I struggle for words. “The night that you …”
I flash back to the photograph Ms. Chancellor showed me — the man who had no scar three days before my mother died. It doesn’t make sense, and yet something catches in my mind, like a sweater caught on a nail. I can feel my whole world beginning to unravel.
“Think, Grace,” he tells me, easing closer. “Think! They’ve spent years filling your head with lies. And maybe they were right to try to make you forget what happened that night. I know I wish I could. I wish that every day. But you can’t forget it, can you, Grace? And you can’t quite remember. Now the truth is like a tightrope that you can’t walk forever. Think! Think before it gets you killed.”
“Get back!” I tell him. “You can’t hurt me. I have the gun.”
“No, Grace.” He shakes his head slowly and reaches for my hands. My empty hands. He holds them up for me to see. “You don’t.”
I look down at my hands and then stupidly glance around at the ground. Where did the gun go? When did I lose it? I don’t know. So I cling to the only thing I know for certain — the only fact that will ever really matter.
“You killed my mother. You killed her. You —”
“I came to save her!” The Scarred Man’s voice cuts through the cool night air. “I was there. You’re right. You did see me. People did want her dead, but I would never kill your mother, Grace. She was the last person … I would have never killed her. So I came to get her, to take her away, to hide her. We were going to stage her death, and then —”
“You’re lying.”
“Your mother’s death was an accident,” he says softly, but he doesn’t know that they are the exact wrong words. Before I know it, my fists are pounding against his shoulders, glancing blows that do nothing to shake him. I can’t stop trembling.
“No!” I shout. “It was no accident. I saw her death certificate. She was shot!”
“Grace” — he grabs my arms and pulls me to his chest, holds me still and shakes his head very slowly — “it doesn’t have to be one or the other.”
And then his arms let go, and I’m stepping away, suddenly numb. Even the tears on my cheek seem to freeze.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say.
“You do know, Grace.” He sounds so sad. “They tried to make you forget — to tell you you were seeing things, misremembering things. But you have always known.”
It’s too much. I can’t think. I can’t feel. I can’t do anything but tremble.
The Scarred Man is so close to me. Right here. Staring into my eyes. So I kick him as hard as I can. My shoe makes sharp contact with his shin. He doubles over in pain and I strike him in the eye with an elbow.
And then I start to run.
Fire streaks across the sky. There’s a sound like cannons booming as the night becomes a kaleidoscope of color and sound and fire.
There is so much fire.
I have to outrun the smoke. I have to get help. I have to —
I stop too quickly — realize too late — that I’ve run into something. Someone. Arms are around me. But the face that is staring into mine does not belong to the Scarred Man.
“Well, hello, Grace,” the man says. “Do you remember me? We met at the palace. I’m —”
“The prime minister,” I say. Or I think I say. How am I supposed to know what’s real? “Have you seen my grandfather?” I ask, then think about Ms. Chancellor, the person closest to him, and I know that he’s not safe. “I have to see my grandfather!”
“Grace, dear.” The prime minister looks at me, concern in his eyes. “Are you okay?”
“Yes!” I yell, even though I honestly feel like I am breaking.
I am breaking free.
There are barricades up ahead. Signs shout Caution! Explosives! in three different languages. I have no idea how far I’ve run, but there is no one around. Long lines of cables stretch across the cobblestones. I see stacks of equipment. Scaffolding reaches toward the sky. The yells of the crowd still echo in the distance, but I am a far cry from safety.
“You shouldn’t be here,” the prime minister says, and suddenly I know he’s not talking about the restricted area filled with pyrotechnics, not the closing ceremonies. Not even Adria. He means here. Alive.
I shouldn’t be alive.
Slowly, I start to back away. When he reaches for me, I recoil.
“You don’t trust me?” The prime minister actually laughs.
“I don’t trust anyone.”
“Smart girl,” the prime minister says. There’s a fence at my back. I can’t move any farther, and that is when the prime minister lunges for me, grabbing my arms in his massive hands, squeezing like a tourniquet.
I can’t think anymore, so I just start kicking, screaming. My training is gone, instinct and raw emotion are taking over, pounding through me. Finally there is something I can hit. There is someone I can make bleed. When my elbow makes contact with his nose, I hear a sickening snap and feel the warm gush of blood on the back of my neck. I feel somehow vindicated.
I want to do it again.
“Let her go.” The Scarred Man’s voice is cold and hard and even, and that is the only thing that stops me.
“It was supposed to be done by now!” the prime minister shouts at him. Then recognition seems to dawn. “Why isn’t it done, Dominic?”
But the Scarred Man doesn’t answer. He just stands, unwavering, holding his gun with a remarkably steady hand. For the first time, I realize it isn’t pointed at me.
“Come here, Grace,” the Scarred Man says. “Now!”
“No. I’m not going anywhere with you!” I shout.
The prime minister laughs. “It seems the lady has spoken. She’s right not to trust you, you know.”
But nothing can make the Scarred Man flinch.
“Step away from him, Grace. He can’t hurt you. He isn’t the type to get his own hands dirty. Never was.”
“Why should I?” The prime minister laughs. “That was always your specialty.” Then he’s whispering in my ear, saying, “He killed your mother, Grace,” but the words are too far away. When the fireworks sound, I shudder. The smoke is all around me. I hear someone calling my name.
“Grace! Grace, sweetheart, no!”
“Let her go, sir,” the Scarred Man shouts, ever the respectful servant.
“No.”