by Katie French
The guard on the stool outside the infirmary entrance jumps up and holds out a hand. “Visiting hours are—”
“I don't care,” I pant, skidding to a stop. “Where's my mother?”
He crosses his big arms over his chest and shakes his head. Flakes of dandruff float onto the shoulders of his sleeveless cotton shirt. “You don't have clearance.”
“They're with me,” Mage says, shooting around him. “Come on.” She waves us into the store.
We run. The guard moves to block our path, but I duck around him and skitter into the store after Mage. When I look back, the guard's throwing his hands up in frustration as Clay and Ethan race around him too. He picks up a walkie-talkie and presses it to his mouth. He'll have back-up soon. We don't have much time.
Startled Middies fire dirty looks in our direction as the four of us jog past the rows of beds. I search each mattress for my mama, but we don't find her. Mage waves me to the back.
The sign above the little hallway says “Fitting Rooms.” A Middie with large, sagging breasts and loose jowls sits on a bench outside, fiddling with something. She looks up as we stop in front of her.
“What's this?” she says, standing. Her voice is high-pitched, but coarse. She narrows her eyes.
“Where's their mom?” Mage says, pointing at me. “A Middie told me she wasn't doing good. They came to see her.”
She frowns and glances toward the little hallway with fitting rooms behind her. “She's in there. Had to isolate her from the other patients. She was moaning and carrying on.”
Mama would never cry out in pain, not unless it was unbearable.
“What's wrong with her?” I ask.
The Middie won't meet my eyes. I don't have time for games. Guards will be here any minute to drag us out. I run into the dim hallway with wooden slatted doors on either side. Which room? The old Middie lumbers in, cussing at me. Then I hear moaning. Mama.
The moan is throaty and awful. I run toward the sound, the light growing dimmer. There, in the largest of the changing rooms, my mama lays on the musty carpet. Her eyes are squeezed shut and her face contorts with pain. She's withered even more than last time: her cheekbones rise sharply beneath her paper-thin skin, collar bones poke out of her shirt, and her hands look skeletal. The only big thing about her is her stomach, the round lump the size of a melon under her gown. How has it grown that big already? We've only been here a few days.
“Where's Mama?” Ethan asks over my shoulder. I can tell he’s close to tears.
I look at Ethan. He's seen a lot, but only when I couldn't spare him. I look at Clay. “Can you get Ethan outta here? He doesn't need to see this.”
Clay nods and takes Ethan's hand. “Come on, little bro.”
Ethan yanks his hand away. “No! I'm not a baby.”
Clay looks at me and I shake my head. He heaves a big sigh and hefts Ethan up onto his shoulder. Ethan drums his fists on Clay's back and begins to wail. I pretend I can't hear. I have to focus on my mother. She looks horrifying. I kneel beside her, my hands trembling as I reach for hers. “Mama,” I say, trying to rouse her. “Mama.”
“She's sedated.”
I whirl around. The old Middie stands behind me, looking down. Her eyes are sapped of anger, and her expression has gone doughy and soft. Somehow her pity makes me feel worse.
“What's wrong with her?” I turn back and my eye catches movement. Is she awake? Something shifts under her gown where the baby grows. I stare, filling with dread. Slowly, hand trembling, I pull up her gown.
At first there's nothing, but then… movement on her belly, the baby rolling, stretching the skin there.
I stumble back, slamming into the slatted door with a crash. In the doorway, I grip the wood and try to breathe. That fetus has only been growing for a month and a half. How can it be that big and that… mobile? Images of alien creatures, monsters with fangs and claws, flash through my head. The room tilts as I clutch the door.
“It's the fetus,” the Middie says, watching me from a few feet away.
“What d'you mean?” I ask, hanging onto the door. My legs feel unhinged.
She steps around me and kneels beside my mama, her knees popping at the effort. She places one wrinkled hand on her abdomen. “The fetus is one of the Breeders' mutations. A genetic hybrid meant to mature at double, even triple, the rate of a normal human fetus. They wanted to produce humans faster. Imagine a baby gestating in three months. The problem is the babies become parasitic in order to speed up their growth.” She pulls her hand away as the baby rolls. “Not natural,” she mumbles, shaking her head.
I stare at my mother’s stomach and the baby rolls again. “Para…sitic?” I clutch the door. “What does that mean? What is it doing to her?”
“It's taking everything, nearly every nutrient she eats, and using it to accelerate its growth. She may survive until gestation. After that…” The Middie shakes her head, her jowls swinging softly. Like she's given up. Like she's already buried my mama.
I grab her arm and she stiffens, the thin flex of sinewy muscle and bone beneath my hand. “There has to be something you can do. Can't you…cut it out?”
She shakes her head. “No, I'm afraid we can't—”
“Can't or won't?” I tighten my grip on her arm.
“Can't,” she enunciates. “The placenta has already begun to attach itself to neighboring organs. It's like a cancer, directing blood flow to itself, suffocating your mother’s kidney, her liver, her spleen... In the hospital they could sustain her body with I.V.s and medication. Here, well, we don’t have that kind of ability. She has about a month.”
My head is spinning. The world tilts and I can't see straight. What is she saying? Mama can't be saved? She'll be sucked dry, swallowed up by that thing in her stomach? I place my hands on my knees and try to breathe, try not to be sick.
“We've been able to help before,” says a quiet voice at the end of the hall.
I lift my head, tears swimming in my vision. Mage is the small shadow, clutching at her jumper. She takes another step forward and says it again. “We've helped before.”
The Middie folds her arms over her chest, her billowy cotton top fluttering. “Once, and it was a mandate from the Messiah. The Gods had deemed that she live.”
“Why can't God deem that my mother live?” I ask, struggling to stand. “Why not her?”
“It's very difficult and expensive. The cost of the drugs alone could feed us for weeks. With the food shortage—”
“I don't care.” I turn and clutch Mage's jumper in my fists. “Can you ask him? Can you ask your father to save my mother?”
Mage shrugs. “I can try.”
Mage and I stand outside the Messiah's chambers. She's so close I can feel the heat baking off her pale skin. Her hands fumble in her jumper's large front pockets while we wait. Her anxiety doesn't help settle my nerves. I try not to visualize my mother in that fitting room, pale and lifeless. Like she's a corpse. Like she's already dead.
“I hope he's not mad,” Mage says under her breath. She draws a curl down and bites it between her tiny white teeth.
“How come you're helping me?” I ask, staring into Mage's big gray eyes. I wonder where her mother is. She's never mentioned her.
She shrugs, her unconscious habit. “If I tell you, do you promise not to tell anyone?”
Goose bumps break out over my arms. “Tell me.”
She leans in until her face is nearly touching mine. “When you go, I want you to take me with you.”
I'm shocked. I open my mouth to question this and a door slides open. Andrew waits on the other side. He's frowning, already angry as a stepped-on scorpion when he sees us. The dread in my stomach expands like a cancer, like the baby eating my mother from the inside out.
“Come in,” he snaps.
Mage and I enter and the door shuts, taking the hallway light with it and leaving the dim candle light behind. It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust. We bump through the antechamber an
d Andrew opens another door. Instantly, the overpowering smell of incense reaches my nose, making me feel lightheaded. We enter and again the door seals shut behind us. I stuff my trembling hands into fists at my side. Mama, I think. Whatever it takes.
“Where's my darling daughter?” the Messiah says, turning. He's still dressed in his flowing off-white robe, his long hair unbound behind him. Mage presses herself into his arms. The hug is thin; the Messiah's face never changes as he embraces his only daughter. Mage pulls back, sheepish and shy. Her gray eyes are especially wide now, like a field mouse, taking in every movement. Maybe if I'm still, he won't notice me.
“Riley.” He rolls my name on his tongue like a delicacy.
I nod sharply, forgetting he probably can't see me. I cough the anxiety out of my throat. “Here. Here, sir.” My voice warbles. So much for showing no emotion.
Andrew starts tidying up the piles of paper on the Messiah's desk. He stacks the Messiah's strange documents, the little words cut from many books and glued onto the large parchment pages, crinkling delicately. How can a man with little to no sight left manage to manipulate paper like that?
Andrew breaks the silence, coming up behind the Messiah. “They’re here to ask you to save the girl's mother. I strongly advise against it.”
“Hey!” I shout before I realize what I'm doing. I drop my voice. “Why would you say that? She's dying.”
Andrew glares at me coldly. “People die. The medicine that would save her can help feed us for weeks. We're rationing as it is. I can't spare anything else to help a dus—”
“Silence,” the Messiah says calmly. He turns his head toward me. “The baby? It drains her, yes?”
“Yes.” The image of her sunken body appears before my eyes, making my knees weak.
“And we can stop it, yes?” he says, whirling toward Andrew.
Andrew's knuckles turn white as he grips the paper he's holding. “Yes,” he says slowly.
“Then we should do so.” The Messiah draws Mage to him with one arm.
Both Andrew and I stare open-mouthed. It was so easy. I thought after I turned down his offer to be converted he'd throw it in my face. I blow out a breath. “Thank y—”
“On one condition.” He leans toward me, one hand on Mage's blond curls.
Of course. I narrow my eyes. “What's the condition?”
He strokes Mage's hair. There's another large sore on the back of his hand, a wide red swatch of skin missing.
“You must join us.”
My heart's hammering again. It's the exact opposite of what every fiber in my being wants to do. “We don't have the Sight.”
He shrugs as if he doesn't believe me.
“What if we say no?”
“Then we cannot help you.” He turns his cloudy eyes away and stares off into the distance.
“Fine,” I say, nearly choking on the words.
We'll get my mama fixed and then get the hell out. What does it matter if I break my word to these freaks? The only person I'll miss is Mage and she'll be fine without us. I turn to go.
“One more thing,” he says.
I whirl around.
He's staring at me. Really staring at me as if his blind eyes could see through me into the depths of my heart. Does he know I plan on hitting the high trail the second she's well?
He lets Mage go and strides up. When he's a foot away, the smell that was disguised by the sickeningly sweet incense reaches me. The smell of rot, the same smell of the soiled T-shirt I found. As if some part of him is dying.
“You must allow Clay to join the Brotherhood. He will take the oath this evening. He will replace Stephen.” He narrows his clouded eyes. His lips, behind his tidy beard, tighten in anticipation.
A lead weight slowly circles my heart and begins squeezing. It means Clay drinking that water, Clay becoming whatever they are.
“I can't.” I step back, bumping into the wall. “That's too much to ask.”
“But he wants to join, yes?” the Messiah asks. His blind eyes somehow find me again, bore through me.
“No,” I say, clutching the wall.
The Messiah nods slowly. “He wants to join us.”
It can't be true. Clay doesn't want to be what they are. Sweat prickles on my skin and the urge to vomit returns. The incense is too sweet, and yet I still smell the rot coming off the Messiah, like meat left out in the sun.
I drop my head. “If he wants to join, I can't stop him. I'm not his master.”
The Messiah nods, folding his sore-covered hands. “And you will tell him you approve of the position? That you want him to join, yes?”
I raise my eyes and glare at the Messiah. “How can I? It's a damned lie.”
“Then your mother dies!” he shouts. It's terrifying, the echo reverberating around the tiny room. My head is spinning. I can't think. I have to get out.
“Okay!” I shout, burying my face in my hands. “Just save her.” Tears prick at my eyes, but I don't allow them. My body feels numb, dead.
“Good,” I hear the Messiah say. Then Mage's hand is in mine, leading me out. The incense smell falls away and the light from the hallway lets me know we're through. I open my eyes.
Mage still holds my hand. “It's okay. You did what you had to do.”
“That’s not true,” I manage. “All I've done is sacrifice one person I love for another.”
Chapter 12
The crowd murmurs as they march Clay toward the carousel. His blue eyes scan the crowd for me, seeking reassurance. I have none to offer. For once I'm grateful for this crowd of surging, smelly bodies. Here I can hide my shame.
After I agreed, the Messiah sent word to have the Middies use whatever expensive drug they needed to slow the growth of the fetus and save my mother. But only after Clay swears allegiance and joins. I can't feel happy about saving my mother. All I can feel is shame.
I'm such a coward.
I look up now, unable to stop myself. There stands the boy I love in clothes I've never seen him wear before: a bold yellow shirt and pants, both so tight they show off his muscular arms and thighs. He's a duplicate, a member of their Brotherhood. The thought sends a spike through my heart. He's one of them now. Not one of us.
They stand in a line, arms taut, chins jutted. The other men’s eyes are locked forward, but Clay’s eyes rove around the crowd. I duck behind a woman with a huge head of curly black hair. I hide and hate myself. Hate every ounce of me.
The drums and the chanting are the same as the night Kemuel and Mordecai were named. No woman wails, though. At least not out loud. My cries are silent, but just as pained. The Messiah raises his arm and everyone goes silent. Above, a bird flutters into a nest high in the metal rafters. I let my eyes settle on it as the Messiah begins speaking.
The Messiah sweeps toward Clay, his arms outstretched, his gown fluttering back to his elbows. “Tonight we have gathered for the sacred purpose of inducting Clay Tate into the Brotherhood.” The Messiah fumbles a bit for Clay, but finds him and then wraps his large hands around Clay's shoulders. “This young man saved my daughter. He offered his life for one I hold dear. That night the Gods spoke to me, revealing that this man of courage would bring peace and stability back to our people. My heart is glad because I know Clay will do great works here, among the people.” At this the Messiah drops his head as if overwhelmed with emotion. I remember his stiff hug with Mage last night, the way his calculating eyes seemed to bore through me even in that dim light. It's all an act: the emotion, the fancy words and dress. He's like one of those people on Betsy's TV shows, acting. Manipulating. Those tears when Mage was in danger were probably fake too. And we're swearing an oath to him tonight.
He holds a silver bowl up to Clay. “I Name you, Clay, in the blood of the Gods: Jesus, Buddha, Mohamed, Yahweh, and countless others. With this holy baptism you are now a man of the Gods and part of our Brotherhood.”
The Messiah holds the bowl out and the water dances, its reflection lighting Clay's face. He
shakes his head almost imperceptibly, but then he's reaching out, taking the bowl and lifting it to his lips.
Stop! I think. Don't drink it!
I say nothing. I'm lower than dust. I'm a slug who should be ground out of existence.
Clay swallows a big gulp of water. I watch, feeling like someone is slowly strangling me. The Messiah lifts the empty bowl over his head, smiling, displaying its empty contents for all to see. The crowd cheers.
A wretched, awful squealing cuts through the human voices. At first I worry it's coming from my own throat, but no. A few men drag in two hogs by ropes slung around their necks. The fat hogs lash their heads from side-to-side. Every heart-wrenching squeal reveals their long yellow teeth. Their hooves clatter on the concrete as they scramble to get away from the frenzied human crowd. The people chant and sway as the men drag the pigs to the front. I lift up on tiptoes to peer around the woman in front of me just in time to see a man with a knife step toward the hogs. He presses the blade under the animal's thick neck. I squeeze my eyes shut.
A squeal. A muffled thud. A cheer goes up from the crowd. The other pig is screaming bloody murder. A sickness lurches in my stomach. They take so much joy in killing. Why are they doing this?
I look up in time to see him slit the other pig's throat. Blood splatters on the floor and the second pig falls heavily on the concrete. Another cheer. Their bodies now rest in a large pool of blood. The stink of death clots the air. The people chant. I feel like throwing up. Then I see the Brotherhood step up with knives. I look away.
Finally, the tang of smoke fills the air and I look up. They've constructed a fire on the concrete next to the butchered hogs. They throw bloody legs and hunks of flesh on the fire and the smell of charred meat replaces the smell of smoke. The flames add a devilish glow to the crowd's frenzied faces. Clay stands near the front, his face frozen, his hands locked behind his back. He winces as they throw the pig's heads on the open flame. They aren't even going to eat the meat; they're letting it burn to ash. For their Gods.
