Bad Bloods

by Shannon A. Thompson

  “It is too easy,” I countered, “and my name’s not girlie.”

  Connelly huffed, then moved forward.

  Beyond the steel enclosure, a long, black car awaited us. One that Marion Lachance had sent. Who I met up with was still a mystery to the others, but they trusted my judgment. I hoped they continued to trust me once they met with her. I hadn’t told them for a reason.

  Marion Lachance had been a head figure in Joshua Logan II’s campaign and a powerful force in his party.

  Asking for her help seemed insane, but insanity was often necessary.

  Marion smuggled us into the Highlands, after all.

  “The guards are gone,” Kuthun confirmed with a whisper. Though he couldn’t see in the dark like Kat or me, he could see fate’s strings, and those strings would signal a person a mile away.

  Caleb took his word with confidence. “Let’s go.”

  Earlier that day, Britney had sung him his healing song, and now, he had a pep in his step that was normally absent.

  For once, we felt like normal teenagers breaking into a place we didn’t belong. But really, we were all different from that: Connelly, a doctor. Caleb, a stilts’ survivor. Kuthun, a bad blood. And me, a ghost.

  We surged forward through the darkness, only running when we got closer to the car. The back door slid open as if it sensed us, and we slipped inside, one by one.

  “I assume you’re my party,” a man with a thick accent spoke from behind the driver’s wheel.

  I nodded. “Name’s Vi.”

  His black eyes met mine in the rearview mirror. “Adelio.”

  My heart skipped a beat. “You—”

  He nodded again as he turned the wheel and guided the car away from the wall. We drove quietly at first, allowing the electric engine to take us to the main roads before he peeled out and sped up, then we talked.

  “I drove Serena while she was here,” he confirmed what I already knew. “I work for the Hendersons.”

  “Serena was here?” Connelly asked, curious.

  It was only then that I remembered how oblivious the woman was.

  She, like Caleb, wasn’t privy to some of the election’s information like the flocks were.

  “We don’t have time to explain,” Caleb muttered, but really, he simply didn’t want to.

  The way he pressed his face against the window, with Kuthun’s chin resting on his shoulder, made the two boys look as if they were transfixed by the city they thought they’d never see.

  The Highlands was full of wonders.

  Between oddly shaped structures and pastel-painted walkways, metal trees decorated the streets. They glittered in the rain, but tonight, everything was dry, and the streets were full of people.

  “No wonder their buildings are so tall,” Caleb whispered as the car inched into a crowd of citizens, who maneuvered around the vehicle without hesitation. No one tried to look inside.

  “Most of Vendona’s population is here,” Connelly said, disinterested. “To think they don’t help us every day, what a shame.”

  Caleb harrumphed, but Kuthun stared from Connelly to the crowd. If he saw connections, he kept them to himself.

  “We do what we can,” Adelio said, honking his horn when a woman stepped too close. “This week, Henderson opened a charity to reunite parted families. He believes it will help with the transition.”

  “The transition?” Connelly asked, when I thought she’d ask about reunions.

  “The transition between the two cities,” Adelio continued. “Once the wall is gone, there will be cultural tensions. Communication blunders, so to speak. By broadcasting reunions—hopeful stories—people will feel more complete. More comfortable. And then, they’ll work together.”

  “And what does Vespasien think of this?” Connelly questioned.

  I eyed them both.

  Adelio shifted in his seat. “Vespasien has too many tricks up his sleeve to think.”

  The man whose family built the walls was too busy conspiring for himself to change anything for the better.

  “For someone who built walls,” Adelio continued as he turned down the last street, “the man hardly knows what side he is on.”

  “I would beg to differ,” Connelly said, but she didn’t elaborate.

  During the debate’s pause, Caleb whispered something about magic streetlights instead of security ones. Kuthun laughed. Adelio parked the car.

  “You can’t be serious,” Caleb exclaimed. Only then did I realize where we were.

  The Trident building.

  It was the tallest, strongest structure in Vendona, and centered in the middle. Every event worth paying attention to took place within those walls, including the election. Today, we were invited in.

  “Way to keep a low profile, Marion,” I muttered to myself.

  Only Adelio seemed to hear.

  “You did well, Violet,” Connelly said, nudging my arm. “I’m proud of you.”

  Four words I had yet to hear from anyone.

  My heart surged.

  As much as I didn’t know the woman, she inspired me.

  For forty years, she hadn’t seen her family, and, for forty years, she continued to fight for them. She wanted to help stilts, strengthen bad bloods, and unite two cities despite their years of hatred. She believed she could make a change, and so she did. Without money. Without help. Without being a politician.

  She never let Vendona get her down, and she did it all with a fierceness in her eyes I only wished I could replicate.

  Connelly was altruistic and quite admirable for being so.

  “Who wants to go first?” Connelly asked as she shouldered open the door.

  Caleb practically leapt over her lap to leave. Kuthun followed. But I lingered behind. Adelio’s words had stopped me.

  “You look familiar.” He squinted in the rearview mirror at Connelly. “Really familiar.”

  “Oh,” Connelly breathed. “Lots of old ladies look like me.”

  “I only know Jane,” Adelio joked, but Connelly’s smile twitched.

  “Yes, Lady Jane.” The president’s wife. “How is she?”

  “Well,” Adelio promised. “I imagine you’ll meet her soon.”

  “I hope I do,” Connelly said, then pulled me out of the car with her. Within moments, Adelio drove away. It was best to go unseen. But Caleb and Kuthun seemed to forget that.

  They stood on the sidewalk, spinning around, people from a crowd pushing to get around the duo.

  “Where are we supposed to stand?” Caleb joked, and Kuthun mirrored him.

  For the two guys who lived in almost solitude on an island, the crowded Highlands was both delightful and overwhelming.

  I almost wished I hadn’t spoiled the surprise by visiting the streets through my shadows.

  “Come on now,” I coaxed, grabbing both boys by the arms. “Try not to stand out like tourists.”

  Vendona didn’t exactly have a lot of them. People had to be rich to travel, and none of our appearances screamed of wealth.

  Between Caleb’s thin jacket and Kuthun’s mismatched clothes, we’d be lucky if we weren’t caught before we got inside, let alone to the correct floor.

  “She’s on floor eleven,” I said.

  “That’s a good number,” Kuthun confirmed.

  I rolled my eyes. Connelly stared with hers.

  “You kids go in first,” she said as she surveyed the street. “I have somewhere to be.”

  “This is where we’re supposed to be,” I said, but Connelly shook her head. Bits of her blonde-gray hair unfurled.

  “I trust you to explain the current situation to your contact,” she said, “but I have contacts of my own that I’d like to bring. I’ll be up soon.”

  Caleb nodded, and then Kuthun and him disappeared inside.

  I followed Connelly instead. “Did you get what I wanted?” I asked.

  Connelly leapt as if she hadn’t noticed my trail. We’d only walked a few feet.

  “Violet
.” She spoke my name like a curse but covered it up with a smile. “Of course I did. That was our bargain.”

  If I got her into the Highlands, she would obtain legal documents pertaining to all types of segregation, including Vendona’s wall, including the schools. Where or how she got ahold of such a thing was beyond me, but where or how I found Ami was beyond her.

  Connelly and I both had secrets. I respected that much. But only because it was a mutually beneficial relationship.

  Connelly handed over the paperwork she’d kept tucked in her jacket pocket.

  I looked it over, satisfied, and slipped it into my own. “I think you should come with us,” I insisted. “They won’t trust a couple of kids, and I told Marion that—”

  “Marion?” Connelly interrupted. “As in Marion Lachance?”

  I swallowed. “She’s on our side,” I promised. “She just…”

  “She’s on Logan’s side.”

  “I know,” I managed, but I had nothing else to say.

  If the group could hear Marion out, they would understand. They would see how much she could help us, and then, we could work together.

  “Maybe the parties can even meet in the middle,” I said, only for Connelly to frown.

  In her silence, I wondered if the old woman had changed her opinion about me. If I disappointed her right after I impressed her. The idea hurt all on its own.

  “I’ll be honest with you, Violet,” Connelly began. All the while, her sharpened features softened. “I want to see my family, and I don’t know when I’ll get another opportunity.”

  She wasn’t leaving for a contact at all.

  “You must understand that, seeing as you’re the oldest one of us all,” she continued. “How long has it been since you’ve seen your family? Fifty years? One hundred?”

  I glared at the woman, hard, but it was forced.

  She smiled like she knew. “Don’t be too surprised,” she said, and laid a hand on top of my head. “Everyone’s heard the rumors.”

  The ones of Shadow Alley.

  “It’s hard to be alone for so long,” she said. “Right?”

  This time, I nodded.

  “Let me see them, just this once, and then, we’ll get together again,” she said. “Who knows if I’ll even have another chance…”

  Vendona was known for getting pretty bloody.

  “Okay,” I relented. “I trust you.”

  “And I trust you,” she promised, and then, she was gone.

  “I thought you said you could get us someone useful.” Kuthun said what everyone was thinking, but Violet held her ground.

  “Hear her out,” she begged, but the three words came with a warning hidden in her eyes.

  She did not smuggle us into the Highlands to argue.

  Whether we liked it or not, Marion Lachance was our only chance.

  I just wished we didn’t have to rely on a bird—and a hawk at that.

  Between Lachance’s sharp facial features and the bird’s nest of black hair piled up on top of her head, I guessed she purposely strived to appear as vicious as possible. Even her dark eyes lacked warmth.

  “I can only imagine how hesitant you must be,” Lachance began by folding her hands across her lap, “but I have the best intentions. I want to help you.”

  During the last twenty-four hours, Violet had explained her plan as best as she could. Through Ami—a Southern Flock survivor—Violet contacted her mother, Marion Lachance, a higher-up politician with strings tied to the wall between the Highlands and the outskirts. Aside from Alec Henderson himself, Marion Lachance was our best shot of understanding—and prevention. But staring at Marion Lachance made my blood boil.

  “Why should we trust anything you say?” I asked from the doorway.

  Marion lifted her chin. “My name is—”

  “I’m well aware of who you are,” I interrupted. “Maybe it’s you who needs the reminder.”

  Unsurprisingly, Marion’s expression remained unreadable. Violet, however, rolled her eyes. Before she could defend the woman again, Adam spoke up, “I’m with Caleb on this one, Vi.”

  The only person who didn’t voice his opinion was Kuthun. Instead of speaking, he stood idly by, eyeing everyone one at a time. I recognized the method immediately. He read fate’s strings like some read books—over and over again, searching for missed clues or symbols only second readers would be privy to see and enjoy. But tonight, his expression stayed neutral. That meant one of two things—Marion was a good bet or a terrible one. And even Kuthun couldn’t decide.

  “You do not have to listen to me,” Marion spoke after a long, tiring moment, “but I imagine you would talk to Vespasien if given the opportunity?”

  Donald Vespasien had more power than the president did. Only three generations down, Donald had direct lineage to the original creator of the system of walls Vendona used to stay afloat, which meant his family was the reason my Chinese side got stuck in this hell in the first place.

  I swallowed the bad taste in my mouth. “Is he coming?”

  Lachance lifted her right shoulder.

  “Are you insane?” I asked, both to Violet and to Lachance.

  Of course I wanted to understand the ramifications of the wall. Of course I wanted to stop it or help it or change it, but siding with the enemy hardly seemed the way to go about it. I would’ve rather trusted Calhoun, my own ditching father, than work with Logan II’s company.

  Still, Lachance stood by her reasoning. “We can trust him.”

  “They’re related,” Kuthun informed me of what he could make of the strings.

  Lachance raised her too-thin eyebrows, but explained. “His only son is my sister’s husband,” she said. “And, for the record, I’ve changed parties, as much as I can anyway.”

  Since Henderson’s election, Lachance had formed an alliance with him—unofficially, of course.

  “So?” Adam growled. “Both of you funded Logan’s campaign.”

  “And if you listened to Ms. Wilson here,” Lachance began, but the use of my last name on Violet’s first made my anxiety heighten, “you would understand why.”

  Adam’s brow crumbled into a scowl, his fists at his side, and then, he was gone. In a millisecond, he had gone from standing by the doorway to sitting in the nearest chair to the woman.

  “Go ahead,” he said, instead of punching her. “I’d like to know. But only because you know Vi.”

  Violet sighed and slipped into a chair she placed between them.

  Lachance waited until Kuthun and I joined them at the elongated table on the eleventh floor of the Trident building, the very building the world learned about Robert and Daniel’s relationship and history. That night, I’d watched on the TV at the bordel. That night, I imagined every citizen of Vendona remembered where they stood.

  “I stood by Logan’s side, yes,” Lachance began, “but it’s more complicated than one election. Politics span decades of choices and ramifications, and the best choice for a country is not always the best choice for the citizens.”

  “We weren’t even citizens until November,” Adam said.

  Violet laid a hand on his shoulder. For once, she appeared older than him—like her immortal self had leaked through to look over Adam, a true seventeen-year-old.

  Lachance eyed them both. “You are correct about your citizenship,” she started, slowly, “but it was best that way.”

  If it weren’t for Violet’s placement, I was sure Adam would attack the politician—woman or not—but Lachance continued before Adam walked out.

  “You’re both from the Northern Flock, correct?”

  Violet nodded. “But he knows Ami’s story. They all do.”

  Only an hour ago, I had met the braided blonde from the Highlands who had once lived in the Southern Flock, but even facing her didn’t help the believability of her story. When she was nine, she had been dropped off by her mother—Marion Lachance—right on the front doorstep of the Southern Flock’s home. Robert took Ami in wi
thout questions asked. How Marion found where they lived remained a mystery. Why Marion left her only to take her back in remained one, too.

  “In the Highlands, your life’s purpose is decided for you the moment you’re born,” she said. “My parents were politicians, and their parents before that.” Marion Lachance had to carry on the family name. “But then, I became a single mother.” Ami was born. “When I refused to name the father, tension only grew.” Vendona watched more than bad bloods. In fact, the room we spoke in was one of few without recording devices. “The police watched me, convinced I was siding with opposite parties or other cities in private, but…” Lachance hesitated, then continued without naming the father once. “As Ameline—excuse me, Ami—aged, it was best for her to go.”

  Like most bad bloods, powers revealed themselves over time. Most came out during puberty, but some happened at birth, and even fewer released after entering adulthood.

  “I paid money—a lot of money—but no amount of money should’ve been enough to find you,” Marion said.

  At that, Adam straightened. “You found the Southern Flock.”

  “No.” She shook her head. “I found both. Or should I say, I paid someone to tell me both.”

  Violet went rigid, too.

  “Many citizens knew where the flocks lived,” Lachance said, “but Vendona protected you.”

  Adam’s fist hit the table as he stood. “How could you say that after—”

  “Because we failed,” she interrupted.

  Somehow, somewhere along the way, the information had fallen into the wrong hands, and all the secrets Vendona strived to protect were destroyed by itself.

  “I refuse to let it happen again,” Marion said.

  Silence hung between the three as Kuthun and I watched in our own type of silence. No matter how much we learned about Adam and Violet, their tragedy was their own. But our herd could’ve been killed just as easily as any of the flocks were. In Vendona, the only guarantee remained betrayal. That was why trust was more valuable than money to bad bloods striving to survive. One could go without food for a week and live. But one couldn’t exist without relying on someone at some point to help.

  “Even if what you say is true,” Adam remained skeptical, “you funded Logan’s campaign until it was too late.”