“Not tonight,” I told Nina. “Not tonight.”

CHAPTER 7

SYDNEY

IT TOOK ALMOST A WEEK for the other detainees to stop moving their desks away from me or cringing if we happened to touch. They were still nowhere near being friendly to me, but Duncan swore I was making remarkable progress.

“I’ve seen it take weeks or even months to reach this point,” he told me in art class one day. “Before long, you’ll get asked to sit with the cool kids at lunch.”

“You could ask me,” I pointed out.

He grinned as he touched up a leaf on today’s still-life project: replicating the potted fern that lived on Addison’s desk. “You know the rules, kiddo. Someone else besides me has to reach out to you. Hang in there. Someone’ll get in trouble soon, and then your time will come. Jonah’s in trouble a lot. So is Hope. You’ll see.”

Since that first day, Duncan had pretty much restricted our social interaction to this class, aside from the occasional wisecrack in the halls if no one was close enough to hear. Consequently, I found myself craving art time. It was the only time anyone spoke to me like I was a real person. The other detainees ignored me throughout the day, and my instructors, whether it was in class or in purging, never failed to remind me of what a sinner I was. Duncan’s friendship centered me, reminding me that there was hope beyond this place. He was still cautious—even in this class—with his conversation. Although he rarely mentioned Chantal, the friend—who I secretly believed had been more than a friend—that the Alchemists had taken away, I could tell that her loss haunted him. He’d chat and smile with the others during meals but made a point of not talking to any one person excessively there or in classes. I think he was too afraid of risking anyone to the Alchemists’ wrath, even a casual acquaintance.

“You’re pretty good at this,” I said, noting the detail on his leaves. “Does that come from being here so long?”

“Nah, I used to paint as a hobby before coming here. I hate this still-life crap, though.” He paused to stare at his fern. “I’d kill just to free paint something abstract. I’d love to paint the sky. Who am I kidding? I’d love to see the sky. I never painted many outdoor scenes when I was assigned in Manhattan. Thought I was too good for it and would save myself for some Arizona sunset.”

“Manhattan? Wow. That’s pretty intense.”

“Intense,” he agreed. “And busy and loud and noisy. I hated it . . . and now I’d do anything to be back there. That’s where you and your broody boyfriend should end up.”

“We always talked about going somewhere like Rome,” I said.

Duncan scoffed. “Rome. Why deal with the language barrier when you can get everything you want stateside? You guys can get some sketchy apartment that you work two jobs to afford while you take classes on anything imaginable and he hangs out with his unemployed artist friends in Bushwick. Come home at night to eat Korean food with your kooky neighbors, then make love on your shabby mattress on the floor. The next day, start all over again.” He resumed painting. “Not a bad way of life.”

“Not bad at all,” I said, smiling in spite of myself. I could feel that smile fade as a pain lurched in my heart at the thought of any future with Adrian. What Duncan had described was as good as any of the “escape plans” Adrian and I used to concoct . . . and, at this moment, just as impossible. “Duncan . . . what did you mean when you said you’d do anything to be back there?”

“Don’t,” he warned.

“Don’t what?”

“You know what. I was just using an expression.”

“Yeah,” I began, “but if there was a way you could get out of here and—”

“There’s not,” he said bluntly. “You’re not the first to suggest it. You won’t be the last. And if I can help it, you won’t be thrown back into solitary for doing something stupid. I’ve told you, there’s no way out.”

I thought very carefully how to proceed. In the last year, he probably had seen others attempt to get out of here and, judging from his reaction, had watched them all fail. I’d asked him about exits a number of times, and like me, he’d never discovered where they were. I needed to find a different approach and gather other information that might lead to our freedom.

“Will you answer just two things for me?” I asked at last. “Not about exits?”

“If I can,” he said warily, still not making eye contact.

“Do you know where we are?”

“No,” he said promptly. “No one does, which is part of their plan. The only thing I’m sure of is that every level we ever go on is underground. That’s why there are no windows or obvious exits out.”

“Do you know how they get the gas in here? Don’t act like you don’t know what I mean,” I added, seeing him start to scowl. “You had to notice it when you were in solitary confinement. And they’re using it now to knock us out at night and keep us agitated and paranoid when we’re awake.”

“They don’t need any drugs for that,” he remarked. “Groupthink does a fine job of spreading that paranoia on its own.”

“Don’t dodge. Do you or do you not know where the gas comes from?”

“Come on, just because a fern’s a vascular plant doesn’t mean it’s producing carbon dioxide any differently,” he interrupted. I was taken aback, both by the weird subject change and the slight raising of his voice. “All the chemical reactions in basic photosynthesis are still there. It’s just a question of using spores instead of seeds.”