Page 42 of Hollow Valley

“She’s gonna murder him just because he’s sick?”Fergus asked, incredulous and horrified.

“Execution is primarily reserved for those exceptionally hostile or diseased,” Alphie said.“Despite how it may seem to you, Nell doesn’t revel in the loss of life.”

“No, yeah, she seems like a real stand-up lady,” Boden said dryly.“But if she’s not super big on the execution, and she always does the exaction, what are the most likely options for us?”

“For us?”Alphie echoed, almost as if she hadn’t thought of it before.“I only see expiation or Exbindation.”

“Why not exile?”Leandro asked.“How do we get that as an option?We just have to get the hell out of here and stay away, right?”

“I’ve only ever seen Exilation done in the winter,” Alphie said.“And only then, after all their shoes and clothes have been relinquished, and when they are alone, they are banished outside the walls.”

“That’s just another form of execution!”Fergus said in dismay.“You’ve been saying we’ve got options, but it’s all just different ways to die, isn’t it?”

“What about Exbindation?”Edie asked.“That was serving without end.So does that mean slavery?”

“Of sorts, I suppose,” Alphie admitted quietly.“But they do not serve Nell or the Reverent.They are the servants of the Loved Ones.They enter the courtyard to adorn them and clean up after them.”

I looked out the window at the extravagantly dressed zombies shuffling from side to side.Under the dark clouds, their glittering jewelry was dull, and the paint on their skin was little more than streaks of color staining their ashen flesh.

“How?”I asked, voicing a question I’d wondered since I first saw the decorated Loved Ones.“How can the servants get so near them to paint their flesh without getting torn to bits?”

“They have armor made of steel and leather, and they cover the mouths of the Loved Ones when they are being adorned,” Alphie said.“Sometimes, the servants are still torn to bits, and eventually, they all are infected.If they served well, they will be kept with the Loved Ones.If not, they are put to death and burned to ash.”

“See, it is just another way to die!”Fergus shouted in frustration.

“I’m not the one who decides the punishments!”Alphie yelled back, her voice cracking a bit.Tears filled her eyes, and she glared up at him fiercely.“I don’t get to choose whether we live or die!”

“Wait,” Boden said, as if something had occurred to him.“Remy was here in the winter.You told me that before.What did Nell do to her?”

“Nell never got to decide for Remy.”Alphie shook her head.“She escaped.”

“So there is a way to escape from here?”Leandro asked.

Alphie shook her head again.“Not from the barracks.She was held in the Wellness Center.I don’t know a way out of here.”

Boden, Leandro, Edie, and Fergus had been trying to figure out a way to escape.With the bars on the windows and the locks on the door, just getting out of the room was a difficulty.

Outside the door were armed guards, a courtyard of zombies, and a community of close-knit flamboyantly dressed devotees who would immediately notice that we didn’t belong.After that were more concrete walls with armed guards in the bastions, and locked iron doors.

Not to mention that Dougal and Fae were being held in two separate locations, the Wellness Center and the nursery, so we’d have to find them and get them out.

“Alphie, please!”Edie begged her.“Therehasto be some way to get us all out of here alive.You know this place better than we do.Help us get the fuck out of here.”

“I-I am trying,” Alphie stammered.

Suddenly, the harsh clangor of bells rumbled through the air like ominous thunder.The metallic ringing echoed off the concrete, making the sonorous sound nearly deafening.

Alphie’s eyes widened as she turned to look out at the courtyard in horror.“Is it dusk already?”

“What’s going on?”Leandro asked with his hands pressed to his ears even as the clattering came to an end.

“No,no.”Alphie whimpered and scurried back into the corner of the room, pressing herself as far away from the windows as she could.“I cannot be made to bear witness again!”

She collapsed to the floor and wrapped her arms around her knees.She rocked herself and cried and shook her head, her curls flying about.

“Bear witness to what?”Edie asked, rushing over to comfort her.“What’s happening?”

“Alphie, what does Nell do for expiation?”Fergus asked, coming to a frightening realization before I did.