Dearly, Beloved (54 page)

By the time I found the other carriages parked in a grove of dark, narrow trees just a stone’s throw from where the fighting had taken place, Company Z owned the campsite. When I joined them, Nora ran to me again, and I shrugged off Smoke, dropped Michael, and curled her in against my chest, shutting my eyes and squeezing her almost painfully close. I was tired. I hadn’t seen so much action in months. I was fairly calm now that she was safe, but I needed to get myself under full control.

I was a hypocrite. A walking contradiction. Both alive and dead, both a leader and nothing like it, both with my friends and occasionally against them, both happy to work with the living and ready to fight them for every scrap of extended time I could get.

Nora was the only thing that made sense. She was the only unchanging thing in my universe. She was my lodestar. No matter which way my emotions and circumstances and the impulses of my dead, dying,
trying
body pulled me, no matter how many
mistakes I made, she was always true north. Sometimes I’d side with the dead, sometimes with the living, but always with her.

“I love you,” I whispered in her ear.

She kissed my Adam’s apple. “God, I love you.”

I pulled back, only to see that she was crying. I wiped her tears away with my thumbs, and then scrubbed at her face a bit. “You’re a mess. Anyone’d think you’d been through a war, or something.” She laughed.

“What did you do with my car?” Samedi said weakly, looking around. “That was my retirement.”

“Chas has it. Did most of the AG people follow it?”

“I think they all did,” Nora said. “I actually don’t think they got many of the Changed. They never left their trucks.”

From within Coalhouse’s carriage, Laura and Dog emerged. Laura released a sob when she saw what was happening in the field—most of the Changed rounded up, with a few lying dead on the ground. “Oh God. This is my fault.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

She crushed a handful of her own roses. “The zombies here—Hagens lied to them. But I didn’t know who believed what, aside from a few, and so I thought I couldn’t trust anyone …”

Nora moved to put her hands on the flower girl’s shoulders. “You did well. I heard what you said. We got some people out, or gave them the chance to get out. That’s all we could do.”

“Good,” I said, relieved. “Where’s Hagens?”

“She’s not here,” Laura said, voice dropping. “She got away.”

“So we still have her to worry about. Great.”

As I spoke, I heard sirens. Turning to look, I saw a new herd of lights approaching. Army. Soon the advance guard was driving onto the field, speakers activating.
“Show us your hands! Remain calm!”
My men did so.

“Okay. Everyone, we’ll get our stories straight later. Right now, we need to move.” I gained Laura’s attention. “Go out to
the field. Tell the soldiers which of those people, if any, are guilty of being truly in league with Hagens. If any committed a crime on her orders. And tell them P One is being taken back to the boats, and that they can call on me if he doesn’t make it.”

“All right.” Laura looked at her hands, then back at me. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me.” And then I gave voice to what I’d been thinking since the night at The Failing Liver. “After I finish this, I’ll find you. But until then,
you
need to help your people. Anyone who was just caught up in this, anyone who’s willing to work with the living—you have to look out for them.”

Laura nodded solemnly. Dog edged closer to her, as well as Ben, who offered to escort her. As they headed for the field, Nora turned her eyes up to me. “Going after Coalhouse?”

I squeezed her hand. “Yeah.”

“He didn’t kidnap me, Bram. I told him to take me. It was the only way he and Smoke were going to get out of the ship alive. He’s mixed up, but he was trying to save lives. He said something about Company Z being in danger, and Hagens might’ve had the Changed attack the ships to get Smoke back.”

“Then it’s even more important I find him.” Leaning down, I kissed her again. She wrapped her slight arms about my neck, pulling me to her just as passionately as I pressed into her embrace. She tasted of a hundred sweet things and just a hint of the blood passing beneath my cold lips, pulsing through the living flesh of hers, a mere membrane away. When she let me go, I said, “I promise I’ll come back to you. As long as I have one leg and an eyeball left, I will
always
return to you. Do you believe me?”

“Yes.” She stroked my face. “You did it once before.”

“Avoid the army. Go home. Take Smoke away yourselves—I don’t want him flipping out right now. Get Allister to talk about the Roe bombing and the masks.” Her jaw dropped. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

A few minutes later I left in Coalhouse’s carriage, alone. After all that had just happened, the vehicle cab, the field, and the night itself seemed far too quiet, far too empty. For a minute I wondered where I should head, what I should look for. Coalhouse might be on foot, and had 360 degrees open to him.

From the dark, something else called out to me. Something old, practically primal, yet extant—it wasn’t a memory, or an emotion, or even a thought. It was something real. Something that sang to my very flesh, to every instinct within me.

It was the sound of a train headed down the tracks.

Somehow, I was willing to bet he’d follow them. It’s what I would have done. Tracks were a surer bet than roads. They had to lead somewhere, eventually, if you just followed them long enough. There were fewer forks, fewer directions to keep track of.

After a few moments I shut off my lights and turned around, heading away from the camp, keeping a low profile in case the AG guards were still around. I decided to follow the tracks to the north. If I didn’t encounter him in a few hours, I’d try heading south.

World ending or not, tired or not, I still had work to do.

During the drive back to New London, everyone took turns filling the group in. I begged to be told about the Roes, but Dr. Chase insisted I speak first. So I told them about my encounter with Smoke, Coalhouse’s flawed reasoning, and Hagens’s plans.

Only then did Tom tell me what Michael had done and planned to do. About the Ratcatcher. He had the letters on him. I was so angry it physically hurt. I wanted to murder the boy, unconscious though he was, and Tom had to trap me against his short, muscular body in the backseat to get me under control. After two minutes of struggling I gave in, leaned back against the carriage door and tried not to cry. I didn’t speak. I couldn’t. It was all too much.

We went to the boats first, and dropped Smoke off. He looked relieved to be back in his cage. I told Papa and a handful of army officials what had happened, what Smoke had said about Allister’s preserve—everything but the information I’d newly heard about Michael and the masks. I wanted to get it out, because I could tell, from the tightness with which my father held me and the tremor in his voice, that I would soon be Belize-bound.

“You’re leaving,” he finally said, as he saw to my wounds. “I love you, but you’re leaving.”

“I know.” And I knew it was pointless to fight him, at least at the moment. Because I also knew what was awaiting me at home. What we still had to deal with.

Interrogation. The whole truth, at last.

It was close to dawn by the time we got everyone assembled in the celestial parlor. I wanted to wait until Bram returned to talk to Michael, but we didn’t have time. The Allisters had to be going nuts, wondering where their son was. Of course, if they had been keeping an eye on him, none of this might have happened. Maybe we had all the time in the world.

Lopez stood in the corner. He’d been waiting at the house for hours. Dr. Chase and Dr. Samedi claimed chairs, while the Roes took the couch. Pamela was reluctant to leave my side, and I was reluctant to let her. She kept moving toward her seated family to offer them support, then back to me, sweeping back and forth across the floor like a pendulum. I figured her motions mirrored her mood—happy to see everyone safe, anxious about what was to come.

Michael sat on the piano bench, his hands unbound, his suit crusted with blood and his face swollen. It actually improved his appearance, by my reckoning.

Finally, Tom showed up with Renfield and a living boy—the last people to enter. The boy was lanky, crazy-haired, and seemed to buzz on his feet, all energy and anticipation.

“Who’s that?” Michael demanded.

“Havelock Moncure,” the boy said. He looked at the Roes, and managed to contain his enthusiasm. “Reporter.”

“Who starts?” The situation felt almost informal. My best
friends, my mentors, people whom I admired—they were all congregated in my house, drinking coffee and tea, waiting for the blood sport to commence. The Dearly version of a high-class salon.

“Yes, what’s going on?” Mr. Roe asked on behalf of his family.

“I won’t talk,” Michael said, glaring at Havelock. “This is pointless. If you let me go now, I’ll convince my father not to get you all for kidnapping.”

“So you don’t want to talk about the bombing?” Tom asked. “Remember, I was there.”

Pamela slowly stood up. “Bombing?”

Michael rolled his eyes. “Someone shut the baggage up.”

Tom made like he was going to start the Pain Olympics, Pamela gunning for his side, but I held up a hand. “No. No more punching.” I swept toward Allister. “I’m tired. Tell us what you know. Because you’re not getting out of here until you do.”

“I won’t,” he said again, turning his eyes to mine. “In fact, I can’t.”

“Do you honestly think you’re going to get away with this?” I said, my face heating. “You think we’re not going to go to the police?”

Michael’s eyes widened. “You can’t go to the police. They won’t believe you anyway.” And then they narrowed. “If you do, I’ll drag your deadmeat beau down with me. I told him that in the field. I can get him for about ten different charges. You should see what he did to Allister Genetics!”

Fear fluttered in my heart, but I knew Bram could handle anything Michael threw at him. “I’m not talking about just you. I’m talking about all the people you’re working with, whoever they are. We don’t need the coppers. We’re going to bring the masks down, and we’ll be sure to tell each one who referred us.”

“More than that,” Samedi said, almost casually, “think of the
info we do have. Who’s been snitching on you, Mikey? Who’s been selling you out? And who else might he have told?”

Allister looked around at everyone, assessed every avenue of escape. He realized the truth of our words.

And he started spilling.

He told us about the Murder—that the group had been formed months ago and only just become active. He told us about the system that allowed its members to exchange paper notes by numbering and hiding them behind a false stone in a pub fireplace, their attempts at intra-group anonymity. He told us about the zombies he’d seen get killed and all the living sympathizers he’d seen get hurt. About his plans for Bram.

When Lopez heard about the Roes, his fists curled eloquently, and he chose to walk to the very edge of the room. When Michael got to the death of Mr. Delgado, Isambard very nearly tackled him, and Samedi had to step forward and hold the boy back until he got himself under control.

Although I knew it would threaten every scintilla of my own control, I looked at Pam.

She didn’t move. Not even when Issy flew past her. She stared at Michael almost blankly, her eyes a maelstrom of unfocused emotion. Behind her, her mother wailed and her father chose to hold her, even as his eyes threatened to reduce Michael to a heap of smoking embers. But Pamela didn’t move.

“Why?” she asked. “Just … why?”

Michael acted like her question was irrelevant. “If I had any hope that you’d move up in the world, marry a lord, I would have waited. I would’ve taken you down socially.” He frowned slightly. “But I don’t. You could remain low and dirt poor for the rest of your life. I had to hit you where it hurt. Because you hurt me, endangered me, disrespected me.”

It took every ounce of willpower to remain where I was. “It
was all me, then,” Pamela said numbly. “I did this. I brought this on my family.”

“
You
didn’t do it,” I said. “Don’t you dare believe him.”

“I did do it. By ever liking him.” Suddenly, Pamela flew into frenzied action, racing across the floor. She kicked the piano bench out from under Allister and put her boot into his chest when he tried to crawl back across the floor, causing him to cough violently. “But thank you! You hear me?
Thank you!
” she screeched into his face. “Because I know what my life’s been leading up to now. Oh, yes. You’ve given my pathetic little life meaning! Because I am going to use the lady’s education I should never have had, and the contacts I never should have made, and I am going to do whatever I must to remain in high society, because I’m going to haunt and torment you for the rest of your miserable life! I don’t care what the cops and the courts do to you—you will never atone for this. I will make you fear everything that wears a skirt, including dogs dressed up for Halloween, do you hear me?!”