Bad Bloods

by Shannon A. Thompson

  But no one seemed convinced.

  In fact, Serena shook her head. “That’s why Catelyn called,” she explained. “Connelly was last seen near there.”

  “And she took supplies from the Pits,” Skeleton added, speaking up for the first time.

  Strangely enough, the boy blended in seamlessly.

  “If Connelly goes down there with people, with bad bloods, then…” Kuthun faded off. At some point, he’d tied his long, black hair back, and it reminded me of the way Violet did it when she was prepared for battle.

  “If she goes down there at all, she’s dead,” I stopped him. “No one can withstand this storm, and she’s human.” I jabbed my finger against my chest. “Like me.”

  Daniel twitched as if he’d forgotten. Serena sighed as if she never could. Violet, on the other hand, remained unreadable, unreachable, and undeterred.

  “She might be counting on us thinking that,” Violet said, “or she doesn’t know how bad the storm is.”

  “Oh, she knows,” I said. “Everyone in Vendona knows.”

  Hurricanes weren’t rare, but the circumstances around this one in particular were.

  “There’s always the eye of the storm,” Violet countered.

  “And no one knows when that’ll happen,” I pointed out.

  “How about when the storm calms?” she tried.

  Five minutes ago, we were holding hands. Now, we were arguing about how long the storm would last and what it would mean for the entire city. But we never had a chance to resolve it. Instead, Serena changed the subject.

  “It’s worse than that,” the blonde insisted. “Something’s not right. Something’s…” Serena looked at Daniel, then at Violet. “Catelyn’s not telling me something.”

  “I’ll go,” Violet decided, then—before anyone could comprehend what she said—she reached into the shadows and pulled out her favorite black boots. She sat down and strapped them on.

  “What?” I stuttered.

  “What do you mean, what?” she retorted, then tied her ponytail high up on her head.

  When she stood, she met my height. Maybe even towered over me. And her get-up was all too familiar.

  It was what she wore to the school that day and to Henderson’s speech.

  Her battle armor, I realized.

  “Violet…”

  “Don’t Violet me,” she cut me off with a grin. “Listen, I know we’ve all been through a lot.” Jia-Li. Levi. The Pits. “But if Serena says something is up, something is up.” She turned to the Southern Flock girl, to the one who started an unfinished revolution with a prison escape. “I’ll go talk to Catelyn.”

  “What about the rain?” I asked.

  “The rain?” Violet repeated, incredulous. “Oh, the water.”

  “Yes,” I spoke slowly. “The water.”

  Like sunlight, the water hurt her, but Violet set her own limitations.

  “The rain isn’t the ocean,” she pointed out. “I have to go.”

  As she stomped away, I hoped the others would follow, but no one budged.

  “You’re going to let her go?” I asked Serena, who shrugged.

  “I don’t control her,” she said. “You don’t either.”

  “And she’s perfectly capable,” Daniel added.

  I pointed at him. “Two weeks ago, you made me promise not to let her get involved.”

  “Two weeks ago, things were different.”

  I flinched, because he was right.

  Two weeks ago, I didn’t know my father. I didn’t know my mother would die. I didn’t know I could become dependent on so many others—that I could love so many people at once.

  “Caleb…” Kuthun started, but I waved him off.

  “I’ll be back,” I promised, then I trailed Violet to the door, hoping I could stop her, but someone already waited for her.

  “Let me go with you,” Serah said, unable to understand how impossible her wish was.

  Serah was human. Serah would die in Violet’s shadows. Serah couldn’t withstand a storm any more than I could, than any of us could.

  “You can’t,” Violet said simply, but Serah stood akimbo.

  “I started this with you,” she said. “You can’t cast me aside now. Not like…” Serena.

  Violet heard the unspoken name as much as I did, but Violet let it go.

  “Serah,” she said, kneeling as she did so, “we’ll finish what we started when this storm’s over, okay?”

  “But—”

  “I promise,” Violet said.

  Serah’s eyes welled with tears. “Okay.”

  “And will you come back soon?” I spoke up from my corner.

  Both Serah and Violet turned to see me, but only Serah smiled. Violet, instead, frowned.

  “You wanted me to stop being a shadow,” she said, “so let me do what I can.”

  I hated myself for it, but it was the right thing to do.

  “You don’t need my permission,” I said, “but I want to see you again.”

  And if she got wrapped up in the wall during the storm, I feared I wouldn’t.

  She looked back at me as if she understood, but as soon as our eyes met, she dissipated. Then, all the shadows she left behind began to whisper.

  I’ll see you again, she promised, again and again and again.

  And I didn’t believe her at all.

  The night the Northern Flock and Southern Flock were ambushed, Vendona had turned the street’s security lights to red. Reflections made the falling snow look covered in blood. Tonight though, the rain reflected nothing. In the hurricane’s darkness, it was impossible to see the warning lights at all, but as I slithered over walls, I realized why.

  Most of the security lights had been torn off and thrown about in the streets by the wind.

  Whole tents from the main square were turned over and smashed. Even cars had flipped. But I watched for people most of all.

  So far, so good.

  No one tried to tough it out in the streets, but as I rose above the marketplace, I saw families huddled in corners in the houses where roofs had been ripped off. One house in particular had a tree laying in its living room. But the worst had yet to come. As I rose above the city, I met the velocity of the storm.

  The hurricane.

  I wondered if the monster had a name or if monsters never needed names in the first place.

  One thing was for certain though.

  The sunken bay, for once, deserved its name.

  As the ocean churned, the city succumbed to disaster. Whole boats overturned. Docks broke apart. Scattered debris bobbed between waves, and buildings crumbled. Somewhere beneath the ocean, the bordel had become a watery grave.

  The entirety of the eastern shore was underwater.

  Monstrous waves crashed ashore like foaming beasts clawing their way through the city.

  As the surge stretched, so did the danger zone, but the inner wall—or what was left of it—kept the water from hitting the inhabited outskirts. As long as the western wall stood, the Highlands would continue to take most of the damage, and Vendona could withstand the storm, as it had for decades.

  But Catelyn kept secrets. And so did the city.

  I soared over the eastern seaboard, through the south, and spotted the last remains on the west side from afar. Then, I moved over the barrier as I had before Separation Day, before I spoke to Ami or saw Adam again. But the storm had plans of its own.

  The atmospheric pressure free-fell. With it, so did I.

  When I hit the ground, my shadows splintered out like a spider’s web. They shook. I ached. And then, the bits and pieces strung itself back together. A tapestry of darkness.

  I was whole again—a whole shadow, that was—and I had one last mission.

  With careful precision, I made my way to one of the most guarded houses in Vendona, and then formed into a person in the entrance.

  Emergency lights flickered on and off as I walked down the empty hallway. Only my footsteps could be hea
rd. But I tried to imagine a crowd of people moving between doorways, as it should’ve been.

  I also tried to picture Serena. She had lived here once, if only for a little while.

  The Henderson home.

  An inch of water covered the tiled floor. As I walked, the water deepened.

  I splashed my way to the stairs, and made my way to Stephanie’s room—or Catelyn’s room.

  It wasn’t hard to find. In fact, I’d found it months ago when I first started tracking down people from the flocks after we were all separated. Catelyn, to me, was a practical stranger, but she lived as Stephanie now that Serena didn’t, and the contrast to Catelyn’s lifestyle compared to my own was about as startling as Ami’s had been.

  Jewelry hung on golden hooks, while unread books rested on wide and open desks.

  Outside, the world cried.

  Inside, I stood alone.

  There was one last place the Henderson family would’ve gone.

  I disappeared against a flash of lightning, feeling my shadow skin tingle. It was the same feeling Caleb gave me when he held my hand, when he smiled at me, when he thumbed my tears away. And I was sure he was the only person who saw the light, too. Who heard my voice in his head.

  After learning how to cry with him, I had learned so much more about my powers. About my abilities to not only control the darkness, but also the light. The telepathy, however, remained a mystery.

  Did he hear me? Did I only wish to be heard?

  Did it matter if I heard others’ secrets?

  Without answers, I fell into myself on the main stage inside the Trident building.

  Rain dripped off the ceiling and splashed against all the empty seats. The past’s rallying cries echoed throughout the room. Shivers ran up my spine.

  Sometimes, being a shadow was better anyway.

  I flickered off with the lights and followed the electricity to the nearest, busiest room.

  Sure enough, people surrounded the elongated table. Everyone held grim expressions, but, more importantly, they were familiar.

  Catelyn stood by Adam, and Adam spoke to Adelio, Henderson’s driver.

  At the table, Alec folded his hands in front of him, while Marion Lachance sat back. Jane Henderson, however, stood tall. She wore heels, even in a storm.

  I formed next to her, just so I could compare her heels to my boots. “I’ve never liked heels much,” I said out loud, scaring everyone in the room but Jane herself. She smiled as if she’d sensed me the entire time.

  “No one cares if you wear heels or boots,” she said. “It’s how you wear them that matters. And how you feel in them.”

  “I feel like I can run better in boots,” I retorted.

  She raised a pointed eyebrow. “But what could a shadow possibly be running from?”

  “Enough banter,” Catelyn interrupted, though I wished she hadn’t.

  Jane Henderson was snappy and serene, all at once. I liked that about her. I respected her, too.

  “What are you doing here?” Catelyn asked anyway.

  “I’m here for Serena,” I said, and all three of them tensed. “She’s under the impression that you’re not telling her something. I am, too.”

  Jane snickered. “I told you that girl was smart.”

  “I know she’s smart,” Catelyn bit back, but her bite lacked any viciousness needed to make a point. “I just thought…”

  “That I wouldn’t find you?” I finished, but before I could rant, Jane cut me off.

  “There are cameras in here,” Jane said more to me than to Catelyn.

  I needed to hold myself back. I needed to pretend as though Catelyn was Stephanie still.

  “Well…” I eyed the walls as if I could find the spies buried inside them. “That’s a bit unsettling.”

  “It’s more unsettling to them.” Alec Henderson played off my presence seamlessly. “Imagine, a ghost in the Highlands.”

  I couldn’t help but smile. President Henderson, as much as I hated to admit, was charming. And intelligent. And he loved bad bloods more than any other politician. But my love had been hesitant. He’d worked on the other side once, after all, and so had Cal.

  No matter how much a person changed in the present, it didn’t change what they did in the past.

  But I’d seen how Cal had overcome his grief and mended his relationship with his son. I’d changed my mistakes, too.

  “How’d you know where to find us?” Alec asked, curious.

  “I figured if you weren’t at home, you’d haul up in the tallest building Vendona’s ever known.”

  The president chuckled. “The Trident is much more important than its stature,” he explained. “It’s protected by a god, one in the sea.”

  It could’ve been the same one Hanna loved.

  “We thought it best to be here if we began to drown,” Jane said, amused.

  “And drown, we shall,” Alec added.

  “What?” I snapped, surely thinking it was a sick joke, but everyone’s face remained the same. “What do you mean?”

  As far as I knew, the Highlands would be hit harder but not by much. They’d be hurt, sure, but considering the city’s buildings were taller and stronger, I figured our plan would work. Above all else, the outskirts would be safe.

  “Connelly,” Marion explained solemnly. “If she finishes her work…”

  “She finishes us all,” Alec spoke when Marion faded away.

  In response, the French woman rolled her eyes. “Really, Alec, we’ve only been friends for a few months.”

  “And yet, we can finish one another’s sentences,” he teased. “At least something has been mended.”

  Both grinned. Jane, though, stuck to an explanation. “Naturally speaking, the Highlands is well below sea level, unlike the outskirts.” At this, she lifted her right foot and pulled off a heel. She took off the other one, too. When she slammed both on the table, she placed them with the heels touching one another. They looked like a mountain, and I quickly realized that was the point.

  Jane taught landscapes with fashion.

  In this case, the shoes served as a city, and the table became the churning ocean below it.

  “The Highlands,” she said, pointing to the highest point of her shoe construction. “The outskirts,” she said, pointing to the bend in the sole’s arch. Then, she pointed at the heel’s tip. “Those are the platforms. The same ones the walls are attached to underwater. If the tips are gone…”

  “This is my favorite part,” Alec chimed in at the same time Jane lifted both shoes into the air. When she slammed the heels against the table, the stilts broke off and shot across the room. They would’ve hit Catelyn, too, if it wasn’t for Adam, who—using his speedy powers—leapt in front of her and caught them. She barely had time to mutter thanks before Jane slammed the now heel-less shoes on the table.

  “What do you see?” she asked.

  I stared at how the shoe rocked, but no matter how much movement Jane left behind, the arch—or the outskirts—stayed up in the air, while the rest of the shoe laid on the tabletop, or, in this case, the ocean.

  If the wall crumbled completely, the Highlands would drown—along with Henderson and Marion and Catelyn and Adam and Adelio and all the millions of people who believed they were protected by steel towers and heaven-touching skyscrapers.

  “The first Vespasien designed it that way,” Jane said, “so that the wall could never be taken down.”

  So that his family would remain in power. Or worse, because his family didn’t care about the ramifications.

  “Obviously,” Jane said slowly, “we didn’t believe Don until now.”

  With the hurricane hitting, no one could deny how the city sank.

  “In our defense,” her husband bantered, “the idea was asinine.”

  “So is Don,” Marion added ruefully.

  “Turns out Vespasien meant it when he said he hated Vendona most of all,” Catelyn whispered.

  I turned on her. “Why’d yo
u lie?”

  Surely, she knew this from the beginning. Surely, they all did. Hence why Marion insisted Ami come with us. But Catelyn shook her head.

  “I didn’t.”

  “Not to me,” Adam said.

  He understood what he was risking by coming the entire time. I should’ve known. It was unlike him to avoid danger. In fact, he’d escaped the ambush just to run back in to try to help Daniel in any way he could. Adam, unlike most bad bloods, needed a mission beyond survival to feel complete.

  “We would’ve been fine if Connelly didn’t finish what she started,” Catelyn defended her decisions.

  “We still could be,” Jane corrected.

  Connelly hadn’t finished the job yet, after all. She still had the western wall between the outskirts and the Highlands.

  “But if she knocks it down…” I started, only for Jane to sweep her shoes off the table.

  “We’re as good as dead,” she confirmed.

  The woman was a force to be reckoned with.

  I imagined if hurricanes could speak, if the sea knew who exactly she was attacking, then she would’ve avoided Jane Henderson at all costs.

  “You don’t sound scared,” I noted.

  “I’m not,” she said. “I’m grateful.”

  For the life she had, for the daughter she gave birth to, for the new daughters she took in.

  “You should go,” Jane said to Catelyn. “You, too, Adam.”

  The bad bloods who’d survived a human ambush only to be attacked by weather shook their heads.

  “We stand here.”

  “You know I could force you, right?” I asked. “And I will.”

  Adam smirked at the threat. Catelyn didn’t.

  I turned away from them to face the politicians. “Isn’t there another way?”

  “No,” Catelyn said.

  At the same time, Jane said, “Yes.”

  “Please,” Catelyn continued. “Don’t.”

  But Jane listened to only herself. “If we can stop Connelly from taking out the western wall, the outskirts will take some of the hit.”

  I pictured her heels and how the slope would drain the water toward us. Just like Connelly originally planned.

  She wasn’t completely wrong, then.

  But the outskirts taking a hit for the Highlands was like bad bloods taking a hit for humans.