by T. C. Edge
He nods. “It was a large part of it. They don’t expect Savants to care when things are taken from us. They don’t realise how different some of us are. Something changed inside me that day. It felt like…like my emotions were set free, more than most others. I loved Amelia, I was happy with her. And they took her away from me. It’s the same for so many people across this city, so many broken lives…”
He reaches to the table and takes up his wine. The crease on his forehead, usually so smooth, has grown deeper, more pronounced.
“I was already working for the Institute of Human Relations then,” he continues. “I found the Nameless soon after, and offered my services as a spy. We’ve been waiting for someone like you ever since, Brie. Someone to carry out this mission. Your brother…he knew you were out there somewhere. And now he’s found you, we can finish this together. You and me.”
Now it’s him who takes my hand. I feel my lungs emptying, my body warming as he looks at me. I remember back to our first date here in this apartment. He’d said something off the cuff…said I reminded him of someone.
Was he talking about Amelia? Was he talking about his wife?
A longing engulfs me. I want to move closer to him, but hold myself back. Now isn’t the time.
It may never be the time.
“I’ll do everything I can to avenge your wife,” I tell him. “I promise you, Adryan, that I’ll make those responsible pay.”
“We’ll make them pay together, Brie. For Amelia. For your parents. For thousands of others who have been killed or cast to the shadows. Director Cromwell will have his day of reckoning.”
His day of reckoning…
Like the Nameless said, when they hijacked the video feed. The day of reckoning is coming.
It is, one way or another.
And it’s coming up fast.
76
I don’t stay with Adryan that evening.
I’m afraid of putting a single foot wrong now, however minor it might seem. Despite his invite to do so, I ask that he take me back to the western gate, and he does so without further question.
Before he drops me off, I reiterate the haste with which we need to act now. He assures me that he can accelerate things with the Council of Matrimony now that we’ve concluded our third date. Usually, that’s the fewest number of times a courting couple can meet before they determine their suitability for one another.
“I’ll speak with them first thing in the morning, and ask them to arrange your approval test at the earliest possible convenience,” he tells me. “It should only be a day or two.”
“And then?”
“Then we can marry immediately. As I’ve told you before, marriage here involves no pomp and ceremony, and it involves no planning. The Council will ensure that we’re immediately given approval, assuming you pass your test, and we will then be assigned to a suitable apartment in the High Tower.”
“Right, OK. And once we’re married? Surely I’ll be given some assignment, some duty, to perform around here?”
“That may or may not come later,” he informs me. “Some Unenhanced work, others don’t. But that’s not something to worry about now. Depending on how things go, your time in Inner Haven may be short. We’ll have time to figure that one once you’re here permanently.”
I nod and suck in a lengthy breath. This is getting real now. More real by the day.
And with Agent Woolf breathing down my neck, it’s getting more desperate and dangerous too.
Before I depart the vehicle, I feel the urge to apologise to Adryan once more. I do so by way of a kiss on the cheek, my lips brushing against his gritty stubble.
“I’m sorry for bringing that memory to the surface,” I whisper. “I can…try to conceal it if you want? It might ease the pain?”
He shakes his head firmly.
“I’d never lose it, Brie. Not ever,” he says a little frostily. Perhaps the suggestion wasn’t appropriate. “I don’t want to forget her. And I don’t want to lose my hate either. They both fuel me; love for her, hate for them. Even a Savant can be driven by such emotion.”
I feel a bit foolish for making the offer, and slide from the car under the cool glow of the moon. Adryan’s voice comes once more, turning me before I walk to the gate.
“I’ll see you soon, Brie. And the next time I do, we’ll be married.”
He smiles at me, showing a set of pearly white teeth that catch the celestial light from above.
I pay back the look with my own smile. It fades as soon as I turn away from him.
Just before I reach the western gate, it dawns on me that I don’t actually have an official pass to be out on the streets of Outer Haven after curfew. I slip through the door beside the gate and look upon the Brute on guard.
As always, it’s impossible for me to tell at a glance if he’s Magnus or not. The look on his face upon seeing me – one of slight surprise – suggests this is the Brute who’s currently on night duty.
“Um, what’s your business in Inner Haven?” he asks.
OK, definitely not Magnus.
“Courting,” I say.
“Ah, I see,” he says, surveying my clothing. “Do you have a pass?”
I shake my head.
“I didn’t expect to be this late. Could you issue me one?”
“I can give you a temporary one,” he says. “I’ll have to confirm your identity first. I assume you passed through earlier, when my colleague was on duty?”
“Oh, you mean Magnus?”
“Yes, you know him do you?”
“I’ve passed this way a few times now, so we’ve got chatting once or twice. But, actually, today I didn’t pass this way. I was escorted inside. It’s…a long story.”
“Right, well don’t worry about that now,” he booms. “Just tell me your name and I can confirm who you are.”
“It’s Brie Melrose. I live at Carmichael’s academy, over in district 5 in this quarter.”
I wait for the name to strike a chord with him. He doesn’t appear to recognise it, or me. It’s quite refreshing to be unknown for once.
A quick check of his forearm interface, however, confirms my identity. Satisfied, he goes about issuing me a temporary pass, instructing me that it’ll only last for this evening and that, should I continue to return late after my dates, I’ll require a more permanent one.
“Don’t worry,” he adds. “It does happen quite often, girls coming back late without the proper paperwork and passes. Of course, curfew is much earlier these days than usual, so a few more girls like you have been caught out. No matter, though, that’ll get you home safe. Good evening to you, Miss Melrose.”
As per usual, he turns out to be perfectly polite. I wonder if it’s just a requirement of this particular post, or just a general characteristic that all Brutes share. To think that I used to be so frightened of them, plodding about and casting their giant shadows down the street.
Looks can certainly be deceiving, that’s for sure.
Holding the small pass in my hand, I wander home with a busy mind, my thoughts rushing far faster than my feet.
Mostly, despite my close shave with Agent Woolf, it’s Adryan’s memory that dominates. To have suffered the loss of a wife he loved so young is a terrible fate, a terrible curse. A woman who, barring the most diluted of Hawk blood, was a Savant through and through.
And yet they took her anyway, killed her simply because of the slightest of chances that she might bear a hybrid child. Their lust for total control is so all consuming that, in the end, it blinds them to the effects their doctrine has.
The Consortium and Director Cromwell, up on their perch, may not even know of the hatred they’re brewing across the city, even among some of their own kind. Their inability to empathise might just turn out to be their undoing. As if nature is fighting back, re-determining the natural order of things, wiping clean the slate so that these emotionless vessels, masquerading as human, no longer hold all the cards.
As I walk through the inne
r districts of the western quarter, the sight of Con-Cop patrols and City Guards break my mental wanderings. My immediate instinct is to slip away into the shadows, activate my Dasher powers and work my way back to district 5 in secret.
But then I remember that, for once, I’m walking these streets legally. That my presence here is totally acceptable.
Passing by the nearest patrol, I’m immediately approached. I hold my pass to the Con-Cops and they inspect it silently, before nodding me on.
The same thing happens a couple more times before I reach Brick Lane, my path unhindered and only slowed very briefly. By the time I enter back into the academy, the hour has clicked past midnight, into a new day. A day during which Adryan will apply for me to be tested, and for us to be married, and for an apartment in the High Tower to be prepared and outfitted.
It will all happen quickly now, and I have no concerns about the approval test. After battling with my brother, and sparring with Agent Woolf, a test to determine my commitment to Inner Haven should be simple enough to beat.
So, essentially, I am now engaged. It’s not quite how I envisioned my nuptials. But then again, becoming a wife is hardly something I’ve ever lent much thought to.
The main hall in the academy is silent when I step in, only the security light on the wall glowing. Moving to the spiral staircase, I see another glow from down the corridor at the back, emanating from beneath the common room door.
I find myself gravitating towards it. The door is slightly ajar, silent inside. I assume that someone has merely left the light on, and so step through to shut it off.
But the room isn’t empty. I look to the sofa and see Tess sitting alone, in silence and thought. Her eyes look sad and weary, her body curled up a little in a protective posture.
A flash of memory in my mind takes me back nearly a decade to when she first came here. When she was just a shade, drifting silently around, hiding constantly in her shell.
She adopts the same image now, and I feel a pulsing sadness in my heart at the sight.
Her eyes lift and see me, and for a few moments we just stare at each other. There’s still so much I want to say, to tell her. I want to sit and share my life with her as I always have. I want her advice, her support, her dry humour. To hear her words in my ears again, and to laugh as we have so often.
And I want to hear about her life too. I want to ask how work is going. I want to sit and chat about anything and everything. I want my best friend back.
I want my sister back.
But nothing that I want comes true now. It can’t. Not now, and maybe not ever. I can’t put her in danger. I won’t.
I love her too much for that.
Instead, a short silence that seems to last an age descends. So much feeling passes back and forward between our eyes. Sadness, anger, disappointment, longing. And when I finally speak, it’s empty words that fall from my lips.
“Sorry, I thought the room was empty,” is all I say.
I begin sliding back to leave the room. Every single exchange I have with her now is similarly terse, similarly tense. It’s the same with just about everyone in my life.
Whether it’s Mrs Carmichael or Zander or Adryan, or anyone else for that matter, there’s always this current of fate to everything we say, everything we do. A burden sitting upon every word, weighing down every conversation.
Nothing is light or unimportant now. There’s no time for laughter or gossip. My world has changed too much for that. I have changed too much for that.
I wonder, right now, standing here in front of my oldest and best friend, if I’ll ever be able to properly laugh again, even when all this is over. Maybe I’ve been changed, just like Adryan has. Irreparably so.
I’m almost out of the room when I hear Tess’s soft voice.
“Brie…”
I stop, turning my eyes back to her. They look so sad and weary. The hostility and bitterness they usually carry these days when they look at me is absent. I find myself drawn into the quiet room a little further.
I move to the sofa and her eyes follow me. I sit beside her, my heart pounding inside my chest, and wait for her to speak again.
“How…how are you?” she asks delicately. “I’ve barely seen you since…since I found you, on the floor in our room. You were sick. And your hands.”
Her eyes fall to them. They’re fully healed now.
“I’m OK,” I say. “It was…nothing.”
I fight the urge to explain, to tell her what’s going on. Something so powerful, so primal in me wants to share it with her. It feels unnatural to keep things hidden, to lie with such abandon.
She doesn’t appear surprised by my silence. Her eyes now drift to my clothes, to the light blue colours of the Unenhanced in Inner Haven.
“How was the date?” she asks.
I have to give her something. She’s trying, and she’s trying hard. My standoffishness isn’t putting her off. She’s making a proper effort, and so should I.
“It was good,” I say. “He cooked me dinner. And we had some wine. He’s not like I expected.”
“A Savant? He’s a Savant, isn’t he?”
I nod, a smile forming and then fading.
“He’s more like a normal person, though. He’s got emotions. He’s…he’s a good man, Tess.”
Now a smile, perhaps a little forced, ripples across her face.
Another silence falls, and I look into her bright blue eyes. In a flash I want to speed inside her, to find out what she really thinks of me. To find out about her life without having to ask.
I creep forward instinctively, still unable to fully control myself, to control my powers at times of high emotion. I dip into her thoughts and find a great sadness in her, her animosity towards me dwarfed by it, drowned by her own desire to see our friendship renewed.
I snap myself out of it, and blink hard. When I look at her eyes again, a hood has fallen, and her own eyes stare for a moment before turning away.
The tension seems to rise. I break the new quiet.
“I’m getting married,” I say.
The words flow out without approval, without any thought at all. Tess turns back to me, and I sense a battle inside her. The sadness seems to flare, but not because of me, because I appear to be happy. It’s a selfish sadness, but one I understand. A sadness that emanates from our diverging lives, our paths that are splitting us up, seemingly for good.
“I’m so happy for you,” she says.
The words are compulsory. Her pulse starts to rise, and her lungs appear to drain. And her eyes, her beautiful blue eyes, begin fading out.
“We’ll still be able to see each other,” I say.
I can feel it’s what she wants to hear. Despite the current state of our relationship, the main concern in her is seeing her best friend’s life move on, while hers remains stagnant.
“How do you know?” she asks, dipping her eyes briefly.
“I’ll make sure of it, Tess. Maybe…maybe I could even help you get into a bachelor ball? You could join me in Inner Haven?”
I immediately realise the words are inadvisable. It’s a promise I can’t keep, and wouldn’t want to anyway. I’m not going to be in Inner Haven for long.
She shakes her head, to my surprise.
“You don’t have to do that, Brie. I don’t want any help. I don’t…need any help.”
The shadows seem to creep back up on her. The last thing I want is to sound patronising, not when we appear to be making the slightest bit of progress.
“I know you don’t,” I concede. “Either way, I’ll be coming back here, I promise.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. It won’t be on my account. We haven’t exactly been that close recently…”
“Tess.”
The firm use of her name compels eye contact. She obliges, and I continue.
“Whatever’s happened between us recently, you’ll always be my best friend. You’ll always be my sister.”
The smallest of smiles thr
eatens to climb. This one isn’t forced. Inside her, I feel a fire lighting at my words.
“You are too,” she says quietly. “My sister…”
Her smile hovers. Mine now builds, growing tall. I reach across and pull her into a hug, and suddenly we both start breathing loudly, letting our lungs work properly for the first time since I entered the room.
“I’m so sorry I’ve been short with you recently,” I say. “I’ve just been going through some stuff. I…I just can’t talk about it…”
She pulls away, shaking her head.
“You don’t need to explain. I should be the one apologising, Brie. I’ve been a child. Immature. You’re the best person I know. I should trust you more. If there are things you don’t want to tell me, that’s OK. I…I understand.”
I drag her into another hug. It feels so good to have her say that, some of the weight I’m carrying around lifting. A fresh weariness grips at me, and I feel my room calling, my bed calling. A place that, for a while now, has felt uninviting and frosty, my own home no longer a place of refuge.
But now, maybe, that will change. Just at the time when I’m about to leave.
Standing, I nod to the door.
“It’s late,” I say. “We should sleep.”
Her own tired eyes suggest agreement. I get the impression that the room has also become a place of discomfort for her too. That she’s been spending plenty of time down here in the common room, alone, away from her troubles.
No longer.
She stands too, and together we go upstairs, and climb into our own beds, and say goodnight to each other as we always used to.
And with that burden slipping from my shoulders, I fall into a rare, untroubled, sleep.
77
Adryan is true to his word. The following morning brings with it a letter from the Council of Matrimony, confirming the date of my approval examination.
It’s brought to my room by Mrs Carmichael, waking me with some brisk knocking. I croak for her to come in and check my watch to see that it’s nearing midday already.
Tess’s bed is empty, as it always appears to be. Yet this morning, the sight doesn’t bring a sense of deflation to my insides. Instead, the memory of our reconciliation the previous night brings a smile.