My feet move once, but then I stop. Stiffen. The boy’s face has turned, and he’s looking straight at me. I’ve grown up with darkness, and I Know he can’t see me in the deep shadows around this doorway, not while he’s in the light. But the way he’s staring, intense, unwavering, makes me think he can. The girl kneels beside him now, arguing, then slowly turns her head toward the door. Four beats of my heart go by before the boy raises his voice and says, “Hi.”
I stay still. I think he’s talking to me. The girl waits, wide-eyed, and I glance up once at the ceiling, at the hole letting in the light. What is he trying to tell me? That he fell? From up high? The girl whispers, but he ignores her. Just watches me, expectant. He must have incredible vision. Maybe he’s asking for my help. I can see that he needs it. I take a step more fully into the doorway.
The girl gasps and spins around on her knees, stuffing some kind of box back into her pack. Like I might try to take it away from her. Her fear gives me confidence. I don’t want them to be afraid. Or maybe they can’t remember why they should be. The boy is calm, gazing at me through the magnifiers, so I talk to him.
“I am Samara Archiva, from Underneath. I’m not with the Council, but the Council is coming. Are you from Outside?”
I realize too late that they might not remember where they’re from. Outsiders are not taught to read or write, so they couldn’t have a book. The girl holds her pack behind her back, but the boy’s dark brows come down, thinking. One side of his forehead is still bleeding from a shallow gash, but he’s handling the pain from that ankle well. Impressively so. I can see that neither of them knows how to answer me. I take another step forward.
“Have you Forgotten?” I ask. The dark brows deepen, and the girl edges closer to him. I try again. “Do you know your name?”
This time his face eases. “Beckett Rodriguez,” he says. It’s a low voice. Resonant in the echoing chamber. I look at the girl. Her hand is on his shoulder now, squeezing.
“Do you remember your name?” I ask.
She startles like a dustmoth, but eventually says, “Jillian.” It’s barely a whisper.
I’m pleased. These aren’t names. They’ve made them up. Because they’ve Forgotten. I have so many questions, but first I have to get them to hide. And before that, I think, they will have to trust me. I take another step toward Beckett.
“Could I examine your leg? I have physician training.”
They both stare at me, and then the girl, Jillian, shakes her head no. But Beckett smiles. It’s a friendly smile, a little guilty, somehow, like he got caught doing something he shouldn’t. I see the same smile in my memory. But it’s not an expression that goes with his injury. Can you Forget to feel pain? He doesn’t move as I approach, but he doesn’t take his eyes off me, either.
I set down my pack, get my loose hair out of the way, and kneel at his feet. He’s wearing an odd, heavy sort of foot covering, sewn from a material I’ve never seen. I can’t imagine how he’s managed to make such a thing for himself, and when I move his legging up a little higher, the silver cloth is thin, yet curiously solid between my fingers. Maybe Forgetting actually spurs creativity, I think, when you have no memory of how a thing should be done. It’s an interesting idea that I will leave to the arguments of the philosophers. I touch the ankle gently, bending down to look at it from all sides.
“Luxatio pedis sub talo,” I mutter. “Antero-lateral.” They look at me like I’ve been babbling. “The ankle is dislocated … out of position,” I explain. “Probably with some small fractures.” And I don’t like the color of it, as if the blood isn’t flowing. “It will heal if I set it, but that should be done soon. An artery may be restricted, and the ankle is swelling. Will you let me set it?”
I can tell the last part of this has gotten through, because I see them exchange a look, Beckett’s clearly saying, I told you so. This doesn’t seem like a reasonable reaction, either. Maybe he doesn’t understand what setting a bone means.
“It will be painful,” I say, “but will hurt much less when I’m done. Will you let me?”
The girl, Jillian, asks, “Are you a doctor?”
I stare at her. How could that word be in her head? I’ve only ever seen that term in disintegrating manuscripts in the Archives.
She looks back at Beckett and shakes her head again, hard, but he just says, “Go ahead.” When I hesitate, he says, “Yes.”
I get to work. It’s difficult to take the sandal, or whatever it is, off his foot, and I Know I must be hurting him. Or at least I should be. But this familiar, bloodied, Forgetting young man of abandoned Canaan tolerates pain better than I’ve ever seen. And he’s strong. I can feel the calf muscle beneath my fingers. He’s definitely been in the fields. Or maybe at a furnace. Though the magnifiers speak to something smaller, like fine metalwork. It doesn’t make sense.
When I drag a piece of fallen rubble to put beneath Beckett’s leg, the girl gets the idea and helps me move it, positioning it beneath his calf while I hold the dangling foot. Her eyes are large and very blue, and I have to take a moment to cache, to banish Nita’s memory back to the high, dark shelf.
When I open my eyes, Beckett is still watching me. I wish I’d brought a sleeping draught for him, so he wouldn’t have to remember this, but his face is steady, his concentration on me intense. Maybe he hasn’t Forgotten physical pain. Maybe he can cache it. That would be an amazing skill. But probably not good enough for what’s coming next, and we have very little time. The Council could be here in less than a bell.
I turn to Jillian.
“You should sit on him.”
Her face is blank.
“He’ll move … ” I try to think how to explain simply. “It will hurt too much for him to be still. Sit on his chest, and hold his other leg, like this … ”
She does what I tell her, straddling Beckett’s chest, leaning forward to wrap her arms around his other leg, to keep it in place, her only words a whispered, “Shut up, Beckett,” which makes no sense. I plant my feet, get a strong hold on Beckett’s heel and the top of his foot.
I Know how to set an ankle. But Knowing can be different from doing. The Outside taught me that. And the rope on the clifftop. I reexamine the recitation in my mind, go over the details, then meet Beckett’s dark gaze through the magnifiers, watching me from over Jillian’s shoulder. There’s something a little different from my dream, I think now, something about the eyes. But his expression is straight out of my memories.
“I will begin,” I tell him.