The Duality Bridge (Singularity #2) (Singularity Series)

by Susan Kaye Quinn

  “There’s another one, Nat!”

  I hear Kamali gasp over the comm. Nathaniel’s grip on me becomes painfully tight, and he swings his gun off his shoulder. He lays the side of the barrel against my cheek, and the cold steel rivets me in place. But he’s not looking at me—he’s scanning the ferns like there might be a hundred cloaked assassins waiting for him.

  He leans down to hiss in my face. “We don’t much care for liars, either, Elijah.”

  My hands are back up. “I wasn’t lying.”

  Jacob stomps out of the ferns, hauling Kamali with him. She’s still cloaked, so I can’t see her face, but I don’t have to. His gun is jammed into her chest or possibly pointed at her head—I can’t tell because it disappears before it reaches her.

  “Let her go!” I yell in Nathaniel’s face.

  He looks at me anew, but his voice is still filled with menace. “Tell her to turn off the devil’s tech.”

  I swing to look at her. “Kamali, just do what they say.”

  It takes a moment, but she flickers into existence. Jacob has her by the arm, his long gun digging into her side.

  Nathaniel looks back and forth between us. “The two of you were running away.”

  I can’t decide which lie I should tell.

  “He was just trying to protect me,” Kamali says. “You can’t hold that against him.”

  Nathaniel looks surprised and a little amused by her words but doesn’t respond, just gives me a cold look. “Son, looks like we found you just in time.”

  I have no idea what he means by this, so I keep my mouth shut.

  He lifts his chin to Jacob. “Take their helmets. That way if they decide they want to run back to their soulless keepers, we’ll have a clean shot at the head.”

  Jacob moves to pull Kamali’s helmet off, but she manages to evade him and take it off herself. She shoves it at him. He glares at her, then sends the helmet sailing off into the forest. I hand mine to Nathaniel. He lobs it out of sight as well.

  His glare gets a little friendlier. “It’s a good thing we stumbled across you and your girl today. I think the Good Lord put us in the right place at the right time to give you just the help you need.”

  Kamali’s eyes couldn’t be any more round and scared, but I don’t see much choice for us at this point. Given they have the guns, and we don’t.

  “We’d appreciate any help you have to give,” I say.

  Nathaniel smiles, and while it’s warmer, I still get a chill from it. Then he gestures us back toward the stream, and we fall into step with them. Prisoners. Nathaniel’s my keeper, and Jacob stays close to Kamali.

  The march is long and hard, and takes at least two hours, maybe three. We must have slept for several hours—the sun is already on its way back down. I’m guessing it’s late afternoon. Kamali’s limping a little. Not too badly, and it seems to get better over time, but it still makes me angry. We follow the stream deeper into the mountains, away from the Resistance’s basecamp, then up into the forest again. We don’t climb too high in elevation, but looking back toward the camp, I can see what drew Nathaniel and Jacob our way. The plume of the billowing smoke is gone, but the haze of it lies in the valley like a shroud on a corpse. The ascenders’ transport has disappeared, along with any visible flames, but at this distance, I can’t tell if there are sentries still there.

  Along the way, we startle a couple birds from some trees. Jacob shoots them, which leaves me open-mouthed. He ties the bloody carcasses to his belt—I have a feeling that’s dinner. There’s no talking. Kamali keeps throwing me fearful glances when the men aren’t looking, but they don’t let us get close enough to talk. It’s like they’re not just trying to keep us from running, but also keeping us apart physically. Do they think we’re going to try to escape? They must know we can’t activate our invisibility suits without the helmets.

  When we reach the “community” Nathaniel spoke of, it’s bigger than I expect. Hundreds of feet wide and extending back through the trees even deeper, it’s a village carved out of the forest. A twelve-foot wooden wall surrounds it—raw tree trunks, bark and all, bound together and sharpened to massive spikes on top. We cross a short, wooden bridge over a wide ditch that surrounds the compound. Two men armed with the same kind of long-barreled gun that Nathaniel and Jacob have stand guard at the gate. They’re younger, maybe twenties—beards must be the fashion here because everyone has them. The guards stare at me and even longer at Kamali. Nathaniel barks an order, and they hustle to wind an enormous crank to open the doors.

  Inside are two long rows of squat, rectangular buildings. They’re like barracks, only made of wood, not canvas. A dozen of them stretch down each side. Nathaniel leads us along the center toward an open area a few hundred feet away. A stage sits dead center in the courtyard with a large wooden block on top and another cluster of buildings behind.

  As we pass the barracks, small figures move between them: children. Tons of them. Really small, too, some barely old enough to walk. They seem to be split up, with girls on the right side and boys on the left. When they see us, they run off, holding the hands of the littlest ones to drag them along, out of sight. There are no adults, at least outside, until we get about halfway down, then a few adult-sized figures emerge from the boys’ side. They’re dressed in heavy brown robes with hoods that shade their faces. When they see us, they flee back inside their barracks, just like the children.

  I glance to Kamali behind me: her expression is carefully neutral, but I can tell she’s as freaked out by this as I am. My attention is ripped forward by the sound of someone yelling incoherently. The doors of one of the far buildings have flung open, and two figures in brown robes are hauling a third between them, toward the stage. A fourth follows behind. We’re far enough away, almost a hundred feet still, that I can’t quite make out what the fourth one’s carrying… but it’s long and glints in the afternoon sun.

  I shoot a look to Nathaniel, who seems unfazed. “What’s going on?” I ask.

  He keeps his gaze straight ahead as we march closer. “It’s not easy surviving here in God’s country,” he says gravely. “We don’t have much and each needs to pull his own weight. We don’t care for those who take more than their share.”

  “So that guy…” I gesture with my chin to the man being dragged, kicking and screaming, to the stage. “He stole something?” A chill runs down my back as the man begs, pleading for them to stop whatever punishment they’re about to enact, but they just haul him up on the stage and toward the block.

  “Zachariah knew it was a sin to take more than his meal allotment,” Nathaniel says coolly. “The council of elders lives in God’s perfection, and their prayerful judgment is always just. And merciful.”

  The man’s hood falls back as he struggles. He’s young—not much older than me, but with coarse brown hair and a scraggly beard.

  “Zachariah should be thankful the council is saving him from his sin, allowing him to pay for it in this life, so he doesn’t have to spend an eternity trying to absolve a debt he never can.”

  Zachariah does not look thankful. My stomach churns as they pin him to the block, one robed figure holding him from behind, the other stretching his arm across the block. I gag as I realize the long, metallic thing is a sword. A very large sword with a curved blade and a tip that glints as it’s raised.

  I don’t look away soon enough.

  The blade flashes and thunks on the block. Zachariah screams. His severed hand tumbles away from his body. Kamali makes a choking sound behind me. The man’s pain echoes across the compound, which is absolutely empty of movement.

  “They took his hand,” I mumble, choking on the words.

  Nathaniel nods. We’re close enough now to see the blood gushing across the block and the hand lying on the ground where it rolled to a stop. The man’s screams are now moans, but the others haven’t released him. The sides of the block are blackened by dozens of other long-dried stains.

  Nathaniel slows, a
s if he wants us to see the full horror of it. The robed figure with the blade sets it down and pulls something else from inside the thick, brown folds of his cloak. I look away and try to catch Kamali’s eye, but she’s staring at the ground. Her whole body is shaking. Nathaniel’s hand on my shoulder turns me back to the spectacle.

  “Set your gaze on this, son,” he says, quietly. “You should see the care the council takes to prepare each of us for our time in eternity. They want every one of us to reach that state with purity and righteousness.”

  The others are bent over Zachariah’s stump, working at… something. I can’t really see, but his moans arch up to screams again. The sound slices like the punisher’s curved blade through my chest, again and again. Nathaniel’s hand holds me in place, forcing me to watch. Finally, they’re done, and all three of the community’s enforcers back away from Zachariah. He now has a mechanical hand. Metallic, articulated with fingers and a thumb, but it’s not like the ascenders’ bodyform hands. Theirs are beautiful and otherworldly while still human-like. This… this is some kind of monstrous thing, black and silver and ugly. But obviously functional—the fingers flex as the man stares at his new hand and sobs. It doesn’t look like ascender tech, but that fact that it can attach and function so quickly means somehow this crazy cult has med tech as advanced as anything in the Resistance med bay.

  “Zachariah will carry the devil’s tech with him now, every day.” Nathaniel says this like it’s a blessing, not a horror. “He’ll see the reminder in every moment of his time on earth, and he’ll always know the price of sin. But he’s free of it now. When he ascends into heaven, he will be made whole, and his sin, the flesh that failed to be purified, will remain forever on earth. A true blessing.”

  I don’t even have words for the horror of this. Nathaniel is insane. All of this is. I glance back to Kamali. Her eyes are glazed, and she’s staring at me, but I don’t think she sees me. I wish she could see the promise in my eyes that I will get us out of this freak show.

  I look back to Nathaniel, who is studying my face with cool dispassion. “I…” My voice cracks, and I have to swallow down the dryness. “We don’t know all the rules here.” I hope that will buy us some time.

  Nathaniel nods gravely. “We understand that, son. You’re a lost lamb, who was in grave danger of sin, but God led us to you because he wanted you to be saved. Which is why your education will have to start immediately.” He glances at Jacob and tips his head toward the barracks.

  Jacob latches onto Kamali’s arm and starts dragging her away.

  Alarm electrifies my body.

  “Eli!” Kamali’s voice is pure terror. She struggles, but Jacob is far too strong.

  “Where are you taking her?” I demand of Nathaniel.

  “She’ll be with the women, of course,” he says calmly. “Until you two can be properly wed in the eyes of the Lord, it’s best you don’t spend any more time together. I’m sure you had the best intentions, Elijah, bringing her out of that soulless camp, but there’s no sense in giving the devil any help with his wickedness.”

  This is so messed up, my mind is reeling. “Don’t hurt her,” I beg. “Please.”

  Nathaniel frowns. “Don’t worry about your girl, Elijah. The women of the Cleansed will tend to her needs. And she’ll get her training, too, so she’ll make a good wife for you.”

  The Cleansed? Training to be my wife? The vise on my chest couldn’t be any tighter.

  What have I gotten us into?

  Nathaniel gives me a brown woolen robe, some kind of mush in a bowl, and a cell.

  The cell appears to be an austere bedroom—the rough mattress on the bed feels like it’s stuffed with straw, and a woven rug covering a small spot on the floor looks handmade. There are no windows, just a storage trunk with another brown robe inside and a wash bin on top. An empty pot that I’m afraid is my toilet sits in the corner. But as far as I can tell, it’s really a prison cell, just like all the others Nathaniel and I passed down the long hallway outside my door. Those all had locks… on the outside. I didn’t see anyone on the way in—half the doors were closed, and the rest of the rooms appeared identical to this one, except empty.

  Nathaniel told me to put on the robe and pray for guidance.

  When he left, I tossed the brown robe to the floor and checked the door: locked. Then I wolfed down the mush, which tasted like a nutty onion of some kind, but I didn’t care, because I was starving. I hope whoever has Kamali is feeding her too. When I set the empty bowl aside and wipe my mouth, I have nothing left to do but think.

  What an unbelievable mess.

  Whatever training Nathaniel has in mind for me, as long as I don’t steal anything, I might get through it with all my parts intact. The question is how to get both Kamali and me out of this insane religious cult. I’ve heard of places like this, and I know we won’t last two days. I’m sure the horror show we saw on the way in is just the beginning of what goes on inside these walls. I don’t know what awaits us back at the Resistance camp—there may be no hope there either—but I will take my chances with starving on the Oregon prairie over whatever punishments the council of the Cleansed decide we need.

  A full-body shudder raises the hairs on the back of my neck.

  I scoop the robe back off the floor. The only way out is pretending I’m willing to sign up for their brand of crazy, then taking the chance to run when it appears. And somehow getting Kamali out as well. Nathaniel seems to want to marry us—like immediately—which completely spins my brain, but I might be able to work with that. It would all be a ruse, of course, but the sooner Kamali and I are together again, the better.

  As I lift the robe over my head, the motion jars loose the drawing pad tucked in the back of my invisibility suit pants, and the pad falls to the floor. The paper is crumpled and warped from sleeping on it, and I’d almost forgotten it was there. The half-drawn picture of Kamali peeks out. I pick up the pad, fumble the charcoal pencil out of my pants pocket, and take a seat on the bed while I draw.

  It doesn’t take long to finish. Her image pulls emotion out of me, even though I’m the one who created it. No, that’s not right: Kamali created the art, I just put it down on paper. I touch her face, smudging the lines a little to add a shadow that wasn’t there, in the brilliant sun, just this morning. I make a silent vow to recreate that scene someday. For both of us.

  I close the pad and hide it again, tucking it securely in the back of my shorts, under my tanktop and jacket. Then I slide on the robe. I’m supposed to be praying, so I get on my knees on the rug and clasp my hands together, the way I’ve seen my mom do, with her statues of dying saints in the corner of her bedroom back in Seattle.

  I wait.

  I have no idea when Nathaniel’s coming back. After a minute, I realize this maybe isn’t the best plan, but I stick it out, using the time to think of ways to get out of the compound. I’ll need a weapon of some kind to threaten the guards at the gate. I might have to fight them, which means I need a really good weapon because the men here all seem to have muscles built on manual labor and hard living. The curved blade from the stage might work although I have no idea how to wield it. And they’ve got guns—maybe I could steal one—but I’ve never fired a weapon of any kind in my life. I’m just going to have to be alert, see what comes my way.

  My knees start to ache, and my arms grow tired. I grit my teeth and stay in the kneeling position. I need to make a good impression on Nathaniel if any of this is going to work. I take a deep breath and let it out slow. The Dalai Lama and his meditation chant swim up from my memories. The last thing I want is to go into a fugue, but the Om Mani Padme Hum song draws my mind to its simplicity. As the words repeat on a loop in my head, the aches of the prayer position seem to fade. I think about the camp and everything that might have been destroyed by the ascenders… then I draw in a deeper breath and try to focus on the chant, not the memories, not the people I may have already lost…

  Something shifts. I’m sti
ll in the same room, on the same rug, hands clasped, but the walls are brighter and the corners darker. This is the fugue state, I’m sure of it. A man steps from behind me, nearly brushing me. He doesn’t seem to know I’m here. He kneels at the trunk, bent over, hands clasped. He’s sobbing.

  “I tried, Lord. I tried,” he mumbles into his hands. “But the devil won’t leave me alone. I keep falling, keep sinning against you. The council says it’s this or banishment, and I know I’ll never make it on my own. I can’t even keep from sinning here in your perfect haven, Lord. How could I stay pure outside these walls? I know this is the only way, the only chance I have left, but I’m afraid. So afraid.”

  Two men burst into my room, which I realize is our room, only somehow different. Shifted in time. Or possibly space because the rooms all look the same. But there’s an unstoppability to this, a feeling like this has already happened, and I’m only an observer. The two men grab the kneeling man and lay him face down on the floor. He doesn’t resist. His tears surge, one after another, flowing down his face. One of the men holds him while the other waves a wand of some kind over his scalp. The ragged brown strands of his hair slide in patches along his tear-streaked face. When his head is shaven, the man holding him down produces another wand, this one gleaming with blue light at the tip. He takes a small tech chip, bristling with a hundred hair-like wires, from inside his robe. The wand lifts it from his palm with an unseen force. I watch, hands still clasped, as he presses the wand to the base of the shaved man’s skull.

  His screams wash over me as blood runs down his neck—

  “Elijah!” A rough shake and the sound of my name snap me out of the fugue. Nathaniel has me by the shoulders, with a grip so hard it’s painful. I blink up at him, still dazed. But I’m not shaky with any of the backlash that usually—but not always—seems to accompany the fugue. “Son, are you all right?”