Spark

by Rachael Craw

  “You need a hand?” Jamie rises from his seat.

  She shakes her head and steps away. We all watch her slip through the kitchen door. Her parents exchange worried looks. Conversation stalls completely and I become aware of an uncomfortable churning in my stomach. Miriam compensates for the silence by spooning soup into her mouth and mmm-ing repeated compliments, saying she’ll have to get the recipe and Barb says something about it being handed down and then I lose the thread because the churning feeling quickly sharpens to a point. My lower abdomen contracts so fiercely, I nearly groan aloud and a horrible realisation hits me. The cramps. Miriam’s warnings about my body, my monthly period becoming a weekly ordeal and the cramps that will signal its arrival. I have been living in dread of it for the last two weeks. Not now. Please, not now. Heat creeps up my neck and my ears feel hot. I lift my napkin and dab at my lips, about to excuse myself.

  Jamie frowns across the table. “What did you do to your fingers?”

  The heat in my ears fills my cheeks, my gut gripes and my mind blanks.

  “Overzealous with the cheese grater,” Miriam supplies the alibi, affecting a wry tone as if to say, poor, clumsy Evangeline.

  My laugh sounds weak and I push my chair back. “Just need the powder room.” I have to force myself not to run, feeling every eye on my back. But once I make the foyer, I snatch my purse from the console table and hurry up the corridor to the guest bathroom, thanking God for the emergency supplies I always keep zipped in the side pocket. I barely make it before the flood hits and I buckle over on the toilet seat, cursing but desperately relieved I left the table when I did. I can’t bear to imagine the humiliation if I’d waited any longer.

  It takes me a minute or two to pull it together and organise myself. Only an hour, Miriam said. I hope she’s right. I wash my trembling hands, dry them and lean on the vanity, checking that my mascara hasn’t bled down my cheeks. The tightness in my stomach contracts with the tether, stabbing behind my bellybutton. The static in my head crackles loudly, something changes and I became very still. An electric current expands from my spine to the tips of my fingers and the soles of my feet. Seconds, milliseconds, hours and years, I stand paralysed, lost in an internal storm. I blink once in an endless slow sweep, my pupils expanding in the mirror – black pools that make everything around me razor-edged and painful to look at.

  I reach for Kitty in the bandwidth then a looming shadow fills my mind.

  It’s happening.

  Energy flames to the center of my body, burning fear like oxygen, releasing an emission of black rage. Time fractures. I say her name, ramming the door and stumble out of the bathroom.

  I bolt down the hall to the back entrance of the kitchen. Kitty’s unearthly scream comes just before I burst through the door, wrenching the hinges. Instantly, I register a dark figure beyond the kitchen window and Kitty by the counter recoiling from it, teetering, falling, her basket of rolls flying up towards the ceiling. I launch myself across the floor, light bulbs popping above me, and catch Kitty before her head smacks against the black and white Italian tiles, unconscious of her weight or strain in my muscles.

  In the same second, the door to the dining room bangs open. Jamie sees me crouched over Kitty and his features contort. He shouts and lunges towards us. Instinct and inspiration propel me away, a high-pitched ringing in my ears. I run at the counter, scoop up a knife and jump, levering off the side of the sink, curling my knees up to my chin, shoulder first. The sheet of glass explodes before I touch it. I cannonball through the window, uncurling in a shower of splinters, landing in the flowerbed, a faint burning at the top of my head, a chemical smell in my nostrils.

  Jamie cries out, but I’m already halfway down the path beside the pool house, driven by the offending signal in the bandwidth. The deepening shadow of the garden wall cuts short and I skid into the stable yard where the rising moon silvers the shutters of the unused stalls. Disorientated, I close my eyes. The chemical scent lingers here too. A sound directs me to the north east and I sprint between the stable wall and utility sheds, out onto the vast stretch of lawn that dips down to the forest. There, near the edge of the trees, a dark figure slips into the shadows. I tighten my grip on the knife and lengthen my stride, spurred by a terrifying sound – the distant call of the river.

  Water.

  Water blocks the signal.

  If he crosses over – I can’t let that happen. I run. I fly, barely sliding on dew-damp grass, pumping my arms and legs. The forest seems to grow quickly up and up and up until I dart beneath the first outstretched arms of elm and birch that hem the firs beyond. It feels like stepping through a wall of ink but the black on black shifts and clarifies, my senses compensating in an instant.

  The surprising sound of pounding feet echoes both before me and behind me. Why would Miriam leave Kitty unguarded? I shake it off, zeroing in on the sound ahead and the faint chemical waft as we head for the slender arm of the Border River where it winds onto the estate.

  Thick brush rips the cardigan from my shoulders and branches slap at my arms, neck and face. I’ve entered the world of my recurring nightmare, moving by instinct through the unpredictable space, sure-footed as I skim the undergrowth. Just as I begin to feel that I’m gaining on the Stray, I become aware of those pounding feet behind me coming up on the right, hammering through the trees. Miriam pacing me?

  A shot rings out; a painful clap of sound by my ear.

  I skid, confused.

  “Stop!”

  The voice is all wrong.

  Distracted for half a second, I slam into an outcropping branch. Like a baseball bat to my left side, it forces air from my lungs and jars the knife from my hand and the blade spirals away in the darkness. The impact spins me anticlockwise and I hit the dirt in a shower of muddy leaves. Skin tears from my knees and elbows. I scramble to get back on my feet, almost blind with pain, only to be flipped and flattened on the root-tangled earth. A knee in my stomach, a pan-like hand in the middle of my chest, Jamie pins me.

  I can’t think.

  I can’t breathe.

  Jamie presses the hot mouth of his gun to my forehead and I struggle against him and imminent blackout.

  “It was you.” His black eyes are wild. “I didn’t want it to be you.”

  Beyond the sound of our combined panting, I can hear the Stray getting away. I want to scream and throw Jamie off but can’t move or cry out. Jamie presses harder then freezes, suddenly aware of the distant sound. The lock of his gaze lifts and he stares, horrified, into the darkness.

  I hear the faint splash of water. The bandwidth goes blank, like going blind. I groan, limp in defeat, crushed by Jamie’s weight. I flap at his arm. “He’s gone.”

  He looks down like he forgot I was lying beneath him. He drops the gun and climbs off me. I roll to the side, gasping for air, feeling all the bones in my body. None of them are happy.

  “Everton.” Jamie grips his head and shakes where he sits. “I nearly killed you.”

  ALLIES

  I push up against the rough base of a tree, my scraped and battered legs splayed in the dirt. It takes shallow breaths to stay conscious, holding myself to ease the white-hot pain in my side. I am filthy. My dress is torn in alarming places. I can’t think. Jamie still pants grey-faced where he sits. His ripped shirt gapes from shoulder to elbow and his stare burns through me.

  “Affinity?” I say.

  He frowns and brings a finger to his lips but gives the barest nod.

  I shut my eyes like I’ve been sucked through a black hole and wish Miriam would appear through the trees and take charge of things. Neither of us speak. We’re on the same side of an impossible line, where we both imagined ourselves alone.

  Frustration at a lost opportunity eats me up and I aim it at Jamie. “Why on earth would you let me in the house if you thought I was the Stray?”

  “I didn’t know what to think. I didn’t want to believe it was possible. It was only after you left the table I reall
y started freaking out. I could tell you were feeling something.”

  I don’t react. No way will I explain that little episode.

  He holds his head. “On the one hand you passed out at the ball, on the other, no seizure, no vomiting. But then you’d disappeared after the attack and it didn’t seem to add up. When you arrived so early at the hospital …”

  “I could have just been a worried friend.”

  “At seven in the morning?” He shakes his head. “I definitely worried when I couldn’t feel your tracker.”

  I need to get back on my feet and I turn, grunting with effort, onto my knees. “I don’t have a tracker.”

  He scrambles up to help me, taking me by the arm. “You should tell your Watcher,” he whispers the word. “If it’s dissolved. It’s pretty bloody slack if she’s let it reach that point.”

  Even with Jamie’s support, hauling myself up sends blinding pain through my ribs. An involuntary groan shudders out of me and I shove Jamie aside, bringing up Kitty’s minestrone in a kaleidoscopic splatter. Still functioning enough to wish Jamie hadn’t seen, I wipe my mouth and step away. My throat rasps in the afterburn. “I don’t have a Watcher.”

  “What?” He picks up his gun and tucks it into the back of his pants. “You must have.”

  “I think I’d know.” The forest spins. Jamie catches me against his chest and his scent makes me even dizzier.

  “Have you broken something?”

  I right myself. “You broke something.”

  “Sorry.” He grimaces. “You’re not making sense. How can you not have one?”

  “Can we please get back to the house? I need to know she’s okay.”

  He takes my arm and directs our path, turning me to the left where the trees thin. “She’s fine. They would’ve taken her straight to the panic room.”

  They have a room? “What? Your folks know?”

  “I told them.”

  “What?” I exclaim, completely rattled. “You didn’t tell Kitty? Tell me you didn’t tell her.”

  “I had to.”

  “Oh shit, Jamie!” I try to yank my arm out of his, but he keeps hold of me.

  “I couldn’t take any chances. I only arrived the day before it happened, I had no way of knowing if a Warden had been through, if agents had been dispatched. You know the odds of a spontaneous response to a Spark aren’t traditionally that great,” he says, careful over the illegal terms.

  “No wonder she’s acting so weird,” I groan.

  Jamie keeps me moving and I am too upset to speak. We come out of the trees and onto the lawn. On the rise, the windows of the house shine in the darkness and we take it slowly up the gradual slope, each step jarring my side. Even through the fog of pain, the idea of the Gallaghers knowing anything about the Affinity Project does my head in. Finally, I say, “I guess that’s why your mom’s staff aren’t around?”

  He nods. “Easier for everyone.”

  It makes sense – one of the few things that does.

  “Is it your dad who’s active?” I ask.

  “He’s just a gene carrier. Uncle Jeremy’s with the Project. He’s pissed with me for breaking his cover.”

  It’s too huge to comprehend.

  “You?” he asks.

  “Miriam.”

  Jamie’s eyes widen. “Bloody hell.”

  “I can’t believe we’re having this conversation.” My frustration diminishes with hope rising to take its place. Jamie is a Shield. He’s strong. Capable. He’ll be with Kitty when I’m not – not that I can imagine letting myself be separated from her now. “What made you realise it wasn’t a mugging?”

  “Something the driver of the van said about the speed of the attacker vaulting the estate wall. It frightened him like he’d seen a ghost.”

  “That wall’s got to be twelve feet.”

  Jamie nods. “Once the DNA came back unreadable, I knew for sure we were dealing with a Stray.”

  “How?”

  “The synthetic gene has very different markers. But we have a doctor of our own, thanks to Uncle Jeremy, someone familiar with our genetic anomaly who’s running tests for us privately.”

  “That’s fantastic.”

  “If we have time to draw any conclusions. We can only be grateful the Stray’s a beginner. Buys us a little time.” He sighs. “What are you on? Your third or fourth?”

  I stop on the lawn and turn to look up at Jamie. “Kitty’s my first.”

  He scoffs. “That’s not even funny.”

  I don’t move.

  His eyes widen. “No tracker. No Watcher. Illegal terms.”

  I sense bad news and my hope deflates like an old balloon.

  “But – but you registered the – guy from a distance. First timers can’t do that.”

  “Jamie,” I struggle to produce volume. “Kitty’s my first.”

  “That’s impossible!”

  “Why, exactly?”

  “Because your frequency sensitivity is only in its early stages with your first. There’s no way you can detect a threat unless you can feel your bond with the Spark and that requires close physical proximity when you’re new. Surely, Miriam explained all this?”

  I feel faint and hot. It doesn’t make sense. Miriam assured me I would feel the threat. No mention of “close physical proximity”.

  “Kitty’s your first and Miriam didn’t tell you?”

  “She told me I’d know when.”

  He rakes his hand through his hair. “I see.”

  “I don’t get it.”

  He falls silent and stares at the house. Finally, he says, “I guess I can’t really blame her.”

  “Why wouldn’t she tell me?”

  He meets my gaze briefly. “To save you from feeling bad.”

  The bitter resignation in his voice frightens me and my eyelids flicker like a strobe. “Obviously, it won’t be easy. I’ve got a lot to learn but–”

  “No one saves their first. Few even save their second. Maybe by your third or fourth you might expect a save, but by then your sensitivity would be more mature and you’d have had professional training. A newbie doesn’t stand a chance.”

  No one saves their first.

  His words are worse than a physical assault. Ringing fills my ears.

  BLAME

  The soft glow of lamplight washes the recessed cornices of the ceiling.

  We don’t have recessed cornices.

  “Mom?” I have plastic lips and a matchstick throat.

  “She’s awake.” Jamie’s low urgent voice.

  Nightmare reality rushes in.

  I try to lift my head but it’s rock heavy and stings at the scalp.

  Miriam bends over me, pale with worry. “Just stay still.”

  Anger eclipses the pain and I groan.

  “Evie?” Kitty’s voice brings everything into focus. I know exactly where I am and what’s going on. The confusing pressure in my stomach is the tether. Guilt, relief and shame war in my chest as she comes into view; her eyes are huge and swimming with tears. Barb holds her tight.

  “Kitty.” My tongue is too thick. “Are you hurt?”

  She disengages from her mother, forcing Miriam aside and jostling me painfully, wrapping her arms around my neck. She sobs into my hair.

  “Kitty,” Jamie says. “Let her go. She might have a broken rib.”

  She sits back, wringing her hands. “Evie, it’s all my fault.”

  “No,” I say, choked by her obvious terror. “No, it isn’t.”

  “I’m so, so sorry. I can’t believe this is happening. I can’t believe you’re the one, and that this is happening.”

  “It’s okay,” Miriam says.

  Where does she get the gall to soothe her? To be in the same room? No desire to protect me can make up for the lie that risked Kitty’s safety! It makes me sick to look at Miriam, but turning my head hurts my scalp. I reach up and find a stinging graze beneath a patch of damp, sticky hair. I lower my hand and there’s blood on my fin
gertips. I try to sit up but cry out at the stab in my side.

  Jamie catches me. “What are you doing?”

  I struggle, turtle-like, on my back. “I’m bleeding on your mom’s couch.”

  “I don’t care about the damn couch,” Barb says. “Lie down.”

  Surprised by her sharp tone, I let Jamie lower me.

  “Perhaps we should give Evangeline some space.” Leonard’s cool voice makes me want to curl up. Jamie must have told them the terrible news. I squeeze my eyes, wishing I could disappear. “I’ll call the doctor,” he says and my eyes spring open. “Don’t worry. He’s very discreet.” He moves like he carries a heavy invisible load and pauses at the door. “Jamie.”

  His son watches me over the back of the couch, frowning, lost in thought.

  “Jamie,” Leonard says again.

  “I’ll be right back,” Jamie says.

  “Wait.” I wince in the attempt to reach him and whisper, “Will she be safe now?”

  Jamie freezes, his eyes fixing where I touch him. His brow creases and he pulls away. “You’re the best chance we have to know that.”

  I shiver as he withdraws. The saviour they’d been hoping for is just useless, inexperienced me.

  “I’ll fetch you a damp cloth,” Barb says, her voice and posture stiff. “Kitty, come and help me get a blanket and some clothes for Evangeline.”

  I don’t want Kitty out of my sight, but I don’t feel I have the right to ask for anything. So I lie like a leper as they draw away, the tether stretching, thinning until it blends with the atmosphere of dread.

  Miriam kneels close, her face awash with emotion. She reaches to stroke my forehead and tries to hold my hand, but I turn away, balling my fists. “Why didn’t you tell me the truth? Days she’s been unprotected!”

  She sighs. “You don’t understand.”

  “You let me believe she was safe, that’d I’d feel it if she were in danger!”

  “Listen to me.” She leans forwards, her dark hair falling across her face, reminding me of my mother, a hot poker to the heart. “The odds are–”

  “All the more reason you should never have kept me from her.” Thinking about the failure rate of first timers burns me up.