His days and his nights had been filled with suffering. His mind seethed with impressions of the wrongs done to him, or those that might be done. For the pain, he took the pink pills—the blue pills had run out long ago—but they seemed to do little except excite his imagination. Scenes of blood and the visceral feel of a wrench breaking bone passed through his vision and he groaned, realizing he was replaying memories—recent memories—not visions.
Starving after nearly a month of living in the tunnels under the station, eating only what he’d managed to bring with him and the little bit of food he’d grabbed from intermittent raids up above, he’d begun wandering closer to the base, eventually coming across someone hauling supplies from the warehouse on a cart. Leroy had followed him, frustrated when he’d taken the freight elevator, and so he’d ascended the steps to the base for the first time in a week. Smells from the galley had pulled him in and he’d begun panting at how warm everything was. He’d followed the cook quietly, only meaning to knock him out and steal the food he needed. But then he’d seen her and suddenly the only important thing was to obliterate the person who reminded him of a lifelong source of guilt and fear.
When he was done, he’d grabbed what food he could and fled back to the safety of his nest. Exhausted, he’d fallen asleep immediately, only to be ripped awake by his nightmares. When he was awake, however, the visions of blood were still vivid and alive in his head . . . Then he looked down at his hands and saw the real thing.
They’d come for him eventually, he knew. He could’ve lived down here indefinitely if he hadn’t bothered anyone, but now that he’d killed, they’d want to capture him and drag him back for their judgment. The thought made him twitch under his layers, and his mind careened off into a new clutch of anxious thoughts. He croaked threats and curses into the air.
He froze in mid-curse. A dull, distant whump had reached his ears. Considering how far away he was from the occupied parts of the base, it must’ve been earsplitting at the source. The sudden noise was a shock in a place where, aside from the creak of ice and burble of fluid through the sewage pipes, he was the only source of sound. Had he actually heard it? Or imagined it?
Throwing off the blankets and pieces of carpet, he struggled to a sitting position. He held his breath, listening intently.
He heard nothing. But he felt something.
It began with a light, feathery touch, caressing the sliver of exposed skin on his cheek. A few seconds later, it was pressing insistently. His scarf, frozen permanently in the shape of his face, crackled as he peeled it away.
The wind, forced through the halls and corridors under the station, moaned its greeting, then, squeezing and tilting through tiny spaces, it pitched upward until it was a constant, insistent shriek.
Leroy scrambled to his feet, his heart racing. Without thinking, he began shrieking along with the wind, his voice rusty and breaking from disuse. In his mind, he saw nothing but colossal movements of color and emotion. A part of him made a weak attempt to hook reason onto his actions, but in the end, he gave up and gave in. A cracked smile broke across his face as he shuffled out the door of his nest and into the ice tunnel beyond, still singing the song of the wind, looking for its source.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
Cass was shivering.
She hadn’t gotten a real night’s rest since being locked up—no surprise, of course. More than once she woke gasping, crying, or shivering. This time, she lay flat in bed with her eyes shut, willing herself to become calm and serene. Something was tickling her cheek, though. Still half-asleep, she reached up to scratch and felt a crust of ice on her eyelids.
She sat bolt upright in bed, blind.
Frantic, she rubbed the ice away and opened her eyes with difficulty. The room was dimly lit, illuminated not by the normal overhead lamp, but from a weak battery-operated emergency LED above the door, one of the same ones that had kicked on during the station-wide power failure. She stared at it, her vision obscured by her fogging breath.
Her muscles, shocked by the cold, rippled and twitched as she rolled out of bed and began throwing on every scrap of clothing she could find. Taylor hadn’t allowed her any outdoor clothing, but Deb had secretly brought Cass her books, clothes, and personal items from her berth. Mouthing a thanks for the woman’s kindness, Cass pulled on five layers in all, then crawled back into bed, pulling the blanket up over her nose as she tried to get warm. Tiny ice crystals, formed by her breath as she had slept, clung to the ceiling above her head, glittering and twinkling like tiny stars. Her mind, almost as frozen as the rest of her body, lay dormant and blank, but after long minutes, the shivering slowed, then finally stopped, allowing her to think.