My heart hammered against my sternum. “What could be worse?”
“The national guard has authorization to shoot anyone who is obviously cryptid on sight. No arrest. No questions. Just a bullet in the head.”
Panic closed in on me like dusk in fast-forward, and the world seemed to grow darker in front of my eyes. The reaping and its aftermath had been one of the grimmest periods in US history. And it was happening again.
Because Gallagher and I had freed the surrogates.
“That was on the news?” my voice carried little sound.
“On every channel,” Lenore said. “It was on in the gas station when I stopped to fill up. On the car radio. I overheard a woman in the grocery story say they’d somehow texted everyone with an area code from the affected zones. And starting tonight, they’ll be broadcasting curfew instructions through loudspeakers on the streets.”
“It’s like we’re at war...”
“We are. They’ve declared war on us. This is real, Delilah. It’s the second wave, and they know it. They just don’t know who to blame now, any more than they did last time. So they’re blaming us all.”
“Okay.” No reason to panic. “But they’re not going door-to-door—”
“Yet.”
“—and even if they were, we’re not on the grid. We don’t have a home phone, or even an address. So we just need to lay low.” And cuddle with a newborn.
“That’s what I’m saying.” She laid one hand over mine. “I just thought you should be aware.”
“Do the others know?”
“Just me,” Gallagher said from the chair in the corner of the room, and I nearly jumped out of my own skin. I hadn’t seen him in the shadows. “And Rommily’s been pretty upset for the past few hours, so I’m guessing she’s seen something.”
“Where’s Alina?” I asked. Gallagher stood, and I saw her asleep in his arms. “Wow. I couldn’t see either of you over there. Not even a silhouette in the shadow.” And she was so quiet when he held her... As if she’d already mastered the fear dearg skill set.
“I couldn’t see her in my own arms,” Gallagher admitted. “She’s a natural.”
“So then...she’ll need blood.”
“I’m virtually certain of it.”
I decided to believe that was a blessing, as well as a curse. Gallagher could pass for human under most circumstances, and surely that would be even easier for Alina, since half of her genes came from me. A blood test would out her, but any abilities she inherited from her father would help lessen the chance of one being administered. After all, they couldn’t test a girl they couldn’t see.
And if she had to defend herself someday, she could. She would be her own champion.
But there would be a price.
As if he knew what I was thinking, Gallagher reached into his pocket and pulled out a tiny bit of cloth. When he stepped into the light of the bedside lamp, I saw that the cloth was red.
“I finished it last night.” He set the tiny cap in my hand, and I ran my finger over the material, marveling at the tight knit. It was a little red beanie with a flower knitted into the left side, where it would lie right over her temple. “Wow. That is oddly adorable, considering its purpose.”
“It’s supercute.” Lenore backed toward the door and opened it. “I’m just gonna give you guys a minute.” She stepped into the front room and softly closed the door.
“I didn’t even know you could knit.” I was still staring at the tiny cap, trying to imagine Gallagher with a set of knitting needles.
It was easier to imagine him with a sword. Or a dagger.
“I don’t knit. What you’re seeing is glamour, so I can change the appearance, if you don’t like this one.”
“No, I do like it. It never really occurred to me to wonder what a female redcap’s hat might look like. Much less an infant’s. It’s adorable.” I turned the cap over in my hand, amazed. I could feel the yarn beneath my fingers. I could see and feel each individual stitch. It looked and felt so real. “So, if it isn’t actually wool—or cotton—what is it made of?”
“As is fear dearg tradition, Alina’s cap is crafted from the flesh of an enemy, killed in battle or vengeance.”
“An enemy? Where did you—?” Oh. “You took more than vertebrae from Oliver Malloy, didn’t you?”
“Yes. He seemed like the perfect source material for the most important gift our daughter will ever receive. Other than her birth. Delilah, do you approve?” His words had taken on a distinctive, formal tone, which surely meant something important was about to happen.
“Of the hat? Of course. Why?”
“Though it was my duty to craft our daughter’s first cap, it is your decision whether or not to present it to her. If you find my effort worthy, I would be honored to watch you put the cap on her head.”
“And I’m guessing there’s some symbolism involved in that?” As there was symbolism involved in everything he formally asked me to do.
“In presenting her with the cap I made, you’re presenting me to her as her father. And accepting me in that roll yourself.”
“But you are her father. Do you really need a ceremony to tell you that?”
“In fear dearg culture, it’s a mother’s prerogative to choose a parental partner, and that partner does not have to be the child’s biological sire. It’s a concept similar to a human’s adoptive parent or stepparent.”
“I see.”
“I know you didn’t get to choose your child’s sire, and I know you likely wouldn’t have chosen me. Nor would I have asked you to, considering our existing relationship. But this choice is yours, and as much as I adore her—” his deep voice cracked as he cuddled Alina closer to his massive chest “—I will not take that decision away from you. I would love to be her father. And I swear on my honor that I will never let either of you down in that regard. But only if that’s what you want.”
“Yes. Gallagher, of course I want you as her father.” The relief in his expression was like sunlight breaking through clouds. “I hate that you ever had any doubt about that. So how do I do this?”
He lowered himself to his knees with one hand on the edge of the bed for balance, still holding our daughter in his other arm. Then he reached across me for a pillow, which he laid lengthwise on my outstretched legs.
Gallagher placed Alina on the pillow, cradled by the support of my thighs beneath. “Once you put the cap on her for the first time, she and it will be inseparable until the day she is old enough to craft her own. It will return to her from anywhere, over any distance, with nothing more than her physical need of it or conscious desire for it. It cannot be destroyed by human means. And if it ever dries of the blood of her victims—my victims, until she is old enough to fend for herself—she will die. It is your acceptance of this cap on her behalf that makes that possible. Is that what you want? Is this what you want for her?”
“If I say no, can she skip the whole bloody cap thing?”
“You don’t have to give her this cap—” though he looked brokenhearted by that thought “—but without any cap, she will die.”
I cleared my throat, well aware of what my next words would mean to him. And, someday, to our daughter. “Yes. I accept this beautiful and thoughtfully crafted cap on behalf of Alina, my only daughter, and with it, I accept you as her father.” Gallagher exhaled in relief, and I couldn’t resist a little smile. “How was that? I was going for formal respect worthy of your culture. How’d I do?”
“That was beautiful. Someday, I shall tell our daughter exactly what you said in this moment.”
“I had a feeling you were going to say that.” And I was glad I’d put in a little extra effort.
The arch in his left brow gave him a quietly amused look. “I hope to also be able to tell her that this was when you first placed her cap on her perfect little head.”
“Oh. Yeah.” I picked up the hat. “It is truly my privilege,” I said as I slid the cap over the top of her skull and down to where it brushed her ears. It was a perfect fit. And somehow, I was sure, it would always be a perfect fit. “It’s beautiful. And so is she.”
“You are both beautiful,” Gallagher whispered, still on his knees next to the bed. “You are the best things that ever happened to me, and I regret every moment of pain I have caused you.”
“Hey.” I reached up and took his chin, claiming his gaze. “No more of that. I’m serious. We’re moving forward. With what’s happening out there, we need to trust each other. I trust you with my life, Gallagher. I trust you with her life.”
He nodded. Then, in a moment that seemed somehow removed from the real world, Gallagher leaned in and pressed a kiss against the corner of my mouth.
When he pulled away, he looked just as surprised by what had happened as I was. “I know I should apologize for that,” he whispered as he stood and backed carefully away from the bed. “But I cannot truthfully tell you I am sorry. There have been few sincerely joyful moments in my life, Delilah. The only excuse I can offer for my behavior is that this is one of those moments. And I did not know how else to show you. But despite how I feel, it won’t—” He stopped, obviously reconsidering his phrasing while my heart tried to beat its way through my chest and onto the floor at his feet. “I won’t do that again without your permission.”
Then he left the room, and I fell back onto my pillow, confused and overwhelmed by what had just happened. By what Gallagher had said, as much as by what he had done.
Without your permission.
So, with my blessing, he would kiss me again?
I could still feel the ghost of Gallagher’s mouth against mine. I could still see the conflict haunting his expression as he’d tried to balance his obligation to me with...
With what?
I sat upright, my pulse pounding a desperate, staccato rhythm in my ears, and laid Alina in her makeshift bassinet, her little red hat bright against the blanket beneath her. The hat Gallagher had made for her from the flesh of the man he’d torn apart to avenge me, though he’d been just as wronged by Malloy as I had.
Gallagher had sacrificed his own honor to spare me further violation and humiliation. He’d literally put his body between me and danger a hundred times. He’d dedicated his entire life to keeping me safe, though he got nothing in return, and now...
“Gallagher!” My voice broke on his name as I stood from the bed, my hands open and useless at my sides.
Footsteps stormed across the outer room toward me, then the door flew open. Gallagher stepped inside, his fists clenched and ready, scanning the room for whatever threat had made me shout for him. But he found nothing.
“Delilah?” His posture remained tense as he studied my face. “What’s...?”
“Close the door.”
He obeyed without questioning the request, but stayed across the room. “What’s wrong?”
“You said, ‘Despite how I feel.’ What did that mean? How do you feel?”
“I...” He frowned, and I could see that conflict raging inside him again, but no explanation followed.
“Gallagher. Talk to me.”
“I shouldn’t have said that. I had no right. I shouldn’t have...” His gaze dropped to my mouth, and again, I could feel an echo of his touch there. “My oath to you precludes...”
“Precludes what? Life? Living for something other than violence and duty?” I put one hand on the edge of Alina’s bed. “I think we’re well past that, Gallagher. Our daughter is neither violence nor duty, but she’s a part of your life, and that’s as it should be. That’s normal. Don’t you want—?”
“This isn’t about what I want,” he growled, and the gravelly depth of his voice seemed to echo with equal parts pain and anger. Frustration.
“Well, then, what about what I want?”
He considered that for a moment. “What do you want?”
“I want you to tell me the truth.”
“I’ve never lied to you.”
“Semantics. I want the whole truth. Am I nothing more to you than an obligation? A debt you owe the world? Am I just some way for you to pay the universe back for the air you breathe and the blood you soak up? Am I—?”
“You are everything.”
“I... What?” I blinked, and suddenly he was a foot in front of me, towering over me, staring down at me with such intensity that the air between us seemed too thick to breathe.
“You want the whole truth?” he growled. “That’s it. You are my entire world. My most celebrated triumph and my deepest regret. You are every thought that I have and every breath that I draw. I wanted you from the moment I first saw you at the menagerie, and it took every bit of restraint I possessed to keep from ripping the head right off your worthless boyfriend and feeding him to the adlet. The only reason I haven’t kissed you before is that that’s not who we are. That’s not who you needed me to be. The world gave you a calling and me a duty, and you needed—”
“You don’t get to decide what I need.”
“What?” He couldn’t have looked more shocked if I’d slapped him.
“I’m tired of being your obligation. Your burden. If you’re going to protect me, do it because you want to, not because you have to. Do it because you want to be with me. If that is what you want.”
“I’ve never wanted anything more in my life. But that’s not how this works. I can’t dishonor you by acting on—”
I took his hand, and his mouth snapped shut. “The way I understand it, we’re breaking new ground here, with Alina, and she is perfect. She is right. Why would it be any less right for you to feel more for me than simple obligation? Or are you afraid of making this any more complicated than it is?”
“The only thing I fear is losing you,” he growled.
I smiled. “Then you have my permission.”
“Your...?” His confusion cleared, and his gaze dropped to my mouth again. Something seemed to spark behind his dark eyes, then he bent and kissed me so suddenly—so urgently—that I would have lost my balance, if not for the thick arm steadying me.
Vaguely, I heard the door open at his back. “Is everything—?” Mirela bit off the end of her question and quietly closed the door, but I couldn’t tell that Gallagher had even heard her.
“I feel like I waited a year for that,” I murmured when our kiss finally ended.
Gallagher chuckled. “I waited a lifetime for that.”
Delilah
That night, I listened from the bedroom while Lenore filled the others in on the changes in town, explaining the terrifying realities of martial law, and the new restrictions that meant for us.
Yet as I fed my daughter, instead of reaching for one of the newspapers she had left on the bed next to me, I picked up my phone and navigated to the screenshots I’d taken of my own school pictures, just minutes before I’d gone into labor days before.
I couldn’t read about the violence, grief and mistrust taking over the world outside of our cabin. The world that—one way or another—my daughter would have to live in someday. I didn’t want to infect her nourishment with my own despair.
So I opened my first grade class picture, to look at all the adorable, chubby faces of the kids who would grow up to abandon me when I needed them most. Back then, we’d been friends. We’d had no inkling of the wedge fate would drive between us. Of the bitter slice of life it would serve me. Of the violence and vengeance it would expect of me.
Yet the face I remembered best—Shelley Wells—wasn’t there. We hadn’t met until fourth or fifth...
I clicked on the fourth grade class picture and scanned three rows of kids in jeans and cute little dresses until I found her, across the picture from me. We’d met the first day, but hadn’t really become bes
t friends until after Christmas.
When Alina began to fuss again, I burped her, then switched her to the other side and scrolled to my fifth grade class picture with my left hand. There I stood on the first row, between a ten-year-old Shelley Wells and the kid in the middle who held the little chalkboard denoting us as—
The phone fell onto the bed.
“What’s wrong?” Zyanya asked from the doorway, where she held a steaming bowl of leftover rabbit stew.
With only one hand to spare, I left the phone lying on the comforter and used my thumb and forefinger to zoom in on the chalkboard held by a kid whose name—if I was remembering him correctly—was Neal. Written in stark white letters, accented with flowers Shelley and I had helped draw, were the words Ms. Essig’s Fifth Grade Class.
How could I remember that—drawing on the chalkboard used in the photo—but not remember my teacher’s name?
My finger trembling against the screen, I dragged the zoomed-in picture until I found the teacher standing to the left of the class. “It’s Rebecca Essig.” No wonder her picture had looked so familiar the other day. “She was my fifth grade teacher.”
“What?” Zyanya crossed the room with the bowl, and Gallagher and Lenore came in right behind her, probably drawn by the shock in my voice. “That’s...your sister? The one who survived?” Until that moment, I hadn’t been sure she’d followed the crazy story I’d told her to distract myself from labor. “She was your teacher?”
“Yes. But I didn’t remember that until just now. How could I have forgotten?”
Lenore shrugged as she sank onto the end of the bed. “I don’t remember half of my elementary-school teachers’ names.”
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