Black River Falls (8 page)

“It's fine.”

“You sure? I had a colorist take a whack at it since I thought it'd be my big finale and all.”

His last drawing was of Cardinal. Of course it was. He was in a classic Cardinal pose, arms and wings outstretched as he soared over Liberty City, the noonday sun shining off his armor and the towers of the city below him. His wings extended out beyond the edge of the page, each feather meticulously detailed. His colors of scarlet, black, and white were rendered perfectly, deep but bright. The only real difference was that where Dad usually drew Cardinal as a kind of burlier Iron Man, Gonzalez had gone the other way. His drawings made Cardinal look leaner and more graceful, like a dancer.

“I guess it's kind of like a tribute,” he said. “I can totally take it out if you think—”

“No,” I said automatically, not really hearing him, or myself. “It's fine. Really.”

“It's just that without your dad's stories I probably would've ended up another loser grinding it out in the Bronx, you know? I mean, I must have read those comics a thousand times. I had the single issues
and
all the trades. And I wasn't one of those poseurs who started reading after all the awards. I was there from the start! I've even got this guy in the city says he has a line on some of your dad's scripts for what would have been Volume Five.”

“He's lying,” I said. “There is no Volume Five.”

Gonzalez kept going—talking about Dad and how his Cardinal stories had inspired him, first to join the Guard and then to be an artist—but I was too distracted by a twisted-up feeling in my gut to really hear him anymore. It was a strange thing, Tenn, to wish you could see your father the way a stranger did.

Gonzalez was interrupted by a burst of static from his radio, followed by a muffled voice.

“Surveyor One, this is Homeland. We need you back at the line, over.”

“Ah, damn it. Duty calls.” He grabbed the mic clipped to his shoulder. “Acknowledged, Homeland.”

Gonzalez started gathering his things.

“Oh, hey,” he said. “I gotta ask.”

“Ask what?”

Gonzalez dipped his head and looked at me from beneath an arched eyebrow. “You get yourself a green-haired girlfriend and not tell me?”

Right. That.
“She's just this girl. I came across a couple of guys trying to run the lost wife scam on her.”

“So you strapped on your Cardinal wings and saved the day, huh?”

“Just in the wrong place at the wrong time, I guess.”

“What were you doing in town anyway?”

“Snow Cone needed meds for that rash,” I said. “Greer had enough to worry about.”

Gonzalez nodded. “So you brought the girl up here?”

“Didn't see any other choice. That shelter of yours—”

“Yeah, I know. It sucks.” He took a breath. “I can cover for you on the girl. With everything that's going on, Raney's probably going to be too busy to give a damn for a while anyway. Just keep her out of sight. No more Buffy the Pedophile Slayer.”

I nodded.

“And for real,” he said. “You guys keep your heads down. Whatever Raney's intentions are, tread lightly. You're not careful, the Eye of Sauron's gonna turn your way. Picture our Mr. Raney leading a platoon of orcs and wargs right up Lucy's Promise. You got me?”

“Yeah. I got you.”

Gonzalez slipped into his backpack and helmet. I started to hand him the sketchbook but he waved it off. “It's okay. Spend some time with them. I'll be back before the pullout. You can give me your professional opinion then. All right?”

I nodded.

“I'll owe you, man. Ten percent of my millions. For life!”

We said good night, and then his boots crunched through the trees, slowly fading out until I was alone in the dark. Or until I
thought
I was.

“I swear, Cassidy, you kill me.”

Greer was standing in a patch of moonlight on the other side of the stream, grinning. I set the sketchpad down and pulled my mask back on.

“Black River has always prided itself on being a diverse community,
” he said, chuckling as he came through the trees. “I don't care what everybody says, you're funny.”

“Anybody else out there?” I asked.

“Few other Marvins looking around near the base of the mountain.”

“They see you?”

“Please. I got within five feet and they just stood there picking their noses. So! What did Lieutenant Supernerd have to say?”

“He can cover for us on the girl,” I said. “Thinks Raney's probably too busy to worry about her right now anyway.”

Greer plopped down on the streambed across from me. “So he didn't seem so bad, right? Raney?”

I looked over at him.

“What?” Greer said. “I'm serious. He said nothing's going to change.”

“He said he saw no reason
right now
for anything to change,” I corrected him. “It was a threat, Greer.”

“Come on.”

“He was making sure we knew he could change his mind anytime he wanted. I mean, seriously, didn't you think it was a little weird that he didn't come down on us at
all?
Why not?”

“Fine. Maybe it's weird. But the kids
could
use some fun. Not to mention new clothes.”

“We don't know anything about him,” I said. “We start taking favors from him now, then—”

“I know, I know. He's gonna turn out to be some kind of lizard person who wants to eat our faces off. But how about we deal with that
after
we get everybody some new underwear?”

Greer kept on chattering away, but his voice faded out just like Gonzalez's had. The sketchbook had fallen open to a drawing of Black Panther. I went to close it but ended up flipping ahead until I came to the end again, to Cardinal. The way the moonlight washed out the colors, it looked like those early pages, the ones you and I shared as the snow fell on the fire escape outside our window. I could almost feel you beside me as I traced the curve of Cardinal's wing with my fingertips.

“I'm coming with you,” I said.

Greer stopped whatever he was saying and turned to me. “What?”

I looked up. “Tomorrow morning. To find those kids. I'm coming with you.”

“Seriously?”

“There's a trail from here to Joseph's Point that doesn't go through town. We'll go first thing in the morning.”

“But what about Gonzalez? And Raney?”

“As soon as we get those kids back here, we figure out where they belong and we get them there. Same with the green-haired girl.”

“Uh, yeah. Great.”

“Who knows,” I said. “Maybe we'll get lucky and they'll all have family in town just dying to take them back.”

Greer laced his fingers behind his head and lay back near the streambed.

“Us getting lucky,” he said. “I wonder what that'll feel like.”

By the time Greer and I made it back to camp, it was raining again. I stopped at the equipment shed to grab a few things before starting up the trail to look for the green-haired girl.

I found her not far from my own campsite. She was crouched between two boulders at the edge of the mountain. When I came out of the trees, she spun around, holding up one hand to ward off the glare of the flashlight. My knife was in her other hand. She held it just like she had held that shard of glass, marking out the borders of my world and hers with its tip.

“I brought you a tent,” I said. “It's not much, but it'll keep the rain off.”

The girl didn't say anything, so I backed away and started assembling it nearby. She didn't take her eyes off me the entire time. When I had it set up, I pulled the other things I'd brought her out of a backpack, holding up each one before putting it inside the tent.

“Flashlight. Dry sweatshirt and socks. One can of tuna and some crackers. Bottle of water.” I pointed back the way I'd come. “My camp is just a couple minutes down that path. If you need anything else—”

“I won't.”

There was nothing left to say, but I couldn't seem to leave. My eyes went to the knife in her hand. The rain splashed against it, sluicing down its sides and dripping off its row of teeth. I wanted it back, but the words wouldn't come. Maybe I wanted her to feel the way I did when I held it, like I was anchored in place. Or maybe I just didn't want her to see how much I needed it.

“Try to get some sleep,” I said. “Tomorrow we'll figure out where you belong.”

There was a rumble of thunder. I turned to go. Her voice cut through the rain behind me.

“What if I don't belong anywhere?”

I stopped. Turned back. The silver key around her neck glinted in the flashlight's beam.

“Everybody belongs somewhere.”

T
HE NEXT MORNING
, Greer and I found the boy and the girl cowering inside a shelter they'd constructed out of brush and a moldy tarp. They were all jutting bones and pale skin, livid with mosquito bites. The boy warned us away with a rusty butter knife, but after an hour or two of Greer's patient convincing the kid dropped it and they came with us.

When we got to the camp, they were both clearly overwhelmed, the boy most of all. He stood there rigid, his eyes wide. The girl went into big-sister mode. She grabbed his hand and drew him a little bit behind her, shielding his body with hers.

It was hard to blame him for being freaked out. The camp was in its usual state of semi-chaos. The kids were tearing from one end of the place to the other, cleaning cabins and hanging laundry on lines strung between the boys' cabin and the dining hall. Makela was running the show, like she always did. She stood on a chair at the center of camp, clipboard in hand, barking out instructions. Jenna and Crystal, her loyal minions and enforcers, flanked her.

Greer came up beside me. “Is it possible that Makela was the dictator of a small country in her past life?”

“What are they up to? It's not like them to clean without being asked.”

“They are a constant source of mystery,” Greer said. “Yo! Astrid!”

Greer whistled, and Astrid, Carrie, and Tomiko headed toward us. Dreamy girls with grubby hands and matted hair, they were the polar opposites of Makela and her friends.

Greer squatted down and drew the Joseph's Point kids close, one hand on each of their knobby shoulders. “My friends are going to find you some new clothes and something to eat. Okay?”

The boy looked at the girl, unsure until she nodded.

“Now, I'm going to warn you,” Greer added with great seriousness. “These three girls are very,
very
weird. They might try to talk to you about your auras or make you fingerpaint your feelings.”

“Greer,”
Carrie complained, clearly loving that he was talking about her, even if it was to make fun.

Astrid lifted the hem of her long, flowery skirt and dropped to her knees in front of the two children. Her white-blond hair practically glowed under a pink handkerchief.

“I bet you two are hungry, right? Well, my friend Tomiko here just happens to be the best baker in the whole entire universe. Want her to make you something?”

The boy and girl looked to each other, then nodded eagerly. Astrid beamed and took the girl's hand. The others followed suit, making a chain and snaking their way through the bustle of the camp.

“We'll wait a few days before we start figuring out who they are,” Greer said. “Let 'em get settled. Gonzalez won't blow a gasket over that, right?”

I shook my head. Greer stood up and stretched.

“Well, that's two lives saved for the day. How about we shoot for the trifecta? I'll go see if I can find angry-girl-with-knife. Now
her
we can get moving along.”

I jumped up. “It's okay. I'll find her.”

He gave me a look.

“What?”

He smiled. “Nothing. You know what? You're absolutely right. You go after her. I'll grab my things and get set up.”

Greer jogged off. I gathered some food into a paper bag and set out along the trail. It wasn't long before the noise of the camp receded behind me. The morning was warm and the rain clouds from the day before had passed, leaving the sky achingly blue.

I found the girl right where I'd left her the night before, sitting at the edge of the mountain wedged between two boulders. She had her back to me and was looking out at the valley below. Her shirt was drying on one of the rocks, leaving her in a gray tank top that exposed the curve of her shoulders, which were as taut as a strung bow. I'd barely made it into the clearing when she heard me and turned, knife in hand.

I lifted the bag . “Thought you could use something to eat.”

She studied it like she was trying to decide if it contained a hidden explosive device.

“There's this girl in our camp,” I said, stepping from the dirt trail to the grass. “Tomiko? She's twelve. Greer found her hiding out in the health-and-beauty aisle of a Rite Aid. Literally all he did was show her this cookbook he got from the library, and in no time she was making the most amazing biscuits ever. Cakes, too. You know, when we can get sugar and stuff. Which isn't very often, but—” I suddenly realized I was babbling. “Anyway, I managed to score you a few before the kids devoured them all.”