Teardrop (42 page)

“What happens now?” she asked.

Ander looked around the shield. Everyone’s eyes were on him. Cat and Dad didn’t even seem to begin to know what kinds of questions to ask.

“There is a passage near the end of the Seedbearer Chronicles that my family refused to talk about.” Ander gestured at the flood beyond the shield. “They never wanted to anticipate this happening.”

“What does it say?” Eureka asked.

“It says the one who opens the fissure to Atlantis is the only one who can close it—the only one who can face the Atlantean king.” He eyed Eureka, gauging her reaction.

“Atlas?” she whispered, thinking:
Brooks
.

Ander nodded. “If you have done what they predicted you would do, I’m not the only one who needs you. The whole world does.”

He turned in what Eureka thought was the direction of the bayou. Slowly he started to swim, a crawl stroke like she and the twins had used to get to shore the day before. His strokes increased as the shield moved toward the bayou. Without a word, the twins began swimming with him, just as they’d swum with her.

Eureka tried to grasp the concept of the whole world needing her. She couldn’t. The suggestion overpowered the strongest muscle she possessed: her imagination.

She began a crawl stroke of her own, noticing Dad and Cat slowly do the same. With six of them paddling, the wild currents were just barely manageable. They floated over the flooded wrought-iron gate at the edge of the yard. They pivoted into the swollen bayou. Eureka had no idea how much water had fallen, or when, if ever, it would stop. The shield stayed several feet below the surface. Reeds and mud flanked their path. The bayou Eureka had spent so much of her life on was alien underwater.

They swam past broken, waterlogged boats and busted piers, recalling a dozen hurricanes past. They crossed schools
of silver trout. Slick black gars darted before them like rays of midnight.

“Will we still look for the lost Seedbearer?” she asked.

“Solon.” Ander nodded. “Yes. When you face Atlas, you’re going to need to be prepared. I believe Solon can help you.”

Facing Atlas
. Ander could call him by that name, but to Eureka what mattered was the body he possessed. Brooks. As they swam toward a new and unknowable sea, Eureka made a vow.

Brooks’s body might be controlled by the darkest magic, but inside he was still her oldest friend. He needed her. No matter what the future held, she would find a way to get him back.

B
rooks ran headfirst into the tree at full speed. He felt the impact above his eyebrow, the deep slice into his skin. His nose was already broken, his lips split and shoulders bruised. And it wasn’t over yet.

He had fought himself for nearly an hour, ever since he’d lumbered ashore on the western fringe of Cypremort Point. He didn’t recognize the land around him. It looked nothing like home. Rain fell in colossal sheets. The beach was cold, deserted, at a higher tide than he had ever seen. Submerged camps lay all around him, their occupants evacuated—or drowned. He might drown if he stayed out here, but seeking shelter from the storm was the last thing on his mind.

He was being dragged along the wet sand where he’d
slid into a heap. He felt the tree bark in his skin. Every time Brooks verged on losing consciousness, the body he could not control resumed its battle with itself.

He called it the Plague. It had gripped him for fourteen days, though Brooks had sensed an illness coming on earlier than that. First it was faintness, a shortness of breath, a bit of heat across the wound on his forehead.

Now Brooks would have traded anything for those early symptoms. His mind, caged within a body he could not control, was unraveling.

The change had come on the afternoon he’d spent with Eureka at Vermilion Bay. He had been himself until the wave took him out to sea. He’d washed ashore as something else completely.

What
was
he now?

Blood spilled down his cheekbone, ran into his eye, but Brooks could not lift his hand to wipe the blood away. Something else controlled his destiny; his muscles were useless to him, as if he were paralyzed.

Painful movement was the Plague’s domain. Brooks had never experienced pain like this, and it was the least of his problems.

He knew what was happening within him. He also knew it was impossible. Even if he’d had control over the words he spoke, no one would believe this story.

He was possessed. Something ghastly had overtaken him,
entering through a set of slashes on his back that wouldn’t heal. The Plague had pushed aside Brooks’s soul and was living in its place. Something else was inside of him—something loathsome and old and built of a bitterness as deep as the ocean.

There was no way to talk with the monster that was now a part of Brooks. They shared no language. But Brooks knew what it wanted.

Eureka.

The Plague forced him to turn an icy coldness on her. The body that looked like Brooks was making every effort to hurt his best friend, and it was getting worse. An hour earlier, Brooks had watched his hands trying to drown Eureka’s siblings when they fell from his boat.
His own hands
. Brooks hated the Plague for that more than anything.

Now, as his fist slammed into his left eye, he realized: he was being punished for failing to finish off the twins.

He wished he could take credit for their wriggling free. But Eureka had saved them, had somehow pulled them from his reach. He didn’t know how she had done it or where they had gone. The Plague didn’t, either, or Brooks would be stalking her now. As that thought crossed his mind, Brooks punched himself again. Harder.

Maybe if the Plague continued, Brooks’s body would become as unrecognizable as what was inside of him. Since the Plague had overtaken him, his clothes didn’t fit right. He
caught glimpses of his body in reflections and was startled by his gait. He walked differently, lurching. A change had come into his eyes. A hardness had entered. It clouded his vision.

Fourteen days of enslavement had taught Brooks that the Plague needed him for his memories. He hated to surrender them, but he didn’t know how to turn them off. Reveries were the only place Brooks felt at peace. The Plague became a patron at a movie theater, watching the show, learning more about Eureka.

Brooks understood more than ever that she was the star of his life.

They used to climb this pecan tree in her grandmother’s backyard. She was always several branches above him. He was always racing to catch her—sometimes envious, always awed. Her laughter lifted him like helium. It was the purest sound Brooks would ever know. It still pulled him toward her when he heard it in a hallway or across a room. He had to know what was worth her laughter. He had not heard that sound since her mother died.

What would happen if he heard it now? Would her laughter’s music expel the Plague? Would it give his soul the strength to resume its rightful place?

Brooks writhed on the sand, his mind on fire, his body at war. He clawed at his skin. He cried out in anguish. He yearned for a moment’s peace.

It would take a special memory to accomplish that—

Kissing her.

His body stilled, soothed by the thought of Eureka’s lips on his. He indulged in the entire event: the heat of her, the unexpected sweetness of her mouth.

Brooks would not have kissed her on his own. He cursed the Plague for that. But for a moment—a long, glorious moment—every future ounce of sorrow had been worth having Eureka’s mouth on his.

Brooks’s mind jolted back to the beach, back to his bloody situation. Lightning struck the sand nearby. He was drenched and shivering, up to his calves in the ocean. He started to devise a plan, stopped when he remembered it was useless. The Plague would know, would prevent Brooks from doing anything that contradicted its desires.

Eureka was the answer, the goal that Brooks and his possessor had in common. Her sadness was unfathomable. Brooks could take a little self-inflicted pain.

She was worth anything, because she was worth everything.

A Q & A
WITH
L
AUREN
K
ATE

What inspired you to write Eureka’s story?

When I lived in rural Northern California, the nearby lake was a flooded valley that had once been the site of a small village. Imagined ghosts of this underwater town haunted me, leading to an obsession with flood narratives, from Noah’s Ark to Plato’s Atlantis to the Epic of Gilgamesh.

I was especially drawn to the legend of Atlantis: a glorious and advanced ancient civilization that disappeared so completely under the ocean it slipped into the realm of myth. For several years I knew I wanted to write about Atlantis, but I didn’t know whose voice would tell this story—and isn’t that always the most important question?

Inspiration struck one day when I was crying. My husband was listening to my sob story, never mind what it was about. He couldn’t reach me; I was trapped under the flood of my emotions, as tear shedders often are. But then he extended his hand, touched the corner of my eye with his finger, and captured the tear welling up. I watched as he brought my tear to his face, as he blinked it into his own eye. Suddenly we were bound by this tear. Suddenly I wasn’t alone. And suddenly I had the first scene between my hero and the boy she loved.

That tear unlocked this story. Instead of an angry god generating the deluge, a single tear incites
Teardrop
’s apocalypse.
And in the tale I wanted to tell, I knew that a tear capable of flooding the world could only be shed over a mighty heart broken.

FALLEN fans are a very passionate and vocal bunch. Did you write
Teardrop
anticipating what they’d want, and if so, do you think they’ll be pleased?

Fallen fans are so phenomenal it would be impossible for me to write a new book without them in mind. When I first started studying writing and taking workshops, the general consensus among my teachers and classmates seemed to be that it was wrong to write for anyone but yourself. I believe in the idea that writers must only write the stories they want to tell (as opposed to, maybe, the stories they feel they should tell), but I also believe that knowing and considering your audience can make your writing stronger. My readers push me to be a better, more detailed and conscientious writer all the time. Their questions inspire me and allow me to take risks. Because I have been lucky enough to interact with so many of my readers, they stay with me when I write. I’ll finish a scene and hope the girl in Memphis, the boy in Sydney, or the book club in Bogotá will like it.

Where do you do your best thinking?

There’s a secret trail behind my neighborhood that is almost always empty. I’ve always taken my dog—and now, my daughter—up for a hike in the hills every morning before I write. It requires some trespassing, but that’s half the fun, and
on a clear day, you can see snow in the mountains to the east and a shimmering ocean to the west. It’s L.A. at its finest. The setting is stunning, but equally important is the intention of this simple ritual. Thinking through story is just as important as writing story. Staring into space is as important as typing words, as long as the staring leads to typing.