I jerked my arm out of his grip and swallowed back an argument, desperate to continue my search. I’d stay behind him. As soon as he headed down a path, I’d duck away from him and keep going on my own.
“We’re wasting time,” I prompted. “Let’s go!”
Gideon narrowed his eyes at me. “Are you looking for Sepp? Or the overseer?”
I pretended I couldn’t hear him over the storm and shook my head. He shouted the question again, drawing himself closer to my ear, holding my arm tightly. His breath was hot in my ear as he asked the question again.
From behind, a flash of something entered my sightline. Arms raised, it crashed down on Gideon and they both tumbled to the ground. Gideon lay face down and a figure sat on top of him holding a log like a club over his head.
Gideon struggled. “Get off me!”
The figure turned. His eyes, glazed and ringed by dark circles, stared at me, bright with sickness. His mud-covered face was haggard, skin peeling and blistered. But the dark stain on his cheek marked him as mine.
And then another figure stumbled out of the path. It was Sepp. “Don’t leave me!” he cried, walking toward us with slow, uneasy steps. “Are you there? What happened? Come back!” he yelled.
“Lev!” I cried, finding my voice. “Let him go.”
“Kaia?” Sepp turned to my voice.
“I’m here, Sepp. So is Gideon.”
Sepp’s face crumpled with relief and he started to sob. My heart lurched at the fear he must have felt in his world of darkness.
Gideon groaned, wincing with pain and rubbing the spot on his head where Lev had hit him. My eyes locked with Lev’s and he opened his mouth to say something, but moaned instead and rolled off Gideon. The log dropped and he held his stomach with both hands, writhing on the ground. His face was deathly pale.
Gideon got to his feet. He stared in confusion at his attacker and reached for the log, but I grabbed it first. “What are you doing?” he asked.
I widened my stance, holding the log in both hands. “He won’t hurt us.”
Gideon’s eyes widened in anger. “Maybe not you.”
Lev tried to stand. “I thought he was attacking you.” His words came out slurred and he only got as far as his knees before he collapsed. Anyone could see he was sick. Dropping the log, I ran to him and slid to the ground. I lifted his head to my lap. His skin radiated feverish heat, but his teeth chattered. “Lev!” I said. “Lev, wake up!’
“He’s not going to make it,” Gideon said, standing over us. A note of satisfaction in his voice.
“We need to bring him back to camp. He needs to see Mara.”
Gideon crouched beside me. His eyes hard. “Ezekiel will never let an overseer into camp.”
“An overseer?” Sepp’s voice rang out. “But he helped me. He was leading me back to camp.”
“No, Sepp. He was using you to find our camp.”
Sepp’s brow wrinkled at Gideon’s words and his face fell. “I led him to us?”
“It wasn’t your fault.” Gideon moved beside him and rested a hand on his shoulder.
Lev stirred. “Kaia,” he whispered. “I’m looking for Kaia.”
“Shhhh,” I soothed and shot Gideon a defiant glance. “Look at him. He’s no threat. Take Sepp back to camp and then find Mara. Tell her I need her help”
Gideon narrowed his eyes at me, his mouth tight with anger.
“Please!” I begged.
Gideon grabbed Sepp’s arm and left the clearing. In seconds, he and Sepp were swallowed by the sheets of rain and the dark of the forest.
Lev
I felt hands on my cheeks. A voice in my ear. Sweet, urgent. I knew that voice. “Wake up!” she said. “Lev, wake up.”
It was Kaia. She stared down at me, water dripping off her eyelashes and nose. I opened my mouth to catch some drops and licked my cracked lips. She looked the same, but different. Every feature was more defined. Her skin had lost its silvery translucence. Days outside had scarred it with pigment. I wanted to slip away again, but she was smiling at me. Smiling and crying. Kaia stroked my forehead. I wanted to go back to the orchard with her and sit in the trees, the smell of citrus fresh and sharp all around us. I closed my eyes again.
Tar floated in front of me. She wanted me to come back to the City. She smiled at me, beckoning. You’re just like your father, she said, but there was no malice to her words. You’re a hero. A female stood beside Tar. An elder. It was Mae.
“Mae!” I gasped out loud.
“No, Lev. It’s Kaia. We’re outside, on the Mountain.”
I shook my head, rolling it from side to side till the insides spun. “Mae. Alive.”
Her hands froze on my face, cradling it. “She was balanced.”
“No. She’s alive.”
“Lev?” Kaia’s eyes dug into mine, full of questions. “Lev! Mae’s alive? Lev! Talk to me!”
I couldn’t find the words to tell her. They were buried somewhere, hidden in darkness. And then a wave of pain washed over me and everything went dark again.
Kaia
Mara leaned over Lev, her forehead rippled with concern. She pressed his stomach, prodding different areas and then put her fingers to his neck, counting out his pulse. The rain had stopped, but the sky was still a dark grey, the clouds threatening and thunder rumbling in the distance. I was chilled to the bone, shivering in my wet clothes.
As soon as she saw the state of Lev, she’d sent Gideon back to get a stretcher. Made of canvas and two long poles, it rested against a tree. He’d also brought a blanket for me, but I’d laid it across Lev.
She shook her head and sighed, leaning back on her heels. “He needs antibiotics to kill the bacteria in his system. None of my remedies will do any good.” Her kit lay beside me. Useless.
“And if he doesn’t get any?”
Her silence answered my question.
His face was drained of colour, his lips white and cracked with fever. He kept mumbling, talking to people that weren’t there, the dregs of sentences never spoken.
“Before he blacked out, he said Mae was alive.”
Mara gave me a sharp look.
“She was never balanced. They kept her alive. I don’t know why. Every time I ask, he blacks out again.”
Gideon stood at the periphery of the clearing, but at my words he stepped closer to us.
“He’s got a fever,” Mara said. “He could have been hallucinating.”
“But what if it’s true? What if we went back and found her, took her out of the City. Sy too. We could all be together.”
Mara’s face fell and her hands closed around mine. “Kaia,” she said gently. “It’s impossible.”
“I thought finding you was impossible, but I did it.” A flicker of defiance rose in me. I had done it, against the odds.
“Mae wanted you to leave the City. She wouldn’t want you to go back for her.”
Lev grew agitated and his eyes flew open. He looked around startled, but lucid. “I thought it was a dream,” he said.
“No,” I said gently. “You found us.”
“Us?” He looked at me confused.
“The Prims.”
His hand lay open on the ground and I slid mine into it. His fingers closed tight. “Mae,” he whispered. “She’s alive.”
Exhausted already, he shut his eyes. A weak breath rattled through him. “Lev!” I said, desperate for him to tell me more, “Lev, stay awake!”
Carefully sliding his head off my lap, I stood up, shaking the numbness out of my legs. I was wasting time thinking about my options when there was only one thing I could do. Lev would die if he didn’t get back to the City. And Mae. Her life lay in my hands. I knew what losing her had felt like. I couldn’t go through that again, not when I could stop it. I turned to look at Mara and Gideon. “I’m taking
him back to the City.”
Mara shook her head. “Kaia—” she started, but I cut her off.
“I have to.”
“It’s too dangerous. If you get caught—”
“I won’t. I’ll wait until it’s dark and then slip inside the same way I got out,” I interrupted her. “I look more Prim now than I used to. Perfect for the underland.”
Gideon shook his head. “You aren’t thinking clearly. The Mountain is dangerous. You’d never have made it to our camp if Akrum and I hadn’t found you.”
“I know things I didn’t know before.” I fished under my shirt for the whistle on its strap and held it out to them. “I know about the beasts and how to protect myself. I’ll be prepared.”
“With a stretcher, you could do it with another person. But, even using the tunnels, it would be slow going. It would take hours to get down the Mountain, and you’d still have to cross the valley.”
I nodded. I knew all that, but wouldn’t be dissuaded. Lev had risked his life to tell me about Mae. If he’d killed the other overseer, it had been to protect me. I couldn’t let him die on the Mountain.
Gideon looked at Lev with contempt. “He might die before you get there.”
I knew he was right, but I stood my ground. Gideon threw up his hands in frustration. “You’ll never make it on your own. How will you even carry him by yourself?”
“I’ll go.” Mara’s voice cracked with emotion. She looked as surprised at the declaration as I was.
I shook my head. “No, Mara. What about Sepp?”
“It’s only a few days.” She looked at Gideon. “He’ll be okay.”
“Neither of you know the paths to take in the caves. You’ll get lost. It’s like a maze.”
I looked at Lev. “We won’t take the caves. We’ll follow the stream down the Mountain. Go back to camp and pack what we need,” I said to Mara, ignoring Gideon’s mutterings. “I’ll stay with him.”
“Mara,” Gideon implored, “you of all people know how dangerous this is!”
But she set her mouth into a thin, determined line and met his gaze. “I let her go once, I can’t do it again.”
Gideon gave me a long, disappointed look.
“I have to do this,” I told him.
He turned and walked toward the forest without saying anything else.
⌓
Mara brought a bag of supplies for each of us and dry clothes for me. We lifted Lev’s limp body onto the stretcher. A knot of hopelessness started to tighten in my stomach as I thought about the struggle we would face going down the Mountain and then across the valley. But I’d done it once. I could do it again.
I was at the front of the stretcher and Lev’s feet dangled over the edge. They flopped as we took our first tentative steps. I remembered Mae’s eyes and how they crinkled when she laughed. I thought I’d never see them again, never feel the touch of her hands on my cheek. Was it possible that she was still alive? A glimmer of hope sent a flutter of nerves through me.
⌓
A crashing through the forest made me gasp and almost drop my end of the stretcher. We stopped, beads of sweat tickling as they ran down my spine. Mara had wrapped our palms with bandages after they’d been rubbed raw holding the stretcher. It had been a couple of hours and my shoulders and arms burned with exertion. Worse, it felt like we were no closer to the bottom of the Mountain.
“Did you hear that?” I whispered to Mara.
“Stay still,” she answered. “It might be beasts.”
“But we haven’t crossed the stream,” I whispered back, lowering my end of the stretcher to search for the whistle buried under my shirt.
A branch snapped and I peered into the trees. It might be Prims. If they’d discovered we were gone, they could take us back to camp. I’d be punished as a traitor. I didn’t want to think what they’d do to Lev.
Mara lowered her end of the stretcher. Lev stirred, but was too weak to sit up. I didn’t dare glance behind to check on him.
I pulled out my only weapon, Mae’s knife, from the belt at my waist. I held it in front of me and tried to look threatening. I hoped I didn’t have to use it. “Who’s there?” I asked, trying to keep my voice even.
Two Prims emerged and my heart jumped to my mouth. “Gideon! Akrum!” I thought I’d melt with relief. But when I looked at their faces, I hesitated before putting my knife away. “Did Ezekiel send you?”
“We came to convince you to turn back,” Akrum said, eyeing Lev.
“I can’t do that,” I told him. “He needs help.”
“Looks like it’s the two of you that need the help.” Akrum frowned.
I bristled at his words and pressed my lips into a thin, determined line. It had been slow going, but we’d come this far. I wouldn’t let him take me back now.
“You think you can carry him all the way back? Just the two of you?”
Gideon looked at me but I stood my ground. “If it’s what we have to do, yes.” I put my knife back in its sheath at my waist.
He snorted. “You have your mother’s stubborn streak, that’s for sure.” But there was grudging admiration in his voice too.
“We think it’s a mistake for you to go back. But if you won’t listen to reason, we aren’t going to let you go alone,” Gideon said.
I was too surprised to move. “You aren’t?”
He shook his head. Relief flooded through me when I realized he was serious. With a jubilant laugh, I flung my arms around Gideon’s neck. His beard brushed my cheek as I whispered, “Thank you.” For the first time since we’d started down the hill, I felt hopeful.
From the stretcher, Lev stirred, a film of sweat covered his skin. He muttered words of nonsense in his delirium. “Kaia!” he croaked. I left Gideon’s side and went to him.
“Shh,” I whispered, laying a hand on his burning forehead. “I’m here. It’s okay.”
“We should keep moving,” Gideon said. Akrum waved Mara aside so he and Gideon could pick up the handles of the stretcher. “There’s a cave entrance a little further down the Mountain. If we take it, we can get to the base of the Mountain before dark and then cross the valley at night. We should get to the City by sunrise, leave him”—Akrum cast a quick glance at Lev—“outside the dome and make it back to the base of the Mountain before nightfall.”
His plan could work, especially now that there were four of us, but he didn’t know about one key element: Mae. Even if Akrum, Mara and Gideon returned to the Mountain, I couldn’t. I had to know: was she alive?
The tunnels sloped steeply downwards and were dank and cold. I shivered and pulled the cloak of fur I’d grudgingly agreed to wear tighter around my shoulders. “Who is he to you?” Gideon asked. We’d just passed the stretcher to Mara and Akrum. I shook the feeling back into my fingers.
“I told you, my friend,” I said, looking down at Lev.
“Just your friend?” Gideon asked.
Would he stay with us if I told him the truth? “Yes,” I lied. “Just a friend.”
Lev groaned, and one arm flinched, as if he disagreed.
We came out of the tunnels at the same place where Akrum had found me. “The stream’s just over there. We’ll stop for water and rest up.” The base of the Mountain was within reach.
“He’s flushed. That’s a good sign. Means he’s fighting infection,” Mara said as we took long gulps from the stream. The water dribbled down my chin and I wiped it away. I went to put some into Lev’s mouth, but Mara stopped me. “Use his canteen. The water doesn’t harm us, but it might not be safe for him.”
“Do you think he’ll make it, honestly?” I asked, searching her face for the truth.
She sat back on her haunches and surveyed him, frowning. “I don’t know,” she sighed. “The bacteria is poisoning his blood. Maybe his organs. Even if we get him to the City, it might b
e too late.” Her eyes, so similar to Mae’s, searched my face and I knew what she was wondering. Was it worth it?
Twilight made the sky glow powdery blue. I looked at Gideon. His hair lay in damp clumps on his forehead, but his eyes shone bright, as if he was eager for the next part of the journey. Akrum whistled a bird call and smiled when it was answered. They were willing to leave their home and risk their lives for me. A small voice reminded me that Lev had been willing to do the same.
I turned to Mara and the pained expression on her face made me cringe. She was leaving Sepp and her role as healer to follow me back to the place she’d escaped. She was willing to sacrifice her life for me the same way she had for Sepp. But was I willing to let her?
“You have to go back,” I said to Mara.
She shook her head, stubbornly, determination flashing in her eyes. “No. I won’t let you go again.”
“Mara, you have to. Sepp needs you. You are the camp’s healer.” My stomach dropped at the words, but I knew they were true.
Her face creased with anguish and she clutched at my hands. “Listen,” her voice cracked with desperation. “Come back with me. Leave him here. If more overseers come, they will find him and bring him back to the City.”
But I shook my head. “I can’t.” As much as I wanted to continue my life on the Mountain, I would never feel at peace knowing I’d let Lev die out here. And Mae. I had to know if she was still alive. The only way to find out was to go back into the City.
“Kaia’s right,” Akrum said. “All of us don’t need to cross the valley.”
Mara winced with indecision. Finally, she threw her arms around my neck and hugged me close. I could feel her heart beating in her chest, the smell of wood smoke in her hair and warmth of her cheek against mine. “Letting you go sixteen years ago was the hardest thing I ever did. And now, I am doing it again. What kind of a mother am I?” Her whispered question left me breathless.
Shutting my eyes, I fought the tears from falling and clung to her. Our embrace the only answer I could give her.
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