by Amber Hart
“It might be,” Clovis replies. “But think about it, Raven. Think very seriously about this first. If involving her turns out to be a mistake…”
The consequences would be disastrous.
“Why do you think Mr. Tondjii let him go, Clovis?” I ask, even though I am pretty sure I know. I’m almost certain Mr. Tondjii couldn’t kill his own son. But, still, knowing this war is coming, it seems a mistake for Mr. Tondjii to have let Jospin go.
Clovis nods as if he’s been thinking the same thing. “I honestly didn’t think he would.”
It hits me then: Clovis thought he’d lose his best friend that day. He actually thought Jospin would die in front of our eyes. And if Clovis thought so…
“Jospin knew, didn’t he? He knew that saving me would cost him his life, right?”
“Yes.” Clovis’s voice is suddenly ragged. “I never—” Clovis takes a moment. Swallows. Looks away. “I never wanted him to die, Raven. He’s my best friend. God, it was so hard to see that, to know that Mr. Tondjii was coming and we didn’t have a chance to run. That moment, Raven, when I really knew we were caught—that was anguish.”
“But then Mr. Tondjii let him go,” I add, somewhat unnecessarily.
“Exactly,” Clovis agrees. “Do you see it now?”
“See what?”
“The reason,” Clovis replies.
I still don’t. “No.”
“Think about it, Raven. What did I teach you about the jungle? What did I show you with trails?”
“To always follow them,” I say automatically.
Clovis is looking at me as if the answer is hanging in the air between us. “Precisely,” he says.
I’m about to tell him I have no idea what he’s talking about when it suddenly clicks.
“Mr. Tondjii didn’t let Jospin go because he loved his son too much to kill him. He would have killed his son. He let him go because he wanted to follow the trail. Of course. Mr. Tondjii wants to know which pack Jospin betrayed the tribe to. He wants Jospin to lead him there.” Despite having observed how cold Mr. Tondjii is, this realization makes my head reel.
“Smart girl,” Clovis says. “Your father would be proud.”
I suck in a breath.
“Your father is the one who taught me what I needed to get by. Focus. Determination. That’s how he did his job too. It’s how he was.”
How he was. I picture my dad, so dedicated to this jungle, his work here. I can feel a literal ache in my chest. The way one side of his mouth would grin before the other. The way his eyes squinted and crinkled in the corners with each laugh.
“It’s the same way you are now,” Clovis adds.
I like Clovis’s idea. The one where I’m like Dad. I want to be like him.
I try not to think that being like Dad might mean that I end up the same way Dad did.
Clovis told me the truth about Dad’s gruesome death. While he and another worker were rereleasing a silverback into the wild—a silverback Dad had cared for at the habitat—a poacher, concealed in the trees, shot the ape with a silenced gun. This caused the gorilla to retaliate against the closest person. The other habitat worker ran off to get assistance; he tried to save my dad.
I hate to think of Dad that way: Lying alone on the forest floor as the gorilla escaped into the trees. Hurt and bleeding, just like I was after my attack. Knowing he was dying. Even still, there was a slight chance he would’ve made it, if it weren’t for the poacher who approached him—the same one who shot the ape on purpose in hopes that he would attack. The poacher made sure Dad would never survive his injuries. His hands closed around Dad’s throat, and he killed him.
That poacher was Jospin’s father.
Chapter 12
Jospin
“Chloe, I need to see Raven’s room.”
I announce this as I stand next to Chloe, cutting up fruits and vegetables for the gorillas. Berries and seeds and bananas and everything they love to eat. It doesn’t surprise me that the workers feed the gorillas better than they feed themselves. At least today’s lunch consisted of freshly cooked rice and vegetables. That was nice. And I’m still running on energy from last night’s pig kill.
Chloe keeps cutting fruit, removing banana peels. Not answering me.
“Where is it?”
I could have easily snuck around the habitat by now. Searched other rooms until I found hers. I’ve thought about it but decided not to. I’d prefer to earn Chloe’s trust by asking instead. But I need to search Raven’s room, and I need to do it alone. I need time with her; even though she won’t be there, lingering echoes might be. Maybe Raven’s pillows still smell like her. Maybe there’s crucial information waiting to be found. After all, Raven didn’t know that she wouldn’t be coming back to her room. She didn’t realize that day that her life was about to change.
Chloe says nothing.
“Are you hearing me?” I ask.
I know she is, even though I’m keeping my voice low. It’s a small room, and Chloe and I are the only ones in it, but I have to be careful to not let other passersby hear me. I’m not supposed to know who Raven is. I wasn’t working here when she was. I need to keep track of the small things or they could blow my cover.
I sigh, frustrated. Chloe hasn’t spoken to me—other than when she needs to—since I mentioned how much money she could make off the meat she tries to protect. I won’t apologize. I’m not sorry.
“You haven’t brought her back,” Chloe finally says.
“No,” I agree. I don’t add that it’s killing me. Or that it’s possible I may never bring Raven back here.
It might not be safe for her at the habitat. Not now that poachers are dropping packages so close. I may need to find Raven and run. But I can’t tell Chloe this.
“You’ve been here a week tomorrow, and Raven’s still not back,” Chloe says. “And you promised me information that you haven’t given me.”
True. I see where she’s going with this.
“Okay,” I agree, to the plan she hasn’t yet voiced. “I’ll tell you more if you lead me to Raven’s room.”
I try to think about it from Chloe’s point of view. She knows I’m a poacher, and still she’s allowed me a room to sleep in, a bed, food, a shower. She’s even agreed to cover my real identity. And what have I given her? A promise of information that I haven’t delivered. Shown her a picture to prove that I know Raven. Would that be enough for me if I were Chloe? No.
“All right,” Chloe says. “We can go tonight when everyone is asleep.”
“Thank you,” I whisper.
—
Chloe walks me to Raven’s room, as she agreed. She looks down the corridor, makes sure no other habitat workers are up, and opens the door.
It’s past midnight. The halls are draped in pure silence. The apes are asleep. The Cameroonian jungle is not.
Chloe flips on the low-wattage light. This room looks just like mine, only the thin sheets are brown, not blue. The shelves hold Raven’s clothes, not cargo pants and threadbare shirts.
It hurts me to see Raven’s room like this. My eyes latch on to the pink shirt she once wore to my house. That was the first piece of clothing I ever removed from Raven’s body.
“I am a poacher,” I say. “That much you were right about.”
I shouldn’t be telling Chloe this. I really, absolutely, have no other choice.
“I don’t want to be here, Chloe,” I say honestly. “I wish I were home. I wish I were with my pack.”
I don’t tell her how deep I am in the pack. I suspect she might already know. Yet she’s let me stay here. Because of Raven. That’s what convinces me that I need to trust her more.
“To see Raven’s clothes like this,” I say, reality leaking through slowly, “is ripping me up inside.”
Chloe stands in the middle of the small room, nodding as if she agrees. And I see it then, in Chloe’s eyes, that she loves Raven too. I don’t know what Raven was to this woman—maybe a friend, maybe like a
sister or a daughter—but it was something real.
“I left the pack,” I say, testing the words on my lips, “for Raven.”
Chloe stiffens. I wonder if she understands.
“I was banished. I lied to protect Raven and it cost me my entire life.”
I planned on telling Chloe where Raven was. Right now is the perfect moment to give it all away. But I can’t.
I can’t speak anymore.
I swallow what feels like five tons of emotion and try not to let Chloe see one ounce of it. I try to appear okay. I’m used to stony faces. I wear them daily around the pack members. But here, around Raven’s things, I’m losing control.
I need to know that she’s okay.
Chloe’s eyes never leave my face. Her expression softens. “We’ll talk more later,” she says. “Be quiet in the halls when you head back to your room.”
It’s the most generous thing, what Chloe has done. She could have demanded to know everything. She could have threatened me by using the room and food she lets me have as leverage to give her whatever she wants. Instead, Chloe recognizes my pain and offers me space.
No poacher would ever do that.
The compassion she directs toward me feels unnatural. Only one other person has ever been nice to me like that. My mother.
I can’t think about her. Won’t. I’ve tried so hard not to think about Mother. But I do wonder what Father has told her. What excuse did he give for banishing me? Did he tell her that I’m a traitor? Does she think me dead? She must be worried. I hate that I’ve possibly hurt her.
Chloe shuts the door on her way out. I get to work right away, checking all of Raven’s clothes. I unfold them, shake them out, and fold them again. They smell sweet, like her, but I find nothing there. I look under her bed and discover the weapons we made together. I want to laugh. Smart girl, hiding them in a folded blanket, where no one would see them.
I close my eyes and picture Raven—light-blue eyes, pale-golden hair spilling down her back, the way her lips feel against mine. I picture her hungrily, until it becomes too much to bear, so I open my eyes and continue searching.
And get lucky when I strip the mattress.
I find two things: a black notebook and Raven’s canvas book.
I open the notebook and scan a few pages before I realize it’s a diary. I tuck it under my arm and decide to take it with me back to my room, where I can read it carefully, in private.
Next I flip through the canvas book, seeing the world through her eyes. There are sketches and paint lines and brushstrokes, and, God, my Raven has touched this. She painted these things. Fruits and forest and the same ape over and over again, scars like bullet holes on his arm.
But most of the paintings are of me.
My rounded nose and dark skin. Brown eyes that look as though they’re staring right back at me. In one, I’m carving knives. In another, I’m laughing. It goes on and on. Climbing trees. Eating coconuts. Aiming a gun. Lounging on the couch. All things that she’s seen me do. The last picture she painted of me steals my breath.
I’m lying back in my bed, the one I shared with her, sheets tangled around my waist. I’m wearing nothing. And I have this look—eyes closed, slight smile—that says I’m so unbelievably happy. My hand grasps something off to the side of the picture. I look closer.
It’s Raven’s hand.
I’m tempted to stay here, but I get up instead. Take the canvas book and black notebook with me. As I carefully shut her door, I realize I have decided that I don’t care what happens to the poachers anymore. Up until this moment, I’ve been missing my pack. I’ve been thinking about Father and if he’s all right. I’ve been tied down by memories of friends I no longer have.
But remembering Raven like this, instead of having her next to me, is torture. It’s enough to strengthen my resolve.
“I’m not part of the pack anymore,” I whisper. It’s the first time I’ve said it aloud. I say it again, with more conviction. “I’m not part of the pack anymore.”
I’ll kill them if I have to, I admit to myself. And I mean that too. I’ll kill any poacher, any old friend, whomever, doesn’t matter, if they try to stand in the way of me getting Raven back.
Chapter 13
Raven
The jungle beckons me with its dark leafy fingers.
Closer, it whispers.
Shadows hug nearly every speck of land. Moonlight drips through a few small cracks between branches. And I smell nothing but gunpowder and lead. My fingers are smudged with it. My gun is clean. Resting in my hand as if it belongs there.
Clovis nods toward the right, telling me to follow a path. We’re on patrol with Mattius and one other poacher, named Hervé. To my surprise, I like patrol. The jungle air is refreshing. There is a cool breeze rustling the leaves above me, the type I never feel during sweltering daylight.
It’s quiet now, save for the soft, intermittent sounds of animals. But even those are different at night. There’s something about this forbidden time between midnight and sunrise that has my blood thumping in my veins.
What the poachers want is an easy night of surveillance, marching through the rain forest under a starry sky that we can only see in tiny patches between leaves. What the poachers really need is to find something that will lead them to their traitor.
I try not to glance up too often, for fear that I’ll fall. The jungle floor is bumpy, unpredictable. And it’s too hard to see anything with a clear eye. Starlight dwindles as we cross under dense leaves that shroud us in complete blackness.
Mattius whispers something in their tribe dialect, Maka. Authority in his voice.
Clovis takes my arm. “Mattius says you’re being too loud.”
Too loud? I’m not saying a word.
Mattius already made it known that he didn’t want me along for patrol, but orders are orders and Mr. Tondjii is not to be questioned.
“Watch your feet,” Clovis continues. “Pay attention to where and how you step.”
I nod. Accept the fact that they’re right. I can keep up, but I don’t know this jungle like the poachers do. There’s no way I will ever be as good at this as they are. But I can learn. So I take Clovis’s advice. I try to walk more quietly.
“Better,” Clovis says.
I can hear the smile in his voice, though I can’t see his face.
The leaves thin, revealing patches of sky again. I like it better this way, when I can see where I’m going, when my feet aren’t bumping into stumps, arms hitting branches, legs getting cut up on thorns and thickets. I’m grateful for Mattius and Hervé, leading the way.
Clovis keeps pace just a little in front of me. They’re all scanning the jungle floor for signs of disturbance. That’s maybe why I see what they don’t.
I squint, make sure I’m not imagining things. My heart thuds. I have a sudden burning hope.
Jospin?
But no. The face hiding in the branches above comes into view under moonlight. Definitely not Jospin. No time to hesitate. He raises his gun a second before I do mine, but my trigger finger is quicker.
A scream.
It doesn’t come from me.
A thump on the forest floor as his gun hits the ground. Thankfully, it doesn’t go off. Mattius, Hervé, and Clovis look up.
“Th-third branch to the left,” I stutter, shocked.
They spot him too. Tribe dialect flies out of their mouths. I grab Clovis’s arm gently.
“I shot him.”
Clovis pulls out of my grasp. Helps Mattius yank the guy down from the tree.
“He was going to shoot,” I say, trying to excuse the fact that I shot someone.
No one is listening to me.
Once they secure the man, they ask him questions. I look on like an outsider, trying not to flinch when my eyes meet his bleeding arm.
Finally, Clovis turns to me. Eyebrows drawn in, a frown on his face. “You okay?”
“We don’t have time for that,” Mattius says, glancing at C
lovis. “Come help us.”
Mattius and Hervé block my view of the bleeding man.
“I shot him,” I say again. My throat feels dry. My stomach twists, as if I might be sick.
I look at the gun in my hand. It’s heavy, and so is the realization that I’ve wounded someone.
“Good thing,” Mattius says. He pauses as if he’s having a hard time believing it too. But, just as quickly, his stare moves to Clovis. “Now help us get him up.”
—
“Interesting night,” Mr. Tondjii says.
Uneasiness turns my insides out. I’m trying to keep it together, because I’m terrified of what Mr. Tondjii has in store for this man we’ve caught. Whatever happens to him is on me.
“You shot him, yes?” Mr. Tondjii asks, double-checking Mattius’s story.
I try not to look at Clovis, Mattius, and Hervé standing off to the side. Or at Simon standing by Mr. Tondjii. They keep watch over the prisoner, ensure that he makes no attempt to escape. Not that he can. He’s tied down to a chair, with his mouth taped shut.
“Yes.” The quicker I answer his questions, the sooner I leave.
“And how is it that you, little Raven, saw this man before any of my men did?”
Good question. “I was looking in the right place,” I reply.
He smiles. “So what you’re saying is, my men were looking in the wrong places.”
If he wants to put it like that. “Yes.”
“And you,” he says, “shot him without asking any questions first? You shot him and helped my men bring him to me, is that right?”
I helped by carrying the man’s gun back. I couldn’t stomach touching him after I’d injured him.
“Yes.” He already knows this.
I try to find a focal point—the spot between Mr. Tondjii’s eyes. I let everything sharpen, my vision and thoughts.
Mr. Tondjii paces the space around the captive. Stalking his target. “Do you understand what you’ve done here?” he asks me.
And I really think I do. “I’m pretty sure.”
Mr. Tondjii confirms my suspicions. “You have sealed his fate.”
