Aether (The Shadowmark Series Book 2)

by T. M. Catron

  First though, she had to kill Doyle. And she couldn't die honorably unless she had exposed this traitor. Knowing he was too strong to kill outright, Calla had to find a weakness. He had one, she was sure—he was too bold, too sure of himself. She would find her opportunity. She wanted revenge so badly it left a bitter taste in her mouth.

  Doyle remained at the window watching the blue planet below. Calla moved to stand beside him and was surprised to see the eastern US below shrouded in twilight. Fewer loyal hybrids were stationed here than anywhere else. Why didn't they rest over Eurasia where more of them lived? Doyle turned to Calla. With the sunlight accentuating the harsh lines of his face, he looked more severe than ever.

  “Send the message,” he said. “The hybrids are to use any available means to return here, by order of the Condarri.”

  “It’ll take weeks for them to gather.”

  “Days—tell them they have three. Condarri ships are standing by.” Doyle stood impatiently before her, waiting for her response.

  Calla bowed her head and said, “Yes, sir.”

  He smirked and left the window. “Better hurry,” he called back. “The Nomad is leaving in thirty minutes.”

  Day 98

  A FACE COVERED IN GRAY ash turned to fiery silver. Deep, black eyes looked from the flames and at Mina. The fire seemed to come from him, rather than consume him. Again Mina struggled as if she were submerged in water, but she floated on nothing. Air, not water, gripped her tightly. Was it air? Because she couldn’t breathe.

  She was drowning on air.

  The figure closed in, and the heat became unbearable. Mina tried to turn away. Then something cool splashed her forehead, and she looked up. Rain.

  She gasped and opened her eyes. Sweat covered her body and soaked her clothes. She kicked off her blanket then lay back, listening to the soft patter of rain on the fabric of the tent. The same dream every night. Every morning, it faded.

  A trickle of water ran along the seam of the tent before dripping into one corner. She turned and watched the small puddle there for a minute, putting off the inevitable moment when she would crawl out into the dreary day.

  “Mina.” Emily’s voice startled Mina out of her morning fog. “Are you there?”

  Mina sat up. “Emily?”

  Emily giggled. Mina grabbed the sweatshirt she used for a pillow and pulled it on. As she reached for the zipper, the teddy bear caught her eye. She stuffed it under her blanket before unzipping the flap. Emily sat on her knees in front of the tent, her thin cotton dress soaked through despite the gentle rain.

  “Hi, Emily.”

  Emily grinned at Mina, her broken teeth leaving wide gaps in her smile. “Found you,” she said.

  “How long have you been out in the rain?”

  Emily stood as Mina climbed out. Her legs were muddy from knees to bare feet. She shivered. Mina took off the sweatshirt, placed it around Emily’s shoulders, and then led her to the concrete stairs at the front of the hotel.

  Iverson sat on the bottom step cleaning a long knife. He nodded as the women approached. Emily gasped and gripped Mina’s arm, hiding behind her as Mina stopped to say hello.

  Iverson stood and moved out of their way, leaving the stairway open. “She doesn’t need to be scared of me,” he said.

  Emily whimpered. “He has a knife, Mina.”

  “Shh . . . I know, Emily.” Mina looked at Iverson again. Her gaze drifted to the knife in his hand. It was a long, fixed blade, similar to the kind Doyle carried. Realizing she was being rude, Mina looked to Iverson’s face. “Emily’s been wandering in the rain,” she explained.

  “I can see that.” Iverson tucked his knife in its place at his hip. “Better get her indoors.” He smiled and walked past them toward the road.

  Emily circled, keeping Mina between her and Iverson. Mina watched him a moment before wrapping an arm around Emily. They climbed the stairs to the second floor where they proceeded to room 210. Mina knocked. The door opened, and Helen appeared. Her quick smile faded to a frown when she saw Emily.

  “She found me in my tent,” Mina explained. Helen stepped out of the way for them to enter. As soon as Emily came in, Helen pulled a towel from a shelf, one she kept washed and folded at all times, and helped Emily leave the worst of the mud in the doorway.

  The room was immaculate. The double beds were made, their maroon comforters perfectly situated on the mattresses so that the edges fell equally down the sides. Clean, heavy curtains were drawn to one side of the large window, the only light source in the room. The fading yellow walls gleamed, and even the carpet looked fresh despite the dreary day. Mina had once glimpsed the middle-aged woman sweeping it vigorously with a broom. The broom now rested neatly in a corner.

  Helen saw Mina’s eye on it. “It was in the room when we arrived. Anyone else could have had the room, but I got here first and the broom is mine. Others have things in their rooms they don’t share with me, but I don’t complain about their little luxuries.”

  Mina decided only to nod while Helen steered Emily into the bathroom with another towel. She thought about sitting, but Helen hadn't invited her to, and something told Mina she was the kind of woman who thought a great deal about such things. “Where are your roommates?” she asked politely. Helen roomed with a young woman and her little girl. But Mina had only seen them from a distance.

  “They’re down in the lobby. Everybody’s crowded in there for the fire. Thought I’d take the opportunity to tidy.”

  Mina couldn’t imagine what needed tidying. Helen smoothed the bedspread on the bed closest to the door. Her silver hair was pulled back into a ponytail, the ends some color of bottled red. Despite her apparent age, Helen moved her sturdy frame around like a very young woman.

  She walked to the bathroom door and knocked. “Emily?”

  Mina’s eyes were drawn to the large mirror over the counter along the back wall. She hadn't looked at her own reflection since the Nomad, and her new look shocked her. The person looking back at her was more like a ghost than a human. Her skin had lost its luster, and her thin, hard body was almost unrecognizable. Despite spending so much time outdoors, Mina remained as pale as ever. Dark circles formed half-moons under her eyes, and she looked like she hadn’t slept in weeks. The dreams were taking their toll.

  “Doesn’t do to look too long at yourself these days. We all look a little worse for wear,” remarked Helen from behind Mina. She knocked on the bathroom door again. “Emily? Hang your clothes over the shower curtain and wrap that towel around you.” Some non-distinct noise came from the bathroom.

  Mina tore herself away from the mirror and asked, “Where has Emily been staying?”

  “She flits in and out of here like a bird. Some nights she rolls out her quilt on the floor. Others, I don’t know.”

  Emily opened the door and came out wrapped in the yellowing towel, holding Mina’s sweatshirt in her good hand. She handed it to Helen who in turn handed it to Mina. Mina took it and then changed her mind, holding it out to Emily again. “You need it more than I do. Keep it.”

  Emily shook her head vigorously and pushed it back toward Mina.

  “Why?” asked Mina. Emily continued shaking her head.

  “She won’t take anything for long,” Helen said. “We’ve tried to give her warmer clothes, what better ones we could spare.”

  Mina still held the sweatshirt out to Emily. “Maybe you can just hold onto it for me. I’ll ask for it if I need it.”

  Emily smiled but shook her head. Apparently she would not be tricked into taking it.

  Helen busied herself again smoothing pillows on the beds, saying, “She’s an odd one, aren’t you, Emily? So Mina, how’d you get all the way out here?”

  Mina questioned the sudden change of topic. Apparently Helen had been itching to ask. “I just sort of . . . wandered in like everyone else.”

  “How’d you survive all that time by yourself? I know I never would’ve made it if I hadn’t run into Solomon and som
e others. Life out in the woods is hard.”

  “Just got lucky, I guess.”

  Helen snorted. “Luck didn’t have nothing do with it, honey. I know. Solomon said you were pretty smart about finding food. Where’d you learn it?”

  From Doyle, of course. But Mina didn’t feel like sharing anything about him with this woman whose prying questions felt more like an interview than polite conversation. And the implication that Mina was some helpless female who couldn’t take care of herself rankled her, even if it had once been true. “Trial and error. It took me a while to figure out what would make me sick and what wouldn’t.”

  This was true. Doyle had saved her more than once from ingesting plants that would make her ill, at the same time teaching her how to tell them apart from edible ones. Mina was surprised he hadn’t just let her eat the wrong things and learn from her mistakes the hard way. But then if she’d become sick, she only would’ve slowed him down. Why didn’t he just leave me? Why did he keep me alive in the beginning? And don’t I always come back to this question?

  Helen seemed to accept Mina’s answer for now and was chattering on about something else entirely before Mina realized the topic had changed. She tried to tune into what Helen was saying: “. . . you have a gun.”

  “I found it.”

  Helen’s eyes narrowed as Emily sank down on the edge of a perfectly made bed, but Mina thought the look might be for her, not Emily. Mina sighed. Helen didn’t trust her, and she was the nosiest person Mina had ever met. Still, the lodgers seemed to respect Helen, and Mina didn’t want any trouble. “It wasn’t easy, as I’m sure you understand. I just had to survive, take things a day at a time, and I ended up here. What about you?”

  “Yes, that was the way with all of us, I suppose.” The hard lines on Helen’s face softened a moment as she straightened from finishing the pillows for the second time, then her face darkened. “I remember being so scared, just me and my . . .”

  Helen cleared her throat. “Daytime was worse if you can believe it. At night we could hide, no one could find us, but days were worse. Then we ran into Solomon and Evan. We thought things would be better at the camp, but we were still so hungry.”

  We? Mina felt Helen had intentionally left out part of the story and was about to ask when someone knocked on the door. Emily clutched her towel and jumped off the bed, sprinting for the bathroom and slamming the door with a bang. Her whimpering echoed throughout the room as Helen looked through the peephole before opening the door.

  A tanned woman stood in the doorway. Her dark hair had been chopped off as if she had used a knife to give herself a haircut. She could have been about Mina’s age, maybe a year or two older, but her sunken cheeks made it harder to guess. Her glasses had been broken and repaired with tape at least twice. The woman’s hand shook as she extended it to Helen.

  “My name’s Lindsay Alvarez,” she stated. “Someone said you might have some bandages.” Despite the small tremble in her hand, her voice was steady.

  Helen didn't take Alvarez’s hand or invite her into the room. “I’ve seen you around.”

  Mina walked forward to shake her hand. “Mina Surrey.”

  Alvarez visibly started, gripping Mina’s hand briefly before stepping back. “Mina Surrey?” Her eyebrows rose, and her eyes gleamed.

  “Do I know you?” Mina peered more closely at Alvarez, trying to recognize a familiar face.

  “Mina! I think . . . you look a lot alike . . . I worked with Lincoln!”

  Mina gripped the door as a noise like rushing water filled her ears. She must still be in her tent dreaming. “My brother? Have you seen him? Do you know where he is?”

  Alvarez’s smile vanished. “Yes,” she answered, “but . . .”

  Mina could feel the blood drain out of her face, and she grew sick. She steeled herself for the news that was coming, news she had never expected to hear.

  “Oh, wait Mina! Don’t look like that!” Alvarez stepped inside and guided Mina to sit on a corner of the bed closest to the door. “Last I saw him, he was perfectly healthy.”

  Helen, silent through the exchange, drew the line at sitting on her bed, and tsk’d them. “You ladies can catch up somewhere else. I have things to do.”

  Alvarez, taken aback at Helen’s rudeness, said, “Look, I know you’ve been through a lot.”

  “A lot? Honey, you have no idea what I’ve been through!”

  Mina, eager to find out about Lincoln and wishing to avoid irritating Helen, gestured out the door. Helen glared at both of them as they left. Mina turned to thank her, but she'd already closed the door on their heels. Mina would never be in Helen’s good graces now, but she brushed aside the thought and turned to Alvarez. “Where is he?”

  “We were with him until about two weeks ago. We were separated when they attacked the camp.”

  The fine drizzle had stopped. Mina grasped the hotel railing for support. “The military camp? Were you there the whole time?” She lowered her voice. “You were there when it burned?” A thousand thoughts raced through her mind as she replayed the great plume of fire rising into the sky while she fell to the Earth. If Lincoln had become trapped . . . She had been there.

  Doyle knew the Glyphs were going to attack the camp.

  A cold wave washed over Mina, moving from the top of her head down to her gut as the realization sunk in.

  “Mina?” Alvarez frowned. “He couldn’t have been in the camp when it happened. He was with us on the mountain moments before.”

  “What happened?” Mina’s voice cracked.

  Alvarez shifted on her feet. “We were leaving, and he went back for someone. Look, we’ll tell you the whole story. Come downstairs?”

  As they hurried down the concrete steps, Mina barely registered the stairs under her feet. She had been within miles of Lincoln. Doyle knew about the attack.

  “We’re over here at the edge of camp,” said Alvarez. “Carter’s badly hurt.”

  “Give me a minute,” said Mina, recovering a little. And she jogged to her own tent to root around in her pack. Doyle had stuffed a first aid kit at the bottom of it. Grateful she’d never needed it, she grabbed it and a spare water bottle on her way out.

  When Mina reached their campsite, she was shocked to see how sparely they had been living. Even if they hadn't been Lincoln’s coworkers, Mina would have already offered to help them if she'd known their condition. They barely had a fire going. A green Army duffel contained the few supplies they owned.

  “We lost our sleeping bags,” said Alvarez when she caught Mina looking.

  Nelson and Carter were just as surprised to see Mina as Alvarez. Nelson was a small-framed, skinny man with brown hair that hung in his eyes. Carter, whom Mina had met once before, lay on the ground using someone’s jacket as a pillow.

  He looked like a completely different person. He’d lost a lot of weight in a short period, evidenced by the loose skin surrounding his neck and face. His hair was whiter. His pallid face was almost gray with beads of sweat running into his short beard. Dried blood covered the shirt around his abdomen.

  “Mina,” he choked out. “Good to see you. Lincoln will be relieved. Wish I’d seen you sooner.”

  “What happened?” Mina asked as she handed the first aid kit to Nelson.

  “Slipped and fell. Landed on a branch—sharp as a skewer.”

  “During the attack?”

  Nelson shook his head. “After.”

  Carter chuckled humorlessly. “I slipped two days later, when we weren’t panicking.”

  “We’ll get you fixed up now.” Alvarez peeled up Carter’s shirt to reveal a nasty gash in his belly. She threw the soaked t-shirt they used as a bandage onto the ground. Mina struggled not to let her revulsion show.

  Carter wrinkled his nose at the stench. “Alvarez thinks she’s doing me a favor by trying to sugarcoat it. I may be a helpless fool, but I can still smell when a wound is septic.”

  “Mina,” said Nelson, digging through the first aid ki
t, “I think you have everything in here but penicillin, which is what we really need. Where did you get this? Painkillers, bandages, thermometer, antibiotic cream—don’t think the cream will help at this point.”

  “Penicillin won’t help, anyway,” said Carter. “I’m allergic.”

  “Why didn’t you tell us before?” asked Alvarez. “What if we’d injected you with some?”

  “Yes, Alvarez,” snapped Nelson. “It’s a good thing we didn’t find a refrigerated case of penicillin in the middle of the forest!”

  “Well, he’s got to let us help him! He fought us all the way here!”

  “Stop talking about me like I’m not here. Lemme see those painkillers.”

  Alvarez pushed her glasses up on her face and spoke again in a calmer voice, “Is there a nurse or doctor in the hotel? I asked yesterday, but no one seemed to want to talk to me.”

  “No,” replied Mina. “I’m sorry.” She looked at Carter.

  “We had a medic,” Carter wheezed. “He was good. Patched up Lincoln when he got stabbed. The medic’s probably dead now.”

  “Lincoln got stabbed?” Mina looked from one to the other and sat down on top of her sweatshirt to hear the story.

  “He’s okay now,” said Nelson, glancing at Carter. “Or he was.”

  Between the three of them, they told Mina everything, starting with finding the silo and Halston, and Lincoln’s stabbing. Mina clenched her hands together to keep from giving anything away when they mentioned Halston, who Mina knew was a rogue hybrid. She shuddered at the danger they had been in. Then they told of Lincoln’s recovery, their discovery of the second tunnel with all its symbols, and their subsequent frustrations in deciphering them. Mina had no doubt what they called the “silo” was the bunker Doyle had wanted to investigate.

  When Carter told her about the problems in the camp and the refugees, Mina interrupted. “Solomon told me you helped them, Nelson! I didn’t realize who he was talking about at the time.”

  Nelson shifted in his seat and glanced at Alvarez, waiting for her to discuss the matter. When she didn’t, he said, “What the colonel was doing wasn’t right.” He mumbled something else about trying to help, but Alvarez ignored him and picked up the story with Captain Baker, leading up to the morning of the attack and their argument about Schmidt.