‘I guess.’
Her hand finds mine. We stare into space, just watching the dust move back and forth, following the tide-like pattern of our breath.
‘Thanks for the letter,’ I finally say.
She grins. ‘Yeah, I had to be careful what I said because I knew Thorn would read it, but I knew you’d understand.’
‘So how’s it been?’ We’re both talking about the whole flirting with Thorn thing.
She smiles. ‘OK. He’s been kind of nice. We’ve spent a lot of time talking about Ruth. He’s still in love with her, even though it’s nearly twenty years since she hanged.’
‘Twenty years? I didn’t know it happened that long ago.’ The canon never specified, but it doesn’t surprise me; this universe has a habit of embellishing the backstory.
‘Yeah, he looks good for his age, doesn’t he? He must be pushing forty. I guess that’s the Gems for you.’
‘You haven’t forgotten he’s an evil spermpiper, have you, Katie?’
She laughs. ‘God no. I could never forget how mean he was when we first got here. But I’ve been bored, you know, and lonely. It’s been nice having someone to talk to. And I do feel kind of sorry for him . . . The way he looks at me sometimes.’
I study her face. ‘It’s creepy, you know that, yeah? He’s nearly forty and he’s sleazing on a seventeen-year-old.’
‘I guess. It never feels sleazy though, it feels, I don’t know, protective. And he’s never done anything, he’s been the perfect gentleman.’
‘Just be careful though.’ I sling my arm around her neck and pull her copper head on to my shoulder. ‘You’re playing with fire.’
‘Is Nate OK?’ she suddenly asks, changing the subject.
‘Yeah, he’s just Nate, you know.’
Her face relaxes and I notice how pretty she looks compared to the Gems. The slight irregularity of her eyebrows, the smattering of freckles across her nose, the interesting way her lips pull slightly to the left when she smiles.
‘So what happens next?’ she asks.
‘I really don’t know. If everything had gone according to plan, Willow would be here with me now. We’d be planning our escape from the rebels, tonight. Remember? They were meant to raid that brothel.’
She nods. ‘And if he was here, if you did escape, you’d get caught by the Gem authorities, yeah?’
I nod. ‘Yeah. Willow and Rose made it as far as the river. They were trying to reach the safety of No-man’s-land, but that’s hardly going to happen now – Willow’s probably banging Alice as we speak.’
Katie looks deep in thought. I notice her fingers tapping the fabric of the couch like she’s practising a cello piece. ‘What if you got caught? Without Willow, I mean. What if you still end up hanging at the Gallows Dance tomorrow?’
‘It wouldn’t work. Not without Willow announcing his love for me. That’s what captured the Gems’ sympathies and caused the revolution.’ Take up your guns, your stones and sticks, I think. But I force my attention back to Katie. ‘Without Willow, the story can’t complete. And I’ll . . .’
‘. . . just die on the gallows.’ She finishes the sentence so I don’t have to. We hold each other’s gaze, and I wonder if she’s wishing she never met me, never came to Comic-Con. But instead she says, ‘Well, we can’t have that. If I’m going to live in this shit-tip for the rest of my life, I at least need my favourite person here.’
I smile. ‘Thanks, Katie.’
‘Just try and stay alive. You and Nate, yeah.’
‘Yeah. You too.’
Thorn enters the room. He looks at Katie and smiles, an unfamiliar softness to his face, but when he looks at me, the hardness returns. ‘Time to go, Little Flower.’
I wish he’d stop calling me that. It just reminds me of that rhyme and how far away hope seems right now. ‘Just another minute?’ My voice sounds fragile. I want to tell Katie about Ash, about the Dupes, about the skipping rhyme, about Nate nearly getting his hands chopped off. I want to lighten some of my load. But Thorn shakes his head.
‘Can I come too?’ Katie asks.
‘No. I’m sorry, Katherine, but I need you here. You’re my insurance policy.’
And I can’t help wondering if Thorn keeps Katie locked away in this tower Rapunzel-style not for insurance, but because he wants her all for himself.
We walk down the stairs towards the main body of the church. Thorn tells me he’s prioritizing the Meat House over the Duplicates. ‘It’s a matter of timing,’ he says. ‘The Dupes aren’t going anywhere.’
The rebels did just this in canon – raided the Meat House on the Friday night, the night before Rose hanged. Willow and Rose accompanied them to the raid, pretending they wanted to help. They hid in the alley with the rest of the rebels, waiting until Saskia had conned her way past the Gem guards. But instead of helping, the lovebirds used the distraction to escape the rebels – dropping down a manhole cover into the disused sewage system, slinking away like rats, trying to reach the river and the safety of No-man’s-land.
Thinking about it now, this was a really sucky thing for Rose to do; abandoning her fellow Imps so she could shack up with her dream man. I always thought she was romantic and impulsive. But now, knowing what I know, she just seems selfish.
I tell Thorn everything I remember about the Meat House – location, timings, risks. We enter the church and Thorn whispers something to Saskia. Within an hour, dozens of rebels fill the church – assembling weapons, studying plans, exchanging muted, excited words, same as in canon. And I think about those threads again, how they keep winding together in spite of everything.
I find Nate sleeping on the front pew. Someone’s laid a green blanket over him, and only the top of his sandy head pops out. I sit beside him. I can’t bear the thought of him growing up in this bloody awful place. Toiling all night at the manor, and breathing in the stinking city air in the day. But I can’t see how to fix it. I mull over Baba’s words. If you were stuck here, here in our world, how would you live your life? What kind of an Imp would you become? Maybe this is all I have left – being true to myself. And right now, that means keeping Nate, Katie and Ash alive, and sticking it to those bastard Gems.
Night falls and I wake Nate. We leave the protective walls of the church, lurching from the archway into the cold night air. Clouds obscure the sky and I can barely pick out the skeletons of the surrounding buildings. The rebels start loading weapons on to a collection of beat-up vehicles – Humvees, hovercycles, trucks – all originally Gem vehicles, stolen or salvaged.
Thorn guides us to a faded-yellow pickup truck; the jagged, dark shapes of weaponry fill the cargo area. It’s the same truck Willow and Rose travelled to the raid in, and it feels like the canon is mocking me again.