“What—what did… How do you know?”
“You said his name.” He pauses and looks up at me with concern. “I miss him too. I know it’s different for you, but he was my friend too.”
Different for me? Because our families had assumed we’d get together? Because he was the only boy in our group whom I wasn’t related to, and therefore from an early age we were pushed together? Because we spent a lot of time together by choice too. Particularly toward the end.
But I don’t want to think about that. Not now.
I point to the sky. The pink hues from the sunrise are fading, but there’s a strange light. “Do you think the Turning’s close?”
“Katya says so.” Elf stretches his arms out either side of him, then stands. “We haven’t had one in a while.”
“Not unusual, not for this time of year.”
It’s fairly common not to have many Turnings for a while, then suddenly have loads. We’re coming up to the end of the slow period now. Soon the seasons will change ferociously fast as the spirits get restless. Thinking of the spirits makes me nervous. No one likes the Turning. No one wants a spirit to feed from them and kill them.
“What’s on the schedule for today?”
“Hunting,” Elf says. “Yani says he saw game on the other side of Anjazi’s Rock late last night. We’re going out there shortly.”
“Great, I’ll get my things.”
“No.” Elf places a hand on my arm. “Rahn’s leading it.”
I try not to flinch, try not to show the effect my brother’s words have had on me. “And?”
Elf watches me carefully. A muscle in his jaw visibly tightens. “And I don’t want him…” He shrugs. “Hurting you.”
“Hurting me?” I step back, my eyebrows shooting up. “He won’t hurt me, Elf. I can manage myself.”
Elf shrugs. “I don’t know what went on before… What he did to you—”
“He didn’t do anything.”
Elf raises his eyebrows, but it’s not in a surprised way. It makes him look angry. “He did, and you’re protecting him. Hell, Keelie. He took you away, in the middle of the night. The first I knew was when Bea and Mila came running to me, in tears. Bea said you’d gone off with Rahn.”
“I didn’t choose to go!”
“Exactly.” He raises his voice, and I glance toward Rahn’s hut. “I knew you wouldn’t go off with Rahn, just the two of you—and now you won’t say a word about what really happened? That’s not like you. Normally, you’d be raging. You’d be declaring war on the man. But you’re not. You’re not even speaking about it.” He pauses. “He threatened you, didn’t he?”
I look away. Not me, I want to say. But I can’t say the words. Rahn made that clear.
Minutes pass, and my brother and I stand here. In the hut, I hear Bea getting up, moving about, and then Mila’s high-pitched voice. A moment later, Bea starts humming and then her hums turn to soft song. She doesn’t sound ill. Maybe she was tired, needed to sleep more.
Elf exhales. “You’re staying here when we go out hunting. No arguments, Kee. Rahn wants a small group—four or five hunters. If you come along, I can just see it, he’d find an excuse for you two to be paired together—alone. He’d… I’m not letting him get you again. I didn’t protect you last time, but I will from now on.”
“It wasn’t anything like that,” I say quietly.
“But you won’t tell me,” Elf says. “What am I supposed to think? You come back, all subdued and quiet.”
Subdued? Quiet?
“It wasn’t me he threatened,” I say.
“Wasn’t you?” He looks at me carefully. “Who then?”
I take a deep breath. “He said if I challenged him again or something, he’d take Bea out next time. You know he’s never liked her! I can’t retaliate against him, Elf. Not if I’m to protect our sister. And I have to.”
Elf pales, then grips his hands together in front of his chest.
“Don’t say anything to him,” I warn. “If he knows I’ve told you, he’ll take that as me trying to cause a mutiny or something. Elf, I mean it. You can’t do—or say—anything.”
His eyes darken. “Fine. But I’ll be watching him.”
“You and me both,” I mutter.
I head back into the hut and join Bea. She’s sitting on her blanket, holding our mother’s necklace. Bea was wearing it the day D’Elinous was ambushed. And it’s the only thing of our mother’s she has. The only thing any of us have.
“You all right?” I put on a cheery face.
Bea runs the necklace through her fingers, feeling each amber bead in turn, then the butterfly in the center, before she slides it over her head. She turns to me, eyes wide. “You look like Mum.”
Her words freeze me, and I stare at her for a second. I didn’t think Bea remembered Mum, what she looked like, how she smelled, how she always sang to the birds early in the morning. But there’s no reason why she shouldn’t. Bea’s older than me, and just because she thinks differently to us, it doesn’t mean her memory’s affected. Immediately, I feel bad for even thinking that Bea wouldn’t have remembered. I can remember Mum and Dad.
“So do you,” I reply, taking in Bea’s face.
Bea frowns hard. “But you look more like her…you and even Eirnin. I wish I looked like Mum. Then I’d be close to her too.”
“But you are close to her. You’re her daughter, her first-born.”
“I want to see her, Kee-Kee. I want us all to be together. You and me, and Eirnin and Mila. And Mum and Dad.” She looks up at me. “Do you think it will happen?”
I take my time in replying. I don’t want to lie to her—shouldn’t lie to her—but I don’t want to say the words.
I shrug. “Someday, we’ll all be together again.”
“Someday? When?” Bea leans against me, rests her head on my shoulder.
I stroke her hair.
“Someday, Bea. Someday.”
In the end, the hunting party comes back empty-handed. Rahn curses and blames malignant spirits, then storms off.
“You okay?” Elf joins me on the sand, where I’m sitting, watching Bea watch Marouska and Esther play with the dogs twenty feet away. They throw them sticks and squeal with them when they run about.
I nod, watching her. Bea’s talk of our parents has made me feel strange all day. Uncomfortable. I never asked Red which Enhanced town he’s tracked my parents down to. And what if they are at New Kimearo, or can get there? What if I could see them—see them Enhanced. For years after the D’Elinous attack, Bea regularly asked me when we’d see Mum and Dad again. It nearly broke my heart telling her that we wouldn’t.
I look at Elf. “Do you ever dream about finding Mum and Dad?”
My question obviously surprises him because he lets out a low whistle.
“They’re dead,” he says.
“They’re Enhanced.”
“Kee, they’re dead to us. Dreaming about finding Mum and Dad isn’t going to help us. Just torment us.” He sighs, and the way he looks at me suddenly reminds me of Rahn. For a second, I freeze. Then the resemblance is gone, and it’s just my brother next to me. “We mustn’t let it affect us now.”
We watch Bea in silence as she watches Marouska and Esther run round and round with the terriers.
After a while, Five walks past, carrying a heavy load. Elf rushes off to help her—just as I knew he would—and I’m left on my own again. Left to think about my parents.
But I know I’ve made the right decision. They’re too far gone. We have to concentrate on the people we still have.
I can’t stop thinking of Red. He fills my head, fills every part of me.
And the knowledge of some secret undercover Untamed group makes my heart pound. Maybe once Red’s got to know me more and things have settled, he’ll tell me all about it, and I can get involved. Yes, I’d love that. I’d love to be an undercover agent too, be in the midst of the Enhanced all the time, living with the adrenaline and the th
rills. And we could make a bigger network or something. Work with the undercover agents—because Red will trust me by then—and then we can really start to do stuff. Big stuff. Stuff that will help all the Untamed.
“Hungry?”
I look up, dazed, to find Nico standing in front of me, holding two plates of steaming noodles and sauce.
“Got you extra meat in yours,” he says, handing me one of the plates. He digs a spoon out of his back pocket and gives it to me.
“Thanks.” I wipe the spoon on my shirt several times, then dig in.
Nico sits next to me, and we eat in silence, watching everything from the edge of the village. Rahn and a few of the men are discussing something by the fire. Seven and Five are taking the dogs out for an evening run—but I frown as I notice one of the dogs isn’t with them.
“I heard Bea wants to go out shooting,” Nico says after a while.
I stare at him. “She’s never wanted to go shooting before. The noise would terrify her.” I can’t think of anything worse for Bea.
He shrugs. “Rahn must’ve got it wrong then.”
“Rahn.” I curse. Great. Next he’ll be forcing her to eat anything other than the smoothest soup and slices of mango.
Nico puts an arm around me. I tense up.
I’ve never tensed when Nico’s touched me before, and he notices, withdraws his arm. After a moment, he gets out a pack of cigarettes. Offers one to me.
I shake my head.
Smoking is one thing I’ll never do, though Corin and Nico smoke a lot. But I associate it with Red’s mother. How she was at the end, desperate for anything. Anything addictive.
But you’re addicted to something too, Keelie. To adrenaline, to the rush. To putting yourself in dangerous situations where you can never be sure of other people.
I stiffen a little. My adrenaline-seeking behavior is controlled. It may look impulsive, but it’s careful, planned. I’m careful. I think through all the possibilities before I do something. Yes, my behavior is controlled. Red’s mother’s behavior wasn’t. It drove her insane.
I’m not mad. Definitely not mad.
And I think about her now—think about her properly. How she scratched her skin furiously all the time, complaining that it burned and burned. She’d douse herself in Caia-Lu’s cleansing lotion every hour or so, but it never worked.
“Help me,” she whispered to me once, as I walked past.
Red told me to ignore her, to step into his hut with him, pretend she wasn’t there. And so I did.
I ate with Red, and I stared at the smears of mud covering the side of his face, and the blisters on his hands, all the while listening to his mother’s moans. Twice, she screamed for Red, screamed for her wild, unkempt brat of a son. Red didn’t react, not to her, but I saw the look of hurt on his face, and I knew how he felt he wasn’t good enough for his mother. Not when she’d been Enhanced and had seen how wonderfully clean and well presented everyone in an Enhanced city was.
I wanted to reach across to hold Red then, to comfort him. But he’d become different in the last few months, different since his mother became desperate—not just for augmenters, for anything, drugs, alcohol, everything. He’d closed off more. He didn’t talk as much. And sometimes, there was a look in his eye that reminded me too much of his mother’s look.
Once, I saw him holding a bag of fine, white powder. He said he’d confiscated it from his mother, but he turned away as he said the words. I didn’t see him the rest of that day, or the next. Two days later, and he was fine. More than fine. Overexcited about everything.
“Hey.” Nico draws me into a tight hug, and I let him, though the smoke tickles my throat. I try to get him to distract me from my thoughts. From Red.
And I know I shouldn’t be thinking of Red so much. Not when I’m with Nico. And I wanted to be with Nico before, didn’t I?
Nico takes my plate from me and stacks it with his. “You all right? You look a bit….”
“A bit what?” I say, defensiveness clear in my voice.
“Lost,” Nico finally says.
He brings my head closer to his, then kisses my forehead. His lips feel like slugs against my skin, and I shudder, then pull away.
“Where are you going?” he asks as I stand up.
“I’ve got work to do,” I say.
“What kind of work?”
“Training work.” I bring a hand up and shield the low sun from my eyes, then set off. “Going for a run,” I call back, immediately knowing I’m not going for a run. But telling him my plans wouldn’t do any good. He hates me riding my motorbike, and recently I’ve stopped riding it as much as I like to—because of him. What the hell?
Nico hurries to catch me up. “But it’s getting dark.”
“Not really. Won’t be fully dark for a while. I’ve got time.”
Getting away from Nico—being on my own—makes me feel better. Makes me feel like I can breathe again. And maybe it’s because I feel guilty when I am with him. Because I did kiss Red—at the office—and then…then what would’ve happened yesterday if I hadn’t pulled away?
I grimace.
And I didn’t even pull away from Red because of Nico. I breathe deeply as I head back into my hut.
“Going for a ride on the bike,” I tell my siblings as I grab my leather jacket. It’s not real leather, and it won’t do much if I fall. I haven’t got any safety gear, much to Katya’s and Alan’s horror. But I’ve never fallen. Had a few close calls, once or twice. But that’s all.
Mila nods, holding Straw Hair carefully. Elf, examining a radio, shrugs, and Bea tells me not to be long. And to be careful. There’s a knowing sort of look in her eyes, and I wonder if she thinks I’m going to see Red now. Something tells me she’s keeping track.
I look at them all for a second, then see the Watcher Doll lying on my pillow. One of them’s been holding it. I pick it up quickly and return it to its place at the foot of my bed, then head back out. Nico’s watching me, not far off. Corin’s with him, and I watch as the two of them speak. Then I head for where we store my motorbike.
There’s nothing I like more than riding my motorbike. The exhilaration it fills me with is like a drug. Feeling the wind on my face, seeing my shadow with hair streaming out behind me, it makes me feel alive.
And I live to feel alive. I crave it.
This isn’t madness.
I take the bike up the steepest path I can. The engine’s not that loud—Three modified it for me last year—and its tires kick up dust. I operate the gear shifter with my left foot and the hand clutch with my left hand, then use the throttle—need to go faster, faster, faster.
Everything’s better when I feel like I’m flying.
I barely sleep because I’m meeting Red the next morning, and every part of me tingles.
Stop it, I chastise myself. He’s just a friend.
I try to keep my breathing even, but I can’t stop thinking about the way his body felt over mine, and how his lips were so soft against my collarbone.
And why I turned my head away.
Why I stopped it.
When I get up, Bea’s already awake and ready to go out on her walk.
“You’re going to the same area?” I whisper to her as we leave the village.
She laughs. “Don’t worry. I’m only going part the way. Don’t want to intrude on your romantic get-togethers.”
“That’s not what they are,” I say.
“So why are you meeting him?” Her eyes flash.
I smile.
When I don’t reply, Bea gives me a knowing grin, then heads off to the right, leaving me on the path alone.
Like before, I get to the meeting place first. I try to sort out my thoughts, my feelings about him, before he gets here. But, just when I’ve decided that maybe it’s not a good idea for us to be together like this, I see him, and it’s like my heart doesn’t listen.
“Hey, you.” I find myself smiling, and I want to touch him, want to kiss him.
“Your eyes!”
He grins, and the emotion reaches his eyes. Beautiful gray eyes. No mirrors.
I stare at him.
“No point in having my disguise in.”
Before I can stop myself, I pull him close, my hands on his shoulders. Our faces are inches apart, and I stare at him. Stare into his soul, because that’s what it feels like with the intensity of the emotion.
Seeing his eyes, Untamed, changes everything. They set off his face in a new way. He was attractive before, but now he’s more so. Now he’s on a new level, and I feel a deeper yearning stirring inside me.
“Missed me?” he says, smiling, and the twinkle in his eyes grabs me.
“No.” I give him a mischievous grin and turn a little, see my survival bag sitting not far away.
“Not even a little bit?”
“Not even a little bit.” But my smile betrays me.
“Another game of chess?”
“Sure.”
We set up the chessboard, but this time we play a whole game. I try not to notice how close we are or how the air between us seems charged. A few times, I catch him looking at me in an intense way. He wins, easily. He says he hasn’t been practicing much, but it’s obvious he has. Or maybe I’ve lost my talent. It has been years, after all.
After the game, we sit on the sand, our backs against a rock. The surface is hot with the sun’s heat, and it feels like little fingers, massaging me through my thin shirt.
We’re sitting with a few inches between us, and I look across at him.
“What?” he asks. “Have I got something on my face?”
“Just those kissable lips.” The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them. Alarm pours through me. Hell. What am I doing?
A Dangerous Game Page 11
