Still I struggle and kick and swear and scream.

But the noise hits me again.

This time I can’t protect my ears. I scream in panic and kick and fight my way into black silence.

When I come to, the van is moving and I’m being bounced around on its rusting metal floor. The journey goes on and on. I can see the back of the big woman’s head. She is driving the van, but there don’t seem to be any guards or Hunters with us.

I shout that I need to pee. I think there may be a chance of escape with her alone.

She ignores me.

I shout at her again. “I need to pee.” And I really do.

She half turns her head and shouts back, “Then shut up and have one. You’ll be cleaning the van tomorrow.”

Still she keeps driving. When it gets dark my guts are in turmoil from being inside as well as from the motion of the van. I fight not to throw up but don’t manage to hold it off for more than a few minutes.

Because of the collar and chain, my head is resting in my own vomit. She doesn’t stop until we arrive at our destination many hours later and by then I’m lying in a brew of my own sick and piss.

PART THREE: THE SECOND WEAPON

The Choker

You’ve got to give her credit: she’s an ugly witch from Hell, but she’s a worker. She’s been up all night and most of the day perfecting a new band of acid.

She puts it on. Tight.

“You’ll get used to it.”

You can squeeze one finger between the band and your neck.

“I’ll loosen it if you want.”

You blank her.

“You only have to ask.”

You can’t even gob up, it’s so tight.

You’re in the kitchen again, sitting at the table. No morning exercises, no breakfast, but you won’t be able to eat with this thing on anyway. She can’t seriously mean to leave it like this. You can hardly swallow, hardly breathe.

The buzz from healing has gone, like it’s been used up. Your hand is swollen and has healed only slightly. It’s throbbing. You can feel your pulse in your arm and your neck.

“You’re looking tired, Nathan.”

You are tired.

“I’m going to clean your hand.”

She dips a cloth into a bowl of water and wrings it out. You pull your hand away but she takes it and strokes the cloth over your wrist. It’s cool. It feels good. Taking away some of the burning even for a second is good. She slides the cloth down the back of your hand and then gently turns your hand and cleans the palm. The dirt won’t come out but the water feels fresh. She’s very gentle.

“Can you move your fingers?”

Your fingers can move a little but your thumb is numb and won’t move at all because of the swelling. You don’t move anything for her.

She rinses the cloth in the bowl of water, wrings it out, and holds it up.

“I’m going to clean your ear. There’s a lot of blood.”

She reaches over and wipes round it; again she does it slowly and gently.

You can’t hear with your left ear but it’s probably just dried blood blocking it up. Your left nostril is blocked too.

She puts the cloth back in the bowl, blood mixing with the water. She wrings the cloth out and reaches out to your face. You lean back.

“I know the choker’s tight.” She smoothes the cloth across your forehead. “And I know you can stand it.” She’s dabbing the cloth tenderly over your cheek. “You’re tough, Nathan.”

You turn away slightly.

She puts the cloth in the bowl again, mud and blood and water mixing together. She wrings the cloth out and hangs it on the side of the bowl.

“I’ll loosen it if you ask.” She reaches over and brushes your cheek with the back of her fingers. “I want to loosen it. But you have to ask,” she says again so quietly and gently.

You pull back and the choker cuts in.

“You’re tired, aren’t you, Nathan?”

And you’re so tired of it all. So tired you could cry. But there’s no way you’re going to let that happen.

No way.

You just want it to stop.

“All you have to do is ask me to loosen it and I will.”

You don’t want to cry and you don’t want to ask for anything. But you want it to stop.

“Ask me, Nathan.”

And the choker is so tight. And you’re so tired.

“Ask me.”

You’ve hardly spoken for months. Your voice is croaky, strange. And she wipes away your tears with her fingertips.

The New Trick

The routine is the same as ever. And so is the cage. And so are the shackles. The choker is still on, loose but there. If I try to leave, I’ll die, no doubt about it. I’m not at the point of wanting that just at the moment.

The morning routine is the same. I can do the outer circuit in under thirty minutes now. That’s down to practice and the diet, which means I’m a lean, mean running machine. But mainly it’s down to the new trick.

The new trick is no easier than the old trick.

The new trick is to stay in the present . . . Get lost in the detail of it . . . Enjoy it!

Enjoy the fine tuning of where I put my fingers when I’m doing push-ups, I mean really finding the finest tuning of where my fingers are in relation to each other, how straight or how bent, and how they feel on the ground, how the sensation changes as I move up and down. I can spend hours thinking about the feeling in my fingers as I do push-ups.

There’s so much to enjoy, too much really. Like when I’m running the circuit, I can concentrate on the deepness of my breathing but also the exact dampness of the air and the wind direction, how it changes over the hills and is slowed or speeded up as it’s funneled through the narrow valley. My legs carry me effortlessly downhill—that’s the bit I love best, where all I’ve got to do is spot the place to put my foot: on a small patch of grass between the gray stones, or on a flat rock, or on the stream bed. I do the spotting, looking ahead all the time, and move my leg to the right position, but gravity does the hard work. Only it’s not just me and gravity; it’s the hill as well. It feels as if the earth itself is making sure I don’t put a foot wrong. Then the uphill section and my legs are really burning and I’ve got to find the best foothold and handhold if it’s steep, and push and push. I’m doing the hard work and gravity is saying “payback time” and the hillside is saying, “Ignore him, just run.” Gravity is heartless. But the hill is my friend.

When I’m in my cage I can memorize the color of the sky, the cloud shapes, their speed and how they change, and I can get up there, be in the clouds in the shapes and colors. I can even get into the mottled colors of the bars of the cage, climb into the cracks beneath the flakes of rust. Roam around in my own bar.

My body’s changed. I’ve grown. I remember my first day in the cage and I could only just reach the bars across the top, had to do a little jump to grab them. Now when I stretch up, my hands and wrists reach freedom. I have to bend my legs to do pull-ups. I’m still not as tall as Celia, but she’s a giant.

Celia. I admit she’s hard to enjoy, but sometimes I manage it. We talk. She’s different from what I expected. I don’t think I’m what she expected either.

The Routine

Don’t get me wrong. This is no holiday camp, but Celia would say it’s no gulag either. This is the routine:

GET UP AND GET OUT OF THE CAGE—same as ever, at dawn Celia chucks the keys to me. I asked her once what would happen to me if she died peacefully in her sleep. She said, “I think you’d last a week without water. If it rains you could collect water on the tarpaulin. You’d probably starve rather than die of thirst, given the rain here. I’d say you’d last two months.”

I keep a nail hidden in the soil. I can reach it from the cage and I can unlock the shackles with it. I’ve not managed to undo the padlock to the cage yet but I’d have plenty of time to work on it. But then I’d have to get the collar off. I reckon I’d last a year with the collar on.