The Gift

When the light ebbs, I see that The One Who Is The One is on his knees. Screaming. Only for some reason I can’t hear him. In fact, I can’t hear anything.

Was there an explosion? I don’t know, but suddenly there are hands all over me, cold hands. They’re loosening my ropes. A small army of hooded figures has banded around me and Whit. The New Order guards lining the stage have been toppled by the rush of flooding light and energy.

No sooner have the hooded figures pulled the nooses up over our heads than the hangman’s trapdoors on which we’ve been standing click open. And I’m falling into darkness.

It’s as if I’ve been hanged, but I haven’t been, have I? I’ve just fallen onto my back.

I’m sprawled on the ground with all the spirit and decorum of a discarded rag doll. I don’t care to move. I don’t even care to breathe. I just want this all to end. I want to close my eyes and stop being. I pray for it to happen.

There’s another cold hand on my arm, helping me to my feet. And now my ears are starting to ring, and I hear something else, too-a voice. A familiar voice.

“Run,” the voice says as a door opens and daylight streams in. “Run, Wisteria. Run like there’s no tomorrow… because if you don’t, maybe there won’t be.”

My hearing returns as the sound of massive panic sweeping through the stands hits me. The shrieks and wails seem to have enough power to bring down the entire stadium.

What have they seen? What has happened to their fearless leader?

I stagger outside and join the frantic crowd on the stadium field streaming toward one of the four tunnel exits. I have done this before: escape the scene of my own execution. It seems impossible, but I know I can do this. I know how to keep my head down. I know how to duck and weave. I know how to stay focused in a sea of blind panic.

But I haven’t gone fifty yards when I stop dead, as if my heart has fallen from my chest. Whit! Where is Whit?

I turn and manage to glimpse the plywood hangman’s scaffold. Four empty nooses dangle limply in the breeze. The One is nowhere to be seen.

Neither is Whit.

I haven’t even cried for my parents yet, but now I fall to my knees and start to bawl like a baby. In an ocean of thousands, I’m alone.

But not completely. Again there’s a hand on my arm and a voice in my ear. “Run, Wisteria,” it says. “Hurry. You have to leave this cursed place.”

But this time I resist. I get to my feet, but I’m pushing back toward the scaffold, toward the last place I saw my brother.

I make it only a few steps when somebody-or something-knocks me to the ground.

“Whitford’s fine,” it says, pulling me back to my feet and turning me around. “Think about it. You can’t be together now. It would make it easier on them if you were together. We can’t risk it.”

The voice has been rational, if insistent. But now it sounds truly urgent. “There’s no time, Wisty. For Whit’s sake, run! Run. You have The Gift. Only you have it. Without you, hope will die.”

And I have to run, don’t I? I have to try to escape. My life matters. My Gift matters. So I run. I run as if my brother’s life depends on it.

As I look back, I finally see the face of the one who rescued me-it’s Celia. Celia!

There she is-that one bright spot in the bitterly dark landscape. I told you I would find it. I told you I would cling to that light for dear life. And I am.

I’ll use it to find Whit. To find my friends. And to make my way to the Shadowland to find my parents.

Because…

Of bad, scary witches who are given Great Gifts, Much Is Expected.

TO BE CONTINUED

Excerpts of NEW ORDER PROPAGANDA

as Disseminated by The Council of N.O. “Arts”

ESPECIALLY OFFENSIVE BOOKS THAT HAVE BEEN BANNED

as Dictated by The One Who Bans Books

THE BRAWLERS: The story of a pack of sentient dogs-some stray, some pets-seeking to fulfill a “prophecy.” Thankfully, since New Order citizens are now aware that pet ownership is irrational and a burden on society (and that the only appropriate role for canine beasts is in the employ of members of the Hunt), there is little interest in this series.

GOSSIP GHOST: A series of books that follows a roaming pack of teenage spirits who lie, cheat, and spy on one another. According to the New Order Council for Documenting Pernicious Influences, the lying, cheating, and spying were reasonably well done, but the supernatural elements were offensive. The books were among the first to be rounded up and destroyed in the Great Book Purge.

THE INTERESTING CROSSOVER OF THE DOG TO THE SHADOWLAND: The purportedly nonfiction story of a dog, more exploratory than the rest of his pack, crossing into another dimension. Because of nonsensical references to alternate dimensions, the text was banned.

THE THIRST TOURNAMENT: A work of fiction set in a world that has run out of water and where the government has decided to control the population by having excess children serve as gladiators. After a thorough investigation, the New Order Council on Resource Protection has declared this to be an unrealistic water- rationing strategy.

THE UNFORTUNATE STONES: In this absurd novel, a group of actors are turned into stones in a publicity stunt gone horribly wrong. They spend the majority of the book contemplating their stony bodies and the afterlife. References to the dark arts, theatrics, and the afterlife quickly earned the novel an Objectionable Mention on the New Order Book Burning Committee’s list of tomes to be destroyed.

ULTIMATE ARMSTRONG: The absurd tales of a collective of genetically altered children with wings who can fly. As The One Who Is The One once quipped, these books should be read just as soon as pigs fly.

SOME PARTICULARLY REPREHENSIBLE NOISE POLLUTERS OF THE FORMER AGE

as Defined by The One Who Monitors Auditory Stimuli

DUCHESS GOO GOO: A ridiculous pop star who burst on the scene with her dangerously infectious first single, “Five-Card Stud.” She dominated the charts of the day and used her theatrical wiles to beguile the mass media into abetting her celebrity ambitions. She was among the first musical celebrities rounded up by the New Order Council of Cultural Standards.

DUSTIN BEEPER: A singer propelled into stardom by the videos posted online from his debut album, Beepin’ & Weepin’, which spread like a viral pandemic. Though officially banned for entertainment purposes, his music is still sometimes used by the New Order to lure Freelanders out of hiding.

THE RED-EYED SLEAZES: A “hip-hop” group whose disturbing videos proudly projected tacky excess and bikini-clad girls, and yet the musicians always seemed as if they’d just like to go to sleep. The New Order Council of Musical Standards had them banned for their oblique mockery of N.O. professional culture.

SMILEY PYRUS: A teenage pop star who rose to stardom by deceitfully charming her audience with a shy smile and then literally setting the music charts on fire. While not as dangerous as the wanted witch Wisteria Allgood, Smiley still is among the most dangerous musical fugitives in Freeland.

SWIFTY TAILOR: Country music superstar who was as famous for her bouncing blond curls and silly romantic folk songs as she was for breaking the hearts of handsome movie stars. Upon the arrival of Order to the world, she was swiftly jailed for her insistence on referencing “romance” and “love”