Finding North (49 page)

“
To whom?”

“
To me,” Bestat said. “I
once had an answer. I believed it was one man. He created a world
of evil and . . . That was a long time ago. He and
his world are long forgotten, and I . . . I’m not
sure what to believe. I’ve seen the world cycle through this
pattern more times than I’d care to describe, and, still, I have no
idea who is behind it.”

“
Why?”

“
I no longer believe in
simple answers,” Bestat said and gave a sad smile. For the first
time in knowing her, Alex felt like she was seeing the real being
that was Bestat. Alex touched Bestat’s hand.

“
How long has this been
going on?” Alex asked.

“
All of my long life,”
Bestat said. “As soon as there is more liberty, more freedom, and
more food, they unleash pain upon the world.”

“
The way you say
it . . .” Alex said. “Is it humans doing this to
other humans?”

“
Of course,” Bestat
shrugged. “But remember, you are not the first species to burn to
death on this planet. I’m not sure it’s not some kind of natural
cycle for this planet. They are merely using it, enhancing the
suffering, in order to bring about their own ends.”

Bestat put her hand over
Alex’s and smiled.

“
You are a dear friend.
I’m grateful to know you.” Bestat smiled and leaned forward, “Where
is the key?”

“
What key?” Alex shook her
head.

Alex blinked against the
pain the simple movement caused.

“
Good girl,” Bestat said.
She put her hands on Alex’s head, and Alex felt immediate relief.
“Have you found all of the components?”

“
Maybe. I’m not sure,”
Alex said. “What’s that have to do with this skeleton?”

“
The key opens the lock to
an archive,” Bestat said.

“
Archive?”

“
In Linear A, no less,”
Bestat smiled.

“
What is in this archive?”
Alex asked.

“
How to make it stop,”
Bestat said. “Answers to the riddle of who forces the world to
suffer so much. It’s an amazing place. I was there a long, long
time ago. You will love it.”

“
But no one knows where it
is,” Alex said.

“
No,” Bestat said. “I was
young at the time I was there, and . . . No, no one
knows. They want to get there as badly as we do.”

“
Why?”

“
Because we stole a few
things from them,” Bestat said. “Without them, the world stays in
balance. They want their items back; we want the information. There
are many, many people, scholars, who say the archive doesn’t exist.
It’s a dream or a myth. Linear A and the location of the archive
have been lost. But I . . . I remember the archive.
I know it exists.”

“
I think my brain damage
washed Linear A out of my brain,” Alex said.

“
Did it?” Bestat
asked.

“
No, not really,” Alex
said. “Oddly, I think it fell into place while I was sleeping. Or
maybe, I’m now receptive to learning it.”

“
Imagine that,” Bestat
smiled.

“
Did
I . . .?” Alex asked.

“
Would you believe me if I
told you that you’ve known it all along?” Bestat asked.

“
And I had to tap my heels
three times to make it come to mind?”

Alex smiled.

“
What are you saying?”
Bestat asked.

“
Never mind,” Alex said.
“No, I would not believe you.”

“
That’s good, because it
was not true,” Bestat smiled.

“
Then
how . . .?”

“
You’ve been working on
the puzzle with a singular focus for almost six months,” Bestat
said. “My guess is that you could figure out anything if you gave
it that amount of time and effort.”

“
Is it going to take me as
long to figure out the maps?” Alex asked.

“
Maps?” Bestat became very
intense. She leaned forward. “What maps?”

Alex held up her hands as
if Bestat were holding a loaded gun.

“
I’m sorry,” Bestat leaned
back. “I was surprised.”

“
My grandfather had some
maps,” Alex shrugged. Bestat’s reaction kept her from saying
anything about the map of Ultima Thule. “I’m a cartographer. Why
would you be surprised by maps?”

“
The location of the
archive has been lost,” Bestat said. “I thought maybe you had found
a map to that location.”

“
I memorized a map from a
bookstore in Paris,” Alex said. She again avoided telling Bestat
that she had the map. “It was of Ultima Thule.”

Bestat raised her
eyebrows.

“
It had a mark on it,”
Alex said. “May I have a piece of paper and pen?”

“
Draw on my hand,” Bestat
said.

Alex scowled, but Bestat
nodded to assure her.

“
Let me finish it before
you look,” Alex said.

“
As you wish.”

Alex drew the compass rose
using her finger. As she drew, lines appeared on Bestat’s hand.
Alex nodded when she was done. Bestat looked down and
gasped.

“
Where did you see this
mark?” Bestat asked.

“
The maps Rebecca’s father
gave her and Ben,” Alex said. She nodded, and, then, as almost an
after-thought, she said, “And the map of Ultima Thule.”

Shaking her head, Bestat
put her hand over her heart.

“
I found a cartographer’s
set at the bookstore,” Alex said. “One of your kin was
there.”

“
Who?” Bestat
asked.

“
Eloise Le Grande,” Alex
said.

“
No,” Bestat said. “You
are mistaken. She is . . .”

“
Living in Paris,
apparently,” Alex said.

“
Think of her,” Bestat
ordered.

Alex envisioned Eloise Le
Grande as the older woman she’d appeared to be, and as the young,
beautiful woman Alex had met inside the store. Bestat rested her
hand gently on Alex’s wrist. Bestat gasped and leaned back.
Bestat’s eyes welled with tears.

“
I don’t know what to
say,” Bestat said. “I’m not sure if you got caught in a time loop —
that bookstore has been there for a hundred years at least and has
always been a mess — or, if she’s really alive. But,
why . . .”

“
There was a man there,”
Alex said. “He used to be in French Intelligence. I didn’t realize
he had left their service. He met her there.”

Bestat described the man
perfectly. Alex nodded.

“
Her rider,” Bestat said.
“I thought he’d killed her.”

“
Controlled is more like
it,” Alex said. “Dominated.”

She told Bestat about
getting trapped in the bookstore by Eloise Le Grande. Bestat
nodded.

“
He wouldn’t have been
able to tell the difference,” Bestat said.

“
Josh knew something
happened,” Alex said.

“
Exactly,” Bestat
nodded.

“
Oh,” Alex
said.

Bestat leaned forward and
kissed Alex’s cheek.

“
It heartens me greatly
that Eloise Le Grande is still here,” Bestat smiled. “She’s still
fighting our fight. It must have taken a tremendous strength of
will to pull off the time jump without her rider knowing. She has
given you an enormous gift.”

Alex smiled because she
didn’t know what else to say.

“
This cartographer’s
set . . .” Bestat said.

“
It has that mark on every
piece in the set,” Alex said. “And a book in Linear A, but get
this.”

“
What?”

“
Three of the pieces were
out of the set,” Alex said. “One of them, Max and I inherited from
Mom’s father. Another I got from Ben. The books was the
third.”

“
Good Lord,” Bestat
said.

“
Do you know it?” Alex
asked.

“
No,” Bestat said. “But
it’s been a very long time since I’ve been this close to the
struggle.”

“
Why are you now?” Alex
asked.

“
Just my turn, I guess,”
Bestat said.

Alex knew that Bestat was
not telling the truth, but she was too tired to confront
her.

“
How is Ji a part of
this?” Alex asked.

“
You will have to ask
him,” Bestat smiled. “You are tired and have been very ill. I’m
going to take my leave.”

“
But . . .”
Alex started.

Bestat
disappeared.

Alex was so desperately
tired that she could only blink. A nurse came in and chatted while
she took Alex’s vitals. Alex could only nod in agreement. She
struggled to keep her eyes open so that she wouldn’t see the
skeleton again.

Before the nurse left,
Alex fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Chapter
Thirty-four

One and a half weeks
later

Saturday
morning

June 11 — 9:05 a.m.
MDT

Denver,
Colorado

Laughing at John, Alex
pushed the shopping cart into the warehouse club store. The twins
were sitting on a quilted shopping-cart cover in the front
compartment of the shopping cart. The babies loved the warehouse
club store.

“
Hey!” Max called from the
door. “I forgot my card.”

Coming from behind, Wyatt
flashed his card and walked past Max, who was rooted at the
door.

“
Hey!” Max said
again.

Alex pointed to Wyatt, and
Max laughed. He jogged to catch up. They were early enough that the
store wasn’t crowded. Leena and Joseph were walking in front of
them with a cart. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Margaret
and MJ sitting with Ooljee at a white plastic table outside the
snack shop. She heard Trece’s distinctive laugh near the pharmacy.
They walked past Matthew and Troy arguing over an enormous
flat-screen television. Alex smiled.

She loved it when
everything came together.

“
What adorable children!”
an elderly woman wearing a headscarf said in a thick Persian
accent.

“
This is Joey,” Alex said.
“And his sister Máire.”

Her husband stopped to say
hello to the twins. The husband’s large, dark eyes took in the
children and Alex. He gave her a white, toothy grin.

“
They are very sweet,” he
said in his deep voice. His accent matched his wife’s.

“
Makes me want to have a
dozen more,” the woman said. “What do you say, Heydar?”

The man laughed, and they
moved on. As they walked away, Alex could have sworn the man had a
bony ridge down his back. One minute the ridge was there, and the
next it was gone. He turned to smile at Alex. She smiled
back.

“
Our list,” John said. He
made a show of taking out his smartphone.

“
It’s huge, I know,” Alex
said. “Cian is in total freak-out mode.”

“
It’s our babies’
birthday,” Wyatt said. “He should be.”

Raz came up from behind
them.

“
Sorry I’m late,” Raz
said. “Sami’s parking the car. We got stuck in traffic picking
up . . .” Raz leaned in as if he were telling a big
secret. He mouthed, “the cake.”

“
There’s a special
half-birthday cake?” Alex asked.

“
Of course, there is — a
half-cake,” Raz said.

“
We’ll get a regular cake
for their birthday,” John said. “In December.”

“
But really, it’s such a
mess with the holidays,” Wyatt agreed.

“
They need their own
celebration,” Raz said.

Max and Alex looked at
each other and then looked at John, Wyatt, and Raz. The twins
laughed. They continued walking along the wide concrete aisle
toward the back of the store. The warehouse seemed cold, so Alex
checked the twins. They were warm and happy.

“
Do we need another couple
of carts?” Alex asked.

“
Oh,” John stopped
walking. “You think so?”

Alex laughed. John leaned
forward and kissed her.

“
Let’s get
one
cart at a time
and
only
if we
need them,” Max said.

“
Good thinking,” Raz
said.

“
Sorry,” Samantha said as
she jogged up. Samantha leaned over to say hello to Joey and Máire.
“How are the birthday twins?”

Joey grabbed Samantha’s
long auburn hair, and Máire laughed. Alex stepped back from the
cart so that Samantha could free her hair. Samantha took over
pushing the cart.

“
Bread,” Alex said. “We
need seven loaves or something. Is he really making a bread
pudding?”

“
I’m afraid so,” John
said.

Alex looked up and saw
that Peggy, Sergeant Dusty’s wife, and Sergeant Dusty were standing
near the meat section. Their middle child was sitting in the cart
on a quilt that looked suspiciously like her twins’ cart quilt.
Peggy’s mother was carrying their youngest. Their oldest son took
off running, and Sergeant Dusty ran to catch up. Alex pointed down
an aisle.