by Emily Colin
A sinking sensation in my stomach, I look away from the photogs and up at Ronan’s face. “Where’s my mother?”
“She died in the second wave,” he says, his eyes flickering downward. “I’m so sorry. She went back for the wounded. I told her not to, that it was a fool’s errand. But she said if we didn’t try to go back for them, we were as guilty as the officials who’d ordered the bombings, and the bellators who’d seen it done. I got hold of her arm, but she twisted away from me and went running back into the clearing. Right when the second bombs fell.”
“My fault,” I say, my voice as numb as I feel. “I led Eva straight to you.”
“You’re not to blame, Ari.” He folds his arms across his chest for emphasis. “The Executor, the Bellatorum, and Eva, for allowing them to implant a tracker to lead them here. But not you, and don’t you ever think it.”
“A tracker? How do you know?”
“Kilían got word to me. He feels a considerable amount of guilt. Had he known such a thing existed, he would have taken steps to eliminate it before it could do us harm.”
Eliminate it. He means, eliminate her—kill Eva. Why doesn’t the thought fill me with satisfaction? Her actions led to the death of most of the people in the encampment—of my mother. She betrayed me. Shouldn’t I want her dead?
My thoughts must show on my face, because he gives me a pained smile. “People aren’t one thing or another, Ari—good or evil. Eva used you to further the Executor’s ends, sure—but if she hadn’t cared for you, she never would have tossed that grenade to facilitate your escape.”
I shake my head, dismissing this with an effort. “It doesn’t matter. The people who betrayed me and cast me out, the ones who slaughtered your camp and killed my mother—I will make them pay at the point of my sword, until they beg for mercy.”
Ronan raises a soot-smudged eyebrow. “All by yourself, really? We’ll lose a fighter and you’ll make no difference to our cause.”
“What’s my life, into the bargain? I’ve already lost everything else.”
He grips my shoulder—a gesture that, in the Commonwealth, would have to be earned through years of solidarity. I have to force myself not to flinch. “No,” he says quietly. “You haven’t.”
Without another word, he turns. One hand on the hilt of my dagur, I follow him into what remains of the Brotherhood’s camp.
30
Eva
I huddle on the floor of the cell, shivering. I’d come to in here, still wearing my drenched clothes, with no idea of the time. When I’d asked Paul, one of the bellators stationed outside the door, he’d told me it was past midnight. And then he’d shoved a heel of bread and some water through the bars and stalked away without another word.
I eat the food, use the toilet in the corner, and then try to sleep—but it’s no use. One of the guards approaches the cell every time I doze off, sticks an electrical prod through the bars, and shocks me. After the third time, I give up and sit with my back against the wall and my knees drawn up to my chest, waiting for morning.
As the night passes, so does the cold, transmuting itself into a slow-burning, simmering heat that creeps through my muscles, making them twitch without warning. Even my eyeballs feel hot, scorching my lids whenever I close them. At first I think it is a lingering side effect from the electroshock—but as time wears on, I begin to wonder if I have a fever. Hugging my knees to my chest to keep myself still, I peer into the red haze that blankets the inside of my eyelids and imagine I can see Ari’s face.
I’m still awake hours later, when I hear the Executor and Efraím conversing in low voices out of sight of my cell. “I trust you’ll explain what I saw yesterday afternoon, sir,” Efraím is saying stiffly. “I apologize for losing control of my temper. That was unforgivable.”
“No need to apologize, Bellator Stinar. I’m sure I would have been equally taken aback. And yes—when the time comes, I shall most definitely explain.”
“Is there anything else I should know, sir? So I can prepare myself—and my bellators—”
“Ah, Efraím.” The Executor gives a mirthless chuckle. “Citizen Marteinn is special. Unique. Even I don’t know everything she might be capable of.”
“I see,” Efraím says, sounding as if he doesn’t see in the slightest. “Is this why you recommended her for the Bellatorum, sir?”
“It is, yes. And she has performed admirably, has she not?”
“She has, sir. But if what I saw yesterday is any indication, she can be said to have some unusual advantages.”
I am listening for all I am worth, fever forgotten, inching toward the cell door. The changes in my perception—the way everything looks brighter and more detailed, my superior night vision, my ability to run and jump and fall, the way I was able to hold my breath in the tank yesterday—I’m sure this is what he is talking about. So what’s the answer? What’s wrong with me? Am I finally about to discover the secret of the little pink pills?
As if I’ve spoken aloud, the Executor chuckles again. “Advantages, yes. You could say that. But perhaps disadvantages, too—it’s too early to tell. It is most important we keep an eye on her—hence the molecular trackers that we put in those pills we have been including with her vitamins. And a good thing, too, otherwise we would have fallen short of the opportunity to destroy the Brotherhood’s forward party and catch the seditionist Westergaard in the act.”
I sag back against the wall of the cell, feeling the rough outline of the stone through my clothes. They’re close to dry now, spurred by the waves of heat that have deluged me all night. I was right to be suspicious of the pink pills. They had nothing to do with my supposed anemia—nor are they behind the enhancement of my senses. They were trackers, meant to apprise the Executor of my whereabouts. Which means—what? That the Bellatorum has succeeded in stripping me of my civility, shaping me into one of them—a savage warrior—without chemical assistance? That my ability to track Ari through the branches of a tree by scent and see in the dark, my victory over Riis and Karsten—it is a learned skill?
All the Bellatorum are trained to bolster their senses. They rely on them in interrogation and in a fight. But what’s happening to me is different. I think of the time I heard people approaching in the woods before Ari did, the way I was able to find the right path through the tunnels to the scholar’s room when he couldn’t smell a thing—not to mention how I held my breath in the ice tank—and shudder. And then there’s the night of the Choosing, when I jumped from the window of the Rookery and landed without a scratch...before I had an ounce of Bellatorum training. If the pink pills aren’t making this possible, then what is?
What if what Ronan told us was true? Have the gen techs tampered with my DNA somehow, enhanced it?
I shudder at the thought—then at another one, right on its heels. What the pink pills did make possible—that the bellators found the location of the resistance camp—means something else: I’m responsible for Ronan and his fighters, for whatever’s happening to Ari now. Guilt stabs me, and I wrap my arms around myself, trying to ignore the memory of Ari’s mother making her way toward him, hand outstretched, before a horrible sound split the stillness and the woods went up in flames.
I’m sorry, I mouth, so the bellators who are guarding me can’t hear. I’m so sorry.
But I have no time to dwell on this terrible realization, because the Executor is talking again. “Of course, there’s no need to administer that pill anymore,” he says briskly. “No need to track our little rebel. She’s not leaving anytime soon.”
“Begging your pardon, Executor,” Efraím says, sounding uncomfortable, “but the girl maintains she was acting on behalf of the Commonwealth. She’s held true to that position this entire time. You don’t suppose she could be telling the truth—”
“Unlikely. But we’ll have her at our mercy tomorrow, will we not? Together, we will separate fact from fiction.”
“Yes sir,” Efraím replies, and then I hear their footsteps movi
ng away.
I drift into an uneasy sleep, plagued by nightmares. First I dream I am back in the ice tank, struggling for breath, burning with fever despite the cold. I try to bang on the glass, to smash my way to freedom, but it is no use. My hand has become a flipper, and all it does is slap uselessly against the surface of the tank, again and again.
Fury fills me, but when I scream, my voice emerges as a harsh, inhuman bark. I lunge at the glass, throwing my body against it, and somehow break through. Then I am flying, my flippers transformed into wings, soaring out of that horrible room and through the tunnels, up the stairs and into the crisp outdoor air. I spread my wings wide, cawing in victory, heading for the woods.
The forest is mine. The world is mine.
I’m free.
My eyes blink open. I’m lying on the floor of the cell, the ground blessedly cold beneath my cheek. Something is wrong. I know it, I can feel it—
I try to sit up, but my hand skids along the stone, making a horrible screeching noise—as if my nails have grown exponentially while I slept. My palm feels strange, leathery.
I turn my head, afraid to look. When I do, I have to stifle a scream. The thing at the end of my arm no longer resembles a hand. It is yellow-gray and scaly, tipped with curved black talons—a bird’s claw.
Nightmare, I think, clenching my eyes shut. Not real.
The fever grabs hold of me, sinking its jaws into my bones, and drags me back down into sleep. When I wake, my hand is its normal self again. The relief that washes over me is so profound, for a moment I forget to be afraid.
Then someone says my name, and my heart starts pounding all over again.
“Get up, Eva.” The voice is rough in my ear, accompanied by the bite of fingers into my upper arm. I blink and twist away, rolling onto my knees.
Kilían crouches next to me, his expression grim. “Good evening,” he says. “Or should I say good morning? It’s three a.m.—the hour of the ill-doer. You decide.”
My eyes flick over him, assessing the proximity of his weapons, and he shifts backward, shaking his head. “Don’t even try it. I’ve heard every bit of what happened in the ice tank chamber, not to mention your little performance in interrogation.” His hand drops to his belt, and when he lifts it again, he’s holding a syringe. “So I brought a gift to entice you to cooperate. You don’t want to know what this will do to you, Eva. You really don’t.”
My gaze must linger on the syringe a few seconds too long, because he gives a reluctant chuckle. “I see you’re thinking of using this against me, Bellator Marteinn. Don’t bother. There’s an antidote, and I’ve already taken it. You’ll just get yourself in even more trouble.”
I glance upward, at his face. “What do you want from me, Kilían?”
“That’s the question, isn’t it,” he muses. “What do I want from you, indeed? A fair query, as you’ve already done more than enough.”
It occurs to me that Kilían believes what Ari must—that I was opposed to the Brotherhood all along, that I used my relationship with my mentor as leverage to gather information. It’s ironic, really—the two people who I need to convince I have no investment in the resistance, that I am committed to upholding the Commonwealth, don’t believe me in the slightest. And here’s Kilían, convinced I undermined the Brotherhood and triggered the bombing. That whatever tracker they utilized to follow me to the resistance camp was implemented with my knowledge and consent.
My only consolation is that he can’t kill me, not without angering the Executor, who seems to believe I am valuable—or take drastic action without exposing himself as a Brotherhood spy. I want desperately to give him a sign I’m on his side, to ask if he’s seen Ari. To find out what happened to Ronan and Ari’s mother and the other members of the resistance. But I don’t know how.
I glance down, hoping to compose myself. But that does me no good, because carved into the stone I see the impossible: Four shallow furrows, exactly where the talons from my nightmare scraped along the floor of my cell.
By the Architect, what is happening to me?
I’m still staring at the grooves in the stone when Kilían digs his fingers into my shoulders. “Am I boring you, Bellator Marteinn?”
I can’t afford to think about my nightmare, about the fever and the claw. Kilían holds my life in his hands. With a supreme effort, I force myself to focus.
“What are you doing here?” I do my best not to sound as frightened as I feel. “I’m surprised they let you in. Efraím and the Executor seem intent on having me all to themselves.”
“Oh, they are,” he says, rocking back on his heels. “But I have my ways.”
“You did something to the guards outside my cell, didn’t you.” It isn’t a question.
He shrugs. “They’ll be fine. Unlike the majority of the people in that camp you helped to destroy. Nice work, by the way. I think the boy really believed you.”
A chill runs through me, attributable to more than my still-damp clothing and the conditions of the underground. “Ari?” I say stupidly, as if there’s another boy he might mean.
“Who else? I must say, the Executor and Stinar are being very secretive about the origins of their plan. I’d be happy if you could shed some light on it.” He grabs me by the arm again and stands, hauling me to my feet. I think of struggling, but feel the pressure of the needle against my upper arm and reconsider.
“Walk,” Kilían snaps at me.
“Where are we going?”
“Don’t ask questions. Move.” He pushes me forward.
“Kilían,” I say, “I don’t think you understand—”
“Oh, I understand more than you know. But not nearly as much as I’d like to. Now move. We don’t have all night.”
He shoves me again and this time I comply. My mind is churning, trying to find a way to communicate with him, but there are ears everywhere. Maybe wherever he is taking me will be soundproof. In the meantime my best course of action is to go along with what he wants, and not compromise the only ally I have—not that he thinks he’s any ally of mine.
The two guards are slumped outside my cell, leaning against the wall. Kilían steers me around them and down the passageway, in the direction of the interrogation chamber. He unlocks the door and pushes me through.
“Efraím already interrogated me,” I say, twisting to look at him. “I don’t know what you think you’re going to accomplish—”
“Shut up,” he says. “You traitor.”
“No,” I protest. “I’m not, Kilían, I swear. Not the way you think.”
“I told you to shut up.” He locks the door behind us and grabs my upper arm again. “I’m not interrogating you, Bellator Marteinn. Oh, no. You’ll do that all on your own.”
“What are you talking about?”
“You’ll see.” Fingers digging into my arm, he marches me through the interrogation chamber and into a smaller room I’ve never seen before. Illuminated by wall-mounted torches, it’s empty save for a jute mat and a large fireplace, piled high with branches. Dark blue berries cling to the tightly woven green needles.
“That’s juniper,” I say to Kilían, who has locked the door behind us and is standing with his back against it, as if to prevent my escape. The torchlight casts grotesque shadows on his face, transforming his features into elongated, monstrous shapes. His hair gleams red, then auburn, then brown as he turns to face me.
“Very good, Marteinn,” he says, and, moving forward, pulls one of the torches from the wall. “The Bellatorum use it to induce trance states, to achieve a higher sense of discipline and focus. But you’ll find it’s also excellent at rendering one more susceptible to the questions and suggestions of others. It’s what Stinar and the Executor have in mind for you next—but I’ve usurped the privilege.”
He strides across the room and tosses the torch onto the stack of branches. Immediately they begin to smolder, white smoke drifting up the chimney and out into the room. “You’re trained in resisting interrogatio
n techniques, Marteinn,” he says, swiveling to face me. “But no one taught you how to withstand this.”
The smoke fills my lungs, making me dizzy, and I struggle to keep my feet. I consider holding my breath, the way I did in the tank—but then I change my mind. If this is what it takes for him to believe me, I’ll marinate myself in juniper fumes, and welcome.
“Ask me whatever you want, Kilían,” I manage. “I have nothing to hide from you.” Aside from the fact that I’m transforming into some kind of beast. “I’m on your side.”
He digs in his weapons belt for a mask, which he hooks over his ears, covering his nose and mouth. “You’ll say anything, won’t you? No conscience whatsoever. What a bellator you would have made.”
Try as I might to stay standing, I lose the battle. My knees buckle, and I sink onto the jute mat. My eyes blink, then flutter closed. The resinous smell of burning juniper singes my throat, and a strange sensation floods my body, as if I’m floating.
Kilían’s voice comes to me from a great distance, echoing throughout the room. “What is your name?”
Without conscious volition I feel my mouth move, forming a reply. “Eva Marteinn.”
“And who are you, Eva Marteinn?”
“I am—I was—a bellator.”
“Are you not anymore?” His voice betrays only mild curiosity.
“I followed Ari to the resistance camp. I listened to Ronan. And then—then the Commonwealth bombed them.” I hear my voice break, catch. “When we fled back through the tunnels, seeking sanctuary, the bellators confronted us. They would have killed Ari. They wanted me, so I pretended to go along with their plan. Then I threw the grenade. I helped Ari escape. I don’t know what they want from me. But I can’t endorse what they have done.”
“What they have done.” His tone is quiet, considering. “Westergaard’s mother is dead. So are seventeen others. Their deaths are on your heads.”