Firstborn

by Tosca Lee

  “Think there’s a chance we can get some food down here?” Luka interjects into the silence.

  “A very good chance,” Jester murmurs, beginning to download the chip’s contents.

  “What’s up with Arrick, anyway?” I say.

  “He’s . . . I don’t know how you say it. A groupie?”

  “Sounds about right,” I mutter.

  “In love with Progeny life.”

  “So what does he get out of this?”

  “Persuaded,” she says.

  “What?”

  “He only asks one thing from those of us who come here. Persuade him. To do anything. To think of something pleasant, hopefully. Let him forget for a while. He was very in love with Analise. We all were.”

  “Okay,” I say. “That’s kind of creepy.”

  “Is it?” Jester says, looking up at me. “Wanting to forget?”

  I step back as though slapped. Her attention returns to her computer.

  In the last twenty hours, I’ve been hunted by the police—twice—jumped onto a ship, into a river, on a horse, on a bus, and made my way here only to be confronted by a manic Tibor bent on taking out the Scions from the inside and given de facto leadership of a flock that knows my name but whose faces I’ve never seen. And I’ve just returned with the best chance we’ve ever had against the Historian and right now I’m so over all of this.

  “You know what? I’m gonna get some rest,” I say, and head upstairs. Probably with the same look Claudia had a few minutes ago, which just makes it worse. And without the dignity of a regular gait, which just makes it lame. Luka comes to help me, but I brush him off.

  I feel angry, betrayed to some degree or another by all of them. Including him.

  “Does nobody care that we have this?” I say upstairs, not bothering to whisper. “That you and I both nearly died trying to get it here?”

  He closes the door. “They’re weirded out, Audra.”

  A series of bronze lamps illuminates the room in a mellow glow. The long daybed against the far wall is piled with colorful pillows. What does Arrick do in his free time anyway—moonlight as a professional lounger?

  “And I’m not?” I say, dropping onto the cushions.

  “What do you expect? You’re not the person they thought you were.”

  “They should be happy! I can do more!”

  “You know, you won’t remember this, but at one time I wanted to be a footballer. A soccer player,” he says, falling onto the pillows beside me. He rubs his brows as though they hurt. Bruised as he is, his whole face must. “My best friend, Bertrand, and I were on the same team for years, growing up. The year we turned sixteen, I was approached by a professional recruiter. I was ecstatic. Couldn’t wait to tell Bertrand all about it. I thought he’d be happy for me.”

  “I take it he wasn’t.”

  “He could barely look at me. It didn’t help that he had always practiced harder than me. Started younger. We were friends after, but it was never the same.”

  “Your story sucks.”

  “Claudia has always known whose daughter you were. It’s hard being the friend of someone who makes you feel invisible. The only thing she’s ever had over you is that she knew more about this life and how to live it than you . . .”

  “And she always will.”

  “Yes, but now you turn out to be this thing that everyone is in awe of. Including her.”

  “Well I don’t want her to be!”

  “Neither does she. But she is. And now she’s wondering what that makes her.”

  “My friend,” I say. “The only true, surviving friend I have from before, after you.”

  “Not in her mind,” he says. “Audra, you’re gifted. You’re smart. You’re strong. You’re beautiful.”

  I groan.

  “Those things alone make you a very hard person to be close to.”

  “Then why are you with me?” I say bitterly.

  He rolls his eyes, and I know I’m such an ass.

  “I’m just saying when something about who you are changes, it makes anyone close to you wonder how that also changes them.”

  I lean onto an elbow, study him in the low light. “You know,” I finally say. “You’re going to make a great dad.”

  The smile he gives me is sad. And I hate it, because it’s like he’s already accepted that he’ll never really be that. In the same way that I can’t think of myself as a mother. Because I’m not. Not really. A mom is someone who raises you, is there for you. Not just protecting you with her absence.

  “So what am I supposed to do?”

  He shrugs. “Be you.”

  “Easy for you to say.”

  “What else can you do? You can’t persuade her to feel a certain way.”

  The door abruptly opens, and there’s Claudia. For a moment, I panic, not knowing how long she’s been standing there, what she might have heard.

  “I found these in one of the other rooms,” she says curtly, several items of clothing in her arms.

  She holds a short stack toward Luka, who takes them and thanks her, and another for me.

  I get up and move toward her. But instead of taking the clothes, I throw my arms around her.

  She stands, stiff and unmoving, clearly caught off guard.

  “I missed you,” I say, leaning my head against hers.

  “Me, too,” she says at last.

  “I was scared,” I say. “Really scared.”

  Her arm closes slowly around me, the bundle of clothes clasped between us.

  “So was I,” she whispers.

  Luka slips out to change, and Claudia lets me go. Taking a step back, she looks me up and down—much the way Tibor did less than an hour ago.

  “Well, you certainly don’t look Firstborn.”

  “So I hear.”

  She shakes out a pair of black jeans and a sweater and holds them toward me. And I’m only too glad to shed the dirty T-shirt and moldy, damp pants, to toss them onto the floor.

  “What does it feel like?” she says as I pull the sweater over my head.

  “Ahh,” I sigh. “Amazing. I feel like I’ve been cold for a year—”

  “No. I mean . . .”

  “Oh.” I pull on the jeans, which are snug, but it’s not like I’m complaining. They’re dry. “It hurts.”

  Her brow wrinkles. Clearly not the answer she expected.

  “It’s like the worst migraine in the world, until you nearly black out. With nosebleeds . . . and pain. Did I mention that it hurts? But not as much as dying, probably.”

  Most of the time, I forget how young she is. But standing there now, so pale, arms crossed around herself, the too-long sleeves of her sweater obscuring her hands, she actually looks eighteen.

  And I realize this has been hard on them, too. Holed up and having to wait, not knowing in the silence between our calls whether I’m still alive. Knowing that the minute I die at Scion hands, everything I know about them will be exposed. It’s the reason I haven’t asked or been told any of their locations this last week. I guess in some ways it’s easier being the one on the run.

  “Finally I understand Ivan’s strange devotion to you always,” she says. “I thought it was because of your mother, though as far as I could tell, you were nothing like her. I—I didn’t know.”

  “Me either.” I shrug.

  I give her a small smile, but she’s looking at me much the same way Luka did earlier tonight on the cruise ship: concerned. No, afraid. Not for herself, but for me.

  I glance down between us and understand her distance for what it is: self-protection. No one wants to get close to a dead woman. And Claudia’s lost so many already.

  “I’m keeping a secret for you,” she says suddenly.

  “What?”

  “Your notes, of course. Your things from the safety deposit box.”

  “Thank you,” I say, feeling guilty. I shouldn’t have left them with her at all; should have asked her to burn them, if only for her own safety.
But despite my photographic memory, I couldn’t bring myself to destroy the only thing I ever received from my mother.

  “But now that I’ve done this for you, you have to do something for me.”

  “Anything.”

  “Stop pushing us away.”

  I blink at her. “What do you mean?” I say, taken aback. “I’m pretty sure I haven’t been the one doing the pushing since you got here.”

  “Really? Since I saw you last you’ve sent us to Switzerland, where you were supposed to join us but went to Budapest instead—”

  “I had to, to keep Luka safe! But you knew that.”

  “And did it work? No. And so you went on that crazy five-day search for the diary . . .”

  “I didn’t have a choice! They were going to kill him!”

  “And then to Vienna—again—for him, when you could have gotten killed with the diary in your head. Which means they would have it all!”

  Is she seriously schooling me right now?

  “What did you expect me to do, Claudia? Just let Luka die? We couldn’t save Nino. We couldn’t save Ana. But I could save Luka. And quit talking to me like I’m fifteen. You have no idea what this week has been like for me. And then to come here and get this from you—”

  “Have you even considered since all of this began the lengths you have gone to protect him? How many times you have nearly died for him? I know you love him. But we”—she taps her chest—“are your family.” Indignation has given way to injury in her eyes.

  “Just because he’s common doesn’t make Luka’s life any less valuable! It’s because of him that I’m still alive!”

  “Really? He’s the one who took you in in Zagreb? He’s the one who taught you to survive—before?”

  I close my mouth. I’ve said too much already. If she knew what he was, I’d have far less of an argument for saving him.

  “This has never been just about you, Audra. And it’s not even about Luka. Every time you go out there”—she gestures to the world above us—“you put more than your life at risk. It’s about all of us. Now, more than ever!”

  “I did what I had to.”

  “And we kept you safe. Without our help you would be dead! And the diary—whatever it is—would have vanished with you. Would even now be in the Historian’s hands.”

  “Well guess what? They didn’t take me or the diary. Jester’s downloading it now. And Luka’s alive. Sorry if that upsets you,” I say.

  “I’m not upset. I like him. Piotrek does, too. We are glad to see him alive. And anyone can see he loves you. He’d die for you, I believe it. But the day may come when choosing him might mean not choosing everyone else who needs you.”

  I stare at her, knowing she might be right. Hoping to God she’s not.

  “Do you know they are calling you the newest Progeny prince?”

  “Oh please . . .” But the skin has prickled on my arms.

  “It’s true. Tibor’s been exiled. Everyone is saying your name. How it makes sense that Amerie the beloved zealot was Firstborn. Acting in secret all this time, hiding you away. And you, back from the dead like some Jesus Christ.”

  I roll my eyes.

  “What do you want from me, Claudia? I’m here. The so-called diary is here. And it doesn’t matter what they call me because the Scions are still out there. Which is—oh yes—also why we need the diary. Did I mention that I brought it? So I saved Luka along the way. What’s it to you?” I brush past her toward the door.

  “Do you know what they call Piotrek and me, whose fathers are not of the legacy?” she says from behind me.

  I sigh. “What?”

  “Half-blood. As though we only count half as much as a full-blooded Progeny. Even though we are as gifted—and as hunted—as any of the others waiting for you to save them. You, who might be dead right now without our help. While everyone else is hiding, we are the ones here with you. With you. So stop treating this as some personal crusade or cross you have to bear that no one else can understand. Because it is personal. To all of us!”

  I turn around and consider her. And in that moment, I wish I could tell her. I wish I could show her a picture of Eva, tell her whose—and what—she is. But even then, it wouldn’t do anything to convince her of Luka’s worth. Luka, hunted in his own right for turning traitor to the Scions.

  And maybe, with her not knowing any of that, it does look like I’m on some personal crusade. Because I am.

  But that crusade also includes her.

  I go to her and take her hands. “I swear, Claudia. I’m not doing this just for me. And I promise not to ditch you again. As for Luka . . . please, just trust me.”

  She sighs, looks away.

  “Please?” I say again, earnestly. “I can’t be at war with the Historian and Nikola and you, too.”

  She finally nods, grudgingly.

  “Thank you,” I say and pull her into a hug. She begins to shake in my arms, and I realize that she’s crying. And with that, every sharp edge in my heart softens.

  “Hey.” I take her by the shoulders to look at her. She turns her head, swipes at her cheek. Without her spidery false purple lashes and elaborate makeup and wigs, she could be any number of girls plucked from the senior hall of any high school. Except, of course, for the haunted fatigue in her eyes.

  That is solely a Progeny trait.

  Somehow I sense that telling her I love her will only make it worse—cause her to brace for some inevitable shoe to drop. Nor will it help to say I won’t die. Because I’m positive that would make me a liar.

  “Come on. Let’s check this crazy place out.”

  “Your ankle—”

  “It’s feeling better.” Which is mostly true.

  I take her by the hand and lead her to the exit. And suddenly we’re just two girls hurrying up the back stairs. The hard drum of European trance music assaults us as we bypass the main floor of the club to the rafters of a precarious catwalk over the stage.

  For as much as I’ve ridiculed Arrick’s club as a childish sham, my pulse spikes and begins to hammer to the electric beat. I point across the walk to where the stairs continue to the roof, having wondered since I saw him how and where Tibor made his rapid escape.

  Claudia steps onto the catwalk, and then next thing I know, she’s running along its metal grate. Midway across, she leaps out over the dance floor. My arms fly out and I scream, sound swallowed by the roar of the music. But she doesn’t fall—she’s caught an aerial performer’s abandoned silk to swing wide over the simmering mob.

  I grab her the minute she’s within reach, heart drumming the familiar staccato of adrenaline and alarm. But for the first time since we left Croatia, she is laughing.

  I let her go. And a second later I’ve launched myself off my good foot at a second silk swath.

  I grasp it in midair, sail out over the crimson crowd. I twine my ankle around the silk and let go to dangle upside down.

  I fly wide, weightless. Snag a plastic cup from a raised, clueless hand. One of the drunken crew below finally spies us and points with a shout as Claudia kicks off one shoe and then the other into the throbbing melee. They dive for them like beads at Mardi Gras.

  “It’s a good day to be alive, Audra!” she shouts above the music, whipping her legs around until she twirls.

  I have to work to get back to the catwalk, pumping arms and legs to climb to its metal edge. I grab for Claudia, who misses my hand the first time and then teeters when I catch her on the second, off-balance for a prolonged moment until I grit my teeth and tug her up beside me. She lands, catlike as a circus performer, as though the danger of falling just a second ago was all an act.

  “You’re insane,” I say.

  “Life is insane,” she says, as we take off for the far stairs and ascend above the music.

  There’s a door up there, and we let ourselves out, leaving my soggy sneaker to prop the door open so it won’t lock us out.

  Below us, Munich is in the full throes of festival. W
e go to the edge of the roof, gaze out toward the grounds with their scores of crowded tents, carnival rides, and giant Ferris wheel lit up against the sky. Even from here we can hear the music of the carnival, laughter, and distant singing.

  “I wonder what it’s like”—Claudia sighs—“to spend a weekend playing like that. A life. Never looking over your shoulder. To meet new people and never be afraid they have come just to track and kill you. To be able to say, ‘Let’s do this again next year.’ To make plans so far ahead.”

  Somewhere in my past, I have the faint memory of an amusement park with a looping roller coaster. Of milling from one ride to the next eating funnel cakes and ice cream, flirting with a group of boys. But Claudia has never experienced something like that. The thrills she seeks don’t come with safety harnesses or cords, no mats to catch her if she falls.

  The streets are congested, filled with foot traffic spilling from the festival to the clubs. Directly below us, the freak parade waiting to get into Club Anarchy stretches around the corner.

  “Watch,” I say.

  I lean out far enough to see the end of the line. A few seconds later, the line starts to coil in on itself, like a snake. Claudia lets out a sharp exhale of a laugh. A few seconds later, the end uncoils . . . and then takes off running around the corner.

  “Where have they gone?” Claudia says. We run to the other side of the roof, catch sight of them tearing down the block—follow them from wall to wall as they return from the opposite direction to regroup in front of the befuddled bouncers. A moment later they break apart, arms flailing in unison.

  “What are they doing?” Claudia says, as a foursome of costumed guys breaks away from the line, and I swear one of them is dressed as a cowboy.

  “Dancing!” I say. “Y . . . M . . . C . . . A . . .” I mimic, singing along to the unheard melody. Claudia laughs, watching with appalled fascination.

  “You’re making them do that?”

  I nod, wondering vaguely how long I can keep this up. Delighted shrieks issue from the swing chair ride in the distance as I speed up the frenetic pace below. They signal the letters faster and faster while I wait for the pain to start behind my eyes.