Aside from Emmy, Jackson comes by every day—and every day I try my best to avoid talking to him. I think to how quickly I trusted him. I’ve thought it through a thousand times. Why? Was it that I felt like I knew him? Because I did in a way. I had known Jackson—or the Jackson I thought he was—since we were kids. Seeing someone year after year, growing up together, gives you a sense of comfort, like you’re predisposed to trust simply because you remember what the person looked like six inches shorter. I don’t know. Sometimes I think I’m just trying to make sense of my decisions, justify them, because the truth is, after weeks now of nothing but my own guilty thoughts, all I can come up with is hope.
The attacks were increasing. Everything felt so intense. I didn’t need him to tell me that a war was coming—anyone with a brain could sense it. I needed to believe that we could stop it, that there was hope. And no one knows what it’s like to trust on hope alone until they’ve been so deep in horror that there is nothing left but hope. That’s where I was, maybe where I still am—in horror—but there is no worry of me trusting on hope again. I made that mistake once…and he let me down. Now I’m stuck here, waiting to learn what Zeus has planned for me.
“How you feel today, child?” Emmy asks after a while of silently staring down at Triad in motion. It’s like watching clockwork move, everything and everyone so robotic I have to wonder if they are programmed.
“Good,” I finally say and she smiles, taking my hand in hers. She has a youth about her, despite her outward appearance. Her hair is white, outside of an orphaned blonde strip in the front. Her face has creases around her eyes and mouth that suggest she’s laughed more often than she’s cried. I’ve never seen her laugh or even smile, which makes me wonder how long it’s been since she felt the happiness that created her lines. She doesn’t look at me, likely afraid I’ll ask her, yet again, to explain what she had meant about Zeus. Questions about Triad she can handle, and does to appease me, but Zeus is another topic altogether.
I glance down at the bowl of bocas and prepare for how I’ll ask her. “Emmy,” I start.
She peeks behind her, making me wonder if Zeus’s shadow follows her around. “I told you, no talk of him. Now, young-one be by soon. Eat. Food brings—”
“Healing. I know. Emmy, please…”
“Not my place. Now rest.” She pats my hand one last time, leaning in to hug me, and says, “His eyes are everywhere here, his ears in the walls. Be careful, child.” She straightens, pulls out the band of beads from her pocket that I’ve seen her reach for when she gets worried, and laces them through her fingers again and again, her look distant.
As soon as she leaves, I return my attention to the city. I find myself standing by my window for hours each day, surveying Triad, hoping to see something new that gives me an idea of where the humans are, but each day the sun sets with me knowing nothing more than I had learned the day before. Now, the sun rises from a wall of green foliage that lines the city, separating Triad from whatever lies beyond it. Within the wall, there are rows and rows of houses, neighborhoods perhaps. I imagine what they are doing in their homes. If they are eating dinner now or playing games or watching some version of a T-screen.
From the neighborhoods, a large bridge stretches over a river into a city that covers the rest of everything visible. Building after building, all with green roofs, all different sizes and as rustic looking as the Panacea. It’s simple looking. But also beautiful, unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. Every day, I stare, mesmerized, until my eyes drift to the furthest edge of the city, to the rock-like building that stalks forever to the sky. There are no visible windows or doors in this building, giving it a look of complete power and terror. I remember asking Emmy what it was and her responding with only, “His.” I didn’t ask for clarification, I knew what she meant, and we ended up watching it together that day. Her eyes full of worry, mine of wonder.
The Liberator (A Dante Walker Novel) (Entangled Teen) Page 30
