City of Burning Shadows (Apocrypha: The Dying World) (16 page)

So much for small talk. “You’re in danger. More than you realize. Eddis was the saboteur, but Eddis wasn’t Eddis.”

“Eddis is dead. He’s no longer a threat.”

Her words were cold. Her eyes hard. Too late I realized how this would sound to her—the accusation it seemed I was leveling. Her husband had betrayed her. Worse, had betrayed the company. Except her husband hadn’t been her husband. And if the power the shadow-creature had could alter the surveillance footage, if Syed could make Iris forget his presence right in front of her, who knew what sort of misdirections this creature had been using to keep Seana and the rest of Desavris from seeing it?

“Eddis is dead, but the monster inside him is still out there.”

Seana raised an eyebrow and gestured for me to sit down. “You’re going to have to explain.”
 

I didn’t try to sugar-coat. I knew this woman far too well to give her anything but the truth straight-up. I told her about my discovery with the research, the struggle I had getting the pattern to work, the vision, and the way the magic had exploded at the end.

Whatever she was thinking, feeling, I couldn’t read it in her face. She got up from her desk, walked around to stand next to my chair. She looked down at me. “Truly, you saw this thing?” Her hand twitched, like she wanted to reach for me. My own hands felt weighted down by the gulf of years since we’d last touched.

“There’s more.”
 

She stepped back, putting a more professional distance between us. “What more?”

I told her about Syed. What he’d done to Iris. What he’d tried to do to me. “I resisted him, this time. But he’s tied to this. Whatever magic killed Eddis, I would bet money Syed is behind it.”

“And he’s here, in Miroc?” Seana took another step back. It seemed even Jansynians told horror stories about the Silent One.

“Yeah. I don’t know what he knows, but I have to assume it’s a lot.”

“And you resisted his power.” Seana went back to her chair. I could tell all this had shaken her. She sat down and folded her hands before her on the desk. She sat, silent and still for several minutes. I let her think.

Finally, she looked at me again. “Tell me your analysis of the situation.”

It sent a thread of warmth through me, that she would ask my opinion. “Everything ties back to Eddis’s project. I don’t know why Syed would want it stopped, but that’s about the only conclusion I can draw.”

“He may have succeeded.” Seana leaned back in her chair. I’d never seen her so tired. “With Eddis dead, the research tampered with—I don’t know if we’ll be able to recover.”

I fished the data stick out of my pocket. “Not all lost. I don’t think. I was able to pinpoint the files that got changed. At least, the timing of when Eddis was…taken. Could the rest of your team work forward from there?”

I slid it across the desk, and she caught it. “It’s possible.”

That was some relief, I supposed, that we might still be able to save Miroc. Nonetheless, I’d be sleeping with my lights on tonight. If I could sleep at all.

Seana flipped the data stick through her fingers, staring at it. “I must admit,” she said without looking up, “when Eddis died, my first concern was for you.”

The confession made my stomach lurch. Especially coming on top of everything else I’d been through today. “What?”

She stood, still not meeting my eyes. “In all this, I never did get dinner. Although now it’s closer to breakfast-time. Either way, would you care to join me? For food? In my apartment?”

I blurted out the first thing that came into my head. “Where he died?”

“It’s been cleaned.”

It was such a Seana thing to say. And I’d never been able to say no to her. “Sure, let’s go.”

#

When we’d been together, Seana had always come to my place. I’d tried to imagine what her own living space might look like, but had only managed an image of a better-organized, fancier-furnished version of my own home.

Turns out, it was nothing like that. Or like anyplace I’d ever seen. Amelia’s house had been fancy, but in a perfectly normal way. Seana’s home was something else.

At first, I thought we’d somehow gone outside. Except that even when the bird priests had summoned all the rain Miroc could absorb, it had never looked like this. The walls, the ceiling, even half the floor were covered with plants. Seana lived in a garden.
 

And it was beautiful. Flowers I’d never seen before created living artwork along the walls and between the furniture. Here and there, fruits and vegetables peeked out from clusters of greenery. Even the lights had been embedded within the plants, giving the room’s illumination a soft, green feel.

Seana pushed aside a curtain of tangy-scented vines covered in waxy white flowers to reveal a closet into which she kicked her shoes. She wandered through a sunken living-room, brushing her hand along a soft-looking hedge of ferns that defined the space. Ahead of her, stairs led up to an open second floor, where I could see a bedroom and into a bath area with the most decadently huge tub I’d ever seen, but Seana turned the other direction, towards the kitchen. “Are you coming?” she asked over her shoulder.

I hesitated in the doorway, struggling against this reminder of the gulf between us. “Are you sure about this? Sure I should be here? Couldn’t it hurt your reputation?”

Seana waved the question away. “I’m the director of security for Desavris Intercontinental. This is the job I needed a pristine reputation to get. And now I have it.”

Conscious of the dirt—and possibly worse—on my boots, I pulled them off and dropped them next to Seana’s shoes before I came all the way into her home. “This is amazing.” I dug my fingers carefully through the solid layer of foliage to find the wall beneath them, discovered a rough, porous surface. The plants grew out from it.

I turned to catch Seana watching me, her face unreadable. “To be honest, I’ve never done much with it. Many people make their homes into a hobby. Intricate designs, living sculptures. Eddis and I never had the time.”

“Does everyone have homes like this? With the plants and all?”

That earned me an affectionate smile. “With the plants, yes. Look around you, Ash. The Crescent is a city in the sky. Below us is the desert. Where else would we grow anything?”

I followed her into the small, sleek kitchen. In here, close at hand were a greater density of fruits and vegetables and greens, all carefully trimmed back from work surfaces. A flat stovetop and oven sat in the center of a u-shaped arrangement of countertop, with a sink off to one side. Along the counter were various smaller appliances, but I saw no storage anywhere. No cabinets, no pantry, not even a refrigerator.

Seana woke up a touchpad on the wall. Her fingers tapped through menus faster than I could read them. A panel slid open next to me and a pot presented itself. “Fill that with water, please.” She typed some more and a different door opened, this time revealing a wrapped bundle of dry pasta and a bowl of olive oil, by the smell.

I wanted to ask how all this worked, how the system was set up, whether everyone in the Crescent lived like this. But maybe this wasn’t the time. So I pushed aside the questions I wanted to ask and brought up the only subject that mattered. “How long do you think it will take, now, to get the weather satellite working?”

“I’m not a scientist.” Seana requested a knife and cutting board from the magic panel and started chopping vegetables after setting the water on the stove to boil.
 

Right then, I knew what I should have done. If I’d copied the data stick before returning it, I could have shown it to Spark. It had all been her brainchild to begin with. Surely she’d be able to figure out what Eddis had broken and fix it.
 

Just how far could I trust Seana? How much was I willing to gamble on remembered affection and a woman who may have changed in the last seven years. If I made the wrong choice, Spark would suffer far more than I.

At some point, I was going to have to bring up Spark if I wanted Seana to make the assassins stop. But I didn’t want to shatter the regrowing intimacy between us.
 

Seana ordered up more utensils and some spices in order to cook the vegetables. “You’re being quiet.”

“It’s been a long day.” My evasion was also truth. Parked on a stool in the peaceful safety of Seana’s home, body and mind were starting to feel the effects of all the excitement.
 

Her gaze held steady. I couldn’t tell what she was thinking or what she’d seen on my face. “No question the city has become dangerous.” She returned her attention to the food. “And it will only get worse.”

No question about it, if we didn’t get water soon. “Miroc was always dangerous.”

“Not like this.”
 

The food she stirred was starting to smell very good. Tangy and sharp and fresh. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d been able to afford anything fresh. Even after the sandwiches at Amelia’s, my stomach rumbled. “There’s nothing I can do about Miroc, except help make sure this rain gadget gets up and running. It’s not like there’s anywhere else I can go.”

“But there is.” Her voice was soft. Her words, hesitant. “Here.”

Seven years ago, she’d walked out my life with no tears, no apology, only the reminder that she’d told me from day one her career came first. Her duty to her employer came first. “You left me, remember?”

“I did what I had to do then.” Even now, she didn’t apologize. “This is what I’m free to do now. I’ve missed you, Ash. And you are,” a little smile broke free, “useful.”

This was too much to think about right now. “I owe a lot to Amelia. I couldn’t leave Price & Breckenridge.”

“I would never ask you to. I can’t believe you’d think I’d ask you to abandon your employer. All I’m saying is, this could be the home you return back to.”

Way too much. Maybe for her as well. She turned away to summon a colander and busied herself setting the food out on plates.
 

It tasted amazing. We sat across from each other at the counter, both of us hyper-focused on the act of chasing the pasta and veggies onto forks. This food, the casual way she’d had me draw the water, the utter luxury of our surroundings, I couldn’t deny the temptation of it.

I’d loved Seana. I still loved Seana. And when she looked up at me, her ice-gray eyes intense and said, “Stay the night. What’s left of it,” that was too much.

“Sure,” I answered. Like she’d asked if I wanted any salt.

Seana nodded and returned to eating.
 

#

After the Abandon, after the riots, I lost myself. My mind went to sleep when my body was broken, and it never woke all the way back up. I’d been moving through a hazy world, half-aware and numb and I hadn’t known it at all until now, this moment, as I followed Seana up her stairs and realized just how much I wanted her.

Not just her, if I was to be honest with myself. I wanted the world as it was back when we’d been together. I wanted my life as it had been. But that, I couldn’t have. The Thirteen had found new and better toys somewhere else in the universe and had left us crying in the sand on our dying world.
 

I would never have the rest, but at this moment, I could have her. And in the cool, quiet air of the Crescent, where flowers still grew and water still flowed, I could forget about the city below.

At the top of the stairs, I grabbed Seana’s wrist and pulled her to me. She allowed me a brief kiss, her lips cool and familiar against mine, then twisted out of my arms. “Come along, Ash.”

I came along. To the bedroom, where Seana pulled off her jacket and lay it over the arm of a chair, then began unbuttoning her shirt, as efficient in this as she was with everything else in her life.
 

I remembered. I remembered how I could make her shiver with a touch along her spine where her shirt joined her jacket. I remembered the fit of her arms around my shoulders as I scooped her up and carried her to the bed. I remembered the feel of her lean body against mine.

We humans were the first race, and when it came to sex, we served as the blueprint when the other gods created the rest. It was something I’d worried about, our first time. Just how alien were the Jansynians? Turned out, in bed, not very. Not physically, at least.

Seana made love like she did everything else—she offered no quarter, accepted nothing short of perfection. We rolled back and forth, a mostly good-natured struggle for who got to be on top. This time, I surrendered. I just wanted—

I wanted to forget. I wanted to lose myself. I wanted to find myself.
 

I wanted to close my eyes and to open them again on a world that wasn’t broken. I wanted to be that young man, seven years ago, whose biggest worries were his quarterly performance review and whether or not his workaholic girlfriend was going to take the weekend off.

That young man who had lived with his head in the sand. No different from the countless citizens of Miroc who trudged through their days, clinging to every familiar habit they could, waiting for the Thirteen to miraculously return.

Seana’s hand stroked my cheek, and I opened my eyes. Her finger moved down, traced the lines of my scars. I’d never seen such a tender look on her face.
 

The moment passed as waves of pleasure engulfed us both.

After, we lay alongside each other, our only point of contact her hand resting on my chest. It felt possessive, much more familiar than the earlier open affection.
 

So easy to lose myself like this. To take Seana up on her offer, to give in to the security and comfort she offered. How much did Seana know about the city from which she offered rescue? “Amelia says Miroc doesn’t have much time left.”

“No, it doesn’t.” Seana spoke with calm. “We are aware of the situation below.”

“What do you think will happen?”

Seana leaned up on her elbows, serious now. “If the satellite can’t be fixed? I expect word will get out. The city council can’t keep the water shortage secret forever. At which point you’ll see chaos. Rioting, looting, burning—worse than after the Abandon, I would imagine. The city will tear itself apart. And then it will die.”