by Chris Howard
Kallixene turned to me. “I assume you have the ability to construct a path to a water source at the school? You and Ephoros did not simply glide down the rivers to the Gulf like a couple of Nine-cities courtiers on holiday?”
I nodded, looking into the gloomy streets through the village where I had last seen Ephoros.
“Yes, grandmother.”
“Phaidra is strong and she is family. She is proud. She is not the only one who lays some of the blame for our downfall on your mother.”
“But the king did not know she had the Wreath.” My voice rose defensively. “It wasn’t about Lady Ampharete. Tharsaleos sent his armies against House Rexenor because he knew he couldn’t lose. He had the book of Telkhines magic, and my father was his slave.”
“Since our fall, that has been one clear explanation, but there was no way to draw certain conclusions. Until now.”
Kallixene looked at me with a deeper sadness. “If we cannot reach the school before the Olethren, you must flee. Make your way here as swiftly as you can. My son would not want his daughter to die when his own life is already lost. Nor would he wish you to find him only to spend a few minutes before the dead army takes both of you. This is not a final stand. Your life is more important.” Kallixene smiled at me suddenly. “Like Odysseus reaching the shores of Ithaca?”
I choked on my response. I’d thought that very thought.
Kallixene pointed east, and with a serious tone, said, “Your true home is there. When I see you on the throne in the Nine-cities with the seaborn crown on your head, then I will know I have helped bring you home. You are the Wreath-wearer, the one who deserves the throne.”
Fifteen minutes later, Phaidra and I kicked through the gates, high in the water, and the grim, heavy-armored guards saluted as we passed.
Chapter 27 - The Agent of King Tharsaleos
I frowned at my own sluggish movements in the water, comparing them to Phaidra’s. The ability to slither and dodge Olivia in Red Bear Lake had given me the impression that I could actually swim.
Phaidra slowed, took my hand firmly with a curt nod, and pulled me through the water at twice the speed I was able to get out of my awkward kicking and paddling.
The sea rushed by my face and I stared into it like a hawk into the wind. I kicked, watching Phaidra’s motion, trying to copy it and stay in sync. We swam in silence for another hour before Phaidra stopped and studied the deep endless blue. She released my hand.
“How near to the Mississippi mouth must we be to make the path?”
I clamped my teeth shut, holding my face expressionless. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d done this. Ephoros had awakened me and the next thing I could picture was the cold shower stall in the nine-to-sixteens department, and me throwing up saltwater.
“I will try from here,” I said firmly, trying to sound like I could have built the path from Kallixene’s courtyard if I had needed to.
Phaidra nodded, licking her lips. “We are still far from the headwaters but I can taste the dilution of the sea here.”
My focus dropped to look into the black gloom below me, and I immediately wished that I hadn’t. I imagined hundreds of thousands of dead warriors in endless ranks, marching over the sands below. “How close do you think the Olethren are?”
Phaidra looked up instead, opening her mouth, nose in the currents as if trying to catch an elusive scent on a breeze. “They say their stink carries far but here I sense or taste nothing foul.”
I tucked my hands into fists to stop them shaking. “If we can...taste them we are too close.”
Phaidra stared back at me, clearly wondering something. She nodded almost imperceptibly and grasped my hand tightly—and even affectionately, no sign of her earlier mood or antagonism. And I was sure her question had nothing to do with what she had been thinking. “Before you take me with you to your school, tell me what I will see when we emerge?”
“The bathrooms. I left the water running in a shower stall.”
“A large room?”
“Not very. It’s covered in tiles and there are smaller rooms, stalls for the toilets. Four sinks. Four showers. I’ve only done this in the middle of the night when everyone’s asleep. There may be girls in the bathroom when we show up.”
Phaidra nodded and gripped her sword. I waited to see if she was going to draw it before letting my eyes close. Then I concentrated on the last shower stall in the second floor girl’s bathroom at St. Clement’s.
I had come through the pipes with a drawn sword the first time, but now understood that that was probably not a bright idea. One good jolt in the flow and I could decapitate myself—or others who happened to be taking the trip with me.
I felt the tug of the path, but it was far away, and wondered if it would fail. My eyelids fluttered, my teeth ground tight, waiting for the bone-loosening pull under my arms and in my stomach. Phaidra’s hand gripped harder as if she also sensed it.
Then it was here.
The draw of the river sucked us into its spiraling course. I spun, holding Phaidra’s hand. Then reached over and grabbed my aunt’s armored shoulder, pulling her close. The dark tunnel of water shot over our heads.
I blinked, trying to hold my eyes open. Broad gray streaks of light ribboned past us where the channel pulled us over a submerged mud bank and into the river shallows. What river?
I twirled out of control, flipping behind Phaidra as we shot around a sharp bend in the flow. My fingers clawed deeper into her armor.
Phaidra knew enough about traveling through a vortex to tuck her chin down before attempting to speak. “How far?” She shouted the words and I nodded back to acknowledge hearing them.
We rocketed by a bright doorway. I jerked my head toward it, skewing my helmet over one eye. The force of the pathway ripped my shoulders back. Phaidra let out a short broken scream. My legs flew up in front of me, over my head, and I was thankful for the tight fit of the armor. I would have lost my shorts on that one. I flipped around, wrenching my wrist before unlocking my fingers from the scale plates along Phaidra’s shoulder.
I swung my free hand around, reached out and seized Phaidra by all three braids. The two of us twirled like autumn leaves in the turbulent depths under a waterfall.
Phaidra shouted something, another question probably, but the rush of water was so loud I couldn’t understand it.
Had I missed the path? Had someone shut off the shower? Questions bounced through my mind amid fleeting bits of doubt—and I couldn’t think straight with Andromache and Praxinos shouting suggestions that intertwined with my own.
I let go of my aunt’s hair, dug my fingers into her armor again, and kicked back toward the well of light we had passed before hitting the end of the flow. It wasn’t far, but it was tough focusing ahead in the gloom through the slits between my eyelids.
I saw it, a gaping ellipse of white. The sky over Nebraska opened up around us and we shot from the water.
Phaidra flew out ahead of me. Both of us tumbled across the grass. I went face first, Phaidra skidding on her back. Then we rolled over, choking water from our lungs.
I got up on my knees, disoriented, nearly blind from the daylight. I didn’t realize where I was, still thinking of the shower stall as the end point, and when I caught a glimpse of an old emaciated man standing over me, I felt a moment’s outrage. Fucking creeper, what’s he doing in the girl’s bathroom!
“Fenhals!” Phaidra cried just before an attack of coughing seized her.
I clamped my eyes tight against the sun’s glare, opening them when a shadow passed between me and the sky.
We’re outside. The thought made its way to the front of my bewildered mind. We had shot out of the dripping faucet next to the playground on the girl’s side of St. Clement’s.
Hey, the one I nearly killed myself on when I tried to run away from Clement’s
There heard a thin hiss of scraping metal as Phaidra, right next to me, drew her sword, then she was screaming in my ear.
<
br /> “Run!”
I blinked against the light. Fenhals’ mouth was wide with shouted words. His hands were up in claws. Matrothy stood behind him, arms folded, mouth sagging, a dull stare in her eyes.
I’d just staggered to my feet when Fenhals snapped his fingers and bellowed a curse. I heard his words, I even think I understood them for a second, something about the blue burning heart of—
A crack of lightning stung my ears. My hands went to my face to cover the flash of light, brighter than the sun, and a wave of heat rippled through my armor.
Phaidra shrieked. She flew into me, bowling me down. We both flipped over one another and slid toward the school upside down, armor plates shoveling up lumps of grass and dirt. The smell of burned hair hit me.
Phaidra rolled over and crawled to her knees, gulping for air. She pushed me toward Clement’s
Fenhals’ first attack hadn’t killed us. If anything it made us more alert. We jumped to our feet.
Phaidra had her left hand straight out, webbed fingers spread. She held her sword up defensively. Two of her braids swept across her armored back as she twisted into a defensive stance. The third was a short singed stub that stuck out the length of a thumb from under her helmet. Fenhals’ blast had hit her in the shoulder, taking one braid with it.
“I will hold off these two,” said Phaidra hoarsely and coughed. Her eyes didn’t leave Fenhals and Matrothy. “Go.” She screamed the word over Fenhals’ thin-voiced casting.
I turned and ran. Find my father, find my father. One of the bulkhead doors that led into the basement was open, a tall rectangle of shadow, slashed on one side by a wedge of sunlight.
Fenhals cried the last of a long string of words and released another lightning storm. A crackling tendril of it arced around Phaidra and hit my forearm with a hammer’s force. The sword flew from my fist, ringing as it hit the ground ahead of me. Both my hands were out this time, stopping my headlong slide toward the basement windows. My chin slammed into the dirt, jarring my teeth.
I didn’t look back, but I heard Fenhals shouting again. I got to my feet, scooped up the sword, and dove for the doorway. I hit the wood plank at the threshold, skipped past it, and tumbled down the concrete stairs.
The sword point caught on a step and I rolled over it the grip, grinding my hand between my armor and the stony edge. I let go. My body came around, feet swinging over my head, my heels scraping along the wall. I landed hard and slid across the basement floor. My helmeted head banged against the concrete and my hand, knuckles bloody, dropped and slapped the ground.
The sword followed after me, skipping and ringing down the steps, point first. I crab-crawled out of its way and, using the wall for support, clawed my way to my feet.
In one motion, I bent down, grabbed the sword, turned, and ran to get out of view from the top of the stairs.
I crashed into Mrs. Hipkin, running toward the stairs, knocking her to the ground.
“Sorry!” I shrieked and staggered past. “Run, Mrs. Hipkin!” I dashed off and didn’t look back.
Fenhals’ voice carried down the basement passage.
Sword clanking against pipes and file cabinets, I snaked through the maze of tunnels, a whole network of them underneath St. Clement’s Education Center. Who designs this shit? I tried a few doors but they were locked. My father could be anywhere. I took a left, heading into darkness. He had to be down here—where else would a psycho-lightning-thrower want to hide him? He wouldn’t be up in the teacher’s lounge or the admin offices, hanging out with the principal, Mr. Cutler. Matrothy had keys, and knew these tunnels. Yeah, that’s why Fenhals was using her.
Fenhals’ voice carried down the corridors behind me.
“She went down here.”
I ran, eyes darting at vent pipes and stacks of cardboard boxes, any place I could crawl into and hide until Fenhals passed.
Don’t look back.
The corridor was dim and I couldn’t see any change in the light as I moved through it, but the Wreath’s like a bloody neon sign to someone who knows what to look for. I can’t get a decent glow out of it when I need it.
“The girl went this way!” Fenhals yelled. Who’s he talking to? Matrothy? Was Hipkin on his side?
I felt a stab of guilt at running down the laundry lady, but only if we were on the same side. Otherwise, I hoped it hurt.
Darting down a short corridor that ended with a metal door, I jerked it open and jumped into a shallow lightless closet stuffed with paint cans, rollers, and long aluminum poles.
Nasty chemical stink in here.
As quietly as I could, I pulled the door closed and leaned against the back wall, gasping for air, my heart thudding hard. A crinkle of armor when I breathed, the surfaces of the overlapping plates scraping against each other. In the dark it sounded like a thousand spiders crawling up my body. I tried to catch my breath, sucking in paint fumes and the smell of cut grass, my face and fingers tingling.
I pulled up the sword to put it away but there wasn’t enough room in the tiny closet, not without making a lot of noise. I lowered it, pressing it against my leg and tightened my bleeding fist around the grip.
Finally got my breathing under control, but it was forced, and every few breaths I had to draw a deep shuddering one that was difficult to keep silent. I heard a man’s muffled voice, and then jingling keys.
“She can’t get into the locked rooms,” said Matrothy.
“This one then,” said Fenhals. “Hurry. The other one is not far behind.” He sounded winded, perhaps casting his lightning at Phaidra had weakened him.
I slipped my left hand down toward the doorknob. If Fenhals was too weary to cast another bolt of electricity, I might be able to get my sword up in time to stab him.
“Stop!” Fenhals shouted.
I grabbed the doorknob, not caring about the rattling or the scraping sounds of the armor.
The door shuddered. Fenhals threw his shoulder against it. “Lock it!”
I squeezed the knob, trying to twist it, but Matrothy held it firm from the outside. There was a metallic rasp of an inserted key and then the snap of the lock.
The closet was so narrow I couldn’t raise my sword. I managed to bring my left fist up and pound on the door.
Something was happening. The sounds of a scuffle came through the door, feet scraping along the floor, the dull thud of someone slamming into a wall. Was Matrothy fighting her enslaver? Phaidra?
“He’s going to kill us all!” I shouted encouragingly through the door. “Stop him!”
“Give me those.” A girl’s voice snapped, and then the jingling of keys grew louder, closer to the door.
“Kass? It’s me, it’s Nicole.”
“Nicole?”
The door swung open and I lunged forward into Nicole Garcia. I hugged her left-handed, keeping my sword down, and glanced past her. Matrothy stood dumbly in the corridor, one hand stuck out as if she still held the keys. Behind her in the main hallway, Fenhals’ legs and feet stretched out on the floor from around the corner.
“What happened?”
“Hipkin told me where to find you,” she gasped, breathless from the fight, but still scowling down my front, trying to focus on what I was wearing. “He grabbed me. I hit him hard.” Nicole rubbed her hand. “I may have broken something—of his not mine. I’ll have bruises though. Then I shoved his head into the wall until he blacked out.”
I blinked at her. You really are Queen of the World material, Nicole Garcia.
I looked down at the keys in Nicole’s hand, and then at my armor. I didn’t have pockets. “Keep those. My father’s here somewhere, probably in one of the locked rooms.”
“Father?” Nicole pushed them into her pocket. She kicked one of Fenhals’ legs. “Who’s this? This isn’t what you were talking about when you said ‘bigger than Matrothy,’ right?”
That yanked my thoughts back to the real problem. “The ‘bigger than Matrothy’ thing will be marching from the river. Come on.
”
We raced back down the hall, leaving Fenhals on the floor, battered and unconscious, and Matrothy standing dumbly over him.
“Jill’s helping that woman who was with you in the yard. She took her up to our hall.”
“That’s my aunt Phaidra.” I looked over my shoulder, pleased with the sound of that on my tongue. My aunt. And I didn’t miss the stunned reaction on Nicole’s face.
Instead of turning down the corridor that ended in the stairs at the foot of one of the bulkhead doors, I took the narrower tunnel left. In a minute, we reached the stairs to the first floor.
“Hold on.” I stopped. It was too early to be seen in armor around St. Clement’s. I took in a deep breath, let my shoulders drop, and closed my eyes. Then felt the armor fold away, off my body, followed my hand closing around suddenly empty sword-free air. The basement was cold, and I was soaking wet. The dump of energy and the sudden drop in the temp made me stumble. Nicole grabbed me before I went all the way down.
“Thought that was getting easier.” With another deep breath I said, “I’m okay. Let’s go.”
We climbed to the central hallway on the first floor. Classes had been out for hours, and few of the students and teachers we passed gave us a second look. One or two boys stopped and stared after us, but Nicole scared them off with a glare and a “What the fuck are you looking at?”
We ran to the girls’ wing.
Jill was just coming down the stairs from the second floor. “Kass!”
Nicole ran into me as I skidded to a stop.
Jill, flushed with excitement, spoke twice as quickly as normal, so I had to lean in and try to read her lips. “She’s up stairs. Phaidra. She’s your aunt! Family! The laundry lady helped me get her upstairs. I’m grabbing her something to eat. Nicole and I saw you outside, next to the door to the basement. He shot lightning at you! And then we ran out to the yard, and the old man and Matrothy went down into the basement to chase you. And I helped the woman with the sword, and Nicole went after Matrothy. Are you hurt? Is that Fenhals? What happened to Mr. Henderson? Is he coming back?”
