“No! We’re so close,” Wallach shouted. He shoved the tablet at Pirolli. The anchors’ light increased again until it was too bright to look at. Wallach held one arm over his eyes and walked toward the anchor on the wall. His steps were slow and halting, as if he were fighting a wind only he could feel.
Painful pressure seized me. Danger, the oracle said. Ending.
“Stop!” I shouted. “Don’t do it!” I headed for Wallach and immediately was caught in the same wind that pressed him back from the anchor. I heard the other scientists shouting things I couldn’t understand, and Lucia calling my name, but I couldn’t have stopped walking if I’d wanted to.
“It just needs an adjustment,” Wallach shouted over the noise of the discordant melody that had grown in volume along with the increased brightness of the anchors.
I took another step. Wallach had almost reached the anchor. He looked like a black blotch against the painfully bright light. I reached for him—
The sound cut off so completely I felt deafened. Glass shattered nearby, and I screamed silently as something grabbed my outstretched hand and twisted it painfully to the left. I jerked my hand away and fell to my knees, breathing heavily. All I could see was a pulsing yellow-pink light and black afterimages that might have been people. They were located where the others had been, at least, but they were motionless. I squeezed my eyes shut and hoped I hadn’t been blinded.
Gradually, sounds emerged from the silence as if someone were turning up a volume knob. I heard muttered conversation, and someone put an arm around my shoulders and supported me into a sitting position. I hadn’t realized I’d collapsed. “Helena,” the person said faintly. I recognized Judy’s voice. “Helena, show me your hand.”
I still couldn’t see anything. I held out my left hand and screamed when Judy touched it. It felt raw and burning at the same time. “It will be all right,” Judy said, which seemed preposterous. I held it away from my body and keened at how the air brushing over it felt like acid poured over my skin.
More sounds, still unintelligible, reached my ears. I heard Lucia talking steadily the way she did when disaster struck and she was giving orders. I blinked, and found the brightness had faded from yellow-pink to pulsing red. The black afterimages looked more like people, though I still couldn’t make out details, and they had moved to converge on a spot nearby. “What happened?” I said.
“The anchors exploded,” Judy said. “Mr. Wallach—I don’t know what happened to him. And Viv…”
Cold dread washed over me. “What happened to Viv?” I focused on Judy. I could see her now, but as if she were behind smoked glass. She looked as if the explosion had stunned her.
“She broke the diamond,” Judy said. “I don’t know why. It exploded in her face.” Her arm closed more tightly on my shoulders. “She’s not moving.”
19
I pushed myself one-handed to my knees and stood, wobbling until Judy steadied me. The pain in my hand had lessened so it now only felt like a rasp stripping the skin from my bones. With Judy’s help, I walked to where Pirolli and Osenbaugh knelt beside Viv, each holding one of her hands. Her eyes were open and sightless. I didn’t think she was breathing. “What—” I said, then realized I didn’t know what I’d meant to say.
“Give them space, Davies,” Lucia said. She stood in the corner beneath where the anchor had been, looking down at Jeong, who knelt beside another fallen form. I approached them cautiously, feeling as if the floor was rippling underfoot and might knock me down if I stepped wrong.
The only thing I recognized about the figure beside Jeong was the black scrubs printed with colorful palm trees. Wallach looked like a wax sculpture melted over a fire and twisted out of recognition. My numb brain insisted on trying to make what was left of him look human and failed. I felt cold and sweaty at the same time, bright sparks filled my vision, and I fell to my knees and lowered my head to keep from passing out. I heard people talking around me, but they sounded as if they were underwater. I breathed deeply with my eyes closed and waited for the dizziness to pass.
“Helena. Helena.” It was Jeong. “Are you all right now?”
I nodded and opened my eyes, then wished I hadn’t, because I was again looking directly at what was left of Wallach.
“I need to look at your hand,” Jeong said.
I held it out—and screamed. My left hand was nothing but a club, with the same waxy, twisted look Wallach’s body had.
Judy grabbed my head and made me look at her. “He’ll fix it,” she said. “Do you understand me? You just touched the edge of the effect. It can be fixed. Helena. Breathe.”
I nodded and sucked in air, holding my breath for a few heartbeats and letting it out again. My hand didn’t feel like a club. When I wasn’t looking at it, it felt like my fist was clenched, and if not for the fact that I couldn’t open it, it would have been a perfectly normal feeling.
Jeong took hold of my hand, and I clenched my teeth on another scream, because my skin still felt raw. But almost immediately, the pain vanished. “Have you had a major healing before?” Jeong asked.
“Yes.”
“I’ve deadened the nerves so you can’t feel anything, but…Helena, this is a major reconstruction. It looks like all your bones are still there, but fused.” Jeong’s calm manner was so at odds with his words I wanted to laugh. Fused? The idea was terrible and ludicrous and couldn’t have anything to do with me. “We’re going to take you to the Gunther Node and put you under before trying to fix it.”
He sounded way too calm. “There’s something you’re not telling me,” I said.
“I don’t want you to worry. We can fix this.”
“But…?”
Jeong sighed. “Darius was the expert on this kind of reconstruction. I don’t know of anyone who comes close to his level of expertise.”
“And he’s dead.” I felt as if my fear had been numbed along with my nerves. “I can’t believe he’s dead. What are we going to do?”
“We’ll figure it out.” He looked past me. “I’m more worried about Viv.”
And just like that, fear pulsed through me. “Is she…”
“She’s not dead. But she took the full backlash from breaking the fulcrum. I have no idea what that did to her.”
I turned around. Osenbaugh and Pirolli still knelt beside Viv. Now that my vision was fully clear, I could see she was her normal color and her eyes were closed now. She no longer looked dead; she looked asleep. “Why did she do that?” I asked. “What happened? I don’t understand any of this.”
Jeong and Judy helped me stand and assisted me to the metal folding chair beside the door. It wobbled as I sat down, but I was used to its peculiarities and held myself steady. “I can’t explain the details of the magic,” Jeong said, “but basically, we knew the anchors would vanish as the magic spread through the system. It was something Darius planned for. But they vanished faster than we expected. I don’t know why yet. The point is, countering that meant pouring more magic into the system. Tapping into the node more…you can picture it like poking a straw into a drink. We swapped out the first straw for a wider one.”
I nodded. “So the magic killed Mr. Wallach?”
“Not the magic itself. He tried to adjust the anchor manually before it activated, to keep it from vanishing. But he wasn’t fast enough. The anchor started to shift our reality, and he got caught in its field.” Jeong pointed at my hand, which I refused to look at. “So did you.”
“That doesn’t explain why Viv broke the diamond,” Judy said. “I didn’t think that was possible.”
“I don’t know what she was thinking,” Jeong said. “Breaking the fulcrum stopped the magic pouring into the system, like unplugging a lamp, but she was there for the creation of the diamond. She knew it was unbreakable. At least, we all thought it was.” He stood from where he’d been crouching next to me and looked in Viv’s direction. “She probably saved us all. With the anchor disrupted by Darius, that distortion field wo
uld have spread to engulf this whole room.”
I nodded. I couldn’t stop looking at Viv and the bone magi trying to save her. It reminded me so strongly of how Jun had died four months ago, of the bone magi huddled around her and how it had ultimately been futile, that I closed my eyes and prayed more fervently than I ever had before.
Footsteps sounded on the linoleum, and I looked up at Lucia. “Can you walk?” she asked me.
I nodded.
“You and Rasmussen are going with Henry. Jeong, do you need any help getting Haley into your van?”
“I think we can manage it,” Jeong said. He glanced over his shoulder. “What about Darius?”
“I’ve called for assistance. I’ll stay with him until they get here.” Lucia looked at my hand and quickly looked away. “I’ve called Campbell and Washburn and they’ll meet you at the node. Jeong, I want a full report on this debacle as soon as you and your colleagues have had time to analyze the situation.”
“Understood.” Jeong put a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t worry, Helena. Everything will be fine.”
I wished I knew him well enough to judge whether he was offering me empty assurances. Instead, I said, “Thanks.”
I was recovered enough to walk under my own power to the little white van, where I sat in the back seat while Judy rode shotgun. The last thing I saw before Dave pulled away from the curb was the three scientists carrying Viv’s unconscious body to the blue van. That made me cry when nothing else had.
We rode to the Gunther Node in silence. I tried once to open my left fist and felt only as if someone had closed their much bigger hand around mine. The rest of me felt as numb as my hand, but with an emotional deadness rather than a physical one. Now that the immediate terror had worn off, my mind circled around and around might-have-beens. If I had refused Wallach access to the store’s node. If I’d pushed him to listen to the oracle’s warnings. If I’d made Viv stop working for him. If I’d—the possibilities were endless, and all of them felt like my fault. I’d known there was danger, and I hadn’t acted decisively.
The gardenia scent of the Gunther Node should have been calming, but today it made me feel ill. I followed Dave down the passage to Green 1 and waited, still feeling numb, while he spoke to the bone magi at the desk. I caught them staring at me and almost turned my back on them. I didn’t need to feel like a freak on top of everything else. Judy eyed me, but said nothing.
Finally, Dave and one of the bone magi came to my side. “This is Veronica,” he said, indicating the woman in maroon scrubs. She looked familiar. “She’s going to show you to your room, and in a few minutes they’ll do an initial analysis. It’s going to be fine.”
I nodded and let Veronica lead me back down the hall to one of the little rooms with the curtained windows. Judy sat in a chair opposite the bed while I kicked off my shoes and lay back. Veronica looked like she wanted to shoo Judy away, but was afraid to. “You don’t need to undress or anything,” Veronica said. “Someone will be in shortly.” She pulled the curtain across the window and left.
“I can go if you want me to,” Judy said. “But I don’t think you ought to be alone.”
“I’m worried about Viv. Maybe you should find her.”
“Those scientists told me she would be in isolation while they treat her.” Judy clasped her hands on her knee. “I’m worried about her too.”
The door opened. A young, dark-skinned woman with her black hair pulled back from her face in a soft pouf entered, followed by Jeong. I recognized her; she was Wallach’s assistant, or something, and they resembled each other strongly. “Ruby Wallach,” she said, offering me her hand. “You tried to save my grandfather.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s a terrible loss.”
Ruby nodded. “Let’s take a look at your hand.”
I hesitated. “Are you sure…I mean, you must be grieving…”
“I am,” Ruby said, “but he would want me to honor his memory by carrying on his work. And you were injured trying to save his life.”
I extended my left hand, still not looking at it. I couldn’t feel her touching me, but I did feel the rotation of my wrist as she turned it one way and the other.
“You’re right, Rick,” she said. “All the bones are there. I think we can reconstruct the hand.” She released me, and I lowered my hand out of my line of sight. “Helena,” she said, “I don’t want to lie to you. This is an extremely complicated magical procedure, and my grandfather was the expert. But with a combination of surgery and magic, I think we stand a good chance of success.”
I shuddered. Surgery. “I want you to try. But what happens if you fail? I mean, could you make it worse?”
Ruby considered the question. “That would depend on what you thought of as ‘worse.’ You might end up with a partially functional hand, or only three fingers. To me, even partially functional is better than what you have now. But you may disagree.”
“No, I’d rather have some fingers than none.” I took in a deep breath. “How soon can you do it?”
“They’re prepping an operating room right now. You will need to change into a hospital gown because it’s a surgical procedure.” Ruby opened a cabinet and pulled out a pile of cloth. “Take everything off and put this on so the ties are on the side. Then we’ll come back for you.”
“I’ll go,” Judy said. “Is there a waiting room?”
“I’ll show you,” Jeong said. “Good luck, Helena.”
Judy hugged me. “I’ll tell Malcolm everything when he gets here.”
I’d almost forgotten Lucia had called Malcolm, and the thought that I probably wouldn’t see him before the procedure made my chest ache. “Thanks.”
When everyone was gone, I undressed awkwardly, one-handed, and put on the gown. It was already tied, for which I was grateful because I couldn’t have done that myself, but it was loose enough to slip over my head regardless. I’d never had an operation before and was surprised at how comfortable the hospital gown was. All those movies with people walking around with their butts hanging out…either they’d been playing for laughs, or hospitals had gotten fed up with being made fun of and had changed their styles. I sat on the edge of the bed and wished I had slippers. My feet were cold despite the room being the same comfortable temperature all of the Gunther Node was.
In a few minutes, someone knocked on the door and entered without waiting for me to respond. The man was pushing a wheelchair and had a pleasant smile. “Ms. Campbell, I’m your ride,” he said. “I know, you’re not an invalid, but the floors are cold and hard and we don’t want you uncomfortable.”
I felt plenty uncomfortable anyway, but decided a wheelchair was better than truly being an invalid and having to go on one of those wheeled beds. The nurse—I assumed that’s what he was—tucked a soft blanket over my lap and legs and wheeled me out of the room. I hid my malformed hand under a fold of the blanket and pretended no one was staring at me.
He pushed me down the corridor to Green 1 and then beyond it to a wide door that swung open without being touched as we approached. Beyond lay another corridor, more brightly lit than the main one and with a lower ceiling. It looked like any of the hospitals I’d ever been in and smelled faintly of antiseptic and gardenias. The nurse pushed my chair halfway down the hall and through a door on the left which also swung open without him touching it. If he was doing it with magic, that was quite the useful skill.
The new room, larger than the one where I’d changed, was just as brightly lit as the hall, but curtains hanging from a rail in the ceiling made it look dimmer even though the curtains were currently drawn back. When they were pulled out, they would surround the operating table at the center of the room, shrouding its occupant and her surgeons. I realized I was shaking and without thinking clasped my hands together—or, rather, put my good hand over the injured one. I wished I hadn’t. It felt so wrong, lumpy and too-smooth and more like a leather sack of marbles than a clenched fist. I snatched my hand away and closed
it on the armrest, which was cold and angular but at least felt normal.
“Hey, are you cold?” The nurse tucked the blanket more closely around me, then checked my eyes. “You’re in shock. Somebody should have noticed that before. Let’s get you up here so you can lie down, that will help.”
I nodded and let him help me sit on the table, which to my surprise was warm despite being very hard and smooth. “The illusion makes it more comfortable,” the nurse said. “Lie back.” He spread the blanket over me, and the shakes subsided.
I didn’t tell him illusions didn’t affect me. At least the warmth was real. The lights were too bright, and I closed my eyes and wished desperately that Malcolm was there. Probably they wouldn’t let him be there for the surgery, but I needed his arms around me, if only for a few minutes.
The door opened. “Ready to get started?” Ruby said. “Why is she lying down, Paul?”
“She was in shock,” Paul said.
“Not a surprise.” Someone put a warm hand on my forehead, and I opened my eyes to see Ruby standing next to me. Rick Jeong was there too, standing beside the door, along with an older man I didn’t recognize. All of them were suited for surgery, though none of them wore masks. Since I didn’t really know what the point of a surgical mask was, I couldn’t tell if this was normal or not.
I drew in a shaky breath. “How long will this take?” I asked.
“We’re not sure,” Ruby said. “From your perspective, no time at all, because you’ll be asleep. Do you want to know the details, or will that make you more worried?”
“I…think I’d like to know.”
“All right. Right now, your hand is…you could think of it as a seed pod containing all the bones and flesh of your undamaged hand. We’re going to cut into that pod and free what’s inside, then rebuild any structures that were destroyed by your encounter with the anchor’s field. It’s a complex procedure only because hands are complex.” Ruby smiled, a reassuring expression that almost made me forget that she’d just used the words “cut” and “rebuild” in relation to my hand.
The Book of Destiny Page 21