by S. J. West
“I came to see my mother,” I said, directing my question to Ash while I tried to ignore the hurt look on Zoe’s face. “Do you know where she is?”
“Haven’t seen her,” Ash answered, his voice distant as he looked at me.
I turned to leave but heard Zoe say, “Skye, please don’t go.”
I was just about to step away when Ash said, “Don’t bother, Zoe. She’s not our Skye anymore. All she cares about is herself.”
I made an about-face and walked a little farther into the room.
Ash smirked, seeing that his ploy worked. I ignored him and finally let my eyes take in the full extent of Zoe’s condition.
“You’re huge,” I said, finding myself unable to pull my eyes away from Zoe’s distended belly. “You’re even larger than you were last night. You look like you’re about ready to pop.”
“That’s about how I feel.” Zoe smiled at me uncertainly. “Skye, would you help me sit up. I need to go to the bathroom.”
“Again?” Ash said. “You just went thirty minutes ago.”
“When you have three babies pushing on your bladder you can complain,” Zoe replied irritably. “Until that miracle day happens, just help me.”
Ash pushed Zoe up while I pulled her arms.
“Oww, Skye!” Zoe said. “Don’t pull so hard.”
“Harvester strength,” I replied, feeling like I needed to apologize for some odd reason. I was the one helping her out, not the other way around. I did, however, make an effort to not pull on her arms quite so hard.
“Ring the bell, Ash,” Zoe said as I helped her sit in a wheelchair parked at the end of the lounge.
“I can take you,” Ash replied, making to get up.
“I am not about to let you help me go to the bathroom,” Zoe said with a roll of her eyes. “Just ring the damn bell and get the maids in here to help me.”
“Such language,” I admonished. “You know I read babies can hear everything you say while they’re inside the womb.”
Zoe looked alarmed for a second, then rubbed her belly soothingly.
“I’m sorry little ones,” she crooned. “But Daddy makes Mommy very mad when he doesn’t do what she wants.”
Ash chuckled. “Why do you always believe what Skye tells you?”
“Because she always tells me the truth.” Zoe looked at me with complete trust. “Right, Skye?”
I felt the ice encapsulating my heart crack ever so slightly with Zoe’s desire to be able to trust me like she always had. I was more than just a friend to her. I was her sister and mother all rolled up into one person. When two maids came to wheel her away to the bathroom, I felt relieved I didn’t have to give an answer to her question.
“Wait until I come back before you leave,” Zoe called over her shoulder to me as she was wheeled out of the room.
She was out of sight before I could make a reply.
“She loves you,” Ash said behind me, bringing my attention back to him.
His tousled hair and rumpled clothing told me Ash hadn’t slept much in the past few days. A fine growth of hair covered his lower jaw giving him a wild, manly look, awakening the only primal need I hadn’t been able to satisfy since becoming a Harvester.
“And what about you?” I asked, slowly unbuttoning my coat while walking toward him. “Do you still love me?”
“I’ll always love you,” Ash said, looking me up and down warily as I approached him. “You know that,” he replied with just enough hoarseness to his voice for me to know I was provoking the right response.
I let my coat slip from my shoulders and fall to the floor behind me. I crouched down between Ash’s legs and let my hands slowly glide up his thighs.
“What are you doing, Skye?” Ash asked, his breathing faster than before.
“What you’ve always wanted me to do,” I said, rubbing the inside of his thighs in a slow rhythmic motion.
“Why?”
My hands stopped moving. I looked up at him.
“Why not? I know you want me,” I said, cupping one hand over the proof of his arousal.
“No,” he said, pushing my hands away from him. “I don’t want you. Not like this. Not here. The Skye I love would never do this.”
“What is it with you and Jace?” I said angrily, standing to my full height. “Neither of you seem to be man enough to take what you want, even when it’s offered to you.”
“That’s because we both love you, and you’re not yourself right now.”
“No, I’m better.”
“No. You’re not. You just think you are.”
“Whatever, Ash. Maybe you’re just a coward. You had me alone for five years and never in all that time did you tell me how you really felt about me. Even when I asked you to kiss me on my sixteenth birthday, you couldn’t find the balls to kiss me like a man.”
“It wasn’t the right time,” Ash said, the excuse sounding lame.
“Just like now isn’t the right time? Aren’t you tired of using that as a cop-out? Maybe I should just tear your heart out with my bare hands and end your cowardly life.”
“Then do it, Skye, because you’re tearing my heart to pieces anyway. It’s killing me to see what she’s made you into.”
“She’s made me into a god,” I hissed. “I’ll live forever while you’ll just rot away into nothingness.”
Ash shook his head. “You know what’s sad, Skye? You were more when you were human than you are now. You had people who truly cared about you then, who really loved you and would risk their lives to protect you.”
“I have an army of Harvesters to protect me now. I don’t need you. I don’t need any of you anymore!”
“Skye,” I heard Zoe’s small voice say behind me, “you can’t mean that …”
I turned to face Zoe sitting in the wheelchair near the entrance of the room looking like the goddess of innocence. I snatched my coat off the floor and stormed up to her. Bracing my hands on each armrest of her chair, I leaned down until my face was just inches from hers. Tears fell from Zoe’s eyes as if on cue.
“Listen to me carefully,” I told her. “I’ll even say it slow so your little human mind can comprehend what I’m about to tell you. I−do−not−need−you. I−do−not−love−you. The sooner you die the happier I’ll be.”
I shoved Zoe’s chair away from me, causing it fly into the corner a few feet behind her and stormed out of the room.
I rolled my eyes as I heard Zoe begin to cry like there was no tomorrow. How someone could weep so much I had no idea. Tears were a waste of energy over empty sentiment.
“Skye …”
I looked up to the second floor landing and saw my mother standing there having obviously witnessed the altercation. A hint of a smile played across her lips.
“Could you come up here for a moment?” she asked.
In less than ten seconds I was by her side.
“Come with me,” she said, looping an arm around one of mine. “I have something I would like to show you.”
We walked to one end of the hallway and entered what appeared to be my mother’s study.
“How was your night?” she asked me, motioning for me to take a seat in a brown leather chair in front of her desk.
“It was fine,” I told her, not mentioning the time tripping events with my future self. I wasn’t sure why I was holding back such vital information but didn’t see how telling her would do anything but upset her.
“How did you like my gift? I heard you picked Grant.”
“Thank you for thinking of me. He was fine.”
“Did Grace and Mary Anne serve you well?”
“Yes,” I said hesitantly, something my mother picked right up on.
“What’s wrong? You can tell me if they did something you didn’t like.”
“It’s not that they did anything wrong,” I admitted. “It’s just that I don’t understand why you keep Grace around.”
“Oh.” My mother smiled in understanding. “You mean the s
mell?”
“Yes. How can you stand it?”
“Grace has been with me since childhood. She was one of the few people I could fully depend on. I guess I’ve just gotten used to her company.”
“Do you love her?”
My mother seemed caught off guard by the question but quickly reclaimed her composure.
“Of course not. She’s just a human.”
A silence hung in the air between us. I wasn’t sure where to take the conversation from there. Thankfully, I didn’t have to.
My mother stood from behind her desk and walked to a wall with a framed painting of a group of ballet dancers.
“Come here. I would like to share something with you.”
As I walked over, my mother touched the picture. It was instantly transformed into a map. The painting had simply been a hologram. It was similar to the old map Ash and I used during our travels, but this one didn’t include the west side of the United States. It only showed a small circular section of what was once called America, encompassing the east central part of the country.
“Is this what’s left of the world?” I asked.
“Yes. It’s all I was able to save with the shield.”
“Where is the machine that runs the shield?”
My mother looked at me and smiled. “Good question. It’s right here,” she said pointing to a town in Kentucky. You and I are the only ones who know its location now.”
“What about the people who helped you build it?”
“I killed them. I couldn’t risk anyone else knowing its whereabouts.”
“Who maintains it?”
“I left the two mechanical engineers who designed it there. They make sure things stay working.”
“Do you have a backup plan?” I asked. “Machines usually break beyond repair at some point. It won’t last forever.”
“It’ll last long enough. The natural ozone layer is slowly repairing itself, but it will take a few thousand years for it to be complete. The machine should last until that time.”
I let my eyes wander around the map noting the blue and red dots marking specific areas. There were also gold points marked, but there were only two of them.
“What do the different colored markers mean?” I asked.
“They’re all camps. The red camps manufacture energy of some sort like gas or electricity, the blues ones are the food manufacturing sites, and the gold ones mark the camps that make Harvester chips and nanites.”
Walsh had told me the camp I was in made Harvester chips and nanites. One camp was in Roanoke, Virginia and the other one was in the middle of Geneva, New York. Considering the time it took to fly to the camp, I had to be in the Roanoke camp.
“So you grew up here in Roanoke?”
“Yes. Emma and I came to live with our grandmother when we were ten years old.”
“What was she like? Your grandmother.”
“Well, she didn’t like kids,” my mother said matter-of-factly. “She mostly made Grace take care of us. She subscribed to the school of thought that children should be seen and not heard. Emma and I would usually end up in the attic playing so we didn’t disturb her.”
“Did she just ignore you?”
My mother let out a harsh laugh. “I wish she had. No, our grandmother made sure we learned the meaning of discipline. Every night before we went to bed, she would come in and whip us with a willow branch.”
“For what?”
“She said children almost always do something wicked every day and wanted to make sure we were properly chastised for it.”
“Even if she didn’t see you do anything wrong?”
“I didn’t mind the whippings that much,” my mother said, a far off look on her face like she was mentally reliving the events from her childhood.
“What did she do to you if she actually caught you doing something bad?”
“Put us in the cage.”
“What was that?”
“It was a room in the basement, not a real cage. Emma and I just called it that. The only way in or out was through a trapdoor. There aren’t any windows down there just a twelve by twelve room. She wouldn’t let us have a flashlight, saying it would make us weak to depend on something so transient.”
“How long would she keep you there?”
“Depended on what we did. If it was just talking out of turn, a few hours. One time I broke an expensive vase because Emma and I were playing chase in the house. She kept me down there for a week, only letting Grace bring me food once a day. I tended to get into trouble a lot when I was younger, but her discipline made me better, more focused.”
“Didn’t anyone try to help you?”
“Grace did.” My mother’s focus returned to me as she let go of the past. “She would sneak down at night after my grandmother went to sleep and talk to me through the trapdoor to keep me company, so I wouldn’t be so frightened. It was all she could do because my grandmother kept the key to the door on her bracelet.”
I understood better why my mother kept Grace around. Deep down, she felt a connection with Grace, whether it was gratitude or some undying loyalty I wasn’t sure. I couldn’t fault her for keeping someone who had helped her when she was defenseless to help herself.
“That helps explain why you care for her so much,” I said.
My mother looked at me like she didn’t understand why I would come to such a conclusion.
“You care for her because she cared for you when you needed it the most,” I tried to explain.
“Caring for a human isn’t logical,” my mother said, holding her head high.
As if knowing we were talking about her, Grace walked into the room pushing a silver cart through the door with a tea service, a plate of biscuits, butter, and jam.
“I thought the two of you might like a snack,” Grace said, wheeling the cart to my mother’s desk.
“Thank you, Grace.” My mother walked over to the other woman.
The stench of death hung in the air around Grace, but I tried not to let it bother me. She was, after all, my mother’s first loyal servant in what would become a world of them.
Grace smiled, pleased with her foresight in providing what my mother wanted. I supposed it would be hard to replace Grace in my mother’s eyes. The woman knew what she needed without having to ask for it. That was a rare talent in a servant.
My mother breathed in the heady aroma of freshly baked biscuits and picked up the butter knife, studying its dull edge.
With one swift motion, my mother twirled the butter knife in her hand and stabbed Grace directly in the heart. The older woman grabbed at the knife but was unable to summon the strength necessary to pull it out of her chest. She fell to her knees with one word slipping from her old cracked lips.
“Why?”
My mother towered over Grace, her expression filled with disgust.
“To prove a point to my daughter. To show her you should cut the people you once cared about out of your life because they can only be a liability in the long run. I don’t need you anymore, Grace. I’m not that child who needed you when she was locked in the basement. That person hasn’t existed for a very long time.”
The pain on Grace’s face didn’t seem to only be physical. My mother’s words appeared to be stopping her heart just as deftly as the dull blade of the butter knife.
I watched the light of Grace’s life fade as she closed her eyes. Her breathing slowed, and I could hear the beats of her heart go silent.
A glowing gossamer mist floated above Grace’s corpse, hovering there as if it were watching us. Then it quickly shot out of the room.
“What was that light?” I asked.
My mother pulled her gaze away from Grace’s body to look at me.
“Her soul,” she answered.
“I’ve watched people die before, but I’ve never seen that.”
“You weren’t a Harvester before either,” my mother said. “We see things normal humans can’t.”
�
�What will happen to my soul when I die?”
“You’re a Harvester and my daughter, Skye. You’ll never die so don’t worry about it.”
“But what if something happens that even you can’t control? What will happen to my soul?”
“I don’t know,” my mother said, looking back down at Grace’s corpse. “I’m not completely sure we still have one.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
I went to Grace’s body and studied the corpse while my mother went to get some servants to clean up the mess. Grace’s face looked younger now for some reason. Had the release of her soul unburdened her body? I was just about to walk away from her when a glint of pink caught my eye. I bent at the waist and picked up the pink heart-shaped stone peeking out of the pocket of Grace’s apron.
I stared at the rock in the palm of my hand wondering what I should do with it. When I heard the door to the study open, I quickly pushed the stone into the back pocket of the jeans I wore, deciding to worry about it later.
My mother and a female Harvester walked into the study. The Harvester quickly picked up Grace’s body and took her away. We sat down to eat the tea and biscuits like nothing had just happened. To say this seemed odd to me would be an understatement. The unexpectedness of my mother’s action and the realization that humans had souls you could actually see when they departed the host body still had me reeling.
As a child, my parents took me to church on special occasions such as Easter and Christmas. They weren’t devout Christians, but they did believe in a God and tried to pass on those teachings and values to me. When we were inside the breeding camp, it was forbidden to talk about a higher power because we weren’t supposed to believe in a deity. We were supposed to only worship our Queen. Anyone caught trying to keep the practices of the old way alive were immediately harvested. Some welcomed death as a way to show how strong their faith was and bear witness that they would not forsake their God. I once looked up to those people but now realized just how ridiculous it was to have faith in a being you couldn’t see when you had one of flesh and blood standing right in front of you. The Queen could in fact grant you immortal life as long as you spent that life worshiping her, which brought up a question I needed to ask.