Why were they providing comprehensive blood typing on adoptees? The only reason for listing it that she could see was with the Choice in mind. Once they’d turned him into an Ichorwulf, he would know his phenotype profile in every detail so he could avoid drinking incompatible blood and experience hemolytic death. “They’re already treating them like… they’re never coming back.” A heavy tear popped the page.
“You gotta stop that and fast, Willa. Gonna smear your mascara.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, quickly stroking the wet from her eyes. There he was, starring into the camera, all the sunshine drained from his face. His cheeks, though, were full and he looked stronger than he ever had living with her. She wanted to scream, to crush and destroy those who had usurped her as his guardian only to sell him to more monsters who would, at the twilight of his childhood, give him the choice to become one of them or to die. “I want to kill them,” she said.
Lock fingered Olden’s lapel pin. “I know.”
They climbed the floating staircase, higher and higher over the swelling crowd and arrived at theater style doors, spaced evenly around a large central chamber. Lock pushed one open and they entered. The opulence of the outer hall was but an appetizer to the feast of luxury inside the lyceum. Fashioned after a great orchestra hall, rows of red velvet seating ascended at extreme angles from a central stage. The seat numbers were black opal set in nacre, across a mezzanine festooned in golden ornamentation.
Another large jellyfish chandelier swam prodigiously in the air high above the central parterre. Framed by the arch of the theater’s ceiling, it appeared captive, the undulating lights within giving watery motion to its flowing arms. Down below, others trickled in and took their seats. Another usher breezed over. “Reserved seating?”
Willa shot a glance to Lock. “Uh, we–”
“Not a problem. Mezzanine is reserved seating, so to the gods with you!” he declared with an airy laugh. “Right up top. Last ten rows. Enjoy!”
They made their way up the alpine steps and crossed through a gap in a waist-high wall. They selected two seats near the end of the row and tried to fit in. The theatre filled with sumptuously attired and bejeweled Ichorwulves, husbands and wives, husbands and husbands, as well as wives and wives, and only a small number of singles. One of them, a ponderous woman with a grub-like complexion and an over-feathered hat forced herself down the aisle and wedged into the seat next to Willa. Before long, not a seat remained, with many left standing at the periphery.
The big woman sipped from a tiny grail. “Rumor is that the Claret will be here,” she said smiling, exposing her red teeth. “Hope they’ll come mingle during the reception.”
“Oh,” said Willa, trying not to look at the woman’s gore-stained mouth. “That’s great news. Do you know why?”
“Local Patriot quashed the protests. You heard, I’m sure.” She gulped a final swallow and licked her lips. “Even with all that got out: the drones, the ganglion, the children. Prevented an uprising. Framed it all as a hoax so all the little piggies would break the lines,” she said, winking. “And thank goodness for that! I certainly don’t want to go back to the Old Way, do you?”
“No. Certainly not,” said Willa. “Far too messy for my liking.”
“And too much work. You know… I’ve never even seen it done,” the woman confessed, shifting noisily in her seat. “I’m sure it’s terribly difficult. Can you imagine having to wrestle someone down while you drain them? It just lacks – what’s the word? Refinement. I like my food prepared ready to eat. I don’t want to have to hold it still or talk to it.”
“Preach,” Lock interjected.
The woman cocked an eyebrow. “And, err, where are you both from?”
“Riversfork,” said Willa. “You?”
“New Delphi,” said the woman. “O-negs I take it?”
“AB-positive,” Willa answered automatically just as the lights began to dim.
“AB-pos? Oh my.” The woman straightened her posture and fixed her hat. “I had no idea! What are you doing way up here?”
Willa and Lock exchanged a glance and shrugged as darkness fell.
The jellyfish chandelier made the only light – a dim ache of red that seemed to glow from within. Willa half expected to hear the slow rise of music, an orchestral introduction to match the gravity of whatever was happening, but it remained quiet enough that the large woman’s labored breaths might as well have been crashing waves.
A spotlight clicked brightly onto center stage, the gap between the heavy curtains splitting the circle of light. Footsteps echoed until a man emerged, tall with thick black hair and vacation skin, dark pants and shirt pulled snuggly over his narrow physique. A single red stripe ran from the top of his left shoulder down the arm to the end of his sleeve. He stepped casually to the front of the stage.
“It’s him,” said the woman breathlessly. “It’s Dagen.”
The crowd was frozen in anticipation, too enthralled to applaud.
He spread his arms to the room. “Three thousand years,” he said. “And we’re still here.”
At this, a roar went up and the crowd surged to its feet. The cheering continued until he interrupted it with a finger.
“Oh, please, please. This isn’t about me. This is a celebration of all of our shared accomplishments,” he said over the cheers. “I am so happy to meet you all, to be in your fine city. My name is Dagen. Thank you for welcoming me.”
Another round of applause.
“We gather for Patrioteer each year in order to secure the next generation, and I can tell you from having met these fine juveniles, that no one will leave this conference dissatisfied.” The curtains slowly pulled apart behind him. “I know you are all excited to get to the Pageant – and we will shortly – but before we do that, it is the wish of the Claret that I reemphasize the importance of the various protocols we have established to preserve our place in the natural order.”
A pair of screens descended from the ceiling and a montage of images flashed as Dagen spoke. “As you know, we were recently compromised by a small and cowardly hacking syndicate.” Footage from the pirated Patriot Report broadcast rolled silently: blood drones being shot out of the sky, Kathy delivering her monologue. It paused and he gestured to Kathy, saying, “Many of you knew Ellen, the Oldens’ only child. She was taken by these terrorists, who murdered and burned her parents, and then forced her to perform in this… charade.”
The crowd grumbled its offense. Dagen continued, along with the video, “Though brief, this broadcast induced protests and an acute shortage across all vintages. Naturally, our teams aired brilliant response propaganda and as you all saw on the Report last evening, the boycott was ultimately crushed.” Brief applause stopped short by a curt gesture. “You should be joyous. This is our lifeline. But you must never let the fact that you live among the livestock dull your sense of self or blur the lines of where you belong in nature’s hierarchy. We are living our destiny. It has been so since the first seedling took root.”
The video paused just as Kathy sliced the blood bag over the ganglion. Dagen stepped to the edge of the stage. “Some of you panicked during this boycott because you forgot the natural order, failed to remember all that we have done to ensure we remain on top. Our efforts. Our achievements. Over the course of a century we positioned ourselves as captains of industry, forming conglomerates, monopolies, taking control of manufacturing so that we could automate the world in order to rid it of the need for cheap labor, and the necessity of paying for it.”
He paused for breath. “This was an arduous and expensive endeavor, but always to an end. The wars brought the Harvest. Automation gave us the Trade. We took the jobs and the food supply lined up to feed us. Like beasts of the field, they march to the corral for their monthly reward.” Images of actual cows being fed filled the screens. “When faced with adversity, you must always remember what is axiomatic: livestock rarely stray far from the trough.”
Willa’
s throat clamped in terror. Who was this man, this person who declared his kind’s superiority over humanity? How did such a person come to be? She felt called back to her Catholic upbringing, the musty classrooms of her youth. Could this be him? The one that the nuns, with their Catechisms, had spoken of while she mocked them from behind her book bag? The one they were told to fear? Was this some twisted comeuppance for her lack of belief in God’s nemesis – to render him in flesh before her? Surely if he were real, then this was him – the embodiment of evil.
“It is with this backdrop that I bring you to my final point. One more thing I must share before we get to our main event. I indulge your patience.” The screens went black and curtains closed over them. “The blood trade has allowed us, with discipline and constant vigilance, to maintain the exclusivity of our ranks. Recently, however, that discipline has slipped.” A large black box wheeled onto the stage. “What is the Rule of Progeny?”
The crowd boomed, “Grow from within!”
“Not from without,” he replied in answer. “We select our future lines here, and here alone. We do not take it on our own to play creator and make new Apex outside of protocol. Control is the key to our survival, our lodestar. It has been like this tracing all the way back to the Prime Mover. If you create in the districts, you open the door to millions. And millions more. And then what? Open war. You remember the lesson of Rome, do you not? The Visigoths? They were nothing before their King Alaric. And how did he rise? Through negligence, carelessness, he was made Apex, turned by a foolish aristocrat for his own enjoyment! Erzsébet Báthory was no different! One of our brightest but – to put it lightly – least disciplined, having to be confined within her own castle until her death. Ever since that costly and embarrassing episode, our grasp on the dual helms of our advancement and evolution has never faltered, and I will not be the one to see the grip slackened.”
Whispers sifted through the crowd.
“Secrecy is security. Let there be no doubt: carelessness will not be tolerated. It only takes one, a single Apex who is not of our caste to start a rebellion. Or worse. And you know of what I speak.” He strode to the black box, said, “Dagen, Patriot ID octozerosix,” causing the door to click open. “Come on out, my friend, you are home now.”
Willa squinted to make out the creature emerging from the box so far below, but its complexion and hunched posture were unmistakable. Her silent gasp came synchronous with Lock’s.
Everard.
“An interesting case,” Dagen continued. “This one seemed determined to avoid taking blood in the Old Way. In one respect, I am impressed – a resilient fellow who held onto his humanity for as long as he could throughout the seating process. Patriot security found him soaking in black-market O-neg just outside of DS3.”
Everard was even thinner than when Willa had last seen him. He cowered and flinched, tried to see into the crowd against the blaring lights. His trademark sleeveless white undershirt was filthy and bloodstained. “Hungry,” he coughed.
“Yes, I bet you are. And we are all going to enjoy a meal very soon,” Dagen said, turning back to the crowd. “And in what can only be a stroke of luck for which we should count ourselves doubly fortunate, this person confessed to the infiltration of The Patriot Report stream. Described the means and methods precisely. On his information, we located the home from which the broadcast was made and confiscated the equipment. He confessed the names of all of his co-conspirators, who have been found and eliminated. And we thank him for that.” He turned to face Everard and began clapping. “Let us thank him, shall we?”
The crowd began to clap and Willa and Lock forced themselves, painfully, to go along.
“Hungry,” said Everard.
“Then let us feed you!” Dagen threw his arms out wide.
Spots of red bloomed across Everard’s shirt. Shocked, he considered his torso. The splotches expanded as blood poured from a constellation of holes in his body, put there by laceguns fired from the wings.
“No!” whispered Lock.
His eyes were that of a snared animal after the struggle, not comprehending why, but cognizant of the coming loss. His legs gave and his knees kettle drummed the stage. “Hungry,” he muttered once more, before falling dead to the wood.
“I hope that this reinforces my sincerity,” Dagen said. “The same fate awaits any Apex who sires against the Rule.”
Stagehands rushed out and wheeled the box offstage. Another took Everard by the feet and dragged him away like a set piece.
Willa tried to internalize her breathing, to bury it deep within. She could tell that Lock was doing the same.
“And now, putting all of that ugliness behind us, on to the main event.”
Behind him, another curtain pulled open to a large tiered dais and he stepped onto the red carpeting that wrapped it. With his back to the audience, he brought his arms up slowly from the sides, as if calling forth the gentle rise of a symphony, but it was not music that came. Lines of children entered silently from both ends of the platform, with the youngest at the base and the oldest across the top row. Dressed in tailored black, faces clean. The boys had their hair clipped short, while the girls had theirs pulled into tight buns or looping braids sealed with crisp white bows. Willa scanned upward to where she guessed the ten year-olds would be and ran her eyes across the faces in search of Isaiah. A few rows from the top she found him, looking solemn, but confident, almost brave. It’s not that she expected him to look defeated, or wanted that, but his cool demeanor made her heart ache. Had he already resigned himself to this new life, or worse, embraced it? Did he think she’d given up on him? Did he wonder if she’d even tried?
“Good evening,” Dagen called to them brightly, and they responded loudly in sync. He faced the crowd. “Four hundred and seventy-one of the best the region has to offer. Already well into their education and indoctrination. In order to make your jobs easier, we have begun cotillion to ease their assimilation into a higher lifestyle. Each has also selected an enrichment activity that they will take with them into their new homes. Let us see here.” He approached the first row and knelt near a little boy, probably no older than four. “Good evening, son. What is your name?”
“Andr – um, Grant.”
“That’s lovely. Now tell me, Master Grant, have you chosen an enrichment activity since you’ve been with us?”
The child’s eyes darted all over and then settled as he visibly worked to calm himself. “Yes.”
Dagen gave a warm chuckle. “Alright, and what activity have you chosen?”
“I, um, the trumpet.”
“The trumpet. Of course,” said Dagen emphatically. “The brass family. Very bold. Very bold, indeed, Master Grant.” He patted the boy’s head and returned to the audience. “I know I preach to the choir when I say this, but when you select one of these children, you give them a chance at a better life. Adoption is an act of kindness, mercy. Charity. No such chance exists for them in the districts.”
“No thanks to you,” growled Lock.
“What’s that?” asked the fat lady.
“Nothing.”
Dagen visited with a number of other children, none of them from the Seychelles, but little of what he said registered over the raging maelstrom growing in Willa’s head. She wanted to leap over the rail and scream her grandson’s name before the lace got her. Then he would know for the rest of his life that she had come for him, even though she had failed. She sat, trying to work up the courage to act. All she had to do was stand up. Do it Willa. Do it. Do it.
She was still seated when the Pageant ended and the curtains drew closed. Her eyes remained fixed on Isaiah, willing him to see her until the velvet took him from view.
“With that, we will conclude tonight’s formal events. Selection begins in the morning directly after the complimentary morning meal,” said Dagen. “I do hope everyone will stay and toast our success in the refectory downstairs.”
Willa and Lock got to their feet but were al
most trampled by those around them, pushing to get out the doors and down to the ground floor. Casually, they let the others rush by and within a matter of seconds their section was clear.
“We have to find where they’re keeping them,” Willa whispered.
“We need to go down with the crowd,” said Lock. “Us lollygagging already looks suspicious.”
Outside the Lyceum, Willa gestured to the lines stretching back from the elevator banks, thinking they might provide a plausible means of delaying their arrival downstairs. They stepped into the line and the big woman from their row turned to greet them, her meaty forearms protruding from scarlet sleeves like untrimmed lamb shanks.
“Whew, all of that really got my appetite up,” she said. “I don’t know about you, but I’m starving!”
“Us too,” said Willa.
“Well, I didn’t have the time inside to say it, but it’s a thrill and an honor to meet you two.”
Confused, Willa wondered if they were being toyed with. “It’s a pleasure to meet you as well, Miss…”
“Candice. Candice LaTremaine.” She extended a hand with gaudy rings choking puffy fingers.
“I’m Eileen and this is my wife, Pearl,” said Willa, taking the woman’s fist while catching a glare from Lock about her pre-chosen name.
“Pleasure, Eileen,” said Candice. “But, can I ask why you are up here standing in line?”
Willa just shrugged.
“You don’t see many AB-positives up in the cheap seats.”
“Well, we, uh–”
“So modest, you two!” Candice said, turning to the line. “AB-pos back here!”
The line split immediately to the sides, with all eyes on Willa and Lock standing at the back.
“Oh, there’s no need,” said Willa.
“Don’t be foolish,” said Candice, imploring them forward. “Don’t tell me you’d pass up the chance to eat first.”
“I suppose we wouldn’t,” said Willa. “Thank you.” They started forward through the lane of hungry Ichorwulves, all watching and nodding at them in an apparent show of respect. Willa stepped into the elevator next to an attendant in an exquisitely trimmed uniform. Lock entered behind and turned to the crowd, gesturing them in. But instead of flooding into the elevator so they could get to the meal they so eagerly awaited, they shook their heads politely or mouthed for the two AB-positives to please go ahead.
The Phlebotomist Page 27
