She then placed a hand on my forehead, like she was checking for a fever. That's when I realized something was different. I wasn't shocked or jolted by her touch. There was no offense mark.

"Why aren't you burning my skin like they do?"

"Well, I'm not here to hurt you, dear. But also, I was human, like you. So I don't produce those kinds of marks on others."

Human? But Caleb has said there were only three humans. Could it be that they didn't know about her?

She pulled out a needle and a couple tubes with labels and I felt sick. I turned, groaning and pressed the side of my face into the pillow.

"She needs more liquids," the woman called out to her husband. "I won't get much blood from these dry veins."

He banged on the wall again and a young guy I'd seen somewhere before opened the door.

"Bring me two bottles of orange juice, unopened."

He nodded and left quickly. She continued to poke the inside of my elbow with her fingers until he came back with the bottles.

"Drink one now, one after," Sikes said as he tossed them to me. The guy who brought them stared at me with a little smile. His eyes roamed over me and I realized with chagrin I was still wearing the damp sheet. I pulled my legs up and placed my arms on top of my knees. He chuckled at my reaction but Sikes barked at him. "Get out."

Then I recognized him, the guy who tried to help Marcus kidnap me. He had put a majority of the offense marks on me that night. I glared at his back as he left.

"Drink up, dear. I need to get this blood so we can let you rest."

I wanted to laugh at her attempt at humanity. It was a little late for that now. I drank the orange juice eagerly as I needed it. While she waited for the juice to hit my system I decided to small talk.

"What's your ability?"

I fully expected her to not answer, but she did.

"I can see through things. Skin, for instance. It's why I'm so good at taking blood and things like this."

That gave me pause and I was surprised I could follow and focus so well after everything that had happened to me. My body felt disoriented but my mind was sharp. I wondered if the ascension had anything to do with that.

"Wait. I thought the abilities were supposed to compliment each other? But if he," I pointed to the jerk still sitting, leaning on the wall, "can go into dreams, that doesn't go together with seeing through things."

"That's only a Jacobson rule," Sikes muttered. "The rest of us just have to make do."

"Oh."

"It's time," she chimed and began to get my arm ready again. I felt bile rise in antic.i.p.ation of the stick. I hated needles. "Just relax. I'm very good at this. It won't hurt. Lean back and close your eyes."

I did what she said though I didn't trust her, I had no other choice.

"I can't believe I have to do this to do this to this poor girl." She took a deep breath. "It's for the good of the clan the good of the clan."

"What?" I asked, wondering what she meant by what she said.

"I didn't say anything, dear. Lie back."

I looked at her curiously because I knew I heard her say something. Then her lips didn't move but...I heard her.

"This better work. I'm not spending the rest of my life experimenting on teenagers, Sikes."

I coughed a shocked laugh.

"What?" she asked out loud and began to look worried. She looked at her tubes in her hand. Then in her head she said, "Did I take too much? She's acting funny."

I watched her and listened to her inner monologue, sometimes to Sikes and sometimes with herself, until she was done.

"All done," she chimed happily and took the rubber band from my arm. "There. You didn't even know I was doing it, did you?"

"No," I breathed because it was all I could do.

Holy c.r.a.p, I can read minds. That's my ability? Somehow the way everyone had made such a fuss over me, I thought it'd be cooler than that. How the heck was that going to get me out of here?

"Ok, Maggie. Drink your juice and put those clothes on. The next time I visit, we're taking a little field trip," Sikes said and left behind his wife.

I tried to process and think. Tried to reach out to Caleb but got nothing. I washed up in a bowl of water left beside my bed. The water was cold and it didn't feel good but I did it anyway. I hurriedly put on the clothes left for me, a pair of old jeans and a black baby doll t-shirt that said 'Bite Me' with two red blood dripping vampire holes in the collar. Ugh and Eew.

I tried to pull my hair back in a twisted bun but my arms ached so bad, I couldn't make it work. I hurt all over, like I'd been hit over and over, my muscles refusing to cooperate. I needed Caleb.

By then Sikes had returned to find me sitting on the bed's edge.

"Ah. You look like a new girl."

"I'm sure I do," I muttered sarcastically.

"Come on. We have work to do."

He didn't touch me but beckoned for me follow him. When I came out of my cell, I saw that there were other cells too but no one was in them as we pa.s.sed. We did pa.s.s a few people out of cells though and they gawked openly as we pa.s.sed them every so often. Some looked like they wanted to spit on me, others wanted to put me in their bag and run with me like I was the Holy Grail. I didn't like either of those options.

"Where are we going?"

"Somewhere."

"Hilarious," I muttered and tried to stretch out the ache in my back.

"Keep your questions to yourself for now."

I rolled my eyes at him but he didn't see. I kept shuffling along through the pain. I considered the karate I'd learned from Kyle's dad but I was so weak from withdrawals, I was barely dragging myself down the hall. And the meds they were giving me probably had something in them to keep me from something like that. I'm sure Marcus told them what happened the first time he tried to kidnap me.

Speak of the devil. I heard someone behind me and turned to see Marcus smiling cruelly behind me. Then Sikes started spouting something ahead of me.

"Maybe we should try to test the blood first. Maybe we could pair her with one of ours and see if we can break the imprint or trick it."

"What?" I asked him, confused and terrified.

"I didn't say anything. Be quiet."

I realized I'd heard his thoughts. I decided to test it since we were apparently headed down the longest hall in history. I tried to open my mind, my ears, my senses and listen to a group of three people as I pa.s.sed them in the hall.

Plan backfire.

I heard all kinds of voices at once and it was too much as my head stung and buzzed. I collapsed with a scream to the floor, cupping the sides of my head as I felt like I'd black out. A couple of them tried to run to help me but Sikes held up a hand to stop them.

"Wait. Don't touch her! No offense marks!" Then I heard his thought.

Other than the one Marcus already put on her hand.

"What's wrong, Maggie?"

"I, uh..." It was ok it if didn't push it so I eased my self off the floor on shaky, achy legs. "I'm ok, just a sharp pain in my head, headache, I guess."

"Well, come on. Fresh air will do you good."

"Outside?"

"No tricks, Miss Masters. You are still pumped with meds. Your Caleb will not save you."

"Not like he could even if your heartbeat was blaring like a foghorn," Marcus remarked snidely.

I ignored them and tried again to focus on hearing someone's thoughts. If I focused on one person it worked. It was strange how my body just seemed to know what to do. Just like Caleb had described. There was no denying it. We were meant for this.

There was a man by a door with a gun. I opened my mind and focused on only him; thought of his face and it worked. He thought this was ridiculous and they should just kill me. Then the imprint would break and Caleb would never ascend. Problem solved. I inched against the wall around him, eying him warily. He smiled sweetly and rea.s.suringly at me which completely contradicted his thoughts and I wondered if my whole life had been lead this way.

With people saying or acting one way and then thinking and believing a complete other way.

I kept at it. I discovered that if I was hearing a thought, my head felt a little fuzzy, like I was talking on the telephone with a metallic connection. I had to focus to notice it, but it was there. I'd have to master that skill so as not to answer something that wasn't asked out loud.

We came to a ladder at the end of the hall, or tunnel. It went straight up so Sikes went up and unscrewed the bolt on the lid and lifted it straight up and over. He went out and I a.s.sumed I was supposed to follow. I climbed the steep ladder slowly and with labored breaths and bare feet because they'd taken my shoes. I knew I couldn't make it. I was going to fall the short distance I'd made but then felt a hand on mine. I looked up to see Sikes wife smiling.

"Come on, dear. I know it's hard but you can do it. Let me help."

She pulled me up the rest of the way and I collapsed on the ground. When the sun hit my cold face it was painful and good. I'd missed it.

"Get up," Sikes barked. "Almost there, then you can rest."

"It hurts. It's been...I don't know how many days since I've seen Caleb. I can't. It hurts too much."

I didn't want to cry anymore but after the exertion, it was ferociously painful and p.r.o.nounced. My head pounded so hard that my vision bounced when I tried to focus on something.

"I can't help you. I don't want to taint you with an offense mark until we've tried every other avenue in our experiment first. Come on, just a little further."

His wife looked displeased as she helped me from the ground.

If we hadn't been married for as many years as we have, I swear...

I wanted to look over and laugh at her but my body would absolutely not have cooperated with that. Sikes's wife was practically dragging me behind him as we made our way through a wooded area that was really gra.s.sy and overgrown. The gra.s.s was so tall it was up to my thighs, which made sludging along that much harder and the blades were scratching and itching my feet.

I felt like I'd collapse again but we came upon a well. I could see the cliff just beyond it and knew exactly where I was. Did they know that Marla had told me that story? That she told me about the well behind their house? I knew where I was! If I only could tell Caleb.

I looked at Sikes. I tried to push into his mind just like Caleb had pushed into mine that first day. Focusing and honing in on him, picturing his mind. It didn't take much of a push and I was in. It was the strangest thing I'd ever experienced. It wasn't like Caleb's mind at all.

Sikes's mind was murky and I could feel his anger and bitterness like a slime on my skin. It consumed him. I realized I wasn't just reading his thoughts, I was looking into his mind; all of it, every corner. I could sort through and look at things he had planned or thought and done before this. I saw what he was planning for me and this well.

And I wanted no part of it.

We stopped and I looked around to see Marcus and about five other guys had joined us there, big burly dark guys. Their thoughts were all different and I discovered, just like Sikes's wife, not everybody was thrilled to be here.

"Oh, man, I'm so ready to be done with this."

"We can't even call ourselves human beings after this. Sikes is crazy."

"I wonder what mom's cooking for dinner. Hurry up, Sikes's. I'm ready for some fried chicken."

"Why are other clans always so much hotter than ours. I'd pay a lot for ten minutes with this one."

"So stupid. It's not even gonna work. All this wasted time, torturing some teenage girl. Ridiculous."

I felt the onslaught crushing over me but staved off the collapse of my control with focus. I could control this but I hated hearing what people said. Well, these people anyway, so I shut them out.

"Alright, Maggie," Sikes started. "Let's get you in."

"Please, no. Please don't put me down there," I begged and tried to pull from Sikes's wife but she held me tight.

"Don't start. If you don't cooperate, I'll send Marcus to Caleb's house right now and we can see first hand what happens when an imprinted Ace dies."

"No!" I yelled and collapsed to my knees. The pain in my stomach at just thinking about it was insufferable. "Please, don't."

"You see," he said conversationally. "This well is supposedly what started it all. Over three hundred years ago, my ancestor fell down this well. The legend says he was betrothed to a beautiful girl and was in the well for four days. He thought she'd be worried sick about him and prayed to G.o.d, made every promise he could think of to help him. He became so enraged when no one came to his aid, that on the fourth day he started to scream and beat his fist on the walls. His blood from his hands and arms mixed with the water in the well and it started to glow. He was scared but then he saw a face over the well. Someone had come to rescue him. He was pulled out and was eager to see his beloved, but when he came up, she was not among the ones waiting for him. You see, she thought he had cold feet and had left, decided not to marry her so she married another. He was heartbroken and went to the church where they were to be married to pray. There in the cemetery in the church yard, he met a girl, placing flowers on her father's grave. When he helped her stand and they touched, that was the first imprint. He was relieved of the pain from the woman he loved and immediately loved another. Within a few days him and his significant both ascended. By then others had started to imprint in the village as well. A village occupied by mostly Watson's. Then they ascended just as my ancestor had and it started it all. No one in the village was married again without an imprint and their abilities helped them to conquer and fend off their enemies. You see, when he bled into the well, in his rage, legend had said that's what started it all. He eventually told everyone that the water had started to glow and it must have meant something. And it was the village well, so everyone consumed this water. Now, you see why I want to test the theory of the well water. Now. Get on the platform," he said evenly and I heard Marcus chuckling behind me.

Sikes's wife helped me to stand and moved me towards the board attached to rope on all corners over the well opening. I couldn't fight, I just moved where she moved me. She laid me on it and I curled up in a ball and tried to hide my fear from them. I didn't look at them or speak to them as they lowered me down. I heard Sikes's wife muttering in her mind but she kept right on doing what he wanted, and Sikes.

He wanted to see if the water would reverse the imprint or break it since it had given it to someone who had none. As for Marcus's mind, I couldn't even look into it without being sick. All the vile and horrible things he thought about me, about the Jacobson's, about Caleb. It physically hurt me to look in his mind with its gray fog and thick barrier of pure hatred.

So I let them lower me until I felt water come over the edge of the board and I sat up. I didn't know if I'd have the strength to swim and I started to panic, but felt no increased heart rate to go along with it.

When the water reached my stomach the pulley stopped and I looked up to see Sikes leaning over.

"We'll be back to get you in a couple days, Maggie."