The fact that it had seemed the better choice to that Experimental made her shudder.
Pike glanced behind him and his gaze settled on Keira. She tugged self-consciously on the hem of her shirt and was shocked when it crumbled away to nothing in her hands.
She’d been Darkside long enough that her clothes were beginning to disintegrate. It seemed so terrifyingly final. Even this last bit of the life she’d known, the life she’d planned, the life she wanted—was crumbling beneath her fingers. It wouldn’t be long before the Reformers would hand down their sentence and then she’d be nothing too. Gone. Like her shirt, and the instruments, and everything she’d ever known. A lump sprang up in her throat, impossible to swallow.
“But Keira was different.” Pike’s words cut through her thoughts and she blinked in surprise. He looked back toward the Tribunal but he pointed at her, his arm shaking.
“Keira was raised on earth. She had the best possible Darkside lineage. Her mother possessed tremendous musical talent. I myself heard Keira’s fledgling ability—little musical birdie who hadn’t learned to fly, plinking out the notes with her tiny, little girl fingers—I was proud. Proud, proud, proud as that thing—that funny thing—and birds. Birds with their wings and their beaks . . . ” Pike’s hands shook at his sides and his eyes wandered.
Keira curled her fingers tight against her palms. His mind was slipping again. Shit.
“Dr. Ssssendson?” One of the Tribunal members prompted him, “You recognized some ability in this earth-bound Experimental?”
Pike clasped his hands in front of him as though doing so would help him hold it together. “Yes. Even though she was so young, Keira was obviously able to make music. More than that, she seemed to have a real talent for it. I made sure she was provided with an instrument and money for the education she needed to develop her abilities.”
He turned to Keira.
His face shone with pride.
She remembered Uncle Pike putting phone books on the piano bench for her so that she could reach the keys. When she pushed down middle C with a pudgy little finger, his face had shone the same way it did now. She could hear him saying, That’s my girl, while he ruffled her hair. With a start, Keira realized that, in a sense, Pike himself had been her first piano teacher.
The ruined face that stared at her now was a ghost of that man.
Pike licked his lips.
“Your Honors, it was the goal of the Experimental Breeding Program to create a being with Darkling genetics who also possessed musical ability. To bring the music we worship back into our species. The damage the Experimentals did to our world was a deeply unfortunate side effect. But side effects are not the same as failures. I believe—” He clacked his teeth together, half choking on the insane giggle that Keira heard rising in his throat. “I believe that she can play. Let her prove her musical ability to you. She’s not a failure and neither am I. I can feel it in my bones.” Pike held up his right hand, shaking back his sleeve to reveal a mutilated hand, the stubs of his missing fingers offering physical proof of the damage that the Seekers caused themselves with too much crossing between the worlds.
Keira gagged.
The Reformers eyed her suspiciously.
Keira’s blood began to burn like a signal fire. Pike was trying to prove her worth. It was a shame he was too far gone to realize what he was actually condemning her.
One of the Tribunal members tilted his hooded head, considering Pike. “If she can play, then perhaps you are right. It would be a mark in your favor to find out that all three of you were not wasted. If she can play, perhaps we have enough use for her to spare her.”
The room bucked and spun as his words wormed their way through Keira’s mind.
There was no way out of this now, because if they thought she couldn’t play, they’d kill her. And if she proved she could, they’d still kill Walker. Those were the only two possible outcomes.
Walker caught her arm as she staggered. She looked up at him, but meeting his eyes was a mistake. Pain and loss burned in his gaze. She couldn’t breathe through the ache in her chest; she couldn’t see through the lake of tears.
“Well, then, Experimental,” the Reformer rasped. “What instrument did Dr. Sendson provide you with?”
“A piano,” Pike said proudly.
“Sssilenccce!” The hiss rose from the Tribunal in unison. Even the walls seemed to cower beneath it. “You were not invited to speak!”
Pike’s skin turned pearly gray and he shook like he’d touched a live wire.
The female Tribunal member gestured to one of the guards.
He turned neatly and swept aside an enormous curtain, revealing an assortment of instruments in varying stages of decay. Among them was a scratched and worn upright piano.
Keira’s stomach plummeted.
They didn’t just expect her to play. They expected her to do it right now.
Chapter Fifty-Two