Impostors

by Scott Westerfeld

I shake my head. “We’re going to hide eight klicks away from this bonfire?”

  Col gathers himself, sets a determined face.

  “There’s nowhere else to go.”

  We move fast—Zura running, me and Col on the hoverboard.

  There’s no point being stealthy now. Whoever’s waiting for us at the rendezvous point heard that firefight. Either they’ve slipped away or gone to ground.

  I just hope they don’t start shooting when they see us charging in.

  I also try not to think about the direction we’re running—away from the rebellion that Col wanted to join yesterday, toward a woman who’ll likely want to bury me.

  At our frantic speed, eight kilometers doesn’t take much time, or seem very far away from the wreckage behind us. But soon a breathless Zura calls us to a halt.

  “Just over that ridge.”

  Col steps from the board. “We’ll walk in slowly. Weapons down.”

  “Weapons?” I mutter. Our collective firepower is down to a rifle, a few grenades, a pulse knife, and a bow and arrow.

  As we climb the ridge, I glance back the way we’ve come. No vehicles in the sky, no body heat. Just columns of smoke blotting out a stretch of stars.

  Maybe when people see plasma guns blazing away, they investigate with caution.

  We creep onto the ridge top with only the eye slits of our sneak suits open. Our destination doesn’t look like much from up here. Just a flat expanse of rock, the perfect size for a hovercar to land.

  “Anything?” Col asks.

  Zura shakes her head. “I’ll do a circuit.”

  “We don’t have time,” Col says. “We have to make contact before someone starts poking around back there.”

  He pulls his sneak suit down to reveal his face. Then stands up in plain view.

  “¡Hola!” he calls down.

  No answer.

  “Soy Col Palafox. ¿Hay alguien ahí?”

  Nothing but echoes.

  He waits a moment, then sighs.

  “Might as well go down.”

  We’re in the right spot, at least.

  There are footprints in the dirt, a few discarded food containers. A pile of rocks to one side suggests that someone has cleared the space.

  But there’s no fancy tech, nothing to detect our arrival and ping whoever’s got the codebook.

  No jump mines, at least.

  Col is pacing. “They ran when the shooting started. They probably thought an army was coming down on them!”

  “Plasma guns have that effect,” Zura says, looking at me. “Not my first choice for dealing with mines.”

  “My first choice was running away,” I point out. “But then someone flew off with our only hoverboard!”

  “My job is to protect the heir, not—”

  “Enough,” Col says. “We’re here now. What exactly did your orders say, Zura?”

  “Search for the signal from your board. Find you, then report here.” She shrugs. “There wasn’t a backup plan for if nobody was around.”

  “Okay. So they’ll pick another spot to meet. How long till they send that out?”

  “It doesn’t matter, sir. Our codebook receiver is at the bottom of a ravine.”

  For a moment, Col looks like a lost child. Then he gathers himself. “We need to find another Victorian unit. How do we do that?”

  Zura shakes her head. “What’s left of our forces are running silent, which means trying not to be found. They’ll only listen to orders from the codebook. That’s how our system was designed.”

  “Then we go back to the bunker,” Col says. “Sooner or later, someone’s bound to show up for those weapons.”

  “On foot? Through enemy territory?” Zura asks. “We can’t fit three on that hoverboard. And we’ve already run into one bunch of jump mines!”

  Col lets out a sigh. He’s scratched up from our fall off the hoverboard. His face is dirty and streaked with sweat.

  “We don’t have a choice.”

  “Col,” I say gently. “Let’s get some sleep. Whoever wanted us here could show up tomorrow.”

  For once, Zura agrees with me. “We’re too tired to walk into another firefight, sir.”

  “Of course,” Col says, then frowns. “I don’t suppose there’s anything to eat.”

  That’s when it occurs to me that we’re back to nothing. No food, no water, and no wood to burn.

  It’s like the wild is always trying to starve me.

  Zura has some good news—we don’t have to sleep in our sweaty sneak suits. Thanks to clever Victorian military tech, they can be fused together into a stealth tent.

  The only problem is, all I’m wearing under mine is a ripped nightshirt and undershorts. My sweatpants are back in that ravine, on fire, along with our food and our receiver.

  And mountains get cold at night.

  While Zura works, I huddle half-naked on a rock, hugging my legs to stay warm. The wild feels infinite around me, a boundless dark.

  The whole world seems boundless now. No more combat training in the morning, ever. No more breakfasts with the Palafoxes, pretending to be Rafi. No pretending at all.

  Just me and my allies—and the things in the dark that want to kill us.

  Freedom has a way of being terrifying.

  I wonder what Rafi’s doing now. Is she being a good daughter, making speeches to support the war effort? Or fighting our father every step of the way?

  Maybe some part of her feels this freedom too, with no little sister to take her place every time things get interesting. She used to envy me out there on the dance floor, in front of the cheering crowds. Solving problems with my fists.

  Maybe she’s happier now, being both edges of the knife.

  Does she miss me as much as I miss her?

  A red dot bobs out of the darkness, Col using the laser sight of his hunting bow like a flashlight.

  As if he knows the dark thoughts in my head, he sits next to me and puts an arm around my shoulders. Out here, the simplest things make all the difference. Food. Safety. Warmth.

  His body against mine makes everything dividing us—our warring families, our lies—seem less important.

  “You promised me an army,” I say. “And I don’t even have pants.”

  He pulls me tighter, and the low shudder in my bones finally stills.

  “Uniforms will be easy,” he says. “I’m more worried about the army part. When this all started, we had three thousand soldiers, two hundred hovercars. We’ll be lucky if a quarter of them are still out there.”

  I don’t answer. Fifty warships against my father is nothing.

  Col puts his arm around me again. “When Zura jumped on the board, left you to face those mines alone, I couldn’t stop her.”

  “I get it, Col. Her job is to protect you. Just like me and my sister.”

  “Well, except she volunteered.”

  Right. Normal people choose their work.

  It seems like that would only make life harder, having to decide. Being born to protect my sister always felt like destiny.

  “You didn’t choose to be first son,” I say.

  “No. But I could always run away and become a big-game hunter. Jefa would love that.”

  I pull away to look at his face.

  “I hope she’s okay, Col. Even if she hates me.”

  He shakes his head. “Fighting beside someone, it’s hard to hate them.”

  I close my eyes, and see this war against my father stretching out before us. Running, fighting, maybe for years. Sleeping in the wild, hungry and uncertain.

  But we also have this, Col’s body next to mine.

  I kiss him.

  He kisses me.

  All those explosions an hour ago deadened my senses, but now I can feel everything. The hard stone beneath us. The weight of his hands on my shoulders. A hint of rain chilling the desert air.

  Col’s lips are dry, edged with thirst and cold. Our breaths quicken, shallow and unsteady in each other’s
mouths. His fists knot in my borrowed shirt, our gentleness sharpening in the dark.

  Then, between kisses—the soft dance of his tongue like he’s saying my name—I murmur a stray thought.

  “My sister.”

  Col pulls back, confused at first.

  “Sorry,” I say. “But the thought of her alone, with him. While I’m here with you, safe.”

  Col holds me closer. “I’m worried about Rafi too.”

  “We have to get a message to her. She needs to know I’m alive. That I’m coming for her.”

  “We’ll take you to a city. You can tell the feeds everything.”

  A shudder goes through me. “That would just warn my father. I’m not ready for everyone to know.”

  “Then we’ll figure something out.” He kisses me again. “We’ll save your sister.”

  “And your brother too,” I say.

  We’re going to fight beside each other, maybe for a long time. This war seems endless, and we’re only at the start.

  We kiss again, the sounds of our lips as faint as whispers in the night.

  Zura finishes and calls to us to get some sleep.

  She’s fused the smart fibers of our suits, making a tent just big enough for three. Its camo skin is pitch black in the darkness.

  Some part of my brain registers that it’s awkward, sharing a tent with Col and one of his soldiers. But most of me is too exhausted, too battered, to care. And I need to pee.

  “Back in a minute,” I say.

  Zura sighs. “You should’ve done that in the suit.”

  I stare at her. “What?”

  “Here in the wild, nothing’s more important than water. The suits collect our sweat and urine, and filter it back into drinking water. It tastes funny, but the purifiers work almost perfectly.”

  “Almost? No thanks.” I turn away and head into the darkness.

  “Watch out for snakes!” Zura calls.

  Right. Deserts are full of snakes, aren’t they?

  Hopefully in this cold, they’ll be asleep, or hibernating, or whatever snakes do. But as always, cold-blooded creatures are invisible in heat vision, so I can’t be sure.

  The wild sucks sometimes.

  I’m not gone very long, but Col and Zura are already asleep when I come back. They’ve left me the middle.

  Great.

  But at least it’s warm inside the tent. The suits are opaque to infrared, the insulation almost perfect. Zura warned us that the heat of three bodies will make things downright hot by morning. I’m fine with that.

  When I lie down, there’s a rock in the middle of my back. It’s under the floor of the tent, big as an apple, embedded in the ground. Trying to shift it aside through the tent fabric is useless.

  I lie there, trying to sleep, but the stone is too big to ignore.

  Did Zura not see it? Or did she leave it there on purpose?

  I wonder if the rest of the Victorian army will feel the same way about me. If all they’ll see is Rafia, the first daughter of the enemy, even after I explain who I really am.

  Maybe alliances are bogus. Maybe I should have stayed an army of one. I could go back to Shreve, sneak into my father’s house, and get my sister out …

  Or maybe it’s just this brain-wrecking rock in my back.

  I sit up and unseal the tent. The desert air reaches in, icy fingers along my flesh.

  Col stirs, a plaintive murmur pushing from his lips.

  The cold outside is brutal after the warmth of the tent. The freezing sand sticks to my bare knees and palms like ice crystals.

  I slide one arm under the tent.

  With my fingers stretched out, I can just reach the stone. But it’s half-buried, and it takes a solid minute of scrabbling before it pops out.

  There’s something in the hole—

  A folded piece of paper.

  I pull it out and stare in the starlight.

  The paper is covered with coded markings, like on the weapons cases back in the Palafoxes’ bunker. But this is handwritten, hasty and clumsy.

  I stick my head back into the tent and whisper, “Col.”

  He doesn’t respond. I grasp his bare ankle with my freezing hand.

  He sputters awake, staring at me with confusion and annoyance.

  I wave the paper. “Someone left us a note.”

  He blinks a few more times, then finally sits up.

  A gust of wind rushes past me into the tent, and Zura jolts awake, reaching for her rifle.

  “Relax,” I say.

  Col crawls halfway out into the starlight. When I hand him the paper, his eyes go wide.

  “It’s Victorian battle code,” he says.

  “Can you read it?”

  “It says, ‘Stay here. We’ll check back soon.’” Col squints closer. “And then, ‘Leave me the sign, so I’ll know it’s you. And watch out—this place is plagued by scorpions.’”

  I sit up straight. “Scorpions? Fantastic.”

  “Better than fantastic.” Col looks up from the paper. “This is my little brother’s handwriting.”

  The next morning it rains.

  It’s cold and miserable, and we hunker in the tent together. All we can do is wait.

  After finding the note last night, we made a spiral of stones on the landing pad. It’s the symbol of a fictional hero Col and Teo pretended to be when they were little—the “sign” Teo was asking for.

  Somehow, he’s okay.

  While we wait, Zura recounts battles from when she was fighting the rebels instead of my father. When she runs out of stories, Col tells us about his little brother, who was kicked out of his first boarding school for breaking curfew, and his second for bribing other students to take his tests.

  When the time comes for me to entertain them, Zura gives me an expectant look. She’s still wondering about the story behind my face.

  “You can trust Zura with anything,” Col says. “But it’s up to you.”

  I hesitate. My story is something I should get used to telling, if we’re going to spill it to the whole world one day. And I’ll have to explain everything to Aribella, if she’s going to understand my value to her struggle.

  I like being bound to Col by the secrets we’ve shared. Once somebody else knows the truth of me, it won’t be the same between us.

  I’m selfish with him, and with my secrets.

  “Not yet. Is that okay?”

  Col takes my hand. “Of course.”

  “Can’t wait,” Zura says.

  The day warms up slowly, but the rain doesn’t relent.

  “We should take the tent down,” Zura says around noon. “The suits will collect more water if they’re stretched out.”

  “Better than drinking our sweat,” I say.

  Col agrees.

  We crawl out into the cold downpour, and we’re muddy and soaked in seconds. But once I stop shivering, the feel of clean water against my skin is glorious.

  Col and I stand side by side, drinking from our palms, rubbing two days’ travel off our skin. Showering together in the rain feels almost normal, like this is a camping trip and not a war.

  “Wish we had some soap,” he says.

  Zura looks up from taking apart the tent, pulls a blue wafer from a pocket of her fatigues. She tosses it to Col, who rubs it between his hands. A blue lather builds.

  When he gives it to me, it smells exactly like the stuff they clean our kitchens with back at my father’s house. It reminds me of playing hide-and-seek with my sister after the staff had all gone home. It also reminds me of having a whole kitchen full of food.

  “Anything edible in those pockets?” I ask Zura.

  “Just this.” She pulls out a small bottle of powder. “Rub it into raw meat and it kills the parasites. Safer than food cooked on a fire.”

  “Sounds yummy.” I turn to Col. “Your military tech creeps me out.”

  “Your military tech blew up my house.”

  “Oh, I didn’t mean—” I begin, but Col breaks
into a smile.

  “My little brother’s safe, Frey. I get to make jokes again.”

  “Sure. Just warn me it’s a joke next time.” I hand him the soap.

  Col’s smile fades. “I wonder if Abuela …”

  He doesn’t say more, but I can see him sink into the layers of everything he’s lost. Even if Teo’s okay, his home is still gone. His city conquered.

  I gently change the subject. “How do you think Teo got back from Europe? His face is on all the feeds. It’s not like he can buy a suborbital ticket.”

  “My mother must’ve sent someone to grab him.”

  “Why would they grab two of his friends?”

  “For propaganda value?” he says. “You’ve seen the feeds. The cities are tightening the embargo.”

  “Yeah, I guess that does sound like Aribella.”

  Col shrugs. “I’m sure she told their parents.”

  I’m not. Once more, I remind myself to get back on her good side as soon as possible.

  “I bet that note was her idea too,” Col adds. “She knew I’d recognize Teo’s handwriting.”

  “Messages within messages,” I say softly.

  But it seems risky to me, leaving so much to chance. If Zura had set up the tent in a different spot, we’d have missed the note completely.

  My stomach rumbles.

  “That parasite powder is starting to sound good,” I say. “Do rabbits come out in the rain?”

  Col shrugs. “Never thought about it.”

  “Wait,” I say. “There’s something about nature you don’t know?”

  “I don’t hunt in the rain. My feathers get wet.”

  For a moment, I imagine Col as a large predatory bird. Then I realize—“Oh, the ones on your arrows.”

  He laughs, like this was a joke and not my brain gone briefly missing. After everything that’s happened, Col still thinks I’m funny.

  “Aren’t deserts supposed to be dry?” I ask.

  “Desert rains are infrequent. But when they happen, they can be torrential.”

  “Torrential,” I say. “Such a tour guide word.”

  He comes closer. “We tour guides know all the good words.”

  A fresh wind is whipping through the camp. Water flows across my bare feet, and the rain slants and coils around us.