The Hidden Twin (11 page)

But he doesn't. Instead, he gives us all his sourest frown and says, “I do not accept your plea of silence in this instance, Beloved, and if you want to have any hope of convincing the Temple of your innocence, I'd advise you to answer all questions simply and truthfully.”

My lungs expand, stretching my skin tight. The scars on my back seem to writhe like living things trying to burn themselves off my body.
Convincing the Temple of your innocence.
It's possible, then. Maybe I'll make it out of here with everyone in one piece after all.

“Then the simple truth,” I say, “is that I have not been accused of a crime.”

Two or three priests mutter in protest. The Onyx Staff leans forward into the light from the dirty window. “I will repeat my question: What is the secret of the merchant and the tailor?”

I grow weary of this game. Everyone knows this story. “They are twins.”

“Twins?” He arches a feathery brow. “And why should that be kept secret?”

I snort in derision. “For a high priest, you are awfully unfamiliar with mythology.” One of the priests in black lashes my head with a stritch whip I didn't know was there, slicing my ear. Warm blood oozes under my hair. I can't lift a hand to rub it, and its tickling bothers me more than the pain.

“Pardon me,” the Onyx Staff says lightly. “I didn't catch that.”

You don't have to enjoy this, you wicked old beetle.
I don't say it aloud. Instead, “The merchant and the tailor are not human twins, and so do not bear the mark of a priest on their foreheads. They are the offspring of a human being and an Other.”

“Ah, fairy tales,” he says to the others. “Children's stories. Isn't that what these are, Beloved?” He holds the storybook up as the group murmurs hesitant assent. “Drivel with no place in a court of law.”

This isn't a court of law. For one thing, there is no judge, jury, or scrivener. There is no list of charges signed by an officer of the Commandant. There is only the Onyx Staff.

The high priest lets the storybook fall to the floor with a thud. “Yes, as children, we all heard the old stories of Other princes and princesses, and as adults, we abandoned them. After all, this is the modern age, one of machines and locomotion and equality. Surely we have outgrown fairy tales. Yet…”

At his pause, the priests shuffle their feet nervously.

“Yet,” the Onyx Staff continues, “to this day, twins are marked with a priest's razor so that we may know them as human and good.” He turns to me. “Beloved, what is a redwing?”

“It is a type of flower,” I say, “that can cure forty-seven different ailments.”

My answer is technically true, but the priest in black flicks his stritch whip again anyway, now across my back. The
crack
is more impressive than the injury this time, but I don't want to press my luck further. Next time it could be my eyes.

“You are absolutely right to scorn such a question, my dear. I doubt these learned people need such a thing explained to them.” The Onyx Staff takes a step, his white robes catching patches of brown light. “Of course, everyone knows redwings do not exist. The beings known as Others have not lived in Caldaras for a thousand years, isn't that right?” He spreads his arms and smiles at the gathering. “In any case, surely no one who gave birth to a creature as monstrous as a redwing would allow it to live.”

“Surely not,” I say darkly.

“But,” the Onyx Staff goes on, his voice suddenly quiet and eerie, “despite what ‘everyone knows,' there are those of us who remember a different story. We remain vigilant, beautiful in the eyes of our god.”

The Beautiful Ones.

Now the Onyx Staff addresses me. “You do not bear the priest's mark, Beloved, and we know you to be a twin.” A few contemptuous exclamations rattle the thick air. The Onyx Staff looks to one of the purple-robed priests. “Brother Bonner, would you step forward, please?”

My kidnapper detaches himself from the shadowy group and slouches toward me. Not too close. I resist the urge to spit at him.

The Onyx Staff speaks in a calm voice. “This is the brave young man who discovered the unmarked twin in our midst—the monster.” He turns to Bonner. “All of Caldaras owes you a debt of gratitude, Beloved. Now, if you could do us one more service.”

Bonner nods. “Anything, Your Benevolence.”

“I would like you to answer a question,” the high priest says. “How can we identify a redwing?” Bonner's eyes flick to the black-clad priest with the stritch whip, but the Onyx Staff chuckles and says, “Do not fear, Beloved. You have done nothing wrong. I am merely giving you the opportunity to prove your case to our brothers and sisters.”

Relief floods Bonner's face. “Scars,” he says.

The Onyx Staff looks at me. “If you would be so kind as to kneel, Beloved,” he says gently, and in a split second, I'm struck again with the stritch whip, this time on the back of the legs. I fall hard onto the floor, smashing my knees. The chains around my wrists jerk, making terrible clanking sounds that fill the quiet space. I am coughing when the Onyx Staff says, “Are you prepared to provide the evidence for this, Brother Bonner?”

I can see Bonner sweating. He doesn't know if I have scars or not, and it's possible he's been wasting everyone's time. I glare at him, glad he gets to stew a little before this is all over. His turnip face glistens.

Seriously, Jey, this clod?

He approaches me hesitantly. The Onyx Staff motions for me to turn around, and the priest in black pulls on my chains. I comply, and soon feel the timid scrape of a blade at the back of my neck.

The little dirtbag, he's actually going to slice my clothes off. I hear the fabric of Jey's green gardener's jumpsuit slowly ripping. He doesn't have to rip it all the way down, but he does anyway, and my naked, scarred back is on thrilling display for the whole room.

“Behold the righteous scars forever carved into the back of every wicked redwing! Behold the proof of the gods' eternal anger!” The Onyx Staff's voice cuts the stale air as the room erupts in shouts and cheers and anger. “Now we strike for the second, and final, evidence.” The black-clad priest prods me to turn and face the room again.

“Let us see,” the Onyx Staff bellows, “what flows through the veins of this creature!”

One of the purple priests approaches, wielding a shiny dagger set with stones that sparkle. Bonner, eyes wide, steps aside as the purple priest takes my hand, extending my arm and pushing the sleeve of my jumpsuit up to my elbow. He rests the blade of the dagger against my skin.

“My ear's bleeding already,” I offer. “I can't quite reach my hair, but you could just lift it up and show everyone if that's easier.”

“Be quiet,” he snaps, pressing the blade. With a quick motion, he slashes the dagger across my forearm. I feel nothing, but blood gushes out—more than I would have imagined.

Bonner steps back, horrified. “It … it really is black,” he murmurs as the liquid drips down my fingers and pools on the dimly lit floor. I stare at my wound, slightly perplexed. It doesn't even sting.

“What did you expect?” I ask. Then, just to be nasty, I give him a good snarl. He jumps six inches into the air. I can't help but laugh. It comes out as a strangled cough.

The room is in a frenzy now. “The blood of evil!” the Onyx Staff says. “No human goodness resides in the veins of this creature! Brothers and Sisters, look upon this redwing, and look upon your doom!”

Breathe,
I think. They don't know how much doom I could bring them.

And I find myself
waiting
for it. I want to lose control. I want to blame my evil blood for the mayhem I will rain down upon this sanctuary.

“I am condemned, then?” I say. “You're certain of that?”

“One does not condemn a monster to death.” The Onyx Staff raises one thin eyebrow. “One only has to capture it, and give it what it deserves.” He motions, a twitch of his fingers, and I hear gears clank somewhere behind me.

The places where the stritch whip struck me ache in earnest now, but I raise my chained arms as best I am able. Hot spikes of power find their way through the bones of the Temple, up through this metal floor, up through my legs. “Then I condemn
you
.”

My first burst of fire almost hits home. I see a distinct flash of surprise contort the Onyx Staff's face as flames erupt from my hands. Priests dive and shout.

But before I can strike fully, I'm knocked backwards by harsh jets of water that come javelining out of what I now realize are large pipes edging the room. The torrent pushes me back against the carved wall, and as I thrash, I see the assembly regaining its composure.

Damn it to wet hell. If I'd attacked only moments earlier, they'd all be smoldering piles of righteousness by now. But I just
had
to know that I was to be condemned, that I was out of options, didn't I? Imbecile. I had to be able to
justify.
As if a raptor needs to justify its talons, or a volcano its lava.

I struggle to stand, thick jets of water forcing me ever backwards, my chains slicing into my wrists as I writhe. The Onyx Staff shouts above the din, and priests scramble to pull levers and turn valves. I've got to regain control, call back my fire.

Then, with a groan, the floor begins to tilt.

I slip, liquid over smooth metal, sliding away from the priests and the Onyx Staff. Through gasps and rushes of water, I see them illuminated by white sun instead of dingy secondhand window light. That can only mean—

I twist to find open air behind me. The mechanisms in the floor are winding it down away from the wall, a jaw opening as the priests watch from their level platform. I'm sliding toward sky.

My feet scrabble for purchase, but the floor is too slick. I wrap my fingers around the chains at my wrists, the only things between me and the high mist, as the outside pours in.

Soon the floor is gone entirely. The jets of water stop. And I hang.

Through the glare, my eyes register the delicate emerald rainbow of the Jade Bridge stretching into the mist far to my left. My gaze travels upward, into the blinding white fog behind which a sun must surely burn somewhere, then down.

I am two hundred feet above boiling Lake Azure Wave. The back of the Temple juts out over the water; there is nothing below me but bubbling aquamarine.

“Breathe easy, Beloved.” The Onyx Staff leans out from the dark opening above me. “May the Long Angel guide you to the Eternal Garden.” And he turns, disappearing once again into the recesses of the temple.

How long do they intend to leave me out here? My arms are already sore. I need a plan. The scars on my back crackle and burn, but I swing my legs, trying to connect with the hanging flap of what used to be the floor. I kick at it, but my boot just slides.

Maybe I can climb back up my wrist chains. I grab one and hoist with every drop of strength I can muster. The little room is only about ten feet above me. The chains grow tighter as I make what little progress I can, closing the distance.

Then another metallic creak sounds from near my head, and the manacles open. It is all I can do to grab a chain with my now free hands and cling.

I'm not meant to hang here after all. I'm meant to fall.

No matter. Same plan. I hang on with my left hand and reach with my right. But the chain is surprisingly rust-free and smooth, and there's nothing I can do to stop my fingers from sliding along its wet surface.

I remember the words I scratched into my journal as a child, when I first started trying to understand myself:
Fact: Redwings don't actually have wings.

That's too bad,
I think as the chain slips from my grasp. I manage to make one last grab at it before I plummet two hundred feet into the boiling water of Lake Azure Wave.

 

eight

“Papa, how did you meet Mother?”

Jey and I were at an age when everything required explanation. We were scientists.

Our father sat back in his not-quite-big-enough-for-three bed. The candle on his bureau guttered and rain clattered against the dark window that looked out onto Saltball Street. Every few moments, lightning would flash, but the thunder was safely grumbling in another part of the city. It was time for us to return to our own beds.

“Haven't I told you?” Papa said, tousling Jey's hair.

“No,” I said, wise to his tricks, “you haven't. How did you meet her?”

He frowned, then smiled, and we knew we were going to get the truth. “Years ago, before we moved to Val Chorm, I was apprenticing with the head gardener to the Commandant. He sent me to gather fire truffles near Mol's Mouth.”

“You went up Mol? To the top?” Jey's eyes were wide.

“I certainly did,” Papa said proudly. “It's an amazing place. Dangerous and terrible, but beautiful at the same time.”

“Like a raptor,” I said. “If you were a mouse.”

Papa nodded and patted my hand. “Just like that,” he said. “Now, fire truffles are very difficult to gather—that's why they're so valuable. They grow just at the edges of the lava. They love it, the sulfur and ash. They thrive up there. But that's treacherous ground to walk. You must wear special clothes that keep the heat away. And if you lose your footing, or if the edge gives way, well, that's the end of it.”

“I could do it,” Jey said, shaking Papa's old quilt. “I'm light. I wouldn't break the edge.”

“I'm sure you wouldn't,” Papa said. “I wasn't so lucky, however. After hours of searching, I spotted a whole cluster of fire truffles along a little glowing stream. In my excitement, I stepped too heavily on a crust of ground, and my foot broke through onto the lava.”

I touched a ridge in the quilt. “That's why you have a metal leg?”