“We also met one of your buddies,” Sophie added. “He thought he was so special with his Psionipath tricks.”
“He is special,” Gethen said. “I recruited him myself.”
“But he’s not supposed to be taking action yet,” Mr. Forkle said. “Is he?”
Gethen’s eyes narrowed. “Very good. Your pathetic telepathy scraped out one secret—a worthless one you already know most of. Yes, we have many timelines. And yes, it looks like one has changed. All that means is everyone’s roles will soon be much clearer.”
“Why are you looking at me?” Keefe asked, backing up a step.
“Why do you sound so afraid?” Gethen countered. “Wouldn’t it be nice to finally feel useful—not that you haven’t had your moments. But someday you’ll be more than just the wannabe rebel. Once you stop trying to impress the Black Swan’s little doll.”
“SHUT UP!” Keefe shouted.
“Oh, come on. Haven’t you always wanted to hear that someone believes in you?” Gethen asked. “We do. Or rather, your mother convinced us that we should.”
“Maybe we should go,” Sophie said when she noticed how hard Keefe was shaking.
“Yes, I think that’s a good idea,” Mr. Forkle agreed.
“Not yet,” Keefe said, stalking closer to Gethen. “How long have you known my mother?”
“She joined us not long after she got pregnant with you. Puts things in perspective, doesn’t it? All the lies you believed. All the clues you missed. And now she could very well be gone and you’ll never get to know why. Unless I tell you.”
“You’re a monster,” Sophie growled.
“Said the living lab experiment. Tell me, did he spark your life and then freeze you and keep tweaking?”
“Of course not!” Mr. Forkle turned to Sophie. “Any tweaks I made to your DNA were done before your inception. I implanted your embryo immediately.”
“Okay,” Sophie said, not sure why he seemed so upset by the idea. Humans froze embryos all the time. And either way, she was still an experiment.
But for the first time, she didn’t care.
She stalked closer. “If whatever they did to me makes it so I can stop you, it’s worth it.”
“You may inconvenience us occasionally,” he sneered. “But you will never stop us.”
“We’ll see about that,” Mr. Forkle told him. “She’s done an excellent job keeping you distracted. And now I’ve found the information we came for. Looks like the next stage of your timeline will be in Merrowmarsh.”
Gethen’s jaw dropped.
“I can divide my consciousness,” Mr. Forkle said with a smile. “One part of my mind was being rather obvious while the other slipped past and dug out what I needed. Clever enough for you?”
“It’d be more clever if you had any chance of stopping what’s happening.”
“There’s always a way,” Mr. Forkle said, dusting off his hands. “Oh, and we’ll also be removing that bludgeblot from your nails so we won’t have to worry about your friends tracking you.”
Gethen snorted. “There’s no way to remove bludgeblot—that’s why the ogres use it. Burned like the sun when they painted it on.”
“Well then. I guess we’ll just have to remove your nails entirely. Our Froster will be by soon to freeze them off. So I’d recommend you go back to that place you’ve been hiding and hope your pain receptors stop working.”
Gethen shouted threats as they left, but the warnings were as empty as his sandy cell.
His final words to Keefe were the only ones with any impact.
“You’re choosing the wrong side, boy. You’ll regret it when you see your mother’s vision realized. But then it’ll be too late.”
TWENTY-THREE
YOU GUYS DON’T look so good,” Dex said as Sophie and Keefe stumbled back to the girls’ main room. “What happened?”
Sophie didn’t know where to begin as she collapsed into the nearest chair. Keefe flopped onto the ottoman next to her and stared at the ceiling.
They’d had to use light from Marquiseire to leap home, and the unmapped star’s glow felt like getting sliced and diced by a shattered disco ball. But Sophie’s unease had much more to do with the fact that Calla and Blur were on their way to Merrowmarsh—another Neutral Territory—to investigate, while Mr. Forkle had left to get Squall so she could freeze off Gethen’s fingernails.
The latter task haunted Sophie more than the first, making the black swan pendant around her neck grow a million pounds heavier. She knew they had to stop the Neverseen from finding Gethen, but . . . wasn’t what they were doing to him torture?
Della crouched in front of Sophie and turned Sophie’s face from side to side, then squeezed Sophie’s cheeks, giving her a fish face.
“What are you doing?” Sophie asked—though it came out more like “Wharyoooing?”
“Attempting to fill in for Elwin. He gave me a Sophie Survival Kit, as well as a separate list called Crazy Messes That Sophie Will Find A Way To Get Herself Into.”