Let the Sky Fall (30 page)

She sucks in a breath and closes her eyes.

“What are you thinking?”
a woman’s voice asks.
At. The. Last. Second.

“Come
on
!” I shout as Audra jumps back like I have the plague.

I turn to glare at the woman.

Her long, dark hair is styled in a tight braid and she’s dressed in the same uniform as Audra, but she doesn’t wear the jacket. Only the tank underneath. Gavin sits on her shoulder—and I swear he’s laughing at me with his beady red-orange eyes.

She lets out a slow, dramatic sigh, letting it rock her whole body as she shakes her head and focuses on Audra—who’s busy trying to smooth her hair into some sort of sloppy braid. “No need to put on airs, Audra. I’ve already seen more than enough. But we’ll deal with that later. For the moment, why don’t you introduce me?”

Audra closes her eyes and swallows, “Vane, this is my—”

“Yeah, I know,” I interrupt—because even if I hadn’t seen her in my dreams, the family resemblance is impossible to miss.

Audra’s mother arrives at last.

CHAPTER 48

AUDRA

I
want to claw a hole in the ground and disappear into it for the rest of eternity. But I won’t give my mother the pleasure of watching me crumble.

I dust off my pants as I stand. My legs shake and my loose hair blows in my face, making me feel sloppy and weak. But my voice is strong when I ask, “What are you doing here?”

A chilled night wind whips around us and my mother trembles, hugging her arms to her chest and squeezing her eyes shut, like the draft is stinging her skin. Her voice is strained when she finally opens her eyes and asks, “Did you really think I would leave you to take on the Stormers alone?”

Yes
.

“Did you really think I wanted my only daughter—my only
child
—to have to sacrifice herself, if there was a way to avoid it?”

Yes.

“Yes.” The answer comes from Vane, not me.

My mother straightens up, smoothing the fabric of her tank as she turns to face him. “It sounds like my daughter hasn’t given you an accurate picture of me.”

“Actually, the fact that you wouldn’t call for backup said it all.” He sounds colder and harder than I’ve ever heard him.

Her eyes narrow. “That’s because I’d been counting on you to finally become a
real
Westerly. And I was hoping you’d turn out to be less useless than the others.”

“Hey,” Vane says, the same second Gavin screeches.

“Enough.” I rub my temples and hold up my hands to silence everyone. “Then why did you tell me you wouldn’t fight with me?” I ask my mother.

She sighs. “I thought if I gave you some extra
motivation
, you’d finally push for the breakthrough the way you should’ve been doing all along. But I always planned to fight by your side if it didn’t work. So here I am. And it appears I arrived in time to spare you from
other things
as well.”

My cheeks burn. My whole body burns. But some of that is disappointment—much as I hate to admit it.

My mother clears her throat, snapping me away from a mental image of Vane’s lips.

“I’m only going to say this once,” she says, putting her hand on her hip, like she’s reprimanding a couple of toddlers. “I’m willing
to pretend I didn’t find you both in such a
compromising
position when I arrived, but only because it’s never going to happen again, right?”

I say yes at the same time Vane says no.

“What?” he shouts, making Gavin screech again.

My mother strokes Gavin’s feathers and murmurs soft words to calm him. For a second I’m speechless. Gavin’s the only bird my mother never reached out to, blaming him as much as she blamed me for what happened. I don’t know what to feel when he nuzzles against her fingers, completely swept up in her.

“I’m so sorry, Vane,” my mother tells him. “Unfortunately, you’re not free to make that decision.”

She’s using the same soothing tone she used for Gavin, but Vane’s not so easily appeased.

“We’ll see about that,” he snaps back.

He looks at me, pleading for me to say something. But I can only turn away.

With my mother here, I might have a chance to survive this fight. Which means I’ll live to face the consequences of my actions if I bond myself to Vane Weston. The shame. The disgrace. Being removed from the Gales, the only thing that gives my life purpose. And that’s if they don’t banish me for treason.

“So that’s it, then? Mommy shows up and I don’t matter anymore?”

There’s nothing I can say, so I stretch out my arm and Gavin flies to my wrist. I stroke the softer, spotted feathers on his chest, grateful for the distraction.

“I never knew you were such a coward,” Vane says, whipping each word at me like a sharp stone.

The words sting—more than he can know. Mainly because they’re true. I’m not brave enough to fight the Gales to be with him.

I choke back my tears.

My mother lets out another epic sigh. “When I told you to make him love you, Audra, I didn’t mean you should fall for
him
.”

“What?” Vane shouts, and I can’t help looking at him. “Your mother put you up to this?”

“No. It wasn’t—I’m not . . .” I send Gavin to find a perch so I can shove my stupid hair out of my face. The wind keeps blowing it in my eyes. “I’m not up for this conversation.”

He snorts. “Right. Enough said. In fact, I’ll make this really easy for you.”

He stalks away, and when he’s vanished into the darkness, my mother approaches me. Her face is painted with sympathy, but I know underneath it she’s probably thinking,
Look how Audra screwed things up again.

“He’ll lick his wounds and get over it. No permanent harm done,” she tells me, placing a hand on my shoulder.

I shove her arm away. Even if she is sincere, she hasn’t earned the right to suddenly act like a loving mother.

And maybe she’s right—maybe it’s a good thing. But the thought of Vane moving on makes me physically ill. So does knowing he’s somewhere in the shadows, thinking I was only pretending to care.

“Been a rough few days?” my mother asks as I sink to the ground, resting my back against the cold base of a windmill.

“You could say that.”

“Well, unfortunately, it’s only going to get harder.” Her hand moves to her golden cuff, rubbing the intricate blackbird. “There’s another reason I’m here—I just didn’t want to say it in front of Vane. Didn’t want to worry him.”

Right. Only I get to worry.

I stare her down, refusing to ask a follow-up question. I’m tired of having her control the flow of our conversations.

She closes her eyes and reaches up, waving her hands through the air. “There’s something different about these Stormers. Something unnatural in the way they work. So much unrest in the winds.”

Pain seeps into her features and she doubles over, hugging her legs as her whole body shakes and a faint groan slips through her lips.

I’ve
never
seen the winds affect her so strongly, and by the time I realize I should probably try to steady her, shield her—like my father always did—she’s already straightened up. But her arms clutch her stomach like she might be sick.

“I don’t know what anything I’m feeling means,” she gasps through ragged breaths. “But I think it’s safe to say we’re in for quite a fight.”

“Then maybe I should use the emergency call.”

“No!” Her sharp tone echoes off the windmills, and her fingers resume rubbing the blackbird on her cuff, like she’s trying to calm herself before continuing. “The Gales can’t spare any guardians—how many times do I have to tell you? They’re spread too thin as it is. You have no idea.”

She starts to pace, moving in and out of shadows as she does. “I
can’t believe Vane didn’t have the last breakthrough. You should have pushed him harder.”

“Any harder and he’d be dead. I forced three breakthroughs in twenty-four hours—and the winds almost drew him away. I brought him to the west and surrounded him with Westerlies. He even breathed part of one in—but it pulled him so deep into his consciousness he almost disappeared. I had to release his memories to bring him back.”

Gavin screeches as she runs over to me and grabs my shoulders. “You released his memories?”

I stare at her thin fingers cutting into my skin. Just like when I told her my father sent me his gift, all those years ago. “Why?”

Her lips part, then freeze. She lets go of me and turns away. “I just . . . always thought that was our last chance. That maybe his parents had taught him
something
that would help him find his heritage. But if you released his memories and he still didn’t have the breakthrough . . .”

Her voice fades away.

I rub my shoulders, trying to keep up with my mother’s erratically shifting moods. I’ve never seen her so unstable. She seems almost . . . lost. Fragile.

Gavin’s vivid eyes glint at me through the darkness. “Why did you bring him here?”

She turns to face me but doesn’t meet my eyes. “When I got your message, I followed your trace, but it led me to your home. I didn’t realize you’d been living in such a . . .”

“Hovel?” I finish when she doesn’t.

She nods. She looks at me then, and there’s something in her expression I’ve never seen before. Takes me a second to realize it’s pity.

Or maybe regret.

“You couldn’t find anywhere better?” she asks after a second.

I shrug. Honestly, I didn’t look. I didn’t need comfort. I needed to do my job.

She wrings her hands. “Well, I saw Gavin there, and . . . I thought maybe it was time to make peace.”

I have to lock my jaw to keep it from dropping.

I know the meaning of each and every word she said, but strung together and coming from my mother’s lips they might as well be a foreign language.

“Were you really prepared to make the sacrifice?” she whispers.

“I made my oath. I intend to keep it.”

She’s silent long enough to make me fidget, and her fingers rub so hard at her cuff I’m surprised bits of black don’t flake away.

“What?” I finally ask.

“Nothing. Just . . . you really are your father’s daughter.”

The words feel warm.

That’s all I’ve ever wanted to be.

“You two were always like the clouds and the sky—a perfect pair. Sometimes I didn’t know where I belonged in the mix.”

I can’t read her tone. The words are sad, but she sounds more . . . hurt.

I clear my throat. “The sky would be empty without the birds.”

She reaches toward me, like she’s trying to feel me out the same way she does with the winds. But she doesn’t step closer.

I close my eyes, concentrating on the winds surging across my skin, whipping through my loose hair. They sing of the tiny steps that bring about change. Ripples in a pond.

I’m not sure I’m ready to break the surface.

“We should send Gavin home,” I say. “He might get in the way.”

My mother drops her arm and nods. “I’ll take care of it.”

She calls Gavin, and as he flaps at her shoulder I’m surprised to realize that I trust her.

I turn to walk away—then turn back and clear my throat. “Thank you for coming to help.”

A few endless seconds pass. Then my mother whispers back, “You’re welcome.”

It’s a small, reluctant step. But maybe with time it will lead us somewhere better.

CHAPTER 49

VANE

W
e were So.
Freaking
. Close.

One more second and I would’ve finally known what it feels like to kiss the girl I love.

The red lights of the windmills wink at me through the darkness. Almost like they’re mocking me. I want to scream or throw things or . . . I don’t know, just
something
.

I kick the nearest windmill.

Pain shoots through my foot, and I force myself to sit down before I get
really
stupid and go confront Audra again.

I lean against the windmill and rub my throbbing foot. My eyes focus on my copper bracelet, remembering the careful way Audra clasped it around my wrist—after saving it for me for ten years.

She couldn’t have been pretending. Our connection goes too
deep for that. And I can’t believe she would’ve come so close to kissing me if it was all an act.

But if it’s real, why can’t she screw her stupid rules and let me in? How can she choose the Gales over me?

Round and round my mind goes, trying to make some sense of the Audra roller coaster I’ve been riding. I’m not sure how much longer I can deal with the emotional whiplash.

The hours pass and I fight to stay awake through the dark silence. But after so many sleepless nights and endless days, I can’t stop myself from sinking into a dream.

I stumble through the storm. Icy flurries make me shiver. Twisting drafts push and pull, trying to knock me down or rip me away. Somehow I know where to step, how to move, how to keep my feet on the uneven ground.

“Mom?” I shout for the millionth time, my throat raw and dry. “Dad?”

The wind carries my pointless calls away. I lean into the gusts and press forward, ignoring the panic that rises in my throat and makes me want to throw up.

I’ll find them. Everything will be okay.

Two dim shapes blur through the storm and I race after them as fast as my legs will go. “Mom? Dad?”

I fight my way closer, but I still can’t really see them. A wall of wind separates us—a storm within the storm.

I don’t know if it’s safe to push through, but I have to get to my parents. I charge the winds and fall through an icy waterfall of air into the inner vortex, tumbling across the ground.

I rub the dirt and debris out of my eyes. My heart sinks.

It isn’t my parents.

I recognize Audra’s mom. But the man is a stranger. I’m about to cry for help when I notice the dark cloud sewn to the sleeve of his gray uniform. A storm cloud.