* * *
My stomach burbled from the meal and it was a toss-up as to whether the food would stay down. I peed behind the screen, gagging at the scent of my urine combining with Keira’s bile, which lined the bowl. What happened when this camping toilet got full?
We sat on the futon like it was a boat in the middle of the ocean. Minutes passed, melting into hours.
And then, finally, the door opened. Roza strode in with Taylor close behind. We jumped to our feet, moving as if by magnetic force towards the bars.
“Hello, girls.” Roza waited in the middle of the entryway. Taylor set down a stool and Roza settled herself on it like a regal queen visiting her prisoners. Her jasmine perfume wafted over us. “How’s everyone feeling?”
Finally, Keira spoke for all of us: “Are you fucking serious right now?”
Taylor’s expression was disturbingly anticipatory as she gently set down a heavy tote bag. Roza, on the other hand, looked slightly annoyed, as if we’d interrupted her plans for the day. She wore a chunky knit gray dress, red lipstick, and platform boots. Seeing her on the other side of the bars, the concrete wall behind her, she looked like she was ready to pose for some artsy magazine.
“I know you’re upset.” Roza held up a hand. “And I understand that. This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen.” Her gaze landed on Zoe. “But I didn’t know we had an interloper in our midst.”
“Roza?” Now Wren was using her calm, charming voice even though it was shakier than usual. “This is all a mistake. A total misunderstanding. If you let us out, we can talk about it.”
“Wren, darling.” Roza gazed at her with affection. “My beautiful bird. I wish that were the case. It was more fun playing with you all upstairs. This is going to be a bit more tedious. But c’est la vie. You all wanted—needed—to figure out the riddle. So here we are.” She looked at Taylor, who picked up the tote bag and approached the bars.
“Back up, please,” Taylor ordered. I noted the “please”; she was only using it because Roza was there. We retreated a few feet and sat. Taylor tossed in water bottles through the door. They rolled towards us. Zoe opened hers immediately, guzzling it down. I forced myself to take only a few sips. It was like liquid gold coating my throat, which had been made dryer by the coffee and salty stew.
“Now, girls,” Roza went on. “I know that this is a surprise. But since we’re here, let’s try to make the best of it.”
Keira scoffed. She’d left her bottle in front of her, untouched.
“You can be mad at me; that’s fine.” Roza folded her hands. “But you’re entering a survival situation now.”
“Survival?” Wren sounded panicky.
“Don’t interrupt me.” Roza’s voice was suddenly cold.
I reached out and grasped Wren’s hand.
“I don’t like whining,” Roza went on, her voice clipped. “Understood? Here’s what’s going to happen. You have two options. You can sit in this cell and die of thirst. It will only take a few days. We still have a week and a half left of this retreat, so no one will miss you until it’s too late.”
“That’s a lot of bodies, Roza,” Zoe said. “How will you explain that?”
“Fire.” Roza smiled, as if drifting into a happy reverie. “Fire takes all but the bones. You should know that, Alex. It happened to Daphne. All it would take is one candle on a desk, lighting a curtain on fire. Your whole wing would go up.”
The cool words slammed into me like I’d walked into traffic. Horror was doing funny things to my body, causing my right foot to twitch, my arms to feel frozen in place.
“It would be a tragic event,” Roza said, solemn. “We’d probably set up a new charity in your names. Something for other young female writers. That would be nice, wouldn’t it?”
“What’s the other option?” I asked. “You said there were two.”
Roza grinned. “Good question.” She again looked at Taylor, who opened the tote bag and pulled out an extension cord with a power strip. Taylor plugged it into the outlet near the door and slipped the end through the bars. We watched in stunned disbelief as she pulled open the small slot at the bottom of the door and slipped all our laptops and cords through.
“The other option is to write,” Roza said. “As long as you reach the word count each day, you’ll be given water and meals. The count will be higher, since we’ve lost a couple of days due to all this nonsense. But I think you’ll agree that there’s not much else to do in here.”
“And what happens at the end?” Zoe’s voice quavered. “Another fire?”
Roza rubbed her chin. “Good question, Ms. Canard. So curious, just like Lucy.”
I felt Zoe go rigid next to me.
“This is your fault, you know,” Roza said to her. “I planned this retreat expecting we could all come to a peaceful agreement. I only needed one novel. I thought it could even be a team decision, picking the winner who gets published under their name, and the winner who gets published under mine. You must realize that if you give a book to me, I take care of you for the rest of your life. There are a lot of egos in the group, of course, and I figured it would take a little convincing. But, in the end, one of you would’ve agreed.”
“What a great honor,” Keira muttered.
Roza glared at her before continuing. “So this is all to say that I had high hopes that we could start and end with positive reinforcement. That no one would have to get hurt. Unfortunately, Zoe ruined that for all of you by bumbling into this space. Even then, I did everything I could to protect the rest of you by making you think she was dead. But you just couldn’t let it go, could you?”
“So this was your plan B?” I asked, my voice cracking. “Locking us up?”
“Yes.” Roza focused on me. “I always have a backup plan.”
“Why would we do anything for you in here?” Keira scoffed. “If you’re just going to kill us anyway?”
“Now, I didn’t say that.” Roza shifted on the stool. “My methods may be extreme, but they work. If you finish your novels in this setting, I can guarantee that they’ll be magnificent. Zoe, I know you were copying that book, but I’m assuming you can still write, even if it’s been a few decades. So I’ll allow you to start something new. And we’ll proceed with the original plan. I need only one book. I have plenty of money to share with everyone, and I know most of you need it. Of course, I’ll need collateral to make sure you don’t tell anyone what happened here. But cults do that kind of thing all the time. And besides”—she smirked—“who would believe you? There’d be no proof. Just a bunch of wannabe writers trying to get famous.”
Wren shook her head. “I can’t do it. I can’t.”
“Well, that’s too bad.” Roza raised a palm. “Because this is an all-or-nothing proposition. If one of you refuses, none of you get to drink or eat.”
Wren covered her face with her hands.
“Fuck!” came the muffled cry.
“I know you hate me right now.” Roza’s voice was warm. “But eventually you’ll thank me. You won’t be able to hold out for very long, and you might as well start today instead of two days from now. Either way, it’s going to be brilliant. Remember: ‘What is to give light must endure burning.’？”