She shakes her head as if amused when Asher makes a disgusted sound in his throat. “We continued working on our project and everything was falling into place easier than I’d hoped. I’d never been happier. I was doing something I loved, helping people, living in the prettiest place on earth, and I was falling in love with a wonderful man. Life couldn’t have been more perfect.”
My life is just about perfect. The thought comes out of nowhere. I don’t know why I thought it, but it startles me and reminds me of the way Gavin had reacted in the village when I’d said something similar.
But before I can think further on it, Asher is talking and I lose the thought.
“So what happened?” His voice is rough, but he doesn’t seem angry anymore.
“Fate had other plans,” she says, quietly. “What neither of us knew was that Mother—we knew her as Abigail then—had fallen in love with Eli, too. And while he never did anything to encourage her, she developed an entire relationship between the two of them in her head.” She meets my eyes. “If I’d known how … not right … in the head she was, I would never have taken the job. Never.”
She pauses and seems to be waiting for me to respond. As if she needs me to believe her because maybe she doesn’t believe herself. But I nod, because I want to know the rest of the story. It’s the most information I’ve ever had about the place that was my home for sixteen years.
She lets out a breath. “Then, a few months after we found success with the nanos and finished injecting them into people, we saw they were working. Really working. Just like they were supposed to. Sure, all the data and tests we’d done said they would work, but we didn’t know for certain until we actually put them into people and tested them on a large scale. People weren’t getting sick, even when directly exposed to diseases that should have killed them. It was fantastic. We’d found a cure for almost any disease we’d ever faced, and with no side effects. It was a huge medical breakthrough. I couldn’t wait to share it with the rest of the world. However, one night, when Eli and I were … um … celebrating…” She blushes and I almost smile. “She caught us.”
“Then what happened?” Asher asks, without even batting an eye at his grandmother’s admission. He’s leaning forward eagerly, and I have to admit I’m dying of curiosity.
“Abby went crazy. She was sure we’d done it on purpose. That we’d known she loved him and were laughing at her behind her back, which of course we didn’t and hadn’t. But she didn’t believe us. She yelled about paying us back and then ran off.
“She was only a child, really. What was the worst she could do? We thought she’d get over it. But we should have known better. There had been rumors—that I ignored or just flat-out didn’t believe—that the people who she said had died of diseases had really died at her hand. Because they didn’t fit her ideal vision. But I blew it off as ludicrous. She’d lost her entire family in the War, but she was still only a child. And even though people always seemed especially careful not to upset her, I didn’t put much stock into any of the rumors. But she instituted a new law. Unmarried—unCoupled—people weren’t allowed to touch, and she was the only one who could permit people to become Coupled. It was her way of making sure Eli and I couldn’t continue our relationship.”
“UnCoupled.” The term rolls around in my head. Coupled. UnCoupled. Touching between unCoupled people is forbidden. I glance at Asher, wondering if that’s why I’m so nervous when anyone new touches me. But his grandmother is still talking and I force myself to listen.
“So, we just figured we’d leave. There was no reason to stay. We’d finished our task. Sure, Elysium was pretty and peaceful, but that was it. We had the nanos inside us, and we knew how we’d created them. It’d be easy to share that knowledge with the rest of the world. So we got ready to leave … except she caught us. And then we realized what else the nanos could be used for. Torture. Control. Not all of the military tech had been stripped from the nanos, and she used that against us. She tortured us until I agreed to let her have him.” There’s a tremor in her voice.
Asher and I exchange a glance and he squeezes my hand. I have no idea what Mother did to torture her, but if Lenore loved Eli as I love Gavin …
Asher’s grandmother takes a deep shaky breath. “The minute she left us alone, confident she’d made her point, we ran away. Eli and I snuck out using one of the submersibles. When we got back to the Surface, he told me he loved me, but he was worried about the rest of the innocent people. That he didn’t want her to use the tech we built to hurt others, but he wouldn’t be able to live with himself if she killed me, which he was certain would happen if I stayed. Then he kissed me, and jumped back into the submersible before I could stop him. I never saw him again.”
“Why?” Asher asks, voicing the question in my head.
“No way to get down there. No one believed me that it existed, and I couldn’t find a different way to get that deep on my own. Eventually, I met your grandfather and it didn’t seem to matter as much.” She looks off into space. “I’d begun to wonder if I hadn’t just been making it all up myself. A city underwater? It didn’t seem possible. How could they be there without anyone knowing about them? So I just did the easiest thing and pretended to forget about it.” Her eyes meet mine. “Until I met you, my dear.”
“Me? How did you know?”
She gives me that soft smile again. “You reminded me of Eli. Then Asher told me where you’d come from and I knew.”
“Knew what?”
She opens her mouth, then closes it and sighs. “Knew I couldn’t pretend anymore.”
“But … why didn’t you use your technology to help people here?”
She gives me a level look. “Twice unscrupulous and murderous people corrupted the technology I invented to help people. Twice I was ignorant and naive enough to be used to hurt innocent people. I promised myself never again. I would never again be manipulated or let my knowledge cause pain for any reason.”
“So…” I say, still not understanding.
She closes her eyes, and I get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach when she reopens them and focuses directly on me. “I think you need to go back. To Elysium.”
“You want me to go back?” My voice cracks with surprise. I don’t know why, but I never saw that coming.
She nods. Then pauses and shakes her head. “No, I don’t really want you to go back, but I think it’s the only way. Go to Eli. He’ll help you. If he’s even still alive.…” Her voice trails off and she goes back to twisting her wedding ring around and around on her finger.
Asher turns to me. “You don’t have to go back, but it sounds like it’s the best bet. Even if we can’t find Eli, there has to be someone there who knows how to fix the nanos.”
When I hesitate, thinking of everything Gavin feels about the place, Asher’s grandmother speaks up once more. “I know you want to go back, Evie.”
“No … I…” I sigh. What’s the point in lying? Despite everything Gavin said about it, I do want to go back. I want to go home. “Yes. I want to go back.” Looking first at Asher and then at his grandmother, I say, “Thank you for helping me.”
She gives me a sad smile. “It isn’t just for you I’m doing it. It’s for me, too.” Without any further explanation she stands and walks from the room, leaving Asher and me to stare after her.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
I found a letter today. From Eli. From … back then. I found it in one of the books I haven’t looked at since then. I don’t even really know why I looked now, except I needed to clean out that room. The baby is due any day now, and she’ll need it. Anyway, the letter warns me to never go back. Not until he gives the signal. I can only assume he never got the chance to send one.
—EXCERPT FROM LENORE ALLEN’S JOURNAL
Evie
Exhaustion pools into me and I let myself fall back into the bed. Asher turns toward me, but I wave him off. “I’m fine. Just tired.” I’m beyond tired. I feel like a husk of mysel
f. Every time I feel that click in my head, or have a hallucination, or wake up somewhere other than where I thought I was, it’s followed by this crushing fatigue. I feel as though I’m being dragged to the floor by invisible hands.
He watches me for a minute, then nods as if he just came to a decision. “We’re going to have to leave tonight,” he says. Shock makes me speechless and he continues, either not noticing or not caring that I’m completely flabbergasted. “They’re not going to just let you walk out of here. Not after you KO’d everyone in that room. And if we go late, there won’t be as many people walking around. We should be able to sneak out.”
Sneak out? Gavin’s stories of Elysium dig at me. “I don’t know. Maybe we should wait and see what your doctor comes up with.”
He blinks at me. “No. They’re not going to come up with an answer, Evie. You’ve intrigued them. They want to know more about you and how you can do what you did. You’ll be nothing but a lab rat now. I can’t let that happen, which means we need to leave tonight.”
“But … why? What’s the hurry? Why can’t we wait?
He sighs. “Remember those errands my father wanted me to run in exchange for helping you here?”
I’m not sure what that has to do with anything, but I only say, “Y-yes…”
“Well, one of the errands was to take a letter to someone in the city. I’m not stupid enough to give someone a letter without reading it first, at least, not anymore.” He looks extremely sad for a minute, but when he continues his voice is just as strong as it was. “Well, I read it and it was about you. To someone I know very well.” The way he says it suggests that he may know him pretty well, but liking is another matter entirely. “My father wanted this person to find out as much as they could about you. To do some tests and everything to figure out just what you could do. He said you could be useful to the city in ways we could never imagine.”
“I-I don’t think I understand. Are you saying that you gave a letter to someone to have them experiment on me?” I can’t decide if I’m angry or shocked or some other emotion all together.
“No!” he says forcefully. “No. I didn’t give it to him. I ripped it up and threw it away. My grandmother made sure we could trust the doctors who were helping you. But after your testing today, I went to find the doctors to figure out what our next step was. I heard them talking with someone really familiar. The exact person I was supposed to give the letter to. And they weren’t discussing treatment plans. They were talking about what tests to run and they were excited about what that could mean for Rushlake’s security force and technological advances over the other cities.”
This time I don’t have to have him explain to me what he means. I get it, and besides, the quicker I get to Elysium, the quicker I can get my memories back. It’s not like they can really do anything for me here anyway.
“All right,” I say. “What’s the plan?”
“I’m not exactly sure, but I’ve got some ideas. Give me a little time to pull things together and get everything ready,” Asher says, pausing at the door. “Rest until I get back.”
Left with no choice, I stay where I am, but I don’t want to rest. Even as spent as I feel, my body is tingling with nerves and anticipation. If I weren’t so exhausted, I’d probably be pacing the floor like Gavin used to do all the time.
My thoughts are filled with him. What if he’s really gone for good? What if he’s not? What if he shows up after we leave?
For the next two hours I sit in the chair, dozing while I wait, while Asher runs around getting things ready. I consider writing a note for Gavin, but what would I say? He’d never support returning to Elysium. I don’t even know that he’d ever get it. If he’s alive to get it.
Finally Asher steps into the room. “Everything’s set. We should go.”
“What’s the plan? How are we going to get to Elysium?”
He looks over his shoulder, before stepping closer. “When Gavin came back with you, he had a submarine. I guess that’s what he used to escape with you. My father confiscated it, for safety, of course.” He rolls his eyes.
“Of course,” I say.
“Anyway, I know where it is and I know it’s still working. We’re just going to steal it.”
“Your father doesn’t have it protected?”
Asher gives a cynical laugh. “Yeah, right. My dad’s too sure of himself to think anyone would steal from him right under his nose.”
It’s not perfect, but it’s the only plan we’ve got. We’re going to have to make it work … but there’s just one more thing I need to know. “What if Gavin is still looking for us?”
He gives me a sad look, but his eyes are determined. “We don’t have time to wait. My friend is guarding the gates right now.” He glances at his watch. “For only another twenty minutes. If we’re going to go, now’s the chance. We can’t wait for a slim-chanced maybe.”
My stomach lurches. “But…”
He leans down so his face is close to mine. “Evie … you know as well as I do, he’s not coming. We’ve been through this and we have to leave now before it’s too late.”
I don’t say anything and he turns and starts walking toward the door.
“But what if he’s right? What if it is far worse to be there than here?” It’s barely a whisper.
Asher spins around. “Evie! You do not have a choice! I wasn’t kidding when I said Dr. Trevin would use you as a lab rat. Sure, they probably could fix your problems. But then they’ll perform experiments on you. Just to see how well they work. They’ll cut you open to see how long it takes you to heal. Give you different poisons, bring you to the point of death, only to revive you and bring you back. Force you into situations like what happened today, but maybe next time you won’t pull back. Maybe you’ll kill someone, Evie.” I look at the ground. I know all too well, that’s a definite possibility, but he doesn’t stop. “Then, when they have all that, they’ll torture you to get information about Elysium. Information you don’t remember. And do you think they’re going to believe you don’t know the answers to their questions?”
Again I shake my head, as visions of what he’s talking about play in my mind. My breath hitches, but as much as I don’t want that to happen, I’m almost positive that if we leave, Gavin will show up. I’m not sure why I’m so sure. Maybe it’s wishful thinking.
“I don’t know, Asher—”
“Evie!” he yells, startling me into shutting my mouth. He’s never yelled at me before. “If we don’t leave in the next five minutes we won’t get another chance until tomorrow night and by that time it may be too late.”
I close my eyes and nod. He’s right. Gavin’s not coming and if I wait, it may be too late. Not just for me. For everyone around me.
Asher leads the way out of my room and around the corner to a stairway. He was right about there being no one around. It’s almost as quiet as that horrible empty town we rode through. The clatter of our footfalls on the concrete stairs terrifies me as we run down them. I’m sure someone is going to hear, but then we’re bursting out into the moonlight.
He glances left and right, then jerks his head to the left. “Come on. This way.”
We run through the streets and I’m glad he knows where he’s going, because by the time we’ve turned three times, I’ve no idea where we are or how to get back to where we were. Finally, a building looms in front of us, large enough to be at least two levels, but I can see through the open doors that it’s just one large one. A smell that reminds me of Starshine blows out and I feel my stomach sink. I still don’t know what happened to her. Lights suddenly blaze out as we approach, blinding me. Someone’s going to see us. I try ducking back out of the path, but Asher lunges at me and yanks me back before I can.
“Relax,” he says with a half smile. “The lights are automatic. They turn on when someone walks near them.” He drags me into the building, which I can see now is lined on either side and as far as the eye can see with horses in boxes.
In the aisle between them, four horses are already prepared and tethered to the bars of the closest boxes. The leather of their saddles creaks as they shift from foot to foot. Almost the instant we step in, the horse on the left makes a familiar whinny sound and stomps at the floor. I can’t help the grin that slides across my face. It’s Starshine. I race toward her, and wrap my arms around her large neck.
“Told you I’d send for her.”
At that moment, two men step out from an aisle. They’re dressed in black with two guns crisscrossed on their backs. I can see the barrels peeking over their shoulders. I instantly tense when I see them and try backing away. I’m not letting them put me back in that hospital.
But Asher touches my shoulder. “It’s okay, Evie. I hired them to protect us in the Outlands.” He glances at my leg. “I’m not taking any chances this time.”
I’m still a little wary of the guards, but I grin at Asher. For the first time in days I feel like maybe this will be all right. That everything is going to get better.
Starshine makes another sound and picks at the back of my shirt, tickling me. Giggling, I say, “I missed you, too.”
Asher laughs. “Long way from the girl who was terrified of her just a few days ago.”
I just shrug. “Transportation?” I put my foot in the stirrup and try to hitch myself up.
He gives me one quick nod and pushes on my butt to shove me into the saddle. “Transportation.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
They came again today. Somehow my past has caught up with me, but, as before, I’ve told them nothing. Even if I have a few bruises on my person for my troubles. I don’t know where they heard about Elysium or why they want information on it, but it can’t be anything good, especially when they’re willing to resort to torture of an old lady to obtain the information.
Revelations (The Elysium Chronicles) Page 17
