The Belly of the Beast

Ch. 60, Death Wish

The dressing room was three times the size of her bedroom, and packed with more clothes than I'd seen in my entire life. Unfortunately, most of said clothing was also skimpier than I'd ever seen in my entire life. An older woman, perched on a stool in the hallway, narrowed her eyes when Xyla said I needed a change of clothes. But a smile broke over her face when I offered my red dress in exchange. Xyla picked through the clothes and then handed me soft black pants and a flowing blue shirt that looked like they were made for a boy. I didn't care. I was tired of red.

Kovu stood in the hallway when we came out, his eyes trained on the floor. He jumped and stuttered when a woman in only a thong walked past. "Miss, umm, Z, Iker has requested your presence back at the table."

"Tell him we'll be there shortly, darling," Xyla drawled, running a finger down Kovu's chest, and batting her eyes at him. His mouth opened and closed, wordless, like a fish stranded on land.

I laughed as we tumbled back into her room, and she slammed the door behind us. "You really shouldn't," I said. "He's one of my nice guards."

Xyla snorted. "Only you would think a K-guard could be nice. Now tell me about this new partner of yours?" She grinned. "He looks scrumptious enough to eat."

I laughed, suddenly not sure how to describe Dagger. So I decided for the barest truth. "We teamed up to survive. He's . . . hard to read sometimes."

"Mmmhmmm." She wiggled her eyebrows at me. "I bet he is."

I laughed and threw a pillow from the bed at her. "Shut up."

"Looks like you've really been suffering. Not sure I've ever seen kissing as a trial strategy."

"You're just mad I thought of it first."

She giggled and together we sat on the bed, silent for a time as she wrapped her arms around me. I breathed deep, closing my eyes, trying to forget everything and pretend that it was just Xyla and I, back in our hideout, safe from the world. But her next words, though soft, shattered the illusion. "I'm glad you were with Yana in the end."

It was hard to speak. "It was my fault she died."
Xyla turned me to her, lifting my head to meet her eyes. "No, Z, it wasn't. We both went into that Chute. Yana knew she was dying. I think if she could have chosen to give her life so we could have a better one, she would have."

We were quiet again. Even though I wanted to laugh and joke with her, the memory of the room of bodies, of Nuka's small, still form and of Yana's final words all pushed against me, till I whispered, "What happened in the last High Letter Trial? Did anyone move up?"

She shook her head. "No." Her eyes lost some of their shine, her voice dropping. "It's not really a thing here. No one wants to move up the Top Letter Trial. The only people who have are never heard from again." She took my hand in her own. "Besides, the whole point is that we don't have to move up. All we have to do is survive each weekly trial, just like we survived the Belly. A few months of competing, we become legends. Heroes even. Some people are granted their freedom early, and with the way the crowd loves you, I'd say it's totally possible. Even if not, the law is that after a year of surviving the High Letter Trial, you are granted your freedom and a High letter. We can do it, Z. I know we can."

I wanted to lean into her. Tell her that she was right. We were Belly Rats. We'd survived worse in the Belly. Life there was an everyday trial. We deserved this— we'd worked our whole life for it. All this time, I'd told myself that I was doing this for Xyla. To use the necklace as a way to find her and then save her.

Maybe it had begun that way, but now it was more than that. Now I owed it to the people of Level N to find Androcles and give him the necklace. I wasn't the Z I once was, who belonged only to Xyla and Yana and the smog and noise of the Belly. I had a new mission, a new purpose, and, though it hurt to admit, a new partner.