When Copper Suns Fall (10 page)

“Girlie, are you all right?” Lexa said.

“Um, no. Tell Father, I’ll be back. I need a
place to change.” Far from all right, I grabbed my bag from her
hands and headed toward the double doors across the lobby. The
bathroom thing was just an excuse to escape and get my head
together. Overwhelmed by the whole idea of going against the
governor’s champion, I wanted to end the day and go home.

Scurrying down the deserted hallway’s red
carpet, I came to the women’s bathroom. I grabbed the doorknob.
Nervousness was working overtime on my rationality, I guess.
Reaching for the handle, I pulled. The lever didn’t budge. My
bladder expanded by the second. Wonderful. Surely the Thalian’s
staff kept repair people on duty.

I turned back to the knob, yanking it again
and again. Why lock the doors on a day like this? Laser eye power
would come in handy right about now.

I crossed my arms, uncrossed them, squeezed
my left fist. Flirted with the idea of using a memory technique.
But that’s how I ended up standing here kicking a door. Nerves
rolled up in me. All I could think about was facing the crowds
while I smelled like urine. Maybe not taking the ale-meds made me
weaker. “Don’t panic yet. Figure out something.”

“Door troubles?” A boy’s calm voice spoke
behind me.

Horrified I’d been caught talking to a door,
I turned to face a dark-haired boy a few years older than me. Wavy
silver hair framed his face. He wore a silky, smoked gray shirt,
opened to expose a star-shaped tattoo at his throat. He met my eyes
with dark ones of his own, vivid blue-black pools staring at me
with no reflection of anything in them. They were the darkest,
lovely blue I’d ever seen. I blinked and lowered mine.

“I—I, it’s locked, I think,” I said to the
floor.

“Let’s have a look.” He reached over me and
pulled the door open as if it were a feather. “See. Magic.”

My cheeks burned. “Thanks, um…”

“Seth Alton.” He held out his hand, long and
svelte like the rest of him. An earthy scent surrounded him. It
reminded me of the incense Lexa’s mom used to cover the watery
smells inside their house sitting beside the marshes.

“I’m Chela. Wish I could talk more, but
I…”

He laughed softly. “Duties first, of
course.”

Those blue-black eyes stared at me. No
blinking, or anything. He moved closer to my neck, sniffing the air
around me. “Nice scent. What is it?”

“Lotus. I—I, um, it used to belong to my
mother.”

“Used to?” He raised his left eyebrow,
something I thought only girls could do so well. It intrigued me in
a strange way.

“My mother is, well um, she died when we were
babies. I—I wear her old perfume for luck,” I said.

Okay, so why are you stuttering?

“We?” he asked.

“My brother. But he’s, um, not here today,” I
said, chest filling with a tinge of sadness.

“Sorry to hear that. About your mother and
brother, that is.” He moved back, freeing me from whatever thing I
needed to relieve myself from. He wore no clothing that offered any
evidence as to what group he belonged to.

“She died two months after we were born. So
it’s—I don’t remember her.” I truly didn’t understand why I chose
to reveal my private stuff with this stranger. If I stood around
talking much longer, I’d probably be asking him to come home for
ale-med tips.

“Luck to you today. Although, I’m sure you
won’t need any. Don’t get lost on the way back. These hallways
are…tricky,” he said. I nodded like a mute standing there plastered
against the wall beside the door. “We’ll see each other again soon,
Chela Ceylone.”

He mini-bowed and strolled away.

Seth turned the corner. I peeled myself off
the wall and exhaled. Wait, I didn’t even realize I’d been holding
my breath. I glanced at the handle, stepped into the bathroom, but
stopped in the doorway. Seth called me Chela Ceylone. No one but
Father knew my middle name.

Chapter Nine – Wicked Games

The way back to the lobby turned into a
challenge just as Seth promised. Horrible with directions, I tried
to remember if I came down the hallway to the right, or the one on
my left. Even more interesting? I didn’t remember walking through
so many of them or seeing split passageways. No, there was only
one.

I took off down the hallway to the right,
deserted and silent. The whole area gave off a bad vibe, as if
ghosts in the place loomed over me were laughing at me stressed
out.

Okay denseness, get lost and miss your
evaluation.

Turning around three more corners that led
nowhere, I realized I was lost, the going-around-in-circles kind.
The bathroom where I met Silver Streaked kept showing up. Even
worse, the hairs on my neck fluttered. It was the Creeping Willies
again.

Was someone following me?

I glanced back and studied the empty hall
dimly lit by lamps spaced out along the walls, deciding whether to
ask if someone were back there. But everybody knew how that went.
I’d get silence, for sure.

Pandemonium came next. The lights darkened
one after the other until they all went out. Blobs of black covered
them, darting up and down and sideways, zipping by as if they would
go right through my body and stain me with whatever dark thing hid
inside them.

Claustrophobia set in like a hawk, its talons
of fear digging into my head. I walked along the walls, feeling my
way toward what I thought might be the exit. The shadowy hall
reminded me too much of a closet. The theatre’s furniture polish
smells combined with a rotten meat odor. My breath quickened. Chest
tightened. Whispers hissed around me.

“You’ve got to be kidding me? This isn’t
happening.” But the dark was real, and the whispers mumbled words I
didn’t want to understand.

And then the memory came, flooding my eyes
with new images. Micah and I were small children holding hands. We
played and laughed as we ran into the iron gate behind my house.
The lock was shaped like a monster’s head, a cross between a
gargoyle and a dragon. How did we get in? A bird squawked. We ran
through a field in the gate, a garden closed for years. Only this
bird wasn’t little or cute, and the horrid noise it made ripped
through my eardrums.

“Run,” Micah said. “Go as fast as you can!”
My feet pumped, heart hammered. But we couldn’t get away fast
enough. A shadow shaped like a hawk, hovered over us. I already
knew what caused it. What I didn’t know was what made the noise
from inside the trees behind us.

Was it a growl? Not a bear’s gruff warning,
but smooth like a lion.

The memory surged out of my mind as fast as
it had entered. I doubled over, bracing myself on a wall, and dry
heaved. How lovely. I’d smell like puke when I faced my opponent if
I didn’t get myself together.

Why didn’t the lights just come back on?
Didn’t they have repair people for these old buildings?

Something in the hallway scraped toward me.
The sound was like knives scratching along the wall, itching to
stain my soul with cold fear. The cottony feeling in my head hit me
first, making me feel numb. I turned and bumped into something
standing in the darkness. But the something turned out to be
someone.

“It’s all right. I’ve got you. Walk with me,”
a boy’s familiar voice said over the whispers. Hands gripped my
shoulders.

“I c-can’t move. My feet are stuck,” I
said.

“No. You just think they are. Walk with
me.”

“The voices, whispers. They—they’re…”

“Imaginary. Playing tricks. Just listen to
me, will you?” His voice was strong, but his touch was comforting.
“Hush now,” he said.

The lights flashed and came back on in full,
dingy glory. To both my horror and flattery, I discovered my hero—a
dark-haired one with silvery gray eyes and a rolling accent.
Dressed in black slacks and a long sleeve white shirt, he took me
back to a place I couldn’t quite identify.

“See, like I said—imaginary.” His voice was
confident, filled with control, someone who never lost a temper
battle. While I was quite sure that if I said anything right then,
I’d sound like someone injected me with helium. “I’m Faris.”

“Chela. Um, Chela Prizeon.”

“Yes, I know,” he said.

“Does everybody know who I am?”

“Not everyone,” he said. My cheeks heated to
a scorch. Staring in Faris’s silver-gray eyes, I found myself
wrapped in déjà vu. His hair hung loose around his shoulders and
highlighted eyes that studied me in the same way I considered him.
I struggled with my thoughts or maybe a memory.

I stepped out of his arms and studied the
carpet, a muddled red and brown with a black scroll pattern etched
into it, an all around bad distraction. My breathing evened out.
The ache in my chest eased.

“Pull it together, now.” He placed his hands
on the sides of my head, moving loose hairs away from my face,
tucking them behind my ears. Here stood another strange boy
showering me with attention I didn’t understand. “I bet a thousand
staffs you’re not ready for this,” he said.

What a bold statement. I should act a little
annoyed, anyway. Somehow I found the ability to whisper laugh
through my huffs. “Exactly who are you to tell me what I’m ready
for?” I said.

“You might be surprised,” he said with a
slight smile.

The questions: Why was he here? How did he
find me? Why did he keep staring at me like that? Most of all—why
did I feel this wasn’t the first time I’d glanced into those baby
grays with the silver highlights.

“Can you pull this off, or not?” he
asked.

“Yes, okay. I’m not some—some fragile doll
girl.” Besides, Governor Winthrope was interested in sponsoring me
for Swordfest in two months. I wasn’t about to go numb because of a
blackout.

“Hey, don’t grow a tumor. These old buildings
don’t always work so well,” he said and glanced around.

“Okay, um, you think so?” I said. He led me
toward the exit that wasn’t there before the blackout. Or maybe it
was, but I’d been too freaked out to see it. We stopped just before
the door leading to the dressing rooms. He turned and stared at me.
A grim expression crossed his face. Sadness? Anger? I wanted to
know. He glanced behind us. Had he heard the whispers too? Maybe
skipping my ale-meds turned out to be a terrible idea. Maybe they
kept you from going insane, as in not seeing black blobs hopping
around in hallways before critical evaluations.

“Are you sure you didn’t hear those
whispers?” I said.

“Never do unless they’re my own.” He opened
the door leading to the dressing rooms, watched me walk through,
and stalked off. I stood in the shadows with nothing but jumbled
thoughts to keep me company.

* * *

Thalian’s back door opened into an
arena-sized yard. The field, about the same size as a football
stadium, overflowed with foxgloves, azaleas, and roses growing
along the borders.

Well tended gardens were Tribunal
requirements. How ironic—beauty to emphasize freedom for the lucky
chosen ones. But I was the unlucky Historian’s daughter; a reminder
that no one in Castle Hayne was immune to the rules.

Stadium style seats held spectators ready to
watch duels between the contenders, the kids Jalen and I had
checked into the city. A healthy crowd filled them up today. They
all wanted to see the government girl in action. How could Father
let this happen? But then, he didn’t create this mess. I did. Now
I’d have to un-create it, too. At that moment, I decided to become
the master of my own destiny chain, and Micah’s too.

The Judges included a kaleidoscope of
personalities: some old, young, and those who sat with chins
propped on their hands. They sat in a glass box situated between
the stadium seats. Steve Filipino’s father sat among them. What
would they say about me at the dinner table tonight?

From the seats on the right side of the
Judges’ box, Lexa and Father waved to me. To my surprise, Jalen had
slinked his way into the mix and was shouting out his support.
Happy energy ignited the flame inside me. All I knew about the
saber, he’d taught me. He was a natural. A Tracker well past
knowing how to use some stupid body heat detector; but he’d never
own up to that fact.

I trudged up the steps to the stage set up
for evaluation matches and stood before a sea of girls and boys
experienced in violence. Costing week was a time for citizens from
all over the country to put in requests for modified food
allowances, clothing, housing, or extra protection for people
living along the city’s borders. Points for virtuous deeds were
tallied throughout the year. On the fifth day, point cards were
placed into a golden compureader shaped like a bowl. One card for
every four points was issued. That was easy enough for those of us
living in the Boroughs.

But the kid contenders from the Dim Cities
didn’t have it as good. The costing was the one chance they had to
prove their family was worthy of living in Castle Hayne. And to do
that, they had to fight for a card, giving them only four marks and
one chance to be pulled on costing day number five. They made the
deadliest moves because they had to be top notch to stand a chance
against Castle Hayne kids trained in the fencing arts. Kids like
Steve Filipino. He thought it was fun to compete on evaluation day
just so he could crush someone’s dream by winning.

The competition was open to kids sponsored by
the groups guides like Jalen and I had assigned them to. Now I
stood in front of the same contenders I’d marked as either
unclassifiable or assigned to groups I knew wasn’t right for
them.

No one in the Tribunal had a child in the
tournament this year. Nobody except Father who kept saying he
couldn’t get me out of it. Father and his rock hard beliefs. I
vowed to stand by what I believed in, too. I was going to find out
what actually went down the day Micah fell.