8
NINE
After seventeen years spent doing the mad general’s bidding, I’d always thought nothing could surprise me, but it turned out I’d been wrong. Of all the things I’d considered might be in the forest, Nastya and her murderous little friend hadn’t even made the list.
Nastya… I noticed the second blonde, the tough one, called her Ana, but in the beginning, she’d been Nastya. It wasn’t until we’d started learning English and the boys began calling her Nasty A that she’d stopped answering to the old nickname. They didn’t call her Nasty A in front of the general, of course, or Nastya, or even Ana. He hadn’t liked us to use names, period. To him, we were numbers, tools, barely human at all.
Seven of Ten.
Nine of Ten.
Could he really be dead?
I found it difficult to believe, but if he
