Galdoni (20 page)

I wasn't sure what the cops normally did in
that type of situation, but I knew time was essential and they were
definitely running out of it. The student on the roof moved and
everyone gasped.

“
His dad committed suicide
last year, shot himself in the head in front of his entire family,”
a girl next to me said to her friend. “He’s really struggled
since.”

“
He’s in my biology class,”
a boy with spacers in his ears replied. “He’s quiet, but I never
thought he’d do something like this.”

Brie touched my arm. “This is horrible.”

“
We’ve got to do
something,” I replied.

“
Yes, but what-”

I was already making my way to the edge of
the crowd. She followed me around the building to the back door. I
pulled out my keys.

“
You’re going
in?”

I answered her question by unlocking the
door.

We ran across the hall to the stairs. Power
to the building had been cut long ago to discourage students from
crashing the place for parties. It was a nice idea, but it didn’t
work; I had chased my share of students out of the basement.

We ran up the steps, adrenaline giving us
energy. I pushed open the door at the top and we stepped out into
the sunshine, gasping for air.

I walked slowly toward the young man on the
roof. He hadn’t heard us enter and balanced precariously on the
edge, staring at the crowd below.

“
John, don’t do this,” Brie
said.

The young man turned quickly and he wavered
for a second as he fought to regain his balance, but he didn’t step
down. “Go away. I don’t want anyone up here.”

“
What about your family?
They love you. You can’t do this to them,” Brie pleaded.

“
I can do what I want. It’s
my life,” he retorted. His eyes were wide and jaw tight, the look
of someone who felt he had no other choice. I had seen that look
many times in the Arena.

“
Just come down and talk.
Please. For me?” Brie pleaded.

I took a step closer and shrugged my coat
down one shoulder in case I needed to get it off quickly.

“
Let’s get off the roof and
talk. What do you say?” Brie pressed.

John looked down at the ground far below us.
“Okay,” he agreed, his tone strange. He turned as if to step down,
then gave Brie a small smile, opened his arms, and fell
backward.

Brie screamed and I lunged for his hand,
grabbing it just as he fell over the edge. His weight pulled me
with him; we plummeted off the roof.

Brie cried my name. I fought to get my
bearings and take off my coat. Shouts of surprise and shock rose
from the crowd below. The wind rushed past like laughter in my
ears, calling for me to open my wings and join its carefree dance.
John flailed wildly; I struggled to hold him as I freed my other
arm from the coat and let it flap away behind me. The crowd below
sped quickly toward us. My heart raced. I wrapped my arms around
John to stop his thrashing, then forced my wings open just before
we hit the ground.

The wind caught my wings like a battering
ram; my old scars burned in protest, but my wings held and I pushed
them down hard. We skimmed over the top of the crowd. I let John go
on a patch of grass, then crashed a few yards away on the hard
ground. I rose slowly. My right wing throbbed. I didn’t dare fly
again. The crowd stared at me with wide eyes. Cell phones glinted
in the rising sun and my heart slowed.

It was inevitable now. Students were already
sending videos to their friends of what had happened. I glanced up
and saw Dane standing on the edge of the crowd. He met my eyes and
gave a triumphant smile, lifting his phone meaningfully. My heart
dropped. With his help, the Academy would definitely find me. The
crowd of students, parents, teachers, school faculty, and city
workers who had surrounded the building made their way to John, and
I felt everyone’s eyes on my wings. I turned and stumbled past a
building and into a shadowed alley.

Chapter Fourteen

“
You shouldn’t have done
it,” Jayce said, pacing the living room.

“
You would have done the
same thing,” Nikko replied calmly.

“
No, I wouldn’t,” Jayce
protested.

“
Oh, you’re right,” Nikko
agreed. “Anyone with a normal heart would have. You, however, would
have let John fall to his death.”

“
If it meant saving my
hide, yes,” Jayce replied, but there was doubt in his voice this
time.

“
It doesn’t matter,” Brie
said. She leaned against my chest, her knees tucked up under her
chin as she sat beside me on the couch. “What’s done is done. We
have to figure out what to do now.”

“
Kale needs to run.” Jayce
spoke as though I wasn’t in the room.

“
We can hide him here,”
Nikko said at the same time.

I shook my head, my voice calm despite the
thoughts that tumbled through my mind. “I’ve got to let them take
me.”

All three of them turned to stare. Brie’s
eyes filled with tears. “Kale?”

I shook my head. “We knew it would happen
eventually. We were crazy to believe otherwise. It’s only going to
be harder if we don’t accept it.” I glanced out the window at the
night sky, amazed they hadn’t found us already. In the back of my
mind, a small thought reminded me that my security shift had
started a few minutes ago. I wondered if Mr. Mason had found
someone to take over.

“
You promised,” Brie said,
her voice unsteady.

“
I said if there was a
way,” I reminded her gently. “Now I’ve put us all in
danger.”

“
John's put us all in
danger,” Jayce cut in. He cracked his knuckles. “I hope he knows
the result of his stupid action.”

Nikko touched his shoulder. “He knows,” he
reminded him quietly.

And he was right. John and his very grateful
mother had come to the house earlier, some of the many people who
had flocked discreetly to Dr. Ray’s home in pairs and trios to talk
about what they had witnessed and give us their encouragement.
Several even offered me places to hide, but in the end they all
left because they knew what would happen if they were near me when
the guards came.

“
But you can’t just go,”
Jayce argued. “You’ve got to fight it. The system is
wrong.”

“
Then we have to fight it
at its source. None of us has power here,” I said.

“
The video’s not done yet,”
Nikko argued. “It still needs work.”

“
And we need to wait until
the Blood Match. It’s imperative that we try to catch as many
viewers as we can.” My voice sounded more sure than I felt. “I’ll
be fine until then.”

Brie pushed off the couch and left the room.
My heart slowed at the sound of a door slamming shut.

I rose from the couch and put on my
coat.

“
Where are you going?”
Nikko asked. Jayce just stared at me.

“
I need to clear my
head.”

“
What if they find
you?”

“
Better out there than
here.” I put a hand on both their shoulders, then went out the
front door into the night.

***

I slid my fingers along the rough bricks of
the library, remembering all the memories since the day Brie,
Nikko, and Jayce had found me and given me a new life. The night
air hung heavy with the scent of rain and a breeze ran teasingly
through my hair, promising freedom if I took to the skies. Familiar
footsteps sounded around the corner.

I looked back to see Jayce hurrying toward
me through the mist that had settled over the city grounds like a
protective blanket.

Jayce’s hands clenched when he caught up.
His eyes were dark and matched the tumultuous night. “What are you
still doing here?”

I knew he wouldn't understand, but said it
anyway. “I can’t just leave.”

The mist slowly turned into rain. Jayce
peered through it at me. “You can’t stay here. They’ll find
you.”

The concern in his voice touched me. I
remembered his hostility my first days at the house, and sighed
silently at the difference our time together had made. “If I leave,
they’ll come down on all of you. You know that. It’s better this
way.”

Jayce shook his head. “Nikko’s hiding
everything. There won’t be any evidence at the house that you were
there.”

The thought was surprisingly painful. I
turned away, but Jayce grabbed the front of my shirt. Adrenaline
rushed through me and I fought down the impulse to flip him onto
his back. “You can’t go back, Kale. I can’t see you dead on the
Arena floor.”

I stared at him. Rain dripped down my hair
and into my eyes. I shook my head to clear it. “We knew this was
coming. Deep down, I think we all knew there was never a way to
beat the system.”

Jayce shoved me roughly. “Don’t say that.
Don’t ever say that. There’s a way; we have the way. The video’s
going to work. You just have to wait until it’s ready.”

The urgency in his voice grabbed my heart
like a fist. I forced my voice past the knot in my throat. “This is
the way, Jayce. I’m the only one who can fight from the
inside.”

He stared at me and his chest heaved. He
held his hands at his sides and clenched and unclenched his fists.
“So that’s it? You’re going to give up? You going to leave us,
leave Brie, just like that?”

I fought down the urge to hit something as
the anger I had pushed deep down at the situation threatened to
rise up and take control. “You don’t get it, Jayce. They know where
I am, who I was with. If they don’t find me, they’ll come after
you. Then you can all kiss your futures goodbye. They’re
relentless.” The rain started to fall harder and I glared at him
through it. “I’ve lived at the Academy my whole life. They’ll never
give up until they find me. Letting them come for me is the only
way to protect you, Nikko, Dr. Ray, and Brie.”

Jayce opened his mouth to argue, but he knew
I spoke the truth. He shut his mouth and his jaw clenched, then he
spun without a word and left back through the darkness. A pit rose
in my stomach. I let the stress that had built up in my muscles
fade with a slow breath. I forced my footsteps forward, continuing
on my path.

My muscles tensed again at the sight of a
form waiting for me next to the new city building, but when I drew
closer, I saw that it was Mr. Mason. He turned silently at my
approach. When I nodded at him, he fell in beside me.

“
I didn’t think you’d show
and took over your rounds. You should be with your friends,” he
said quietly.

I shook my head. “It’s not safe for
them.”

He nodded as we walked together. “That was a
brave thing you did back there,” he said after a few minutes.

“
You would have done it,
too,” I replied.

He hesitated, then tipped his head pointedly
toward my back. “If I’d had those, yeah, I probably would
have.”

I felt a little bit better and gave him a
smile. “Thanks.”

“
I always knew you were
different,” he said after we had checked the doors to the utilities
center and continued down the beat path.

“
Really?” I questioned with
raised eyebrows. I relished the feeling of the rain as it soaked
through my coat.

He shrugged. “Not that I would have guessed
how different. But it was the way you carried yourself. Confident,
you know? Sure of yourself. Not something these guys have learned
yet.” He gestured vaguely toward the school grounds.

I looked away. “Not feeling so sure of
myself right now,” I admitted briefly.

He gave another nod. “I can believe it. I
wouldn’t blame you for not wanting to go back. I can’t imagine what
they do to make you guys fight like that.”

I didn’t answer and instead bent to check
the chains around the doors at the front of one of the original
settler’s houses to hide my expression.

“
It’s okay to be scared,
boy,” he said gruffly.

I glanced at him and couldn’t hide the shame
I felt. He read it on my face.

“
You’re not the only one
debating whether to run from a fight. I was a gunner once, and was
tempted not to return from leave on more than one occasion.” He
took off his hat and for the first time I noticed the blaze of
silver that ran through his otherwise brown hair. “That one nearly
killed me.” He put his hat back on and we continued on our path
through the falling rain.

“
What made you go back?” I
finally asked.

He sighed. “It was my fight. You’ve got to
pick your battles, the ones you can truly make a difference in.” He
glanced at me. “You know what I mean?” At my nod, he smiled.
“You’ll make the right choice. That doesn’t mean it’s always the
easiest.”

We walked on in silence; at the end of the
beat, he patted my shoulder and walked away through the darkness. I
listened until his footsteps faded away, then slid down the side of
the library until I rested with my back against the cold bricks. I
put my head on my knees and gave in to the tears.

They were tears of anger at a situation I
didn’t want to face, of fear at returning to life at the Academy,
of heartache at leaving Brie, of loneliness so sharp it threatened
to engulf me. Tears I had never allowed myself to cry mixed with
the rain.

After several minutes had passed, I forced
the pain back down. I allowed myself one wracking sob, then put the
wall back up and once more locked up the emotions that could get me
killed. I pushed up from the wall and stared into the rain. An
achingly familiar figure stood near the library stairs.