Dad strolled over to stand by my side. I thought he might lay an approving hand on my shoulder. Instead, he drew back his fist and struck.
I stumbled, losing my connection with the air. The table and chairs came crashing down. “No, no, no!” my father roared. “You’ll have to do better than that. Lift them up again.”
I straightened with difficulty. Dad circled around me as the furniture drifted steadily upward. Then he hit me again.
I was a quick learner. The table and chairs did not fall.
When I was fourteen, I passed my assessment and received a Citizenship tattoo. And I began to split in two.
Connor the Illegal, Connor my mother’s son, started to recede from the surface of my consciousness, becoming safely cocooned within Justin the Citizen, Justin the enforcer-to-be. My Justin self was a mirror, a perfect reflection of the expectations of others. The Justin-me made jokes about Illegals with my enforcer classmates, won a prize for an essay about the imminent threat that abilities posed to the Balance, and passed my father’s increasingly extreme tests of control. My peers were satisfied, my instructors were satisfied, and my father was satisfied.
Deep inside, I occasionally screamed. But that was all right because nobody ever heard.
When I was sixteen, I became the youngest Citizen to ever receive an enforcer uniform and submitted my application to become a bodyguard to the Gull City Prime. I was almost through the lengthy approval process when Prime Talbot had a stroke and died.
I said to my father, “At least he’s dead.” But Dad didn’t answer.
For the next two weeks, Dad rose from his bed, sat at the table, and didn’t move again until the evening, when he went back to bed. He seemed to grow smaller every day, shrinking farther and farther into himself. Until, one day, he didn’t get up at all.
The doctor said that a blood vessel had burst in his brain. One of those awful, unexpected things that were impossible to predict. There was nothing that could have been done. And Justin-the-enforcer agreed that it was a terrible, unforeseeable tragedy.
But I knew that I had failed my father for the last time.
I celebrated my seventeenth birthday alone and adrift. My entire life had been defined by one consuming purpose, and without it, I was lost. I knew I should find another path, but it just seemed like too big an effort to do anything except continue to exist in the life I’d made. So that was what I did until the day that Chief Administrator Neville Rose came to see me.
The gray-haired man offered his sympathies on my father’s death and spoke of how proud Dad must have been of such an exemplary son. I endured it in silence. Finally, he said, “I must tell you something. This is very difficult, but I think it’s important for you to know. Justin, your mother was killed by an Illegal.”
For a mad moment, I almost shouted that I was an Illegal. But the habit of caution was too deeply ingrained, and my defense system snapped back into place. Connor sank into the shadows, while Justin sat up, white faced and staring, as Neville explained how a Rumbler had caused the Eldergull quake. Nothing about the assessor. Justin-the-enforcer was appropriately horrified, outraged, thirsty for revenge. But Connor-the-Illegal was curious. Neville Rose was going to a great deal of trouble to obtain the loyalty of someone he believed was a perfect enforcer, and I wanted to know why.
There were more meetings, in which Neville spoke of how he feared the government would lose its way after the death of the great prime Talbot, especially with the reform movement gaining increasing support. He told me about his own political ambitions, and how he wanted to carry on Talbot’s vision for the future. Eventually, he explained that in his new role as the head of Detention Center 3, he needed enforcers who were willing to bend the rules in the interests of countering the Illegal threat. What was more, he wanted my help with a special project, something to do with the runaways living in the Firstwood.
I was given a file about the leader of the runaways and told to study the contents. I did, and my Justin-self displayed only those emotions that Neville expected to see — outrage and disgust that anyone would so blatantly defy the Citizenship Accords. Deep inside, though, I reacted differently. I read that file over and over, until I knew by heart the story of a girl who, like me, had lost someone to the government. It seemed almost as if her voice were speaking to me from the crisp white pages. I told myself that it was absurd to think that, and yet I could not escape the growing conviction that she was someone I had always been destined to know, or even that I somehow knew her already. That was absurd, too. But I began to miss her, just the same.
Then it occurred to me that there was more information in the file than there should have been. How could they have such a detailed description of someone who had run away from the city four years before? How could they know how many people were in the Tribe or about the pact with the saurs?
I thought, She is being betrayed.
The sense of aimlessness that had plagued me since my father’s death vanished, burned away by the fire of a new purpose, a single, simple mission.
Save Ashala Wolf.
The memories evaporated, leaving me blinking and disoriented in the dim light of the cave.
Ember was sitting right in front of me. “Ash? Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re crying.”
I lifted my hand to my cheek, surprised and yet not surprised to find it wet with tears. “I’m okay. Promise.” Grabbing hold of Ember’s arm, I asked, “Can you do that in reverse? Give one of my memories to him?”
“Yes. But why?”
“Because I’m asking you to. Get the water and the stone and whatever else you need. Please.”
“Ash —”
“Don’t argue with me, Ember! I need you to do this.”
She pressed her lips together and stalked off to the corner of the cave, leaving me looking right at Connor.
“I think,” I said, “you can untie yourself now.”
Ember froze in amazement as the ropes around his wrists and ankles began to unwind, and I asked, “Have you got that water yet, Em?”
She came over to me, picked up the cup that she’d left on the floor, and tipped out the old water. Then she filled it again and dropped in a new stone. “Are you sure about this?”
“Yep.” I smiled at her. “This is important. And thank you.”
She sniffed, looking mollified, and handed me the cup. We went through the whole thing, as she had with Connor and — wow, it hurt! It felt like I was literally shaking apart. When we were done, I slumped forward, gazing at Connor with new respect. I’d put one memory into the stone, and my head was pounding fiercely. How much worse must he have felt when he’d already been hit with a very large piece of firewood? Swung with a lot of force, too. At this point, I was starting to feel quite bad about that.
I dragged myself over to him. I couldn’t have stood up if my life depended on it, so I half crawled across the floor with the cup in my hand, held it out, and watched as he took the stone. Then I tossed the cup away, careless of the water running onto the floor, and pressed his hands closed around the pebble.
“The word you want,” I told him, “is Connor.”
He laughed, an unexpectedly joyful sound that echoed around the cavern, and said, “Connor.”
His face went blank, staring at something I couldn’t see, although I knew what it was. He was experiencing the moment I’d come to the Firstwood, and the things I’d felt when I’d touched the tuart. I started talking — even though I knew he probably couldn’t hear me — wanting to explain what it all meant. I liked to believe that I understood the Firstwood’s message better, now that I’d had years to think about it. “People, animals, trees — everything grieves, and regrets, and mourns what’s passed. But nothing is ever truly gone forever. This is the place where life began again, where I began again. Whatever we were before, whoever we were before — it doesn’t matter. Because we’re all made new here. We live. We survive. We belong.”<
br />
He came back to himself slowly, his eyes focusing on mine. He looked vulnerable. Wounded. Hopeful. And he whispered, “Ashala.”
He didn’t say anything more. But I knew what he was asking.
I shifted closer, brushing my lips against his cheek. “You’re Tribe now, Connor. Welcome home.”
THREE MONTHS AGO
I loved the forest at night. The way the gray tuarts went silver in moonlight, the curving shadows between the trees, and the changed sounds and movements of the Firstwood as the owls, tree cats, bats, and other night animals woke to hunt. That was why I was out, wandering beneath the stars and heading in no particular direction. Well, that, and because, once again, I couldn’t sleep. It had been four weeks! Where was he?
Ember kept telling me, patiently and often, “He can take care of himself, Ash.” And, when that failed to reassure me: “You know he won’t come back until he finds out who the traitor is.” She was right, but it didn’t stop me from worrying. It wasn’t that I didn’t think he could protect himself. I knew that he could.
But I also knew how much that self-preservation cost him.
There was a noise somewhere behind me, and I turned to see Ember stepping out from the trees. “Honestly, Ash, you would be wandering around out here when I need to find you. He’s back.”
I bounded toward her. “Is he all right?”
“Of course he’s all right. He’s waiting in the caves.”
She started walking, and I followed behind her. Except she was moving too slowly — much too slowly! Hopping from one foot to the other, I asked, “Exactly where is he waiting?”
“In the largest of the caverns that opens onto the woods.”
I took off, tearing through the undergrowth until I was pounding through the narrow entrance to Georgie’s side of the caves, then down the tunnels to the big cavern. Connor was standing in the opening with his back to the forest, his feet resting on the edge of the drop as if he’d floated down from the sky. Which I guessed was exactly what he’d done.
Stumbling to a breathless halt, I grinned idiotically. “Connor.”
He smiled back, teeth gleaming in the moonlight. “Ashala Wolf.”
“Are you — um, is everything okay?”
“I know who the traitor is.”
Oh. There’d been a small, unrealistic part of me that had been hoping it would somehow turn out to be a horrible mistake, and I suddenly didn’t want to hear the name, didn’t want it to be made irrevocably real. “Don’t tell me yet! I mean, Ember should be here soon. She’s behind me somewhere.”
“Then, I suppose we had better wait to talk until she catches up with you.”
“Yeah.” I stared down at the ground, feeling awkward and uncomfortable. There had been no need for me to come running up here like a lunatic. He was fine.
“Ashala?” His voice had changed. Not so smooth or so cold.
“Yes?” I asked hopefully.
“I . . . I think of you. And the Firstwood. When things are bad.”
My throat closed over, and I answered, “I know.” And I did. That was why I’d been so worried these past weeks. Without even being conscious of it, I’d picked up on his loneliness, his extreme isolation, grown so much more acute now that I’d shown him what it was like to belong. The memory sharing had created a link between us, just as Ember had said it would. Taking a hesitant step closer, I said, “I can hear you, Connor. Even when you’re not here. Even when you don’t speak.”
For a second, he was still. Then he moved toward me, or maybe we moved toward each other. I flung my arms around his neck, and he hugged me back, the two of us clinging together as if we could make everything else disappear if we held on tight enough. Resting my cheek against this shoulder, I whispered, “You’re not alone.”
He sighed raggedly and pressed a kiss to the top of my head. Then he pushed me gently away. I clenched my hands into fists to stop myself from hanging on to him, watching as he took a step back, and another, and another, until he’d nearly run out of cave to stand in.
“Ashala . . . I have . . . There are things I have to tell you. There are some difficult decisions to be made. I still need . . . I cannot let go . . .”
He stopped, shaking his head in frustration at not being able to get the words out. But I could fill in the blanks: I still need Justin. I cannot let go of him yet. He had to maintain the defense system that allowed him to survive in a Citizens’ world, and he was worried that if he allowed himself to be completely Connor, the mask of Justin-the-enforcer would disappear forever.
“It’s all right. I get it.”
He exhaled, and when he spoke again, I could hear the relief in his voice. “Yes. You would.”
Ember arrived and found the two of us standing, in total silence, a long way apart. She looked from him to me, and I could almost hear her mind ticking over.
All she said, though, was “I’ve put a lamp in one of the smaller caves across the way. I didn’t want to bring a light in here. I mean, I’m sure everyone’s asleep. . . .” Her voice trailed off, but she didn’t need to say any more. We didn’t want anyone looking up from the forest and spotting us, not when no one but Georgie knew about Connor.
I strode out jerkily, heading for the smaller cave and leaving Connor and Ember to follow. The three of us settled down in a loose circle on the floor, and Ember asked, “So, enforcer, who’s the traitor?”
He cast a concerned glance at me, and I knew that he’d realized I was dreading hearing a name. Bracing myself, I nodded at him, and he said, “Her name is Briony.”
Bry? “It can’t be!”
Ember sighed. “She was on the list, Ash.”
Connor’s brows drew together. “You made a list of the people who might betray you? Are there so many?”
“No,” Em replied, “we made a list of anyone who could have left the forest to make contact with the government. Although Bry was a ‘maybe,’ because she could only have done it if she’s been lying about how strong her ability is.”
Bewildered, I asked, “Why would she do this?”
“Because,” Connor answered, “she wants an Exemption.”
Ember shook her head in disbelief. “They’ll never give an Exemption to a Runner!”
“No, they won’t. But she doesn’t know that. She’s told them the names and abilities of everyone in the Tribe and given them a description of each of you.”
I gasped. “They know what we look like?”
“General descriptions aren’t photos, Ash,” Ember said soothingly. “It’d be hard for anyone to pick us out in a crowd without more than that.”
“They could pick you out.”
“Yes, but you know I can fix my eyes.”
She could, too. Ember had a special contact lens that her dad had given her, which made her blue eye as brown as the other one. But that didn’t make me feel a whole lot better. “It’s still bad, Em.”
“Believe me, I know.” Turning to Connor, she said, “Some of the Tribe are still in contact with their relatives. If the government starts investigating them —”
“They aren’t, yet. Briony knows you by your forest names. Ashala Wolf, Ember Crow, and so on. It’ll take time to match first names and descriptions against all the records of runaways.”
I drew my knees up to my chest. “Neville found me quick enough. He gave you my file.”
Connor’s eyes darkened. “You weren’t hard to locate because Briony knew that your sister had been killed in Gull City four years ago. Besides, he isn’t even trying to track the rest of you down.”
“Why not?”
His mouth twisted as if he’d tasted something bad. “I’m afraid the Chief Administrator has made the Tribe his own personal project. He’s hoarding information about you, keeping it away from the rest of the government.”
There was a small silence as Ember and I absorbed the level of Neville’s unwelcome interest in us. Then Connor said, “There’s something I must know. Does Briony possess an
y information of importance, other than what she’s already told them?”
I felt very grateful for Ember’s circles of secrets. “No. She’s passed on everything she knows. Why does that matter?”
“Because she’s going to be told to introduce me to you. I think it would be best to let her continue betraying the Tribe long enough to do it.”
“What?”
“Neville doesn’t consider Briony to be very reliable,” he explained, “so he wants someone he trusts to make contact. The idea is that I will pose as a clerk seeking help for an Illegal relative.”
Ember looked thoughtful. “That could be useful. It would put you in a position to cast doubt on everything Bry has already told them.”
“Connor, that’s too big a risk for you!” I objected. “Besides, now that we know who the traitor is, you’re coming to live with us.”
But he shook his head. There was an odd expression on his face that I hadn’t seen before and couldn’t place. Is he . . . afraid? I felt cold all over, wondering what could possibly scare Connor.
“Ashala,” he said, “Neville has promised Briony an Exemption if she delivers you. He is sending me to the Tribe to get to you. And the best way for me to protect you is to be by his side.”
Dismayed, I asked, “What does he want with me?”
“I believe he thinks that capturing you will break the Tribe, and he has to break the Tribe. He can’t risk having free Illegals so close to things he is trying to hide. Chief Administrator Neville Rose is a man with a lot of secrets.”
“The rumors are true?” Ember demanded. “About Dr. Grey and her interrogation machine?”
“It’s supposed to read memories. Not unlike your ability.”
“Because,” I said bleakly, “they probably experimented on someone like Ember to develop it.”
“It’s possible,” he agreed. “And there’s more. I’ve seen the machine, and it’s a small electronic device, a box about so big.” He measured a space in the air with his hands, and Ember let out a strangled sound. “You’re sure that’s it?”
“Unfortunately, yes.”
The Interrogation of Ashala Wolf (The Tribe) Page 16