If I Fall (20 page)

We are sitting in the captain’s quarters, two men watching over us, when a woman slams through the door. She is young. Early twenties, and yet she does not carry the attributes I associate with most women her age. Her dark blue eyes have an element of aged wisdom in them. The skin around her mouth devoid of laugh lines. Black hair is pulled back into a knot at the base of her neck, brushing against the collar of a once-cream workman’s shirt, now tinged a faint brown. Brown trousers, black boots, and a knife concealed in her belt create the appearance of a stern sailor. Her entire persona catches me by surprise, and just when I think I have become accustomed to her attire, the man to my left speaks.

“Good evening, Captain.”

I startle. “Captain?”

Her eyes fall down to mine. She smirks. “Captain Devry. And you must be the riffraff my boys picked up this evening.”

“But you are …”

“A woman? Why, yes, I am. Happy to hear the sailor’s work clothes have not completely stripped me of my true gender.” She pokes a finger through a hole in her pants as though to make a point before reuniting with my hard gaze.

“We did not mean to offend you, Miss Devry. It only caught us off guard. It is so rare to find a woman in such a profession,” Dela offers as she stands, making her way around the table in the center of the room. She nearly hits her head on a lantern hanging low over the work-desk. Its dying flame barely lights the papers and odd contraptions strewn across the table.

“It’s
Captain
Devry,” she says, turning towards my sister. She looks Dela up and down, a strange look twisting her features. “How old are you, child?”

Dela looks her square in the face. “I am twelve as of this past February. If I may inquire, how old are
you
,
Captain
Devry?”

The woman laughs and the men join in hesitantly. Dela and I are stone silent. “You do not speak like a twelve-year-old,” she says. “Nor do you act like one. The audacity it takes to ask a woman her age. Well, I cannot say I do not admire the quality.” She laughs again. “I am twenty-two and I have been with this ship for five years. Captain for three. And oh how lucky you are for that good fortune. The previous Captain of
The Mermada
would have tossed you riffraff back in without a second glance.”

I set my jaw, still trying to gauge how these events will unfold.

“Lucky indeed,” I say dryly.

It takes us an hour to tell our story; from our last night in the village to floating aimlessly at sea. Skipping the more intimate details, we share what is necessary until the events of the past week are fully known. The thought catches me off guard.
The past week.
Is that truly all it has been? A week? It feels as though this time—this time of running and hiding—has been my entire life. As though nothing else ever existed. As though the times spent with my mother and father, happy in our home, were only dreams; something to wake up from and remember for those brief seconds before it slips away into oblivion.

Captain Devry does not make any form of acknowledgement while we are speaking. Not a word leaves her mouth. When we finish, she only continues to stare at us, leaning back in her chair with her arms folded across her chest. Supporting her weight with only the back two legs, the chair slams back down when she leans forward again. She nods her head, as if just now absorbing all of the information.

“Let me make sure I completely understand what you are saying,” she says at last. “You and your sister escaped an attack on your village by hiding away on a refugee ship heading to America. When you were discovered, you abandoned ship and somehow ended up in our good graces. And now you want passage to America where you can be free with your family?”

Dela and I exchange a brief glance. We nod.

The Captain tilts her head back and, to my astonishment, cackles. She laughs obnoxiously, tears nearly streaming from her eyes. It is strange to see a woman laugh so freely. She does not even try to hide her laughter behind a handkerchief, but rather opens her mouth to its fullest and lets her amusement loose without restraint. The few other men laugh too. I think back to what she said, trying to find the joke, the punchline that has clearly flown over my head, but still do not understand. Confused and afraid, I watch her in stunned silence. Dela, however, is not so quiet.

“What?” she asks shrilly. “What is so amusing?”

Captain Devry’s laughter subsides into a few weak chuckles before she is able to answer. “You foolish, foolish girls!” she screams with another fit of mirth. “You left a war only to join another!” She resolves into another fit of laughter.

A sudden anger overtakes me and I fly out of my chair. “What do you mean?” I yell. “What war?”

“The Marked’s,” she says. “The Marked’s and the Radicals! We are on the brink of war, my friend; America has succumbed to the madness, as well. Nowhere is safe anymore! Not for us! Not for the Marked! Oh, how foolish you are, child! You truly did not know!”

Her words race around my head in circles and I collapse back into my chair. Even with laboring breaths, not enough oxygen can gain transport to my brain. The world spins. Images of the war flash before my eyes—children lying dead on the floor, Dela barely visible through black smoke, Mr. Eversby’s lifeless body floating atop the water …

I was so sure I had finally escaped it. That America would be different for us. That we would finally be treated like equals. That the war was over, at least for us.

But I was dwelling on lies.

Dela refuses to accept it. “That doesn’t make sense. Why would they send refugees to America if there is a war there as well?”

I perk up. She is right; why would they—

“Because war has not yet begun. Nevertheless, it is coming. There is no doubt about it. The tension in America is at its maximum. It is only a matter of time before a real battle begins,” one of the men behind me says.

Dela looks up at him incredulously. “A real battle? As opposed to what?”

Another man to my left answers. “Lynchings, knifings, skirmishes in the street. The Marked are not liked here. War has not officially broken out. But understand this, girls, the Marked are not considered equals. Not here. Not
anywhere
.”

“But it’s ‘The Land of the Free,’ is it not?” I argue.

The man shakes his head sadly. “Aye, it is. The Land of the Free where all men are created equal—”

“Then, I am afraid I do not understand. If all men—”

Captain Devry stands, meeting my eyes this time without humor or scorn. Instead, her gaze carries an essence of compassion and pity. “All
men,
my dear. The Marked are not
men.
The Marked are not even human.”

I lean back against the table for support. She is right. They all are. I am a foolish, foolish girl. How could I ever have believed we would be treated as equals, let alone as humans! America is a lie. Freedom. Equality. It’s all a lie; a pretense I was imprudent enough to believe.

“We will take you with us to America, but when we arrive, you go your way and we go ours,” the Captain says.

Originally standing behind me, a man walks around the table to face us. With grim eyes, he leans forward and says, “When you step off this ship, you will be in a warzone. Do you understand the gravity of what I just said?”

Dela looks to me. My lip quirks up in a half grin and she bites her bottom lip in return. We have an understanding. I turn back to the man with a hard glare.

“I have not seen my mother and father in a week and I do not know that I will ever see them again. I crawled into a box to be carried onto a ship with no food, no water, and no plan. I watched through a window as three children and their mother suffocated. I nearly lost my sister to the same fate. I had the blood from a fellow Marked drip from the knife of a Radical onto my face as the dead body lay next to me. I held onto a friend as the life drained from his eyes,” I say, my voice rising higher and higher as I speak. “Should I go on?”

The room is dead silent. The men bow their heads, avoiding my gaze. Captain Devry stares at me coolly, a stoic charm in her eyes.

“War is in my life. It is a part of me now, whether I like it or not! So, yes, sir. To answer your question, I understand perfectly.”

24
FLYING

A seagull passes overhead. Its cawing drone slices through the salty air. Closing my eyes and spreading my arms, I lean my head back and listen to the rhythmic push and pull of the ocean and the caw of the bird. The wind rushes over my face, blowing my hair out behind me. A grin breaks out upon my lips. The first one since the ball, since…
Adam.

Instantly, the smile falters. My arms droop back to my sides and I open my eyes, watching as the bird performs smooth, coasting arcs across the sky. Its white feathers wink in the sunlight. I am jealous of the gull. Its ability to open its wings and jump into the sky, gliding away on pallid feathers like a ship and its sail. How easy it would be if I could just fly away whenever life got too difficult. I could forget about the war and just disappear into the sky’s blue expanse.

But the closest I will ever come to the gull is this moment, standing on the bow of a ship as it flies across the water, my arms spread out like wings.

“The first gull.”

The voice comes from behind me and I spin around on my heel. Captain Devry stands before me, wearing the same clothes she has for the past two days. I wear a similar outfit, finally free of the dress that only ever brought back horrid memories. As soon as I undressed, I threw it overboard, but its red beauty and the night that accompanied it still haunt my dreams.

The Captain smiles weakly and moves forward to stand beside me. We do not look at each other; instead, we both focus on the gull’s sweeping dives.

“It means we are getting close,” she says, inclining her head towards the bird.

“Close to where?” I scoff. “More war? More pain and suffering? That is not something I wish to get closer to.”

She nods. “None of us do, but it is like you said. It is a part of us now, whether we like it or not.”

I turn to her then, something she said before nagging at the back of my mind. “When you say we, Captain, are you referring to the Marked? Are you … like me?”

Smiling, she allows her eyes to finally steal away from the bird. They settle on me and I fidget under their cool gaze. “Yes, Miss Hamilton. You are not the only one upon this ship who feels the full effects of this war.”

I shake my head. “But they—the crew—they treat you with such respect. They not only see you as an equal, but as a superior. How did you … I mean, how—”

She laughs. “How did I stop them from throwing me overboard at the very sight of my Mark?”

Biting my lip, I tuck my hair behind my ear. “Well, yes.”

“People learn with time. They were not pleased with me when the truth was first revealed, but we were in the middle of a storm. The waves were pounding down over the deck and thrashing the ship around like a ragdoll. A strike of lightning had already taken out one of our masts. Everyone was sure that night would be the end of us all,” she tells me. I hold onto her every word, her story capturing my interest and reminding me of my own life. A whirling storm I cannot escape, and me, a powerless ragdoll trapped in the gale.

She continues. “But I refused to surrender. I knew my ability could be our salvation, so I took command and steered us to safety. It still took time for them to treat me normally. But eventually, they began to see that the only differences between them and me are a Mark and an ability beneficial to any ship.”

An odd jealousy crawls beneath my chest. It slithers out from a deep place I do not recognize. I am not jealous of her for her beauty or her charm or her lustrous hair. No, I am jealous of her ability to make people accept her. An ability I am clearly without. Adam could not even bear to look me in the eye, even after I saved him. But Captain Devry? She saved her crew and
they were actually grateful!

I nearly laugh aloud at the unfairness. Why could Adam not just be happy he was saved? Why did he have to look at me that way?
Why?
It is the question with no answers. It is the question that only leads to more questions, an endless cycle of unknowns. And it is the question that has been slashing at my heart ever since I stepped off that ship.

I ask myself that question every day, every hour, every minute. What if Adam had never found out about my Mark? What would he have said had he not been interrupted that night? I know I should stop, that the longer I allow such questions to circulate around in my mind, the longer it will take for me to let go. But it is a lost cause. I
need
to know.

… But I will never get the chance to ask. Because he is gone. And our story is over. There will be no Elvira and Adam. I am certain of it.

“Nothing is ever certain.”

I emit a feeble yelp as I whirl around. Icy spiders spin webs across my back and arms, spreading chills as they weave their way through my skin. One of the crew members stands before me. He is scrawny, younger than the rest. He looks like a child despite the wispy hairs that grow in patches along his chin. His hooded eyes are a milky blue and as I shift, I realize he cannot see me. As though knowing I just realized his condition, his lip quirks up in an almost smirk; it is a painful reminder of Adam. Another wave of goosebumps nips at my arms.