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smile or thank her. He simply took his gloves and marched away. And she held her hands over her stomach like he’d just done her a huge favor.
    I made my decision right then, though I finished my visit to the Communes. But the life of child-bearing, cooking, cleaning, and farming repulsed me. I’d rather die first, but I couldn’t blame the Unmanifested girls who chose Communal Motherhood over menial labor at the school or Councilman’s fortress. Death at a young age was hard to look straight in the face.
    Life wasn’t much better for Unmanifested boys. If they couldn’t hack it in the brutal sentry courses, they lived in agricultural communities, separate from the Communal Mothers.
    Since I’d vetoed the communes, my remaining choices became Educator or servant. But I didn’t choose. I drifted, somehow hoping something else would happen.
    Like getting selected for a Council.
    That prospect dominated my thoughts—until I Manifested my Element.
    I worried my life would end if my firemaking ability was revealed, and I felt I’d die if it wasn’t. I didn’t want to personally experience the same fate as that female Firemaker who was executed, but living without being a Firemaker felt too caging, too unfair. See, Unmanifested girls were only good for repopulating the world or serving Elementals.
    Elementals didn’t serve other Elementals. Watermaidens couldn’t sustain a pregnancy—their offspring drown in the womb—and therefore had to be selected for a Council. If they weren’t, they could become mentors, and that was all.
    I remembered Cat’s anguish from last year. At the time, the Watermaiden courses offered at the school had been sparse, and no new mentors were being taken. If Cat didn’t get chosen for a Council, her only remaining option was exile. I’d spent the time before the selection ceremony trying to convince her that Isaiah would never leave her to wander the wilderness alone.
    “You guys will always be together,” I had soothed, tucking a stray lock of Cat’s black hair behind her ear. “You’ll get chosen together.”
    Tears had filled her wide eyes and rolled down her porcelain cheeks. “You think so?”
    I didn’t get a chance to answer, because Isaiah had knocked on the door. I opened it while Cat composed herself.
    Isaiah glanced at me briefly. “Gabbers,” he murmured.
    I threw my arms around him, suddenly very aware that this might be the last time I saw him. He’d held me in his strong arms, and I’d leaned against his cocoa-colored skin, inhaling the scent of moss and earth.
    “How is she?” he murmured.
    I pulled away and watched him smooth his large hands over his bald head. “She’s okay.”
    When Cat turned, I could tell she’d been crying. Isaiah could too. He strode over to her and took her in his arms. When they started kissing, I left.
    And then they’d left me.

    Exhaustion seeped into my bones and cramped in my calves as I shuffled down the hall. I leaned against the wall for support. In the first bedroom, I settled on the bare mattress and wrapped my arms around myself, trying to find my core warmth. Trying to get the sight of Patches falling to the ground out of my head. Trying to find a way to simply take one more breath.
    I peeled off my shoes and socks using only my fingertips. My feet bore cracked and bleeding blisters. I hobbled into the bathroom and rinsed the blood from my socks with spurting orange water, leaving them to dry on the side of the sink.
    I found nothing with which to cover my feet in the bathroom, so I limped back to the bedroom. I rifled through the closet, finding two T-shirts wadded up behind an old stringed instrument, a set of speakers, and a couple of empty plastic tubs. On a high shelf behind a rusty birdcage, I found a stocking cap, which I pulled over my head.
    I used one of the T-shirts to clean away the ooze on my feet, and then I wrapped them in the cool cloth. I sighed as I lay back, pulling the hat lower over my eyes. I