Matched

The air train into the City the next morning is almost silent. No one wants to talk about what happened in the Borough last night. Those who gave up their artifacts are hushed with the loss; those who never had any to begin with are quiet out of respect. Or, perhaps, out of satisfaction, because now everything has been equalized.

Before he gets off at his stop for swimming, Xander leans over to kiss my cheek and says softly, “Under the newroses in front of Ky’s house.”

He steps off the air train and disappears with the other students while I ride on toward the Arboretum. Questions crowd my mind: How did Xander hide the artifact in the Markhams’ flower bed unseen? Does he know it belongs to Ky or is it coincidence that he picked the Markhams’ house as the hiding place?

Does he know what I’m starting to feel for Ky?

Whatever Xander knows or guesses, one thing is certain: He couldn’t have picked a better hiding place. We’re al charged with keeping our yards neat and clean. If Ky digs in his own yard, no one wil suspect anything. I just have to tel him where to look.

Like everyone else, Ky stares out the window as we glide toward the Arboretum. Did he see Xander’s kiss? Did he care? He does not meet my eyes.

“We’re pairing off for this next round of hiking,” the Officer says once we reach the bottom of the Hil . “You are each partnered with another hiker according to ability assessed by analyzing the data I col ected from your earlier hikes. That means Ky is paired with Cassia; Livy is paired with Tay

...”

Livy’s face fal s and I try to keep mine expressionless.

The Officer finishes reading his list. “You have a different goal on the Hil ,” he says. “You won’t ever see the top here. The Society has asked us to use our hiking time to mark obstacles on the Hil .” He gestures to the bags piled next to him. They hold strips of red cloth. “Every pair takes a bag.

Tie the markers on branches near fal en trees, in front of particularly bad thickets, etc. Later, a survey crew wil come through. They’re going to clear and pave a path on the Hil .”

They’re going to pave the Hil . At least Grandfather doesn’t have to see it.

“What if we run out of cloths?” Lon whines. “They haven’t cleared the Hil in years. There’l be obstacles everywhere! We might as wel mark every tree we see.”

“If you run out of cloths, use rocks to make cairns,” the Officer says. He turns to Ky. “Do you know how to make a cairn?”

There’s the briefest of hesitations before Ky answers. “Yes.”

“Show them.”

Ky gathers a few rocks from the ground around us and stacks them, largest first, in a smal pile. His hands are quick and sure, the way they are when he’s teaching me to write. The tower looks precarious but does not fal .

“See? It’s simple,” the Officer says. “I’l blow my whistle later and that means you need to start making your way back. You blow your whistles if you get lost.” He gives us each a standard-issue metal whistle. “It shouldn’t be hard. Just head back down the mountain the way you came.”

The Officer’s thinly veiled disgust for us used to amuse me. Today, I understand it. I feel disgust when I think of how we climb our little hil s when the Officials say the word. How we hand over our most precious items at their bidding. How we never, ever fight.

We are barely out of view of the others when Ky turns to me and I turn to him and for a moment I think he is going to touch me. I sense, more than see, his hand move slightly and then drop back down. I feel a disappointment deeper than the disappointment I felt this morning when I opened my closet and did not see the compact resting there.

“Are you al right?” he asks. “Last night, when they searched the houses—I didn’t know until after I came home.”

“I’m fine.”

“My artifact ...”

Is that al he cares about? I whisper fiercely, “It’s in your flower bed. Buried under the newroses. Dig it up and then you’ll have it back.”

“I don’t care about the artifact,” he says, and although he stil does not touch me, I am warmed at the fire in his eyes. “I couldn’t sleep al night, worrying that I’d gotten you in trouble. I care about you.”

Those words are quiet here under the trees but they sing loudly in my heart, louder than al the Hundred Songs caroled al at once. And his eyes are shadowed underneath, from thinking about me. I want to reach up and touch that skin under his eyes, the one place I’ve seen any vulnerability in him, make him feel better. And then I could run my fingers there, across his cheekbones, down to his lips, to the place where his jaw meets his neck, where his neck meets his shoulder line. I like the places where one part meets another, I think, eyes to cheek, wrist to hands. Somewhat shocked at my own thoughts, I take a step back.

“How did you—”

“Someone helped me.”

“Xander,” he says.

How does he know? “Xander,” I agree.