The Other Side (6 page)

“Baekjul boolgool!”
I bellow, and jerk the wheel a hard left.

The Jeep careens across the dragon's talons. The front end lifts up. The Jeep goes airborne, sails through the emptiness between its legs. As the dragon roars its pain, a triumphant euphoria fills me.

Then the Jeep crashes back to earth, and I crash through its front window.

I
wake to the pungent odor of ammonia and a colossal headache that dwarfs the dull throb in my midsection. The whir of an alarm siren fades in and out. Large hands appear at the haloed edge of my vision. I catch the glint of silver between the fingers.

Something is put on my head.

Cool and metallic and familiar, but I'm too disoriented to place it. I reach up to investigate, but my hands are cuffed to something. My ears warm, the pressure inside my skull intensifies, and the circlet cinches into place.

A CENSIR.

“No.” I groan.

“A precaution.”

Another whiff of ammonia, and the world comes into
view. I'm in the hospital, handcuffed to the bed railings. Oren straddles the chair at my bedside, long arms folded across the upholstered back, a tablet dangling from his hand.

He checks the tablet, which can show him my general mood—I focus on wrath—then regards me with a curious smile. “That was quite a stunt you pulled out there. Much like your mother, aren't you?”

“Don't talk about my mother.”

“You should learn to take compliments better.”

“You should learn not to kill people.”

He drags a finger from his left ear to his chin, tracing the knotted edges of a scar that stands out pale and angry against his dark skin. “Considering what happened to you in Georgetown and considering your brother, I'd think—”

“Sam? What's happened to Sam?”

“Keith was always good at keeping secrets,” Oren says, but doesn't elaborate.

Sam is safe with my aunt and uncle in Michigan. He must be.

So what if he never responded to any of the letters I sent via Preston? He's probably still pissed at me about everything. If something had happened to him, Dad would have mentioned it in his letters to me, wouldn't he? Unless Keith filtered them. I can't put it past him; he hid his and Mom's involvement in Loki's Grunts because he wanted to protect me from the truth that my mother was an insurgent. Oren's
right. Keith was always good at keeping secrets.

No, Keith wouldn't do that to me. This is nothing more than a cruel lie from a cruel man. I can be cruel, too. “Do you know how much Lorena—”

Oren's hand flashes to my throat. “Be careful what you say about my daughter.”

“Handcuffs and CENSIR not enough for you?” I say between gasps. “I see why Lorena despised you.”

I expect him to crush my windpipe—a part of me hopes for it. But instead he releases me and leans back. “You even look like Olivia.”

His words, spoken with sad fondness, hurt more than his hand ever could. “Did you come all this way so we could reminisce about the dead?” I glance at the CENSIR tablet and bite my lip. I will be strong. “You wasted your time. I don't know where she is.”

“We already have what we want, Melissa. You just put on your big-girl face, act like everything's okay, and say good-bye. Then we'll be out of your hair.” He gives me an apologetic look. “Don't worry, she'll be safe with us.”

“She's not even of breeding age. Please—”

“The Silver?” He squints. “Figured Keith was smarter than that.”

He opens the door and speaks to someone in the hallway. “Make her presentable.” Then he looks back at me.
“She thinks you're coming with us, but I told her you'd have to wait until you're healed. She insists on saying good-bye. A favor for you, Melissa, for the friendship you gave my daughter.”

She? My chest tightens. They were never after Baby. “Allie? Why?”

“Multichannel telepathy,” he says, as if that should mean something to me. “Cumbersome, isn't it? I prefer what the dragons call it. ‘Tangled.' Not quite right, but it has a certain simplistic elegance.”

“Please, she's just a kid.”

“You should have seen her face when she saw all those dragons outside.” He beams as he rises. “Reminded me of the first time I showed my Lorie. Allie wants to come, Melissa. She wants to help us save her dragon friends.”

“She doesn't know what that entails. Please.”

“We are not the enemy,” he says, and leaves.

Evelyn struts in. Even with the bulky body armor, white cloak, and goggles resting on her dragon-print headscarf, she manages an annoying beauty and grace. Worse, she reeks of roses. “Hello, Twenty-Five.”

I gape. “Real?”

She pinches my arm, smirks when I grimace. “Guess so.”

I don't get it. In Georgetown, Evelyn was Talker One, the perky sycophant who did everything the All-Blacks
wanted her to do and shunned everybody who didn't. I hated her and thought she was evil, but only in that high-school popular-girl sort of way. The only time I ever saw anything authentic from her was when rescue came, when she was in the ER, huddled with James . . . I bite hard into my lip.

“Where is he?” I say, quivering. I want to cry. I want to strangle him.

She lifts my backpack from the floor and drops it on my bedside. “You look awful. “Don't know if I'll be able to pretty you up. Shame how this—”

“Where is he, Evelyn?”

“Where is who?” she asks. She unzips the pack. “You have nobody to blame but yourself, you know? Don't suppose you have makeup in here? Never were much concerned with keeping up appearances.”

While she investigates my pack, throwing barbs whenever she can, I focus on making sense of her words in an effort to stave off the looming darkness. “Nobody to blame but yourself?” James and Evelyn knew about our hideout on Saint Matthew Island, so why did Oren and his Diocletians wait to pounce? After we left, there was no guarantee he would find us again. Nobody knew our location—

Until I panicked in the escape crate and attempted to contact every dragon I knew. Told them where we were headed.
But why the subterfuge? Why flush us out? Why not capture Allie on the island beforehand?

“Those mental cogs of yours still clunking along, Sarah?” Evelyn asks, checking my fake driver's license. She flings it to the ground. “You'll thank me later. Preston got your worst side.”

She wets a pair of towels at the sink, returns to the bedside, and vigorously scrubs dried blood off my face. She drapes the towels over my handcuffs, then pulls a ski cap from somewhere inside her cloak and tugs it down over my CENSIR.

“Well, you're presentable. I guess. Be on your best behavior. Twenty-One's enough of a pain in the ass when she's in a good mood.”

She's at the door when I cave. “Why, Evelyn?”

“If you can't figure that out, you're even dumber than you look.”

Before I can make any sense of her parting shot, Allie bounds into the room, all hops and skips and squeals. She jumps onto the bed and nuzzles into my chest. I groan, and she pulls back.

“Mr. O said not to touch you because you're hurt and I already screwed up.” Her smile returns with a delighted laugh. “I'm so glad you're okay, Melissa. Did you hear about the dragons? Mr. O says that when you get better, you can
join us at HQ—that's what Mr. O calls it. We can all be together like we're supposed to. And we don't have to be afraid of anything again. We'll be safe. We need to convince Arabelle. She's being stubborn and won't talk to me.”

She is so full of joy. It makes my own smile that much harder. “Don't worry. I'll set her straight. Now come on, give me a hug. A real one this time.”

She wraps her arms around my neck and presses her cheek to mine. I relax to the pain in my ribs, allowing her slight weight to sink into me. When I can feel her heart beating above mine, I close my eyes. Behind the lilac of the shampoo, there's the faint smell of iron that will grow stronger in the company of Greens, and the hint of woodsmoke and winter that I always associate with Baby.

This is how I will remember her. At peace. Content.

“Time to go, dear,” Oren says from the doorway.

Allie kisses my cheek. “See you soon.”

“Yep. Be good. I love you.”

She waves once, and then she is gone.

“Please don't do this. I'll do anything you want. Just leave her out of this. Please.”

Oren gives me a rueful smile. “Move on with your life, Melissa.”

After he leaves, I let myself cry.

“Do
you understand your rights as they have been read to you?”

The sheriff repeats himself as a shift in light pulls my attention to the shadowed figure in the doorway. Claire? Her ghost here to take vengeance on me? A waking nightmare? I hope for the former. She skulks toward us and presses a finger to her lips. No worries, I will not make a peep. She reaches Sheriff and snaps his neck in one quick motion.

Sheriff falls, and through the wetness that clings to my eyes, I see that the shadow is Colin. He removes the towel over my left hand and inserts a broken hairclip into the handcuff keyhole. After unclasping the second one, he rolls up my cap.

He retrieves defibrillator paddles from the wall and places
them against the CENSIR. The machine emits a gradient whine, then beeps. He brushes his lips to my forehead. “Stay with me, okay? This will hurt.”

A jolt of hell blasts through me. When awareness returns, I'm in Colin's arms and the CENSIR's off. He presses me close and carries me through the hospital, past a deputy sprawled on the floor with his head turned the wrong way, Nurse Frown weeping in a chair, several people huddled in a group, and a couple of shrieking kids whose father got devoured by a dragon.

Outside, the sun's sitting on the horizon, and I'm not sure whether it's rising or falling. He loads me into an ambulance, buckles me in, and says something about getting us to safety. We drive off, the sky darkens. I stare out the window at a world that seems tranquil. Rebuild the burned-down house across the way, fix the wrecked Jeep we just drove past, clean the random spatters of blood and mounds of dragon crap, and Dillingham's good as new.

If only humans could be repaired so readily.

“You okay?” Colin asks.

When I don't reply, he proceeds to tell me his strategy for our escape and rendezvous with Loki's Grunts. I hear maybe half the words, provide him my limited information.

Somewhere in all of his talking, he's put his hand on my thigh, and he keeps glancing at me. I think he's worried I
might open the door and jump. No, Mom taught me better than that. If you're gonna go out, do it in a blaze of martyrdom for the entire world to see.

But the world's seen enough of me already, and I've seen more of it than I ever planned. I'm done with all this. When we get to Denver or wherever, I'll leave Baby in the hands of the competent, and I'll go visit Dad and hopefully Sam. I'll stay with them as long as I can. And I'll make sure to have a gun with me at all times in case—

Kill emotion, human.
Her voice is strained and distant.

“Grackel!”

“She's alive?” Colin says.

I nod.
Are you okay? Where are you?

Do not worry about this one. You cannot even take care of yourself.
Her growl echoes through my head.
I wake and find myself buried in the darkness of rubble because of the invisible monsters. My tail is shattered, my back foot is missing, and my fire fails me. This is manageable, but then I hear you acting as if the world is over.

They took Allie.

Cry some more, then. What good will that do her?

I'm glad you're alive, Grackel, but I don't need your lectures right now.

Block me,
she says, knowing full well I can't in my current mood.

Leave me alone.

She does, for about a minute.
Your boyfriend tried to talk to me. Is that what you need, human? A knight to protect you?

For a moment, I think she means James, but then I remember Colin's a dragon talker, too.

I know what you're doing. It won't work. I lost her, Grackel. I promised I'd protect her, and I failed.

You behave as if she is dead already. And what of Arabelle? Will you abandon her to your sullen reverie?

What can I do? I don't have an army. I can't protect Baby. I can't even protect myself.

Give up then. Call it over and go home. Oh, wait, you have no home. You are stranded with yourself. I do feel bad for you now. I shall let you wallow, for I should conserve my energy for something useful. I cannot believe I sacrificed my beautiful tail for the likes of a coward such as yourself.

“I hate you,” I say aloud, but she's already gone.

Colin steers the ambulance onto a gravel road. The shadows of evergreens loom like silent executioners on either side. A mile or so in, he stops and turns off the headlights.

“Randon and Arabelle will be here in a little bit. We'll have to fly them out. Grackel can take care of herself. Everything will be okay.”

“Yeah.”

He cranks the heater to full and flips on the cabin light. “You wanna talk?”

I remove his hand from my leg and lean against the window. “No.”

“I'm always here for you, okay?”

“I need some time to myself.”

“I want to help,” he says.

“I know. I just . . . I'm fine. Please.”

After a long stretch of silence, he says, “Don't shut me out, Melissa. I know what you're going through, I know how—”

“You have no clue!” I say. “Everybody I care about . . .” Lost. Taken. Gone.

He reaches for me, and I slap his hand away. There's hurt in his eyes, but also that stubborn persistence that tells me he won't back down. He'll always want to help me, rescue me.

I know of but one way to convince him that I'm not worth the trouble.

“I killed your sister, Colin. I killed Claire.”

I wanted to come off neutral, I'd have settled for cruel, but his bewildered expression starts another bout of tears. I throw open the door, desperate to escape, but Colin catches my arm and jerks me to him. “No you don't. You don't get off that easy.”

“Easy? Fuck you! Let me go. Please, let me go.”

But he doesn't. I struggle to break free, but I am weak and he is not. He waits for me to play myself out, then he kisses me. I'm so stunned I respond by impulse alone. My tears come faster, but I don't stop kissing him.

He pulls back, leaving a hand on my cheek. “I'm sorry. I didn't know what else to do.”

I cannot bear the way he's looking at me, the way that kiss shattered the darkness for a few seconds. No, I cannot bear losing that, too.

I flee.

Fast as I can. Into the woods. Across a frozen creek. Up a hill. My legs fail me and I land knee-deep in the snow. I push myself up before thought and memory can return, but my arms give, and I get a face full of winter.

I roll onto my back, hyperventilating, and look past the canopy of shadowed branches into the sky. Even with my vision blurred and my thoughts numb, it doesn't take long to identify the constellations shining back at me.

I never showed Draco or Cygnus, or even easy ones like Orion, to Allie. Because I was terrified of what she might see. Evil dragons or evil jets, or maybe nothing at all. So I spent time teaching her math and English and history because I wanted her to feel normal, so on that day when our names and faces became forgotten footnotes, we could merge back into dragon-fearing society without difficulty.

I should have taught her the stars. I should have taught her something important.

There is still time, human.

“I thought you were done with me, Grackel.”

Your thoughts bleed into mine. Your emotions are a virus.

I sniffle and wipe at my nose. “If you're trying to cheer me up, you suck at it.”

You remind me of her.

“Her?”

Your mother.

“You knew Mom?”

Why do you think I came to your island, human?

“Because you were told to,” I say, and croak a laugh. Nobody tells Grackel what to do.

She was the one person I ever permitted on my back. A most resilient human, but her heart often interfered with her brain.

“Yeah, I've got the emotion part nailed.”

You have her strength, too. You need to find it.

“I don't know how, Grackel.”

You must stop running away from life.

I make a snowball and toss it into the darkness. “This isn't life. I'm not equipped for this.”

Nobody is. But you have no other option. Be brave or die, human.

She's right. Two choices. Lie here and cry forever,
waiting for someone to rescue me from reality, or . . .

I climb out of the snow, glancing skyward. I will find Allie. I will teach her the stars. “Please contact Allie. Tell her you're okay. Tell her I'll see her soon.”

I already did, human.

I smile. “Thank you, Grackel. Also, have her send us images of where she's headed.”

Your boyfriend and Randon are deciphering that.

“He's not my boyfriend.”

Perhaps you should reconsider.

“Don't you have some rubble you need to dig yourself out of?”

That is the easy task for the day.

“And I assume you've already finished the hard one?”

She doesn't answer, but I'd swear I hear her grin.