“Flux storm,” I murmur. “Is it heading our way?” I feel my stomach churn with fear. What would happen if the storm were to hit us while at sea? If a Flux storm can level half a city, what can it do to one little boat?
Alastair pulls out his little rock. Holds it tightly in his fist. “Don’t think so. It will skate by us, I bet, though the ride will get choppy.”
We’re just two days from shore, or so says the crew. Two days for me to figure out the logistics of an entire voyage. And who is coming with me, a little voice says, drilling the point home. I’m still not certain what Jared will do. And while I now have a much better idea of where to head once the ship docks, thanks to Christopher E.J. Turner and the bread crumbs of the Gilt, I still don’t know where exactly Margot is.
Will that special sense of Margot flicker on again? Will I just know—will she feel closer? Margot and I have never been so far apart before. Everything about this situation is new and strange—a living, breathing experiment.
All I do know for certain is that I’ll get much farther, faster, with help.
“Are you coming with me?” And only when I’ve said it out loud do I realize I’m frightened he’ll say no.
Alastair nods and leans on the rusted iron railing. “I’m coming. Though I’ll probably regret it.” He grins ruefully at me and glances over his shoulder as a crewman with a machine gun perched on his shoulder saunters by.
I stare after the figure, perplexed. “Are we expecting company?”
Alastair looks out over the sea at the growing mass of clouds. “Desperate times, Lucy Fox,” he says mysteriously. “And we’re nearing shore.”
“What does that mean?”
But Alastair doesn’t answer. He comes to stand in front of me. He takes my shoulders in his and squeezes slightly. Then he tips my chin up until I’m staring into his fathomless brown eyes. “It’s time you told me what’s really going on.”
I pull my chin from his fingers but stand my ground. “I told you. I’m going to meet up with my family.”
Alastair studies me with a look of profound impatience. “Tell me something I don’t know.”
But what can I tell him? That I think we’ve got to follow the Gilt to wherever they’re going, certain as I can be that they’ll lead us to Margot? “My sister and I,” I tell him, swallowing deeply, “we’re different.”
“Different how.”
“Different. We can’t seem to catch Plague,” I say. “At least, that’s the theory.”
“So you’re True Born, like Jared.” Alastair shrugs as if to say, So what?
“No.”
“No?”
“I don’t think so. We don’t know for sure.”
“You don’t. Know.” Ali’s eyes practically cross with annoyance. “You’re Upper Circle. How can you not know?”
“I told you. Different,” I say, irritated. A seagull weaves overhead like a carrion bird. Close to the shore, then. Very close. Anxiety pinches at me at the thought. I need to start making plans.
“Have you seen Turner today?” I ask.
“No, he slept in, I think.”
“I need to see him.”
“Wait just a minute.” Alastair grabs my hand. “Dammit, Lucy, I’ve gone out of my way to help you and then some. Least you can do is talk to me. Tell me what we’re going to face.”
“Can’t do that,” I tell Alastair truthfully. Because I don’t have a clue.
“So what can you tell me?”
“We need to follow the miracle seekers.” I spare a glance down at the heads of the Splicers taking their constitutionals on the deck below us. “Then I think we’ll find mine.”
Alastair lifts an eyebrow. “Your sister.”
“Of course. That’s what all this is about. I’ve been telling you the truth, Ali.”
“Is she with your parents?”
“She might be,” I say carefully.
“Might she also be with someone else?”
“Might be.”
“Might this person have guns?” As my face falls, Ali barks a laugh, his dimples winking. “Oh, you’re fun. Is she anything like you?”
“She’s exactly like me,” I tell him, not bothering to explain.
Alastair chucks me under the chin with a grin. “Then she’ll be okay. And what about you and Cat Boy?” He nods in the general vicinity of below.
I shrug. “What about us?”
We’re barely speaking, Jared and me. Almost crawling out of our skins. We revolve around each other like the sun and the moon, strange and untouching objects in the same orbit. Yet he still crawls into the softly rocking bed and goes to sleep by my side every night. Sometimes, instead of getting in, he sits in the chair across from the bed for a long time before lying down beside me. I wonder what he’s thinking. I want to ask, but I can’t.
And I still want him. That gnawing, hungry need for him doesn’t seem to go away. When I wake up and his arms are curled around me, I sometimes just lean back and pretend I’m still sleeping so I don’t have to pull away. I’ve wondered more than once if he’s pretending, too.
The wind from the Flux storm picks up so I almost miss Ali’s next words. “Just waiting…pick up…pieces.” I hear him in chunks.
“What? Ali, the storm,” I say, pointing to the gigantic funnel cloud that swoops out of the sky unexpectedly.
“Do…worry!” Ali yells in my ear and drags me down the stairs.
At the bottom, we spy Jared, one ear plugged with a finger. And with the other, he talks into his mobile.
“Maybe another thirty-six hours. No. No, that’s the wrong way to play it,” we overhear.
Ali tugs on the sleeve of my sweater, trying to lead me away, but when I refuse to budge, he just sighs and lets me eavesdrop.
“Listen. You can’t ask her to turn back now. She’ll just run away again… Well, next time, I might not be able to track her.” Then, after a pause, “No, that’s not a threat. Listen.”
But the storm takes over and sets upon the world with howling claws that slash through our clothing like tiny knives. Jared turns. And freezes. His face is a granite mask, giving away nothing. And I do the only thing I can do.
I turn and flee.
14
Three hours later, I’m packing my clothes. I’ve been unable to think straight with the wind howling and Jared’s face in my mind. The old-timey cabin phone shrills, startling me. I pick it up.
“Yes?”
“Miss Fox.” Marcus’s gruff baritone fills the line. “Chris is asking for you. He’s taken a turn.”
“Oh. Do you—er—want me to come?”
“Please. I wouldn’t ask, but…”
There’s no need to say it. We all become both colder and kinder with the approach of death. “I’m on my way.”
The cabin is dark when I arrive, curtains drawn. Turner is in his bed, curled up on his side. His sickness tugs at me the way it sometimes does with a fresh corpse. Like a nagging toothache or shattered nerves, nails on a chalkboard.
“Christopher,” I say, moving slowly over to the bed. The closer I get, the more I feel it, as though something in the malignant cells is tuned to me.
Marcus stands on the other side of the bed. His hands are empty, clenching and unclenching as though unsure what to do.
“Pull the curtains, please, Marcus,” I tell him gently. “We need some light in here.”
Turner winces as the frosty light flickers through the room. He rolls over to avoid the light, bringing me face-to-face with him. A pink rash leaves blotches across his wan features. He dozes on.
“Did you call Alastair or Jared?”
Marcus shakes his head. But it’s Turner who places thin, cool fingers over mine. “Not them. Only you.”
“There you are,” I say as cheerfully as I can muster. “I reckon we’re almost to shore.” I’m overwhelmed by the desire to pull my fingers from Turner’s. But it’s the least I can do for a dead man. He’ll not be able to hurt me now.
He gives me something between a cackle and a cough. Marcus helps him sit up as I hand him a glass of water with a straw. He’s lost so much weight since just yesterday.
“What’s the matter, Lucy?” he asks once he’s sipped.
Deep lines of exhaustion have sunken his face. The navy blue of his eyes seems shrouded in the mist of pre-death. “I don’t like to see you like this,” I tell him honestly.
“Nor me. So close,” he says almost under his breath. “I was so close.” Then, he glances over at Marcus.
“You might still make it,” Marcus lies.
Turner sits up a little higher. He’s not even dressed today. Just lounges in a pristine white undershirt that shows the bony nubs of his ribs, arms covered in a loose white robe. With a chuckle, he says, “Don’t let anybody tell you it doesn’t hurt.”
There are new threads of gray and white in his shoulder-length hair, in his eyebrows, thick and wiry. They say the hair continues to grow, even after. It’s the one thing the Plague doesn’t put a halt to.
“Remember what we were talking about, Lucy?” I’m shaken from my thoughts. “Evolve or die.” His free hand twirls in the air, punctuating the absurdity of the phrase.
“Yes.” My fingers curl.
“You asked me if I knew who’s behind it.” I nod. “I don’t,” he tells me quietly. I suck in a pained breath, hating myself for being disappointed. Turner squeezes my knuckles. “It’s odd that I don’t. My set deals in information as much as money. But I have some theories I thought you might like to hear.”
“You probably shouldn’t be talking so much,” I say, wanting to pull back. But Turner just laughs and grips me tighter.
“Save my breath for what—death? What’s the point? Listen here, Miss Fox. Let’s say for the sake of argument that this new catchphrase, all the rage in Dominion, is the works of Lasters. Many of whom are under the sway of the preachers. Tracking me so far?”
“Yes.” I nod, picturing Father Wes, gone underground, and all the tiny ribbons and things sewn onto the tree in Heaven Square. “I think so.”
“Evolve. Or die. What do you think happens when we’re Spliced, Lucy?”
I sit up straighter, unsure where this is going. “The patch genes are hardwired to our DNA. Genes without their Plague switches thrown.”
“Good girl.” He pats my hand again, though I can tell he’s growing weaker. “Someone has been paying attention in Genomics class.”
Little does he know. Girls who have been put through as many Protocols as Margot and I have can’t afford to be ignorant. Girls who have secrets locked away in their bodies, bodies like a lock and its key.
“So why would a Splice fail, then?” he asks.
“When the native genes resist and overcome the newly introduced genes. It’s like a hyperimmune response.”
Turner nods weakly. “Did you know? A bunch of the people you met at the Mulhollands’—they’re all going to seek the new cure. Word around the Gilt has it that this is a special new kind of cure. Overcomes even the most resistant strains of Plague. And best still…you don’t need to be Spliced.”
What? My mind swims with all that Turner is suggesting. “And you think our—my”—I catch myself—“father is behind it.”
“I am aware your father has a business partner in Russia. Bit of a dark horse. But certainly someone to pay attention to.”
Turner coughs, which turns into a long hack. Marcus leans down and pats his back while Turner tries to get himself under control. The dying man takes a sip of water from the cup in my hands before continuing. “Lucinda Fox,” he says with a sweet smile. He brings his hand to my face, and I struggle to suppress the chills crawling down my spine. Brushing my cheek with papery fingers, he continues. “You’d make a good nurse. If things weren’t turning out this way, I’d want to take the time to get to know you better. I’d make you mine.”
The hand falls, heavy and limp. I stare at it, the skin almost the same shade as the white sheets. I look back into Turner’s face. His navy eyes are still open. Open but unseeing. A small smile still lingers on his lips. But I can see even now the skin around his jaw relaxing, the pallor of death as it crawls over him.
I scramble off the bed. “Marcus,” I call. I press myself against the wall, feeling nauseated, but I can’t figure out if it’s from a man dying in front of me, the way he touched me, or the sudden pitch of the boat. Flux storm coming, I remind myself.
Marcus leans over his former employer. He gently pulls the lids down over those navy eyes and sighs. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I did what I could to keep him from you.”
I’m shocked by Marcus’s matter-of-fact explanation. And then suddenly the enormity of death stuffs the room. Everything, from the china figurines down to the gold boxes, looks as it should: a proper mausoleum. The relentless tug of illness that I feel around the catching-sick halts abruptly. I breathe deeper, as though the room has suddenly flooded with oxygen. When something wet falls on my arms, folded across my middle, I reach up and realize it’s my own tears.
“I’m sorry.” They’re the only words I have. I’m not sure they’re for the man or the merc he leaves behind. I stumble over to the door and am out into the eerie brightness of the deck before I hear Marcus call me back.
“Wait. Miss Fox—Lucy.” I stop and let him catch up to me. “We’ll be docking soon. I know he wasn’t the best of men.” Marcus looks up at the heaving sky. He hands me a crisp white envelope with my name scrawled on the front.
I look at the merc. His shoulders are hunched. I wonder what his life will be like now that his employer is gone. “What will you do?”
Marcus smiles, but it doesn’t reach the ice of his eyes. “I’ll take him home. He left me everything, you know. Everything save what I’m giving you, in there.” He nods to the envelope. “Go ahead, take a peek.”
I fold the envelope open. Inside are three printed billets for a first-class train, along with a map. Europe is stitched in red where it joins with Russia. A large red bull’s-eye marks a town just across the border.
“What is this?” I ask.
Marcus nods. “Your inheritance.”
I meet Marcus’s uncanny gaze. His lips twitch with something I’d as soon not call humor. “Thank you,” I finally manage to say.
Marcus nods and flips his shades down over his eyes. “You’re welcome.” The words come out frosty, but his next are softer. “I hope you find what you’re looking for.”
“You’re Gilt now, huh?” Somehow it seems fitting that what must be one of the largest fortunes in the world is going to a caregiving merc. “You going to buy shares in this miracle cure?” I almost don’t recognize the cynical edge in my voice.
But if Marcus is offended by my question, he doesn’t show it. He squares his shoulders, hunching them against the howling wind. “I’m going back to Dominion. And I’m going to build a hospice for mercs.”
It makes me feel better that I believe him.
15
The train car sways violently as it hits a bump. I come off the seat a fraction, sitting down hard enough to feel my teeth clamp. It’s an old train. The beige leather seats are cracked and blistering. The car smells of mildew and dust, and the windowpanes are streaked with dirt. Down the aisles run carpets that in places have kept their diamond patterns. In others, they’ve become frayed and gummy with age. I shiver with a cold that hasn’t left my bones since the ship docked at the small port town in the area formerly known as Greece.
Ghost yards. That’s what they call them. Places where the dead pile so high there’s little more to be done but to bury the town. Though I could smell nothing but sea air, everywhere we walked I spied the black dresses of old fishwives standing in doorways, eyes rheumy and tired of weeping. There were no children, none that I saw. But I heard the braying of dogs, probably wild packs, a hungry sound that set the hair on my neck on edge. Around the small, dilapidated town ran barbed-wire fences. Probably to keep the dogs at bay.
Once they start eating flesh they don’t stop, they say.
Then we were on the train, courtesy of the late Christopher E.J. Turner. We sat in a berth reserved for funerals, though the place where the coffin would ride was empty. Not another soul rides in this car. The conductor has assured us, in his stumbling English, that we’ll reach the border by nightfall. Add another day’s journey and we’ll be mid-distance to the small town printed on Turner’s faded tickets.
“You need to eat something.” Ali nudges me and holds out a sandwich. He bought it off an old woman weaving through the cars with a straw basket of goods. It smells like moldy socks, bad enough for me to lose my already nonexistent appetite.
“No, thank you,” I say in my best socialite voice. “I’m not hungry.”
“What’s the matter—you Upper Circle girls too good for train fare? I don’t think it’s dog or anything.” Ali gives me a lopsided grin and unfolds a corner of the sandwich to sniff at his mystery meat. He takes a bite. “Mmm. Tastes like chicken,” he says cheerfully.
I smile, but it doesn’t reach my eyes. “Maybe later.”
I turn my head and pretend to watch the darkling view zoom by, avoiding looking at Jared as much as possible. He’s here, I remind myself. Isn’t that enough for now? I try to be happy about it, but the words from Jared’s shipboard call endlessly loop through my brain. That’s the wrong way to play it.
I assume the person on the other end was Nolan Storm. Jared was fighting not to turn me back to Dominion. I want to be grateful. But the words are stuck in my head. Am I something to be played?
“Why would they be in this place again?” Alastair mumbles through a mouthful of bread and meat I’m certain can’t be very good.
I shrug. “Turner knew things.”
“Yeah, but he went to his grave with those things.” Ali munches.
I briefly meet Jared’s eyes. We’ve not passed a single word since leaving the ship. My legs wobbled on the dry dock, and he grabbed my arm, helping me walk until I could get my land legs under me. Other than that, he’s not laid a finger on me.
Nor said why he’s defying Storm to help Margot and me.
True North Page 15