Away (3 page)

Malgam was talking in a low voice to Pathik, who had seated himself on the edge of the bed. They both fell silent when Indigo led Rachel and Nandy closer.

“That the girl?” Malgam scowled in Rachel's general direction.

Indigo stood behind Rachel, so she couldn't see him, but she felt his hands on her shoulders. She couldn't decide whether she felt comforted by them, or trapped.

“This,” he said, in a tone that reminded her of the one her mother used when she was displeased, “is
the girl
. Her name is Rachel, as you already know, son. As you also already know, she saved your life.” Indigo's fingers tapped lightly on Rachel's shoulders.

Malgam jutted his chin out and looked past Rachel to Indigo. He said nothing. Pathik widened his eyes at Rachel as though to say
This should be good
. She wished she could disappear.

“Malgam.” Indigo spoke softly.

Malgam inhaled sharply, through his nose. He released the breath in a sigh, and shook his head. The corners of his mouth curled up a few centimeters.

“I know, Da. Manners, manners.” He sighed again. “Rachel,” he said, in a gentler voice, looking directly into her eyes, “I am pleased to meet you. If my son will kindly find you a chair, I hope you will visit for a bit. I hear we have much to talk about.”

Pathik hopped off the bed and brought three battered metal chairs from where they were lined up against the far wall. He stationed one close to the head of Malgam's bed, and placed the other two at the foot. He gestured to Rachel to take a seat in the one closest to Malgam. Indigo and Nandy settled in the remaining two chairs, and Pathik stood behind Nandy.

Rachel kept her eyes on Malgam as she sat. There was a pallor about him, and though she could see he had made some effort to tidy himself, his hair was mussed from bed rest and he smelled sour.

“First, I must give you thanks.” He reached out toward her with both hands, and before she could stop herself Rachel jerked backward.

Malgam dropped his hands in his lap. He looked away from Rachel, at Indigo.

“See? Regs. They're all the same.”

Rachel knew “Reg” stood for
regular
. It was what the Others called people like her—people from the other side of the Line.

Indigo rose from his seat and gripped the foot of the bed. He leaned toward Malgam, and the look on his face made Rachel press back even harder in her chair.

“How many Regs have you actually met, Malgam?” Indigo spoke quietly, but his tone was scornful. “This one”—he pointed at Rachel without looking at her—“has risked discovery and punishment, as have her friends and family. She has spent days traveling away from all she has ever known, without knowing whether she will ever be able to return home. She has done all that to bring medicine to a stranger—to
you,
Malgam.” Indigo shook his head sadly. “You owe her more than thanks, my son. You owe her an apology.”

Malgam began a retort, but Indigo held up his hand for silence.

“Daniel was a Reg. Do you hold
him
in contempt?”

“Daniel proved himself our friend many times over. He never flinched just because he was near one of us. He never judged us from the stories he heard, he—”

“Yet you judge Rachel for a reflex you can hardly begrudge her. You know what Jab did to her. Why should she trust any of us, after that? Would you be so—”

“What do you mean ‘
was
a Reg'?” Rachel's voice was quiet, but there was a quality to it—an urgency—that made the others in the room listen. “Is he alive or dead?”

There was silence. Rachel felt all eyes on her. She met each person's gaze, one by one, but none said anything to her. Finally she looked at back at Malgam.

“I'm glad that you're better. I didn't mean to offend you. I think I'm just . . . I'm just tired, I guess.” Rachel felt tears in her eyes and fought them back. “I've been here three days and I haven't seen him, and nobody will talk to me about him, but you
know
him, you
know
who he is. Pathik knew his name.” She looked at Pathik, and saw sadness in his eyes. It tipped the balance she had been struggling to maintain, and tears spilled onto her cheeks. “He's my father. I just want to know if he is alive.”

Malgam looked stricken. He leaned forward in the bed, and reached his hands out once more, smiling a gentle question to her. Rachel hesitated only a moment before placing her hands in his.

“Forgive me, Rachel.” Malgam bowed his head. When he looked up again he squeezed her hands gently and nodded.

“We will talk of Daniel. But first, I do need to thank you for saving my life. By our traditions it is important. And so I tender my thanks to you, Rachel.” He raised their joined hands up. “If ever I can help you, know that I will. For what you have done, you will always be welcome to my shelter, my fire, my water, my food.” He squeezed her hands once more and smiled at her. “Not so bad, was it?”

She smiled back, despite her tears. “Not so bad.”

Malgam released her hands. “Now. When was the last time you saw Daniel?”

“I was little.” Rachel wiped her eyes dry. “I don't really know if I remember him, or if I just remember what my mother has told me about him. He got a Call to Serve from the government, and they sent my mother a death notice only a short time after he reported for duty.”

“Call to Serve?” Malgam looked at Indigo.

Indigo nodded. “Daniel said it was one of the ways the government gets rid of people they suspect of being rebels. They summon them, as if they need them in some war effort. Then they get rid of them and claim they were killed in action. It's what happened to him.”

“You spoke with him?” Rachel searched Indigo's face. “When? Where is he?”

Indigo's eyes looked as sad as Pathik's had moments before. Rachel looked from him to each of the others in the room, and they all wore the same expression.

“He's dead, isn't he?”

“We don't know that, Rachel.” Nandy was the one who spoke. “He hasn't come to camp in months, and that isn't normal, even for Daniel. He's always kept to himself, but he's also always checked in, to see if all was well, or to trade for supplies. We didn't know what to think for a long time, but now we have reason to suspect that the Roberts may have him.”

“Who?” It seemed to Rachel that things had sped up; it was hard to keep up with what Nandy was saying through the thoughts that were racing through her mind. Daniel
had
been here. Her father. Alive. A few days' walk from The Property this whole time.

“—just always called them that since then.” Nandy frowned. “Are you all right, Rachel?”

“Yes.” Rachel forced herself to focus on Nandy. “So, who is this Robert? What would he want with my father?”

“Not Robert,” said Nandy. “
Roberts
. Plural. It's another group. In the beginning it's said they were led by a man named Robert, and they've been called the Roberts since then. Their camp is less than a day away from here, but they keep their distance.” Nandy looked worried. “They're no good.”

“And you think they have my father? Why?”

Indigo spoke. “We think they may be planning to use him as a bargaining tool. Several days before Pathik came to you, Rachel, one of the Roberts was discovered near camp. He was injured—someone from his own camp had stabbed him, because he had decided to leave. They don't let people leave.”

“Had he seen my father? Can I talk to him?”

“He died shortly after we brought him here. But before he died, he told us that the Roberts had a stranger in a cage. He said they were going to trade him to the government. We'd planned a council meeting to put together a rescue attempt, but then Malgam worsened to the point where we thought he would die and we had to focus on that.” Indigo considered Rachel for a moment. “How much,” he asked, “do you know about your father, Rachel?”

“I know he was a collaborator.”

“A collaborator.” Indigo frowned. “He called it that too. That word sounds so . . . bad.”

“Most people think they
are
bad.”

“Daniel wasn't . . .
isn't
bad.” Indigo looked pained.

Rachel shrugged. “I wouldn't know,” she said.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean I wouldn't
know,
” said Rachel. “I wouldn't know if he was good, or bad, or somewhere in between. I haven't seen him since I was three years old. Even though he has apparently been alive and well just a few days' travel away, this whole time.” Rachel flung her words at Indigo like stones.

Malgam pushed his blankets back as though he might rise. “Do you think a parent would leave his child, ever?
Ever,
if he knew that child was alive and needing him? No
good
parent would.”

Nandy silenced Malgam with a glare and stepped closer to Rachel. “Oh, Rachel.” She put a hand on Rachel's shoulder and squeezed. “He thought you were dead. You
and
your mother—he thought they had killed you both.” Nandy's eyes glittered. “It almost killed
him
.”

“Why would he think we were dead?” Rachel wasn't moved. “Doesn't sound like he bothered to check.”

“He did bother.” Malgam ignored Nandy's renewed glare. “Unlike some.”

“Enough.” Indigo shook his head at Malgam. He sat back down in his chair. “Daniel did try to find you, Rachel. He had a contact on the other side, and we were able to get word to him. But you and your mother were gone.” He looked at Rachel intently. “I know he would have found a way to get back to you if he had thought for one minute you were alive. He would have stopped at nothing. Just as we must stop at nothing now. If your father is being held by the Roberts, we have to get him out of there. They
will
kill him eventually, or worse.”

“We left . . . we left the city as soon as my mother knew he was dead. We ran. Mom found a job with Ms. Moore on The Property.” Rachel thought, a realization dawning. “Maybe whoever he checked with thought we really
were
dead.”

Indigo cleared his throat. “How . . . how is Elizabeth?”

Rachel noticed all the others in the room fell silent. Malgam had his eyes lowered, but Pathik and Nandy were both watching Indigo.

“She's . . . fine.” Rachel thought about how Ms. Moore had waved, and kept waving, as Rachel got farther and farther away after she Crossed. How finally she couldn't see Ms. Moore—or her mom—anymore.

“Good.” Indigo nodded. “That's good.” He seemed to realize he was still nodding, and stopped. “Well.”

“She wrote to you, to each of you.” Rachel brought out the letters she had tucked in her jacket. Gravely she handed each to its recipient; the envelopes were labeled in Ms. Moore's neat hand.

“This is from Elizabeth?” Indigo ran a finger over his name on the envelope.

“If we're going after Daniel, we need to do it quickly.” Malgam watched Indigo with a tenderness Rachel hadn't thought he possessed. He seemed hesitant to change the subject.

“We'll need today to prepare and to have a council meeting.” Nandy looked like she was making lists in her head. “I think Rachel should move out of the visitors' quarters and in with us.”

“That girl is a visitor? From where?” Rachel had wondered why the girl who shared the room she slept in wasn't with a family. She and Rachel seemed to be the only people who didn't live with a family group.

“She showed up not long after the Roberts man who died. We put her there because we aren't sure what to make of her.” Nandy saw Rachel's confusion. “We think she came from the Roberts. There aren't many lone survivors out there, if any, so she must have. We don't know if we can trust her.”

“So the people you don't trust sleep in that room?” Rachel was half teasing.

“Yes.” Nandy wasn't teasing at all. “But I think we all feel like we can trust you now. You've not tried anything strange, and you have helped as much as you can in camp. I heard you gathered fire twigs yesterday. And I'm told you don't complain, at least not much.” Nandy grinned at Pathik.

“You rest as much as you can,” Indigo said to Malgam. He pointed at Nandy and Pathik. “You two get Rachel settled. I am going to call a council for tonight. I think we will leave in the morning, and we'll want to have a plan.”

They went their separate ways: Nandy to help Rachel fetch her things to their rooms, which were in one of the hand-built huts, and Pathik to gather firewood for the family hearth. Indigo went to call the council together. Malgam stayed where he was, and tried, as much as he could, not to dwell on the sadness he'd seen in his father's eyes at the mention of his mother. He looked at the envelope in his hands, at his name, written in his mother's slanted cursive—a script he'd never seen before. It was fashioned from a fine paper, thin as leaves, unlike anything he had seen, save for the pages of the few books they had in camp, or the notebook filled with information the first survivors thought they might need. He fingered the corner of the seal. But then he shook his head and placed the envelope on the table next to his bed. He didn't want to know what she had to say, at least not now.

CHAPTER 3