The Red Tower (The Five Towers Book 2)

by J. B. Simmons

  I sit beside her and think. The angle of our perch keeps us out of sight from the workers below. It’s not an ideal spot for a conversation, but we have to talk about what happened in the tunnels. Emma knows what I’m feeling. She probably saw a vision, too.

  “Back there,” I say. “The vision I saw was...”

  “Different,” Emma finishes for me. “Mine was as well.”

  “How?”

  “I wasn’t in it,” she says, pausing, as if trying to find the right words. “It showed a few people I knew, and others I didn’t. Many children. There was so much life. They were so...happy.”

  “It was like that for me, too.”

  “Was it the woman you told me about?” Emma asks. “Samantha?”

  I nod. “She was older. She had children, and grandchildren.”

  “And they were happy?”

  “Yes.”

  “Were you in the vision?” Emma asks.

  “No. Were you in yours?”

  Emma shakes her head. Her eyes are moist as she gazes out over the hills. We are quiet for a while.

  The vision didn’t have me in it. I wasn’t even there. Samantha had married another man. She’d met him in the hospital. They’d had children. They’d had a life together.

  “Why do you think we were shown this?” I ask.

  “Maybe it’s not enough to know what we did,” Emma says. “Maybe we have to see what we caused. Those things, covering the ground...they were bones, weren’t they?”

  “It felt like it,” I say quietly. But how? Bones?

  Emma takes a deep breath. “When I was in the Yellow Tower, I learned that some things can’t be healed. I’m not talking about diseases or wounds. But...alternatives, consequences.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The vision,” she says, her voice distant. “I think it never happened.”

  “Did you hear a voice saying that?”

  “Yes, the same as in the Scouring. I think the vision was supposed to seem real. I saw John, the man I ran away with. Remember? We had a baby and lived in a poor little hovel. He grew sick. He died. I’m sure of that. But in this vision I saw him as an old man. He was very much alive. He had children, grandchildren, even great-grandchildren. There was a portrait above the fireplace in the modest home where he lived. It was a beautiful portrait, and I knew it was his prized possession. It showed a woman in her youth. She was the woman he had loved for many years and had only recently lost in old age. And she...was not me.” Emma clutches her knees tighter, looking away.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “I can’t imagine how it feels to have seen that.”

  “No,” Emma whispers, “you know how it feels. Tell me what you saw.”

  “It was Samantha,” I begin. “She lived in the country, and she was making breakfast for her grandchildren in the kitchen. Her husband came in. She loved him so much. They had been together forty years. They were watching the grandkids so their own children could get away for a couple days. Her husband, he led the kids out to see the chickens. They’d met in the hospital. The same one where I’d worked, where I’d started secretly seeing Samantha. So...you’re right. And the voice is right. I’m the reason why this vision never happened.”

  When Emma turns to me, she lets her head fall onto my shoulder, and I let my head fall onto hers, and we hold each other and cry quietly. I think of what Rahab said about the tunnels and the glimpse into the pit. I don’t need to know what it all means. It’s clear enough. I didn’t control my passions, and that kept the vision from becoming reality. It kept the children I saw from ever living. It’s what filled the dark place with bones.

  Now I know what could have been. It tempts me to despair about lives never lived, about the meaninglessness of it all. Even those who didn’t exist had the same ending I did: as bones buried underground.

  But, no, that can’t be right.

  I’m still here, with Emma, alive in some way in these five towers. We can still be better than we were. We have to keep moving, learning from what we see, no matter how bad it hurts. Otherwise the dark terrors of that bone-filled cavern—the knowledge of what might have been—will defeat us. That’s why I have to find my Mom and Samantha and anyone else who knew me before and now is here. I have to tell them all: I’m sorry. I have to ask them to forgive me. No matter how bad it hurts. I’m not just bones yet.

  I study the rigid lines of the Black Tower. It’s too reckless, even for me, to stroll up to it and hope to somehow get inside. The girls here can shut down my powers. Emma and I wouldn’t stand a chance. We would be caught, and our memories could be wiped. No, a direct approach won’t work.

  As I look away from the tower and out over the hills, I wonder if my Mom or Samantha could be one of the workers. There’s a worker on the nearest hill, facing the opposite direction from us and bending and rising, bending and rising, putting small, grassy plants into the ground in rows. There are two on the next hill, one on the terraces closer to the ridgeline. They’re doing the same kind of work. I’ve counted thirteen workers when I first notice a darker cluster mid-hill in the distance. It looks like a few low buildings. Maybe the workers there are far enough away from the Black Tower to need a resting place. Everyone in Red and Blue lives in the tower, but there’s no reason the other towers couldn’t be different. The Black Tower could have a village for its farmers.

  “You see that?” I ask Emma, pointing to the cluster.

  She stirs from her quiet. “The buildings? I see three of them.”

  “Right. Maybe it’s a village. Want to check it out?”

  “You’re the Alpha,” she says.

  “And I’m your pair.”

  She smiles, spinning her ruby ring. “I think we’re past labels. But since I know how excited you feel, lead on...”

  I can’t help but smile back. She’s riding my rollercoaster of emotions with me, as I did with her in the Blue Tower. She’s choosing to trust me. As if I’ve earned it.

  “We’ll go to the village,” I say. “Who knows, maybe they’ll welcome us as visitors and offer us dinner.”

  Emma rises to her feet. “Looks like they’ll have plenty of rice.”

  37

  MY LEATHER BOOTS were not made for this. From a distance the terraced hills of the Black Tower looked like a fine stroll. But as Emma and I descend from the tunnel opening, the mud deepens. I try to step lightly and evenly, on the driest places, but still the sounds come: with each step down, a swallowing swelp and suck, and with each step up, a pop and slop and squelch as my boot breaks free from the mire again. The sound repeats a thousand times. My feet prune like shriveled raisins.

  Emma had a better idea. With the first muddy encounter, she slipped off her shoes and carried them. She lifted her dress and tied it in a knot above her knees. Her calves are caked in grayish black goo, but at least her feet rise and fall easier.

  “It’s exfoliating,” she says.

  The first person to spot us doesn’t run. It’s a girl working on one of the terraces, barefoot like Emma, broad hat on her head, as she places thin green reeds, one by one, into the ankle-deep water. She looks up at us for only a moment before continuing her work. She is methodical. Reed after reed in a clear pattern. Order and discipline mark the entire field.

  This must be the Black Tower’s way. Rice grows best in a place of order. Someone orchestrates the planting of seeds, then the replanting of seedling shoots into perfectly straight lines. Armies of workers harvest the grain by hand, gathering enough to fill the bellies of the hundreds here in Black. It couldn’t be more different from Red, where the pigs only need a daily slop of food and a butchering knife.

  As we crest another terraced hill, we see more hills stretching into the distance and a village in the valley below. The village has several low buildings with black-tiled roofs, wedged like lint in the fold of these dark hills. We descend, passing two more workers, and reach the thin cobblestone street running through the center of the village. The firm ground fee
ls good. The street curves around several hills in the distance, leading toward the Black Tower. It looks like a half-day’s walk to get there. Maybe more if there’s mud to wade through.

  Our arrival in the village is quickly noticed. People begin gathering in doorways, staring at us. I expect to see families, mixed ages, coming to greet us. But they are all boys and girls around our age. No one seems to grow very old here, other than the leaders. These boys and girls wear dark, charcoal robes. They are mostly dirty, scrawny, and shoeless, with vacant eyes. They whisper in tight clusters as we walk steadily along the cobblestones.

  “I bet she’s from Red,” one girl whispers, staring at Emma and her red dress.

  A boy spits at me. Another says something crude about Emma. I stay alert, ready to draw on our power, but no one tries to stop us.

  Ahead a girl steps onto the center of the path, facing us with her arms crossed. She’s dressed like the others, but I freeze in my tracks. Her eyes are narrow, dark as night, with flecks of gold like stars.

  Kiyo.

  “Why are you here?” she asks coldly.

  I move forward until I’m a few feet away from her. It’s really her. She has no idea who I am. I hold out my hands peacefully. “I’m looking for my mother.”

  “There are no mothers here,” Kiyo says.

  This is a bad sign. Kiyo herself was a mother. She has been wiped and hasn’t even seen yet what she saw in Blue. The villagers gather closer, enclosing Emma and me.

  “You know that’s not true,” I say calmly. “You were a mother. Your sons would be looking for you, too.”

  Kiyo shakes her head. She shows no emotion. “I have no sons.”

  It makes me want to cry, to see her so blank. “You did before,” I say. “You told me about them, when we were in Blue.”

  She grimaces like I’ve punched her in the gut. She looks away from me, at the group around us. Her crossed arms release and press down over her rough, charcoal robe, smoothing non-existent wrinkles.

  “Those from Red cannot be trusted,” she says. “Come, we will decide what to do with you.”

  Turning without another word, she enters a small wooden building beside us. The people around us step closer. A few of them point to the building that Kiyo entered. It could be a trap—going inside a closed space within Black’s territory, but it’s better than starting a fight now if we can avoid it. One of these villagers could probably shut down my power. We could be wiped like Kiyo. Maybe I can help her remember. It’s also still the best bet for finding my Mom and Samantha, if they’re anywhere around here.

  Emma and I exchange a glance. She remembers Kiyo, too. After Abram, Kiyo was the first person who came to me in the Blue Tower. Even without memories, she should have the same spirit—gentle and stoic.

  “It’s okay,” Emma says. “Let’s go.”

  We enter the building together. None of the other villagers follow us.

  Inside there’s a single room. It is clean and simple, made of dark wood. The light is dim, the air still. Everything is still, as if this is a place where things move only in tiny increments, at their designated time and for their designated purpose. To one side, the floor is a sunken rectangle around a table on a mat of tightly woven straw. A candle, four small porcelain cups, and a steaming pot rest on the table. Kiyo waits for us with her knees folded and her robe blending into the dark wood below her.

  Emma and I take seats across from each other at the table. I sit beside Kiyo so that I can keep an eye on the door. It’s the only way in or out.

  Kiyo pours steaming liquid from the pot into all four cups. I take the cup in my hand, feeling its warmth. The drink is pale green and smells like tea. It must be harmless. If she’d wanted to hurt us, she could have ordered the villagers to seize us outside. Unless she wanted to make it cleaner. Then she’d poison our tea.

  She takes a sip. It was poured from the same pot.

  “Drink,” she says.

  We do as ordered. It tastes good.

  “Who’s that cup for?” I ask, eyeing the fourth spot at the table. The steam from the cup rises in nearly straight lines through the still air.

  “Me.”

  The boy’s harsh voice comes from behind me. Where did he come from? Before I can even turn I feel the prick of something sharp at the back of my neck.

  “Don’t move,” he demands. “Rice, why do you bring Red under my roof?”

  There’s something familiar about the voice. If only I could see...

  As I try to turn my head, the sharp point presses harder into my neck, forcing me to look forward. I take a deep breath, staying still. Out of the corner of my eye I see Kiyo bow her head in an obvious display of deference.

  “This boy claims to know me, Lord,” Kiyo says. “Maybe he has not always been Red. Maybe he has been here before.”

  “Or maybe he is a spy. Or an assassin.” The voice behind me sounds like an executioner’s. “He must die.”

  The point pulls away from my neck. The floor creaks. Across the table, Emma’s face twists in fear. Her eyes reflect a gleaming line, like metal.

  No, I will not go down like this.

  Things happen all at once. I summon the air into a wall behind me. The blade strikes it and bounces off. The boy shouts. A cloud of black smothers my mind, making my power slip away. I leap across the table to Emma.

  We try to flee, but the boy is faster. He moves like a shadow and stands between us and the only door. The light behind him and the hood over his head make it impossible to make out his face in the dark room. As he closes on us, his sword rises through the still air. But then Kiyo is in front of us. The blade begins to swing but stops inches from her.

  “He’s harmless, Lord,” Kiyo says. “I’ve shut him down.”

  “Good,” the hooded boy says. “Now they’ll be easier to kill. Out of the way.”

  Emma squeezes my hand. “Now,” she whispers.

  The surge of heat warms me before I even see it, blasting into the boy, flinging him back in a blaze of fire. His sword thuds against the dark wooden floor. I grab it and charge at the boy, but something trips me flat. The blade is yanked away from me. The boy and I are only a few feet apart, both rushing to our feet. The sword appears between us, separating us.

  “Stop!” Kiyo demands, wielding the blade like she knows how to use it. “No powers. No swords. We will have tea. Then we will talk. Am I understood?”

  “You will suffer for this,” the boy says, scowling.

  “I have suffered enough,” Kiyo replies.

  The boy moves toward her. Kiyo swings the blade to his neck, freezing him in place. “You know I’ll do it.”

  The boy growls in anger, but he nods. “Fine. Tea.”

  He steps away from the blade and past me, toward the table. For the first time I glimpse his face. I should be surprised, but I’m not. It’s Max, Axe, Lord, or whatever he wants to call himself now. It seems he’ll haunt me wherever I go.

  38

  THE LUKEWARM GREEN TEA feels a lot better than steel in my throat. Kiyo sits beside me, still holding the blade that Max and I fought over. She keeps its long edge against the dark wooden table, pointed at Max across from her. In my mind he’s more Max than Axe now. He looks like he did when I first met him in Blue, a little younger and without the beard that he somehow grew in Red. He seems to fit better here. His knuckles are as white as the porcelain cup that he clenches. He sips from the cup and grimaces.

  “If the tea has grown cold,” Kiyo says to him, “the Lord has only himself to blame.”

  “Rice should know better than to mock me,” Max replies, fixing an angry stare on her. “The Masters will hear of this.”

  Kiyo bows her head calmly. “We will await their judgment.”

  Emma sets her cup down and leans forward. “Thank you, Kiyo, for keeping things civilized. I’m sorry that we have not been properly introduced. My name is Emma Chamberlain.” She’s smiling as if this truly is a tea party and Max didn’t just try to kill us bo
th. She must not remember him, or being his servant, because of what the link did to her. That’s probably a good thing.

  “Nice to meet you.” Kiyo smiles back. “We do not have such grand names here. I am Rice.”

  “That’s not your name,” I say, but Emma gives me a look and shakes her head, blond hair swaying. It’s clear she wants to do the talking. My heart is still pounding. She knows that. I lean back and motion for Emma to continue.

  “What Cipher means,” Emma says, “is that he remembers you from before. I also heard much about you.”

  “You were in Black?” Kiyo asks.

  Her question reveals so much. Not only does she not remember Blue, but she does not even remember everything in Black. She’s been wiped here more than once.

  “No, from another tower.” Emma’s voice is gentle. “We were once in the Blue Tower. I believe all four of us were. I was also in Yellow. In the same Scouring when Cipher captured me from Yellow, Black captured you, Kiyo. In another Scouring Cipher brought you back to Blue, but then you were caught again. It seems Black has a special interest in you.”

  “She is not Kiyo,” Max says. “She is Rice.”

  “And you are Lord, it seems.” Emma folds her hands on the table. “Tell us more about these titles.”

  “You are our captives,” Max says. “We do not give secrets to spies.”

  “We’re not spies,” I snap. Emma’s pleasant conversation clearly isn’t winning over Max. “We just want to find someone and leave.”

  Max sips his tea and grimaces like it’s poison. “You’re lying. Give me one reason why we should let you leave here alive.”

  One reason. There are so many. But if there’s one thing all of us in the five towers want, it’s to know who we were before this place. Marcus told me the Black Tower does not reveal much about the past. I have the advantage of knowing about Kiyo and Max, though not as much about Max. I wish I’d asked more about him, instead of always fighting with him. I know he was from China. He was wealthy and lived around the same time I did. He told Marcus he’d owned casinos and built a replica of the Roman Colosseum.