31
BEFORE
London, England
THE FIRST THING I NOTICED when I woke was that our marriage bed was soaked with blood.
I lit a tallow candle, and the smoke and sulfur filled my nostrils as a tiny flicker of light showed me Charles, my husband. He was painted in shadow; the line of his back, exposed to the waist, was smooth and still. It did not rise and fall with his breath, because he was not breathing. He lay on his stomach, his head tilted to the side, a pool of blood puddled beneath his face. His eyes were open, but they did not see.
I heard nothing but the rush of blood in my ears, the harshness of my own ragged breath in the air. I threw off the blankets that covered him, and he did not move. I watched a bead of blood drip from his nose, and he did not wipe it away. I choked on a sob, covered his body back up, wound my fingers in my hair, and pulled it to try to wake myself. It did not work, because I was not sleeping.
But it did bring me back to myself enough so that I heard a new sound—the crack of something against the bedroom window. My head snapped up, but my eyes saw nothing.
With trembling fingers I reached for the brass candleholder by the bedside. A spill of hot tallow hit my fingers, and I flinched at the pain, then welcomed it. It shoved aside the horror for a moment, allowed me to think of something else. I crept numbly toward the window and peered out of it, the candle reflecting in the distorted glass.
The professor stood below Charles’s house—below our house—silhouetted by light from the gas lamp across the street. He raised one arm and pointed at me, accusing.
What a mad thing to think! A shrill giggle escaped from my throat, and my laughter blew the candle out. I had not seen the professor in six months, since I had become engaged, and his presence here, now, was as senseless to me as the events that had transpired.
Something small hit the window again. I tilted my head at the professor, and saw that he had been pointing not at me but at the east side of the house, to the entrance that led to the mews behind it. He wanted me to open the gate.
But the servants—oh, God, the servants. What would I tell them? How would I explain?
Pulling at my hair again, I tried to think. I could avoid the servants’ quarters if I took the main staircase, exited through the front door instead of the rear. The gate key was kept in the kitchen. If I was careful, and quiet, I could get it without disturbing anyone.
I nearly left the room in my dressing gown stained with my husband’s blood, but I stepped on the hem, drenching me in horror anew. I felt sick but dizzily managed to find a clean dressing gown and clumsily slipped it on. It had been so long since I had dressed myself, and I had nearly forgotten how.
I descended the main staircase in bare feet, my long, undone hair veiling my face, my gown billowing at my ankles. All thoughts of propriety were banished by the memory of my husband’s blood pooling beneath his face. Quivering with panic, I cringed at every creak of the floorboards, held my breath at every sound. My fingers trailed the wall to help me find my way in the dark.
Finally I reached the kitchen and the key, silently slipped out of the house’s side entrance, and unlocked the gate that led to the mews. The professor was waiting for me.
The coal-colored sky had swallowed all the stars but had bitten only a slice out of the moon, leaving just enough light to see him by. He stood there dressed in a black waistcoat with black shirtsleeves beneath. He led me quietly into the empty stables. Since Charles had begun courting me, he had been unable to keep horses here. They kept injuring themselves, kicking the stall doors in fear or fury to escape some unnamed fate, and had to be moved to a stable nearby.
Ghosts of cobwebs hung in corners of the quiet stalls, and a light breeze tossed leaves at the cobbled steps. They danced at the professor’s feet, and I shivered from the chill.
“We must leave tonight,” the professor said.
I opened my mouth, but the only words that came out were, “My husband—my husband—”
“Where is he?”
But I could say nothing else but those two words. I kept repeating them as if it would make him reappear.
The professor took me by the shoulders—I never remembered him touching me before. I recoiled as he said, “Your husband is dead.”
He knew. He knew.
“Your husband is dead,” he repeated. “You must leave this house, and London.”
I could not speak, so the professor continued, “The life you lived is no longer available to you. Everything you once had will vanish. You will be shunned, cast out. If you are not treated like a criminal, you will be facing destitution, poverty. A woman with no property, no husband, the curse of a husband’s death looming over her—”
His words brought me back to myself. “But my family—”
“They are not your family. Have you forgotten where you come from?”
The question frightened me. “How do you know where I come from?” He didn’t answer, but he hadn’t been wrong to ask. I had forgotten. Between the dinners and the balls and the courting and the wedding, I had forgotten many things. It had been so long since I had done anything for myself; I’d spent years learning how to let others dress me, feed me, teach me, all under Aunt Sarah’s careful tutelage, and now, now I was helpless.
“I cannot—I cannot leave.”
He spoke firmly. “You can and you shall.” Then his head tilted, as if he had heard something. “We must—”
“We?” I asked sharply. His words had opened a vein of anger I hadn’t realized was even there. “Where have you been? You left without a word, and now—”
“I left because I had done all I could for you then, and I am doing all I can for you now. You are not my only student,” he said a bit snappishly. “I was assisting another at Christ’s College in Cambridge, and I came here as swiftly as I could. Now gather yourself. We have a long night ahead of us.”
“This is madness,” I said. “My husband—”
“Your husband is dead because you killed him,” the professor said, stunning me into silence. “You are not what Simon Shaw thought you were,” he added softly.
My eyes brimmed with tears. “And what was that?”
“A cure.”
“So, what am I?”
His gaze dropped. “A disease.” He hesitated, and looked around us at the empty stable. “The horses knew.”
The rough hardware of a stall door pressed into the curve of my spine. I had backed myself up against it without realizing. “How do you know?”
“I have seen it.”
“Where?”
“In your future.”
His words chilled my heart. “Who are you?”
“You know who I am.”
I swallowed. “What are you?”
“Your teacher,” he said simply. “Now obey me. Get dressed, in dark colors preferably. Take nothing from this house. Nothing from this life.” He looked at the sky, which threatened to lighten. “We must begin before dawn.”
“Begin what?” I whispered.
“Your real education.” He reached into his waistcoat then, and withdrew something I could not see. He stepped out into the dim moonlight, and I followed him as he opened his palm. Something silver glimmered in his hand. A pendant, half of it hammered into the shape of a feather, the other half a sword.
32
OKAY, SHE’S OUT.”
I’m not
“What did you give her?”
“Morphine, I think.”
“You think?”
“I don’t know! Whatever was in that vial.”
“How do you even know how to do this?”
“YouTube videos.”
“Ha.”
“Okay, um, there’s like, tissue around it—”
Around what
“I think I’m going to throw up.”
“Hand me a scalpel first?
“Which one?”
“I don’t know. No, not that one, a different one. Yeah, that one I guess.”
/> “You guess? What if you cut, like, an artery or something?”
“Stop making me nervous.”
“Sorry!”
“Should we just take her to the hospital?”
“I think . . . I don’t know. I think maybe. Yeah.”
Something smashed against the wall. “Okay. Okay. Go call.”
No no no get them out
“Oh, shit, Jamie. She’s moving. Hold her—”
“I can’t!”
“She’s digging. Oh, God. She’s, like, digging . . .”
“Give her more morphine or something. Christ!”
“I don’t want her to OD!”
“Well, she’s tearing out her intestines!”
“She is not. Don’t be so dramatic.”
Their voices blurred to silence, and my hands disappeared into warmth. I saw red and felt pain, but my hands kept moving, pushing, pressing, until I felt—
“Is that— What the fuck are those?”
What are they what are they
“There are two of them. Oh my God.”
“She was right. She was right.”
“Is that—maybe that’s what’s been making her sick?”
“I don’t know. I think—I think I can stitch this up.”
“How can you even see?”
“Here, give me that towel.”
It hurts it hurts stop please
“Stella, her lips are white.”
“Put some pressure here, maybe?”
“Should she be shaking like this?”
“Oh, no. She’s seizing—”
“What should I do?”
“Mara? Mara, look at us, okay? Just keep looking at us.”
But I couldn’t. Their words faded into darkness, and I did too.
33
BEFORE
London, England
I DISOBEYED THE PROFESSOR IN one thing when we fled London before dawn. I carried in my trembling hands the doll Sister had made me. Nothing more. Nothing less. I stared warily with tear-blurred eyes at the hansom cab the professor hired. The horses were uneasy, but he gave them something to calm them, he said, before he noticed what was in my hand.
“Mara—”
“That is not my real name,” I said hoarsely. I wanted to change the subject, so he would not force me to leave the doll behind.
He considered me. “Did you choose it for yourself?”
I nodded.
“Then that is what I shall call you.”
“What is your name?” I asked as the carriage rolled over the stone streets, toward the smoky sunrise.
The professor lifted an eyebrow. “I have had many.”
“What is the one you’ve chosen for yourself?”
At this he smiled. “I have chosen many. Abraham, Alexander, Alim, Abel, Arthur, Armin, Abdul, Aldis, Alton, Alonzo, Aloysius—”
“All beginning with A ? Why?”
“You are just as inquisitive as when I left. When you live the way I have, you must find ways to amuse yourself.”
I didn’t see how it was amusing at all, but I said nothing. There was too much else on my mind. What would happen at dawn, when the servants woke and found my husband—what Aunt Sarah would say, do, when she learned I was gone. My throat tightened, and I gripped the doll until my knuckles were white.
“How did you find me?”
“In England, or in India?”
My eyes widened in shock. “India?”
“By the well,” he said casually. “You were younger then.”
I reached back, searched my mind for some glimmer of recognition. I remembered a woman pointing at me, whispering something. A man was with her, but I could not remember his face.
“That was you?” And then, before he could answer, “How did you know where to find me?”
“I was paid by Simon Shaw to unlock what he believed would be the secret to immortality.” The professor smiled just slightly.
“He thought I was—”
A slight nod. “I knew the man you called Uncle, and suggested that Mr. Shaw contract with him to care for you until you grew up, as no one could be sure what you would become until you were older.”
“But I thought you saw my future?”
“I can see shades of it, under . . . particular circumstances. But many things are hidden, even to me.”
“How did you know Uncle?”
The professor pursed his lips. “There are not many of us, and we are . . .” He searched for a word. “Attracted to each other.” The carriage slowed to a stop. He stepped out of the carriage and held out his hand to me. I took it, clutching my doll with the other.
“Professor?”
“Yes?”
“What am I?”
The look he gave me was tinged with sadness, but also hope. I would never forget it. “You are a girl, Mara. A girl blessed and cursed.”
34
THE LIGHT CHANGED FROM BLACK to bright red. I squinted against it.
“She’s moving. Look.”
“Hey, you.”
Jamie’s voice. I tried to answer him, to swallow, but my throat was filled with sand. I forced my eyes open—the light in the room was blinding. A backlit shadow shifted beside me.
“Stella—some water, maybe?”
In seconds another shadow joined Jamie’s, handing him something. He held something cold and hard to my lips—a glass. I was weak and couldn’t take it from him, but I sipped from it greedily. Freezing water ran down my chin, and as it did, I noticed that I was freezing too.
“Cold,” I said between gulps. My voice was still hoarse, but at least I had one. The room was coming into focus too. The more aware I became of everything around me, the more aware I became of myself. I was freezing, and nauseous, but somehow I didn’t feel sick.
“What happened?” I asked.
Jamie and Stella exchanged a glance.
“What do you remember?” she asked cautiously.
I thought back, rooting through hazy memories of the past few days—the road trip, the sickness, the train, the razor—
Oh, God. “I—I cut myself,” I admitted. My cheeks burned with shame.
But then Jamie said, “We got them out.”
I blinked.
“There was totally something inside you, Mara. You were right.”
Horror. “Oh, God. What was it?”
“Like, capsules, they looked like?” Stella said.
“Do you still have them?” I asked.
“Yeah. Jamie?”
“They’re in my room. Hold on.” Jamie left, and when he came back, he held out his hand.
There were two of them, slightly larger than grains of rice, and transparent. Something copper and black was inside one, copper and red in the other.
“How did you know they were there?” Stella asked.
I thought back, remembered my face in the mirror, and the whispers:
Get them out.
Please stop.
I opened my mouth to tell them, but then swallowed the words back. “I had a feeling,” was all I said as I shivered. Stella wrapped a blanket around my shoulders.
“You scared the shit out of us, you know.”
I knew. But I’d had no choice. Or at least it felt like I’d had no choice. I remembered the feeling I’d had on the train, the feeling that had been with me since I’d woken up in Horizons, on the island. It was gone now. I felt like—like me.
“You look better,” Jamie said, studying me. “How do you feel?”
“Better.” I was thirsty, and tired, and nauseous and hungry at the same time. But I felt normal. Normal for me, anyway.
“Listen,” he started. “There’s something you need to know.”
I raised my eyebrows.
“When you—when we found you like we found you, we found something else.”
Jamie looked at Stella, who reached into her pocket. “Someone left a note at the door.” She handed it to me.
Believe her.
I didn’t recognize the handwriting. “I’m ‘her’?”
Jamie nodded. “It came with a medical kit or something. A big bag of surgical shit.”
I felt cold again. “Someone knew what was inside me.”
“And knows that we’re here.”
“Which means we have to leave,” Stella said. “Like, yesterday.”
“But whoever it was, whoever left it, they told you to believe me. And they were right.”
“But this person knows what’s wrong with us, and why wouldn’t they just say something if they wanted to help?”
My mind seized on the image of the man I knew as Abel Lukumi. If Noah had been there, he would have said that I was grasping at coincidences and trying to force them into facts. But Noah wasn’t there. It was just me, and Stella, and Jamie, and a trail of breadcrumbs that led to no one and nothing but the priest.
So I told them. About the botanica in Little Havana, where he had seen me, recognized me, and tried to kick me out before giving me some weird concoction to drink that had made me finally remember what I had done to Rachel and Claire. I told them about trying to find him again, after I’d killed everything in the insect house at the Miami zoo. I explained how it had been his face I’d seen in the hospital after Jude had slit my wrists, him on the platform as the train had pulled out of DC. By the time I’d finished, Jamie had backed up onto the bed, his head in his hands.
“So, what you’re telling me is”—he held out his hand—“some Santeria voodoo guy from south Florida followed you—followed us—all the way to DC, and he knows we’re in New York, and he knows where we are, but won’t show himself?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Why, though? What would he stand to gain?”
I remembered words that had once belonged to Noah, but that now belonged to me. “You never know what a person stands to gain or lose by anything.”
“I don’t get it, though,” Stella said. “Why would he just leave the bag? If he wants to help us, then he should just fucking help us.”
“Maybe he can’t,” Jamie said.
“Or maybe he doesn’t want to,” I said, the thought forming as the words left my mouth. “Maybe he’s . . . responsible for it.”
“Responsible how?” Jamie asked.
The Retribution of Mara Dyer Page 15