crept out of the shadows and came to look at my arm. She sucked in a breath at the sight.
“That looks really painful,” she said sympathetically.
“I got shot,” I blurted, ready to cry. It burned so badly.
“Shot?”
I nodded.
She looked at me hesitantly, like maybe she should run away. “I don’t know what you did or who you are, but you don’t mess with rebels, okay?”
“Huh?”
“I haven’t been out here long, but I know that the only people who can get guns are rebels. Whatever you did to them, don’t do it again.”
In all the times they’d attacked us, I’d never considered that. No one was supposed to have a gun unless they were an officer. Only a rebel would be able to get around that. Even August had just said the Northerners were essentially unarmed. I wondered if he’d been carrying tonight.
“What’s your name?” she asked. “I know you’re a girl under there.”
“Mer,” I said.
“I’m Paige. Looks like you’re new to being an Eight yourself. Your clothes are pretty clean.” She was turning my arm gently, looking at the oozing wound as if she could do something even though we both knew better.
“Something like that,” I hedged.
“You can starve out here if you’re alone. You got anywhere to go?”
I shuddered with a roll of pain. “Not exactly.”
She nodded. “It was just my dad and me. I was a Four. We had a restaurant, but my grandma had made some rule that he was supposed to leave it to my aunt when he died, not to me. I think she was worried my aunt wouldn’t have anything or something like that. Well, my aunt hates me, always has. She got the restaurant, but she got me, too. Didn’t like that.
“Two weeks after Dad died, she started hitting me. I had to sneak food because she said I was getting fat and wouldn’t give me anything to eat. I thought about going to a friend’s house, but my aunt would just be able to come and get me, so I left. I took some money, but not enough. Even if it was, I got robbed my second night out here.”
I looked Paige over as she talked. I could see it, under the growing layer of grime. There was a girl in there who used to be very well taken care of. She was trying to be tough now. She had to be. What else was there for her?
“Just this week I found a group of girls. We work together and share all the profits. If you can forget what you’re doing, it’s not so bad. I have to cry afterward. That’s why I was hiding back there. If the other girls see you cry, they make my aunt look like a saint. J. J. says they’re just trying to toughen me up and that I better get that way fast, but it still hurts.
“Anyway, you’re pretty. I know they’d be glad to have you.”
My stomach rolled, processing her offer. In what seemed like a few weeks, she’d lost her family, her home, and herself.
And still she was sitting in front of me—a girl who’d been chased by a pack of rebels, a girl who could be nothing but danger—and she was kind.
“We can’t get you a doctor, but there would be something to ease the pain. And they could get you some stitches from this guy they know. You’d have to work it off though.”
I focused on my breathing. Even though she was distracting, the conversation couldn’t stop the pain.
“You don’t talk much, do you?” Paige asked.
“Not when I’ve been shot.”
She laughed, and the ease of it made me laugh a little, too. Paige sat down beside me for a little while, and I was glad I wasn’t alone.
“If you don’t want to come with me, I get it. It’s dangerous and kind of sad.”
“I . . . can we just be quiet for a minute?” I asked.
“Yes. Do you want me to stay with you?”
“Please.”
And she did. Without question, she sat beside me, as silent as a mouse. It felt like an eternity was passing, though it couldn’t have even been twenty minutes. The pain was becoming more severe, and I was getting desperate. Maybe I could get to a doctor. Of course, I’d have to find one. The palace would pay for it, but I had no clue how to get ahold of Maxon.
Was Maxon even okay? Was Aspen?
They were outnumbered, but they were armed. If the rebels recognized me