Stolen Page 15

  “Don’t,” she said softly. “It’s not funny.”

  “I didn’t think it was,” he said mildly.

  They stared at each other. Maybe it was just too overwhelming to see one’s beloved after months of wishing and hoping and dreaming. They were too shy, unsure if the other still felt the same as before. And so they had reverted to their sharp tongues, to their cool façades. When underneath, her heart was burning. And the way he was looking at her right now . . . like he couldn’t believe she was there, like he wanted to eat her up, kneel at her feet and ravish her, all at the same moment—if only he would—

  God, she loved him. Future or no future. Even with all the broken promises. What was a promise anyway? She wanted him. I want you, Ryan Wesson. Always and forever.

  Now she just had to swallow her pride and admit it. Wes, come back to me, she wanted to say, but the words wouldn’t come out.

  So he shrugged, broke her gaze, and soon he was gone with the rest, lost to the snow.

  Chapter 27

  IT WAS HARD TO LEAVE NAT AGAIN, almost worse than before, because at least the first time they had parted with a kiss and a promise. This time it was as if she didn’t even care what happened to him; she barely even said good-bye. Wes gritted his teeth, his cheeks burning from the cold wind, and swore that he wouldn’t let that happen again. What kind of game were they playing? This was not how he imagined their reunion, but then he hadn’t accounted for her drau bodyguard, either. He had been kidding about having that guy read their minds; he didn’t want that creepy consciousness anywhere near his. And while it hurt to leave her behind, he knew she was safer there, away from the greed of the crazed High Priestess and the flesh markets that sold every kind of meat—to eat, use or abuse, from bed slaves to powdered bones.

  He led his team onward, passing the ruined debris of yet another glorious city from the past. Offshore, a cruise ship rested on its side, its hull wrapped in ice, waves pounding the warped metal. This had been a resort town once, in the time before. A century ago, families vacationed here. They rode Jet Skis and made sand castles. Wes and his boys picked their way through the snow, passing ancient souvenir stands filled with warped postcards with pictures of blue skies and cheerful umbrellas dotting the now-frozen shore.

  A child of the postapocalypse, Wes could never shake the feeling that he had arrived too late to some grand party, that by the time he’d been born the lights were off and the dance floor was scuffed and littered with stubbed-out cigarettes and empty champagne bottles—the remainders of a party the likes of which the world would never see again. Not that he’d ever been to that kind of party, but he’d been to enough Studio 54 nights at Ice to make the connection. Although at the bar, patrons only smoked electronic ciggies and drank champagne-flavored Nutri. Nutri Bubble, it was called, and it tasted gross.

  Farouk eyed the ancient cruise ship. “Bet there’s some great swag on board. When that cruiser sank, people ran off, left everything behind.” Farouk was always looking for souvenirs, for stuff he could sell in K-Town or on the black markets. Silverware or old computer parts could buy him a weekend in Ho Ho City. The kid was too easily distracted.

  “We’ll swim for souvenirs after we’ve found Liannan and Eliza. For now, let’s focus,” Wes said. He didn’t know how long Eliza had or if she was even alive. But moving quickly gave them a better chance for a positive outcome. Command wasn’t known for its efficiency, and Wes was counting on a few days before they freed the helicopter team and Bradley discovered that he had gone AWOL. Of course, Wes had always planned to break the agreement, but he had wanted to do it at the right time, when he held all the cards, when he knew Eliza was safe. But he was playing a losing game, and he was down to his last stack.

  Wes and his team sloshed through the muck, past a shopping mall submerged in a glacier of black ice. Beyond the mall stood the skeletal remains of a few hotels and office buildings. Storms had ripped the windows from their frames, so only the columns remained, the steel red with rust.

  The road they were taking crested a hill, and across the water they saw an island with a mountain in the center, its snowy peaks lost to the gray clouds. At the base of it was a shiny white temple with a statue of an elephant in the front courtyard.

  “The Grand Temple; it’s built right against the mountain,” said Farouk. “In front of the temple is the market where you can, uh, buy things.”

  Things.

  Talismans created from the bones of the marked. Their ashes were turned into “magic powder,” their bones used as good-luck charms. Wes felt a chill from the very thought while next to him Shakes looked furious.

  “Your clients risked the black waters to visit this place?” asked Wes.

  “Not really. Most just send runners to buy goods from the market that they bring back to the domes. Wife needs a fertility treatment or some other miracle cure or potion the priests sell. But the bigwigs talked about it all the time, how visiting the Red City was high up on their bucket list. Shopping at the markets, and taking a turn at the abattoir.”

  “Abattoir?” Wes asked.

  “Yeah, some kind of activity the priests run. Not sure what it is, supposed to be some kind of maze or something, or target practice maybe; they kept talking about the ‘white hunt,’” said Farouk.

  “Huh.” Wes didn’t like the sound of that. “I guess we’ll find out soon enough.”

  “I guess so. You know, boss, that little move we made in El Dorado means I’m banned from New Veg. They’ll have my head for busting up that limo.” Farouk laughed, once, because none of it was really very funny. “Icehole.”

  Wes couldn’t even manage a smile. “I don’t think any of us are going back when this is over.” He turned to Farouk. “I appreciate it, man.”

  “You should; this job doesn’t even pay,” Farouk said with a grin.

  Shakes laughed. “Charity begins with Ryan Wesson, haven’t you learned that by now, ’Rouk?”

  “You kidding? I’m, like, the president of that charity.” Farouk held out his hands. “What else do you want from me?”

  “You’ll learn.” Shakes clapped him on the back.

  “Yeah, I’ll learn it the way I learn everything.”

  “The hard way?” Shakes held up his fist.

  “No doubt.” Farouk pounded it.

  “You two iceholes done?” Wes rolled his eyes, but he felt gratified to have his friends with him, and wished he could offer them something more than just a life on the lam if they were lucky enough to survive this rescue. “All right, anyone asks, we’re runners working for Diamond Jim,” he said. “He needs some luck to put in his lucky dice.”

  “DJ? Didn’t his casino burn down last month?” asked Shakes.

  “In a ball of flame. But no one out here knows what’s going on back home. The name might buy us some credibility,” Wes said.

  Farouk tapped the gun on his shoulder and nodded. “Should be a cakewalk.”

  “Like the rest of this?” Shakes quirked an eyebrow.

  “Yeah, I’m a freezing baker,” Wes said, with a sigh. He looked at Shakes. “Practically management material.”

  • • •

  They left the ruins and came upon the new city. New Kandy was similar to New Vegas, a metropolis that bloomed in the ice around a desirable commodity. But if Vegas was in the business of marketing hope, luck, desire—a chance to win against the odds—New Kandy trafficked in darker stuff. It flowered beneath the mountain, at the foot of the white temple, and the hotels and inns that ringed the city served the needs of the tourists and the runners who came to buy the goods gleaned from the magical dead.

  It was a racket, to be sure, just like New Vegas.

  Only the stakes were higher.

  Wes couldn’t help but feel a chill up his spine as they entered the city proper, following a road that led to the port. The streets were filled with
white-garbed priests and their acolytes, runners in their usual hodgepodge garb, slavers with their tattooed faces, swarms of soldiers giving everyone a cautious eye. The whole place weirded him out. Between Dorado and NV and here, he thought, I’d pick the ocean full of garbage.

  The pier at the end of the road was new and shiny, cast in stainless steel to resist the toxic waters. The priests had cleared the debris and ice from the area around the pier. With the snow absent, the trash gone, the place looked half civilized.

  They joined a group waiting for the ferry to arrive, made up mostly of runners like them, scraggly teams of ex-military types, who didn’t blink an eye at their presence. Wes was glad for the company. Runners kept their mouths shut and didn’t ask stupid questions. He sipped on a green Nutri Veggie and popped open a burger squeezer, trying not to wince at the puddinglike texture. Not too long after they arrived, a ferryboat appeared on the horizon, emblazoned with the words TEMPLE TRANSPORT on its side.

  Easy enough.

  As the boat drifted into the dock, sailors wearing white jackets leapt from the ferry, tossing ropes, mooring the white ship. Planks were drawn and connected, and soon tourists were exiting the ferry. Most were civilians, and their snug-fitting white heat suits and oxygen helmets said they were wealthy. These were the ones who literally could not breathe the same air as the rabble, air that was too toxic, too common. They were probably from the dome cities like El Dorado. This was an adventure for them, a taste of how the other half lived. Wes couldn’t help but hate them, and stifled an impulse to break their silly helmets. He overheard a few of the tourists talking about a “good hunt” and boasted about getting one “right between the eyes,” and the queasy feeling in his stomach returned. It had to be some kind of illegal safari, although it was unclear what kind of game preserve could exist here. There was only that mountain and the temple.

  Once the tourists were off the boat, the priests in the white jackets drew a second plank, opening a lower hold. Steerage passengers disembarked, runners in gray flack jackets and winter-white camouflage like theirs.

  Finally it was time to board. “How much?” Wes asked when it was their turn.

  “Everyone is welcome to visit the temple,” said the temple representative on the dock, a fat, smiling young priest with a face full of white powder and chalk on his hands. “But it will cost extra to sit on the main level.”

  “Fine, we’ll take last class,” said Wes, taking three tickets that gave them access to the lower berth.

  As they settled into the bowels of the boat, Wes, who didn’t believe in anything but the cold, said a little prayer to keep his sister and his friends safe. He didn’t know to whom he was praying, as religion hadn’t been part of his upbringing. He thought he might have been praying to Nat’s drakon. At the very least, the drakon had saved them once, and Wes could see no reason why it couldn’t again.

  Cakewalk, he thought, dropping his head into his hands.

  Chapter 28

  SO WES WAS GONE, AGAIN. NAT TRIED to tell herself it wasn’t a big deal. Caring was hard, apathy easy. When she was a prisoner at MacArthur Med, her superiors had made her believe she was incapable of emotion, of any compassion or attachment. As she stood outside the chopper, watching him disappear into the mist, behind the tall snowbanks, leading Shakes and Farouk toward the ferry port, she wished she were incapable of any feeling. Patient unable to love, the doctors had written in her chart. She wished they had been right, because then she wouldn’t be feeling the hurt she was feeling now.

  Nat felt a comforting hand on her shoulder. Faix was standing next to her.

  You should have told him how you felt, he sent.

  I know, but I was too proud to admit my feelings, she replied.

  I once thought as you do, and suffered for it. One day, he will be gone, and only your regret will remain.

  She blinked away her tears. Faix was right. Life was too short and time too precious to waste. The next time she saw Wes, she would tell him, even if it meant she would be vulnerable, even if it meant acknowledging that she was the weaker one.

  Love does not make you weak; it is the absence of it that does, sent Faix. “But alas, I must leave you for now,” he said, in his speaking voice. It was then that she noticed he was wearing new armor, gleaming white like his hair, and had a long sword strapped to his back. Shaping the ether must come in handy when you needed a change of wardrobe, she thought with a smile, even though she was disconcerted by his announcement.

  “Leave? Why? Where are you going? Back to Vallonis?”

  He shook his head. “Someone whom I have been looking for called to me while I was resting.”

  “Who? Don’t tell me I’m not your only student?” Nat tried to smile, but the thought of Faix leaving any of this to her alone was already making her heart pound.

  “Remember the spell book I told you about, the one that was used in the binding of magic to the world? The one that is locked in the Gray Tower?”

  She remembered. “The Archimedes Palimpsest.”

  He nodded. “I saw something in a dream while we were flying. I think I know where the thief is hiding,” he said, looking like a ghost in the snow, his hair blending with the swirling flakes, his pale skin icy.

  “Where?”

  “Somewhere beneath that mountain”—he nodded, motioning to the island across the way—“very close by.”

  “And you can’t wait? What about Wes? How will we know if they run into something they can’t handle? You were supposed to monitor their thoughts.”

  Faix’s eyes glittered with amusement. “You can do the same.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Yes, you can; you’ve shut them out deliberately because you can hear them. But now you must listen for them.”

  Nat felt a little abashed that he knew she was pretending she wasn’t gifted with the same power. She had meant to tune it out, not wanting to pry, but now that she felt she had permission, she could hear them clearly. Shakes, thinking of Liannan, hoping to find her soon, worried, anxious, yet excited to be reunited with his beloved; Farouk, bitching to himself about the cold, but shouldering on, wondering when they would be able to eat. Wes . . . that was strange . . . she couldn’t hear Wes . . . why was that? Maybe because she wanted to hear him so badly, or maybe she was protecting herself from knowing how he felt about her, as it would be too much like snooping. She could tune into Shakes and Farouk, and that was enough.

  “Never underestimate your power,” Faix was saying. “I have seen the fates in the glass. You remain the hope of Vallonis. Before it disappeared, I was able to read a few words from the palimpsest. ‘The Resurrection of the Flame will light the world,’” he said, tapping her collarbone. “Take care, Nat. You are nothing like the small insect for which you are named.” His mouth twisted into something close to a smile.

  “Faix—” She felt bereft suddenly, to think of losing him, too, so soon after Wes.

  “Take heart: If I am right about this, it will change everything for the better, and we will surely see each other again. This is not good-bye, only farewell.” Then he was gone, disappearing into the ether as simply as winking out a light.

  Roark stumbled out of the chopper, blinking his eyes. “Did I just see . . . ?”

  “Yeah. He left,” she said, feeling terribly alone.

  “Good riddance.”

  She shook her head. “You still don’t get it. He’s fighting for the same thing we are.”

  “What is that? I forget.” Roark smiled.

  “For us. Everyone. For the survival of the Blue. To fix this broken world,” she said softly. What did Faix mean by that? That she was the hope of Vallonis? That her fire would light the world? But there was no time to ponder, for there was movement on the horizon. She squinted. “Do you see that?”

  “Aye,” Roark said, fingering his dagger.

  A w
hite military truck moved in the distance—the blizzard, acting as a camouflage, made it hard to see until now. “How many?” Nat whispered.

  “Too many for us to handle,” Roark replied grimly.

  “Let’s get back in the chopper,” she whispered. “Maybe they won’t see us.” He nodded, and they crept back into the helicopter and closed the door.

  “What?” Brendon asked, when he saw their faces.

  Cone was about to speak when Nat put a finger to her mouth and gestured out the window. The stout boy’s face turned crimson with fear when he saw the truck. They all held their breath as it moved past them slowly.

  Roark and Brendon huddled together in the first row of seats. The smallmen had spent weeks in a detention center, where they’d endured long hours of isolation, little food, no sunlight. She wanted to console them, but she didn’t know how. She’d never had a mother, a family. Help them stay alive—that’s all I can do. Nat felt claustrophobic, and her legs ached from crouching. She hoped the truck would pass soon, and after what felt like an eternity, she stuck her head above the seats to try to see outside.

  “Looks like we’re okay,” she said, just as a gloved finger tapped the windowpane.

  “Open up,” a hoarse voice called.

  Nat looked down, now understanding that she hadn’t seen the truck anywhere because the soldiers had come on foot and surrounded the chopper. Freeze it. Rookie mistake. She and her friends would be captured unless she acted quickly, just as Faix had done when he’d disarmed the soldiers on the navy cruiser.

  Use the ether. Use your power.

  She imagined their guns torn from their hands, flying through the air, the soldiers knocked out cold in the snow. But when she opened her eyes, they were still standing there, more irritated than before.

  Don’t hurt us. Go away. Leave us alone.

  She tried again, but the soldiers remained where they were, stoic, immobile, their guns cocked and ready to fire.

  Freezing ice!

  “Open up, I won’t ask again,” the soldier warned.