Firewalker

by Josephine Angelini

  Lily sensed Tristan’s hunger. Restraint had never been his forte, and she was grateful that she was the one in control of her awesome power—not him. But, she wondered, how would she use that power if Rowan weren’t there to remind her not to give in to it? She looked out the mouth of the cave and changed the subject. “They’re almost here,” she said, feeling Breakfast and Rowan before she could see them.

  They came back in the late afternoon with a dead rabbit, and Rowan immediately began to teach them how to skin it.

  “I know this is probably a dumb question, but why go hunting?” Una asked. “Why don’t we just eat the Woven we already killed?”

  “They’re poisonous,” Rowan answered. “Only Woven can eat other Woven.”

  “Seriously?” Lily asked, surprised. “How can that be? There are so many different breeds, you’d think some of them would be edible.”

  Rowan shrugged. “I don’t know why they’re poisonous, they just are. Believe me, plenty of starving Outlanders have wished it were otherwise, and have died because it isn’t.”

  Lily looked away while Rowan pulled the rabbit’s skin off in one brisk tug, like he was peeling a tube sock off a foot.

  “It doesn’t make sense. Gorilla meat isn’t poisonous, and snake meat isn’t poisonous, but Woven gorilla-snake meat is?” Something about it bothered Lily and she couldn’t let it go. “Nature doesn’t work like that,” she said, frustrated.

  “They’re not from nature,” Rowan replied, raising an eyebrow. “Remember, they were made by witches.”

  “They were made by witches to build cities and haul heavy loads, and basically play the role that machinery plays in my world. Why would they also be made to be poisonous? Why go through the trouble of engineering them to be poisonous for no good reason?” she argued. She accidentally glanced down at the skinned rabbit and covered her mouth, gagging.

  Rowan stifled a laugh at her reaction and shrugged again. “I don’t know, Lily. Maybe there is a reason. We just don’t know what it is.”

  While the rest of them shared what little rabbit there was, Rowan gave Lily a few olives from a jar he had brought in one of the packs. The salt in the brine restored her more than the food.

  “Feel better?” Rowan asked. Lily nodded. “Good. We should stay here one more night to rest and leave early tomorrow morning. Can you contact Caleb and Tristan?” Rowan glanced quickly at the Tristan to his right. “I mean, my Tristan. The one from this world.”

  “I’d have to leave the cave,” Lily said.

  “Tomorrow. I don’t want you out there in the dark,” Rowan said. “I tried reaching them to find out where Alaric is while Breakfast and I were hunting, but they were too far for me to reach them.”

  “You want to go straight to Alaric?”

  “The sachem should know you’re back before anyone else does.” He gave her a wry smile. “You did claim several thousand of his braves. He’s going to want to know where you are.”

  “I’ll try in the morning,” Lily said. She noticed that Tristan was frowning uncomfortably. “You okay?” she asked him.

  “It’s just weird,” he replied. “The thought of meeting myself is just mind-blowing.”

  “Yeah,” Lily agreed, looking down. “It changes everything.”

  The thought of Lillian chased through her mind. Although Lily wanted to avoid dealing with it, she knew that Lillian’s latest memories had changed her.

  Lily didn’t see this struggle between Alaric and Lillian as a battle between good and evil anymore. Lillian hanged hundreds, but Alaric was prepared to nuke millions. Alaric hadn’t actually perpetrated mass murder the way Lillian had, but he had considered it. There was no right answer anymore; no one Lily could follow without question, but she’d still have to choose between them soon. Now that she was back in this world, Alaric wouldn’t simply allow her to keep his army of braves and not use them. Eventually, he would ask her to fuel them in the fight against Lillian and the Thirteen Cities. Lily wondered how many thousands more would die, and for what reason? To stop Lillian, who was only fighting to stop a potential nuclear war? Lily looked over the fire at Rowan, patiently showing the group how to make a rabbit snare, and didn’t know what her answer to Alaric would be.

  She couldn’t even discuss it with Rowan. His answer would be automatic, and his feelings of betrayal understandable. It was one thing to talk hypothetically about how the good of the many outweighed the good of the few, and quite another when one of those few is someone beloved. When Rowan thought of Lillian, he thought of his father hanging on the gallows.

  The sun set, sucking the light from the sky. Night was darker and deeper here than in Lily’s world, and even stubborn Una had to give up on trying to make a snare when she couldn’t see her own fingers anymore. Everyone was too exhausted and too rattled to want to stay up late anyway.

  “I’ll take first guard,” Rowan said. “Who wants second?”

  “I’ll do it,” Tristan offered. “Wake me when you get sleepy.”

  Lily curled up between Tristan and Una, sensing that Rowan had taken first guard because he was too anxious to sleep. Rowan was back in his deadly world with four people who had no survival skills, and Lily knew he felt that the enormous responsibility to keep them all alive was on him.

  We’ll be okay, Rowan. We’ll find your tribe tomorrow and you won’t have to worry so much about us.

  I’ll always be worried about you, Lily. It’s my curse. I don’t know if I’m going to end up dying tonight to protect you, or if I should strangle you now and save myself the trouble.

  Lily stifled a laugh. She drove him crazy and she knew it. I hope you’re less grouchy when we find Caleb and Tristan.

  Having them at my back will make me less jumpy. I’ll probably still be angry with you, though. He glanced over the fire at her and smiled regretfully. What are you doing back in my world?

  Do you wish I wasn’t here?

  I want to say yes, but I can’t. You’re not safe. Everyone here wants a piece of you, but I guess I’m even more selfish than they are. I don’t just want a piece, Lily. I want all of you. I want you with me wherever I go, even if that puts you in danger.

  Wherever you are is where I’m safest and happiest, Rowan.

  I haven’t thought about being happy in a while.

  Maybe you can start now. Maybe we both can. At least we’re together.

  When we find Tristan and Caleb, I’ll consider it.

  Rowan looked out the mouth of the cave, his eyes scanning the darkness.

  Lily floated on top of her coven’s dreams, bobbing gently as if she were sunbathing in a pool of their sleeping minds. She sensed another mind floating along like hers on top of the sleeping minds of her claimed. Lily joined her other self, only to find that she had wandered into the Mist and into another one of Lillian’s memories. This time, Lillian didn’t choose to share another memory of the shaman. Her story, and therefore her reasons to support killing all Outlander scientists, had more to it than rational arguments about saving the planet from Alaric and Chenoa’s bombs. It also had gut-wrenching fear.

  Before Lily could register the burned-out trees and the acrid air, she knew from the panic that enveloped her that Lillian had brought her back inside another memory of the cinder world …

  … They’re coming after me with nooses on poles. They’ve finally smartened up and realized that my touch will kill them. I don’t know how many of them there are, and that’s a problem. I scramble through the thick underbrush, my breath rasping in and out of my lungs in fear. I can’t see. Not clearly. But I can hear them, and they’re getting closer. I run. Their baying laughter seems to come from all around me.

  “Come on, pretty! Where you going? We’ll take good care of you,” they taunt.

  I turn from the direction of their voices, and hear the whipping sound of rope flying through the air before I feel the net tangle around me. They drove me into a trap, I realize. A sob bursts out of me as I fall onto my side. I tr
y, but I don’t have enough stored energy in my body to manifest either an electric current or a fireball. I haven’t had salt in days.

  “We got her!” one of them hollers.

  I have a knife in my skirt, but that’s not what I reach for. I know I’ll never cut myself out of these thick, oiled ropes in time. I snake my hand up to the willstone at my throat. My last resort.

  “Quick! Before she swallows it.”

  “I’m not touching her. Hand me the pole.”

  While they bicker I manage to rip my willstone off its chain and swallow it. It’s huge and chokes me, but I get it down.

  “Ah!” the first one growls, shoving the second one to the ground. “You were supposed to stop her.”

  I hear more voices and the sound of many feet, but I can barely turn my head and can’t see more than five of them standing over me. They must have sent the whole gang after me. One of them in particular leans close. His face is scarred and he has the air of a leader about him.

  “That stone won’t stay in her forever,” he says. A cruel glint lights his bulging red eyes. “And once we smash it, she’ll be a helpless little zombie. We can do whatever we want to her.”

  I try not to show fear, but I fail. I shrink under his appraising look.

  “She’s still healthy. That’s why I like the young ones,” another says eagerly. I can see saliva wetting the inside of his scabby lips and have to turn my head before I gag.

  “Get her up,” the leader orders. “Use the poles to disarm her.”

  As they unwrap the net, the stink of sickness overwhelms everything, even their sour body odor. They’ll all be dead in a few weeks or months at the latest—though, much good it’ll do me.

  They have their noose poles ready as soon as the net slackens, but I make a desperate rush at them anyway. There are too many for me to drain, but I’m not going down quietly. I can’t. A switch has gone off in my head, like the way a leg will kick if you hit the knee just so. Three of them lay hands on me, and I suck the life out of them with a snarl. I’m enjoying this.

  I feel a noose tighten around my neck and the thrill of the fight ebbs away with my breath. I wonder when did I become this thing that I am now?

  As white, blue, and black dots blur out the sight of their oozing, pockmarked faces, I hear the leader say, “Put her in the barn.”…

  * * *

  Lily sat up, her scream echoing off the walls of the cave. Rowan sat up with her, trying to hold her. They were alone.

  “Nightmare?” he asked.

  Lily nodded, lying.

  Rowan narrowed his eyes, picking up on the ragged edge of her thoughts. “About Lillian?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Lily admitted.

  “What was she doing?” He pushed her hair back from her sweaty forehead, his face so open and trusting she had to look away.

  “Killing people. Draining the energy right out of their bodies.”

  Rowan nodded. “It’s a gruesome death. But if anyone tries to take you—if you’re ever cornered and have no choice—” he began.

  “I know,” she said, resting her forehead against his. She felt him go still, his body tensing.

  “How do you know?”

  “I was going to do it to Gideon or Carrick when they had me in the oubliette. I figured it out on my own, but I never got a chance to lay a hand on them,” Lily said, reminding herself to keep her voice even.

  Rowan sensed she was holding something back, something that might be about Lillian. It troubled him, but she was telling the truth about this, at least, and he could sense that. She felt Rowan relax. He held her tightly, smoothing her hair, his heart sore from sharing what she’d been through.

  “Where is everyone?” Lily asked.

  “They’ll be back soon,” he said. “Do you want to try and reach Caleb and Tristan this morning?”

  “Yes,” she said, suddenly smiling. “I miss them.”

  “Me too.” Rowan leaned back to really look at Lily. “Don’t think about Lillian,” he said, his forehead furrowed with worry. “We’re back in her world now, and the more you think about her, the more you open yourself up to her influence. She’s had a lot more practice manipulating minds than you have, and she knows how to do things you haven’t even dreamed of.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like making a mind mosaic, for starters.” Lily raised an eyebrow in question. Rowan pushed a hand through his hair, thinking of how to explain. “When you’ve claimed hundreds of thousands of minds like she has, you can use the perspectives of your claimed to build a bird’s-eye view of any particular moment. And as long as you don’t try to control them or communicate with them, you can do it without your claimed even knowing. Only trained mechanics can tell you’re looking through their eyes. Everyone else just believes they’re thinking of their witch at that particular moment. It’s really subtle.”

  “Apparently, because I don’t get it,” Lily said, feeling a little stupid.

  “Come on,” he said, standing up. “I need to get you out of the cave to show you.”

  They climbed down the cliff and stood facing each other. Lily saw Rowan shiver from the cold, and she offered him her wrist. He grasped her wrist lightly between his thumb and forefinger like he was feeling her pulse. Lily fed him some of her ever-fever.

  “Thank you,” he said, smiling with pleasure. She got the feeling he wanted to stand like this, warming himself with her heat for hours, but he forced himself to break away and concentrate. “I’m going to use something from your world to explain this, so you understand. Think of your claimed as thousands of different cameras all on the same movie set, filming the same scene but from different angles.”

  “Okay.”

  “Now gently reach out, barely brushing their minds, and look through the lenses.”

  Lily thought about Tristan, Breakfast, and Una and ever so softly looked. “Oh my God,” she gasped, sticking out her arm and grabbing on to Rowan’s jacket to balance herself. What she saw was a sweeping, panoramic 3-D view of one particular place in the woods. It was bobbing up and down as the three of them walked.

  “Okay, stop,” Rowan said, trying not to laugh. “You don’t know how to integrate what you’re seeing yet, and I don’t want you to throw up.”

  Lily disentangled her mind and regained her balance. “That was freaky.”

  “So I’ve heard,” he said, his eyes momentarily darkening as they usually did when he referenced Lillian.

  “Can you do this with your stone kin?” Lily asked.

  “No. Only witches have enough control over the minds of their claimed to make a mosaic. And you can make one for any moment in time. You can skip through the minds of your claimed at”—he waved a hand, making it up as he went along—“noon two weeks ago, and watch one person run through a crowd of them, like you’re following alongside that running person. All you need is for that person to keep running past people you have claimed.”

  “I can spy on people who I haven’t claimed by using my claimed like surveillance cameras?” she asked, starting to feel uncomfortable with this ability.

  “Yes. Your claimed don’t even have to be aware of the person running past. They don’t need to actively remember an incident—it could be background noise to them—but as long as they were there at noon two weeks ago, an imprint of it is somewhere in their willstones, and you can find it.”

  “I can access memories people don’t even know they have?”

  “Yes.”

  “That’s—” Lily broke off, stunned. “The word ‘wrong’ doesn’t seem to be strong enough in this instance.”

  “It’s very useful,” Rowan said with a shrug. “Say someone kidnapped a child in the Swallows at sometime between four and eight last Wednesday,” he said, making up another hypothetical time and place. “You could find that child and see who took her by using the memories of your claimed who happened to be in the Swallows at that time. Even if they weren’t aware that the girl was being kidnapped, if it
occurred somewhere in their field of vision, you can filter it out and find it. Mind mosaics can save lives.”

  “But it’s like being Big Brother,” Lily sputtered, horrified. Rowan obviously didn’t get the reference. “I’m not asking permission, and my claimed never know it happened. That violates their basic right to privacy,” she explained. Lily couldn’t understand how Rowan could be so accepting of this.

  “Absolute privacy is one of the things you agree to give up when you let a witch claim you,” he replied, a little confused by Lily’s outburst. “Lily, you saw some of my most intimate memories when you claimed me. You knew this was how it worked.”

  “Yeah, but that was unavoidable. And claiming is a one-time thing.”

  “Most witches don’t see it that way. If they want general information—not an entire specific memory, okay? We’re just talking about snapshots in time. If a witch wants to see what a group of her claimed has seen, she usually just takes it from their minds.”

  “Well, in the world where I grew up that’s totally wrong.”

  He stared at her for a while. The look he had on his face made him seem younger than usual.

  “What?” Lily asked, half a smile tugging at her lips. “Why the goofy look?”

  “You’re just cute,” he said, wrapping an arm around her neck and kissing the top of her head.

  “A-hem,” Breakfast said, fake-clearing his throat to interrupt. “Rowan? Did you send the three of us out to scout around so you could get some nookie?”

  They had no idea Lily had used them like spy-cams while they were trekking through the woods. For a moment she felt bad. She only managed to let go of her guilt by promising herself she would never use that skill again.

  “Actually, I’m teaching Lily something,” Rowan said, moving away from her. He was blushing a little, which Lily found quite amusing.

  “Uh-huh,” Una said, crossing her arms and cocking an eyebrow. “I bet you got a lot to teach her, teacher-man.”

  “He is a fountain of knowledge,” Lily said, grinning.