The man continues, “On top of that, three different families in this neighborhood have had kids stop responding to Mantis, and you know whom people will blame. If you are recognized outside the orphanage, you might not make it back there alive. It was dumb luck that my informant managed to tell me you’d gotten away before anyone saw you.”
“Your informant? Who are you?” My panicked heartbeat races faster and faster.
“We need to get you out of here.” He folds back the rug to reveal a wooden plank in the stone floor. When he pulls it up, there is just enough room to climb down an iron ladder into darkness.
I have no intention of going down the black hole to Yuan knows where with a man who just dragged me into his own personal counter-Liberation study. There is only one place it could lead for me, and execution does not sound good. “Look. I don’t know who you think you are . . .”
He doesn’t look up. “My name is Yang He-ping. Dr. Yang.”
The name nudges some long-sleeping memory at the back of my mind, but I’m too frightened to pull it out. “I don’t care. I don’t know how you learned that sign or what you have to do with my family or where this stupid tunnel leads. I am not a traitor, whatever my stars say.”
Dr. Yang smooths his salt-and-pepper hair away from his face. Lines crinkle around his brown eyes. I’d guess he’s somewhere around fifty. Despite the three metal stars perched high on his shoulder, his hand is marred by a series of crisscrossing white scars where his hand marks should be, as if the wielder of the knife couldn’t decide where he belonged and gave him five, six, seven marks and hoped he’d fit in somewhere. I finally notice that the crinkles are not only the beginning of his age showing, but part of the smile stretching across his face. “I didn’t ask you to lead a revolution, girl. I just want to help. Though if I hear of any job openings, I’ll let you know.”
“You’ll help me get back into the orphanage? Somehow, without anyone noticing, even though they already know I’m out of my room? How?” I can feel a smile crack through the fear pounding at my head. But it is a giddy, uncontrollable smile. Hysteria. I nod toward the ladder. “Where does this even go?”
“The old City. This City was already hundreds of years old by the time Yuan Zhiwei led our people up here to hide, each generation building over the dead bones of the last. There’s a whole world left over from Before. It’s not a safe place to take a stroll, and the sewers leak through in places, but the Watch doesn’t bother much with patrolling down there, and it’ll get us to the library. No one will look for you there.”
“The First library?” I feel my eyes widen in shock.
“The library will get you within a few streets of the People’s Gate, between the First Quarter and the marketplace. The orphanage isn’t too much farther, and I might be able to organize a distraction that will allow you to climb back into your room when no one is looking. Through the kitchens, maybe?”
“What should I tell them when they find me snug in my bed? I had a bathroom emergency and no one noticed the door locked? And . . . the library? Only Firsts are allowed in there. If the Watch really does think I’m behind that bomb, and then Chairman Sun finds me skulking around underground or browsing shelves of anti-Liberation propaganda, my head would be on display at Traitor’s Arch before sunset. No trial. Just an ax.”
“You know they don’t use axes anymore, Sev. Capital punishment is much more refined these days.” Dr. Yang points to my hood. “You’re lucky it’s already cold enough we can get away with hiding your face. It’ll just look like you’re trying to stay warm. Take off your stars, keep your hood up, and walk as if you know where you are going. I can tell you which streets will get you back. It’s your only chance.” And with that, he starts down the ladder, not even checking to see that I follow him.
Truth be told, I don’t need directions. I have been to the library many times. With Mother, before . . . everything happened. The books lining the shelves are from Before. Corrupted by selfish ideology and philosophy from outside our land. Only Firsts are allowed inside, using the information to aid in their scientific research, their minds too high above it all to be tainted by impure ideals. But I know where all the fairy tales line the shelves. Row upon row of books filled with fanciful illustrations. Fairies, gnomes, witches and wizards, dragons, beautiful maidens in distress, and great heroes charging in to save them. I lived through knight duels and army raids, whispering ghosts and talking foxes, evil spells and jealous stepmothers. It’s sad that all those books are restricted to incorruptible Firsts. Kids in the Third Quarter could use dreams with some color.
I still remember settling into my favorite chair, just below the huge picture window, light seeping through the thin-cut jade and onto the floor in a beautiful display. Every hour or so, the colors rearranged themselves into a new picture. When I was very young, my mother and I pretended to capture the lights and take them home with us. Once, Mother gave me a shard of red-tinted jade, bound into a necklace. “This way you can always take the light with you.” The image of her beautifully curled hair softly glowing in the colored lights would be forever engraved in my mind.
From that day forward, I always wore the necklace. Yet it somehow disappeared with everything else I loved the night SS took me.
My stars are heavy in my hand. I don’t remember taking them off.
“Sev?” Dr. Yang calls from halfway down the ladder. “We don’t have a lot of time.”
Rough crosshatching on the rungs bites into my palms as I start down the ladder. Stupid, to follow this man. As stupid as wanting to see the library one more time. To stand in front of the picture window and remember life before I fell Asleep. Dark closes around me, the damp air becoming warmer as we descend. When my feet finally find the dirt floor, the overpowering smell of sewage has me gagging. Echoes of running water climb up from deep ditches that frame our narrow walkway. A faint light blossoms in Dr. Yang’s cupped hands, throwing dark shadows across his face. “This is just a quicklight, so it isn’t going to last long enough to get us out of here. If you run, you’ll get lost. Stay with me, and I’ll get you to the ladder that will take you into the library basement.” Dr. Yang pulls something out of his coat and sticks it in my pocket, the shadows too dark to catch a glimpse of the gift. “Those might come in handy. Just keep your chin up and don’t let anyone look you in the eyes.”
Butterflies in my stomach morph into kicks of fear every time the light flickers or my guide makes any noise. Our footsteps are the only sound I can hear on top of the faint chattering of rushing water. The dark seems to press in on me, clouding my lungs with misty fog. I’ve always been so afraid of the dark.
We pass several ladders rising up from the path, Dr. Yang breaking a new light each time the one in his hand starts to dim. We don’t stop, my companion confident at every turn, until we come to a ladder marked with a large golden circle on the lowest rung. Dr. Yang fumbles in his pocket again, producing another quicklight. He bends it in half to break open the center and watches closely as the chemicals mix, glowing a cheery yellow. Shoving it into my hand, he points up.
The metal rungs disappear into the cloud of dark above me. Stalling, I raise my light high to look around us, the yellow glow hinting at graceful curves of stone just behind the ladder. Some kind of statue. But Dr. Yang doesn’t give me a chance to look closer, pushing me toward the ladder.
I push back and look at him. “Why are you helping me?”
Dr. Yang is quiet for a moment. When he does answer, his voice is small. “I knew your mother. She was a good person trying to do good things.”
“She was a traitor. She might as well have killed my father and younger sister with her own hands, and this . . . whatever is happening today is her fault. Mother deserved what the Circle did to her.” My voice bites at my throat. She is the one who made me what I am. Infected. Fourth.
“Luckily for you, I disagree. Ready to go up?” When I nod, he lays a hand on my shoulder. It feels awkward, as though he is tr
ying to comfort me. “I’ll be in contact. Good luck.”
The rungs of this ladder are much smoother, worn with age. After climbing for a few minutes, I look down to see if Dr. Yang is still at the bottom. I can see his light, but the flare is surprisingly small, sending shudders up my spine. Switching my eyes to the darkness in front of me is almost worse as the quicklight illuminates a gargantuan set of hands, palms together and pressed against a giant’s bare chest, the upper portion of the statue I saw at the bottom.
If I’m only as high as his hands, then how much farther do I have to climb? Gripping a smooth metal rung with one hand, I wave the light above my head, catching glimpses of a square chin and elongated earlobes, like the religious figures that appear in so many of the history books that landed in the First library. Religion. Yet another corruption the Firsts say led to our destruction Before. It never quite made sense to me that a belief in something more would have been our downfall, but Yuan Zhiwei knew what was best for us when he banned religion from the City. That’s why we still follow his teachings.
Looking up so high at the statue bends me over backward, making my head feel as if it’s falling even though I’m latched to the ladder as tightly as a tick in a mangy dog’s skin.
The Da’ard has begun to wear off, so the dull throb in my sides has turned into a sharp pulse each time I raise an arm to pull myself up to the next rung. Darkness seeps into my clothes, each eruption of pain a bite or a scratch from the inside. My breaths come in short bursts of pain. When my head finally hits the ceiling, I almost lose my grip on the top rung of the ladder, my sweaty palms slipping against the cold metal bar. As I jam my hand up against the rough stone ceiling, my quicklight catches the gleam of a smooth metal handle poking out of the rock a few feet away.
The statue’s head looms beneath me, its eyes closed in quiet meditation as the handle above me turns too slowly. The rusted pieces screech as they grind together. I push up, and the hatch falls open with a thud, sending a cloud of dust down into my face. I sneeze and drop the quicklight. Stomach turning, I have to lean into the ladder and close my eyes to stop my head from spinning at the light’s long descent. My arms and legs shake as I pull myself up through the hole and collapse on a floor so thick with dust that every breath is like trying to inhale cotton. I crawl away from the hole, heave myself up onto what feels like a chair, and pull my shirt up over my nose. A few deep breaths, and my racing heartbeat begins to slow.
After a few minutes of battling the dark, my eyes adjust and I can discern a faint line of lighter black on the floor, which I follow until I find an actual light, deep in the library’s basement. Two dusty staircases up and a few minutes of wandering later, I come to an open room that I recognize, with a wide staircase leading to the main stacks. Black marble, just like the rest of this place. Imposing and coldly beautiful.
The picture window I remember so clearly overlooks the staircase, stopping me as a mix of longing and revulsion fights its way up my throat. The jewel cast of the light as it filters through the paper-thin cuts of stone folds down around the rows and rows of books, their colors so familiar. A beautiful maiden is pieced together in the jade, her curls tumbling from a bed of sleep.
Stuck forever.
Mother always told the story with a dramatic sigh, as if the princess pricking her finger on the spindle and falling asleep wasn’t the tragic end to the story, just an unfortunate pause that passed her fate on to the imagination of the listener. Aya and I would make them up together, hiding under our covers, whispering back and forth until Father came with threats of no sweet bao for dessert the next day if we didn’t go to sleep. Aya would say the evil fairy would be sorry and wake her up, then become her servant as penance. Or that little birds cheeped in her ears until she woke up, and the princess threw water on her royal parents to bring them back from the spell. My favorite idea, though Aya always stuck her tongue out and wrinkled her nose whenever I told it, was that a prince would kiss her awake in true fairy-tale fashion, and the whole kingdom would open their eyes along with her, the evil fairy’s spell broken.
But that isn’t how the story ends. The princess pricks her finger, falls down as if dead, and her family and the whole kingdom rot away around her bit by bit until it’s a place of the dead, a place for ghosts and monsters. She’s the one who sought out the evil fairy, and those are the consequences. She deserves her fate.
I look up at the window. It’s a relic from Before, when we mixed books and tales with people from far away. Before the world was us against Kamar, the Outsiders who poisoned our air with SS. The picture changes every few hours, all the tiny pieces somehow rattling to a new spot like a kaleidoscope of trained butterflies. For some reason, the library survived the purges of everything from Before when Yuan Zhiwei claimed the City as a safe haven. Setting foot inside is like stepping back in time. Geometric designs on the walls are richly painted in reds and purples, and the supports holding up the roof are carved with dragons and phoenixes, all legends that have been forgotten.
My hand reaches toward the picture window before I can control myself, brushing the woman’s long curls. She doesn’t look like Mother, but her eyes are closed just the same. Asleep. Dead to the world, and yet still stuck here because of her crimes.
A low cough echoes through the room. I jerk my hand back, knocking two books down from the low shelves as I spin around in panic.
A young man watches me from the other side of the room. His high collar boasts one red star. I feel as though I’ve seen him before, but I can’t place him.
He doesn’t look surprised or upset, just a little embarrassed to have caught someone trying to climb a bookcase. Licking his lips and pressing them together, he seems to be trying to keep his eyes on the floor, but they flick up to my face a few times. I am still frozen to the spot, caught like a mouse in a trap.
The picture transforms behind me, the lights dancing to their new places on the floor. Jade pieces realign into a young girl cowering before a black, fanged beast. The change wrenches me back to life.
“Excuse me,” he starts, “were you looking for—”
“Nothing,” I interrupt. Heart pounding, I nod to him and walk toward the front of the library with my nose in the air.
“Wait!” He’s walking after me, the polite smile pasted across his face starting to slip.
I walk faster, the young man only a bit behind me in the twists and turns through bookshelves, though he doesn’t yell for help. By the time I push through the library’s outer doors, I’m almost at a run. Outside, I duck behind the statue of Yuan Zhiwei, his broad shoulders dusted with snow. His ax points down Renewal Road, toward the City Center building.
The young man comes out after me, looking up and down the street, his face striking a chord in my memory yet again. Was he one of the librarians from when I was young? But I immediately discount that idea. He’s much too young for that. And if the Watch is looking for me, it stands to reason they know about it even this far up in the First Quarter. After the young man passes my hiding place, I walk in the opposite direction, slipping behind the library into the strangled maze of lanes backing most of the government buildings in this quarter. Third entrances for the window cleaners and floor waxers.
Going in the direction the young man went would mean passing through the main gate at the end of Renewal Road and trying to cross the bridge that spans the river over to the City Center, which would be a good way to get caught. And I’m glad I can’t go that way. I can’t face passing the City Center and Mother in her living coffin over Traitor’s Arch. Not today. Maybe not ever.
The back streets are still familiar. Walking with my eyes on the paving stones, I join the steady stream of Thirds moving through the narrow lanes, jobs done for the day. Thirds with the odd Fourth scattered through. The Fourths keep their gaze down, whatever rehabilitation they had to go through that allowed them to remain inside the City leaving their expressions blank. Each step seems measured, as though if their stride stretch
es an inch too far, some First will notice and reassign them to one of the Outside farms or mine labor. Or worse, banish them to the wilds Outside to scavenge what the City and Kamar leave behind. Never able to sleep soundly or stay in one place, because then the other Wood Rats will find you.
To land an assignment in the First Quarter, these Fourths must be reformed indeed, though I think even Firsts have a hard time selling toilet cleaning as glorious labor for the Liberation down in the Third Quarter. A woman jostles my arm as she hurries past. She looks back apologetically but does not stop, almost running to keep up with the flow of workers headed for the gate.
The People’s Gate is a sort of back door, allowing Thirds easier access to the First Quarter. It’s beautiful, the black marble favored throughout the First Quarter relieved by gray sculptures of men and women holding the base of the columns that form the only direct portal through the wall that divides the First Quarter from the Third. A bridge fits into the gate’s mouth like a tongue, spanning the river to allow free access to the marketplace.
For all their beauty, the statues supporting the gate have always struck me as odd. I suppose when the Liberation Army first built the gate, they still thought of Third workers as the center of society, happy in the labor that enabled the City’s survival. It seems almost silly to see carved scenes of bricklayers singing through their efforts and factory workers smiling as they present the fruit of their labors to all who walk by. The Third Quarter wasn’t such a happy place earlier today. Maybe trying to sing with a lungful of brick dust really takes it out of you.
I don’t much want to sing my way through the long hours I put in at the canning factory. My hands are permanently chapped from the steam, and sometimes it seems as though my back will never unbend from hunching over the jars all day.
Last Star Burning Page 5
