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CHAPTER SEVEN

  My hand automatically goes to cover the gaping hole I’m sure is in my chest. I can’t breathe, no matter how much air I suck in. No matter how much I try to pull my gaze away from my parents, I can’t stop staring. They look as if they’re sleeping—aside from the blood. Their eyes are closed. Their hands clasped. As I watch, my mom’s head slumps so it’s lying on my dad’s shoulder.

  A lump forms in my throat and tears burn my eyes, remembering how often I’d seen them like that growing up and how I’ll never see them like that again.

  I blink them away quickly before refocusing on Mother.

  I glare at her. “How?”

  “I’m Mother.” She spreads her hands out as if to say, “Isn’t it obvious?”

  “So what?” It’s said bluntly, without any of the fear I’d normally have being faced with her like this. But I’m numb now. I just don’t care.

  She’s taken Evie from me. And my parents. What else do I have left to lose?

  She sighs. “I see everything. I know everything. Nothing escapes me here in my city.”

  “You’re not omnipotent. No matter how much your ego tricks you into thinking you are.”

  She laughs as if my comment has genuinely pleased her. “Look at you! All tough and steely-eyed. Not at all what I expected when I chose you to be a Suitor for Evelyn. It’s a pity I hadn’t known that before.” She clucks her tongue and glances at my parents. “Things might have been different had I known. You might have been of some use to me.” She shrugs. “Oh well. No use wallowing in the past.”

  She makes a gesture with her hands, and before I can think to defend myself, the two Guards are on me—one of them the Guard turned Suitor, I finally notice. One of them is on each arm and no matter how I struggle, I can’t pull away.

  Mother picks at something on her sleeve. “I’d stop struggling. The Enforcers don’t like it.”

  Confused, I cease my fight in time to see the Enforcer step from the shadows of the hallway, one gloved hand holding a silver pistol glinting in the light and pointed at me.

  I puff out my chest. “Go ahead. Shoot me. It won’t stop anything.”

  Mother chuckles. “I’m not going to kill you. I have much better plans for you.”

  “What?” I demand.

  “My daughter needs a lesson in subservience and obedience. And your Underground needs a reminder about my…omnipotence, did you say?”

  I glare at her. “So what? You’re just going to kill me in the Square? Go for it. Then everyone will see just how much of a monster you are.”

  She chuckles again. “Oh no, dear. I’m going to have much more fun than that.”

  Suddenly there’s a sharp pain in my neck, just below my ear, and I yank as far away from it as I can get.

  Or at least, that’s what I intended to do. Instead, I’m falling to my knees, the Guards still holding me between them. My whole body is on fire. It feels like the one time I went and worked the foundry with my dad and a vat of molten metal shot its contents out like a volcano and I got splattered with it. Liquefied metal cut and burned its way into my skin like acid-filled water droplets.

  I don’t know how long the pain goes on for, but I know I’m begging, pleading for it to stop, fighting against the hands and arms that restrain me. I can’t so much as budge. I must have bitten my tongue, because I taste blood in my mouth.

  Then, as suddenly as it started, it stops.

  “This night didn’t happen,” a man’s voice says in my ears. Softly. Almost cooing it.

  I know it should freak me out, him talking to me like I’m a baby, but I can’t summon the energy or want to care.

  “What you saw tonight, after you saw Evelyn in the service tunnels, never happened.”

  “What I saw tonight, after I saw Evelyn, never happened,” my mouth says without me consciously wanting to say anything.

  “You met up with her. Asked her to Couple with you, and when she said yes, you parted ways. You returned back to your apartment immediately so you wouldn’t miss curfew, and t

  ried to holo your parents to tell them the good news.”

  “I met up with her. Asked her to Couple with me. She said yes, and we parted ways. I returned back to my apartment immediately so I wouldn’t miss curfew, and t

  ried to holo my parents to tell them the good news.”

  “They didn’t answer, but it was late, so you assumed they were asleep. You decided to call them in the morning. After you heard from Evelyn about what Mother had said about the Coupling.”

  “They didn’t answer, but it was late, so I assumed they were asleep. I decided to call them in the morning. After I heard from Evelyn what Mother had said about the Coupling.”

  “You will go to see Evelyn tomorrow. After morning tea, while she is in her gardens.”

  “I will go to see Evelyn tomorrow. After morning tea, while she is in her gardens.”

  A chair squeaks and he mumbles to someone else in the room. “Anything else?”

  “No. I believe that will do nicely,” Mother says. “Thank you, Dr. Friar. Once again, you’ve proved to be most helpful.”

  The chair squeaks again and he says, louder this time. “Very good, Timothy. The guards will help you to your apartment now, so you can sleep.”

  I’m vaguely aware of my restraints being removed, but I’m completely numb. I can’t move. It’s as if my entire body is just floating in nothing, with nothing touching me. I can’t see anything. I can’t feel anything. I can’t taste anything.

  I don’t even smell the stench of my parents’ congealing blood.

  Loved this prequel? Then read on!

  RENEGADE (Tor Teen)

  Available now!

  Since the age of three, sixteen-year-old Evelyn Winters has been trained to be Daughter of the People in the underwater utopia known as Elysium. Selected from hundreds of children for her ideal genes, all her life she’s thought that everything was perfect; her world. Her people. The Law.

  But when Gavin Hunter, a Surface Dweller, accidentally stumbles into their secluded little world, she’s forced to come to a startling realization: everything she knows is a lie. Her memories have been altered. Her mind and body aren’t under her own control. And the person she knows as Mother is a monster.

  Together with Gavin she plans her escape, only to learn that her own mind is a ticking time bomb… and Mother has one last secret that will destroy them all.

  And don’t miss book two of the Elysium Chronicles (Tor Teen)

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  About the Author

  J.A. Souders was born in the heartland with an overactive imagination and an over abundance of curiosity that was always getting her into trouble. She first began writing at the age of 13, when she moved to Florida and not only befriended the monsters under the bed, but created worlds for them to play together.

  Because she never grew up, she decided she’d put her imaginary friends to work and started writing. She still lives in the land of sunshine and palm trees with her husband and their two children and is an active member of the RWA, CFRW, YARWA and SCBWI.

  Visit J.A. Souders at her website www.jasouders.com or on twitter @jasouders