Redeemer (19 page)

Keegan helps pull me up, and we continue the rest of the way across. He glances at me once we're on solid ground. “You OK?”

Sucking in a deep breath, I nod. “Thank you for coming with me, Keegan. I wouldn't have ever made it this far without you.”

He grins, always easy going. “And don't you forget it.”

The tension between us is gone, at least for now. “OK. Let's keep moving.”

We cut a path through the tall grass on the levee as we draw closer to the area near our street. We walk until we're at a place more familiar to both of us. The riverboat where we met Mr. Elders bobs in the water, a reminder of where Keegan's journey started. The place he first realized the rumors he'd heard about the Greaters were real.

Once we reach the old riverboat, we cross over the levee and make a path through the trees and toward the neighborhoods.

Breathing gets harder with every step forward. We are inside Middle City 3. I am home, a place I haven't been in months. A place I never thought I'd be again.

“I always knew I'd walk these paths with you again.” Keegan's words are opposite of my thoughts, and I smile.

He still holds my hand, and suddenly I wonder what I'm doing here. My head is as murky as the Mississippi.

“When all this is done, maybe we can figure out our life. Together. Things will be different, you know?”

His words sadden me. When this fight is over—and a fight is definitely coming—our world will be different. Changed.

I nod, because he's exactly right. We're all going to have to figure it out. Except I can't commit to the together part.

He seems to notice and falls silent.

We come from the trees after making sure no guards roam the streets. Everything looks exactly like it did when I left it. No extra guards or communities for Greaters being built. Just a simple street on a sunny day. Just home.

I freeze when my front door opens, and Dad steps out. I take a deep breath and force myself forward.

It's now or never.

 

 

 

 

26

 

Dad kneels on the ground as we approach. His back is to us, and, as we get closer, I see he's scrounging in the dirt.

He's planting.

Grass seeds?

For probably the hundredth time he's trying to make grass grow in our barren front yard. My heart squeezes, and I grind my teeth to keep from crying as nostalgia hits me in the face. Six months ago my life was here. It was with Keegan, and it was good. Six months ago my life was easy.

“Dad?”

I hear his gasp and see the way his hands still. He's on his feet in a moment.

My heart squeezes again, but this time it's because of how he looks. His cheeks are sunken, and dark rings surround his eyes. His hair is greasy and thin.

“Dad?”

He glances up and down the street almost as if he's in a panic, then he waves us inside.

We follow him in and he locks the door behind us. Moving to the curtain, he looks out the window just to be sure no one saw us.

“You shouldn't be here.” His looks are haggard but his voice is strong. He begins pacing. “They come every day looking for you. They could be watching right now.”

“They come here looking for me?” This is news to me. Surely they're not still looking when Frost Moon saw me only yesterday.

He nods and glances at the door nervously. He hasn't looked me in the eye yet. It's almost like he's gone crazy.

“Dad, are you OK?”

Finally, he stops pacing. His eyes pierce me with the most staggering look of regret I could ever imagine or hope for. I can't stop the tears this time.

“Don't worry about me,” he says. “There's nothing more they can do to me. They took her, and now they've taken you. What else is there?”

Warm moisture flows down my cheeks, and Keegan takes my hand. Dad glances at the gesture, but he doesn't say anything about it.

“Where have you been? Why aren't you in Greater City?”

I can't begin to explain everything that's happened, especially if the guards truly are watching him. It won't take them long to come knocking. I move to the couch and take a seat. Keegan follows me, and Dad perches on a chair.

“I was demoted, but Dad, there's so much the people don't know. So much they deserve to be told.”

He shakes his head, blowing my statement off. “I'm not concerned about any of that. I would like to know where you've been, though.”

I glance at Keegan, but his face is neutral. Blank.

“I was in Lesser City 4, but I ran away. I've been in the free lands between cities ever since.”

He nods and glances between us. “You've been together? All this time?”

He's so eager to know the details.

I shift, unsure of what to say. If Dad is unstable, I don't really want to give away all our secrets. “Not the whole time, no. I found Keegan only a few days ago.”

Dad nods and this time tears form in his eyes. “Thank you for looking after her.”

Keegan's jaw clenches, and he gives a single nod. Dad's tears are affecting him, as well.

“Dad, I came here for a reason. I met someone in Lesser City 4. She claims she knew Mom—in Greater City.”

Dad's eyes widen. At first he stays frozen in place, sitting on the edge of a chair, leaned slightly toward me. But then he leans back and lets out a rush of air. “What are you asking, exactly?”

Those weren't the words I expected.

“Well,” I sputter. “Is she telling the truth? Was Mom Greater?”

He nods slowly. “Yes. Born and raised. We met later, after she came to live in Middle City 3 with the military academy.”

I stare long and hard. Maybe I was hoping he'd deny it. Then I'd know everything Mom had ever said was still true.

Now? I'm not sure which parts weren't lies.

“Is that all?” he asks with a sigh.

“No. She implied Mom had secrets. A secret job, and even secrets about me. I want to know what all that means.”

The sad regret is back in his face. He leans fully against the chair back, a deep frown on his face.

My stomach sinks. I'm not going to like whatever he's got to tell me.

I clasp Keegan's hand as tightly as I can and hold my breath.

“She came to Middle City 3 to scope out the military training facility. Frost Moon intended to build an actual army, he just hadn't figured out how to do it at the time. We've never had an army, you know, not since the Greater system was formed.”

Forcing myself to breathe, I decide to test Dad's knowledge. How many secrets is he keeping?

“Why would he need an army?”

Dad's eyebrows rise, and he shakes his head. “I don't know the answer to that. In fact, I'm not sure your mother knew.”

Of course she knew, if Isabel knew it then so did Mom. I keep that to myself.

“Why did she lie?” Why did they both lie?

“When we met, and we wanted to get married, she knew she would have to give up her Greater status. Supreme Moon didn't like that too much, but she worked a deal with him that she would continue her military work through the academy. He agreed.”

That seems way too simple for Frost Moon. He had to be getting more out of the deal or else he wouldn't have let it happen. Losing Greaters to marriage isn't something he takes kindly to—I've witnessed that first hand on more than one occasion.

“She thought it would be too confusing if you knew she used to be Greater.”

His words make little sense. It seems more likely that knowing she used to be Greater but was forced to demote herself in order to get married would make the Greaters look bad.

And apparently, Mom didn't want to make the Greaters look bad.

I don't like the way this conversation is going.

Dad shifts in his chair, and it hits me. He's still placating me. He's holding back some truth.

“I came all the way here to get answers, Dad. I want to know whatever secrets Mom knew. I want to know what she did for Frost Moon, and how it relates to me.” I force the words out in a stern voice. It isn't easy. I've never raised my voice to Dad, and I don't like doing it now.

He frowns and pauses to think. Finally, he sighs. “She had ideas about building up an army, but once she had you, she wasn't as interested in the work. She convinced Supreme Moon the answer lay with future generations.”

His words are spoken slowly. Purposefully.

They settle over me like ashes from a volcano. “The answer would lie with me. That's what she promised him?”

The realization grips my stomach.

“That's why I was promoted to Greater? Some deal Mom made with Frost Moon when I was born?”

Dad looks at his lap, and I know I've guessed his secret. No wonder he was so worried when I was sneaking out at night and getting caught on the other side of town after curfew. He knew he had a debt to pay, and keeping me in the mold was part of it.

My anger snaps like a pea from Dad's garden. “I was bred to come up with answers for making an army?” I jerk my hand from Keegan's and stand. “I wanted to help the Lessers. No one said anything about an army.”

Saying the words out loud makes everything real, and I fall back to the couch. I'm suddenly exhausted. Too exhausted to stand. To think. To cry. “He's using my ideas to make the Lessers into an army. That's what he wanted from me all along.”

Dad's sad eyes again tell me my words are true.

How could I have been so stupid? Memories roll in like clouds before a storm. Mom planting seeds in my heart to care for the Lessers—telling me how she gave her lunch to a Lesser who looked like he was starving. Encouraging me to shoot for my dreams, even though everyone said I couldn't get a government job.

She wasn't pushing me to be who I wanted to be. She was pushing me to be who she had promised I would be.

My head lowers into my hands and I groan. This can't be happening. If it's true, my whole life has been a lie. Did my parents even love me? Did they sign rights over to Frost Moon as soon as I was born?

“Hana, your mom thought she was doing good. She was helping her country's leader, a country she believed in.” His hand touches mine, and I realize he's moved to the small table in front of me.

I jerk my hand away. “If she believed in this country she wasn't very smart.” I stand abruptly and turn to Keegan. “I'm ready to leave now.”

Dad follows me to the door. “Things weren't supposed to happen this way. The army will be put in place to protect us. You were to be a part of that greatness!”

I sneer at him, unable to keep the bitterness from my heart. “An army to protect us, made up of Lessers forced into the role? That's sick.”

I jerk open the door and turn back to him. “You still believe in this society? In our leader?”

He wavers, and I know the truth. He doesn't believe, but he doesn't know what he should believe in.

My heart softens. He is as lost as everyone else. I step toward him, willing to try one last time. “Dad, there is another way, a free way, a fair way! But it can't be done with the system we have in place right now. It can't be done without God's help.”

He frowns and shakes his head. “Why do you believe such foolishness?”

So he refuses to believe.

Keegan steps to my side and takes my hand. “Are you ready?”

In answer, I step out the door. Just as we make it down the front step, two transporter trucks pull onto our road. The drivers spot us and the trucks speed toward us.

Dad cries out. “You have to run, Hana! Don't let them take you!”

There's no time to reply, but my last thought as I bolt across the street and toward the levee is Dad is broken, and he doesn't even know it.

 

 

 

 

 

27

 

Keegan pulls me behind him, my legs doing double time to keep up. We make it across the street and hurry into the trees covering the path to the levee, but the guards definitely saw us.

“There's no way we can make it back to the bridge unseen.” A tree branch catches my skin and scratches my face.

“We have to try.”

“Can't we hide?” I ask.

Keegan shakes his head and keeps moving. “You heard your dad. They've been waiting for you. They're not stopping until they find us.”

We reach the bottom of the levee, and somewhere in the distance behind us shouts ring out. I dig deep and shoot up the levee as fast as I can move.

“Should we move to the bottom and follow the bank?” It's a long way down.

“It's the only way,” Keegan says. “If we run along the top we'll be easy targets.”

It seems like we're going to be easy targets either way, but I don't argue. We start down the hill but my foot slips in a muddy patch. My legs slide out from under me and I tumble down the grassy hillside. Something sharp scrapes across my back and I cry out.

By the time I reach the bottom, Keegan is there helping me to my feet and pulling me away. “They're going to be here any minute. Don't look back.”

He doesn't have to remind me.

We've run less than a quarter mile when the first shouts ring out from the top of the levee where we came out.

“Stop in the name of the guards!”

It's not the first time I've heard those words, and they're easy to ignore. The first gun shot is less easy.

I gasp and jump, even though it's no less than what I expected.

“Keep going,” I whisper to myself, running at full speed.

Keegan glances at me, but we're both too winded to carry on any kind of conversation. Topping a small hill, relief washes over me. The bridge rises in the distance. If we can make it to the bridge, if we can get across it, we can hide in the wild lands outside the city limits. We only have to make it to the bridge.