Betrayals in Spring (22 page)

“Well, tell her the big plan, Winter. She’s just going to
love
it.” Pax grins at Lucas, but not in a mean-spirited way. More in a normal Pax-loves-trouble way.

“We’re going to find a place to hide and observe so we can see for sure where they come and go, whether or not Wardens are patrolling, things like that.” Lucas pauses and I call up some patience, sensing that’s not the offensive part of the plan. He tugs on an ear, glancing up at me quickly and then away. “And then I’ll put on the Warden uniform and go inside to see if I can find Deshi.”

Cold, sticky fear infiltrates through my pores until it soaks me from the inside out. I knew we were going to have to go inside to get Deshi, but sending Lucas in there alone is a different matter.

I force my mouth to stay closed, my expression to remain neutral. Partly because they’re both expecting me to freak out, and partly because, if I ignore how dangerous an idea it is, it might be the best thing we can come up with.

It would be better if we didn’t have to send Lucas in there alone, but as he pointed out yesterday when he snagged the dirty uniform, neither Pax nor I can pass for a Warden, or a regular Other, the way he can. With his blond curls, strong build, and above-average height, he looks enough like our alien side to pass. His eyes are bright blue and not a smothering black, but if he keeps his head down and stays a safe distance away from anyone he sees, it might work.

I nod slowly, watching an almost matching look of comical surprise twist both of their faces. “It’s not a bad idea. What happens if you find him?”

“If I can get him out, then I will. I’ll sneak him back here and we’ll figure out what to do next. If I need help, then I’ll find a way to sneak the two of you in as well,” Lucas explains, still looking as though he’s waiting for me to object.

“Okay.” A glance outside reveals night has fallen. I slumbered away the day. “Any idea what time it is now?”

“Not late. The sun went down maybe three hours ago?”

Since it’s April, still the middle part of spring, the sun goes down pretty early, around eight or a little before that. Which means it’s not even midnight. “Well, I think we should wait a couple more hours before going out to spy.”

It probably doesn’t make a difference one way or another. We don’t know how the Others function, I remind myself for the second time in less than a day. They might not sleep at all, or maybe they sleep during the day when they have a choice. Letting the night provide natural cover seems like the right thing to do, regardless.

We’re too close to the Underground Core to make using a flashlight a good idea, even indoors, but the idea of filling the hours with idle chatter twinges familiar impatience in my restless limbs. Getting Deshi is the next step, and as Pax pointed out before, there’s no reason to look further ahead than that. Until we get him, we don’t know how it will change our powers. Until we know that, we can’t make a workable plan.

I leave the boys plotting in the gift shop and slip into the back hallway, running my fingers over the pictures and words adorning the walls. Tall partitions separate different areas—perhaps telling different parts of the story of the faces in the rock—dividing the space into multiple parallel hallways. Out front, where the glass windows used to be, more floor-to-ceiling displays run the length of the building like a dotted line down the middle of the hallway.

It means that I’m fairly hidden way at the back, with more than one partition blocking me from sight. It’s safe enough, then, for me to try a new trick that springs to mind, born of the specific situation we’ve found ourselves in.

I cup my right palm in front of my chest and close my eyes. The easiest and closest memory of intense emotion is the kiss Lucas and I shared two nights ago now, and letting it bubble to the front of my mind brings a faint smile to my lips. Heat pushes up from my belly, into my bloodstream, and finally into my palm. If it were touching fabric, it would be smoldering by now, but there’s no visible evidence of the intense warmth.

The problem turns over in my brain. I can shoot fire at people, and lighting material is no trouble, so it stands to reason there must be a way to make it visible but hang on to it. I lower my face closer to my palm, until the heat waves shimmering off my skin is visible. It should feel too hot, but it doesn’t. It feels like a perfect sense of being exactly where I’m meant to be.

Operating on instinct, I close my eyes and blow gently into the heat. It seems like the most normal thing in the world when a little sphere of fire appears, a flickering reddish-orange ball in my palm. It’s big enough to cast enough light onto the walls, and I spent the next couple of hours perusing the history of this place.

I learn that each of the men on the mountain was once the president—which I’m guessing is sort of like the Prime Other—of the United States of America. The question of what these four would have done had they been presented the same problem that faced the Prime Other all those years ago crosses my mind. If Earth had been destroyed, used up, or no longer livable, would they have found a way to propel humanity into space, searching for a new home even if it meant stealing it?

There’s no way to know. The plaques and historical documents tell me only the kind of men people believed they were and how the four presidents are remembered. Not how they would react if faced with making a choice to allow the extinction of their race or another. Not the kind of men they were behind closed doors, when they were scared and staring their own mortality in the eye.

Their faces remain in rock to symbolize the greatness of the contributions they brought to America and their people. I’m starting to form a little bit of an opinion on what a country or nation is, after seeing the map and reading about the war in
A Separate Peace
.

Like with most things I’ve learned about Earth before the Others, Mount Rushmore presents kind of a mixed bag. The symbolism of the men—the presidents—fills me with the hope that we haven’t seen the best of humanity. There’s President Washington, whose face represents independence. From whom, I’m not certain, but I’m starting to believe nothing good was ever won without men fighting a war. The next face belongs to a President Jefferson, who gets a spot to represent that a government should be run by the people, not a few elite.

Apparently the Others disagree with that sentiment. I’m surprised Mr. Jefferson isn’t defaced.

Then President Roosevelt, whose legacy eludes me because I don’t understand how the United States relates to the rest of Earth, and last, President Lincoln, whose face stands for the equality of all people. I know it means only in the United States, but in my mind he meant it for everyone, everywhere.

Maybe even for people who aren’t technically people at all.

My mind drifts over the half-breeds I’ve met these past months. Griffin, Greer, the Goblert. Cadi and Ko, Lucas and Pax in the next room. Me. There’s nothing that makes any of us inherently better than the next, though Griffin would certainly disagree. The thought brings a faint smile to my face as I skim the rest of the wall hangings and quotes, then return to the gift shop to ready myself for our covert foray into the hills.

“So, what did you learn, Monitor Althea?” Pax asks playfully, even though as a general rule he’s not terribly interested in the past.

I’m full of knowledge and excited to share so I acquiesce, telling them about the men on the mountain and how they came to be engraved there.

They’re both attentive, having stopped what they were doing before, which was playing Old Maid. I can’t believe the gift shop here has the same silly game that Pax and I used to pass the blizzard-filled hours at Fort Laramie.

“Anyway, I guess it looks cool, and what it stands for is all right, in theory. But a lot of people died while they were carving it. And there are more sad stories about the Native Americans who lived around here before.” A lump climbs into my throat and I turn my back, pulling on a fresh sweatshirt in the dark. Maybe being a Monitor would have been fun, had we finished our preparatory phase. It might not have been so bad, Monitoring and then coming home to Lucas.

Except I never enjoyed science or math the way I love the tales that have bombarded me since leaving the boundary. The plaques and paragraphs in the other room aren’t made up, of course, but they’re still someone’s stories.

I feel a cold hand on my back, and smell Lucas before I straighten up and face him with my emotions under control. The concerned, protective expression hanging in his eyes makes me want to melt into him, to let him hold me and magically make all the bad things go away. Since that’s impossible, I simply give him a small smile so he knows I’m going to be okay.

It’s pretty silly to be so upset over events that took place a hundred years before the Others even arrived. I should be crying over the thought of poor Reese and Emmy, our old chemistry Monitor, little Tommy, all shackled and being forced to mine under sheets of ice twenty hours a day. And I am. But the past kind of overwhelms me in places like this, and it did at Fort Laramie, too.

“Let’s get going.” Pax’s voice vibrates, tight like he’s impatient.

It’s then that I realize Lucas and I have been staring at each other this whole time, trying to read reassurance or expectation, or maybe just partnership, in each other’s eyes. When I jerk my gaze free and find Pax’s face, though, he doesn’t betray any irritation or hostility. He looks accepting, and maybe a little wistful.

In an instant he swaps it for a trademark lazy grin and shoots me a wink. I roll my eyes, mostly because that’s what he expects, and then shrug. “Might as well get this over with.”

CHAPTER 18.

It’s chilly outside, colder than the springs I typically spend in Portland. Icy wind burrows into my hair, yanking strands loose from my ponytail and whipping them around my face. I pull the hood of the sweatshirt up and tie the strings under my chin, even though it has to look goofy. We can hardly see one another with the pale moonlight blotted out by inky clouds, anyway, and Pax sets a hard pace.

We hike a trail that leads upward in a never-ending climb until we find ourselves on top of the monument. I giggle into my hands, wondering why the presidents’ rear ends aren’t sculpted on the back side, but quiet them into hiccups before I get us all busted. Once directly above the trash pile, I follow the boys as they lie down on their stomachs on the wet rock, wincing when some tough pieces of foliage stab through the thick material covering my front.

Below, the night waits in perfect stillness. Nothing moves and, from up here, nothing but the sound of the wind and our deep, puffing breaths find my ears. The crisp scent of the cool air, infused with hints of pine and cinnamon, tickles my nose. It’s peaceful, though some moonlight wouldn’t be a bad thing. The wind has had its way with the trash pile, scattering a few items here and there. I wonder if there are Wardens assigned to clean it up, or if they don’t care much about what happens to Earth as long as it holds together long enough for them to suck it dry.

With all of this free time and no history to distract me, my mind comes up with an interesting thought that actually pertains to the situation at hand. “Hey. Do you guys remember in the autumn when the Others came to our Family Outing with that pink stuff?”

Lucas grunts his assent, and Pax rolls his eyes like it’s pretty silly to think any of us could forget, then motions with his hand for me to go on.

He missed the offering and didn’t see how the pink dust caused several of my Cellmates to be carted away, never to be seen again. It happened at the beginning of our Terminal year, in autumn, a season Pax has never experienced. But he said the kids were still talking about it when he arrived in Atlanta’s winter.

“Okay, well, don’t you think it’s weird that their trash down there has all that pink dust on it? What if it’s important? The pink stuff?” I continue.

Because of the way we’re lying, with me in the middle, I can’t see them both at once. They’re quiet, but I can feel their eyes on me as I look back and forth until my neck aches from waiting for one of them to speak. The sound of their brains processing is almost audible in the eerily quiet night.

“What could it be?” Pax whispers.

“Maybe they eat it.” Lucas quirks a smile my direction.

“Maybe they use it to brush their teeth,” I counter.

“Maybe it dissolves their trash so they don’t have to clean,” Lucas lobs back.

The warm familiarity of brainstorming with Lucas, even when we’re being silly and not particularly helpful at all, tumbles away when Pax interrupts.

“Seriously, though. What if it’s what they need? The resource.”

The suggestion swivels my head toward Pax. “We still don’t know what it is, though.” Another memory drops the smile off my face completely, bobbing my head back the opposite direction. “Lucas, did anything happen to you after you drank the offering last autumn?”

He shakes his head, eyes wide. “I didn’t actually swallow it. I spit it out in the bushes when Mr. and Mrs. Crawford weren’t looking. Why?”