Firebrand (13 page)

R
ose told Dennis what we wanted him to do. I almost hoped he'd say no, but he didn't. After a lifetime of open spaces, he felt cooped up in Sumter. Checking out a room that no one else had seen was irresistible to him.

That's what he said, anyway. But from the way he watched Rose the whole time, I wondered if he would've agreed to anything just to be with her again.

Two strikes after sunrise, Dennis hid in a shadowy space beneath the battery stairs, exactly as we'd told him. Down on the parade grounds, Rose and I stood beside the sewer entrance.

“Ready?” she asked.

“No,” I answered truthfully. But I took her hand anyway.

I didn't think the diversion would work. The water level was at least a couple yards below us and our elements were as weak as they'd ever been. People wandered back and forth, a constant distraction. But my heart was pounding and so was hers. So I sent my energy through her and watched.

The stench grew worse as the waste reversed course. I closed my eyes and felt her element respond to my touch. I was vaguely aware of the liquid's progress, but when I heard a shout, my first thought was that we'd been caught.

Rose let go of my hand and we split, taking separate staircases up the battery. Behind us, the colonists were gathering, staring with alarm at the filth strewn across the ground. It formed a dark circle in a yard radius around the sewer entrance.

Kell joined them momentarily and slipped away, making a direct line for the gunroom.

I retreated to the corridor just outside our room and spied from the shadows as Chief accompanied Kell outside. I would have kept watch too, but Griffin and Nyla were in the corridor and I didn't want them to be suspicious.

They sat cross-legged opposite each other, signing in the half-light. Amazingly, Nyla already signed better than some of the Guardians ever had.

Good. Signs,
I told her.

She accepted the compliment without smiling.
Useful,
she returned, the gesture too small, like she was still afraid of getting it wrong. “Imagine how this'll change the food squads,” she said. “Jerren says the gatherers work in the same area so they can hear each other. But with signs, they could move anywhere, as long as the lookouts still see each other.”

The more she spoke, the more excited she became. Even though he couldn't hear her, she looked at Griffin from time to time like she was seeking his approval. Her signs were more natural and confident with him around too. She smiled, which I hadn't seen before.

I peered around the corner to see if Dennis had left the gunroom, but he hadn't. He needed to get out. He was only there to look around and report back to us.

As I turned back to Griffin and Nyla, a young child's cry split the air. It was loud enough to startle Nyla. The others flooded out from our room and joined me on the walkway.

Kell was marching Dennis toward us. Rose was running up from behind them. Her mother too. Even the people working on the parade grounds paused what they were doing to watch.

“What's going on?” cried Marin. “Are you all right, Dennis?”

Kell stared at every one of us, weighing our guilt. “Dennis decided to pay a visit to a room . . . a
private
room.”

Under other circumstances, we might have been able to pass it off as an innocent mistake. But from the way Dennis was shaking, it was obvious he knew he'd done wrong.

Marin was desolate. “Why did you do such a thing?” she asked him. “Did someone tell you to go in there?”

Dennis didn't answer. But his eyes shifted to Rose as if he was waiting for her to save him.

Marin understood well enough what the look meant. “What have you done, Rose?” she hissed.

“I didn't know what was inside the room,” said Rose. “It scared me.”

“Is that so?” Kell sneered. “Well then, ask your brother what's in there. Ask him what we have lined up against the walls. What horrible little secrets have we been keeping from you all, Dennis?”

Dennis shrank back from him. “There were guns. Lots of guns.”

“Lots of
loaded
guns,” corrected Kell. “The kind that might accidentally kill a child if he got hold of them. The kind that any responsible colony would kept locked away.” He gritted his teeth. “If you think you need one of those guns, Rose, you should've asked. Although I'd like to know what you plan to do with it.”

Chief had joined us now. He looked from one to another of us. “I don't understand,” he said. “One moment, I'm on the parade grounds dealing with a serious health issue, the next I hear that you took advantage of the situation to spy on us. If you'd just asked me, I would have told you what was in that room.” His voice had an unfamiliar edge. “Please, tell me what we've done to make you so distrustful.”

I should have held my tongue, but I couldn't stand the way that everyone was turning on Rose. “Kell boarded the ship the second night we were here,” I told Chief.

He hesitated. “Is that true, Kell?”

Kell didn't miss a beat. “Yes. I saw a light through one of the portholes. I got to wondering who'd board their own ship in the dead of night. And why.”

“You went into the captain's cabin,” I snapped.

“As did
you,
even though you told us you hadn't. How else would you have heard our radio transmission?” He paused to let the words sink in. “The thing I really want to know is how you got back into the fort that night without me noticing. Seems that if anybody has been keeping secrets, it's you, Thomas.”

Chief was hunched over now. He looked older than before. “I trusted you, Thomas,” he said quietly. “I really did. But trust works two ways. I sincerely hope you'll think ours is worth winning back. If not, I'd urge you to find another home.”

He turned to leave. Kell stayed right beside him, his allegiance unquestioned.

No one else moved.

“There was something else,” began Dennis, but Marin cut him off.

“Enough!” Her eyes roamed from Rose to me as though she couldn't decide which of us she hated more. “Stay away from Dennis. You told us not to use our elements anymore, Thomas, yet from the mess over there, I can see you dared to combine with Rose. In full view. Never mind the dangers of having human filth strewn across the ground.” Her voice was quiet but venomous, anger visible in every twitch. “As for you, Rose, a real sister would never have done what you did today.” She pulled Dennis toward her, hands draped over his shoulders possessively as he tried to wriggle free. “Do whatever you like, but understand this: Dennis and I will be staying here. I will not let you jeopardize his future.”

As Marin dragged Dennis away, he kept his head turned back and eyes fixed on us. I expected him to appear as angry as his mother did. Marin was right. We'd taken advantage of his trust. Instead, he looked conflicted about the side he'd been made to choose. Or was it more than that? He mouthed a silent word as he retreated, but I couldn't make it out.

Ananias placed a hand on my shoulder. “What were you thinking, Thomas?”

“Look, something's going on between Kell and Jerren—”

“So? That's their problem, not ours.” His voice rose with every word. “What'll happen to Father if they throw us out? What'll happen to any of us? There's no food on that ship. If they make us leave, not one of us will survive—”

“I'm sorry,” I snapped. “All right? I'm sorry.”

There was a flash of anger in Ananias's eyes. He was bigger than me and stronger. If he wanted to hurt me, it wouldn't be a close fight, especially without full use of my element. But the anger didn't last. “
You
brought us here, Thomas.
You
were the one who said everything would work out. We doubted you, but it turns out, you were right. And now that we're safe, you're risking everything to prove you were wrong. If they knew that
you
had done that to the sewer . . .” He squeezed my shoulder. “We have friends now. Allies. You can stop doubting that everything is real.”

Alice and Tarn watched me with looks of disappointment and confusion. Griffin and Nyla too. Chief had opened up to me more than to anyone else. Of all of us, I was the one who should have trusted him. If I still had doubts, how could anyone else be reassured by what they saw all around them?

Rose hurried past them, heading toward our room. I ran after her, and caught up to her in the corridor.

“This is all my fault,” she whispered.

“No, it's mine too.”

“I have no one now.” She drew a quick breath. “I have nothing left.”

I wrapped her in a hug. “You have me.”

She was shaking. “Dennis mouthed a word as he left. It looked like
rat.
” She must have felt me sigh, because she added, “That's what I
think,
anyway.”

I wiped away her tears. “We'll ask him, all right? Later on, when your mother isn't around.”

She nodded then, and we hugged. And in the silence of the corridor, I realized at last that Ananias was right: There was no need to doubt that everything was real, when the most real thing of all was right in front of me.

I
hid out in our room for the rest of the morning. Maybe it was cowardly, but I couldn't stand the thought of everyone staring at me, knowing what I'd done.

Away from everyone else, I tended to my father. I collected water so that he could wash himself, and helped him pace slowly around the room to get his muscles working again. Someone, Tarn maybe, had left a pile of clean clothes beside his bed. I turned away while he dressed. In a fresh tunic, he looked almost human again.

It must have been around lunchtime when Ananias joined us. He carried a small wooden object in one hand and a bowl of water in the other.

“I'm not thirsty,” I said.

“It's not to drink.”

He placed the bowl on the floor beside Father's bunk. Then, with a flick of the wrist, he opened up the wooden object. A razor-sharp blade emerged.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

He studied Father's face. “Shaving him. At least, I was going to, but it can wait until he's up again.” He gave the razor to me handle first. “For now, you can shave me.”

The razor felt surprisingly light in my hand. “Whose is it?”

“Kell's.”

“So why don't you get him to shave you?”

“Kell?” Ananias raised an eyebrow. “I'm not stupid enough to let him near me with a blade. His idea of fun is shooting birds with a bow and arrow. I'd hate to think what he might do to my neck . . . especially after Dennis's adventure this morning.”

The blade was so clean and shiny that I caught a little of my reflection in it. It was the first time I'd seen myself in days. My face was bruised, just like Alice's. I had a thin coating of stubble, just like Ananias. I looked older than before.

“I'm sorry,” I said. “I've made things difficult for everyone.”

Ananias nodded. “Well, I'm sorry for what I said to you. I panicked. I was scared about being thrown out of the colony. I was scared for Father. For all of us.”

He pulled a small tub from his pocket and popped the lid off. Once he'd splashed water on his face, he took a glob of the stuff inside and smeared it across his cheeks, chin, and neck. “Kell says this helps.”

“What's it made of?”

“I don't know. Don't want to know, either. Anything that smells this bad can't be good.”

Usually we'd have smiled at that. Now it just melted the ice a little.

“So start,” said Ananias.

“Start what?”

“Shaving me. And telling me what's really going on in Sumter.”

He clamped his mouth shut and waited. I didn't know where to begin. Rose and I had made a mistake and paid for it. Shouldn't we be looking forward, not back?

“I trust you, Thomas,” murmured Ananias. “You're the reason I'm still alive, remember? So please, help me understand what's going on here.”

The words poured out of me then. Over several careful blade strokes, I told him how we'd boarded the ship and found Jerren there. I mentioned Jerren and Kell's rivalry, and the gunroom.

Ananias didn't speak at all, or move, or even blink. His breathing was steady. I wanted him to have questions, if only so that I'd know he wasn't as anxious as me. But even when I'd finished shaving him, his mind seemed to be elsewhere.

I rinsed the razor in the bowl and handed it to him.

“You haven't got much to shave,” he said.

“No. But something tells me you've got something to say as well.”

We were both holding the razor now. Finally, Ananias gave a slow nod.

I washed my face and applied the goo just as he had done. Then I sat perfectly still before him and watched flashes of lamplight reflected in the blade.

He didn't speak for the first couple sweeps. The blade scraped down my cheek. He rinsed it and started again. “It's Eleanor,” he said finally.

Another sweep, this time all the way to my chin. He was shaking. I felt it in every tiny vibration. His eyes filled with tears.

My instinct was to say something reassuring, but I couldn't move with the blade against me. This was the way he wanted it too. Ananias didn't want any interruptions.

“I don't know what happened the night she fell,” he continued. “When I climbed the mast, I thought she was still on the ladder. But when I got to the top, she was out of reach, hanging from the rope.”

Another rinse. Slow and methodical. Something to distract him from what he had to say.

“I made a flame. I needed to see her face clearly, and I wanted her to see me too. I thought, even with everything that had happened to us, it would reassure her. But the look in her eyes . . .” He pulled the blade away from my neck and exhaled deeply. “It was like she'd never seen me before. She was frightened of me, I think. Truly frightened.”

Ananias eased my chin up so that he could reach the curve of my neck. I swallowed hard.

“Then Alice joined us. I stopped the flame because I thought I might be able to grab Eleanor, and I needed both hands for that. But when my eyes adjusted to the darkness again . . .” He blinked, sending a stream of tears down his face. “I figured that seeing Alice would calm Eleanor down. But it didn't. The way she was looking at us . . .” Ananias wasn't even watching me anymore, but the razor still continued its course. “Eleanor didn't fall, Thomas. She jumped.”

I flinched. The blade stopped moving, a sudden adjustment that nicked my skin. I felt the coolness of it, then the heat of blood rushing to the surface.

Ananias lifted the razor and held it in front of him. The blade was tinged with red. “I'm sorry,” he mumbled. “I . . . I'm—”

The door creaked opened. I hadn't heard anyone outside, and the timing of the arrival felt too convenient to be an accident.

It was Rose. She padded over to us and took the blade from Ananias. He didn't try to stop her. And once he was free of the burden, he seemed to awake from a trance.

He left without a word.

Beside us, my father didn't stir.

Rose dabbed the sleeve of her tunic in the water and cleaned blood from the cut.

“You were listening, weren't you?” I asked.

She nodded. Blade ready, she continued what Ananias had started. Her strokes were calm and steady, but I could see in her expression that his news had shaken her up just as much as me.

“Ever since we got to Sumter, Alice has been so quiet,” said Rose. “So lost. We should've been there for her, Thomas.” She removed the razor and rinsed it.

“I thought she was grieving.”

“Sure she was. But I don't think that's why I've been staying away from her.” She ran the blade over my cheek one last time. “I've spent so long seeing her as a rival . . . it just never occurred to me that she might need my help. My friendship.”

Rose rubbed the remaining goo off my face with her sleeve. My skin felt even more alive at her touch than it had earlier.

“Do you think Eleanor really jumped?” I asked.

“I don't know. But Alice clearly thinks so. That's probably why she was arguing with Tarn last night—she's looking for answers again. And I don't think she's getting them.” She finished cleaning the blade and handed it to me.

“Talking of answers, have you spoken to Dennis yet?”

“No. He's closely guarded. It'll be a while before I can get him alone.” She rolled up the sleeves of her tunic. “Your turn now.”

“To do what?”

“Cut my hair.”

I was about to fold the blade away when she stopped me.

“I'm serious, Thomas. I want it gone.” Her hand rested on mine. My pulse was growing faster, but she refused to let the pain show. The fierceness of her expression reminded me of someone else in our colony.

“Just because Alice has changed, doesn't mean you need to take her place, Rose.”

“I've lost my father. My mother hates me. I betrayed my brother. This isn't about becoming Alice. It's about not being me anymore.” She gave a tired sigh. “If this is our new home, then let it feel new to me. Give me the chance to be who I want to be, not who I was.”

She let go of my hand then, but her eyes remained fixed on me. She was imploring me to do this, to be the one person she could still count on.

I liked Rose's hair. But I loved Rose. So I tugged the blade through the blond locks until the uneven strands fell tight against her neck.

When I was done, she didn't ask to see her reflection in the blade. She didn't ask me what I thought, either. She just gazed at me once more. Maybe she was deciphering my feelings from the way I gazed back.

Rose had wanted to change. Well, now she was different. And from the way she was looking at me, it was about much more than her hair.