The Grower's Gift (Progeny of Time #1) (22 page)

"Did that idiot Sage say that? She's always been a little liar. You know that, Ty. Why didn't you try and save him? You could have!" Spittle flew from Lana's mouth, and her face was orange like the setting sun.

If he told her the truth, that he was the one who'd gotten Rober sent away, she'd probably kill him.

Ty let her go and moved back. "All I know is that he's lucky my mother wasn't part of the punishment. I didn't think you cared this much about him, honestly."

"He's my only brother, Ty. Of course I care about him. I've been so mean to him lately! You can bring him back, can't you?"
 

Ty looked down at his hands, expecting to see them still clad in the medieval wool and leather from Castle Life. "No, I can't."

Lana buried her face in her hands and started crying.

Ty wanted her gone.

"He asked for you, you know?" she sobbed. "Why didn't you at least come and say goodbye?"

Ty couldn't even begin to think about any of that, knew he'd lose all control the moment he gave in to remorse.
 

"He's a traitor and I can't associate myself with people like that," he said coldly.

She looked at him through her fingers, her eyes wide. "How can you say that. Rober is your best friend. He loves you."

All of that had to stay shut away. Forever.

"We can't see each other anymore either. Now go."

Lana wiped away her tears, still ogling him with her shocked eyes. "You are exactly like your mother. Cruel and dead inside. I never want to see you again."

His own fear, thrown at him by Lana's self-serving mouth, hurt more than any punch.

"I will make sure Rober is brought back!" Lana shouted and ran from the room.
 

Lana's conviction yanked something free in his mind. Something he always knew, but kept buried in the deepest, dustiest corner of the metal chest in his mind. He couldn't hide forever.
 

Things would only get worse if he did.

~

Eve sat alone at the large dining room table having breakfast. She pouted when Ty walked in. "You haven't been to see me at all again."

Ty sat down opposite her and waved the serving girl away impatiently as she tried to fill his plate with eggs. "I've been a bit busy. Where's Mom?"

Eve shrugged and started stuffing eggs into her mouth.

"Dr. Remarque wanted breakfast at four AM today," the serving girl answered instead.

Eve wore a sleeveless shirt. Her wrists were bare.
 

Ty leapt from his seat. "Where's your bracelet? I told you to wear it all the time!"

"Don't yell at me," Eve countered, her mouth full of eggs. "Mom asked me to let her borrow it."

Cold rising in his forehead threatened to drown out all sense. "You let her take it?"

Eve blinked a few times, like she was fighting back tears. "Of course I did. You told me to be nice to her. That's all you do lately anyway, give me orders."

What did his mother want the bracelet for? Did she know about Eve's power?

Eve's fork clanked against the plate. "You never come play with me. You don't even visit. Then when I do get to see you, you yell at me and order me around." She stood up and ran from the room, hiding her face in her hands.
 

"Wait, Eve. I didn't mean to…I'm sorry."
 

She was already gone.
 

It would all be alright as soon as he got the magic stopping pills for her. Then Ty could finally relax.
 

His phone buzzed. "I left some instructions for you with Martin, Ty," his mother said. "I won't be in the office for most of the day. But you should go there."

Ty would rather cut off his own hand than participate in Maya's testing.
 

When he arrived at the facility, he found Martin alone in the control room, poring over a screen, typing furiously with his metal clad hand.
 

Ty cleared his throat to get his attention. "My mother said you had work for me?"

Martin blinked at him a few times then pointed to a box on the table. "She wants you to take that to today's batch of testees and find out if it interferes with their gifts at all."

Cold sweat ran down Ty's back as he reached for the box. Inside it lay the grass and aquamarine bracelet he had given Eve. His chest constricted, like someone had placed a thousand pound weight on it and left it there. The box and the bracelet fell from his lifeless fingers.
 

Did she know about Eve? The idea was too unimaginable to consider. So he let it go.
 

"What's wrong?" Martin asked.

Ty picked up the box and rose, willing his hands to be still. "I'm a little clumsy today. Which exam rooms are active?"

"Four, six and eight," Martin answered after consulting a second screen. "Do you want me to call someone to help you?"

Ty left without answering. Maya would be in one of those rooms, Ty was sure. At least he would get one more chance to tell her to hide her gift. It was her only chance to end the suffering.

Exam room four held an older woman whose gift was manipulating objects with her mind. Ty knew, because he was with the team that had collected her from a town in the Badlands. She explained all about her power to him excitedly on the way to the facility. She even demonstrated by tying a bow from a piece of string and making it fly across the room without touching it. Her eyes glistened in merriment then.

That was weeks ago.
 

Today she was strapped to a chair, her shaved head covered with sensors that would record all brain activity during her test. Her eyes looked dead.

Two helpers in white bodysuits were placing on the last few sensors as Ty entered. The woman tried to move away from him as he approached. He ignored her fear and tied the bracelet to her wrist.
 

"During your test today, try to see if this bracelet in any way influences your ability to use your gift," Ty directed. "Do you understand?"
 

The woman nodded and Ty left the room. In the adjacent room one of the helpers pushed a button. Inside the room, the bald woman screamed and tried to raise her arms to shield her face. But she was tied down, immobilized, reacting to some terrible setting only she could see, some stuff of her own nightmares his mother had devised to bring out her gift.
 

Ty stared at the floor beneath his feet, counting the tiny imperfections in the smooth white tiles. Years later, it seemed, the woman finally fell silent. Ty followed the helpers into the room and stayed by the door as they revived her.

"Ask your questions now, if you have any," one of the helpers said.

Ty pulled his tablet from his pocket, hit record and pointed the camera at the woman.
 

"Did the bracelet work in any way?" he asked.

The woman nodded. She was pale and looked like she would faint again at any moment.
 

"How?"

"I couldn't…I couldn't reach my power," she managed.

Ty turned off the camera.

He knelt beside her and began fiddling with the knot on the bracelet. "I'm sorry you couldn't defend yourself because you had this on."

The woman had already lost consciousness, didn't hear his apology.

In exam room six, the testing had already begun on a young boy no older than six. Ty turned on his heels and left.

His hands shook as he let himself into exam room eight. The helpers had already strapped Maya to a chair. She wore only a tight sleeveless shirt that left most of her chest bare. Her golden skin seemed to glow in the sterile white room. Helpers were attaching sensors across her chest and down her left arm. She sat there motionless, but her eyes were glowing coals shooting fire.

Ty approached, not daring to look her in the eyes. She jerked her arm away when he tried to attach the bracelet next to another she already wore.
 

"I have to tie this to your hand," Ty said.
 

"No," Maya said.

One of the helpers grabbed her wrist and held it still for Ty to attach the bracelet. "These gems will stop your power from working."

"I don't want to stop my power!" she yelled. "I want to learn how to use it."

Ty told the helper to leave the room, then leaned in closer on the pretext of fixing the bracelet more securely. "Nothing you will see in the test is real. It's all like a VR game. Don't use your gift at all and this will be over soon."

"Then I can go home?" Maya whispered.
 

"Don't argue and do as I say, Maya.
Please
."

Ty rushed from the room, unable to lie to her.

She gasped and flailed during her test, looked to be running away from something, but she didn't scream. She also stayed conscious.
 

"Did the bracelet do anything?" he asked once it was all over.

She shook her head, still out of breath. "It did block my gift, but then I was able to find a way through."

"Why?" Ty asked, panic tightening his chest.

"I had no choice. I had to make the tree grow."

Ty tore the bracelet from her wrist and rushed from the room. Ronia was alone in the control room, soundlessly sobbing into her hands.
 

"Tell me where to get the pills," Ty asked, ceasing all pretense. Maya had doomed herself by using her gift today. Eve could still be saved.
 

"The pills don't work. They're useless," Ronia's words appeared over her head.

"My mother said they were in the final trials," Ty insisted.

Ronia pointed at the wall screen in the next room, where exam rooms four, six and eight now stood empty. "I slipped two pills to Maya. She could use her power despite it."

Then the strangeness of the scene hit him. "Are you crying over Maya? Why?"

"Because she's my niece."

Martin burst into the room, knocking Ty aside. "Don't tell him that. Do you want us to get killed?"

Martin glared at Ty like he had just mortally wounded him. "She doesn't know what she's saying. Please don't repeat this to your mother."

Ty had no intention of doing so. "I won't if you give me the pills."

He knew how the trail worked. Some of the pills had to be placebos. Maybe that's what Ronia had given Maya. Ty had to cling to that hope. The pills could be Eve's last chance to keep her gift hidden.

"We can't," Martin protested.

Behind him Ronia reached into her pocket and pulled out a clear bag full of tiny glass vials filled with purple pills. Ty rushed over and snatched it from her hand before Martin had time to react.

"Don't worry, I won't reveal your secret," Ty whispered and ran from the room.

~

Ty rushed straight back to his sister's room as soon as he got the pills. She wasn't there.
 

He sat by the window to wait for her. A thin white blanket was folded neatly atop one of the cushions on the sofa, Eve's tablet and VR console resting side by side on the coffee table. Eve liked her rooms neat. She tidied after herself obsessively.

One corner of the living room was devoted to her plants. Three rows of large clay pots filled with natural soil, obtained from uninhabited regions in the north where a few trees and shrubs still grew naturally, sprouted plants that Ty couldn't name. She'd told him what they were all called, of course, more than once. Whether the 6-foot high green plant with heart shaped leaves the size of platters was a monstera or something else, he might never get to ask her again.

A sensor on one of the clay pots started flashing and beeping about an hour after he came in. It sounded like a bomb was about to explode; likely it meant the plant had to be watered.

Eve should be back by now.

She would have told someone to care for her plants while she was away. Eve was always obsessing about that too, whenever they went on holiday. Ty tried to silence the beeping device, but could not. He ignored the beeping, and stayed waiting for her until dinner time.
 

His mother was eating dinner alone, two servants hovering beside her. Ty sat down in his seat to her right.
 

"I glanced over your findings with the bracelet," his mother said, wiping her mouth on a cloth napkin and replacing in on her lap. "I must admit I expected a more thorough report. You never even tested the boy in six."

"He was already under when I got there. I didn't want to disturb the exam."

His mother took another bite of her venison and chewed slowly, never breaking eye contact. Ty looked away first.
 

"I want you to redo the tests tomorrow. More thoroughly this time, Ty," his mother said.

"Where's Eve?" Ty asked.
 

"I don't know. She's probably still cross with me for not returning her bracelet yet," his mother said in between bites. "Which is your fault, for not testing it properly."

Ty glared at her. "Why don't you ask Martin about it, he has a whole encyclopedia on gems."

His mother's smiling eyes gleamed with a playful light. "I would prefer some hands on data on the bracelet. From someone I can trust completely."

She threw her head back and laughed a throaty laugh. Whether at the joke on Martin's hands, or the known betrayal on Ty's part he couldn't be sure. All he knew was that he should get away from her or risk losing control. The freezing cold of his power was pulsing in his forehead.

Ty rose and replaced his chair under the table. "I'm sorry if I disappointed you. I'll do much better next time."

"You better make sure of that," she said still chuckling. "If there is one quality I lack it's forgiveness."

Lack of forgiveness was only the tip of the iceberg of qualities Violetta Remarque lacked.

~

Maya stumbled along, supported by the two men who had drugged her the day before. The doors of the corridor back to her cell swirled all around, leaving streaks of blue across her vision. Every few steps the corridor transformed into the sun scorched plain she found herself in during the exam. Her mouth was still as dry as the sand.