Total pages in book: 137
Estimated words: 132491 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 662(@200wpm)___ 530(@250wpm)___ 442(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 132491 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 662(@200wpm)___ 530(@250wpm)___ 442(@300wpm)
I nod, his unspoken advice leaving me unsettled: Don’t ask questions.
He’s been good to me so far, though, and since he’s in a position of power, I don’t want to make him angry. I paste on the placid expression I perfected on Lochlan.
“Thanks. It seems pretty great here.”
It’s my first full day, and so far I haven’t seen any opportunities to escape the island. It may take me a long time to get away, and I have to take care of myself in the meantime. I can’t settle the score with Lochlan if I get eaten by a wild animal in a remote jungle.
“Better now that you’re here.” His gaze roves up and down my body. “Come show me more of what you’ve got, Briar Hollis.”
6
One Week Later
When defending yourself, your goal is always to control the threat, not engage in a back-and-forth of blows. To neutralize the threat, target major muscle groups and large joints.
- Excerpt from a police training manual written by Ben Hollis
Something is shaking my shoulder. No. Someone. I jolt awake, my effort to scramble away cut short by a wall at my back. I groan, pain radiating throughout my body, not from hitting the wall, but from soreness.
The sun isn’t all the way up yet, but I’m able to make out the muted gray outline of a man, his palms out in front of him. I squint, recognizing his untamed hair.
“Olin?”
He moves slowly, keeping his palms facing out where I can see them. With his right hand, he pats the top of his left wrist, where a watch would go.
I’m groggy, my thoughts a murky, slowly creeping fog. My body is begging me to lie down and go back to sleep.
What is he trying to tell me about a watch? No one wears them anymore, and there aren’t—
“Oh shit.” I sit up, scrub a hand over my face and throw off my wool blanket. “I’m going to be late.”
I was dead asleep on the walkway outside of Marcelle’s door. Her schedule is different from mine, and she doesn’t finish training until two a.m. Since she won’t give me a key to her room, my only option is to wait outside her door, and with the intensity of the training I’ve been doing, I can’t stay awake.
The first couple of nights, I tried to. It’s dangerous to sleep out in the open. But eventually, my body took the choice away from me. Now, I cover myself completely with my blanket at ten every night and hope the darkness hides me well enough. Some nights, I don’t even wake up when Marcelle gets here.
And today, I slept through the camp-wide alarm that blares over the sound system at five thirty every morning.
“Okay.” I stand, the stabbing pain in my stomach making me cringe. “No time for...anything.”
The woman I sparred with yesterday was relentless. She must have punched me in the stomach a couple hundred times. It’s only my pride that gets me to the end of my six-to-ten p.m. training block; I don’t have the energy by then.
It would have been nice to clean my teeth with charcoal dust and saltwater and take a quick shower, but I don’t have time. The bathroom lines are long at this time of day.
I shove my blanket up against the outer wall of the housing block and walk over to Olin.
“Thanks for waking me up.”
He nods. I was late on my fourth day here, and my punishment was no food for the day. The next time I’m late, I get three days without food. The training is too rigorous for that.
Olin hesitates, then walks over and picks up my blanket, folding it neatly. He passes it to me.
“You think I should take it?”
He nods.
“Because if I don’t, someone might steal it?”
Another nod.
Despite the headache that never fully goes away, and the pain I feel from my scalp to my toes from training, my lips quirk with a smile.
“Thanks, Olin.”
We walk in silence to the kitchen, stopping at the well next to it to fill our canteens. I drink two canteens full before filling it a third time and putting the strap over my shoulder so it rests on my hip.
I shouldn’t be drinking so much water, because I know I’m feeling the effects of sodium deficiency. Water makes it worse. But I’m also usually dehydrated here. It’s an ugly irony.
“Briar and Rona, you’re on meat prep, get going.” Billy wastes no time putting us to work.
Meat prep is a double-edged sword. It’s hard to peel and slice juicy, ripe papayas when your own stomach is knotted painfully with hunger and you aren’t allowed to eat any of it. Meat prep is gross, but not tempting, so at least there’s that.
The term “meat” is all-encompassing at Rising Tide. It includes fish and kills brought in by the hunting team. Hunting kills are field dressed and sometimes come to us in pieces, and I’m only able to identify some of the animals because of my knowledge of biology.