Taken (Erin Bowman)

was a twisted version of the truth, the version that he knew would earn my trust.
    “I don’t get it. The Heists, the entire project. What’s the point?”
    “It’s a very long story.”
    “I have time.”
    We are in too deep to stop, and my father knows it. He barrels ahead. “Any details Frank mentioned regarding the war were probably accurate. This country suffered greatly in the wake of fighting, which happened long before the project. Even still, AmWest remains a threat. Most of its people live in ruins, like the communities do outside Taem. They have one organized force on the western shore, and right now their attacks are sporadic and uncoordinated. But put them all together—the people living in poverty and the people actively attacking—and they are many. So many. Frank knows that if they united themselves long enough to cross the borderline, claiming back land and freshwater, he couldn’t stop them.
    “The only way to ensure that won’t happen is with greater numbers. Frank wants more soldiers, an endless supply. He wants good ones, too, physically fit and mentally strong. And what better way to get tough and stubborn and resourceful individuals than to make them grow up in the harsh conditions of a place like Claysoot?”
    “That seems incredibly inefficient,” I point out. “Having to wait eighteen years to Heist a single soldier.”
    “We are a means to an end, Gray. He is not after us, just our qualities. It’s the Forgeries he cares about.”
    There’s that word again. I know what it means in the blacksmith shop where Blaine would forge new spears and axes, molding and shaping them to his liking. But in this context, I think it means something more.
    “The Forgeries are the point of the Laicos Project,” my father says. “When a boy was Heisted, he went into the labs, where Frank tried to replicate him. He’s achieved some level of success, just not the kind he craves. Harvey told us Frank can make one Forgery off any given boy. His end goal is of course limitless copies: one Heisted boy who can be replicated one, ten, a hundred times over. If Frank had that sort of army, he could wipe AmWest out in a matter of days.”
    I sit there, stunned. Just a few days ago I trusted Frank, felt at home in his presence. And now . . . this. Harvey is innocent and it’s all Frank. Frank, who is grooming the perfect soldier. With Claysoot as his mold. And the Outer Ring, the smoke—that’s him, too. The dead climbers weren’t victims of a self-functioning piece of Harvey’s experiment. They fell to Frank, who burned anyone that threatened the future of his project by trying to escape it. Emma and I were the first to be saved because . . . of Maude! I told her I was Blaine’s twin as I ran from her house. Maybe it was Frank she was talking to that night. Maybe she told him what I said and Frank had Emma and me saved because he wanted to know how I tricked the Heist.
    “I just . . . I can’t believe I bought all his lies,” I stammer. “How did he get away with locking a bunch of children up? And how did no one stop him? How did no one question him as the Wall was raised?”
    “It’s stamped with Quarantine on the outside,” my father says. “AmWest released a virus that killed thousands back during the war. Claysoot was passed off as a quarantined community still suffering from that illness, and people happily avoided it.”
    My knuckles have gone pale from squeezing the edge of the dresser. Frank put his arm on my shoulder. I trusted him. I think about my trip to the infirmary to be Cleansed, the tracker implanted in my neck. I wonder what else happened to me when I was there, if a piece of me now sits in some vial in his labs.
    “We have a little documentation, if you want to see it with your own eyes,” my father adds. “Ryder got his hands on some partial research records when he ran years ago.”
    “It’s an extremely interesting read,” a voice says from the open doorway. Bree is standing there, holding a clean set of clothes for me in her arms. “Full of surprising details.”
    I look to my father, suspicious that he’s withheld information.
    “I’ve told you the basics,” he says, and I believe him. His voice is steady, and I have a feeling if he were lying, I’d be able to sense the quaver, the way I can with Blaine. “But I’m sure Bree will show you to the library if you’d like to read them yourself.”
    She shrugs, uninterested. “Yeah, I can do