He’s a large man: thick neck, shaved head, muscled arms and wide shoulders. He’s much taller than I am, and I feel tiny and delicate but not in a good way. Instead I realize that if he wanted, this man could toss me from the roof with one hand.

But there’s no malice in his eyes and so I nod.

“I’m Ox,” he says, and I nod again. I think about throwing open the door and storming back down the steps but there’s nowhere for me to run. No way Ox couldn’t catch me. I’m completely at his mercy.

We all are. I remember the rumor of all those skulls staked around the City by the Recruiters, erected after the Rebellion to show their might. With one command mine could be one of them.

Silently, Ox and I stand side by side staring at the Dark City. Clouds have blown in, low and pregnant with snow. People still pile into the river trying to escape, and the Recruiters stationed along the perimeter wall of the Sanctuary are busy shooting anyone who tries to swim or boat ashore. I watch as they take aim at a group of boys crawling their way to the island across the cables. Even from up here I can hear them placing bets on which will fall first—on which boy to aim for next.

Half of their bolts go wide, but enough hit home that one by one the boys plummet into the freezing river below, their fingers clawing at the surface for a while as the water burns red with their blood.

Perhaps Elias and Catcher and my sister and I are safe here, but I wonder if it’s worth it, seeing all it takes to protect us. Besides, just how long will this protection last anyway?

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Ox asks, and his unexpected statement leaves me disgusted.

“It’s horrible,” I spit out. “All those people—they’re terrified. They have nowhere to go.”

He reaches out a hand and tilts my chin until I’m no longer looking down at the desperation in the streets but out at the line of buildings. They stand strong and still like soldiers marching against the wind, prepared to fight yet another storm.

I jerk my chin out of his grasp and dig my nails into my palms, trying to keep control of my scattered thoughts. The Dark City’s impressive but I wouldn’t call it beautiful, not with it filled by so much death.

“Sometimes I wonder what it would have been like before, all lit up at night,” he adds. Surprised at his sentiment, I glance at him from the corner of my eye. I’d always wondered the same thing, wondered how people could get anything done in life back then when they were surrounded by so much color and light.