Between Burning Worlds (System Divine #2) - Jessica Brody Page 0,24

the Black Hole meant no contact with the outside world. No contact at all. Chatine had been told that even the droids didn’t set foot inside that cell.

It was thirty hours a day of absolute nothingness.

Shivering, Chatine pulled her gaze back up to the line of ripped uniforms and grime-covered bodies descending the steps in front of her. As she wound around the staircase, she caught sight of one inmate who stood far shorter than the rest. A boy. Only thirteen years old. Chatine recognized him at once. Despite his grimy blue uniform and shaved head, there was no mistaking his scrawny shoulders, the determined dimple in his cheek, and the slight limp that still lingered from his last encounter with the Policier.

Chatine let out a breath. He’s still alive.

The sight of him each morning always gave her a reason to keep walking. Keep digging. Keep living. He was a small ray of Sol-light in this dark, dark place. The only Sol-light.

The prisoners shuffled lethargically down the twisting staircase until they reached the ground floor. Chatine checked for nearby droids before pushing her way through the line and positioning herself right behind the boy whose life she’d single-handedly destroyed.

“Roche,” she whispered.

His body visibly stiffened at the sound of her voice, but he said nothing.

“Please,” she said softly. “Talk to me.”

He didn’t respond, and Chatine felt a punch of disappointment. Although, she honestly wasn’t sure why she thought today would be different from any other day. Roche hadn’t spoken to her since he’d been arrested. And she couldn’t exactly blame him for the silence. She was the reason he’d been sent to Bastille in the first place.

She sighed. “Fine. You don’t have to talk. But just listen to what I have to say. I’m sorry about what happened at the Policier Precinct. I—”

Just then, a massive body maneuvered in front of her. She could tell by the long hair and half-chewed ear that it was Clovis, an older member of Roche’s exploit crew who had taken on the unofficial role of his bodyguard.

“Roche kindly requests that you stop trying to make contact with him,” Clovis snapped over his shoulder, his voice low and gruff.

Chatine gritted her teeth and attempted to maneuver herself around him.

“Roche,” she hissed. “Please. I need to explain—”

“Get in line, Prisoner 51562,” boomed a nearby droid.

Chatine did as she was told, veering back into place behind Clovis. She stared intently at his dark shoulder-length hair before her gaze shifted to his left shirtsleeve, which had been rolled with precision.

A Vétéran.

That’s what Chatine secretly called his kind because of how long they’d clearly been on Bastille. She could always tell how much time someone had served based on the length of their hair. Every prisoner’s head was shaved before they left Laterre. And no sharp objects on Bastille meant no haircuts. After two weeks, Chatine’s own head was already covered with a soft fuzz of growth, and every time she touched it, she flinched at the strange bumpiness of her scalp.

The Vétérans were mostly older prisoners. Many of them too old to even work in the exploits. Instead, they held jobs all over the prison—kitchen staff, janitors, morgue workers. Every one of them had long hair and every one of them wore their left shirtsleeve rolled up, like a badge of honor for how long they’d lasted.

But what intrigued Chatine the most about Vétérans like Clovis was that they never spoke to one another. Never looked at one another. Never sat together in the cantine. Never even seemed to acknowledge one another.

The line of inmates progressed sluggishly forward, nearing the cantine. Chatine knew it would be only a matter of minutes before she and Roche were separated.

“Roche,” she whispered, stepping around Clovis again. “You have to believe me. I never meant to betray you. I was just trying to—”

Clovis sidestepped, blocking her with his back once again. “Roche kindly requests that you follow protocol and refrain from speaking to your fellow inmates.”

“Why don’t you let him tell me that,” Chatine snapped. She was getting very tired of always being thwarted by this clochard every time she tried to get close to Roche.

Clovis’s heavy footsteps slowed, and for a moment, his large frame looked to be coiling up, preparing to spin around and spring toward Chatine. But he didn’t. He kept walking, his neck muscles visibly straining under the collar of his prison shirt. And when he did speak again, his tone reverberated with pure malice. “Roche kindly reminds you