sleepy grumble. I’m coming.

I knew he would. We face life best together, Will and I. He’s the peas to my carrots; I’m the smoke to his flame. We’re the perfect team. It’s always been this way between us, ever since he found me crying in his father’s cowshed all those years ago. Will is the reason I didn’t run that first night as I had so many times before.

He’s also the reason I’m so determined to run tonight.

One at a time, I pull my feet up behind me, stretching out my quads. Then I bend at the waist until I feel the tug on my hamstrings. Before I even get to my calves, Will is pushing through the window above me. His drop to the ground is surprisingly light for someone his size. He’s already got his shoes on, and as he performs a couple deep knee bends, I admire the play of moonlight across the fabric snugging his glutes.

Will yawns mightily as he stands upright and stretches his arms over his head. Where are we going?

Up the coast road to the lighthouse and back.

That’s eight miles, not five.

The first three don’t count. I won’t start timing till my muscles are good and limber.

He pauses to give me one of those looks that see all the way through me. Jack, you don’t have to do this.

Yes, I do.

No, you don’t. And neither do I. We have everything we need right here.

I chuff with impatience. We’ve hashed through this same argument at least a dozen times the last few months. There’s nothing in 56 except a slow grind toward death. I can’t stay here, Will. I refuse to remain a Lower forever. But if I can’t get my time down by Friday, this is exactly where I’ll stay, canning fish for the rest of my life.

His look softens. It’s almost sad. This is really what you want?

Desperately. Please, Will? You and I, we can change everything. For both our families.

He sighs in resignation, and I squeeze his arm.

We start along the road to the village, side by side. Opal and the Ransoms live on the farthest fringe of the settlement, around the curve of the harbor where the road diminishes into a two-track dirt trail and the wilderness encroaches right up to our yards. We pass half a dozen houses, all fringe families like us. Usually, fringe families have the most children, because they are needed to work. They’re often the most willing to take in orphans, too, just not always for the right reasons. Some families in town have it slightly better—shopkeepers and those who own a trawler or work a trade. They might even be considered Middles, in the poorest sense of the caste. But there isn’t much difference between those of us in the settlements. Not really. Long hours. Hard lives. We are all Outliers together.

Lucky lambed this afternoon, Will volunteers. His feet crunch steadily on the gravel.

Male or female?

A ram. You should bring the kids by tomorrow to see him. He’s adorable.

How about I send them instead? Will’s father usually slaughters the males when they reach full weight, and Opal trades with him for some of the meat. I know we need it, but I prefer not to know my food personally.

Pa said we’re keeping this one as breeding stock.

In that case, I’ll come too. And I’ll bring some of the jam we made over the weekend.

You and Opal take the kids berry picking?

I took them alone this time. Each June, we raid the wild strawberry patches before the black bears and raccoons get them all, but it’s becoming harder for Opal to walk over uneven surfaces. She wasn’t young when she adopted us, and now it’s falling to me to pass her knowledge of the woods on to the little ones.

Ollie and Tillman are the oldest at age eight. Twins, a girl and a boy, they were the first foundlings Opal applied for. Unlike most adoptive parents, she took them in not because she needed help but because the little ones so seldom get placed until they’re big enough to work. That’s just how Opal is. Of course, she chose a ten-year-old next—me—because she did need help with two babies, but she never made me feel like a child laborer. Then four years ago, she took in one more. Baby Hoke. Blond-haired and brown-eyed, with the roundest dimpled cheeks you’ve ever seen. He’s the light of my life.

I smile with the memory of his strawberry-smeared face. I think Hoke ate more berries than he put into the pails. But we picked enough for a large batch.

Surprisingly, Ollie and Tillman proved very helpful. They already know which greens are safe for food and in what season to look, where to dig groundnuts, how to smoke bees from a honey tree, how to soak tannin out of acorns. They’ll be able to take over foraging this fall when I’m gone. Or working.

I’ll let Ma know, Will offers. She says nobody’s jam tastes as good on a biscuit as Opal’s.

Our trading arrangement with the Ransoms works out well for both families. The bounty of the woods in exchange for meat.

It’s a mile and a half to town, but I intend to avoid the settlement altogether. Before we get to the first cross street, we veer inland and follow the old highway that runs the entire length of the cove, all the way to the lighthouse ruins on the far promontory. The highway was paved once, long ago, and connected the settlement to the cities up and down the coast. A few generations past, in an effort to save the earth, people began regulating themselves into a population decline. Now nature has the run of the place. We barely left ourselves strength to survive the war that lost us our western lands, to say nothing of maintaining our infrastructure.

The asphalt beneath our feet is crumbled into chunks, like dry bread that sat too long at the bottom of a schoolbag. Since the surface is more hazardous than the well-trodden village road, no one uses it anymore. No one but me and Will.

The ground is slightly elevated here, and the breeze still smells sweet, filtering through the cover of hardwood trees and wildflowers. A few more steps and it carries the fishy stench of the cannery. To our right, I catch glimpses of moonlight reflecting off the harbor. To the left rises the black bulk of the heights, a bony ridge of rock thrusting upward half a mile from the coastal plain. Tonight it lies like a black paper cutout against the night sky.

Did you get through all the reading Mr. Douglass assigned this week? Will asks.

I finished it up this evening. You?

Not yet.

You need help?

I’ll be wide awake when I get home, he says wryly. I might as well finish then. Think it will be on the Exam?

You know it will.

His silence lasts several strides. Maybe we should go over it tomorrow.

Schoolwork holds a high priority among settlement families, and as much time is devoted to it as possible. A high score on the Examination is the one chance we’re given to become a Bluecoat and launch into the upper castes. Will’s as smart as me, but his family needs his wage. He’s been working the docks since he turned thirteen, helping the fishing crews bring in their catch. And he spends most of his Saturdays out in the trawlers. On Sundays we always hit the books for a few hours. Except this time we don’t have till Sunday.

Can you get tomorrow off work? I ask. We’re passing the two-mile mark. Our stride is still easy and words come without effort.

I think I better. I’ll have Pa talk to Mr. Mansley.

Come for dinner. I’ll let Opal know, and she’ll keep the kids occupied.

We should probably just meet at my house.

He’s right, of course. Will has two younger brothers, Jonas and Hobart, ages fourteen and sixteen. Our chances of getting in some solid studying increase exponentially at his house. His parents are especially keen on granting us time; because Will is so much bigger than either of his brothers, they know he’s their best chance to have a Bluecoat in the family.

Bluecoat is simply the common name for a member of the military. Upon graduation, every student in the country is issued the Exit Examination, which determines if you will follow in your father’s footsteps or if you will advance to Military. It is the highest caste, offering money, opportunities, and a comfortable standard of living to those who outlive its term of duty, which seems to me a reasonable gamble. But it can only be attained by those who pass the most stringent of qualifications. Because for the past forty-seven years, ever since the Provocation, Capernica has placed such an important emphasis on national security.

Every parent hopes one of their children might pass the Exam. Entire families have been pulled into the upper echelons by one outstanding child. At the very least, it means money to purchase adequate food and refit the cabin with running water and propane—luxuries Opal hasn’t known for decades. I am determined that Will and I both achieve Military status on Friday. There are only two complications.

First, very few women qualify. Physically, the odds are stacked against us. Entry requires speed, strength, and endurance as well as the highest mental acuity. But there aren’t separate physical standards for men and women. There is one standard, difficult for men to achieve and impossible for all but the strongest of women.

Will’s a shoo-in. He’s tops in our class, right behind me, and six-foot-three of pure Adonis. The physical standards will pose no problem. My success is in far greater doubt, but no one’s more determined. Because if I don’t pass and Will does, there’s that second problem.

I won’t see him again for twenty years.

We’re approaching a spit of sand that signals the end of my three-mile warm-up. I feel strong. My breathing is regular and my muscles loose. I can no longer smell the cannery. As I pass the stack of rocks that serves as my mile marker, I press the button on my stopwatch and kick into high gear.

Will lets me lead, and I set a brutal pace. Our feet fall in tandem, and as we follow the curve of the cove, the moonlit lighthouse slides rapidly into view. It’s in ruins now, a reminder of a civilization long past. Still, a supply of dry wood is kept high in the tower where it can be lit quickly in the event of a sudden storm. More than once, I’ve seen it guide the trawlers safely home. It’s been a decade since the last casualties, since the storm that claimed Opal’s husband and three other of the town’s fishermen. That was before I came to live in the settlement. Will remembers. He’s the one who told me about it. He said nothing could have saved them. Still, knowing the lighthouse is there sets me at ease when Will goes out on blustery days.

We sprint along the promontory on which the lighthouse stands and circle its base. After turning around, Settlement 56 sprawls out in the crook of the cove’s elbow. It’s tiny and too far away to make out details, but I know what we’ll see as we draw closer: a few blocks of battered houses and a row of sleepy boats tucked into their slips for the night. The whole town is in shadow; not a single light burns except the one in the government building. The tidal reservoir that powers the cannery also generates our electricity. It’s turned off at night, the energy conserved to fully run the town during the day. Of course, the power lines don’t reach most of the fringe houses.

Will and I pass another rock marker. Three miles left. Our breath is coming too hard for conversation. That’s why I know it isn’t Will when I hear the cadence of a man’s voice. And if I can hear the speaker, he will soon hear the scrape of our footfalls.

Greencoats, Will pants. On the cutover road.

It has to be. None of the villagers would risk demerits for breaking curfew. Few of them would even have the energy for it.

The shout of warning comes a few seconds before an engine roars to life, confirming Will’s suspicions. In Settlement 56, only the government owns vehicles.

Split up, Will orders.

He veers off toward the settlement. He’s faster than I am. He’ll draw off the truck and then scoot into some alley too narrow for it to follow. I choose the opposite direction—straight into the wilderness.

I hear footsteps behind me. The beam of a flashlight bobs through the trees. One lucky swipe and they’ll know exactly who I am, and I can’t afford to be identified. By now, most of the demerits from my pre-Opal days should have dropped off my record in the courthouse, but anyone with a holoband could scan my full history from the tattoo on the inside of my wrist. And it includes more than misdemeanors. I’m not taking any chances. The punishments for eighteen-year-olds are harsher than those dealt out to kids. And now I have far more to lose.

Branches swipe my hair and snatch at my clothing. I ratchet my stride up another notch. Greencoats take some flack for not making Military, but they’re no slouches. They either just missed or they washed out and had to settle for civil patrol. Either way, they’re fast. But nobody knows these woods better than I do, except maybe Opal.

I dodge into an area thick with blackberry brambles. There’s a thin game trail that threads between them. I navigate it in the dark and soon hear the faint sound of cursing. I smile smugly. That slowed my pursuer down and gave him a few thorns for his efforts, but I can still hear him following doggedly behind me. I lead him into a muddy bog, hitting the stump, the tussock, the fallen log, and launch into the rocky rivulet beyond. So far my tail has been able to follow my footprints with that flashlight, but the streambed will erase them.

The water cuts a channel through the heights and empties onto the flat shoreline of the cove. I turn upstream and follow the rocky bank for half a mile before dodging up a narrow trail that brings me to the top of the gorge. From there, I can see the flashlight beam swinging in wide arcs about a quarter mile back. The Greencoat has lost my trail. With a smile of satisfaction, I dodge into a dense pine forest where a carpet of needles ensures that he will never find it again. I slow my stride back to a steady jog, letting my heartrate drop and my breathing grow even.

Will is waiting for me at our meeting tree. It’s just an old sycamore that’s grown to enormous circumference, dwarfing the surrounding foliage, but it has always offered a destination away from the eyes of our younger siblings. We staked a claim to it years ago by carving our initials into its trunk. I knew he’d be waiting here.

They see you? he asks.

No. You?

The headlights raked me just as I rounded a corner, but I was moving pretty fast. I don’t think they got a good look.

I grab his hand and squeeze it hard. The gesture says everything for me: Thank you for watching my back. We’re unconquerable together. I’m so glad you’re on my team. But my heart holds far deeper thoughts that I don’t quite know how to communicate. Hopes that reach past friendship into a future I can’t quite see. Dreams that include Will long years down the road. A home. Perhaps a family. These feelings have snuck up on me, and I don’t know if Will shares them. He’s never so much as kissed me.

My anxiety subsides as we traverse the familiar path home, soothed by the scent of pine, the springy give of woodland soil, and the distinct sounds the wind makes as it pushes through different kinds of leaves. I know every tree, every path. The sap of the forest flows through my veins. Here, I am most alive.

It takes only minutes to arrive in Opal’s yard. I wait on the dark porch—skipping over the rotten step—until Will fades into the underbrush between our houses before I duck inside. I dip a cup in the bucket of water that always sits by the back door and drink my fill. Then I wipe down with a scrap of wet flannel, change into an old T-shirt, and lie across the bed beside my little sister. The night air dries my skin.

I check my stopwatch. It’s now ticked seven minutes over the time I hoped to beat. I’d been joking about running from the Greencoats. They certainly gave me a good workout, but I have no idea how far or how fast I ran.

Despite my gamble, I’ll be going into Friday’s test without the surety that I can beat the standard.

TWO

My muscles cramp all through breakfast. I rub at them discreetly, trying to work out the kinks, but nothing’s going to loosen them like the walk to school. I wrestle down my impatience as Opal flips another few acorn cakes onto Tillman’s plate and slathers them with maple syrup. I’m responsible for getting the twins to and from school each day, and there’s no rushing their morning routine.

It’s your last day, Opal tells me, as if I have somehow forgotten. Her eyes grow distant, straining to see back through five decades to her own graduation. Everything changes tomorrow. Once you take the test, you’ll be considered an adult, free to make your own decisions. I’ll have no hold on you any longer.

But she will. Opal will always be tied to me in a unique way. I want to tell her thank you for taking me in off the street. For giving me a home. For treating me with love and showing me how to eke out a living from the earth so I never need hunger again. But I don’t. I’m not one for emotional displays. I do smile at her, however. Straight into her eyes. I think she catches most of my thoughts.

Ollie watches the exchange through bright brown eyes. She brings her empty plate to the basin and says, Tell us how you got us again, Opal, and turned us into your family.

It’s her favorite story, and for good reason. There aren’t too many happily-ever-afters in Settlement 56. I gauge Tillman’s progress on those acorn cakes and decide he won’t down them before Opal can finish her telling of it, so I sit and wait, sweeping up the last drips of syrup on my own plate with my final bite.

Opal eases her frame into an empty chair, still holding the wooden spoon she used to stir the batter, and scoops the little girl onto her lap. There isn’t much to it, Olive. One day I just said to myself, ‘I’m tired of rattling around in this house all by myself. It needs the sound of children in it.’ So I went off to town, straight to the government building, and scrolled through their database. And wouldn’t you know it? There were the two most beautiful babies I’d ever seen, all pink and round-cheeked. So I filled out the paperwork, and within a few days I was able to bring you home.

Tillman is listening now, too, chewing slowly to hear over the sound of his eating. His hair gleams the exact color of Ollie’s. It’s funny how alike we look, all shades of fair even as the Ransoms are all shades of dark. Tell how we were so naughty, Tillman says.

Not naughty, Opal corrects. Busy. Two babies opening cupboards, emptying baskets, and chewing on everything you found. You were partners in mischief. Tillman grins as she approaches his favorite part. One day I slipped outside to fetch a bucket of water. I was gone three minutes, just to the well and back, but by the time I got inside, Tillman had emptied a whole bag of dried beans onto the kitchen floor and Ollie upended my yarn basket. You must have batted that yarn around like a pair of kittens, because I could hardly get to you without tripping over strings. That same day, I went back to town to find myself some help.

And that’s when we got Jack! Ollie exclaims.

That’s when we got Jack. The creases around Opal’s eyes grow moist as she looks at me again. You’ve never seen such a skinny, sad child. Dark brown eyes as big as her face, a tangle of long hair. She was a wild one, I was told. A runaway. If I chose that one, I was in for a heap of trouble. I chose her anyway, and look at her now.

The air in the kitchen is growing too thick for my tastes. Opal’s never told the story quite that way before, and Ollie and Tillman are both peering at me curiously, trying to see what’s so special about their big sister. Nothing, I want to tell them. Nothing at all. I’m just about to herd them to the washbasin when Hoke bursts through the door in his raggedy nightshirt and dives straight for my lap.

The day suddenly grows brighter. I scoop him up and squeeze him close, inhaling his earthy little-boy smell. I would do everything in my power to protect the twins and see them grow up safe and well. But Hoke? I’d give up my life. Since the day Opal brought him home, we’ve shared a special bond. He refused to take his bottle from anyone but me. I was the one he cried for. I rocked him to sleep at night. Maybe it’s our age difference. Maybe it was simply the peace of knowing I was wanted before he came along that let me open my heart up to him so wide. I don’t have any children of my own, but I can’t imagine the bond could be any stronger than the one I share with Hoke.

I run a hand over coarse blond hair that sticks up in every direction and finish Opal’s story. And four years ago, we decided we needed a little more commotion in our lives.

Opal chuckles. We certainly got that.

Hoke turns on my lap and takes my face between his pudgy hands so I’m forced to look directly into his eyes. I wanna to go to school today, Jack.

Not today, buddy. Next school year you’ll be old enough.

But I want you to bring me.

I think I know what this is about. One of the twins must have told him I’ll be going away soon, because he’s been trying every trick he knows to get me to stay. My heart is breaking as I tell him, I can’t promise you that, Hoke. I may not be here in the fall. But I do know that no matter how far I go or how long I’m gone, I will always, always come back.

His eyes are solemn as he looks into my face. You promise?

I tuck him under my chin and snuggle him close. Cross my heart.

Opal rises from the table. You kids need to get going. Tillman, wash the syrup off your face. Ollie, bring me your blue hair ribbons.

As she gives orders, Opal drops her wooden spoon onto the floor. Batter splashes over the cracked linoleum. She stoops to retrieve it, but her spine won’t bend quite that far anymore. In the settlements, age sixty-seven looks more like eighty-five. I scoop up the spoon and toss it in the basin then wipe up the mess with a rag. I’m glad Opal still has Hoke to keep her company and help out around the house while the rest of us are at school. If I fail to attain Military, what will happen to the children when Opal grows too feeble to care for them?

As the twins finish their preparations, I say to Hoke, Come with me to the tide pools.

His grin widens and he hops off my lap, tugging me behind him. It’s bittersweet, seeing his enthusiasm for something so simple and knowing we could have few of these moments left. I vow to make an extra effort to enjoy each remaining day with my baby brother.

We string our way through the tall grass and bayberry bushes to the rugged shoreline. The tide is out, exposing the seaweed clinging to the rock. I can smell its sharp scent. Sand collects in the crook of the cove where the village shelters, but out here on the fringe, the currents sweep the coast bare. And when the tide goes out, tiny sea creatures are left in their hollows.

Hoke pads down to one of the pools and peers into its depths, poking at something with a stick. He looks like a street waif in his bare feet and overlarge shirt. I stand over his shoulder. The pool’s a maelstrom of color: green sea lettuces, strands of brown rockweed, and red fronds of dulse. Tiny branching corals wave in the current Hoke stirs up. He pokes at a green anemone and then a red one. Look, Jack! A starfish!

Hoke? Will’s voice carries to us, then his head pops over the top of a rock. Jack?

I wave. It’s not unusual to run across Will out here, hiding in some recess and watching the everlasting motion of waves spending themselves against the shore. He loves the ocean as I love the woods. The spray of salt, the shifting colors of the surf, marine life in all its forms—they are his life breath.

Hoke and I round the corner of the rock and join Will. He doesn’t look any worse for our nighttime escapade. Sleep well? I joke.

Like a baby. He smirks. Come see what I found.

He leads us closer to the pulsing waves, into the intertidal zone where the land is underwater more than it is exposed and covered with a slick layer of algae. Look there.

He points to a deep crack where a fuzzy harbor seal pup lounges in the still water. Speckled and doe-eyed, it’s adorable.

Hoke dives for it immediately, but Will grabs him by the back of the shirt. Not so close, buddy. That’s his mama, on those rocks just there. I’ve been watching her. She’s come back once to let him nurse then took to the water to find herself some breakfast.

How long have you been out here? I ask. We didn’t even get home till well after one o’clock.

An hour. Maybe two. He shrugs. I do my best thinking out here.

That I can understand. We both have plenty to contemplate these days.

Will turns to my brother. Hoke, you think you can keep an eye on this fella today? Just until the tide reaches him again?

Hoke nods silently, his big eyes eager.

Stay back, Will cautions, and let his mama do the work. Just keep an eye out for eagles or coyotes who might like an easy meal.

I can do it.

I eye Will gratefully. Hoke is no stranger to woods or to shore. Now he’ll have something else to think about besides my looming absence.

Will ruffles his hair. I knew I could count on you.

We have to get to school, I say. Hoke, help me collect a handful of mussels to take back to Opal.

Hoke pulls the hem of his shirt into a makeshift basket and Will helps me fill it.

When Hoke and I return, the twins are gathering up their books and their lunches. I give Hoke an extra hard hug and a kiss on top of his spiky head. I’m herding the others out the door when Opal hands me a basket. Will you see that Mrs. Sweeny gets this?

She and Mrs. Sweeny were schoolmates together, years ago, and Opal likes to send her bits of food—blueberry muffins, a tin of fresh-picked raspberries, a sack of dandelion greens. I don’t know why she bothers. Whatever character traits Mrs. Sweeny once possessed that drew Opal to her in friendship have been shed like the hair of a hound. And it’s not like she can’t afford to buy her own, married to Councilman Sweeny, the highest official in the town. But I agree to deliver it, and we set off.

Will and his brothers are waiting for us on the road in front of their house as they do every morning. Jonas is slender and awkward, still only halfway through the metamorphosis that will spit him out a man. Hobart is thicker and broader and darker. He looks more like Will. I fall into step beside them. We don’t say much during the walk to town. Will and Hobart are naturally reserved, and this year Jonas has put some distance between himself and the twins who clown on ahead, collecting rocks and pinecones and the broken shells of fallen eggs. I ask Jonas a few questions about the new lamb, but the conversation doesn’t last long, and we walk the rest of the way in silence.

As we near town, the road opens up and buildings rise out of the rock and sand. The cove looks so beautiful in the morning, with the sun rising from a hazy ocean and the light too weak to point out any flaws of age and decay. The pastels of sunrise still linger in the shadows, but by the time we arrive, the rocky arms protecting the bay have begun to take on solidity. At the end of the northern point, I can see the lighthouse rising like a pale pink finger.

The cannery is the first building we pass, sitting at the outskirts of town like a child no one wants to play with. It’s a bully among buildings, the one that snatches away the lives of those who pass each day within its walls. Already the machinery has been set in motion, the first shift well underway. Beside it sits the tidal pond, a three-acre pockmark where rock and sand have been blasted away to capture water at high tide and release it at low. The current enters and empties through a narrow channel, and as it ebbs and flows, it turns the turbines that run our settlement. It’s ugly, but it does the job.

After the cannery, we pass into the waterfront district with its few shops and stalls. We’re far too late to see the trawlers leave their slips. The marina lies empty, its lonely pilings poking down into the mud like a row of sawn-off stumps. An ocean ship lies at anchor, a rusty bilge of a tub, bringing trade goods and news from distant settlements. The waterfront isn’t much of a metropolis, but we can trade for cloth and shoes and other things we can’t make or find in the woods.

The houses fan out from the water, two score of them, all bigger and in better condition than our cabin. But the construction’s the same—clapboards sawn from local timber at the mill outside of town. Some have a small addition or a lean-to on one end. Most feature a front porch for sitting. All of them have turned silver and mossy, weathering to match the shoreline.

We aim our steps toward the school, located in the residential neighborhood. It’s the biggest building in town, aside from the cannery, and built of dull yellow brick. It doubles as a town hall and houses every public event that can’t take place outdoors. But I turn off before we reach it. The others go on as I climb the steps to the only other brick building in town—a large house that was once grand, with tall pillars supporting the portico roof and a commanding view of the harbor—and knock on the door.

Mrs. Sweeny answers, all pinch-faced and scowling. What do you want?

I hold up the basket. Opal asked me to deliver this.

She takes it without a word and shuts the door in my face.

Why does she have to be so unpleasant, I wonder as I descend the steps to the street. She’s like a paper wasp nest, dry, brittle, and full of venom. No wonder half the kids in town are frightened of her.

I enter the school and head straight for the library. Miss Whaley is already there, dusting the shelves and setting a fresh bouquet of wildflowers on her desk. She’s youngish, mid-thirties, and wearing a lavender dress of some gauzy material. Her smile radiates warmth. After the wasp nest, entering the library is like stumbling onto a clover field buzzing with honeybees.

Good morning, Jack. How is the wilderness this morning?

Miss Whaley always asks. I think she wishes she lived on the fringe instead of in the center of town. She always likes it when I share details of my walk to school. She calls the morning recital my canvas, as if I’m painting her a picture. I always take pains to make it a good one. The beach roses are in bloom, both pinks and whites. Their scent lingers in the stillness before the wind kicks up. I spotted a tiger swallowtail butterfly, and there were two sea lions lounging on the rocks outside of town.

Beautiful. She sighs.

You know, you could walk out for a visit anytime and see it for yourself.

She nods. I think I’d like that.

She never will. The invitation is a daily exchange, as well. She always accepts but never acts on it.

What can I help you with this morning, Jack?

I set my books down on one of the tables and study the cover of the top one, History of the World. You know I take the Examination tomorrow, I begin.

Of course she knows. She’s spent hours helping me prepare for the written portion. She’s also the one who gifted me a stopwatch when she learned how seriously I was training for the physical half.

She nods. You’re well-prepared.

I guess I’m just wondering if you have any last-minute advice.

The librarian’s smile falters, so slightly I almost miss it. She thinks for several seconds before she speaks. Yes, I do: Remember your audience.

My audience?

She steps nearer and sinks into the chair beside my books. Her voice drops, as well. I mean, think about who’s administering this test. Who will be grading it.

That’s easy enough. The government.

Write exactly what they want to hear.

Except for being pitched low, her words are inflected normally. Her smile is the same. But the intensity with which she holds my eyes signifies some kind of warning.

What they want to hear, I repeat.

Exactly. Don’t deviate. Don’t convey your own opinions. Simply spit back at them what they have been teaching you all these years.

Now I catch her meaning.

Our library doesn’t have many books. Partly because we’re a small settlement without a lot of funding, but mostly because, after the Provocation, education was placed under strict governmental control. All curricula is government issue, and literature in particular has been heavily censored. Only books deemed safe are allowed. It was Miss Whaley who helped me recognize that safe is usually code for dusty and dull.

Four years ago, when the Examination first began to trouble my thoughts and I asked Miss Whaley for help, we arranged irregular meetings at her office after school. Her ability to dig up information proved invaluable. But after a time, she began introducing me to books that didn’t appear on the school shelves.

I remember the first time she placed one in my hand. It was a beautifully illustrated copy of Grimm’s Fairy Tales. I’d never seen a book printed in color, and the images flew off the page at me like the dragonflies that congregate by the stream, all shiny and iridescent. Dragons, fairies, castles, talking animals, and men and women in beautiful and ridiculous clothing. I was mesmerized.

This must be our secret. You can never let anyone know I have this, Miss Whaley had said.

Why? It seemed to me a marvelous thing that should be shared.

There is a penalty for owning it.

Again I could not understand. But why?

She explained about censorship, but I still couldn’t make heads or tails of it. I simply kept her secret and she rewarded me with more stories—The Iliad, Romeo and Juliet, To Kill a Mockingbird, Don Quixote, Robinson Crusoe, Charlotte’s Web, David Copperfield, Moby Dick, Lord of the Rings, Arabian Nights, and so many, many more. Now, however, I understood the distinction she was referring to. I must continue to keep our secret and avoid any mention of the ideas these stories have generated.

The Examination isn’t a test of individuality, Miss Whaley tells me. As you formulate your answers tomorrow, you’ll have to disregard your own heart and think within the box from which you’ve been taught. I pray I’ve shown you the difference.

I leave the library, my mind vaguely troubled by her implications.

The entire day has a strange, detached feel. I can’t quite believe that after tomorrow, I won’t be coming back to this place where I’ve spent so much of my life. At least not as a student. I plod through each class, taking finals and handing in completed assignments, feeling as if I’m stuck on the closing chords of a song I’ll never sing again. When classes are done and I’ve said my good-byes, those final strains thin out, grow distorted, and hum into nothing.

***

After dinner that evening, I grab my schoolbooks and head over to Will’s. He’s waiting for me at the kitchen table, along with a plate of honey-roasted hickory nuts his mother left for us. Will’s been released from evening chores to study, and we make a good attempt at it, reading through the last week’s worth of material that Mr. Douglass assigned. But after two hours, I feel like we’ve only sifted through a few grains of sand with the entire shoreline spread before us. If we haven’t filed this information into our heads by now, we never will.

I close the cover of my book and fling it onto the pile. Let’s go for a walk.

Will looks up in perplexity. This is our last chance to study.

This could be our last night together.

As I say it, I’m hammered with the realization that time is short, that I haven’t cherished it as it flowed through my fingers. Now I’m left with only a handful. I don’t want to waste another minute with my nose pressed to a book.

Please?

Military service requires a twenty-year commitment and holds to stringent regulations that allow for no contact outside Military caste apart from immediate family for the duration. Marriage is allowed after the term expires, when soldiers are retired from active duty and funneled into desk jobs among the Military and Upper castes. The only exception to this rule is that Bluecoats are free to marry other Bluecoats sooner. It’s encouraged, actually, based on the belief that two perfect specimens will combine to form more soldiers for Capernica. The woman, of course, is resigned from active service to raise children.

More than half the women accepted into Military eventually go this route, making the caste even more heavily dominated by men. I don’t know if I’d ever consider such a step. I don’t know if Will would even ask me to. But I do know I can’t wait twenty years to see him again.

Will weighs my request for a dozen heartbeats then gently sets his book aside. I found a new patch of blackberries, he says. Bigger than the old one.

We take a pail with us, and Will leads the way up the road and into a stand of hardwoods. About half a mile through the woods, the trees open into a meadow inundated with sunlight. I suspect that’s where he’s leading me. Food grows there aplenty, but the most direct route to the meadow passes through a cemetery. The newest grave is over a century old, and the wilderness has grown up around it, reclaiming the ground for its own. The granite headstones have been swallowed by vines and moss and underbrush, so you don’t even know you’re in a boneyard until you’re stepping on graves.

I stop dead on the path.

Will turns around. It’s just a few hundred feet farther.

I shake my head and refuse to move.

He looks at me curiously. Are you still scared of the haints? I thought by now you’d outgrown that fear.

I haven’t. But it’s not the haints that frighten me. I’ve never shared the real reason I avoid the graveyard. Not with Will. Not even with Opal. That secret remains locked up tight, too painful to loosen.

Will sighs. All right. We’ll go around. It’s the same patient tone he uses when the milk cow gets ornery.

I let him lead me in a wide circle, and then we’re in the meadow with the westering sun pouring down gold into its jewel-bright circle. Purple meadow sage, black-eyed Susans, and the white spears of pokeweed all lift their heads. So much color, surrounded by an emerald ring of trees. And there in the shadow of the forest I spot a late patch of wood anemones. Even though they’re poisonous, they’re my favorite flower. They spring up immediately after the snow melts, delicate white blooms in a bed of early green.

Will’s right. The berry patch is thick and sweet. We fill the pail and, as the shadows grow long and a cool mist begins to rise from the ground, we climb the ridge until the world we know spreads out before us. The cove, the settlement, the edge of Will’s great big ocean. We stuff our bellies and watch dusk infiltrate the meadow and edge out the colors. Here in the wilderness, we don’t have to worry about curfew or Greencoats. There’s only us.

My old fear strikes from a new angle. Will, you are going to take the physical portion of the Exam, aren’t you?

The written half is required, the data used for analysis by the government. On occasion, someone with a crazy high score might get picked up by the private sector, provided all the permissions work out. But the physical half is optional. What if I pass but Will doesn’t? Achieving Military status has never ranked as highly with him as it does with me. What if he doesn’t even bother to take the test?

The scenario leaves me breathless. If only one of us makes it, regardless of which one, we will still spend the next two decades apart.

Yeah, I’m taking it.

And aiming to pass? He could fudge it.

His gaze focuses far out to sea. I’ll pass.

If he’s intentional, I have no doubt of it. His answer lays that fear to rest.

I begin to shiver in the twilight, as much from the great black gulf of the future as from the cooling night air. Will throws an arm behind my back and I lean into the warmth of his body. He smells of pine and wood smoke and the faint muskiness that is Will. The fit is right, the feel safe and familiar.

If this is to be my last night in Settlement 56, this is exactly how I want to spend it.

THREE

Everything has changed. I can sense it as soon as I enter the school the next day. Will and I have walked here together. Alone. I grabbed his hand early on and haven’t let go. It gives us the illusion that we’re in this together, but we both know it isn’t so. We each have an individual battle to fight this morning, and this time neither of us can help the other.

Even the school has transformed since yesterday. The walls are stripped, hallways bare, and classroom doors locked. Only graduating students congregate inside. We find the testing location in the gymnasium. Twenty-three desks have been placed in rigid rows before a table of stern-looking officials—five men and one woman. All wearing the formal blue dress uniforms of Military and fully armed with intimidation. There will be no cheating on this test. Will and I slip into the back row.

Within a few minutes, every desk fills up. At precisely eight o’clock, one of the men at the table stands and addresses us. Good morning, students. My name is Colonel Paxton, and I will be administering the Examination this morning.

Another of the men begins passing out pencils and booklets—thick stacks of paper fastened together and placed upside down on each desk. Low tech, but holoware simply isn’t available in 56.

You will be given exactly four hours to complete the written portion of the Examination. When you finish, bring it to the table at the front of the gymnasium. At that time, those of you who do not wish to attempt the physical half will be dismissed. Those who intend to continue must report back to the table before two o’clock, when registration for the physical portion will close. You may break as needed between events, but all testing must be concluded by five o’clock.

I shoot a look at Will. Almost everyone will attempt the physical exam, even those with no chance at passing, because it is the one hope that has been held out to us since childhood. Even a slim chance at improving life within 56 is a chance worth taking.

Colonel Paxton raises his holoband and watches several seconds tick off. You may begin.

Will throws me a wink and a half smile and we pick up our pencils.

I page through the entire test booklet before starting. The math, science, logic, and economics sections look fairly straightforward. Most of the questions are fact-based, leading to only one correct answer. Simple deduction or memory. Easy. I’ll finish those later. My early energy I’ll put toward the history essays, which are far more subjective. Keeping in mind Miss Whaley’s advice, I tackle the first topic: What was the Provocation?

Even the youngest children in Capernica could answer this one. It is the singular event that changed North America forever. One that cost countless lives in the past and still haunts our future. Because it always begs the question: Could it happen again?

I begin writing:

The Provocation is still a great mystery. Forty-seven years ago, the North American Republic suffered the loss of tens of thousands of men, women, and children. They simply vanished, with no explanation and no trace. The disappearances included a broad spectrum of the population, but the most influential sectors of society took the greatest hit—university graduates, the heads of companies, politicians, celebrities—the wealthiest, smartest, and most prominent individuals in the culture.

This discrepancy has given rise to a great deal of speculation as to the cause and method of the disappearances, from logical to outrageous. Some experts claim the Provocation was the plot of a sophisticated terrorist organization. Others believe it could have been aliens or some kind of flesh-eating virus. Others claim it was instigated by foreign powers, either economic or military. Still others blame the former governmental system, claiming it turned against its own people in clandestine homeland operations. My own personal speculations run in this direction. But due to a lack of hard evidence—bodies, weapons, motives, or perpetrators—answers remain inconclusive.

The second essay follows on the first: Explain the Recompense and the rise of Capernica. Again, I could probably answer in my sleep, but I take a great deal of care to answer as Miss Whaley advised, with plenty of credit going to those currently in charge. My answer is almost sycophantic.

Capernica arose out of the chaos that followed the Provocation. Within months of the disappearances, the economy collapsed. Commerce came to a standstill. Public health care imploded. And in the months that followed, countless more lives were lost due to disease, food shortages, and unsanitary conditions. Those who survived lived at a subsistence level.

The waning Continental Government proved shamefully ineffective in the face of such widespread tragedy. This inability justified the Recompense. In a desperate bid for survival, a small group of patriots led by Governor Andromeda Macron seized power in a nearly bloodless revolution. The last North American president, Ichabod Dempsey, was arrested, tried, and executed for complicity in the Provocation. His administration was disbanded and the Capernican Council, under the direction of Governor Macron, established in its place. But one could argue that the Recompense is still ongoing, that the revolution was only the first phase. That the restructuring of Capernican society using a new caste system was a necessary extension of establishing order. And that to this day, the Macron government continues the work of the Recompense, remaining vigilant and leading the way in reforms aimed at a permanent solution against further attacks.

The new system isn’t perfect, with its long list of rules, restrictions, and reorganization. I’ll be the first to admit that. But even I, who can’t wait to leave Settlement 56, grant that it’s better than the alternative. I’ve heard the stories from the old ones, from those who survived the devastation. I’ve seen their fear that it might be repeated. I understand why the system is in place. I’m just doing my best to work its single leniency to my advantage.

The rest of the essays follow this same vein, asking for a solid understanding of Capernican organization, law, penal system, and so forth. It’s easier than I thought it would be. We’ve been drilled in this stuff for years, not to mention my own personal experiences. After the essays, I whip through the other subjects without much trouble. A glance at Will shows him in deep concentration, but he knows this material too. We’ve studied it by the hour, pulling high marks in school. I’ve no doubt we’ll both pass. I rise, turn in my packet, and let myself focus on the next half of the Examination.

Relief washes over me, followed by a powerful sense of trepidation. The easy half is over. The true challenge remains.

I take my lunch outside to the bench where Will and I eat every day and pace in small, restless circles. He joins me twenty minutes later. How’d it go? he asks, calmly seating himself in the center of my orbit.

I shrug. The written part never concerned me.

He opens his sack lunch and takes a bite from a hard-boiled egg. I think I did okay.

I snort. Will could have passed that test unconscious. Besides, there’s a measure of leeway in the intellectual half. You need only pull a 95 percent. Tough, but it leaves the door open for those who’ve taken the time to prepare for it. And Will definitely has. The physical standards are far more exacting.

I’ve hardly eaten any of my lunch. I know I need the sustenance to finish the strenuous tasks ahead, so I force down some carbs and protein. But the muscles in my throat are too taut to swallow, and my stomach feels like it’s about to stage a revolution of its own. Instead, I pace. And focus on getting my entire bottle of water into my system one sip at a time.

Will sees my hand shaking as I raise the bottle to my lips. He catches me on my next circle and pulls me down beside him. Relax. You’re going to burn off any calories you manage to get inside you.

I round on him with more force than I intend. Easy for you to say. This won’t even be a challenge for you. I’m sorry the minute I snap out the words. The system, the standards, the Examination—none of them are Will’s fault.

As usual, my outburst doesn’t even faze him. You’re ready, Jack. You’re the strongest, fastest girl in the settlement. You’re better than most of the boys. You’ve got this.

And what if I don’t?

There. I’ve said it. The question that has nagged at me mercilessly. The conundrum that has haunted me ever since I realized I can’t survive without this kind, gentle man at my side.

Will tugs me closer, right onto his lap, and tucks me against his chest just as I hold Hoke. His arms fold around