Page 119 of The Ruler
“No, he won’t be sleeping with me,” she assured me. “At least not that I know of.”
“Good.”
I was walking outside to look for Khan when I heard hushed voices around the corner of the house. Normally, councilwomen don’t eavesdrop. We’re supposed to be above that sort of disgraceful behavior, but I froze to the ground when I recognized Magni’s voice and got an eerie tingling sensation in the back of my neck.
“You were there, what do you mean you don’t remember where it was?” Magni said.
“I was so occupied with bringing Christina home that I didn’t think about where the crossing was.” The voice was easily recognizable as Boulder’s. “Just tell me again, what was the name of the town?”
“Why do you need to know?” Magni hissed, low. “Your wife is here now, isn’t she?”
“Just fucking tell me,” Boulder hissed back.
“Fine. The town is called Northgate, and you remember the name of the guy, right?”
“Yeah, Jackass Johnny. Who can forget his skinny ass?”
I didn’t need to hear more. With a racing heart, I moved away considering the revelation. The men had a way of getting into the Motherlands. That’s how Magni had kidnapped Athena and how Boulder had retrieved Christina.
As a member of the Council I had sworn to serve the Motherlands, and the passage Boulder and Magni had whispered about was a security risk if there ever was one.
There was only one thing to do but I needed to think this through and come up with a plan on how to do it right.
CHAPTER 27
Showers and Massage
Khan
Pearl and I stayed and had lunch with the others – real food for the men, green stuff for the women. Excited that the project was coming along, everyone was in a good mood – except Pearl, who for some reason seemed tense and withdrawn. I knew her well enough to recognize that something was troubling her. Trying to think back, I searched for something I might have said wrong, but nothing came up; she had seemed genuinely happy about my decision to name the school after her.
So why is she cooler to me than she was this morning?
Archer went over a list of the ten boys he had chosen for the school, and as I had requested they were all on the older side. I may have been open to many of Pearl’s ideas, but ultimately, I still wanted the girls to fall in love with my boys over the next three years and hopefully want to stay. Again, the idea of young love and teen pregnancies gave me a surge of excitement. One could only hope.
“So, what are their names again?” Pearl asked Archer.
He projected the first file up in front of us and the hologram of a boy showed up. He looked fit and had large green eyes and straight dark hair. “This is Storm. He’s thirteen and from the east coast.” Another boy came up. “This is Hunter; he’s the boy you requested.” Archer looked at Pearl, who leaned forward.
“So this is Willow’s twin brother? The boy we knew as Jeremy before he came here?” Pearl asked softly.
“Yes, that’s him. But he has no idea he has a sister and we haven’t told him yet. None of the boys know that there will be girls at their new school. All they’ve been told is that they’ve been selected for a new experimental school, and I think we should expect some of them to be resistant to coming here,” Archer informed us. “Being uprooted from your friends without knowing where you’re going isn’t easy for anyone.”
“Good point, Archer.” Pearl turned to Kya. “But the girls all know, right?”
“Yes, the girls have been told they are selected to live in the Northlands, and they’ve been assured that they will be safe and will make lots of new friends.”
“Still, I predict they’re going to be scared when they arrive,” Christina said and looked around the table. “Maybe you guys could all shave to look less intimidating.”
“Not a fucking chance,” Magni muttered and I silently agreed.
“I’ll shave,” Boulder said and received a grateful smile from Christina.
“But I won’t,” Archer said. “I doubt my stubble is scary to them.”
A hologram of a third boy showed up; he was blond and very handsome, with large blue eyes. “This is Solo. His full name is Solomon, named after King Solomon, and he’s fourteen years old and excels in physical agility and strength.”
After that came Nero, Nathan, Oskar, Sultan, William, Plato, and Nikola.
