The Lost Girl (30 page)

“Like I said, you would be free to leave. Bear in mind your familiars signed the order. It was their choice to make. I can’t force them to take you back. If, when the time comes, they refuse to take you, we will have to find an alternative life for you. But I will revoke the Sleep Order. You will live.”

“And what if I’d rather die?” I ask him.

“You
will
die,” he assures me. “The way things stand, you won’t last long at trial.” His gold eyes are pitiless. “I’m offering you a chance. Take it.”

I swallow hard. I know exactly what I want to tell him. I don’t even have to think about it. The thought of being treated like a toy for months, of putting my fate in Adrian’s hands because he wants to do the impossible, is appalling. It saves me from trial. It saves me from the Sleep Order. But at such a heavy price.

And then, before I can offer an impulsive, passionate reply, a little voice in my head reminds me to stop and
think
. It sounds like sense. It sounds like Amarra.

And it tells me to ask him one more question.

“What about Sean?”

“The boy?”

“Yes. If I agree to this, what happens to him?”

Adrian cocks his head and considers me. His gaze is shrewd. “What would you like to happen to him?”

“I forced him to help me,” I say, weighing each word carefully, “so it doesn’t seem fair that he should be punished. If I agree to stay, I want him to be allowed to leave. Now. I know you can’t let him be a guardian anymore, but I want that to be his only punishment. You can’t hand him over to the police or lock him up or whatever it is you do to guardians who break your laws.”

“Very well,” says Adrian, and from the tone of his voice I know he doesn’t believe a word of my lie. “He can leave. Right away, if you like.” He is dismissive. “I don’t care about the boy. He doesn’t interest me.”

I take a deep breath and let it out again in a rush of relief. I swallow back the sour taste on my tongue.

“Then I’ll stay. I’ll help you.”

“Very good.” Adrian stands. “I told Ophelia you’d make the sensible choice. We’ll begin work tomorrow.”

Tomorrow.
I shiver. That leaves me very little time.

Adrian opens the door. Ophelia and the blue-eyed Guard are on the other side. Ophelia looks so anxious it’s almost difficult to stay angry with her.

“Bring the boy back,” says Adrian, sounding satisfied. The Guard nods and steps out of sight. Adrian smiles at Ophelia. She looks relieved. It’s a slightly nicer smile than any he gave me. “We’ve worked something out.”

I don’t think she knows what he offered me. He glances at me. Waiting. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. I could tell Ophelia everything. Tell her that her father set a price on my life. Tell her what the price is. It looks like he’s been a good father to her, and I get that she only turned me in because she believed I’d be safe with him. I’m sure there is something good there that she sees and loves. But I could tell her the truth and take it away. I could destroy her love for him. Destroy her.

And he knows I won’t.

“I’m so glad,” Ophelia says, smiling at me. “I told you it would be all right, Eva. This has all worked out for the best.”

“It has.” Adrian sounds pleased. Now that he has what he wants, he can afford to be generous. “Give her a moment alone to say good-bye to the boy.”

“You mean he’s—you’re letting him go?”

The Guard returns with Sean. Adrian glances at me. “Five minutes,” he says, and turns back to the Guard. “Theseus, send someone to fetch the boy’s things.”

Then he strides away and they shut the door again.

“What was that?” Sean demands. “Why are they giving me back my stuff?”

I gulp. I didn’t expect the words to claw their way so painfully through my throat. “I— They’ve let you go,” I say. “You’re leaving.”

“What are you talking about?”

I tell him. My tongue feels thick and heavy and the look on his face makes it a thousand times worse, but I tell him everything.

He stares at me, deathly white. “You can’t do this. You can’t make me leave.”

“You can’t
want
to stay here!”

“Not
here
, Eva. With
you
.”

“You have a life,” I say as the first tears slip down my face. “And if I’d said no, you would’ve lost everything. I don’t know where they’d have sent you. This way neither of us needs to run. Neither of us will be in any danger. This is the
only
way I know to save you. Sean—” My voice cracks. “
Please
. Let me do it.”

He dashes at his eyes. “You’re asking me to leave you here, to become nothing more than a neat little puzzle for him to use and break, one of his experiments—”

“Yes.”

“Eva—”

“Please.”

Sean gazes at me for a long moment, his dark green eyes burning straight into mine. I want to look away but I can’t.

“All right,” he says. I flinch at how polite his tone is. It’s worse than outright anger. “If this is what you want, God forbid I stop you.”

He crosses the room to the door and knocks so that they’ll let him out. At the last minute he turns back and kisses me fiercely and I taste blood and tears and something else, something so Sean-like I want to grab hold of his shirt and never let go. When he pulls away, I catch a look in his eyes that tells me he will never forgive me.

Then, just like that, he’s gone.

Sunlight turns dust motes in the room to gold. I watch them swirl in the air. I feel a thousand times worse than I did half an hour ago. I feel raw and bruised and the red-hot pain in my head hasn’t gone away.

I don’t have much time. Tomorrow Adrian means to start studying me. Today is nearly over. If I want to escape the Loom, escape a choice between certain death and Adrian, I have to find a way out soon. I close my eyes. If nothing else, at least I got Sean out. If I can’t do the same for myself, at least I know he won’t suffer the consequences of my choices.

Amarra used to read books about battles. Great heroic battles. Swords and shields and knights and honor. Battles like that don’t happen anymore, yet I feel like I am caught in one. Once I may have hoped to fight for my life with all those things: swords and shields and knights and honor. But I don’t have a sword. My shield is broken. I don’t know what is and isn’t honorable anymore. And now I’ve sent my knight away.

10
Cost

T
hey give me water and a late dinner, but I eat very little. I search the tray for anything I can use as a weapon, but they’ve been careful; there are no forks, no knives, no sharp ends.

Ophelia comes to see me a few times. She stays long enough to tell me that Erik is on his way to London. I find that slightly cheering. I want desperately to see Erik again.

“Eva?” Ophelia pauses before leaving. It’s a desperate attempt to reach me. “Please talk to me.”

She sniffs and kisses the top of my head. I don’t pull away from her, but I don’t reply. I want to tell her I understand. I get it. But that it hurts anyway. I trusted her and she knew it and used it against me.

“I love you. Remember that.”

After she leaves, I curl up on the bed with a lump in my throat, exhausted with pain and hurt and just plain tired after a very, very long few days.

I try to catch a few hours’ sleep and regain some energy. But it’s not very restful. I dream of a nursery and a clock, and Matthew sings me songs about beautiful, eerie things. I wake up and don’t feel much better.

It’s bitterly lonely in this tiny room. The words scratched painstakingly into the window seem clearer every time I look at them. I imagine scratching
I AM EVA
under
I AM HENRY WILLOW.

I look for a way out. I check the window, but it’s much too small for even someone of my size to squeeze through. It’s too high off the ground anyway, and there’s no ledge or foothold nearby. I try everything. I scrape at the wall, but the walls are too thick and solid for me to scratch my way through. I search for holes or vents in the ground and find nothing. I test the door, but the wood is solid. Not that breaking it would help me: I’d only tumble out at the Guard’s feet. Theseus is polite, but I haven’t made the mistake of underestimating him. I have no doubt he will be quick to use his knife if I attack him first.

At least I got Sean out. It’s the one good thing I keep repeating to myself, over and over, each time trying not to remember the look on his face or the way he kissed me before he left. He’s safe. That’s something. It might even be enough.

I hear a sound at the door and jerk upright.

The key in the lock. I wrap my arms around my knees and watch the door warily. Ophelia? I’m aware of a smidgeon of hope: Erik?

The door swings open. I see a plump, sturdy woman with a fierce face and hair like the round-topped ashoka trees.

All the breath is sucked straight out of my lungs.

Mina Ma clomps her way in and deliberately bangs the door shut behind her. She’s all strength and fury. I throw myself into her arms and promptly burst into tears. She smells like butter.

“Hush, child, enough of this,” she says briskly, but her words don’t mean anything, not when she’s clutching me as hard as I’m holding her and she sounds like she’s trying not to cry herself. “We have better things to do with our time.”

“W-what are you d-doing here?” I blubber, trying and failing to get a grip on myself. I never dreamed I’d see her again. I never thought they’d allow it.

“Why do you imagine I’m here?” she demands. “What a goose. I came as soon as I heard they had caught you.”

“And they let you see me?”

Mina Ma gives me a brief, smug look. “I chose to ask the right Weaver. I have been talking to Elsa.” Her face darkens. “She has been telling me some strange things. About you and Adrian Borden.”

Heat creeps up my neck and it’s all I can do to meet her eye. I wipe the last of my tears away. “So he’s already told her what he offered me?”

“Yes. Also that you
agreed
.”

I bite my lip. I don’t know what to say.

“She also mentioned that part of the offer involved letting Sean go.” Mina Ma’s eyes narrow on my face. “Interesting, eh? You wouldn’t have agreed to this monstrosity just to make sure Sean was safe, would you?”

“I—” I try to look her in the eye. “You know about the Sleep Order. I had to do whatever I could to survive.”

“And you will stay here?
Help
him?”

There’s something about Mina Ma’s tone that makes my lies wither. “No,” I say, letting out a heavy breath. “I had no intention of staying if I could help it. I meant to find a way out. But there’s no way out of this room. I have no ideas left.”

A grave look crosses her face. She watches me for a long time. Then she reaches into the folds of her sari and carefully withdraws a steak knife. My mouth falls open.

“I don’t like it,” she says. “Knives, they’re not nice. But this is not a nice situation either.”

“Didn’t they search you before they let you see me?”

Mina Ma almost snorts. “After the way I stood there abusing them? I assure you, they wanted to get it over with as quickly as possible. At any rate, I don’t think they understand saris, poor things. They didn’t even think to look in the pleats.”

I choke on my own laughter. It dies almost immediately. It was too strange a sound in this desolate room.

Mina Ma sighs. “My advice,” she says reluctantly, “is to use that on Ophelia. No,” she adds, when I recoil, “I don’t mean it that way. I mean you should threaten her with it. Make the Guard think you will cause her harm if he doesn’t let you go. We can only hope she will be sensible and realize you don’t
actually
intend to hurt her. We don’t want to scare her. Not,” she says darkly, “that she doesn’t deserve it. But I suppose she thought she was doing what was best. She always tries so hard to please everybody.”

I stare at the knife, wondering if I can really threaten someone with it, someone I love. Mina Ma tips my chin up.

“Be brave,” she says, “and everything will be all right. I will go get Ophelia. I will tell her you want to talk to her.”

“Wait. You knew I would want to get out? You knew I never intended to stay here with the Weavers?”

“You may have been gone for the better part of a year,” says Mina Ma tartly, “but you’re still the girl I raised. It wasn’t
Erik
who taught you to be sneaky, I promise you.”

I put my arms around her and hug her tightly. I don’t think I’ve ever been so scared or unsure in my life, but I’m going to get out. One way or another I will get past the Guard and find my way out of the Loom.

“Thank you,” I whisper.

“No,” says Mina Ma, “thank
you
. Thank you for being mad enough to run. I could not have borne it if you had stayed and allowed the Sleep Order to destroy you.”

She wipes her eyes and marches to the door. She bangs on it.

“Oy!”

I hide a grin as Theseus unlocks and opens the door. He looks terrified of her. I actually feel sorry for him.

When I am alone again I pick up the knife. It feels cold and alien in my hand. What if I make a mistake and the knife slips? What if I hurt her? My stomach roils and I squash the feeling. I have to do whatever it takes, or there’s no point trying to escape.

It can’t be more than twenty minutes before I hear the key in the lock again. It feels like an eternity. Each minute I wait drains a little bit more of my nerve.

As the door opens my heart begins to race. Too fast. Too loudly.

“I’ll wait for you on the tower stairs,” says Mina Ma. It sounds like she’s talking to Ophelia. I know she’s talking to me.

“Eva?” Ophelia looks tentative. Hopeful.

I almost give up. The
look
on her face. To threaten her now seems like such a dirty trick. Then I remember that I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for her, and the pounding of my heart becomes a roar that drowns everything out. Mina Ma walks away and vanishes down the stairs. I take a step forward and press my shaking hand and the flat of the knife to Ophelia’s ribs.

“Sorry,” I whisper. I hope she believes me. I hope she understands why I’m doing this. I hope I don’t make a mistake.

The Guard recoils. His blue eyes widen. “Where did you get that knife?”

“You didn’t search me properly when you caught me. That was a mistake.” My voice sounds amazingly calm. I hold on to that sound, I cling to the calm. “Could you please step away from the stairs and let me pass by? I won’t let Ophelia go until I’ve gotten to the bottom of this tower. But I’m not going to hurt her unless you do something stupid.”

“Eva, please—”

“Don’t.” I cut Ophelia off, and there’s a tremor in my voice for the first time. “Don’t make this any harder.”

I cautiously walk toward the stairs. I have one hand clamped around Ophelia’s arm to make sure she doesn’t try breaking free of me. The other keeps the flat of the knife against her ribs. Tiny drops of sweat trickle down my back.

Theseus backs up but refuses to get out of the way. He’s blocking my only way out. He has drawn his knife and holds it with the point down. Unthreatening.

“I can’t let you leave the tower,” he says quietly.

“I have a
knife
in my hand!” I snap. “Do you really think I won’t use it? Do you think Adrian will be happy you obeyed orders and allowed his daughter to be hurt?”

“I do what I’m told.”

“And I’m telling you—”

“I do what the Weavers tell me to.”

Ophelia makes a piteous sound. She looks so hurt and bewildered, I would have relented if my life weren’t at stake. Even so, guilt burns holes through my skin.

“Do what she says, Theseus,” she pleads.

“I can’t,” he replies. His voice has an odd sticking sound, as though he isn’t used to speaking unless it’s necessary. “Forgive me. But I can’t let her leave.”

A low thrumming fills my ears. Panic. Butterfly wings against my brain. Nobody moves. I flick frightened eyes between Theseus and Ophelia, between the knife in my hand and the one in his. He doesn’t waver. And I realize that this isn’t a time to be standing still and trying to think. I have to act. I have to do
something
.

I throw the knife at the Guard. I don’t aim for him. I don’t want to hit him. I just throw it in his direction. I pray that no matter how devoted to the Weavers he is, he is still human enough to react.

He does. His eyes widen and he ducks out of the way. He slams back against the wall behind him as the knife clatters past him down the stairs.

I let Ophelia go and run. I have just reached the stairs when Theseus, on his feet again, springs forward. The knife flashes. I skid to a halt and skitter backward. The stairs are blocked again, the knife missing me by inches.

And maybe it would have been okay if it had ended there. He’d have put me back in my room. Nothing would have changed.

Only Ophelia sees the knife flash and cries out, “No! No, don’t hurt her!”

I see her run at his arm, try to stop him.

“Don’t—” I scream.

The Guard jerks back. I try to imagine what he must have seen. A woman rushing at him. The stairs right behind him. If she pushed him, ran into him, she would have sent them both tumbling down the stairs. They could have broken their necks. He swings his arm around to stop her, but this makes the knife swing around too. It takes a split second, but even then I know, I can see, that he doesn’t mean to
use
the knife. It simply gets in the way.

There’s a horrible squelching sound. And a ragged gasp.

I cover my mouth to stop a second scream.

Theseus drops the knife in horror. The blade looks almost black in the lamplight.

“I—I didn’t mean . . . I didn’t—”

I rush to Ophelia’s side. At the same time Mina Ma comes running up the stairs. She wouldn’t have been far. She must have heard my scream.

She gasps. “Ay Shiva, what have you done, you silly boy?” She kneels on the floor and gently lifts Ophelia’s head onto her lap. “You!” she barks at Theseus. “Give me your shirt! We have to try and stop this bleeding.”

Theseus obeys. Mina Ma balls the shirt up and presses it to the wound spreading a dark stain over Ophelia’s dress. She looks so small, her blond hair spilling across my hand. Her eyes stare at me for a few minutes, shocked, pained. Then she smiles.

Then her eyes close.

“No!” I shout. “No! Ophelia!” A sob bursts through my chest. “No!”

Someone kneels beside me, reaching for her pulse, at her throat, at her wrist. I realize it’s the Guard.

“Get off!” I push him away, sobbing. “She’s hurt and you did it!”

But that isn’t entirely true. I held a knife to her and put her in that position.
We
did this. Both of us.

“It was an accident,” the Guard says hoarsely. His blue eyes are wide. “I . . . I didn’t want to do any harm to anyone.”

I don’t argue. How can I? He is the enemy. He does whatever the Weavers ask of him. He may have killed echoes, maybe ordinary people too. But in spite of all that, I know he didn’t mean to use the knife on her.

Mina Ma’s voice is unsteady, but she makes herself sound calm. Quiet. “Enough,” she says. “Stay calm. You must go get some help.”

He hesitates. Glances at me. “But the girl—”

“Do you think I can’t control an echo I raised from babyhood?” Mina Ma demands. “Idiot! Go! Quickly!”

Theseus goes. I barely hear him running. He has a swift, sure way of moving. His feet make so little sound. Like mine.

A weary misery floods me. I don’t know what to do. Ophelia is bleeding, and it’s my fault this happened. Everything I care about, everything I love, is slipping away.

“Eva.”

Mina Ma’s voice is firm. Deliberate.

“It’s time for you to go.”

“What?” I stare at her in dismay. “But—but Ophelia . . . I can’t leave her—”

“I will look after her. That Guard will bring help and she will heal. You must get out while you can. You will never have a chance like this again. Eva!” She reaches over Ophelia to shake me. “You
must
. For my sake. If you don’t, you will be condemned to die. Or at the very least, you will be forced to honor the agreement you made with Adrian.”

I choke on the words. “And Ophelia—”

“The wound is not as bad as it looks,” says Mina Ma steadily. She looks me in the eye. “She
will
heal. She will be fine. You must go
now
.”

I stroke Ophelia’s cheek. My thumb leaves a bloody stain. She wanted me to forgive her, but I didn’t. She betrayed me and I almost destroyed her. I fought to save Sean. I fought to survive. And I’ve done it, I’ve found a way out of the Loom, but at what cost? There’s always a price. I stare down at her face and all I can think of is five little ducks,
five little ducks, of the ducks going over the hill and far away and of fewer and fewer coming back, each one vanishing. . . .