So . . . I might not have my memory back by the ceremony?
It’s a possibility.
What happened to the others, the ones who didn’t have brain hemorrhage?
But instead of answering, Zee turns away, fiddling with a string on her white shirtsleeve.
What?
They . . . had full memory return in less than one hour. The implant and its effects are eradicated, though the side effects, other than hemorrhage, can be extensive and vary from human to human.
Adrenaline lights me on fire. In less than an hour, the mystery could be over. I could remember everything . . .
I suppose it is best to wait, then, I say.
It is, yes.
“Will you wheel me down to the trees again?” I ask. “I need fresh air.”
“If you’re up for it, yes. We can do that.”
“I’d love that.”
“Do you want to go now?”
“If it’s okay with you.”
“Sure.” Zee turns to retrieve the wheeled chair, and I uncork the tiny bottle, downing the two pink capsules before she even reaches the corner. Bitterness spreads through my mouth as the capsules stick to my tongue before going down with another swallow.
She returns to help me into the chair, and I might as well be sitting on nails. I can’t imagine the horrible things that must’ve happened to me. I’m about to find out, though. If I don’t die first, that is.
“Are you hurting?” Zee wheels me toward the door.
“Yes. A lot.”
She stops at a nearby cabinet, removes a bottle of pills, and dumps a couple into my palm. “When we come back, we’ll get more if you need them.” Then she fills the ceramic mug and gives it to me, and I gulp them down to be with the pink capsules. I taste adrenaline again while my head radiates with warmth. There’s something . . . different there, though it must be my imagination. Those pills couldn’t possibly work that fast.
The door slides open to water pouring from the sky.
“Oh, yeah,” Zee says. “Thursday.” And she unhooks a long, black object from the wall, clicking a button on its side. It pops open to a large, curved canopy.
“What in the world is that?”
“An umbrella. For keeping dry in the rain.”
“Oh . . . ?”
She holds it above us and pushes me through the doorway. The top of the dome is filled with dense fog that shields the sun’s brightness, creating a dreary, purplish-gray day. How fitting. Still, the soft shower tickles my senses. So strange, having no memory of these things. Almost like experiencing them for the first time.
I suspect this is your first time out in the rain, Zee says.
Really?
Yes. Where you’re from, people can’t be “outside,” experiencing things from the Old World. Not even under a dome. You’ll remember soon.
Sooner than you think.
She yanks the chair to a halt on the slatted, wooden pathway, making an OAI who’s passing by crash into her.
“Pardon me,” he says.
“No, it was my fault,” Zee says. “I’m sorry.”
With a bow, he’s on his way again, and Zee crouches down, her face inches from mine. “You didn’t.”
Water rushes by through the cracks in the wood below, and crowds of people pass by, trying not to stare, though each catches a glimpse, peeking from beneath matching umbrellas.
“I had to.”
A Pure woman stumbles out from a Dreamland Booth by the chasm, drops to her knees in the mud and vomits, then lies there in the rain.
Zee resumes pushing my chair, gait stiffened. I can’t believe you did that, Joy. You could . . . you could die.
If I die, I die.
You can’t die! You have people depending on you to live!
Well . . . then I’ll live.
Why didn’t you wait? It would have been safer!
“I’m tired of waiting,” I say.
Shh. Don’t do that, or they’ll discover how we’re communicating. Please, Joy, you need to be smart and trust me. This isn’t a game, and your life isn’t something to risk. Tiny souls are depending on you—
And I need to remember them. I can’t wait any longer; I have to know who I am. And like you said: my painful memories fuel me, make me stronger, and I need all of the fuel and strength I can get. I have to remember. Now.
We turn down a left-hand path, traveling in silence until we reach Maudine’s. A numbness begins at the base of my neck as a warmth that eases my physical pain spreads through my body. But my mind has a thousand unscratchable itches; prickles of energy, popping and coursing through my mental passageways.
A tremble starts in my skull and cascades down my spine in electric ripples, producing periodic violent shaking in my body. Nausea churns my stomach and pain in my chest accompanies my pounding heart; fragments of bruised, broken, and burned pieces. I must be dying. Because what’s there isn’t life. There’s only pain, darkness, death, and brokenness.
I cry, because there are so many reasons I should . . . but what are they? Numerous, dysphoric, unbearable . . . they swallow me up in their vague yet vast magnitude. Soon, I can’t control my sobs, and my body hiccups with each one. I clutch my stomach, doubled over, missing . . . something. What? Scattered fragments, strewn into the wind—lost, empty, separated . . . Vital pieces necessary for my survival are absent—I sense it, deep inside my splintered soul.
Zee squats in front of me before the fisherman’s bridge, bringing the umbrella down to hide us. You can’t do this here. They’ll know, then they’ll imprison or kill you. And me, too. Then you won’t be able to save the rest. Hold it together, Joy, for two more days. No matter what you remember, you cannot let it break you. You have to be both strong and weak: strong inside, weak in front of Lord Daumier. I have a plan set in motion. We have an ally who’ll aid in our rescue. But we cannot let on that anything is different from how they’ve programmed you and arranged for it to be. Understand?
I nod, though a shell has already cracked inside me. A raw, red, and wounded soul claws from it, flailing, grasping at my thoughts. A desperation I can’t tame drives me to my feet, knocking aside the umbrella. I glance around, left, right, frantic—someone’s supposed to be with me. “Who is it?” I demand. “Who’s supposed to be with me?”
“J—Lily, please.” Zee grabs my arm, drags me close. She squeezes my arm hard. “Stop this—now. You’ll remember soon, and when you do, also remember what I’m about to tell you.”
I nod again, shaky with grief and panic.
“I will take you to her. Tonight. Once everyone is asleep.”
I collapse into the chair, tumbling from a million feet high, about to shatter against the Earth. I clench my fists, fight to calm down, or at least appear so. But holes are being drilled into my skull from inside, with heartbreak gushing out, wrecked and ruined, limping into the sunlight.
I unclench my fingers to a shaky hand, examine the lines crisscrossing my palm, the cuts and scabs, the calluses. What did these hands do?
Remember.
What have they held?
Death . . . life . . .
Whose?
So many without faces, without names; they blur, smoke from bodies as they burn, and I burn with them.
We pass Maudine’s, heading toward the Atrium, and rain pours at a steady pace, beating the ground. Zee pulls back the netting and rolls me into the fluttering, wet oasis filled with trees, flowers, life—and now, I’ve brought death. We stop beneath a canopy with a dry bench, and she sits before me, takes my hand in hers. I study her face—puffy, heart-shaped lips; long, curly, reddish-blonde hair . . . and there’s a flash of something—of Zee—except she has red hair and we’re someplace dark . . . with machines. She grins at me, reaching over to take—
“Baby . . . Baby Lou! Where
is she? Is she okay? Is she . . . alive?” I sob. “Please, tell me she’s alive!”
“Shh!” Yes, she’s alive. She’s across the chasm with a few of the others who’ll grow in waiting for their transfer. Please, Joy, don’t say anything else aloud!
I slap a hand to my mouth, press it there, while scorching wrath and horror wrenches me apart. At the word “transfer,” it all comes crashing down with destructive power so fierce, it slices through the dome and tears another hole in my sky. Jax, Pedro, Johnny, Emerson, Serna, Tristan—The boy in chains! That’s Mateo! And Chloe, Pia, and Raven—trapped in those glass tanks!
I recall their faces during the prior night’s events with Lord Daumier, the monster, ripping my helpless body to shreds. The surreal horror was intensified by the device he put around my head. Zee masked the pain some, but still the memory is there, sharp, stabbing, visceral. Was it a nightmare? How could that have been real? He violated, ravished, and defiled every inch of me from surface to bone . . . I should be dead . . .
Cringing, I dig my nails into my palm, shaking the thought away in favor of questions to Zee: How will we rescue them? What about Jax and Vila? They were missing when we were captured. Are they here? And that was Tallulah at Maudine’s!
Zee frowns. Who’s Tallulah? And I thought Jax was the boy in chains—
No, that’s Mateo. I must’ve mumbled Jax’s name by mistake. And Tallulah is Vila’s pet. She ran off into the jungle when the Queen and her men captured us. She must’ve found us here.
I see, she says. Sorry, but I’m not sure who everyone is here. Certain things are unclear. Others are too classified. If I tried to gain access to the information now, it might compromise the plan.
What is the plan?
We’ll discuss it in further detail in the morning before the ceremony.
Are they all okay, Zee?
Though scared, yes, they’re all okay.
Thank God. And . . . wow. You look so much like Aby. She . . . died. Arianna Superior killed her a few weeks ago.
Oh, Joy . . . I’m so sorry . . . She takes my hand, holds it tight.
Zee, how did I get here?
Queen Nataniah’s working with her—Arianna Superior. They traded you all to Lord Daumier for a high price. They administered the Melatozan to make you all unconscious and easier to ship to Alzanei.
A memory blindsides me: Suellen, my “nurse,” was the food server from Zentao. Her hair is lighter now. She kept trying to hide a scar on her wrist, kept questioning Jax, and had an overall oddness about her. I saw darkness in her from the beginning. Then, when the flood came, she disappeared with Morris the cook. He’s probably a traitor, too. I shouldn’t have trusted Mr. Tanner’s judgment of him, but some people are cursed to see the best in everyone, even if it’s a lie. I’m positive Morris and Suellen took Jax and Vila through the secret transport harbor we found. But why?
With a shaky hand, I grasp strands of my hair. How . . . why is my hair . . . blonde? And my eyes—?
Lord Daumier likes it that way. To him, that appearance is “pure.” And since making you his was a sick victory he prided in claiming, he changed you the way he wanted to. He took that from you, too; took your looks, your name, and everything else. He could’ve killed you, but he finds too much pleasure in controlling you and watching you suffer, knowing you’ve lost everything . . . even your own mind.
Why? Why me?
He has a sick fascination and obsession with . . . your father.
Okay . . . ?
We’ll discuss that more at a later time.
I gasp. Smudge! There was an AOAI with us! Our friend, Smudge! Did you see her?
I don’t recall seeing an AOAI come in with you. What was her serial number, do you remember?
Yes, it was . . . it was . . . When I try to recall the string of digits on Smudge’s neck, the memory’s foggy. I can’t remember.
Another image appears: the Key, wrapped up in the paper Professor Al gave me, now hidden under some leaves near the jungle entrance of the Northeast Subterrane.
Zee! I—
Then I replay Professor Al’s warning: Don’t let this fall into the wrong hands. Memorize it, then destroy it. Let no AOAIs—even your friend—lay eyes on it. Promise me.
What? Zee asks.
Are you an AOAI?
I am.
I drop my gaze to my trembling fingers.
What is it?
I have some . . . information. But he said not to tell anyone, even trusted AOAIs.
You can tell me, Joy.
I consider it for moment, before deciding Zee is the only person I have in the world right now. Trusting her with all of the information I possess is my only option. I had one of the Keys. A woman we were with, Cheyenne, she . . . died . . . But before she did, she gave it to my brother, Johnny.
Ah, yes . . . Zee chuckles under her breath, but it’s swallowed like a tear in the ocean. Cheyenne. I knew her. After Raffai awakened me, and I chose to stay with Lord Daumier, there was an . . . incident.
An incident?
Yes. She’d been his fortune teller, and she told him . . . about the fall of Alzanei. He went into a rage and . . . Her gaze drifts off into the trees.
“What?”
She glances at me, then looks down at her hands. He took her eyes.
No. That was him?
Yes. He had his own, failing eyes replaced with them. He was going blind—
Blind! Adrenaline shoots through me as the pieces come together. Professor Al gave me a paper during the flood, before we escaped . . . it said something about three blind eyes helping to find the Keys—
“Lovely day, isn’t it?” The chilling and toxic voice permeates through the other side of the canopy. I freeze and Zee’s face goes stoic.
Lord Daumier enters the covered area, flanked by two helmeted, red-clothed men. And now I remember Smudge’s words, about all of the OAIs wearing helmets. Tucked into their belts are looped whips, and they each hold an umbrella for the demon in white.
As he approaches, I tremble, haunted by what he did to me. The urge to strike him or run is so real—but neither are an option.
“Don’t you agree, Lily?” He rolls toward me, arms clasped behind his back.
You must submit, Zee thinks. Do not let on that you know.
Then I remember. My daddy taught me how to bluff, and Mother . . . she taught me how to treat even the foulest of men. And this man will soon regret the day he chose to play sick games with me and my family. For now, though . . . the bluff of weakness.
I force a smile. “Yes, I do.”
A memory resurfaces of my first time in the Tree Factory’s dungeon, coupled with something I learned back then: No matter how scared you are, don’t let your enemy know. But fear is what Lord Daumier wants, Zee claims, so my bluff is a fear weighed down by weakness and unknowing . . . when the truth is, I do know, and my fear and anger have made me stronger.
I purposefully fidget, adjusting in my wheeled chair. “It’s much nicer now that you’re here.”
It’s not a smile he returns, though I’m not sure what to call it. More of an acknowledgement that my statement’s accurate . . . ?
“Leave us.” He motions for Zee and his men to leave the canopied area.
Without a second thought, the three of them retreat, and he saunters over, hands still clasped behind his back, then takes a seat in front of me on the bench. One hand finds its way to my knee and trails up my thigh, stroking the bruises he left there.
“It’s too bad I can’t remember last night,” I say. “I’m sure it was . . . amazing.”
Lord Daumier grasps my jaw and pulls me close, his face an inch from mine. The putrid stench of rot and lies seep through my nasal passages and down into my soul. “We will have to work on purifying you. We’ll need to teach you some things.” He lick
s his lips with that slimy purple tongue. “You have much, much to learn.”
“I will learn what . . . whatever you w-want me to. I’m yours to do with . . . what you will.”
He laughs and squeezes my thigh hard, digging his nails into my flesh. “Indeed. When I am done with you, you won’t even recognize yourself.”
“I look forward to the . . . the transformation.”
The rain splatters against the canopy above us, the only sound in the long silence as he inspects me—as if deciding which portion of me to devour first. Then he snarls, “As do I, sweet Lily. As do I.” He withdraws his hand, much to my relief, and he rises from the bench, brushing imaginary filth from the seat of his white robe. He towers over me, a venomous predator. Maybe he’ll let me fatten up before he eats me alive? Then he smirks, accentuating the ghastly sharpness of his features. “Have your sister take you to Claudette’s as soon as possible. Your gown must fit perfectly for tomorrow.” He claps his hands together, once. “One more day, Lily. Just one more day . . .” He leans close to brush my cheek. “Then you will be Lady Lily Daumier, right hand to the ruler of Alzanei. What a fine, noble privilege that is for you.”
“Yes . . . my lord.” I lower my chin. “Thank you.”
He makes strange clicking noises in his mouth, then leaves me sitting there. As soon as he rolls to the end of the canopy, his red-robed men converge with umbrellas overhead, and they all move down the path. Zee returns, shaking the wetness from her own umbrella and folding it up. I relax, adrenaline fading, leaving me achy, warm, and queasy.
Are you okay? she asks.
I nod. We have to get out of here.
We will, and we have to acquire all three Seeker’s Keys, as well.
What I don’t understand is . . . if they’re keys to the Wall, and we’re already on the other side of it, then—
We are not.
Not . . . ?
Alzanei isn’t on the other side of the Wall. If it was, the dome would not be necessary.
The Soultakers (The Treemakers Trilogy Book 2) Page 19
