“People can’t do that.” Katie’s voice was soft and scared. But there was something else there.
“I can, Katie. Or at least, I could. And now I don’t know what’s happening to me. I don’t expect you to believe me. I hardly believe myself half of the time, but it’s true.”
I leaned up and reached out for Katie’s hand. I just needed something solid to hold on to. Something real.
Katie took it, cautiously, as if she was scared of me. “I do believe you, Scott.”
I looked down at our entwined hands, noticing how alike they were in ways. The same large knuckles from kickboxing training, the same little finger that bent at a weird angle.
“Sometimes,” Katie said, squeezing my hand. “Sometimes I feel like everything I’ve done in my whole life is like an etch-a-sketch, you know? That I could just shake it and it would all disappear and then I could start over. But I’m too scared to even try, because where will I be? Who will I be?”
I stared at Katie’s scared face and wanted the world to just stop spinning so I could get off. She was talking about her choices the way Shifters did. But it couldn’t be. I’d always known the power to Shift ran in families. But not Katie. Not stubborn, brave, brilliant Katie. I couldn’t believe she’d have a single thing she wanted to undo. No, I wouldn’t believe it. Couldn’t believe it. I didn’t want this life for her. Chasing after madmen in the rain, being stabbed, blown up. I wanted Katie to stay exactly as she was. My Katie. My little sister.
“Listen to me,” I said, wrapping my hand around the back of her neck and drawing her head against my shoulder. “You just don’t think about it, OK? You know that dumb-ass fridge magnet mum has? The ‘No regrets’ one?”
Katie nodded, her forehead rubbing against my collar.
“Well, it’s right. Don’t be like me. Don’t spend your life thinking about all the things you wished you’d done. You promise me. Don’t look back. Just look forward. Always forward and everything will be OK, OK?”
“OK,” Katie whispered.
There was so much I wanted to tell her. So much I had to tell her, but I just didn’t have the strength. It would have to wait. First, I needed to speak to Aubrey and then I needed to face Frankie and work out what the hell she’d done to me.
But before that, I needed to sleep.
“Everything will be OK,” I said, as I fell back on my pillow.
I didn’t know how. But I had to believe it was true. Or else I knew I’d never get back up out of that bed.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
My head felt less foggy in the morning. I was beyond tired and my body hated me: every movement was an act of revenge on its behalf. But the heavy pressure on my mind had lifted slightly.
I saw a glass of water sitting on the table beside my bed. Katie must have brought it in on her way to school this morning as it was still cold. I sipped at the water, the wetness stinging my raw throat and then glugged it all down. Next to the glass was a cereal bar and a small note.
I told Mum you were hung over and she’s to leave you alone. K.
Where would I be without you, Katie? I thought. Had I been imagining things last night, or could Katie be a Shifter too? I didn’t want to believe it. I didn’t want my little sister to have to go through the things I had. But maybe I didn’t have to worry. Maybe she was normal and I was just going mad. Aubrey would know. That’s if Aubrey would ever speak to me again.
I’d left close to fifty messages on her phone throughout the night. The first was a desperate plea for her to speak to me. The last was just me sobbing into the handset. Now when I tried to leave a message there was just an annoying bleat and a digital voice saying “Mailbox full”.
I had to get out of this bed and go find her to explain.
I dragged myself into the bathroom, each step a lesson in pain. I pulled off the T-shirt and jeans I’d slept in, the dried sweat making them stick to my skin, and turned on the shower. I clambered into the bathtub and sat down under the jet, not having the strength to stay standing. It helped, pounding my aching muscles, and afterward I felt, if not quite human, then at least a step up from vegetable. The walk back to my room was less agonising. I dressed in fresh jeans and T-shirt and gingerly squeezed my bruised feet into my socks and then trainers. The nails on both of my big toes had gone a scary shade of black. I’d deal with them later. For now, the only thing that mattered was Aubrey. I pulled on my Bluecoat, swallowed a couple of painkillers, and made my way downstairs.
“So, you’re finally up then?” Mum said from the doorway. She had her arms folded across her chest and was staring at me. I was about to get a Talk.
“Yes, sorry, Mum. But I don’t have time.”
She harrumphed. “Look at the state of you. I thought that place would be good for you, Scott. But all you seem to do is crawl home in the middle of the night. Drunk, no doubt.”
“Yeah, OK. Can the lecture wait till tomorrow? It’s just that…”
“And that girlfriend of yours! Oh, don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about. I’ve seen you with her. And her dyed hair and her smoking. She’s a bad influence on you, Scott. You used to be such a good boy.”
“Mum!” I snapped. “Don’t. Trust me. Just don’t.” My hands were shaking in rage and I clenched them into fists.
“I’m only saying, you’re very young to be just dating one girl. I’m sure there are plenty of nice girls–”
“Mum.”
“Look at your father and me, we met when we were just sixteen and look how that turned out.”
“But I’m not Dad. And Aubrey isn’t you. We’re nothing like you and will never be as bitter and cold and dead inside as you are!” I stepped in close to her and bent my head so I was staring straight into her eyes. “And if you have regrets about your life, that’s your problem. Don’t go trying to tell me what to do. I’ve had enough of that.”
I stepped away and was out the door before she could even answer. Mum was another thing that I could deal with later.
I headed to Aubrey’s flat first and let myself in. She wasn’t home. I guessed, if she was trying to avoid me she’d have known this was the first place I’d have come. Maybe she was staying with a friend? And I had a pretty good guess about who that might be.
“Is Aubrey…?”
The slap came so fast I didn’t even have time to block it.
“How dare you!” Rosalie snapped. “You pig. You absolute pig. And you know what’s the worst bit? I thought you were different. But you’re just like every other bloke, aren’t you? Don’t get what you want and so you move on. I can’t believe you did that to Aubrey.”
I pressed my hand to my pounding cheek. “Rosalie, it’s not like that. It’s all a huge mess and I have to speak to Aubrey.”
“Well, she doesn’t want to speak to you.”
“Is she here?” I looked behind the bar at Bailey’s to the door I knew led upstairs to Rosalie’s accommodation.
“She’s not here. And even if she was I wouldn’t tell you, you… you pig.”
“Please, Rose. You have to help me.” I grabbed one of her hands in mine and squeezed it. “I don’t know what’s going on, but I would never hurt Aubrey, you know that.”
“Yeah, well, you have.” She pulled her hand free.
“But it wasn’t me. Not really.”
“Oh, what? Are you going to give me the ‘you couldn’t help yourself’ story now? That this other girl just threw herself at you? You’re a Shifter, Scott, none of that crap works.”
“But that’s the thing. I can’t Shift!”
Rosalie’s expression softened for a moment. “Entropy? Well, it serves you right.”
“No, I don’t think it is. Look, you just have to get a message to Aubrey for me; you have to tell her that Frankie did this.”
“Frankie? Is that the girl?”
“No. Frankie is… look. Just tell Aubrey, OK? Tell her that Frankie is like me.”
“Like you how?”
I shook my head, not knowing how much to reveal. I decided that things couldn’t get any worse than they already were. “Remember Greyfield’s? Remember how everyone just did what I said?”
“I… I don’t know. It was all such a blur.”
“I can make people do things, Rose. Or at least, I could. That night, I was able to make anyone do anything I wanted.”
Rosalie laughed. “You?”
“Yes, me, really. But look. This woman we saw this weekend, she can do it too. And all of this mess is her fault.”
“She made you kiss that girl.”
“Not really. I don’t know. But I know she’s stopped me from putting it right,” I said.
“I don’t know, Scott. It all sounds like bull from where I’m standing. You’re telling me you’re a Forcer?”
“What’s a Forcer?”
Rosalie picked up an already clean glass and started rubbing it with a tea towel. “I’ve only heard about them from Granny Bailey. She used to tell us stories about Shifters in the past with all these crazy powers. But I thought they were just stories.”
“Maybe they are. I don’t know, Rosalie. But just tell Aubrey, will you? Just tell her.”
She hesitated, took a deep breath and then nodded. “OK, I’ll tell her.”
“And tell her I’m sorry and… and that I love her. And that I’ll find a way to fix this.”
Before Rosalie could answer the world flipped.
I wasn’t standing in Bailey’s talking to Rosalie. I was standing in ARES staring at a video screen surrounded by the rest of the agency. CP and Jake and the rest of the cadets were gathered. Something big was happening.
I fought off the nausea I sometimes got after experiencing someone else’s Shift and tried to sort through the new reality. Maybe, whatever had changed would have fixed the mess I was in.
But no. All the events of yesterday were still in place. The only thing that had changed was that when I’d been on my way to see Rosalie, I’d been suddenly called into ARES because of an emergency.
I focused on the present and why I was here. The video screens were all tuned to the same channel showing a live news report. I tried to take in what the news anchor was saying.
“We have just received the tragic news that the President of China’s son died in the early hours of this morning. Tsing Ken-ze had been in intensive care for the past forty-eight hours with suspected poisoning after attending a diplomatic ball. He was just thirteen years old and the President of China’s only son. President Tsing will return to China tomorrow. But the questions today are: who did this and why? And what will it mean for the already strained diplomatic relationships between China and the UK, and the Prime Minister’s environmental deal, that an attack like this was allowed to take place on our soil?”
I found I couldn’t breathe through my nose. I sniffed and a ball of snot rolled back into my throat. My lips tasted of salt. I’d been crying.
“Scott, what’s wrong?” I turned to see CP gazing up at me.
I couldn’t believe she was asking me that. She’d met Ken-ze, she knew what a sweet kid he was. And then I realised she hadn’t: none of us had. I was crying over the death of a boy I’d never known.
I wiped my eyes with the sleeve of my jacket. “He was just really young,” I said.
“Yeah, he was only my age,” said Jake, a slight catch in his throat.
CP patted Jake’s arm. “My Nan always said God takes his favourites first.”
“Yeah, well in that case God is a selfish bastard,” I said.
CP stretched her hand up and clipped me around the back – as close as she could get to my head. “Consider yourself lucky my Nan isn’t here or she’d have you over her knee for a comment like that.”
“Give me a break, CP. I am having the worst day ever.”
“Not as bad as the day he’s having,” Jake pointed back to the news report.
It was showing pictures of President Tsing coming out of the hospital, his head bowed, his steps laboured. It cut to a picture of Ken-ze in his Little Guards uniform standing next to his father, although no mention was made of his powers.
Why hadn’t Ken-ze Shifted? He must have been able to prevent whatever had killed him. Or one of the other Little Guards. Why hadn’t I done my job and found out who had been behind it? Whoever had tried to kill the President had gone after his son, I was sure. Or maybe the poison had been intended for his father and Ken-ze had died for the President just like he had been trained to do. Either way, it was my fault. I should never have listened to Aubrey and gone to Pandora. I could have stopped it. And now there was nothing I could do to put it right, thanks to Frankie.
Frankie. Hadn’t she been at a ball two nights ago? A diplomatic ball? The one she’d taken Kia to. This couldn’t be a coincidence. Just like Ella being with the PM’s daughter couldn’t be a coincidence either. Yet another death of a powerful person’s child. Yet another connection to Frankie. I needed to get back to my desk.
“Tyler!”
I turned to see Sir Richard, his nostrils flaring above his moustache. “Where do you think you’re going? We haven’t had the briefing yet.”
“Sir, I need to get some information.”
“You need to stay right here.”
I stopped and made my way back to the assembled kids of ARES, trying to keep my anger in check. Jake gave me an encouraging smile. He’d been on Sir Richard’s bad side enough to know it wasn’t worth it.
Sir Richard waved at the screens and someone silenced the volume. “OK, what we know is this. A Shift was made two nights ago in the same grid reference as this ball where Ken-ze was poisoned. It could have been one of the President’s Little Guards trying to save their friend, or Ken-ze himself trying to avoid his own poisoning. Or, and this is what the analysts believe is most likely, the Shift might have come from the attacker, a rogue Shifter perhaps. We’re looking into all the possibilities now.”
“Any chance he can be returned, sir?” CP asked, her small voice carrying across the room.
“That depends on whether a Shifter was directly involved in his death and whether we can talk them round to changing what happened. First, here is a list of all of the guests at the ball.”