The sentries stare at each other, obviously unsure. Jared taps one booted foot on the ground, drawing the sentries’ eyes. It’s an explosion of force, so fast I barely catch it—the gun butting first one head, then the other. They both go down in a heap, where Jared stares at them for a moment.
“The boots were a dead giveaway,” he says, stepping over them and unlocking the gate. “After you, ladies,” he says.
We walk the streets silently, Margot and I clasping hands. No one stops us. Those who cross our path lower their eyes or move across the road. It might have to do with the bloodstains all over Jared. Or the dark, murderous look on his face.
We’re only a third of the way to Cilia and Tom’s when we turn a corner and a rock flips through the air, catching our attention. The lean form lounging against the wall leaps forward and catches it.
Margot stumbles. The dark-haired man grins and catches her elbow.
“I see you found your sister,” Alastair throws out conversationally.
“Where have you been?” I nearly yell.
Alastair eyeballs us, his eyes raking over Jared. “Missing all the fun, it seems. Though I don’t think we’ll have long before there’s more.” He motions to the Elephant, now with a fine sheet of fire and smoke rising from its back. “Come on,” he says, “we can’t go back now. I have a boat lined up. I think you’ll like this one,” Ali says, offering his arm to Margot like a gentleman.
Margot taps her cheek twice. Where did you find this one?
I tug a lock of her hair. Later, it promises.
Just then the Elephant booms, balls of fire careening from its roof like streaking comets, turning the world into a black, white, and red nightmare.
24
It took more than two weeks to make our way back to Dominion. Two weeks of Margot looking over her shoulder. It was only once we were safely on board the hulking cruise ship—this time the S. S. Liberty, taking its moniker from a long-ago name for Dominion—that the endless, stuttering conversations between my twin and I finally began.
“I don’t want to tell you,” she repeated, as though keeping silent would protect her from the bad dreams that had her sitting up and screaming night after night.
“No matter what,” I reminded her. That has always been our pledge to each other. Lock and key.
“What did the doctor tell you?” I ask one night as I brushed Margot’s hair.
“About us? He said we were made. We’re Splicer babies.” Her laugh was hollow. “Though what I don’t get is what happened. He kept saying it had a mind and will of its own. They think the experiment failed, you know…whatever it was they were doing with us.”
What are we?
“What of the babies?”
The moment I say it, I know she can’t bear to speak of it. Her heart beats in my throat like a terrified bird’s. She stills my hand on her hair.
“I—I can’t.”
“It’s not your fault,” I whisper, though she knows it already. I change the subject as quick as I can. I scrub at my mouth with the back of my hand. “Gods, I can’t believe Resnikov kissed me.”
Margot giggles. Still, there’s something off about her reaction. The cord between us, that knowing, grows taut and strange. What did he do to her?
“Do you think we’ll ever be free of them?” She sighs and sinks down on one elbow, watching me with bright eyes.
“Who—our parents? I’m not even sure we’ll ever see them again. Are you?” I don’t have the heart to ask whether she thinks they’ve all been destroyed, those Specials. There will be time enough for me to pry the story out of her.
Margot surprises me with her ferocity as she snarls back, “It’s the one thing I’m certain of. They’ll come for their investment.”
And what investment was that? We know only that they wanted to make money. Like as not, we’ve been seeded with some sort of snake-oil cure. Like nano. I recall the way our blood seemed to call to each other. Was that part of it—part of our parents’ master game? Only time will tell—time, and Doc Raines’s lab. I decide not to press Margot. She needs to learn to trust others again, to open up at her own pace. It’s not something that can be forced.
Through the long nights on the ship, I put together the pieces of the puzzle that I do know: the nanotechnology of the magic bombs. How our own blood behaves at the nanoscale. I tell her of my social outings with Storm, the sweaty ugliness of Theodore Nash.
I say nothing of Jared and our tacit understanding.
And I tell her of Ali. “Have you seen that stupid pet rock of his? He’d rather carry that around than a spare change of underwear.” I laugh.
“Don’t mock him, Lu,” Margot tells me seriously. “There’s something different about him. Can’t you see it?”
I roll my eyes. There was plenty that was different about my new friend, though I’d not be so rude to put a name to it. And for some reason, unknown even to myself, I don’t mention Ali’s odd sleight-of-hand that has me wondering whether I’m seeing strange.
“Sit down, Lucy,” Storm commands, his eyes gray as a sea.
It’s a useless command. Now that I am once again surrounded by luxury and safety, I find I can’t relax—not while, outside Storm’s walls, people are falling like dominos.
Margot is already seated, back straight as a rod. Face still and anxious. She hasn’t been herself since we fled Russia. I can feel her scars, heavy and deep, even if I can’t see them. Storm leans himself against the broad oak desk in the room he uses as his office, arms crossed, and stares at us both. I’m distracted by his reflection, the horns rising majestically from his skull, more visible to me in the glass than the shimmer of air that seems to fold over him.
I tuck in beside my sister on the white leather couch. Pick at a scab on my knee I didn’t know was there.
Storm gathers himself. “I told you we were going to discuss your future. And yours, Margot, now that you’re here.” Margot nods, her eyes as round as saucers. “I think you might have gotten the wrong idea about me being your guardian before,” Storm says to me now. “It’s not optional. I don’t make idle threats. And I don’t let my charges run off and do anything they wish.” He raises an eyebrow now to Jared, who leans against the opposite wall beside the door and scowls. The room is so quiet that the clock can be heard, ticking over Storm’s head.
“I won’t get married,” I blurt out.
But instead of being angry, Storm just shoves his hands in his finely tailored trouser pockets and uncrosses his feet. “Why do you think I want you to get married?” His chiseled jaw catches the watery light, obscuring his features.
“I heard you, Storm.”
A beat of silence. Then: “You heard, but you didn’t understand. I’m going to say lots of things I don’t mean in public. I’m going to do so because I need information, and I need leverage. And you two are the perfect levers.”
“So you’re going to use us, then?” Margot blurts out bitterly, then claps a hand over her mouth. “S-ry,” she mumbles through her fingers.
But Storm just smiles. “No, Margot. We’re going to help each other. You must have a lot of questions about yourselves. I think we can take a stab at answering some of those. More importantly, before anyone thinks of getting married, there’s something else you two need to do.”
Margot and I stare at each other, our faces identical masks of puzzlement.
“I think it’s time you two went back and finished school,” he says with a slow, sweet smile.
It’s after midnight when I wake, knowing my room has been invaded. My dreams had been filled with blood. Blood covering my eyes, obscuring my view. Blood turning me numb.
When I feel wet across my cheek, I brush my skin, thinking I’ll see red. A light clicks on. Jared stands at the door.
“Must have been a bad one.”
I take a few ragged breaths. “You didn’t wake me.”
Jared tilts his head and stares at me as though I’d spoken birdsong. He languidly cro
sses the room before sitting beside me on the bed. He’s in sweats and a plain long-sleeved shirt, the buttons at the neck open to expose his skin. I wonder what he was doing before coming in, whether he was coming to check on me or had been walking by and heard me.
His voice is raspy, as though he’s been yelling for days, rather than quiet and withdrawn as he has been. “I never know. I know, but I mean…I never know if I should wake you.” He means the Seeing dreams. Somehow he knows.
One hand raises as though to stroke my hair. He stops, lets it drop. My eyes finally adjust enough that I can see the pained look in his blue eyes. The dark shadows beneath, the hollowing planes of his cheeks.
We stare at each other for what seems like an eternity. Until I can’t stand it anymore. I can’t do this. I panic. It hurts to keep my distance from him. It hurts me more knowing he can and will.
“Well, I reckon we don’t have anything further to discuss, then, do we?” I shoo him with my hands. “Time to go now.”
“No. Wait.” Jared stares at me in open-mouthed surprise. “I…”
“What?” My eyebrow cocks up in a perfect imitation of his own.
A shock of blond hair falls over one of his eyes. He looks down, maybe only just realizing he’s taken my hand.
“I don’t understand it myself.” His voice softens to velvet. He leans closer, his breath now a warm breeze against my lips.
“Oh?” I say again, pulling back.
“This is what I’ve figured out. When you’re with me, I know you’re safe. So you need to stay with me.”
A pause while I consider. “I won’t let you be just my bodyguard.”
“Well, we’ll have to negotiate that.”
I narrow my eyes at the True Born. We’ll see about that. “And what about if I go off to school? Or when I get married? You were worried about that before.” I swallow and lick my lips. Jared’s eyes light in fascination, watching my every movement.
“Well,” he says, seconds before his lips touch mine, a butterfly kiss that sends electricity ricocheting through my body. “I’m more worried about you getting through a school year. We’ll have to see about the rest.”
His lips come down a second time, claiming my mouth fully. My belly dips as blood roars through my veins.
He pulls back. Jared’s eyes glitter green, and his magnificent chest heaves under the thin white material of his shirt. “We still can’t tell Storm. Not if you want me to remain alive. I can’t be here all night,” he tells me in a panic-edged voice.
“So go.” I push him away. Jared stays where he is.
“Storm told me you and Margot are going through Protocols tomorrow.”
“Yes.”
“We’ll get to the bottom of whatever’s going on, Lu.”
“Maybe.” It comes out like a squeak. I’d rather be electrocuted than have Margot and I go through Protocols, as Jared is well aware. But there’s no other way we can solve the mystery of what they’ve seeded in our blood…or what it is our parents and Resnikov hoped to use it for. And why now, when they’d had eighteen years to use us like blood cattle… Had something woken in our blood just prior to our Reveal? The thoughts swirl round and round in my brain, keeping me wakeful. All told, we left Russia with more questions than answers.
Jared still makes no move to leave.
“Well?”
“I can stay here for a little while longer. If you like,” he tells me after a long beat. “Until you fall asleep.”
“Okay,” I say, oddly soothed. “I’d like that.”
The nightmares had been recurring all night. And each time, just before the blood flowed, I saw the terrible face of Father Wes.
Jared leaps over and tucks me against him. He’s warm and solid, spicy and hot. Immediately I feel sleep steal over me. “You know you’ll fall asleep and wake up with a crick in your neck,” I tell him as his hands thread through my hair.
Dominion is still quiet, though I’m told the Watchers continue to scurry around in the dark, planning gods know what. But, right here and now, there is Jared. Jared and me.
“Yeah, probably.” I can hear the smile in my True Born’s voice. “Go to sleep, Princess. I’ve got you.”
And so I do.
Acknowledgments
It bears repeating that books are born into the world only through the efforts of a community. A very special thanks is owed to my editor, Liz Pelletier, who through this series has taught me so much—not just about writing better books, but about what lies at the heart of this story. I want to give a “group hug” to the entire Entangled team, in particular: Heather Riccio for keeping track of me, Melissa Montovani for her awesome support, and Stacy Abrams, whose keen editing has made this book so much better. You have been so supportive, kind, and friendly—thank you. I also want to thank my agent, Robert Lecker, who has been an incredible pillar of support (I’m so relieved that I’m turning out to be a good investment!). A special thank-you to Fernanda Viveiros and the rest of the Raincoast Books team for being my Canadian cheerleaders. I am so proud to be represented by this label in Canada. Thank you also to Courtney Graham and Melanie Windle, the lady geniuses of Glamazon Pictures, who continue to ask such interesting, provocative and important questions, and another shout-out to the inimitable Irwin Adam for the Russian lessons. I have been so lucky for the unflagging support of my family and friends through all this book stuff. Thanks, guys—love you all. Finally, I want to acknowledge the many remarkable scientists at the Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering at the University of Toronto who shared their research with me, spawning the “sci-fi” elements of this series. I have been at times inspired, awed, confused, confounded and terrified by the insights you have shared with me, and I am a better storyteller for having crossed your paths.
About the Author
L.E. Sterling had an early obsession with sci-fi, fantasy, and romance, to which she remained faithful even through an MA in creative writing and a PhD in English literature—where she completed a thesis on magical representation. She is the author of the cult hit YA novel The Originals (under pen name L.E. Vollick) and the urban fantasy Pluto’s Gate. Originally hailing from Parry Sound, Ontario, L.E. spent most of her summers roaming across Canada in a van—inspiring her writing career. She currently lives in Toronto, Ontario.
www.le-sterling.com
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