Shatter the Suns

by Caitlin Sangster

  Howl.

  CHAPTER 46

  HOWL’S CHEST RISES AND FALLS with a regularity that seems almost miraculous. I hardly know how I cross the floor or feel it when my knees collapse at his side, both terrified to really look at him and hopeful he’ll somehow be better. He lies flat on his back, a thick gray blanket tucked neatly up to his chin, his eyes closed. His skin is cool when I pull back the blanket to touch his wrist, his pulse slowed down from the suicide sprint it was attempting the last time I checked on the heli. My friend still looks shrunken and small, as if some part of Howl escaped into the night the moment the gore bit him.

  Is that what Howl is now? My friend?

  I try not to hold my breath as I check his bandages for the chemical reek that seemed to crawl out of the wounds before. Under the white cloths, Howl’s skin is an angry red, crisscrossed with an awful black thread, as if they sewed the break in Howl’s skin shut rather than using adhesive. But instead of the rank, hostile smell from before, something herbal and tangy wafts up from his skin that makes me want to sneeze. Not pleasant exactly, but healthy. Alive.

  Luokai kneels beside me, reaching out to take Howl’s other hand, still limp on the pallet. Not to check his pulse, but to examine the single white line carved into the skin between his forefinger and thumb.

  Howl’s eyelids twitch, then crinkle open to squint up at me, blinking as if he can’t quite remember how it is he got here or why I’d be at his bedside watching him sleep. He glances over to Luokai, who is still contemplating the scar marring Howl’s skin, then to mark the ceiling, the contours of the room, and the silver strip lining the open door.

  He closes his eyes again, and I can almost feel the gears in his mind beginning to whir, calculations forming on how far he is from the door, to where I’m sitting, to the height and build of the man sitting next to me. Howl slowly twists the wrist I’m holding around so his hand is wrapped around my wrist as well, fingers squeezing gently.

  “You’re awake.” Luokai carefully sets Howl’s hand down on the mat and sits back on his heels. “I don’t know much about medicine, but I think that’s supposed to be a good sign.”

  “How are you feeling?” I ask.

  Howl opens his eyes again and there’s a hint of a smile at the corner of his mouth. His throat convulses as if he’s summoning the courage to speak, but it comes out in a cough that curves him forward.

  “Something to drink?” I ask. “Where’s your medic?” I look toward Luokai, but he doesn’t respond for a moment, eyes still heavy on Howl’s First mark. Finally, he goes to the door, speaking in low tones to the guards we left outside.

  “Where are we?” Howl croaks between coughs.

  “On the island.”

  His eyes widen and he tries to take a deep breath, to stop the coughs racking his chest. “And?”

  “And . . . I’m not sure. I was in a cell until they brought me here,” I whisper.

  “June?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “That stupid medic?”

  “I let him go.”

  Howl’s head ticks to the side, processing. “Tai-ge?”

  I lick my lips, my fingers around his wrist compulsively tightening before I realize. Luokai returns with a small cup of water, steam wafting from its surface. Howl’s chin comes forward as he attempts to sit up, but that’s as far as he gets, his eyes clenching shut in pain. I shift so I’m by his head and help lift him into a sitting position.

  He groans, but he can support himself once he’s up. I try not to think about the fact that he’s bare to the waist, wearing nothing but bandages.

  I’ve never seen him without a shirt before—not like this, anyway. His skin ripples over the muscles that rope up his torso . . . and then I can’t look anymore because he’ll notice. Just the thought of him catching me staring at him causes enough heat in my cheeks to roast taro.

  Howl tries to reach out for the cup with his scabby, bitten arm and swears. His shoulders curve forward around his broken collarbone as he gathers the arm under his wounded shoulder and cradles it against his chest.

  This isn’t the gray, mostly dead boy from the heli. Even with my limited orphan-style medic experience, I know just how close Howl was to stepping over the line into black after the gore bit him. Now he’s not even contemplating it, just wishing he could, probably. He’s much, much better.

  “How long have we been here?” I ask Luokai. A recovery this miraculous didn’t happen in a matter of hours. “Helis are supposed to attack in . . .” I don’t know how many days.

  “You do know their plans?” Luokai tears his attention away from Howl. “You’ll help us, then?”

  Howl’s eyes meet mine, his years spent up to his necks in lies and manipulation mixing with my brushes with lies and promises unkept over the last few months. I don’t know the sorts of things that would be helpful to know about the invasion, in any case. Only that Dr. Yang said seven days and what he means to take. Hope. The future. Everything that’s important to me.

  I turn a fraction, toward Luokai. “I want to see June first. And my mother’s papers. And have a way out of here that doesn’t involve weapons.”

  Luokai swivels toward the door, barking an order at the two Baohujia standing there. One gives a minute bow and slips out of the doorway, out of sight. Luokai nods to the other guard before looking back at me. “I can show you your friend. But as for the papers and safe passage off the island, you’ll have to take that up with Gao Shun.”

  “I’d like to speak with her as soon as possible, then.” I turn back to Howl, the warmth of hope crackling in my chest. He hasn’t tried to reach for the cup again, so I take it from Luokai, the bulky pottery warm against my clammy skin. Before I can offer to help him drink, Howl takes it out of my hands, the cup wobbling as he tries to hold it to his lips.

  Dr. Yang took Howl, too. Made him into whatever it was Howl became inside the Mountain. A person who believed only a gun could preserve his home. That no matter what, Reds would never stop, would never share their food, their medicine, or anything he needed to live. But that only lasted until the Mountain tried taking Howl’s life too, and he was caught between a tiger and a falcon, both hungry for his flesh.

  What was it Howl said when we were in the cave, under the owl’s tree? That I can’t understand. Not any more than he can step into my shoes and know what it was like to have my sister shot in the street, to live with Mother looking down at the City with her dead eyes, waiting for it to be my turn.

  Well, this war can’t have any more of us. Dr. Yang can’t have Lihua or Peishan. He can’t have June. He can’t have the rest of me, or what’s left of Howl. Not if I have anything to say about it.

  Swearing again under his breath, Howl’s throat constricts as he drinks, his whole frame shaking. Even if he isn’t being poisoned from the inside anymore, Howl isn’t going to be running anywhere. He finally seems to feel me watching him, but instead of raising an eyebrow and cracking a joke about being irresistible, Howl pulls the blanket up around him as if he’s cold. Or embarrassed to be sitting here half-naked.

  Vulnerable, perhaps. A state to which Howl is not accustomed.

  “Can I have something to make a sling for his arm?” I ask Luokai. “I’m guessing he didn’t need it while he was asleep, but now that he’s awake, every time he moves it will hurt. Broken collarbones hurt everything else, too.”

  The man starts to bow his assent, but a typhoon made from a gas mask and golden curls pours into the room before he can finish. Blond hair catching the dim light, June slides to her knees away from the guard who seems to be her escort, pivots, and rams straight into him. A groan leaks out of him as she kicks him in the groin. I jump up, not sure if I should be helping June or restraining her, but before she can plant her elbow into the other guard’s ribs or her teeth into someone’s skin, a third guard grabs hold of her from behind, tackling her to the ground, wrapping his arms around her and squeezing until June stops fighting. Her gas mask obscures h
alf of her face, making her sharp nose and chin into a long ugly snout.

  “June?” I run to her, pulling at the guard’s arms wrapped so tightly around her middle. The panicked rasp of air sucking in and out through the filters of her mask makes the hair on my arms prickle. “Let go of her! June, are you all right?”

  One of the other Baohujia moves to grab me, but Luokai calls him off. “Tell her to stop, or we’ll put her back in a box where she can’t hurt anyone,” he instructs.

  I fall to my knees, one hand still pulling at the guard’s arms, but he doesn’t even look at me, doesn’t give an inch. When I put a hand to June’s cheek just above the curve of her mask, she rears back, hiding her covered nose and mouth against the guard’s arm, as if I were going to pull the filters away from her.

  “I wasn’t going to take it off, June,” I whisper as calmly as I can manage.

  June won’t look at me, every breath jerking, panic screaming out of every twitch she makes. I touch the guard’s arm again and meet his eyes. “Let me take her. She won’t hurt anyone if I’m holding her.”

  I hope June is listening, even if she won’t look at me. Luokai translates, and the man loosens his grip. June tumbles forward into my arms, and I grab her around the middle, pinning her arms before she can attempt to inflict any more damage. She only twists against my hold once before wilting against me, her limp form frighteningly still. Each breath comes in a rusty wheeze, her eyes wide in terror, like a caged animal. I hold her firmly against me just in case she’s waiting for the right moment to bolt.

  “You’ve seen her,” Luokai says from behind me. “I’d like to take you up to Gao Shun now. Time presses against us.” He gestures for the guard to take June back, but I curve my arms around her and glare up at him.

  “Let her stay.” The steel in my voice grinds the words out in a heavy, unmovable shield.

  “She won’t hurt anyone if you let her stay with us,” Howl croaks. “And Tai-ge, too. Where is he?”

  June’s weight feels heavy against my chest. It’s comforting to have someone touching me, holding me down.

  “Sev?” I look up, and Howl’s eyes are on me. “Have they told you where he is yet?”

  He holds my gaze, the mist of pain and grogginess seeming to slip when I don’t answer. I look away to find Luokai’s stare instead.

  I feel my heart freeze for a moment, looking from one to the other. Their heavy brows, the shape of Luokai’s nose, just a bit flatter and wider than Howl’s. Their dark eyes narrowed to almost the exact same degree. Even the way Luokai stands, straight-backed and leaning toward me looks like something I’ve seen a thousand times. It’s the mouth that clinches it, though.

  What was it Luokai said before opening the door? In the mixed panic and relief of seeing Howl alive, I hadn’t quite processed it. Howl and this man look as if they were broken from the same mold.

  They look like brothers.

  CHAPTER 47

  “WHAT’S WRONG, SEV?” HOWL ASKS.

  I point to Luokai, my mouth hanging open for a moment before words come. “You said Howl was related. . . . I think you’d better explain.”

  Luokai takes a long breath, then carefully lowers himself to the ground to sit across from us, focusing on Howl. “I probably should. I would never have had a First brought to my own room or allowed an entire heli’s worth of invaders into the same room together if not for you, Howl.”

  “How do you know my name?” Howl’s eyes sharpen, and for a moment I wonder if he’s putting on the sickness, if he’s stronger than he’s acting.

  Luokai tucks his hands into his sleeves as if steeling himself before continuing. “Sun Howl. From the Mountain, no? Your parents, Chen Hui and Sun Baoli, defected from the City during a purge of the Chairman’s family. Sun Baoli was the Chairman’s youngest brother.”

  An ugly flutter of ash stirs up inside me, not sure where to go. Howl is related to Chairman Sun? If the Chairman was removing any challenges to his hand around the First Circle’s neck, it wouldn’t surprise me to find he’d sent members of his extended family to starve outside City walls.

  It would also, after all of the pretending and lying and ridiculousness, be horrifyingly ironic.

  Howl glances at me, brow furrowed. I wait for him to correct the erhu player, but he doesn’t. “And you are . . . creepy Port North guy. Who has not tried to kill me yet, even though you know my name and my entire family history, so I shouldn’t worry?”

  “You worry that anyone who knows you will start with a weapon?” Luokai smiles. “I suppose that’s in line with what I remember of you, though I hoped you would grow out of it. I’m your brother.”

  Howl jerks away and begins coughing again. “My what?” A tear tracks down his cheek as he flinches with each barrage of coughs, clutching his arm close to his chest.

  “Your brother.”

  “Seth—my brother—is dead. He’s been dead since I was little.”

  “I suppose I am. The man I was before most certainly is. I don’t use that name anymore. It was a concession our parents shouldn’t have made. I use the name they gave me when I was born: Sun Luokai.” Luokai breathes in, holding the air in a second too long before letting it back out again. He looks down at his hands, tracing the skin between his forefinger and his thumb decorated with a single scarred line, faded almost to nothing as though he got it very young and never had it redrawn. “I was a child when our parents escaped the City. But old enough to be marked. You, however, were born in the Mountain.”

  I want to laugh and cry at the same time. But it’s not the time to do either, because Howl is shaking his head. “Scars don’t prove anything.”

  A ghost of a smile flits across Luokai’s face, pain a sharp seasoning. “The Mountain was closed back then. They were afraid if we went out, we’d lead Reds right to our hiding place. Or worse, that SS would find its way in. It was hard to find enough food for everyone, so they organized raiding parties. Volunteers to risk contracting SS in exchange for food to put in their children’s starving bellies—”

  “Stop,” Howl interrupts, sliding off the pallet as if he wants to stand and walk away. But for once, he can’t. He slides toward me and June, as if having the two of us at his back somehow makes him stronger, but only makes it a few inches.

  “Stop? Why?” Luokai looks down at his hands. “I wanted to believe you were still alive. I remember the way you looked the day I went out with them. You were only five or six, ribs sticking out like a sick gore, begging to come with us. I was barely old enough to go at sixteen. Those City supply lines from the farms had all the food we could ever need.” He speaks in a straight line, unwavering and direct, inevitably drawing closer and closer to the chasm, the great hole I know is coming. “We didn’t even get a chance to attack. A City scout circled around behind us and threw a grenade right in the middle of our group. I still remember how it bounced, coming apart right at my feet, each piece trailing little wisps of smoke. Mother jumped in front of me.

  “We managed to carry her out, Father and me. But it didn’t matter. She was probably gone before I picked up her feet. Father collapsed less than a mile later. I didn’t even know he was hurt. We couldn’t bring their bodies back. I didn’t know what the grenade was, what I was, because I’d been standing so close to it. I fell Asleep only hours after getting back.”

  Howl’s face crumples, jaw tight. Even more vulnerable than a ghostly shell of the boy from before, missing a shirt and bled dry. He looks like that little boy first realizing his parents aren’t coming back in from the forest. June wheezes underneath the mask and a teardrop falls on my arm.

  “Were you looking for Howl? When I saw you at the Post?” I want to let go of June, to put my arm around Howl and smooth out the painful line of his back, but I’m afraid that any leeway I give to June will be returned tenfold with violence.

  Afraid that after everything, a touch from me wouldn’t be comforting anyway.

  I can’t help but wonder if I looked . . . i
f I went far enough . . . Howl said it when we were sitting outside the Mountain, gazing up at the stars like we had some sort of control over our lives. Sole told me this story when I was still at the Mountain, hiding in her bathtub, waiting for the demons to come steal my brain. She said something else, too, about why he left. Fear crawls down my arms, the studied way the Baohujia watched Luokai suddenly taking on a new meaning.

  “No,” Luokai answers. “When you met me at the Post, I was looking for stories of Sun Yi-lai. We’ve been ranging out farther and farther, hoping to somehow stop . . .” Luokai takes a deep breath, his eyes closing for a moment, his hands perfectly still on his knees, as if he can banish whatever feelings are roiling in his chest. “I wish I could have looked for you, Howl.”

  “You wish . . .” Howl clears his throat, the words jagged and sharp. The space between them feels awkward and prickled, two brothers who always meant to find one another, only to end up in a cell together, one a prisoner. “What happened to you, then?”

  Luokai fingers his ear where a gold ring pierces the skin. “I breathed in the wrong air, and I ceased to be a human being according to the people inside the Mountain. Chan was with us that day too. Both of us were asked to leave the moment we woke up.”

  The name Luokai picks at the edge of my brain. Chan. That was the other boy Sole mentioned the night she told me this story. Her brother. Banished for contracting SS, because back then allowing Sephs to mix with the uninfected was too dangerous.

  It’s still too dangerous. I find myself curling down over June, edging toward Howl as if I can somehow protect them from what could be coming next. Even if breathing the same air won’t poison any of us, compulsions could do just as bad or worse.

  “I don’t know what they told you,” Luokai looks at Howl, his eyes soft. “Just that they wouldn’t let me see you to say good-bye. Maybe it was kinder that way. They didn’t make you watch us leave, wondering when the compulsions would take us, if we’d die by Red fire or by our own hands. We had to leave everything, everyone.” He takes a breath, flashes of emotion flooding his eyes in quick bursts, but disappearing as if he can control them. “Chan and I protected each other, helped when compulsions were bad. But it wasn’t enough in the end. We came to a building standing alone in the forest. It seemed so tall, like nothing either of us had ever seen before. I still remember the rusty red braces sticking out from the old walls like bones from a rotting corpse.” Luokai licks his lips. “I couldn’t stop him that time. Running up the stairs as though the whole world were chasing him. Up on the roof, the whole building swayed under him until he jumped.” Luokai shuts his eyes, shaking his head a fraction. “I still don’t know if it was a compulsion, or just . . .”