Oathbound

by S W Clarke

  She fidgeted with her hands. I had never seen her so worried. “The oath. Do you accept?”

  I stared at her. I was considering it, and it wasn’t because of my arm. If it meant keeping my research out of the World Army’s hands, I would spend the rest of my life as a one-armed encantado.

  But Collin Russo had nothing to do with any of this. He was fourteen years old, and if I finished mapping the third helix, he could live.

  And I knew I could do it. I knew I could save him.

  Fuck. She had me.

  “If I agree,” I began, “I need you to swear you’ll release the others.”

  Her lips quirked. “You would trust my promise?”

  “What other choice do I have?” I paused. “Besides, you need me to want to help you. You’re on a timeline, after all. Six months.”

  “Well observed.” She folded her arms. “They won’t be killed, but releasing them is out of my hands.”

  “What do you mean, out of your hands? You’re the big boss.”

  She laughed softly. “No, I’m just one of them. And being the science arm of the Army—which is just an arm of the World Government—doesn’t exactly have the sway you’d think.”

  She was underselling her power. Everything I had seen in the six months since I’d met Serena Russo told me she had incredible sway. She had chased me all the way here, after all, and brought me to this underground facility.

  But I played along. “So somebody wants to keep Justin and Hercules and the Cupids here.”

  She gave a single nod.

  “Then I won’t agree to it,” I said.

  She gave me a hard stare and spoke slowly. “If you take the oath, Isabella, you’ll be here for a long while. You’ll be able to see a lot of this facility.”

  I stared back. Was Serena Russo sending me a telepathic message? It almost seemed like she was encouraging me to break them out.

  No—that couldn’t be right. She was completely aligned with the World Government. She wanted to eliminate the Other threat.

  I said nothing, my eyes shifting to her folded arms. Where her hand met her opposite elbow, she was tweaking a bit of her jacket between her fingers. A nervous tic.

  She was afraid.

  More than that—she needed me. She needed me as much as I needed her.

  Maybe I had misjudged Serena’s motivations. I knew she wanted to save her son, but I’d thought she’d also been quite keen on exterminating Others.

  Now I suspected it was only about her son. All of it. Everything she did was to protect him from an early death. Even if that meant allowing me to break Justin and Hercules out of here. Because, no matter what, I would still be oathbound. I would still have to save Collin.

  I took a deep breath. If I was totally honest, some non-insubstantial part of me enjoyed making her wait. I enjoyed having power over the woman who had contributed to making my life a misery. To screwing up my boyfriend’s genetics and making him suffer. To the deaths of Roger, Selene and Mari.

  With gritted teeth, I rose from the bed. My cleft arm started into fresh, stabbing pain, but I needed to be standing to do this.

  As I stood, Serena stepped back. Did she think I was going to attack her? A one-armed encantado?

  I turned toward her, stepped forward. My right hand came out, awaiting hers.

  She looked down at my hand and back up at me.

  “You have to clasp my arm to the elbow,” I said.

  “Is this how Others agree to oaths?”

  “This is how I agree to them.”

  She rolled up the left sleeve of her jacket. Then she extended her hand, her elegant fingers sliding up my forearm until they reached the elbow. Mine did the same over her porcelain skin, and we stood close enough that I could see every pore on her face. (I could only see about five, GoneGodDamn her.)

  “We used to swear to the gods,” I said. “But the gods are gone. So I’ll swear it on my love for Justin, for Hercules and for Cupid.”

  “You love them.”

  “I love them all.”

  She assented with a nod.

  “I swear on those I love and on those I have loved,” I continued. “Here, I take this oath: I will do everything in my power to save the life of your son, Collin Russo.”

  Tears came to Serena’s eyes. “And I swear I will give you back your arm.”

  I was surprised; she hadn’t needed to an oath. I was prepared to rely on her promise. “Thank you,” I said.

  For a moment, neither of us moved. We stood together in a strange communion, and I felt the seed of something in my belly. Respect. Begrudging respect for Serena Russo.

  Not because she had sworn, or because she was a good scientist. But because she loved someone so much that she would do anything—anything—to ensure his survival.

  In this way, she reminded me of Hinata.

  “Let’s get you ready for this surgery,” she said.

  “Now?” I blinked. “Don’t you need to develop a DNA sample?”

  The ghost of a smile appeared. “Oh, Isabella. We’ve had your DNA since the day you and I met.”

  ↔

  Twenty minutes later, a nurse settled a mask over my face. She told me to count down from ten. I knew how this went—I’d seen the medical shows on TV. But that didn’t make it any less frightening.

  I started counting. I got to seven before I dropped into a vast and dreamless void.

  What felt like a second later, they woke me up.

  She woke me up.

  “Isa.”

  I knew that voice.

  I knew what hearing that voice meant.

  I was in a bad situation.

  Serena Russo.

  Then I remembered: She’d sworn. She had sworn to help me. I had sworn to help her.

  My subconscious hadn’t quite caught up with my new reality. Serena wasn’t my enemy—at least, not right now. Still, real consciousness remained far-off, elusive. No, that wasn’t it. I was awake, but my body wasn’t. It remained unresponsive, even as the impulses to motion sparked in my brain.

  “Can you wiggle your fingers?”

  I tried and couldn’t. But something had changed. Something had definitely changed.

  “That’s it. Open your eyes.”

  Bone-white light pressed at my eyelids, edging them open. A tiny flashlight flashed into each pupil. It flicked off, leaving a burnt halo in its wake. And the impression of a man in scrubs.

  “She’s responsive,” he said. “Seems to be taking to it well.”

  Another face darted into my vision. I had the brief, irate thought: You should ask permission. And then the longer, angrier thought: That’s the last face I want darting in front of my eyes.

  “Look at how it’s affecting her,” that face said. “She’s already awake.” Then to me, “Isabella?”

  I worked some saliva into my mouth. “Serena.”

  “Did you dream?”

  I slow-blinked. “No.”

  “Pity.” She eased onto the bed, hit a button that slowly raised my upper body until I was mostly upright. “No flashes? Images?”

  What was she getting at? “I saw nothing. Nothing at all.”

  Her lips flattened. She turned to the doctor, nodded once. When he had left and the door shut, she set her hands in her lap. “Can you feel your left hand?”

  “Should I be able to?” Despite her oath, I was still doubtful she’d actually done as promised. I fully expected to have a crab claw for a hand.

  “Have a look.”

  By degrees, my eyes inched down, and after a time my head followed. There lay the lower half of an arm I hadn’t had when I’d gone to sleep. It was wrapped in all sorts of gauze, but it was definitely an arm.

  I stared at it, willing myself not to cry. I had a left arm again.

  “I’ve made it significantly easier for you to do your work,” she said. My eyes flicked up to hers. “Would have been slow going with one hand.”

  “My work,” I said. “You mean the oath.�
��

  Her blue eyes didn’t waver. “The oath.”

  “I expect this hand will be out of commission for a while, anyway.”

  Her eyes shifted to my gauzed left arm. She reached across the bed, her fingers hovering over mine before she reached down toward it. “Can you feel that?” she asked, cupping my hand.

  “I …” I could feel something, but it was strange. A different sensation than I’d ever felt before. Almost as though the limb didn’t fully belong to me. “Whose hand is this, Serena?”

  “It’s yours.”

  I had seen the flicker in her eyes. “Whose was it before it was mine?”

  “Once you start using it, you’ll understand.”

  She seemed too keen on me moving my fingers. I sighed, refocused on the hand. More accurately, I focused on lifting the sheet from over my legs. That would be step one in getting out of here.

  As she watched me attempt—and fail—to work my left hand, Serena cleared her throat. “You know my son’s name.”

  Collin. The name I had called out back in the Garden of Hera. The name that had forced Serena to look around, because what mother could resist the call of her child’s name? That was when Cupid had nailed her with an arrow.

  “I do.”

  “How?” she asked.

  I didn’t answer. I focused on lifting up the sheet.

  “Is it because of the oracle?”

  I raised my eyes to her. “You don’t know anything about the oracle.”

  Her eyebrows went up, and she canted her head to the left. “Actually, I know quite a bit.”

  “Just because you saw a woman die doesn’t mean you know anything about who she was.”

  Serena rose, gazed down at me with folded arms. “You’re a scientist, too. You know how much is contained in the genes.”

  I still couldn’t move my GoneGodDamn hand. “Get to the point.”

  “That’s one expression of your genes I hadn’t seen before. Anger. You used to be so uncertain, so shy.”

  “Turns out six months of fighting for your life has a strong effect.”

  “As does fighting for your child’s.”

  I nearly flinched. Touche.

  She pointed at my gauzed arm. “The oracle bonded with you before she died.”

  “What do you mean, bonded with me?”

  “I mean your genes and her genes are simpatico.” She lifted her hands before her, interlacing the fingers in a suction grip. “Hers was the only DNA we had that would work with yours. Which is just as well, seeing as how she had some of the most powerful magic I’ve encountered. Look at how quickly you’re recovering. It’s remarkable.”

  A theory was quickly crystallizing in my mind. “How would you have her DNA?” But I already knew the answer. “Nossa Senhora … You took a DNA sample from her corpse.” I paused. “You dug up her corpse.”

  “I re-buried it afterward.”

  Finally, my fingers moved. The pointer and middle fingers twitched, the tiniest impulse movement.

  Serena hadn’t seen it. “I know you’re upset.” She began the high-heeled pacing I had seen her doing so many times in her office, back when I was her assistant at McGill. “But you can’t imagine what this will do for the progress of your work. To be able to see pasts and futures as you figure out the secrets to Other procreation ...”

  “You deceived me. You gave me no choice,” I snarled. “You really are a bitch.”

  She raised a hand. “I don’t have time for that. Collin doesn’t have time for that.”

  My breathing came faster. “How did you give me this arm?”

  “Like I said: the oracle had some of the most powerful magic we’ve encountered.”

  I finally got what she meant about the oracle bonding with me. “You spliced our DNA.”

  A flame ignited in her eyes, and she stopped pacing. “It was the most brilliant thing I’ve ever seen. Her cells are so alive—just the small sample we took. But they wouldn’t bond with anything else.”

  Daiski had clued me in to how fast I breathed normally. I was breathing faster than that—too fast, too audibly. I pushed myself upright with my right hand, struggled out from under the sheet. I had managed to swing my legs out of the bed and touch the icy floor tiles with my toes when Serena came around and grabbed my wrist.

  That was when it happened, like the glint of a blade under the light. That quick, but when we touched, I was transported to a different place.

  Chapter 19

  Instead of tile, I stood on grass. Soft, healthy grass. And before me sat a tree so large I had to lift my face to see the whole of it. High up, the boughs were laden with enormous apples.

  I knew this grass. I knew that tree.

  “Yes, encantado,” came a voice. “You are in the garden.” My eyes lowered, and a woman I had not noticed sat at the base of the tree with folded legs. She set one hand on a staff, propped it upright as an aid to stand. Her white robes flowed long as she did, and I gasped.

  “Pythia?”

  She cocked her head. “Who else would it be?”

  I came forward, padding across the grass toward her. As her features became clearer, I knew it could be no one else but the Oracle of Delphi. Her white hair flowed away from her aged face just as when I’d first met her in New York City. “You’re dead.” I paused. “Does that mean I’m dead?”

  Mirth touched her lips. “Do you feel dead?”

  I flexed my fingers. When I lifted my left hand, it was still wrapped in gauze, but the wrapping felt excessive. Unnecessary. The hand didn’t even hurt. In fact, none of me hurt. I didn’t feel tired or hungry or afraid.

  I felt perfectly serene.

  I shook my head. “No.”

  "Because you aren’t.” She set a hand to her chest. “Nor am I. When you live in all times at once, you never truly die."

  Footsteps sounded behind me. “What the hell is going on here?”

  I spun. Serena Russo stood not three feet away, and her face bore an expression I had never seen her wear.

  Pure, abject fear.

  “That depends on you, Serena.” Pythia swept a hand out. “And on which path you choose.”

  Following her fingers, I realized the garden we stood in wasn’t exactly as it had been in New York City. For one thing, the treeline around us wasn’t flanked by Manhattan’s skyscrapers. Instead, a cloudless night sky and a million stars provided our light. No moon, though.

  And instead of an unbroken expanse of grass, three shimmering portals hovered at intervals behind, beside, and before us. Their depths held nothing but blackness.

  Serena took another step closer to us. Her mouth opened, but it was Pythia who spoke. “It’s not a dream. It’s not a hallucination. It’s real. You’re alive, Isabella is alive, and you’re both still in the McGovern facility fifty miles from the Grand Canyon in Arizona. But you’re also here.” Pythia raised a hand to her head. “Or at least, your minds are. And that’s why I can read your thoughts.”

  To her credit, Serena took this incredibly well. She swallowed, her blue eyes traveling in the same arc mine had when I’d first stepped up to Pythia. She turned a full circle, taking in the garden around us before she spoke again. “Why has this happened?”

  “You took my DNA.” Pythia pointed to my gauzed hand. “You bonded it to her because it would not bond to anyone else’s. And now she bears my powers. She has used them to bring you to this place, though she isn’t consciously aware of that choice.”

  I squeezed my hand. The oracle was right: I had not consciously chosen anything when Serena grabbed my arm.

  Serena swept an arm out. “And what is this place?”

  “A means by which you may see the past, the present or a future.” Pythia inclined her staff at each portal in turn. “Depending on which portal you choose, of course.”

  Serena turned toward the portals. “A future?”

  “The future branches,” I said, Pythia’s words from back in New York returning to me, “depending on y
our choices in the present. You have thousands of potential futures.”

  Serena turned toward us, her eyebrows drawn together. Deep lines sat between her eyes. Conflict twisted the canvas of her face.

  “There's only one question that weighs heavy on your heart,” Pythia said. “That question can only be answered by the future. Do you have the courage to see it?"

  The lines between her eyes deepened, and her lips folded. “I fear nothing.”

  So Serena will never turn down a challenge. I filed that information away.

  Pythia tipped her staff toward the portal behind the tree. “That is your way.”

  We watched Serena approach the portal, pause a moment before stepping through. When she disappeared into the blackness, Pythia turned to me. “You are forbidden from seeing your future.”

  I kept staring at the portal Serena had disappeared into. I had felt the pull to follow her, and Pythia had again read my mind. “Why?”

  The oracle stepped toward me, brushed my hair over one shoulder. “Because the future is a complex thing, and I fear what you see there will weaken your resolve for what you must do now. Trust me, child, like you trusted me before—stay in the present. That is what you need to know.”

  Our eyes met. “I trust you.” And I did. This was the woman who had sacrificed the remainder of her mortal life to save mine. Before us, the center portal waited with the serenity of a lake. “Will you be here when I come back out?”

  Pythia smiled at me. “Of course.”

  I approached it without hurry, because nothing felt hurried here. Not as in life, where anxiety palpated through me like a heartbeat. Even in real life, the garden of Hera had not seemed so serene, the stars winking like cats’ eyes above me.

  When I stepped up to it, the portal didn’t reflect back at me. It offered only a diffuse inner light, as though something awaited me on the other side. And I found it easy—an allure—to take that first step through. Then the next.

  And just like that, I became weightless.

  As soon as I had passed through the portal, I floated into the sky. It felt like being buoyed by water to the surface, where a sea of stars greeted me. And where I had felt calmness in the garden, I experienced perfect serenity in the present like I had never known.