The Stolen Child (35 page)

"Fates, you see it like this, it's almost beautiful,”
Micah said, softly.
 

“
It's a bit like home,” she replied.  Micah just nodded as he took another drag.  For a moment she found herself staring down at the railing, trying to work her way around the lump that had
formed in her throat.
 

"Hey, um, I wanted to say thanks, for today,”
she said.
  “It was...  It was really fun."

"Nah, don't worry about it,”
Micah said.
  “I was going stir crazy anyhow.  I've never been good at being cooped up, you know?"

Rachael nodded.

"Yeah. Me too."

"Well, maybe I'll take you out again tomorrow, if the professor's crazy enough to have us stick it out here."

"I...  I'd really like that."

“
Just, don't get your hopes up, OK?” he said.  She was surprised by his look of concern, though she couldn't really say why.  
 

"
Yeah, I know,” she said.  “It's just... I really was crazy about 'em, you know?  Even when I started drawing, it was all just pages and pages of horses.  Whole books of 'em.  
I mean, I knew it was stupid.  Rich girls get
horses
, not
dirt
poor
scabbers
living on the estate."

She looked up at the tall windows above them.

"Guess some things are the same wherever you go."

"Seems like it," Micah said, nodding.

"I suppose
where you grew up must have been a lot like this.
"

Micah turned to look back over the structure that loom over them.
 

"Yeah,
yeah it was
.  I mean, different, but the same."

"So why'd you
ever
want to leave for?"

"I guess I've never really gotten along all that well with most of my family," Micah said. "They're good people, but I just never really..."

He tailed off, staring out into the distance.

"I think getting away from that place was the best thing I could have ever done.  Yeah, I had it easy there, but I felt...  Trapped, you know?  When Rishi came along, offered me this chance, I didn't hesitate."

Micah looked down at the stub of his cigarette, barely anything of it left,
and made an amused sound.
 

"Go on then, let's see you give it a try."

As he held out the cigarette stub for her, Rachael hesitated a moment before taking it.  Pinching the cigarette to her lips, she breathed in and felt a choking wave of hot smoke sear it's way through her lungs.  
She could see him barely holding back his laughter as she spluttered and coughed.  She could feel her ears burning.
 

“
Fates, give me that back,” he said, still smiling bemusedly as he took the stub from her hand and flicked it into the darkness.  Rachael watched the tiny ember sail down into the night, like a microscopic shooting star.  Rachael watched it go, desperately trying not to meet his eyes.  To her relief, Micah just carried on talking as if nothing had happened.
 

"Look, this stuff with my family... I'm not trying to say it's anything like what you've been through. I know I've always had it easy. Even living on the Triskelion, even when I'm freezing to death or sweating my ass off on one of the professor's expeditions, I still chose this, you know?"

He grinned, suddenly.

"Honestly, I only complain so much because it gets up Ilona's nose."

"Jesus,”
she muttered,
“what even
is it
with you two? Like, are you a thing or something?"

"Oh Fates, no. No, no, no,
no
. Ilona is...”  
He shook his head.
“
You know what,
I'll get back to you on that one when I figure it out, OK?"

Micah paused for a moment, looking off into the distance again.
 

"But I
care
about her
a lot
,”
he said.
 “All of these people... I know it's awful to say it, but they've been more family to me than anyone I was born with."

"Yeah,”
she said.
 “That...  That kinda makes sense."

"It's not who you're given,
you know?
  It's who you find.  That's what counts,"
he said, his smile strangely subdued.  
He
gave her shoulder a squeeze and
turned
away from the railing
.
 

“Hey, Micah,”
s
he called after him.  He stopped, and looked back.

“
Thanks.  Really.”
 

“
Don't mention it.”
 

He smiled and slipped through the door, leaving her
standing
in the
warm
night air.  She
closed her eyes and
listened
to the sound of the wind
.
 

Rachael tossed and turned, unable to get to sleep.  
It was too warm inside, the air too humid.
  In the bed across the room from her, she could hear Arsha's soft breathing as the girl slept
on
in spite of the heat.

Eventually Rachael slid out of the bed and pulled on a dressing gown.  She slipped out of the room and padded down the corridor, hoping to find a glass of water.  In the dark, the unfamiliar corridors all seemed alike, and she found that she could not remember the way to the
bathroom
.  Instead she ended up at the end of a narrow hallway, looking up at a small and winding staircase.  Curious, she followed it, and found herself in
some kind of
greenhouse
.  Arranged around the
edge of the
room,
stone planters overflowed
with a brilliant array of flowers.  The scent of them filled the
air
, almost overpowering her.  A glass dome gave her a perfect view of the stars.  By the planters were three low marble benches, like those she saw sometimes in the older parks in London.

Taken in by the strangeness of the place, she sat down and stared up
into
the deep black sky.  She wondered if the stars were the same here as they would have
been
back home.  In London
you almost never saw any stars
.

She'd been staring up into the inky blackness for some time, when s
he heard a sound, like someone tapping at the glass.  
A
t first she could not make out where it was from.  Looking around, she finally saw a small shape against one of the
window
panes.

It was a raven.  For a moment, she wondered what a raven was doing in a place like this, let alone why it would be tapping at the glass.  
She barely had time to consider the question before the answer came to her, and her heart nearly stopped dead
.  She rushed to the glass,
where she saw the tiny latch that the raven was tapping at
.  
She fumbled at the mechanism
and finally pushed the window open just wide enough for the bird to slip through,
swooping by
faster than she could follow.  She turned just in time to see the cloud of oily black smoke reforming, a tall shape barely inches away from her.

Then he was standing there, his long coat draped around him, face flushed as if he had been running, hair matted with sweat.  Gently, as if
she was
something fragile, his hands went to her shoulders and he looked at her with an expression of wonder.

“Rachael.  
Thank God you're OK.
”

She blinked in surprise, unable to form a coherent thought.  All she could think of was the shape of his face in the moonlight, the colour of his eyes, the feeling of his hands
around
her shoulders.

“I've been following you for weeks.  I wasn't even sure what I was doing half the time; I was crossing worlds, moving through impossible places, and I just... It was like there was something inside, telling me how, telling me which way to go.  Like it was pulling me towards you.  I almost caught up with you, just as the
ir
ship was leaving that town on the cliff-face.  
I was exhausted and starving… I…
I had to stay and find food.  Then I finally found th
is place
, and I was so sure you'd already be gone...  God Rachael, when they took you...”

Justin's words seemed to flow past her like falling rain.  Her fingers traced the shape of his face as she moved into him.  
Their lips brushed, and then met.  It felt natural, like something that had always belonged to her.
 

It was a while before she became aware of her surroundings again.  His smile was warm, and just a little bit surprised.  She felt herself flush, but it didn't seem to matter.  His arms encircled her waist as if holding her up.  She decided that was probably for the best.

“Don't you dare try to pretend you were expecting that,”
s
he whispered.

“Not exactly,”
h
e said.  “Imagined.  Hoped for.”  

He
stroked
back a misplaced strand of her hair.  
She was certain her cheeks must have been glowing.
 

“Imagined?”
s
he said, raising an eyebrow.  He just smiled back at her.  Rachael
wondered if she was imagining
the sense of relief that was flooding off of him.  
I
f, perhaps, she was only seeing her own feelings reflected back at herself.  It didn't matter.  At the moment, nothing seemed to matter any more.

He leaned in and kissed her again, their lips only touching lightly this time.  She could feel
the tension in him
as he pulled away and looked her in the eyes.

“
I'm sorry you had to wait so long, but I'm going to get you out of here.  We'll leave tonight.”
 

“Justin,” she began, but he cut her off.
 

“
I did some scouting out around the town below, before I came here.  There are trains that come in every four hours.  Bunch of stuff gets loaded and unloaded.  From what I heard they keep running all through the night.  We can sneak aboard the next one and get back to that big city.  I think we'll be able to stow away on a ship or something from there.
”

“
I... I guess.  Can't you just fly us out together?  I thought you said that it was easier, out here.  For you to change.”
 

“
It is, a little, but it's… It's not enough.  To do what I did before… I'd need some kind of power, like the Seed.
”

“You really think you can get us away?”

He squeezed her shoulders, giving her a fiery look.

“Rachael, it's the best way for you to escape.”

“I... Justin...”  She faltered and looked away.

“Rachael, don't be scared.  I'll be with you.”

She stepped back a little, and his hands fell away from her shoulders.

“It's not that.  It's... These people…
They're not what we thought.
”

“Rachael, whatever they've told you, it's lies.  All of it.  They're acting nice to win your trust.  They're just as greedy and cold hearted as
everyone else.  Why else would they bring you here, to the same people that were hunting us in London?  Do you really believe they're going to let you leave here?
 
That they aren't just arguing for a better price?  Rachael, y
ou know where you belong.”

Her laugh was mirthless, something tired and strained.

“Look, even if you think they might help you, do you honestly think you're better off with them?”

He watched her calmly as she let this thought sink in.  She looked up into his earnest eyes and reached out to touch his face, as if reassuring herself that he was real
ly there
.  
Whatever doubts she had felt, whatever questions Manindra or Rishi had managed to plant in her mind, she felt them all melt away.  Just looking into his eyes was enough.
 

“No.  You protected me.  You... You went through so much, just to find me.  I didn't deserve you.”

“I made you a promise.  I'm going to keep it.”

“Thank you,”
s
he whispered.

He kissed
her
one more time.  Even with her eyes closed, she could feel his body dissolving into smoke beneath her hands.
O
nly the ghost of his lips remained against hers as
she
heard the fluttering of wings.  Then he was gone.  She opened her eyes and looked around the moonlit room,
silent and empty
.  
The fragrance of the flowers filled the air.
 

S
he turned
and
caught a sudden motion by the stairs, then the sound of footsteps.  She made it to the top of the stairs in time to see Arsha at the bottom, halfway around the corner.

“Hey,”
s
he hissed, as loudly as she dared.  For a moment Arsha just froze.  Her eyes were large and frightened in the moonlight
as she looked up at Rachael
.  Slowly, the girl drew a breath.  Rachael carefully unclenched her fists and let her shoulders relax.

“How much did you see then?”
s
he said.

“Not much, I guess,”
the girl
mumbled
,
shifting
back against the wall, her hands clasped behind her back.  “I'm sorry.  I heard you get up and I thought you might want to talk.  So, I followed you up here, and...”

Rachael's anger had already abated.  Taking a step back from the edge of the stairs, she settled herself down on one of the benches that encircled the floor of the
solarium
.  Cautiously, Arsha walked up the steps and sat down on the
bench next to her
.

“That was Justin, right?”

Rachael just nodded.

“He's been following us?”