“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why would I?” For a moment, a sad smile appeared on his face. “It was obvious you thought you were killing me. And you didn’t hesitate. I was hoping, someday, you might feel guilty about that, by the way. But maybe I have misplaced faith in your humanity.”
I looked into his eyes. I’d always thought I’d missed my chance to kill him. And now to find out I hadn’t even been close?
And to ask myself the tougher question: Would I do it again? If I had the chance to kill him … would I?
If it came down to Jack’s life or Cole’s, there’d be no question.
“I’m sorry,” I said. Sorry that I had been so willing to kill him, and sorry too that I would do it again if it would save Jack. Hopefully it would never come to that.
Max called from some ways ahead. “Guys, we need to keep moving.”
We started walking again. Cole was quiet, so I said, “Tell me more about Gynna. And her hearts.”
“The Surface heart allows passage between the worlds. The Everneath heart holds our world together. If you imagine the Tunnels as the power source of the Everneath, then you can imagine the vault of hearts as the keystone. If an Everliving wants to give up her immortality, she has to bring a new heart to the High Court to replace the one she wants to break. It’s like if an employee at a factory leaves, there’s a loss of productivity. The Shades don’t like losses of productivity.”
It finally all clicked. “So she used your heart to replace hers. So she could leave. So she wouldn’t end up a Wanderer.”
“Yep. You see, it’s not really a love story. But I guess there is an element of betrayal in it.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, and I meant it. “What happened to her?”
“Who?”
“Gynna.”
“Oh, she was gone before I knew what hit me. She took her Everneath heart and left.”
“Gone where, to the Surface?”
He nodded.
“Did she break both of her own hearts?”
He finally looked me in the eye. “I don’t know. I never saw her again. I assume she grew old and died. So I guess the joke’s on her.”
He said it without an ounce of mirth, his voice caustic.
“She was crazy,” Max added. “She didn’t grasp the benefits of being an Everliving.”
“What exactly are the benefits?” I said.
“Seriously?” Max let his mouth hang open for a dramatic moment. He started ticking off his fingers. “Eternal life. Eternal youth. A fountain in the center of every Common that makes you forget all of your worries.”
I remembered that fountain. I’d seen it at the slaughter.
Max went on. “Plenty of time to hone our musical skills. A paved road to rock stardom.”
“A paved road how?” I asked.
“All we need is a room and a captive audience …,” he said.
My stomach sank as I remembered what it felt like watching them perform. “You mean an audience whose emotions you can easily manipulate.”
“Exactly. There’s nothing like that breakout moment, when some influential guy in a suit looks at you and thinks he’s found the next Beatles.” Max looked away wistfully. Cole walked next to me in silence. His head was down. I’d never heard him talk about being an Everliving like Max was talking now.
“Is that why you spend all of your time on the Surface? Because music isn’t allowed in the Everneath?”
Max answered. “Yep. That’s what makes us different. And it’s worth it. We’ve had that ‘breakout’”—Max made air quotes—“moment on the Surface several times now, in different generations; right, Cole?”
Cole gave half a smile. “Right. But you’re forgetting the best part of immortality.”
“What?” I asked.
“The absence of that one part of your body that makes all the dumb-ass decisions. The beating heart. The place where emotions reside.” He said it with equal parts disdain and awe.
We were quiet. Cole seemed as if he was done talking, so I turned to Max.
“So why did you come over?” I said to Max.
He turned around and started walking backward. He spread his arms out wide. “For love!” He had to jerk his hands back in when they got too close to the flames.
Cole broke out in spasms of laughter.
“What is it?”
Cole looked at me. “I brought him over. Ages ago.”
“I meant for love of music,” Max said with a grin.
“Careful how loud you say that,” Cole said, but he was still smiling.
“Why do the Shades hate music?” I asked.
“Because they can’t control it,” Cole said. “Music is full of emotion, so it’s unstable. They’re wary of energy they can’t control.”
“At least, that’s Cole’s theory,” Max said. “Nobody really knows. They only know what happens if the ‘no music’ rule is broken.…”
Max turned back around and jogged forward to scout ahead. We walked for a while in silence, the conversation having counteracted the despair just enough to keep our momentum going.
My mind kept going back to Cole’s story about Gynna. I wanted to say something to Cole, but I’d already told him I was sorry, and I didn’t know what else to say.
The truth was, I was in a strange place. I felt sorry for Cole despite all the pain he’d caused me. I didn’t like it. For so long I’d been content and sure in my hatred of Cole. But now to learn how he’d been betrayed …
Actually, betrayal seemed to be a theme with the Everliving. I reached into my pocket and felt Nathanial’s medal in there. Cole seemed to be in a sharing mood now. Maybe it was the right time to ask him about Adonia.
“Cole?”
“Nikki?” he replied.
“You know Ashe …” I paused as I figured out the question I wanted to ask. I wasn’t sure I wanted to reveal that I knew Ashe had his Forfeit killed. But I wanted to find out Cole’s place in it all.
“Yes, I seem to recall him.”
“Do you think he escaped the Siren somehow?”
Cole sighed. “I don’t know. I hope so.”
“You said you did something for him. And that he owes you.”
“Yes.” He wasn’t offering anything.
“Well, what did you do that he would owe you?”
He was quiet for a moment. I could feel Max’s eyes on us. “I helped him find something he had lost.”
My breath caught in my throat. Something he had lost. Something, or someone. Adonia.
“What did he lose?”
Cole hesitated. “It doesn’t matter now, Nik.”
It mattered to me. “This thing he lost, was it a person?”
Cole grabbed my elbow and jerked me back. “What did you say?” He stared at me, apprehensive.
I stood my ground. “Was her name Adonia?”
At the mention of her name, Cole closed his eyes. “How do you know?”
“I visited Mrs. Jenkins. Adonia was her ancestor. She has her ashes in an urn above her fireplace.”
Cole opened his eyes and watched me. “It was a long time ago.”
“You hunted her down? And turned her location over to Ashe?”
“It was a unique circumstance.”
“You were a different person then?” I said, not even trying to mask the sarcasm. “You’d never do it again?”
“I didn’t do it again!” The quiet after his outburst was intense. Cole backed away from me. “You’ll notice you’re not in a jar on someone’s fireplace,” he said.
“Were you there?”
“Was I where?”
“Were you there when the queen found Adonia?”
He shut his eyes again. “No. But I hunted her down. Told Ashe where he could find her. And he told the queen.”
“And you knew she’d be killed.”
He opened his eyes. “Yes,” he said simply. “But, Nik.” He stepped forward and put his hands on my good shoulder. “I didn’t do it to you.”
Staring at him right then, I didn’t put voice to the word in my head. Yet. He hadn’t betrayed me to the queen yet.
TWENTY-SEVEN
NOW
The Everneath. The Ring of Fire.
Silence filled the next few minutes as we traversed the fiery corridors, dodging the occasional rogue flare. I kept a steady pace until we came to yet another archway. The others passed through without hesitation, but something about it made me stop. An uneasy feeling gripped me as I looked up at it. We’d already been through several archways, but this one was different. The flames at the top formed strange shapes. Mostly round ones, with stems sticking out.
As I passed underneath, I finally realized what the shapes looked like: fruit. Grapes, apples, cherries, all formed out of flames. I realized how long it had been since I’d eaten anything, and yet I’d never felt hungry. Mrs. Jenkins told me not to eat, but she didn’t have to worry. Until now, eating had been the last thing on my mind. But as the archway faded behind us, I felt a new hole in my stomach.
I tried to think of something else. I focused on the story of Ashe and Adonia. How was I supposed to feel about it all, knowing Cole’s role in her death? He didn’t do it to me. But he could. Would that possibility be hanging over my head for my entire life?
His actions had resulted in someone else’s death. But that was a way of life here. And Adonia was headed to the Tunnels anyway. Was I excusing his behavior because my feelings for him had changed? With everything we’d been through down here, it was hard to remember that for so long Cole had been an adversary. His history with Adonia simply reminded me of what Cole’s role was supposed to be.
But I couldn’t help thinking again that despite his protests, he would’ve made an excellent hero in somebody else’s story.
We didn’t say anything else about Adonia or Ashe. In fact, we didn’t speak much at all, until suddenly Max stopped.
“I’m hungry,” he said.
“Me too,” Cole said.
I looked from Max to Cole, confused. I thought of my own empty stomach and how I’d become acutely aware of it only after passing under the archway with the fruit. But the hunger wasn’t strong enough to make me stop. “Do you mean … hungry hungry? As in, for food?”
“Fooooood,” Cole said, drawing out the word.
“But, I thought you guys didn’t need to eat. Down here.”
Cole shook his head and gave me a pacifying smile, as if I were a toddler. “Of course we need to eat. And it’s been a long time.”
Max rubbed his stomach. “Potato chips,” he said in a moan.
I looked behind us. We’d been standing in one place for too long, and up until this moment, Cole and Max had been the ones saying we needed to keep moving.
“Let’s go, boys,” I said. “Remember, we’re in a hurry.”
They looked at me as if I were speaking in Latin. I pulled on Cole’s hand, but he didn’t budge.
Did the fruit arch have a stronger effect on them than it did on me? Did I make a wrong turn by going under it? I thought I’d been watching my tether the whole time. But maybe in my obsession with the Ashe-and-Adonia story, I’d missed something.
“Stay here,” I said, which was pointless because they looked as if they’d never move again. I ran back toward the arch to see if we’d taken a wrong turn or if there was another way we could go, and that’s when I saw them.
Wanderers. More than a few. Walking in single file to avoid the flames.
“Crap,” I muttered. I darted back down the path toward Cole and Max. They were in the middle of a fight, each accusing the other of forgetting to pack a snack bag. “Guys, we have to move now. Wanderers are coming.”
They didn’t even look up. They hadn’t even noticed I’d been gone.
“Guys! Move!”
Cole shot me an annoyed look. “Eating should be our number-one priority, don’t you think, Nik?”
Exasperated, I put my hands on their backs and shoved them forward. They took maybe two steps before they stopped again.
Whatever was happening, it was affecting them but not me.
“Crap … crap,” I said, spinning around, trying to think of a way to get them moving. The ground was empty of anything except dirt. My pockets held a cell phone and Nathanial’s medal. I hadn’t thought to bring an apple I could use to entice them forward.
“Crap!”
The Wanderers hadn’t been moving fast, but I knew they had to be right on top of us now.
“Cole! Max! Move!”
By now they were ignoring my existence completely.
I looked down at my feet and realized I hadn’t counted one thing in my list of assets.
My projection.
Cole always said my projection was strong enough to be tangible. Maybe if I focused on it, I could make another projection, one that could help us.