Three men untie me from my tree and take me away from the beetles to the center of the clearing. They’ve pounded a stake into the ground, and they tie me to it. After that, about six men spend more than twenty minutes stacking dry wood around me. The wood offers some relief from the sun, which is at its full height now, scorching my exposed skin.
Where is Lydia? Is she okay?
I let myself hang limply against the stake, unable to move otherwise.
And the time continues to tick by. Sweat beads on my neck and drips down my forehead. The men are all hidden again.
And then I hear footsteps. Crunching leaves. Cautious. Careful.
Lydia.
I don’t know what the trap is, but I don’t think Lydia should try and save me. She shouldn’t even come close to me. But I have no way to tell her anything, so I’ll just have to hang here and hope. More crunches. More cautious steps.
And then I see her walking cautiously through the forest towards the clearing. Her hands are up and her eyes are wide. She sees me, and she stops. I strain against the bands and shake my head.
Don’t come near me, don’t come near me.
She stands frozen. The trees are so thick; I have no idea how many people are here, how many are waiting for her to walk into this very meadow to try and save me.
And then I hear a crackle. Fire. I turn and see that a trail of sticks are on fire, and the pathway leads right to me. The fire moves slowly at first, but it picks up speed as it hurries across the wood towards me.
Lydia doesn’t move from where she’s standing. How can she? If she runs to me, attackers will emerge in a fury from the trees and she’ll be surrounded. She must stay where she is. She must watch me burn. She cannot save me; she needs to let me die.
Lydia throws something at me, and then she takes a step backward, using a large tree as a shield.
She’s transferred her consciousness to me. I can feel her moving around my body, mending scratches, healing the sunburned skin on my neck.
And then the pain starts as the fire reaches my feet. Lydia rushes to the pain, and I feel it subside, only to become excruciating again. She is not as fast as the fire—she can’t keep up.
But the ropes have burned off now. My feet are free.
And then I understand. If she can keep me alive long enough, my ropes will burn, and I’ll escape the fire.
The stake is on fire now. I feel the burns up my back, I feel fire reach my hands. I feel Lydia trying to heal the burns. My lungs are full of smoke and I cough and feel dizzy. I need to stay conscious. I can’t let myself pass out.
I cough again and close my eyes against the sting of the fire.
And then I feel the ropes fall off my hands.
Barely conscious and delirious with pain, I stagger away from the stake, manage to step over the faggots burning around me, and step onto the meadow again.
And then a knife lodges in my back. The pain is too much, and I fall head-first onto the ground. Three more knives fly over me. I see Arujan’s men then, now lying on the ground. I’ve moved into the ambush spot. Lydia was supposed to walk here. In this spot, over a dozen men have a perfect view of me, while I could not see a single one of them until I was here. They all look furious, and they all have knives. If Lydia comes to find me here, she will be killed.
A few more knives fly into the vicinity, but the men can’t figure out how to hit me while I’m prostrate on the ground. My body is getting stronger by the second; I army crawl forward, and then jump into a sprint when I see a few men run out of hiding. I sprint towards the vicinity where I last saw Lydia. Knives clatter behind me, but none of them hit me. I see a wall made of ice and rock, and I run to it and duck behind it and find Lydia there, curled into a ball. As I maneuver around it, a knife lodges in my calf, and I scrape my arm, but those are minor wounds I can worry about later.
Men are charging us. At least twenty of them.
Lydia starts flinging dirt at them, and they fall. Knives clink off her wall.
I pick up a knife just as two men round the corner of the wall. I engage, using hand-to-hand combat skills Buen taught me. Thank you Buen. By the time the two men lie motionless on the ground, Lydia has downed the rest of the men.
“Where are the others?” she says. Her eyes are hard.
“In the meadow.” I point, hoping the others are still there.
Lydia runs. Her hair flies behind her, and her bare feet kick back behind her with unexpected strength. She learned to sprint on the soccer field. I imagine watching her race off towards the goal with the ball. I imagine trying to catch her on the field, and I’m sure I would fail.
I follow behind her as she runs into the meadow. The glade with trees full of brown beetles. No knives fly at her as she enters.
Beetle Glade. That’s what we should call it.
Quint is still tied up against a tree, and so is another of his men, but the other lies in a pool of blood at the base of the tree he was tied to. Tiva and Somrusee are still tied up, but Po has been untied. Arujan has his hand around her neck and his arm raised with a knife.
“Don’t take a step closer and don’t move,” he growls, “or this knife will sink into this neck. That’s a wound, princess, even you can’t heal.”
We stop. Lydia holds out her hands. “Stop, Arujan. What are you going to accomplish by killing her?”
Arujan moves behind Po and pulls her to a standing position, the blade of the knife still on her neck. “This girl and I are leaving now. Either both alive, or both dead. That’s your choice.”
“You think I’m going to let you leave again?” Lydia takes a step forward, but Arujan takes two steps back, dragging Po by her neck. Lydia stops.
“Don’t move your hands,” he growls. “I don’t know how you got past my trap, or how you saved this idiot, but I have to admit you’ve bested me this round. I’ll take the girl, and you can have your victory.”
“No!” Lydia shouts and she raises her hand to throw her consciousness. Arujan cries out and pulls up on the knife. It slices upward through Po’s neck, but it doesn’t make it all the way through. There is a popping sound, and I’m sure his hand is breaking. Half an inch into Po’s chin, the knife stops, hovers a moment, and then slides backward through the skin and falls to the earth.
I run towards Arujan, then, drawing my own knife. The world flies by me in slow motion as I sprint across the meadow. Images flash through my mind. Cadah and her mutilated body in Watch. Buen’s white face the day I heard Arujan’s voice in the castle. Frozen children who starved because their government collapsed underneath them.
I don’t see Arujan’s knife in his other hand until I’ve already left my feet. I fly towards him, barely glancing at his knife as I put all my concentration into my own blow. I hit him hard, with everything I have as his knife slices through my ribs.
The pain is deafening. It explodes through me, and I feel my knife slip. I yell something, though I don’t know what. And then everything goes black.
* * *
When I come to, I’m alone in the glade with Lydia. The light is lower in the sky, but the sun hasn’t quite gone down yet. Another beetle is crawling on my face.
I groan, but my hand is free. I reach up and brush it aside. What a wonderful thing it is to have hands.
“Karl!” Relief washes over Lydia’s tear-stained face. “You’re alive.”
“Did you deliver me from death again, dear princess?” I choke when I try to laugh. Not a good idea. “I’m afraid we’ve fallen into a very bad habit.”
Pain. I’m in pain. I may be alive, but my entire body is groaning with the pain. From a lot of places.
Lydia runs her hands over my arm. “I really thought I lost you this time. You had so many wounds. Still have so many wounds! Burns and cuts and knives in your legs and Arujan’s knife in your ribs. I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to do it.” She chokes up and can barely get the words out. Tears fall down her face. Beautiful tears.
“Arujan
?” I whisper.
“Gone. Escaped.”
I lean back against the grass and groan. If I feel this terrible after a round of healing, I must have been in terrible shape. I’m lying on soft earth under a tree. “You did it, Lydia. Again. Though I’m not sure we should try for another round. Next time, you’ll have to get used to the idea of living without me.”
Lydia is quiet for a moment, and then she slides up next to me so that her legs cradle next to my torso. Her touch is soft and reassuring against the pain. I close my eyes and sigh. She reaches out tentatively with her hand and strokes my cheek.
“I don’t want to get used to living without you, Karl. You’ve been watching out for me and been by my side every step of the way. You’ve been my friend. Ever since we went to the Western Hills.”
The Western Hills. I was such an idiot in the Western Hills. I kissed Lydia and then I kissed Somrusee the next day.
“Yeah. About that. I never meant to be pushy. It’s just that I admire you so much. And I value our friendship more than anything. I understand how you must feel about me.”
It’s a lame excuse, but I can’t figure out how to better express myself. There’s no excuse for what I’ve done, and we both know it.
Lydia puts her finger on my lips. “No. I don’t think you do.”
She doesn’t think I do what? And then I see the look in her eyes and my heart starts beating faster. How does this make any sense?
Her face lowers closer to my face. It keeps coming. I can feel her breath against my lips. Her eyes are open, and they meet mine, hold them, and then they close. They close! I let my eyes close as I feel her lips come onto mine. They’re soft and wet. An Azurean’s saliva intensifies feelings. I’ve never felt so much love for anyone in my life. Passion races through my veins.
My universe explodes.
Sorry to every girl I’ve ever kissed, but your kisses were nothing compared to this.
Lydia pulls away and laughs. “You like me,” she says, and she blushes. She turns a dark shade of red, and I smile, exposed, and yet somehow happy about it.
“You felt it,” I say, and I smile back. We have no secrets now. Or, rather, I have no secrets now. “Is it okay?”
A tear sneaks out of her eye, but she smiles. “Yes, it’s better than okay.”
I look into her eyes, and I see the face of the woman I will love for the rest of my life. The woman who complements me in every way. “Will you marry me, Lydia Miller?”
She smiles, and then she kisses me again.
20 Agile
Bob
“I know where headquarters is,” Pearl says.
I bite into my peach and let the juice run down my fingers. “That’s what you said last time.”
“This time I really know.” She laughs, but I don’t find it very funny. We’ve driven from Georgia up to Pittsburgh and back three times already.
“I don’t love driving to Pittsburgh,” I say. Every time we drive up, we have to find a place to camp in the freezing winter of the city, and every time we come back, we have to find a new place down here. If we just stayed down here for a while, we could all relax and live it up until we ran out of money.
Pearl shrugs, but she keeps smiling. She really can’t read people if she thinks this is funny. “I think I’m right. Besides, the weather is getting nicer up there.”
I laugh, but there is no mirth in my laugh. “You. The Phoenix girl. It’s still subzero up there.”
Pearl leans back in her camping chair and puts her feet up on the rim of the fire pit. So casual, so happy to be on the run with no clue of what we will find, if anything, ever.
“I didn’t say I would enjoy it, just that it’s getting warmer.”
I roll my eyes. “It’s not subzero here.”
Pearl nods. “Maybe I’ll live in Georgia someday.”
“Assuming we all live through this.”
Pearl laughs. “I’m pretty sure I only made one assumption. That I’ll live through this.”
“Touché.” Somehow, she got me to smile. Pearl drives me crazy.
“I’m going to get another peach.” Pearl stands up and stretches before heading to the box of peaches we’ve stowed in the car. Wow, she looks good when she stretches. Even though we’ve been camping for weeks, she still gets up every morning to run. Not me. I think I’m starting to get a bit of a belly. It turns out the Sapphiri were the ones making me exercise all those years. Not a surprise, I suppose.
Not that it matters anymore if I stay in shape or not. Pearl has crushed my chance to make it back to Cassi. She watches me like a hawk. There’s no way I could sneak away. One might think Pearl would get distracted—she’s obsessed with figuring out where headquarters is—but she doesn’t get distracted. As long as we’re working together, I won’t find Cassi.
Maybe it’s all for the best. Because Cassi isn’t inoculated. When Tara showed us all those viruses, I realized that I may not have as much time to get to Cassi as I hoped. An outbreak is the only explanation that’s consistent with what we saw in the laboratory. The only reason to have an airborne virus is if they plan to release it. Once released, the virus will kill millions of people.
No, make that billions of people.
It will kill everyone except the Sapphiri. And the people in Brit’s family that have the gut bacteria mutation. And, well, maybe a few other families that have similar mutations.
And then, from the ashes, the Sapphiri will take over the world. Just like they always wanted.
It’s a new tactic for the Sapphiri. I suppose they’ve tired of trying to get to the Forgotten World and decided to take over this one instead. It makes sense, in a sick sort of way. And what kind of world is easier to take over than one without any people in it? After all, it was people who messed things up the first time the Sapphiri were supposed to rule the world. The hard part about leading people is people. Much easier to rule over people when they aren’t around. It all makes sense.
Of course, Pearl thinks that once we know the leadership of the Sapphiri, we will be able to target them and somehow stop the plot. After all, we stopped them from killing Brit and Ler, so it naturally follows that we can stop them from killing billions of other people.
I'm skeptical, but I’m not ruling it completely out. She might be right—one can never know the likelihood of success for certain until they’ve run the experiment. Yet, I’d say that the data aren’t in our favor. I’ve been a member of the Sapphiri my entire life and I don’t know anything about the leadership. I don’t even know how to find out. Discovering the leadership of the Sapphiri seems about as likely as us being alive at this time next year.
Pearl gets back and sits in her camping chair. She does look cute when she attacks a piece of fruit. I wouldn’t mind kissing the juice off her face for her. Especially if she liked it.
Which she wouldn’t.
“Are you going to tell me?” I ask. “Where you think headquarters is?”
She grins. “You’re not going to like this. Just over two years ago, a new corporation was founded in downtown Pittsburgh. Cassandra Enterprises. They sell banking software. They’re relatively new, but they grew really fast with the support of a few key government institutions, including ones I believe are involved with the Sapphiri.”
I grind my teeth and look away. “It’s a dead end, Pearl. I’ve told you a thousand times. Cassi isn’t involved with the Sapphiri. Cassi is not some clue for you to put into the puzzle you’re solving in that head of yours.”
Pearl leans forward and places her elbows on her knees. Peach juice drips down her left arm. I’m so mad I don’t even think it’s cute.
“Bob. She is. When are you going to accept that?”
“Never. I love her!” I stand up, ready to be done with this conversation. Maybe I will go to Pittsburgh with Pearl again, just to show her that her stupid theory is wrong. Again.
Pearl doesn’t laugh this time. She gazes off into space. “Just because you love someone doesn
’t make them good, or even mean that they love you.”
“Just let me call her. I’ll ask her. I’ll talk to her. I’ll prove to you she isn’t involved.” My hands are balled into fists, like I’m ready for some kind of fight. Cassi is good. How can I make Pearl see that? How can I show her that I need Cassi with me? That we’d all be better off if we would just trust her?
Pearl just sighs. She never listens to me when we talk about this, which is more often than I would like. “Where did she work when you were together?”
“She didn’t talk about work much, but it was a place that sold banking software.”
“Its name, Bob. Did it have a name?”
“I don’t know if she ever told me.”
Pearl shrugs and sits back in her chair. I glare at her and leave for another peach. We’re going back to Pittsburgh. I’ll show her. And I’m going to bring Cassi back with me.
* * *
Pearl stops in West Virginia and finds a bed and breakfast that will take cash. We leave Brit and Ler there and continue to Pittsburgh. Apparently, Pearl has decided it’s too cold for camping right now after all. Not that I’m going to complain, I just thought she had said she could handle it. We drive through a blizzard all the way to the city. There’s at least a foot of snow on the ground when we make it to downtown. We abandon the car in a public garage and head to the tower that houses Cassandra Enterprises. I don’t say much; I’m just following Pearl’s lead, waiting for the chance to show her just how wrong she is about Cassi.
We watch the tower all day from the safety of a Starbucks shop across the street. Unfortunately, what we see doesn’t help me in my cause for a quick dismissal of Pearl’s theory. A lot of tall white men with blond hair come in and out of that building.
Long after dark, just past 7:30 PM, Pearl suddenly stands up with her gaze locked on something out the window. I roll my eyes and look out the window to see who she is looking at. A tall, blond man is just leaving the building. He hurries down the street away from us.
The Sapphiri Page 20