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mode. It had been years since he had to be a father, and it was clear it was difficult for him to negotiate between the two roles. He wanted his family safe, and he was going to get me in contact with James. If that wasn’t reason enough to follow him, I didn’t know what was.
    James. I was going to talk to James somehow. My father had promised. He told me that he had men on the inside of the council’s headquarters. Once his man decided if James was trustworthy, which I assured my father he was, he would help us pass letters across the lines.
    I don’t know how he knew about James. Maybe his spies. Maybe Robert. But he knew what James meant to me, and he had promised to do anything in his power to get my words to him. I had to trust my father. I simply had to.
    I untangled myself from Louisa, trusting she would be safe with Henry for the time being. I walked to where my dad, our leader, stood, nestled amongst his people. “You sure about this?” I asked, glancing back toward the hazy lights of the community.
    “I’m not worried if that’s what you’re wondering,” he replied casually. Too casually for my taste.
    “Al’s not the most reasonable of men,” I said.
    “You think I don’t know that? You think I’m not fully aware that he threw you in a jail cell and put you on trial?” I could have sworn that his hand tightened around his rifle as he spoke. I remembered the way he had killed the chosen one without flinching, and I hoped for Al’s sake that he would hear my father out. “I know exactly how unreasonable Al is, but I also know that if I need to, I’ll take this place by force.”
    I shook my head and bit the inside of my cheek. History was written, compiled from stories of men trying to take something that didn’t belong to them in the first place.
    “You don’t approve of my methods?” my father asked.
    “Does it matter?” I countered, raising an eyebrow.
    “Trust me,” he implored, his voice taking the gentler tone that I’d rarely heard since his mysterious return into my life—a tone that had filled my childhood with comfort and hope. Staring at him, a mixture of desperation and determination etched across his face, I reminded myself this was the man who promised to try and keep me in contact with James. The man who saved my life.
    I reminded myself this man was my father.
    I opened my mouth to reply when the sound of the safeties clicking off ten guns stopped me. The woods that separated us from the community rustled and warned us of the men who approached. I scrambled over to where Henry and Louisa stood. Working together, we pulled Louisa behind the line of my father’s army. Her limbs froze and locked, protesting both fight and flight. She was simply ready to give up.
    This was exactly the natural the council wanted her to be.
    Eric and Lockwood were the first to appear, their hands held up in the air. Both of their faces were tight with worry. A group of ten men, rifles in hand, followed them. Several men lagged behind the community’s row of guns with makeshift lit torches in tow.
    And behind them came Al.
    I tightened my grip on my sister’s hand.
    “It’s been a long time, Charlie,” Al said, lazily leaning against his rifle. His smugness had always driven me crazy.
    “That it has,” my father replied, shifting his gun so it was pointed directly at the man who stood between us and safety—even if that safety was temporary. For the briefest of seconds, I was glad my father was pointing his gun at Al; I’d do just about anything to get Louisa inside the community.
    “I think we can lower the gun. There’s no need for it. Not when we both know you won’t use it,” Al sneered. His slimy, slippery grin refused to leave his face.
    “What makes you so sure?” my father asked. Despite his age, his aim was steady, firm. It never wavered.
    “’Cause I know you. Don’t think I don’t remember those early days. Back then…I heard you. When we traveled from community