The Seeker (22 page)

The fireplace swung back into place, and when they spoke, I recognized their voices.

“I could have sworn I heard something as we came in,” said Ariel.

“Don’t be a fool,” came Alexi’s deep voice. “How could anyone come here without succumbing to the sleep candles?”

“Thank Lud we banked up the fire. It gets colder every time we go out, and now we have the snow to contend with,” said Madam Vega irritably.

The fourth person said nothing, but I could see she was a woman. Was it Guardian Myrna?

“What are you going to do about the Druid’s man?” Ariel asked.

“You can put his body out for the wild wolves,” said Madam Vega. “I do not know what the old man hoped to achieve in sending him up here.”

Alexi laughed. “I expect he fears that we are closer to the knowledge he seeks than he likes.”

“We don’t know for sure if the Druid is even alive. It could simply be his followers,” Vega said.

“That’s not what his man said,” Ariel laughed unpleasantly.

“Either way, I don’t like the competition. It’s a pity we can’t call the Council in to clear them up,” said Madam Vega.

“Impossible,” Alexi said coldly. “Soldierguards up here would make our search impossible. And imagine if they found out what we planned. It is hard enough to keep those nosy Herders from Darthnor out.”

“Well, tonight was a waste of time as far as the search goes,” Ariel said. “I told you she would be useless.”

“I did not think to achieve anything. I merely wanted to try out the new configuration of the machine, and I don’t want to ruin Cameo as we have this one,” he added. I understood then that the silent fourth must be poor Selmar.

“I’m sick of her and all of these Misfits,” Ariel said petulantly. “I am tired of guiding them through the maze and back and of listening to their idiocies.”

“They keep Stephen happy, thinking he has some humanitarian cause,” said Madam Vega. “And when the time comes, they will be good labor. Marisa thought the things we seek would be buried, and I have no intention of digging them up
like a common farmer. Besides, it would have been impossible to suddenly stop purchasing Misfits without the Council wondering what was going on. And you must admit, the business of searching the orphan homes makes the perfect cover for our search for the right Misfit.” She paused thoughtfully. “You really think it was Cameo who set off the Zebkrahn that day?”

“It would have taken a high level of mental power to engage the machine and then to escape it, and I would not have thought her capable of it,” said Alexi. “But she has been dreaming about machines since it happened, according to our informant. It must be that she’s hiding the true extent of her abilities. But once we use the Zebkrahn on her directly, the pretense will end.”

“I’ll be relieved when our search is done,” Vega said.

“Damn that Marisa. If it wasn’t for her, we would have had the map long ago,” Alexi said angrily.

Madam Vega laughed. “Can you really blame her? It was she who discovered the location of the Beforetime weaponmachines, after all. A pity she was content to map their location and nothing more. Hiding the map from us was her sour idea of a joke … and I suspect she thought the knowledge would keep her alive,” she said.

“She misjudged my patience,” snarled Alexi. “I only hope she didn’t destroy the map.”

“She would never destroy knowledge,” Vega said with confidence.

They stood with their backs to my hiding place, warming their hands and silent for the moment. I thought about what I had overheard. Alexi, Madam Vega, and Ariel were seeking Beforetime weapon-machines, and so too, it seemed, was Henry Druid. But why?

I thought of the machine they had spoken about—the Zebkrahn. This must be the machine that had caught hold of my mind. I shuddered at the thought of such a thing being used on Cameo. And yet maybe it would not harm her, since she did not have the power they sought.

Suddenly, I realized that Selmar had left the fire and was drifting toward the dividing shelves. To my horror, she knelt down and peered through the gap to where I was hiding. I doubted she could see me, but somehow she knew I was there. I held my breath.

“I’m so tired I can hardly keep my eyes open,” Madam Vega said with a yawn.

“Get her away from the books,” snapped Alexi.

Ariel came over and pulled Selmar to her feet. She went, unresisting as he led her away. To my relief, they all left the doctor’s chamber, but I was so unnerved by what had happened that it was almost morning before I could summon the courage to come out of my hiding place and creep back to my room.

I hid the map behind a loose stone in the wall near my bed, and then I lay down and watched the sky lighten through the slot window.

In the end, I fell asleep, and woke a short time later wishing I had not. I felt heavy-eyed and sluggish, and I had to splash my face with freezing water to rouse my wits. Cameo tried to tell me of a dream she’d had, but I forestalled her, saying she could tell me later.

If I had known what was to come, I would have listened.

21

I
ATE ALONE
at firstmeal, having missed the first sitting, and was put to work at once by Rushton when I arrived on the farms. But when midmeal came, I hastened to sit with Matthew and Dameon, wanting to tell them what I had discovered. Before I could speak, however, Dameon asked coolly whether I had been out the previous night.

“Yes, but how did you know?” I asked, puzzled.

“You were careless,” he said.

“No!” I said indignantly.

“You promised me that you would take care,” Dameon said. “And now the decision has been made to release Ariel’s wolf-dogs every night.”

“Wait,” I said. “Last night I went to the doctor’s chamber. I heard Alexi and Madam Vega talking, but I’m sure they didn’t see me. They had captured a man Henry Druid had sent here; he’s after the same thing they are.
That
must be why they decided to put the dogs out.”

“Henry Druid?” Matthew echoed, at the same time as Dameon asked what they were all searching for.

“Beforetime weaponmachines,” I said. “I don’t know why, but right now our biggest problem is that Alexi and Madam Vega are the ones who control the machine that caught hold of my mind that time. Tomorrow night, they are going to use it on Cameo, thinking it will force her to reveal hidden Misfit
powers. Somehow, they imagine Cameo can help them find the weaponmachines—or at least Marisa Seraphim’s map that shows where they are.”

“But Cameo knows nowt of any map,” Matthew said. He glanced over to where she sat farther along the bench, plaiting grass in her thin fingers, her eyes on the hazy line of mountains visible beyond the stark branches of the trees in the nearest orchard.

Dameon coughed, and we both looked at him. “I have been thinking about what is being done to Cameo. What if they think they can use Misfit powers to raise the ghost of Marisa Seraphim?”

“But … that is not possible,” I said.

“No, but they do not know that.”

“Wait!” Matthew said, eyes glittering with excitement. “What if it’s nowt the ghost of her that they are seeking, but simply traces of her mind? Dameon, ye told me once that ye can pick up echoes of feelings from objects.”

Dameon nodded, but said that feelings could not give them any useful information.

I nodded slowly, too. “If they are strong, thoughts leave an echo as well.” I wondered if Matthew had hit upon the right answer. Certainly, Marisa’s books and papers would be full of her thoughts and impressions, and I knew that if I desired it, I could probably read those thoughts. But how could Alexi and Madam Vega know so much about Misfit powers? Was it possible that Madam Vega divined it because of her own unacknowledged Misfit ability?

“We mun leave tonight,” Matthew said urgently. “Perhaps if Henry Druid has a secret camp in the mountains, we can join him. Or at least raid his supplies.”

“Perhaps we have no choice,” Dameon said. “I just wish we had managed to get a map.”

Triumphantly, I told them about the map I had found. That decided Dameon, who said the supplies we had collected would have to do. We would bring whatever of our stored supplies we could conceal and carry back through the maze that evening. I would come and unlock their doors that night and do any coercing needed, and we would then make our way to the front of the house and go out the same way we had come in—through the front gate. Despite everything, the audacity of the plan pleased me.

That afternoon, as we gathered to be taken back through the maze to the house, snow began to fall lightly and softly, whitening the world. Uneasily, I looked out to the mountains, my breath making little puffs of mist in the cold air. Their tips were white, too, barely visible against the pale sky.

“In case you have any notion of escape,” Ariel said, so close that the hair on my neck stood on end, “I should warn you again about the mountains and the wild wolves. I have seen them tear rabbit and deer apart while literally on the run. No one has ever been mad enough to try to escape in this season.” He ran his fingers through his white-blond hair, a languid movement that lent his cruelty a casual air.

I looked away from him, certain he must have been able to hear my heart hammering in my chest. Behind us, the imprints made by our boots were already filling up with a fresh drift of velvety white snow. I told myself that whatever Ariel guessed from my expression as I had looked out at the mountains, he could not possibly know we were plotting an escape that very night.

But we did not go that night, for at midmeal, Sly Willie came for Cameo, and there was nothing any of us could do but watch as she was led away. Matthew looked so openly distraught that I kicked him under the table. There was no chance to talk until we got to the farms the next morning, and I was shocked to see they were covered in a thick white blanket of snow. We seemed to have gone in a matter of days from summerdays to wintertime.

“We mun help her,” Matthew said, seeming not to see the transformation.

“Tonight I will see if I can find out where she is,” I promised, just as Rushton arrived to send us off on our various errands. He seemed distracted, and it occurred to me that he had been that way for some time, but I was too worried about Cameo to ponder it deeply. I found myself among a group sent to round up the small herd of goats, which were to be led through the maze to a small yard adjacent to the house. I was in one of the farthest fields, having just found a lame goat, when it began to snow hard. It took me a long time to get her back to the stable, and when I’d done so, I was shivering with the cold.

Rushton heard me cough, took one look at me, and sent me up to the house with an older Misfit to see Guardian Myrna. By night, I was running a high fever, my voice was a painful croak, and I had been put into a sick chamber. There was no question of going out to look for Cameo, and I finally fell into a fitful sleep in which red birds swooped at my face and the ground opened up malevolently and tried to swallow me.

The first person I saw when I woke was Rushton. “You are awake at last,” he said. “The horses missed you.”

I frowned, wondering how long I had slept. Then I wondered why he was visiting me.