PART FOUR
THE GLASS ARROW
CHAPTER 21
MIST SEEPS THROUGH THE trees well before sunrise, lowering the sky, leaving droplets of dew on each tree limb and pinecone. It chills me to the bone.
Today is Trader’s Day. The day of a thousand maybes. Today I might finally be reunited with my family. I might be captured. I might be brought back to the mayor’s house in shackles, drugged until I can’t move, and made the plaything of Amir and his uncle.
I might not even make it that far.
So I breathe in the pine and the damp leaves. My fingers memorize everything they touch: the patterned bark on the trees, the rough surfaces of nearby boulders, the yellow-speckled grouse eggs we’ve gathered, and the freezing, clear water. And though it brings an ache to my chest, I say good-bye, because I know how it feels to be ripped away without that chance.
Our plan is simple: We’ll go to the gates with our wares—the thirty-three trinkets Daphne and I have been staying up late to make and the two bulging sacks of furs Lorcan and Kiran have gathered from the other Drivers. The gatekeepers will grant us a business pass to set up a booth beside the auction stage—used today just for the livestock—but we won’t be going downtown. We’ll be going to a pharmacy in the residential district of the Merchant class. Lorcan saw Salma there two months back. Three days ago he went back to try to see her again, but did not. I try not to think too hard about what this might mean.
He came back with something else, though: two posters from the city. One with Daphne’s body shot from the Garden—the head-to-toe picture that appeared in the leather book the Governess kept in her office. Kiran told us the caption below said that she’s wanted for the Watcher death in the solitary yard and that she’ll probably be in the Black Lanes hiding.
I didn’t know until then that he could read. I pretended I knew what it said too, but I think he knew I was lying.
The other poster was of me.
It was the photo the Magnate had taken during my capture, with a close-up of my face and my bared teeth, my wild eyes, the sticks and leaves in my hair. I imagined this is what the Governess, Greer, and even the mayor must have thought I looked like again after even such a short time away. “Property of Mayor Ryker,” Kiran had said. “Generous Reward.”
I know the poster said more, but he crumpled it up and threw it in the fire before he told me. I wasn’t too upset; it wouldn’t have stopped me from going back to that city anyway.
We’ve gone over the rest of the plan ten or more times. Kiran’s going to find some more Virulent costume makeup like he used to mark me when we escaped, and we’ll use the same Skinmonger dress—assuming Salma’s not already wearing one—to sneak my cousin out. The twins will go in the sacks in place of the furs, and we’ll be gone before anyone knows any different.
I don’t dwell on the obvious: that Amir’s family is looking for me, that the dead Watcher may mean our stretched necks. I don’t let myself think too much about Lorcan, who is still here even though he’s had plenty of opportunities to disappear, or how whenever he’s around I’m silent as he is, because this connection that hangs between us seems to have taken my voicemaker, too. And I definitely don’t let myself think about the danger Kiran is putting himself in to help me. But every time I look at him my hands tremble and I’ve got to fight the urge to beg him to stay behind.
He already told me not to get sore about it, so I won’t.
Daphne, wrapped in a fur mantle, comes to sit beside me in front of the pulsing white coals. Her red hair is growing out; it’s actually more yellow, like Kiran’s. Two nights ago she made me cut it short, almost to the skull. She said it was because of her picture on the posters, but I think it’s because she doesn’t want any more reminders of the Garden.
She’s quiet now, rubbing the line that’s formed between her eyebrows.
“You’ll be all right, Daphne,” I tell her. “The Trackers will all be in the city for Trader’s Day.”
Which doesn’t exactly bode well for me and Kiran.
She scrunches her nose, drawing attention to the explosion of freckles that seem to be multiplying by the day. I feel guilty for leaving her here with no one but Brax for protection, but there’s no need for her to take the risk of going in.
“If I don’t come back…”
“Shut up Clover,” she says. “It’s bad luck to say things like that.”
I snort. “I would have thought those Magnate scientists would’ve proved there’s no such thing as luck.”
Her eyes narrow on me. “Well if you catch me screeching to some mother hen, you’ll know I’ve really lost it.”
A smile quirks my lips. Daphne’s been growing on me these past few days.
“You’ll have the horses ready?”
“I’ve got one job, I think I can remember it.” Her face falls. She begins drawing circles in the dirt with a narrow twig.
“Clover?”
“Yeah?”
“Do you really think I could have stopped the new girl from frying herself?”
Straw Hair. Who ran through the electric fence at the Garden the day she was sold. I cringe, remembering the smoke and the sounds and the smell of it all too clearly.
“Maybe. Probably not.”
“I keep thinking I should try to stop you.”
I take a deep breath, wishing I could say something to make her feel better, but knowing anything I said now wouldn’t be true.
“You can’t stop me, Daphne.”
“I figured that.”
Kiran whistles, but before the three of us can make our way down the mountain towards the Witch Camps, I rest my hand on Daphne’s shoulder and say a quick, silent prayer for her protection.
*
WE STOP IN THE last bit of forest shelter before the field of discarded machines. There Lorcan takes the reins of both horses, and Kiran motions me through the trees.
It’s quiet here, so quiet I can hear him breathe. We haven’t been alone since he came back to find me. He’s tried once or twice, but I’ve always been able to pull Daphne along, or stay near Lorcan. It’s hard to think when it’s just the two of us, and I can’t be losing my head, not with everything we’ve been preparing for, and not after what happened with the other Drivers.
Definitely not when I know Kyna is somewhere waiting.
When I realize he’s stopped, I stop too. He’s staring at me, and the intensity in his gaze makes my heart stutter. His eyes are bright and sad and fearful, and as I stare back I feel everything he does, like an echo. For a flash of a moment I think, This is exactly why I can’t be alone with you, but then the thought vanishes, and all I can do is focus on keeping my legs under me.
It’s hard to believe there was a time I used to look at him and wonder what he was thinking. Now it feels like I’ve always known.
He reaches for my hand, and I let him take it. There are calluses across his palm and the pads of his fingers and they make my hands feel soft and small. Soon they’ll be strong again like his, but I don’t worry about that now, because when he touches me like this it makes me think we’re going to make it. We’re going to be all right.
“You ready for this, Aya?” The way he says my name makes me calm and nervous all at the same time and I force myself to swallow because even though it’s stupid, it feels like he’s not talking about the city.
“I’m ready.”
He watches my mouth as I say the words, and that makes me look at his mouth and think about how I’ve never kissed anybody—never wanted to—which makes me wonder if I’m weak for wanting to now, and if thoughts like these change a person into the type whose only goal is pleasing her master.
“Nobody’s ever going to own me again, Kiran.”
He says nothing. His expression doesn’t even change. The only sign I have that he’s heard me at all is that he gives my hand a small squeeze. I think he must know I need to get this out.
“But,” I say, wetting my lips, “but if trust was a thing you could hold in your hand, I would give mine to you. I’d let you have it forever and never ask for it back.”
I take my hand out of his before he can say anything. My face is glowing, but I needed to tell him that, just in case this goes bad today. There were lots of things I wish I’d told my family before we were separated.
“Any last advice?” I ask.
He gives his head a quick shake and clears his throat.
“Just remember to be silent. If you think it, swallow it.”
I nod and absently adjust my hair. It’s tightly bound into a folded knot behind my head, just like the girl Driver I’d thought was a boy.
“And don’t do that,” he warns. I drop my hand and frown. The longer we stand here, the more aware I am of the bandages smothering my breasts. Daphne’s tied them so tightly I can barely breathe. At least I don’t look like a girl in these baggy clothes.
Without another word, Kiran pulls me down to the mud at our feet and smears my face with dirt. We cover our clothing, our necks, our hair. He even grabs a fistful of horse dung and smears it across my pants. I wish it made me invisible.
“Talk to you later,” he says grimly. I nod. And we continue on.