“Have you met with Mikel?”
A weary inevitability shades his smile as he nods. “His conviction is unchanged. He’ll accept only those from the Colony who are whole.” His arms enfold me and we stand briefly in a warm cocoon of contentment, the broken world at bay. “I knew his answer would be unchanged, but I traveled here anyway…for you.”
Releasing him, I step back, a cascade of possibilities tumbling through my head. “Come with me. There’s something we must do.” He nods without question and lights the stairwell as we descend.
Outside the stronghold doors, the cool air prickles my skin while the black stone of the old road carves a moonlit river down the hillside. “I need to break a promise,” I tell him, unable to keep my intentions inside.
No words of admonishment, no probing for reasons, he simply follows me, trusting. We walk down through the darkness, subtly warmed by his magic, starlight guiding our footsteps. The market is lashed down for the night, daytime crowds dispersed, the rare stillness broken only by a stray drunk, a lover giggling as she’s groped in an alley, random workers seeking their homes after a long day.
At the gallows, I halt. The bodies left on display to bloat and leak and blacken amidst a swarm of fat flies are gone. I know with certainty that Cullan cut them down and that my words shamed him into it. My lower lip catches in my teeth, both excitement and trepidation climbing my spine with a sense of strength. I, Angel, the sister who so often feels invisible, passive in my twin’s powerful presence, can effect change.
With renewed determination, we pass through the gates into the outer city, down hard-rutted alleys, between clay walls and crooked shacks, until I halt outside Dela’s door. Priest gazes down at me as I squeeze his hand. “They have a new baby,” I whisper to him, though he’s asked for no explanation. “He doesn’t cry. I’ve sworn to say nothing, to give them time, but you’re
here
, Priest, and they need to know the Colony is a safe place for them to flee.”
“Everyone here knows of us,” he assures me. “They know they can come to us.”
“But they’re frightened.” I meet his gaze. He’s black as the night, slanted eyes like pools of ink glistening in the moonlight. “They need a face. They need this.” My hand slides down his shirtsleeve to the stump of his arm.
When he nods, I knock on the door.
Dela’s husband, Rik, opens it a crack and peers out at us. “Angel?”
“May we come in?” I ask.
The man glances back into his home and up at Priest, indecision scrawled across his wide face.
“Who’s there?” A woman’s voice asks from within, Jaelyn’s voice. I’m in trouble now.
“Angel and a man,” Rik calls back.
“From the Colony,” I inform him quietly.
Behind him, I hear whispering, Jaelyn’s sharp voice taking command. The plump woman appears beside Rik, a withering glare meant to send us scampering. “What are you doing here? You promised.”
“Just a visit,” I say lightly. “Jaelyn, Rik, this is my friend, Priest. May we come in?”
Clearly, I’ve no plans to retreat, so Jaelyn nods to Rik and they step aside. The home is small, the shadowy interior consumed by a narrow table and two benches, a roughly crafted cupboard in the far corner. Dela and her infant occupy one of two wooden chairs by a metal fire-can with a flat top, its pieced-together pipe venting out the wall. Three children sit at the table, finishing a meal and smiling; they recognize me, frequent recipients of the treats in my pockets.
Priest and I sit on a bench, our backs to the table. We face Dela and Rik as he stands beside her chair. Still glowering, her arms crossed, Jaelyn drops to the remaining seat. The baby looks so tiny to me as he sleeps swaddled in Dela’s arms. Priest leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees, the stump of his arm visible to all. “May I warm the room a touch?” he asks.
“Shhh,” Dela says softly, not to Priest but to Jaelyn, the stern woman’s mouth open to protest. Dela shares a questioning glance with me. I’ve only met the young mother twice before, both times when she was pregnant and hauling water from the cisterns. I carried her buckets to her home as her children dug in my pockets for a treasure of sweets. I smile and nod my assurance.
“It’s a little chilly,” Dela replies.
Slowly the room warms. Dela rests her head back and sighs. The children’s eyes pop open in exaggerated surprise. Priest adds a touch of light as well, filling shadowy corners left dark by the single lantern on the table. For a minute or two, we sit in silence, only Jaelyn emitting little breathy huffs of impatience. Priest and Dela share these moments in unspoken communion, the baby between them, neither seeming to require words in their exchange.
“Would you like to hold him?” Dela finally says. When Priest nods, Rik passes the sleeping infant to his arms.
“In the Colony,” Priest explains to no one in particular, “every life is cherished, every member valued. Each of us is in some manner imperfectly human and each of us contributes in the ways we’re able. We’re a rich tapestry of life, each a thread that creates the whole.”
Dela’s eyes glisten as he speaks and she holds fast to Rik’s hand. The children at the table slide off their bench and creep quietly toward me, eager to sneak a sweet. I slip them each a piece of dried fruit and hold a finger to my lips for quiet.
“Do you think there’s something…wrong?” Dela asks, eyes intent on the infant in Priest’s arms. “Does your…magic show you…”
“He bears the light and feeling of every baby,” Priest says gently, “but I’m unable to answer your question. In that regard, my Touch is limited to reading an expression of spirit, of soul. At the Colony we suffer from the same brokenness as the rest of the world, and we haven’t the power to heal our bodies.”
“If there’s something…different about him, will he be Touched?” Dela asks.
A shrug accompanies Priest’s smile. “It’s probable he will be, but how, I can’t say. The Touch is as unique as the person.”
“Are there…normal people at the Colony?” Rik asks.
“We’re all normal,” Priest says with a chuckle. “But yes, many no different than you and Dela and your other children. Do you know Konnard and Ayley?”
“Did they reach you?” Dela asks, back straightening in her seat. “They left in the winter and we…we hoped they weren’t making a terrible mistake.”
“They showed up at our gate a bit cold and hungry, but they arrived. All four of them.”
“At the Colony,” I explain, “life isn’t so different from here. We work the fields and raise livestock; we crowd…” I suddenly realize I’ve included myself in my narrative, and tears threaten to overwhelm me. “
They
crowd into tight quarters. There’s a waterwheel, light and warmth and music.”
“With one significant difference,” Priest says, indicating the child in his arms. “That means those of us who can, work harder. We haven’t the resources or strength of the Fortress. In that respect, our survival faces greater challenges. It’s my hope that one day we won’t live separately, that the Forerunners will accept us, all of us.”
“If you find it so gratifying, Angel, why aren’t you there?” Jaelyn asks me.
“Because they have laws,” I explain. “Laws that my sister couldn’t...abide by.”
“We rarely kill,” Priest says plainly. “Even the People of the packs are free to join us, to come and go if they do so in peace.”
“What if…when…how would we…” Rik stumbles through his words, but the question is clear.
“I leave the morning after tomorrow, and you’re welcome to join me,” Priest says as he hands the infant back to Dela.
As she nestles the sleeping baby into her arms, smiling down at her son, she whispers one more question. “What if there are others who also wish to leave? Other families with children on the way?”
In the moment that follows, Priest doesn’t reply, his eyes staring absently at the stump of his arm. “The Forerunners never objected when those with Touched children join us. I suspect Mikel will object if others begin to migrate our way.”
“But
you
wouldn’t object,” Dela clarifies.
“No,” Priest concedes, taking my hand. “I wouldn’t object at all.”
2
5
~Rimma~
Militant is too mild a word to describe Mikel’s mood lately, and my sister is no less a catalyst for his present state of mind than the Biters making a home to the east in our timbering country. Four families departed with Priest for the Colony, only one with a satisfactory excuse. Angel’s fingerprints smear the incident like spilled ink and the fact that they all vanished at the glimmer of dawn makes the infraction all the worse. Angel’s wise enough to stay out of Mikel’s way, and Priest better think twice before he returns with the thaw.
The Biters have diverted his attention away from his desire to throttle Angel—that and my personal touch. We’ve come to an understanding, a comfortable routine of physical abandon and release. I feel nothing for him, nothing for anyone but my sister, yet I’ve become accustomed to my frequent escapes into carnality. My mind doesn’t wander beyond his chamber door, but neither am I fully there with him. I am only body, used and using, nowhere and nothing except in my skin.
“Where are they?” Mikel asks Scout. He confers with his officers on the stronghold’s sixth floor, crowding around a long table near the atrium where the light is brighter. No chairs gird the table. Mikel prefers that we stand, keeping meetings short and everyone on their toes, so to speak. I have no rank, but then, I’m an exception to every rule.
“In the evergreen,” Scout replies, pointing out the location on the large map curling up at the corners. “At least a full day’s march due east.”
“Size?” Mikel leans over the table, resting on his knuckles.
“Can’t say exactly. Two hundred, a third children.”
“How many Touched?”
“Can’t say that either.” Scout shrugs. “A few cripples you can pick right out, but the rest look like us.”
“And you think they’re settling there?”
Scout scratches his jaw, his thin black braids gathered in a knot at the nape of his neck. “They’re buildin’ shelters. Whether they’re for the winter or more permanent, can’t say.”
“They clearly know we’re here,” Cullan says. “I don’t imagine them taking up residence in our shadow. And they must see signs of our harvesting in the area.” The strapping major leans against the atrium rail, arms crossed, unconcerned about the long drop behind him.
“So why do it?” Mikel asks. “Why provoke us?”
“Close enough to raid,” Captain Javlan suggests, his hands clasped primly behind his starched back. “A supply of wood.”
“Or simply good shelter near water,” Cullan says. “They may not mean any harm at all.”
Mikel’s eyebrows arch at the major’s caution, and I wonder if Angel worms under Cullan’s skin. Not one to compromise, Mikel swings his eyes to me. “Rimma?”
“Roust them,” I say. “It’s not winter yet, shove them along now before the snows. Better than suffering raids all winter.”
“The last thing we need is a fire up there,” Javlan adds.
“Fine. We take the offensive.” Mikel straightens and brushes his hands together, the decision made. “We seize all the healthy children and women. If the men don’t cooperate, kill them. We don’t need the trouble of bringing them back here just to hang them.”
The officers around the table nod their understanding while my stomach lurches. I drag in a slow breath in an attempt to grasp why his orders rattle me. Then I see it, clear as sunlight, the realization acrid in my throat. Ram and the River Walkers may have uttered those same words outside the walls of Heaven. My hands shake. I wear the guise of civilization, but I’ve become a Biter.
“Any questions?” Mikel asks the group.
“The Touched?” Cullan asks.
“Kill them or leave them,” Mikel suggests. “If Priest wants them, he can damn well come and get them.”
**
Our timberland reminds me of the forests below the Colony, a week’s march south. Copses of cottonwood suck the moisture from the soil at the waste’s edge, and as the land climbs and dries, broad-leafed trees surrender to stands of spruce and juniper, then sweeps of pole-straight pine and quaking aspen. The Fortress has an unceasing appetite for lumber, to fuel our fires, frame our homes, and craft an endless variety of goods. We have no Touched among us to warm our hearths.
The Biter encampment hugs a shallow creek trickling over red rock, bordered by golden grass and scrubby weed. Natural stone crenellations and clusters of pine protect the narrow valley floor from wind. The People have no horses, but a crude pen contains a small herd of goats, enough for a winter. Their camp lies higher up the mountainside than we expected, well beyond our timber. If Cullan’s frown could kill, Scout would be permanently sleeping beneath a blanket of mud.
Even in daylight, it’s cold up here. We’re a couple miles from the encampment, shivering in bulky coats and gathering the folds of our cloaks around us, trying not to foul up our weapons. The major needs a full minute to scrub his face in irritation before his hand drops and he addresses his officers.