Sky Without Stars

by Jessica Brody

  Alouette tried to refocus. A good sister was a sister who performed the Tranquil Forme with attention and mindfulness. She wanted to be a good sister. She really did. She tried to imagine the huge silver ships flying through the stars at hypervoyage speed, their bellies full of people, animals, prized possessions, seedlings for crops, hidden books, and most of all, hope.

  But as soon as the images of the freightships formed in Alouette’s mind, they quickly morphed into the dilapidated Frets they’d now become. And then Alouette was right back where she’d started.

  Thinking of Marcellus. The droids. Her father. His tattoo.

  The map.

  What was the red dot pointing to? Where was the map leading? And why had her father kept it hidden inside a candlestick all these years?

  “Are you with us, Little Lark?” Laurel’s voice punctured her thoughts.

  Alouette glanced around and noticed that the other sisters were still finishing up with Ghostly Stars while she was already on to sequence three, Orbit of the Divine. Her body was moving by itself, untethered to her mind. Exactly the way Tranquil Forme was not supposed to be done.

  She quickly repositioned herself and took a few long, loud breaths.

  Focus, she told herself. Slow down.

  When Alouette and the sisters were done with the Orbit of the Divine, they moved on to sequence four: The Darkest Night.

  “In this sequence we acknowledge the position of Laterre within the System Divine,” Sister Laurel said in her quiet tone. “We honor our current season of lowest light as Laterre orbits around the back side of Sol 1 and the light from the far-off Sols 2 and 3 become invisible at night.” Laurel moved one hand up and the other across, illustrating the twenty-five-year eclipse that Laterre was now experiencing, making the nights the darkest they could ever be. “Invisible, but not forgotten,” Laurel reminded them as she lowered herself down into a squat. “For just because we cannot see the Sols, it doesn’t mean they are not there.”

  As she followed Laurel out of the crouch and looped her elbow up and over in a circling arc, Alouette’s gaze caught the long, raised scar on the inside of her arm.

  Once again, her mind started to drift.

  Back to the hologram. Back to that map. Back to Marcellus.

  How his fingertips had been searching for something that wasn’t there. That hadn’t been there for years. Everyone who came to live in the Refuge had their Skins removed by Sister Denise. Alouette knew, like all the sisters, that if you wanted to fulfill the Sisterhood’s most sacred task of protecting the library, you could not be trackable.

  “Little Lark?” Sister Laurel’s voice sounded like a distant echo.

  Alouette blinked, just now realizing that she had come to a complete standstill. She looked up at Sister Laurel and then around at the other sisters. They were flowing through the fifth sequence—The Gray Cloak—but they were looking at her too. Sister Muriel’s gaze, under her snow-white eyebrows, was kind but worried. Principale Francine’s stare was hard and questioning, of course. And Sister Jacqui had two darts between her eyebrows, which implied she was thinking hard about something.

  “Is everything okay?” Sister Laurel asked in her sweet, unassuming tone.

  Alouette nodded. “I’m fine.”

  But as she caught herself up in the sequence, arching her arms over her head to honor the cloud coverage that kept Laterre warm enough to inhabit, she knew without a doubt that she was not fine.

  Her brain was itching with questions that everyone was refusing to answer. Even Jacqui, the one sister whom Alouette could usually count on to be forthcoming, had walked right out of Alouette’s lesson earlier, refusing to say anything. Sister Jacqui had just left Alouette, babbling something about knowledge and how it’s acquired.

  “Perhaps knowledge is in us from the very start, but it’s also out there to be found.”

  Alouette was trying to acquire knowledge. She was trying to find the answers, but it seemed as though every time she tried, she just ended up with more questions.

  As the group moved into the seventh sequence—Pushing Tides—Alouette stole another peek at Sister Jacqui. The sister flashed her a warm smile before tipping her head back and arching her arms high above her head to mimic the motion of the Secana Sea.

  Alouette felt a surge of frustration rising from her belly to her throat. But she still continued through the sequence. She still swept her arms over her head; she still dropped her head back; she still stared at the ceiling of bedrock that had housed her for the past twelve years. This cave buried deep within the stone had been the only home she could remember. But now it felt like a prison. A vault full of secrets. A locked door that Alouette simply didn’t have the key to.

  When the sequence came to a close and she lifted her head back up, she noticed, with surprise, that Sister Jacqui was smiling at her again. But this time, there was something mysterious in her smile. Something almost enigmatic.

  Was she trying to tell her something?

  Alouette glanced upward again. At the low ceiling that separated her from the above-world. And suddenly, Jacqui’s words echoed through her mind in a new way. With new emphasis.

  “Perhaps knowledge is in us from the very start, but it’s also out there to be found.”

  And that’s when the realization hit Alouette like a collision of planets and stars.

  Out there.

  By the time Sister Laurel led everyone through Sols Descending—the final sequence of Tranquil Forme—Alouette knew what she had to do. She understood what Sister Jacqui had been trying to tell her. The answers would never be found down here. In the Refuge. Where darkness and shadows clung to everything. Where silence was everywhere.

  What she needed to find was out there.

  Up there.

  Waiting for her in an unknown location, marked by a blinking red dot.

  - CHAPTER 34 -

  CHATINE

  “MARCELLOU. I THOUGHT I’D NEVER see you again.”

  As the woman emerged from the mist, Chatine watched Marcellus’s reaction carefully. He’d said in the cruiseur that he didn’t know what he would do when he saw his former governess again, and it was clear now that he still had no idea. His body was rigid and his hands were balled into fists, as though he were physically trying to hold himself back. From what? Embracing her? Seizing her? Chatine was quite certain that even Marcellus didn’t know.

  “What do you want?” Marcellus said in a tight voice.

  Chatine could tell he was trying to sound tough, menacing even. But she could hear right through it and she suspected the woman could too. Her weathered face, etched with crisscrossing lines, broke into a kind, almost-motherly smile, and her brown eyes twinkled. As if to say, Oh, sweet boy. Don’t be like that.

  Regardless of what he did or did not intend to do, one thing was certain: The officer was scared out of his mind. Chatine had known him less than a day, but she already knew him well enough to see that. And he had every right to be. He was in the middle of the Tourbay, completely outnumbered, with no backup.

  Chatine would have felt fearful too, but she knew her tattered clothes and dirty flesh protected her. She was Third Estate. It was the one time when her lowly status had actually helped her.

  “I just wanted to see you,” Mabelle said. “I’ve missed your sweet face. I’ve missed everything about you. You’ve grown into such a handsome man.” She was close to them now. Close enough that Marcellus could reach out and strike her if he wanted. But instead, it was the woman who extended her worn and weather-beaten hand. Not in anger, but in tenderness. She reached for Marcellus’s cheek, but he ducked away before she could make contact.

  Any other officer or inspecteur would have already attempted to arrest Mabelle, but Marcellus was clearly torn. Perhaps it was just the fact that she was surrounded by guards—Vangarde operatives, no doubt. And Marcellus knew it would be suicide to try anything.

  Or perhaps he really did care for this woman.

  Despite
herself, Chatine found Marcellus’s reaction to the old woman somewhat endearing.

  “Well, you’ve seen me,” Marcellus said. “I guess I’ll go now.” He turned to leave but Mabelle caught his arm. Marcellus winced and looked down at her grip with a pained expression.

  “Marcellou,” the woman said again.

  “Don’t call me that!” Marcellus shouted, ripping his arm away from her so brusquely, one of the guards reached for an unseen weapon in his coat. Chatine readied herself to run, but after a single nod from Mabelle, the guard relaxed. “You have no right to call me that,” Marcellus went on, his shaky voice seeming to gain confidence with every word. “You betrayed me. Everything you ever told me was a lie.”

  “Not everything,” the woman replied with a warm smile. “I never lied when I told you I loved you.”

  Chatine watched Marcellus’s face crumple, as though those were the words that he was most afraid to hear. And now that she’d said them, he could no longer hold on to his anger. But he seemed to try regardless. “You never loved me.”

  “I did,” she insisted. “And your father loved you too.”

  Marcellus stiffened. “My father is a traitor. And a murderer.”

  “Your father is innocent.”

  Marcellus scoffed. “Of course you would say that.”

  “I say that because it’s true. He never blew up that exploit. He was framed.”

  “Well, that’s convenient,” Marcellus replied with a bitterness that Chatine had yet to hear from him. It left her with a sour feeling in her gut. “A Vangarde spy insisting that a Vangarde terrorist is innocent.”

  Mabelle smiled, as though she expected Marcellus to respond exactly this way. “Yes, I was a spy. But that doesn’t mean I didn’t still care about you. I’ve known you since you were six months old. After your mother died when your grandfather denounced your father—”

  “For being a terrorist!”

  “Your father asked me to apply for the job of your governess,” Mabelle went on, undeterred.

  “So that you could spy on us and the Patriarche,” Marcellus interjected again.

  “So that I could look after you,” Mabelle corrected. “And yes, after your father was kicked out of the Palais, we needed someone with eyes on the inside. But also, I took the job so that I could take care of you.”

  “And brainwash me!”

  “Marcellou,” the woman said tenderly, reaching out her fingers for him, but again, he was too quick. “I never brainwashed you. I tried to teach you to be kind and respectful. I tried to teach you that everyone is equal under the Sols. That no one should be imprisoned or forced to live in squalor just because they were born on the wrong side of Ledôme walls.”

  Marcellus crossed his arms as though he meant to argue with that, but quickly decided against it.

  “My only hope was that you would grow up to think differently. Think for yourself. Instead of just doing whatever your grandfather told you. I tried to give you empathy. Nothing more.”

  As Chatine glanced between Marcellus and the old woman, she felt some of her hard edges soften. Was that why Marcellus felt so inherently different from every other officer Chatine had ever met? Was that why he seemed to look at her like she was a person and not a piece of trash to step over?

  “Have I succeeded?” Mabelle asked Marcellus, tilting her head and studying him again with that affectionate gaze that felt like a punch in the stomach for Chatine. The only person who had ever looked at Chatine with that much love was Henri.

  She wondered, if her baby brother were alive today, would he still look at her like that? Somehow she doubted it. He would have been thirteen this year. Old enough to be hardened by the Frets and undermined by the Regime.

  Marcellus remained silent, refusing to answer the question. Chatine had a feeling he was afraid to speak, afraid that his tenuous grasp on his toughened exterior would break the moment he opened his mouth.

  But Mabelle seemed to know the answer anyway. At least her smile implied that she did. “That’s why I sent for you,” she explained. “Because we need you.”

  Chatine froze, her pulse quickening. This was the moment she’d been waiting for. This was the recruitment the general had sworn was coming.

  Surreptitiously, Chatine reached into the sleeve of her coat and tapped the button to start a log on her Skin. As soon as she was back in Vallonay, she would send this entire conversation to the general.

  “You need me for what?” Marcellus spat.

  The woman glanced uneasily at Chatine. It was the first time since she and her guards had arrived that she even seemed to acknowledge Chatine’s existence. As though her invisibility followed her around like a shadow. But now, Mabelle was clearly sizing her up, trying to determine if she could trust her. Apparently the answer to that question was no. Chatine tugged at the cuff of her sleeve, making sure her Skin was fully covered.

  “Perhaps,” Mabelle began, keeping her gaze trained on Chatine while still addressing Marcellus, “we can go somewhere private to talk?”

  Marcellus followed her eyeline to Chatine. “Whatever you have to say you can say in front of him.”

  “Him?” Mabelle repeated curiously, and Chatine wasn’t quite sure if the woman was questioning her identity or her gender. She checked the position of her hood, just to be sure. It was still firmly in place.

  “Yes, him,” Marcellus repeated, irritated. “He’s my guide. I trust him, and therefore if you want to say anything to me, you have to say it here.”

  At these words, Chatine felt a layer of warmth fall over her, staving off the chill of the icy mist.

  He trusts me. Just like the general said.

  “Very well,” Mabelle said, her expression turning pensive for a moment. “The truth is, your father and I planned to escape Bastille together.”

  “And how did you escape, by the way?” Marcellus asked, the officer in him making a sudden appearance.

  Mabelle just offered him a cunning smile and continued. “But your father got sick before we could execute our plan. We knew he didn’t have long. So I sent you the message through his shirt.”

  “You wrote the message?” Marcellus asked. “Not my father?”

  Mabelle nodded. “I thought the nickname would be your clue. Just like when you were little. Remember the clues I used to leave around the Palais for you? Leading you to a prize?”

  “This is a not a prize,” Marcellus muttered.

  Mabelle ignored him. “I knew, given your father’s relation to the general, that his body would be brought to the Vallonay Med Center for disposal, instead of the Med Center on Bastille, and that you, as his next of kin, would be called to the morgue to authorize it. Then, I just hoped you would find the message and be able to read it.”

  “I couldn’t read it,” Marcellus said, jutting out his chin like a little kid trying to make a point.

  “Have you not been practicing your letters?” Mabelle asked, and in that moment, Chatine could finally see her as a governess. Telling Marcellus when it was time to go sleep, tucking him into his soft downy bed, kissing him good night.

  “No,” Marcellus replied sharply. “I stopped reading and writing the day I found out what a liar you were.”

  Chatine knew the words were meant to penetrate, but Mabelle showed no sign of the sting. “But somehow you were able to read it,” she pointed out.

  “I had help.”

  “So, you wanted to see me.”

  “I came here to arrest you.”

  Mabelle chuckled tenderly, like a mother laughing at her child trying to act tough. She nodded to her security detail. The guards were still standing motionless around her, like shadows in the mist. “Well, we both know that’s not happening.”

  “We will find you. I will report this back to my grandfather, and he will send more Policier out here. Transporteurs packed full of droids. You will be rooted out and discovered.”

  Mabelle shook her head. “I don’t think that’s going to happen.”


  “You don’t believe they can find you?”

  “I don’t believe you’re going to tell the general about this.”

  Anger flashed across Marcellus’s face, and Chatine wondered if he was irritated that Mabelle would think this, or that Mabelle was right. Something told Chatine it was both.

  But it didn’t matter. She would report it to the general anyway. This was exactly what he’d sent her here to do. This very conversation was going to get her to Usonia.

  Chatine could almost feel the Sol-light on her face already.

  Mabelle took another step toward Marcellus. Chatine expected him to jump back, out of her reach, but he stayed put. “We are coming back,” the woman said, her voice taking on a more formal tone. “The Vangarde will rise again. We’ve been biding our time, building our numbers, waiting for the right moment. And it’s fast approaching.”

  “Well,” Marcellus faltered, and Chatine could hear the doubt in his voice. “We . . . will be ready for you.”

  Mabelle shook her head. “Not this time. There are cells rising up everywhere. In secret. This time, we will not fail.”

  “When does it stop?!” Marcellus shouted, his voice trembling. “How many exploits do you have to bomb before you give up? How many innocent people have to die?”

  Despite Marcellus’s fury, Mabelle sighed. “You still aren’t getting it, are you? The Vangarde doesn’t endorse acts of unnecessary violence and murder. We just want change. We want to make Laterre a better place. A more equal place. But the First and Second Estates won’t allow that. They need to keep us enslaved. Because the truth is they cannot survive without the Third Estate. In our fermes, we grow the food that they eat. In our fabriques, we manufacture the goods that furnish their manoirs. In our exploits, we mine the minerals and metals they need to live. We are more powerful than they want us to know. We are the legs on which this body stands. Without us, Laterre collapses. We are trying to give the Third Estate back their power and end this corrupt system once and for all.”

  Chatine glanced at Marcellus to see his eyes closed, as though he was trying to summon strength from within. “Lies,” he muttered to himself. “It’s all lies. You’re a bunch of terrorists.”