As we walked through the forest the trees seemed to dim. The colors shifting paler, leaves turning almost gray. Dwellings strung between branches, like treehouses high above the ground connected by rope bridges.
As we climbed closer to the spring, clerics began to emerge from their treehouses, and every one of them was unnaturally colorless, their clothing and skin shades of gray like a black-and-white photo.
I stared at a cleric praying from the top of a tree. “When did we step into Kansas?”
It wasn’t just the clerics, even the trees had barely a trace of color. I clicked my heels. There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home.
The cleric gestured. “The Seer Spring steals our color.”
I stepped lightly. I was pale enough already.
At a certain point along the trail, the houses stopped. A river babbled in the distance. A stark white insect crawled across the pale ground.
I didn’t like this. The cleric stopped me at a line of pebbles across the path. The line of rocks continued into the forest, black and white on one side, soft brown and green on the other. Beyond the line of rocks, the slender trees were in grayscale, each leaf glistening and white.
“You must remove your shoes,” he instructed. “This place is hallowed.”
I nodded. The path to the Devout took many a hallowed detour.
I pried off my shoes and stepped over the rock line into the black-and-white woods. The ground on the other side of the marking was several degrees hotter. It burned my bare feet. I yelped and startled a bright red bird perched on a pale branch.
“Sorry. I didn’t expect the ground…” They didn’t need an explanation. “Never mind.”
By the time we reached the spring, or at least the cliff across from it, my calves burned from the climb. Only the cleric’s breaths were even. The ground broke free around us, sharp drops that hid their edges behind stark bushes and thin trees.
We clumped tight along the path, mindful of a misstep.
Beyond the canyon, a massive stone statue cried waterfalls from each carved eye. I stopped as my jaw dropped. The spring was a she. And she was breathtaking, a massive statue etched into the cliff face. Like Mount Rushmore, but female.
Bluebird would have loved this.
I moved toward the edge. Rickety wood and rope bridges crossed from cliff side to cliff side, the ropes bleached pale and frayed by time. Eight different bridges stretched higher and closer to her eyes, and if I had the time I could have climbed them. Clerics crossed the bridges, holding cups that drained of color as they filled.
At the end of the path I followed, a massive stone hand jutted off from the edge of the cliff. Seer water filled the base of the palm, maybe three meters across. A hawk circled directly above it.
Goose bumps shot up my skin. “Incredible.”
Seer water seeped between my toes as I walked onto the upturned hand, leaned over the edge, and peered down. The carved hand was like a perfect diving board. Across from me the waterfall cascaded dozens of meters down to a clear sparkling pool where bone-white fish swam in perfect circles.
“Careful,” the cleric warned. I stepped back.
He pointed to a cleric on the lowest bridge. “That cleric needs a key to unlock the gate that protects the only beach. One of the clerics on the bridges will have it, though I do not know which one. Perhaps if you assist them with their duties, they will give you a prize for your efforts. But beware, the farther down we collect the seer water, the clearer the sight. The clerics may speak prophecies, or they may speak riddles that will aid you on your journey.”
The air smelled of fog, deep and murky.
There wasn’t time for riddles. I glanced up to the damaged sky. Squares of light blurred, like they’d dissolved. One disappeared as I watched.
A Savak Wingship took off from the tallest spire of their castle. The soundtrack drummed heavy and menacing.
Word must have spread to the Savak queen that a player was here. They were coming for me.
The cleric lost his smile. They were coming for him too, I didn’t doubt it.
“No time. I want to jump.”
“Without wings?”
I trusted the cliff more than I trusted the Savak wings. My stomach tightened as I tiptoed back to the edge. I couldn’t just hide. Not when the crown was so close. And this was so obviously an Indiana Jones leap of faith moment. I might die from it, but I doubted it. It was only about a skyscraper high. People had jumped from higher cliffs before. And I needed the velocity to reach the bottom of the spring.
I knew this was a risk, probably a daft risk.
But Bluebird was waiting for me, and if I hid or waited until they could catch me, the window of opportunity to grab the crown might draw its blinds. If we didn’t get the armor, I’d never get back to her.
I let out a breath and stepped off the cliff.
My body arched like I was an Olympic diver. Not on my own skill, mind you. I was more like an Olympic belly flopper. My robes shook from the wind, and I knew this moment was making the most amazing cut scene. My heart thundered as I fell. My stomach flipped. I breathed until the fear faded, leaving only exhilaration behind. Falling was like running, like a rush of joy and freedom and victory.
The cleric shouted as I fell, the others creeping out to watch.
I felt alive in every centimeter. The wind rippled my robes and pulled at my cheeks, but I would not give in to fear. I was a bird, breaking the rules of flight. I pointed my fingertips above me in a perfect V.
The pool rushed closer.
I let out a steady breath and counted for the moment of collision with the water.
Three. The fish scattered, and my shadow shrunk on the surface of the water.
Two. Deep inhalation of breath. The air was sweet and the visions already blinding.
One.
I broke the surface. The impact sent tingles through my whole body, but they weren’t painful. Underneath the water, the spring was even more beautiful than the falls that crashed into it, the water crisp and cold, the light scattered through it glittering. Stark white fish swam away through the pure water, like they were flying in a rippling nothing.
Gorgeous.
Another carved hand reached from the polished sand, and at the center of the palm was a crown. Silver and sparkling in the water, more a diadem than a crown. The orange stones were vivid color against this pool of white.
A circle appeared at the corner of my vision, like a timer slowly draining as my air ran out. I just had to grab the crown before the circle emptied.
A shadow ran over the crown—long, thick, and slithering through the water.
Bloody underwater levels.
23
DAGNEY
There were woods everywhere, a rocky mountainside, and a ceiling full of sky, but we stood like the trees had crowded us tightly together. The branches left eerie shadows and stripes of darkness through the muddy ground. My shoulder pressed against his chest, my skirts brushed against his legs, my bag dug into his hip.
He was my personal space.
I’d gotten so caught up in Ryo I’d lost track of my brother.
“We’ll see Grigfen again,” Ryo said softly. But that wasn’t something he could promise. We couldn’t know how much time we’d have left.
I pressed my palms against my stomach. But no matter what words he said or pressure I put on my stomach I couldn’t smooth the tangle of worry inside me. He wrapped me in his arms and held me tight.
He was strong and steady. I could almost believe him that we’d make it out of this, or that Grig would be fine out there on his own.
Almost.
“Where to next?” I stepped away and he let me go.
“The Axes of Creation and Destruction.” He glanced above me. “Are you hungry? Your stats are dropping.”
“I’m fine.” That was a blatant lie. “We should go.”
“Are you sure? I can make you something. Might be good to press pause and
regroup before we travel to the Kneult.”
I ran a hand up my arm. “Do you even know how to cook? You are a prince.”
“True. Prince Ryo has never cooked a meal in his life, but I can.”
“That’s confusing.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Who is real? What are you really like?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m still me. Except, well … I play football.” Great. “I’m lousy at math, but my mom sent me to a school with a STEM focus, so that sucks. I lost my dad, and my mom creates worlds.” His smile seemed false, like something he put on to cover how he really felt. He met my eyes and the mask slipped. “Prince Ryo never lost his dad. And that kind of grief, it changes you. I have a bigger temper than Prince Ryo does, but I’m more likely to take risks. Something in me broke when I lost him, and it’s broken again every time I’ve died in this game. I’m not really sure who I am anymore, having gone through that.”
I reached for his hand.
He squeezed my hand and kissed my fingers. “How about you? Who is the real Dagney Tomlinson?”
He said it with a smile, but I couldn’t respond with one. “Hungry,” I said after a second. “I’m hungry.”
“Let me take care of that.” He opened the bag and gave it a dirty look. “Why would you pack an entire bag full of cheese?”
“It travels well.”
“Always so practical.” He made a face and dug deeper.
“But not quite to your taste?”
He gave a crooked smile. He could smile when he said he didn’t like something; was that what his face would look like when he decided he didn’t like me?
Activate Traveling Boots.
“One second.” My heart raced so fast, I barely timed my step before I ran away. 3 percent. Far enough away I wouldn’t see him, but not so far I’d plunge into an ocean. Again. I took a traveling step with my boots and he disappeared. One second he was there, grinning, and the next I was alone in the woods, dressed in the flickering light. I combed my fingers through my tangled hair and braided it back with nimble fingers.
WHAT WAS I DOING? He was a football-playing, egotistical, and yet secretly broken boy. This was not a good idea. Maybe you don’t even like him. Maybe he’s just tall, have you thought about that?
Side quest, find peddlers, I thought.
The arrow in my mind spun, and I measured the distance between where they were and where I’d stepped. I’d stepped 3 percent away from Ryo, and they were that 3 percent plus some. 5 percent.
I took a step and landed just outside the peddlers’ camp.
Deactivate Traveling Boots.
I walked through the camp. There was a flurry of activity throughout the carts: grieving people burying their dead, tending to wounds, and a woman assembling our supplies into a pile they were clearly about to abandon. The children leaned on their parents’ shoulders. At least they were alive.
She faced me. “Ah, Lady Tomlinson. You’ve survived the onslaught. How fares the prince?”
Her face was blank of emotion, but something in her eyes seemed tired.
Maybe it was all the deaths in this game, but something in me had shifted. “I won’t ask you to do more.”
Her shoulders slumped with relief.
“I’m just looking for food.”
“Take what you’d like,” she said, gesturing her hand toward the pile.
I loaded my bag with dry crackers, drink in sealed bottles, and dried meat. I glanced around. I didn’t know if I could come back for more supplies. The league boots made traveling easier, but we’d have to carry what we needed on our backs.
I licked my lips. “I’d like to trade back for my ring.”
Why did I want it? It wasn’t attached to plus accuracy, or style. But it was my mother’s ring. On my eighth birthnight my fictional mother had knelt with me up in our attic and asked if I was old enough to be trusted with her greatest treasure, a ring she’d gotten from her mother, and her mother before that. And then she died, and it was all I had left to remember her.
And at the same time, the ring was only a token from a story, an implanted memory with a side attachment of grief and guilt, so I’d traded it like it was nothing.
“I’m sorry, my lady.” The peddler I’d traded the ring to pressed his hand to his chest. “I sold that ring.”
I closed my eyes. My real mother was still very much alive outside the game. We used to be so close when I was younger, then the bullying started, and my mom didn’t stop it. I knew she tried, and I knew she loved me, but she wanted me to be more like them. She wanted me to diet and wear darker colors, told me if I wasn’t so angry all the time and if I kept my opinions to myself maybe they’d leave me alone. She treated me like I was a problem she could solve, and I gave her nothing but my anger for it.
But when I touched Lady Tomlinson’s ring, it was like remembering that someone missed me. Someone wanted me to come home.
“That’s fine,” I lied.
I packed anything that seemed useful and stepped back to where Ryo waited. My full bag pressed against my leg, and I held two roasted turkey legs.
Ryo’s hair was carefully parted, his cape back on. I wasn’t the only one who took my time away as a chance to gather myself.
“Tell me you paid for this.” His eyes twinkled as he took the turkey leg.
I smiled at the memory. “I traded so well, they paid me.”
I took a bite. Oh gosh, this was heaven. Whatever hack they did that made us feel pain also made us able to eat, and I thanked them for that. I loved food. I loved the char on this meat, the crunch of the crackers. If we were in real life, we’d need to drink a lot more water, but then again if we were in real life we’d have to pee a lot more often.
I couldn’t think about that anymore. I was giving myself a headache. “Can I ask you a question?”
He wiped turkey grease off his lip.
“Your mother is Ms. Takagi. But your face was different so…” I trailed off, not quite sure how to continue.
“Are you asking why my mother photoshopped her own son’s face?”
“I’m trying not to.”
“It was a bad call, right? The real me is super hot.” He grinned, but I didn’t think he was joking. “But only my brow ridge and this massive chin have changed. The rest of me is exactly the same. I mean these abs are photorealistic.”
I rolled my eyes and wouldn’t look at him. “Would you put your shirt down?”
He laughed and tucked in his shirt, but not before I caught a glimpse of the skin beneath. My cheeks burned. I was in so much trouble.
He stared up at the damaged sky, his hair flopping to the side as he moved. “The marketing department thought the game would sell better if the main character was more traditionally handsome. Appeal to the broadest range of consumers.”
“That’s horrible. And your mom just let them?”
Ryo took the last bite and tossed the bones into the bushes. “I guess so. And it’s stupid. Everyone has their own type, so the idea that I have to look like someone else in order to appeal to the greatest amount of people is, well, insulting and dismissive, and man. I didn’t realize I felt this much about this. It’s messed up. Isn’t it?”
It really was. “It’s like being a girl.”
His eyes flashed and he scooted closer. “I bet. The girls at my school, I swear, just keep trying to morph into the same person. Bleaching their hair, nose jobs, color contacts. All of that. It’s like they think a girl has to look a certain way for a boy to woo her.”
I hit his arm. There was an insult in his words, either to me, or to other girls.
Or maybe the truth just pissed me off. I looked away. “Did you just say ‘woo’?”
“It’s a word we handsome princes say.”
I laughed, despite myself.
He pressed his hand to his heart. “Warn me before you do that. your entire face lights up and you’re completely adorable.”
“You’re c
ompletely adorable,” I grumbled.
I expected a look of triumph when I flirted back, but he didn’t even pause. “I know. That’s what I’ve been saying.” His gaze slid to mine and that was when he grinned, and I had to smile back.
I was so dead.
He rubbed his knuckle under his nose. “That’s why it doesn’t bother me that it’s not my jawline on the game. It’s marketing lies”—he licked his fingers—“but I’m still me. Besides, I don’t want to see an exact replica of my face on billboards, or banner ads, or TV commercials, when the game launches.”
“Do you think it will still launch?”
“I don’t know. I hope it does.”
I scooted closer. “What’s it like being the child of Nao Takagi?”
He winced. And then that polished mask came back on.
“Sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to sound like an interviewer or something.”
“No, it’s okay.” He leaned back like he was suddenly mindful that we were being watched. “It’s good.” His shoulder bobbed and he lowered his voice. “It was good. My mother smiled in all the family pictures, came home at night and ate the food my dad made for us all, and we’d play Mario Kart as a family. We were all so proud of everything she made, but sometimes it felt like she never really wanted to have kids.” He stared at the ruins around us. “Like I was the compromise she would not make twice. I think I only exist because of my dad. He always wanted to have kids, and she fell in love with the wrong person.”
“That’s hard.”
He shook his head. “It wasn’t. I had a good education, everything I’d ever wanted. My dad made my childhood a joy. But … when he died when I was twelve”—he swallowed—“my mom and I were both stuck with a life she didn’t want.”
“How’d he die?”
“He had a stroke.” Ryo bit his lip. “We were playing Ashcraft. Level three by the waterfalls. It took me a couple minutes to realize why his character wouldn’t stop running into a rock.”
I put my head on his shoulder. “Oh my gosh.”
“I haven’t really played much since then.”
“I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t either.”
“And then after, it seemed safer to keep separate from her world. She had this game and I had a security guard named Thomas who looked quite a bit like Sir Tomlinson.”
Glitch Kingdom Page 20
