Beating Heart Cadavers (24 page)

“Jasper –” Fields said again, her image cutting as the wagon door closed again to block out the outside light. “What are you doing here? What have you done?”

She was staring at the blood pulsing from his chest, but he paid it little mind anymore. She was there, an apparition of something from another world that he would soon step into, and he lifted his head slightly, glad for the chance to be reunited if not in life, but in death.

“I have something … for you,” he said weakly.

Fields leaned closer, not hearing him well enough.

“I know,” she said. “Raban told me what you did. I brought him up here already –”

“I have something … else,” Jasper said. “The book. Andor's book.”

Fields' face pulled into a frown, though Jasper was certain that if he had just been able to keep his eyes open for a few moments more, he would have seen the look of realization on her face when she took note of what he had done. It was an apology that he couldn't say – not now, and not even if his voice and mind had been working properly – but it was the type of apology that Fields liked: the ones that were real, and that weren't just empty words.

He reached his hand out to take hers, and her skin was warm against his cold fingers as she lifted them to her face. And that was how it ought to have been, Jasper thought. The whole world contained in a moment just like that one. And it occurred to him as his breathing slowed and faltered further that for someone who was so constantly accused of caring so little about those around her, that she had cared for him the most out of anyone, and that her heart, at least, had not been as defective as his, and that it never would have mattered to her what he did or who he was so long as he had been a better person.

“Lina,” Jasper said, his breathing slow and shallow. “Do you see me now?”

Fields leaned down closer to him.

“Yes, I see you,” she said. “I know who you are.”

Ch. 32

The silver uniform was laid out on the chair, gleaming beneath the artificial lights like molten metal that dripped from the top rail down to the floor. It was a strange sight to see it empty. Without a body contained inside of it, it appeared even more untouchable than the Spöken themselves, almost as though a ghost was bent inside of it, haunting the reflective material with its presence. Merdow took a step closer and reached his hand out to it, daring himself to touch it. It wasn't as though a spirit really lay inside, after all, he told himself. No soul was clinging to it in a last effort to remain in this life, he knew, because Jasper hadn't had a soul. All that remained of him now were the uniforms that the Spöken had collected from his empty residence when they searched the place for him.

He knew that the albino was dead. He could sense it in the same way that he did whenever an animal wandered into one of his pitfall traps. There was never any true indication that it had happened – no distant snapping sound as the metal claws swung closed over the creature's leg, pinning it in place and holding it there until it bled out – but he always knew, all the same. He could feel the death descend as the life left the air, and smell the decaying body before he walked out to retrieve the animal and the scent truly seeped into his clothes, and this time was no different. Jasper was dead. Only, unlike with the animals, Merdow wasn't as satisfied as he thought he ought to have been.

Perhaps he had liked him a bit after all. He frowned to himself as he considered it, one hand still outstretched towards the old uniform. No, he thought, quickly backtracking before such a lie could permeate his mind: that wasn't it. He hadn't liked Jasper: that was unprecedented. But he had enjoyed their time together. Enjoyed the way the albino's breath would rattle whenever Merdow did something truly appalling, or the way the pale skin would line with raised white hairs when he was frightened. Jasper had been like a childhood pet that Merdow had never had – or had never killed too soon to get attached to – and it was rather sad to know that he would never come back to his door, tail between his legs and ready for a reprimand of what he had done wrong. Yes, Merdow thought, he would miss Jasper solely for that reason. And because he had been so much more fun to torture than any of the others before him.

“Do you like it?”

Merdow turned as the voice entered the room, and he pulled his hand back away from the uniform. Ratsel was waiting in the doorway. Merdow couldn't be certain how long he had been standing there observing him, or why, but he found he didn't like it. Being treated like the prey when he was anything but only made him more certain of his place in the world.

“I've always admired the Spöken, High Officer. As you know.”

“Admiration can be a beneficial view,” Ratsel responded. “So long as it doesn't give way to jealousy.”

Merdow's smooth, doll-like face rippled momentarily, but then he gave a simple shrug.

“I've never been jealous of little Jasper. If anything, it was he who looked up to me.”

Ratsel moved further into the room, sidling past Merdow and going to the desk. He lifted the uniform from the chair so that he could sit down and tossed it aside to the heater. It clanged off the metal and crumpled into a heap.

“Did he?” Ratsel asked.

“Of course. As I've said before, Jasper and I grew up together. I thought of him like a brother in many ways. It was me who helped him see his ideals, especially after Andor's passing.”

“I'm sure you did,” Ratsel said, though Merdow noted that he didn't sound very certain at all. “Many people seem to think that Jasper was under their wing, though, and yet – as I'm realizing now – he might have taken flight from all of us long ago.”

“I can't imagine that there are many higher places to fly than the Spöken.”

Ratsel leaned back in his chair, surveying Merdow with an unreadable expression. He was sizing the lesser man up, Merdow knew, in order to see if he was fit enough to warrant joining the fight. Merdow straightened a bit in his place to give himself his full height, ignoring the pain that shot through his back as he did so, and Ratsel finally blinked and looked away.

“The fact of the matter, Merdow, is that Sawyer has … gotten away. He hasn't returned to his residence, hasn't used any public transportation, and hasn't been seen by anyone as far as we know. Now, my men have scoured East and West Oneris for him, but he's seemingly nowhere. And an albino in a Spöken uniform should not be so hard to find.”

“I would agree.”

“It's imperative that we find him, Merdow,” Ratsel continued. “There are hiding holes in Oneris that we've already overturned, and so-called underground establishments which we've raided and dispersed, and my men are off of their usual routes and scouring the country for any sign of him.”

“That's quite a bit of energy you're expending for him,” Merdow commented.

“You think so?”

Ratsel gave him a withering look. Merdow folded his hands behind his back.

“I only meant that when one has a lab full of white rats, one getting loose hardly seems like such a concern.”

Ratsel's eyes narrowed further.

“It's a concern when the one that got out is the one that had undergone the most experimentation,” he said coldly. “And my men aren't rats, they're dogs. They're trained in many ways, but mostly to be loyal. So I'm asking you, Merdow: do you know where Sawyer is?”

“If I knew, High Officer, I would be the first to bring him to you. And I'd serve him on a platter in any form you asked.”

“You've claimed to know him the best of anyone,” Ratsel said. “So what have all those years of being your little pawn taught him? Why would he leave, and where would he go?”

Merdow's stiff face twitched, but his eyebrows rose slightly to unmask his disdain for the accusation.

“I taught Jasper everything that I know,” he said quietly. “And – yes – I trained him in ways that perhaps didn't match the ideals of others, but everything that I did was to groom him from a sickly, weak little thing into something that could be – and has been – used by you.”

“But?”

Merdow gave a taut, unalleviated smile.

“But if there's one thing that I learned about Jasper over all those years, it's that he's not a dog, no matter how well he masqueraded as one. He's a wolf. So no matter how much effort was spent trying to domesticate him, or dominate him, or simply train him – it was all a waste. Because unlike dogs, wolves aren't loyal to humans: they're loyal to their pack. And his pack has always been – and will always be – Fields.”

Ratsel slowly scratched his fingernail over his jaw, thinking the statement through.

“So he's returned to his sister? The one that you mistakenly failed to kill?”

“My mistake wasn't that I did a poor job trying to kill her: I shot her in the heart, after all, High Officer,” Merdow said. “My mistake was that I failed to realize that she doesn't have a heart.”

“And where is she?”

“Ladeline … can be trickier to figure out,” Merdow admitted. “She's not like most people. Not predictable – not in the least. You can never really say what she'll do next.”

Ratsel raised his eyebrows.

“Then I suppose you're of no further use to me,” he replied. “Just like always: good, but not good enough to be a Spöke.”

He stood to show Merdow out, the metal chair legs screeching over the floor as he went, and the sound made Merdow's head twitch to the side as though the third knot of a noose had successfully snapped his neck.

“I said she's difficult to figure out – not impossible,” he said, his voice hissing in a departure from his usual smooth tone. “But don't forget that I grew up with Ladeline, too, and if anyone knows her – really knows her – then it's me.”

“But you have no idea where she is,” Ratsel countered. “So all that you really know now is that she could be anywhere, and so it's still my job to find out where Sawyer is.”

Merdow licked his lips.

“No. I told you that if there's one thing I know about Jasper, it's that he'll always go back to her. But if there's one thing I know about Ladeline, it's that
she
always goes back to Caine.” He ran his hand over the front of his uniform, smoothing it down and imagining that it was the cold metal that the Spöken wore rather than the thin cotton of his own. “And there's one other thing I know about her, which I'm sure you'll find … useful … when you find Caine.”

Ratsel gave an impatient turn of his head.

“Well?” he asked. “What is it?”

“Fields is a Mare-person, High Officer.”

Ch. 33

There were no lights on in the Ambassador's estate. The sky outside had fallen into a nightly gray, and the windows were smooth and black inside that invited nothing but darkness into the house. The residence appeared to be empty as Fields climbed through the window and made her way around the various second floor rooms, but when she descended the staircase and made her way into the living room, she found Caine seated on one of the couches, his head in his hands and his life at his feet.

“Fancy finding you here, Ambassador,” she said, stepping into the room.

He had a vacant look in his eyes, the same one that Fields had seen just days before in her brother's, only Jasper had been dead when his gaze turned blank and lifeless. Caine was still very much alive. Or at least Fields was assuming he was, given that he had looked up when she had spoken.

“I'm not the ambassador anymore.”

He moved over so that Fields could take a seat next to him, and she dropped down the cushion, shifting so that she didn't sit on the new gun she had gotten from Sunset before leaving. She was much more exhausted than she would have normally been from the long hike from Hasenkamp, and there was still blood on her sleeves from where she had clutched at Jasper's form, though it had oxidized to a deep brown by now that matched her heavy overcoat. She tucked her hands beneath her legs when she noticed it, even so.

“Well, you were always better at being an accountant,” she offered.

“I was never much good at being anything.”

“I wouldn't put that in your resume, if I was you,” Fields joked, but Caine only turned his face away, a pained expression coming to his mouth. He pressed his hand over it momentarily and shut his eyes, and when he turned back to her, the look of anguish was replaced by one of dejection.

“You were right, Lad. You were right about everything,” he said.

“Everything?” Fields frowned, still unable to give up her lighthearted retorts. She wasn't in the mood to be serious – not now, and not with Caine. Not when Jasper was dead, and Mason had been killed, and not when the metal heart locked inside her chest would still turn him against her despite everything else that had kept them together for so long. “I don't know if that's true. I used to copy off your exams in school, not the other way around.”

“They killed my son, Ladeline.”

Caine's voice cracked the air between them as though it had been a sheet of glass. Fields ran her tongue over her teeth.

“Did the Spöken tell you that?”

“They didn't have to tell me,” Caine said. “I – I know.”

Fields leaned back against the pillows. They were stiff and uncomfortable, much like the rest of Ambassador Caine's house.

“They didn't kill Simon, Matt.”

“They brought me his body,” Caine said. “They – Ratsel – brought it here, right after you'd left. And they got the notebook, Lad. They got everything.”

“They don't have anything – least of all what they deserve – hence why I'm here,” she returned. “But first thing's first: Simon's alive.”

“He's not, Lad. I have his body. They brought it to me –”

“They what?”

“That's what I've been trying to tell you, but it's –” He broke off and made a motion with his hand, cutting it through the air in an inability to express why he was having difficulty getting the words out. “After you left, Ratsel … he brought it to me. Simon's body.”

Fields raised her eyebrows.

“Where is it?”

“Where –?” Caine shook his head. “It's – it's in the back office.”

“Just sitting there?”

“It's in a bag,” Caine said through gritted teeth. “I couldn't just – I didn't want to – I wasn't about to get rid of it –”

“I think you should,” Fields cut in, “partly because the smell will only get worse the further we get into summer, but mostly because that's not Simon's body.”

She stood up.

“Come on. Let's go see.”

“Go see –? Lad, no: it's him. It's Simon –”

“Simon is safe and well in Hasenkamp,” Fields told him. “I brought him up there myself last week, and I left him in good hands to come and tell you. Now, where's the bag?”

“Simon's alive?”

“Very much so,” Fields said. “And, as unlikely as it sounds, you have Raban Merdow to thank for it.”

She brushed from the room and looped around to the back of the house, getting a bit lost on the way and cursing how large the ambassador's estate was. When she finally found the back office, she saw why Caine had been so disturbed: the bloody bag laying in the center of floor was the exact size and shape of a four-year-old boy, and it smelled far too much like a decomposing body for her liking. She put her hand to her mouth just as Caine joined her in the doorway.

“Lad,” he said slowly, “if you're sure that Simon's alive, then … who is that?”

Fields let her hand drop slightly to allow herself to speak.

“Not who,” she said. “What.”

“Don't try to tell me that's not a real body,” Caine said. “Ratsel was certain of it – I was certain of it.”

“No, I'm sure it's a body,” Fields said. She moved into the room and walked around the bag, nudging it with the toe of her boot as she went. “But it's not a human body. I don't think Merdow's quite that sick, though I'm sure he'll prove me wrong eventually.”

She stooped down and gingerly unzipped the case, her face twisted in disgust as she went. After peering inside for several seconds, she nodded and stepped away.

“Well?” Caine said.

“It's a dog. A collie, I'm guessing, judging from the size, though he skinned it too well to tell for sure ...”

“Fuck,” Caine said, turning away from the room and retreating back into the hall. “Fuck – just – fuck.”

Fields followed him back into the darkened room, her arms crossing as she observed him. It was difficult to tell if he was more disturbed or relieved, and for a doleful moment she thought of how many days he had probably spent clutching the stiffened form within the bag and mourning his only child. When he finally dropped his hands back down to his sides and turned to face her, though, there was still disbelief etched into his expression.

“But he's alive? He's really alive?”

“I told you,” Fields said. “I brought him up to Hasenkamp myself, using someone else's papers, of course.”

“But why not bring him to me?”

Fields' jaw shifted at the note of accusation in his voice, and she let her breath out through her nose as she chose how to answer.

“I didn't think it was safe, Matt. Oneris isn't safe – you're not safe – and it won't be until something changes.”

“But Hasenkamp ...”

“Is where the Mare-folk are, yes,” Fields cut in. “It's also where I've chosen to live, and where Mason was going to go before the Spöken killed him, and where my brother finally returned before he died, too. And you can think whatever you'd like about it, but it's a better place than Oneris is.”

Caine scratched at his beard, seemingly thinking. Fields wished that she could read him as well as she once had been able to, to know what he was reasoning before he said the words out loud, but even if she could, it wouldn't change the fact that his views on the Mare-folk were the same as ever, and no amount of trying to convince someone or begging them to reconsider could alter what they needed to change for themselves in their own minds.

After a long moment, Caine looked back up at her.

“Why did you give me the notebook?” he asked.

“What?”

“Andor's notebook. Why'd you give it to me, when you knew what it was and what it'd do?” He looked at her carefully, scrutinizing her every micro-expression. “If the Mare-folk are so important to you, then why risk it all? Why not take it back to Hasenkamp yourself?”

Fields sighed.

“I don't know, Matt.”

“You do know,” he countered. “You always know. So what was the reason? Because you had another plan? Because it's not what the Spöken think it is? Because you thought I wouldn't give it to them –?”

“Because I was tired,” Fields said, cutting into his sentence with her sharp, unwavering voice, and letting her eyelids drop momentarily as the familiar heaviness took over her again.

“Tired of what? Arguing with me?”

“No. Just – tired.”

“You gave it to me because you were sleep-deprived?” Caine asked skeptically. “You didn't think you should take a nap or something?”

“I was tired of
this.
Of everything. Tired of waiting for things to happen that never will, and tired of trying to fix things that'll just end up more broken than before,” she said, willing him to understand what seeing Mason's lifeless form lying before her on his kitchen floor had done to her. In all the time she had lived with the knowledge of what she was, he had been the first – and the only one – who had cared for her while knowing that she was a Mare-folk, and he hadn't done so in spite of the knowledge, but rather in addition to; and seeing Caine there now, her lifelong friend and childhood ally, she was frightened to think that Mason would also be the last person to ever give her such regard, and she couldn't tell him about her heart for fear of losing anything that she might have had left. “And I'm tired beyond belief of asking people what I need to do for them, and who I need to be for them, in order for them to consider that I might be worthwhile.”

Caine chewed the insides of his cheeks slowly, and there was something almost ashamed in the action, though whether because he was embarrassed for her or by her, she couldn't tell.

“Jasper brought Andor's notebook up to Hasenkamp before he died,” she told him. “I guess he managed to get it out of Spöken hands. I know, given how you feel about the Mare-folk, that it's not what you wanted.”

“I just want my son, Lad. That's all I've wanted for a long time now – just my son.”

“You can't bring him home,” Fields said. “You know that. You know the Spöken would never let you.”

“I can't live up there, either.”

“Because they're wastelands, or because of the Mare-folk?”

Caine ran his tongue over his teeth, debating his answer.

“I don't know,” he said after a moment. “Both, maybe, or neither – I'm not sure anymore. But Oneris is my home.”

“You'd rather live in a place where Ratsel is in control of everyone – including you?” Fields asked. “You have to see what type of man he is now, Matt. Look what he's done to you: look what he tried to do to Simon.”

“I know. And I do. But ...”

“But nothing. You can't live here – not freely – so long as the Spöken have control.”

Caine sighed and flicked a piece of lint from his sleeve. The smell of the decaying animal was horrid from where they stood in the hall, and his expression was becoming more and more obscured from the darkness.

“Then they can't be in control anymore,” he said. “You've said it – Mason said it, too. We have to get rid of them.”

“We can't just get rid of the Spöken – especially not now. Jasper might've brought us the notebook, but it was in Ratsel's hands for long enough for him to get the information he needed out of it.”

“I wouldn't be so sure: they never got the key.”

“What key? And how can you be sure?”

“Because,” Caine said. “The key was with Andor when he died. He sliced me with it after he'd attacked you – that's how I got poisoned by the metal, though I didn't realize it until after Simon was born and the facility determined that he'd been infected by it.”

“But it could be anywhere by now,” Fields said. She hadn't hidden it with the notebook in the wall up in Caine's room, after all, nor did she remember tossing it away when they had cleaned up the mess in the Sawyers' kitchen. “Unless you've been holding onto it for all these years.”

“No, I haven't. Not exactly, anyway. But I think I know where it might be.”

“Where?”

“I think … I think we hid it with Andor's body.”

Fields turned her head to stare out the window into the blackened backyard, and her brow pulled down into a frown as she considered the information. She turned back to Caine and crossed her arms.

“It's buried in the backyard, you mean?” she asked.

Caine nodded, and Fields gave another sigh.

“Alright,” she said.

“Alright what?”

“Alright, get a shovel,” she said. “We're digging up your mother's begonias.”