Idols (25 page)

Fortis is reproachful. “For a monk, you’re not very hospitable, Beebs. Especially considering that they’re just children. Children who have traveled a very long way to get here.” He clicks his tongue—a mock scolding.

“Since when did you play the nanny, Fortis?”

“I’m hardly a nanny. More of a parent, if you think about it. As are you. We were there, after all, when the plans were laid. You, me, Yang, Ela.”

My heart is hammering. I grab the edge of the tub, steadying myself as I listen. I keep my eyes squeezed tightly shut.

I have no choice but to listen.

A long silence follows.

I realize I’m holding my breath. Because it’s us.
They’re talking about us. The plans that were laid to create us. I remember our conversations back at Santa Catalina, the discovery that we weren’t simply born like normal children.

That we were designed.

Manufactured.

Created in advance of the Lords’ arrival, as if we had something to do with the whole thing.

I have been able to put it out of my mind, but hearing them talk about it in such matter-of-fact voices makes my head hurt.

“No,” Bibi says. “It can’t be. Not these children. You are not telling me that.”

“I am.”

“Impossible. The Humanity Project was not successful. There were no viable specimens produced.”

“And yet here they are. Four Icon Children, true to form.”

I push my shoulder harder against the rim of the tub.

Fortis keeps going. “Just looking for a little help from an old friend. Or from family, you might say.”

He sounds like he’s teasing, but I know differently. He’s deadly serious.

Bibi sounds incredulous. “If what you’re saying is true, they’re not just children. Not only children. I don’t know what they are.” His voice is so low, now, I have to strain to hear it. “I heard the rumors. What happened in the Hole. I just never believed it. I didn’t even let myself truly believe the Icon in the Hole was destroyed. I couldn’t accept what that might mean—if it were them.” He shakes his head. “It’s unimaginable. The power they have. The things we created.”

Things.

That’s what we are.

“I was there in the Hole,” says Fortis, gloating, as if he’s savoring every moment of Bibi’s reaction. “We did it. It’s more than imaginable—it’s believable. So believe it.”

There is a pause so long I think the conversation is over—until I hear a drawn-out sigh. I press harder, pushing until I can once again see a face.

It’s Bibi. “Fine. They can stay as long as they like. But not you, Merk.”

“Now, William. I’m starting to think you want to pretend we didn’t work side by side in a lab together? In the glory days of our youth?”

“And all that time, I had no idea what a rat I was involved with.”

How big a rat, Fortis?

What did you do?

What did you do and who did you do it for?

“You make
rat
sound like such a pejorative term. I prefer to say
flexible realist
.” Fortis’s voice is so cold, now. “I am, after all, a Merk. I never said I wasn’t.”

A pause. Then Bibi adds, “Speaking of which, I’ve never understood. What was in it for you, with all this? Our little Humanity Project?”

Fortis’s voice is almost gleeful. “Ah, see, now? You’re curious. Beneath all this monk rot an’ all this teacher rubbish, you’re no different than I am. You want to know if it’s working? What we started?” He’s practically shouting. “Because you’ve heard about the Hole. And you know what they can do, what they’ve done. You know something’s going on, now, don’t you? Something bigger than what we started, all those years ago.”

Bibi is defensive. “I don’t want to know anything. Not at the price of falling in with you again. I’ve learned that lesson.”

“Fine, then. Don’t.” Fortis laughs.

“I won’t. And it seems like this conversation is over,” Bibi says.

“You’d think, wouldn’t you? Except for one thing,” Fortis answers.

“And here it goes. Like clockwork,” Bibi says. “Let me guess. You need my help.”

“You know the Colonies better than anyone.” Fortis is irritated. I can hear it in his voice. “You or Yang. Especially now that Ela’s out of the picture.”

“Ah yes. I heard as much. So very strange, really. For a survivor like Ela.”

“It does limit my options.”

“Considerably. Especially since, as much as I hate you, Yang hates you more.” Bibi sighs.

Fortis practically growls. “Laugh all you like. There’s someone I need to find. We need to find. One more, like the others. If she exists. The fifth.”

“My god.”

Another long silence.

Fortis clears his throat. “I’ll make it worth your while.”

When he speaks, Bibi sounds bitter. “Yes, well. You always say that, and yet somehow, I always end up on the losing end of your propositions.”

Fortis is pacing; I can hear how the floor creaks beneath his feet.

Bibi raises his voice. “What do they know? The so-called Children.”

“They’re hardly children, I’ll agree with you there. After what they’ve seen. Done.”

“What you do changes you. You of all people know that, Merk.”

“As do you, William.”

“And?”

“They know what they are, more or less. They know why they’re here—at least, part of it. As much as they can.”

I freeze. I can’t believe I’m hearing the words, and from Fortis’s own mouth.

He thinks I know what I am and why I’m here? More or less?

And how is he having this conversation with a stranger, rather than with me?

My heart is pounding like feet on a pavement. Running. Racing.

Fleeing.

I can’t breathe.

I feel like my head will explode.

I’m blacking out.

“Dol? Dol, are you okay?” It’s Tima, grabbing me by the arm. I open my eyes.

It’s over.

The next thing I know, I’m back in the bath, dumping bowls of water over my head. It does not make me feel clean, no matter how many rose petals and lime slices and fragrant strips of lemongrass Bibi’s housekeeper has floated in the tubs for us.

It does not make me feel refreshed or better or more like myself. My old self.

Nothing can.

Bibi and Fortis.

Yang and Ela, whoever they are.

And then Tima and Lucas and Ro and me.

Tima and Lucas and Ro and me and the little jade girl.

How do we fit together? These men who treat us like children and yet insist that we are not?

What do they have to do with us?

And whatever it is, how is it that they know? Why won’t Fortis tell me? Why do I care as much as I do?

I dump the water over my face and down my back and past my burning eyes.

If there are tears they won’t know it.

If there are tears I won’t say.

“Are you okay?” Tima reaches for my hand. Without the usual layers of grime, she seems softer, more vulnerable. She stands at the doorway to the garden, now wearing the loose yellow-gold robes of Bibi’s students, as we all do.

For some reason, she has waited for me.

Probably for the same reason, I find myself waiting for Lucas and Ro.

And then I tell them what I have heard. All of them. About what I’ve seen. About the Icon Children book.

I tell them everything.

Lucas is the first to answer. “Don’t let on that you heard them.” His voice is low and steady. “All right? Not yet. Don’t act like we know anything. Not until we figure out what to do.”

He pulls me toward him, and I feel his head, warm and damp against mine. I want to burst into tears, curl up in his arms, fall asleep crying against his side.

I don’t do any of those things. I can’t. He can’t. That time is over. At least for now.

We look each other in the eye.

“Buttons is right. We wait. That way, when we make our move, he won’t see it coming.” For Ro and Lucas to actually agree on something is strangely sobering.

“Which is?” Tima looks skeptical. “What move?”

“I don’t know. Run away? Join up with the Grass Rebellion in another Embassy City? Or maybe just have an intervention and tell Daddy our feelings are hurt.” Ro runs his hand through his spiky brown hair. It’s his tell—he’s as frustrated as the rest of us.

Lucas agrees. “Whatever we do, one thing is clear. Don’t trust the Merk.” He shrugs. “At least now we know.”

Ro pushes open the doorway, motioning to us. It is time to rejoin the group.

Scrubbed clean and nearly dry, we look like different people. That much is true.

And so we are, but I’m not sure the bath has anything to do with it.

Fortis knows more than he’s saying. We’ve always known that. And technically, what I saw does nothing more than confirm it. What, then, has changed?

Everything.

“So,” says Bibi, brightly, when we enter the garden. “I understand you’re looking for someone. We’re going to make a little trip to town tomorrow. I have a friend who I think can be of some help to you.”

He nods at Fortis, as if the two of them have been doing nothing but laughing about old times.

“Yes,” Fortis says. “Bibi has graciously agreed to act as our guide. For old times’ sake.”

Bibi grunts. “Old times,” he says, distastefully, as if the words are sour as the plate of slivered green mango in front of him. “Of course. But first, we eat.”

Wonderful.

Plates of fresh and dried fruit cover the low table between us. Dried bananas the size of human tongues—which is exactly what they look like—pile against smaller dried strawberries, scarlet-colored and sweet, and even smaller dried longan, golden and tasting like a cross between raisins and nuts. Round rolls are studded with raisins and slathered with coconut and mango jam. Golden curls of noodles float in bowls of richly scented broth, next to plates of fluffy rice. Round green eggplants quartered into sticky sweet sauces compete with spears of green morning glory, slivered with massive discs of ginger, and crispy fried sheets of kale.

Bibi’s no Remnant.

He must have money
, I think.
Protection. A reason he didn’t end up in the Projects like Ro and I would have, without the Padre.

Because this is a feast for kings, and we have not really eaten in more than a week now. Still, none of us can manage a bite. Our appetites have been stolen with our trust, all in a few moments of illicitly intercepted conversation.

Bibi notices our empty plates. He pours tea from an iron set, dripping lychee and longan honey across it. “At least let me offer you some tea. The bees are from my own yard. Out back, in my garden.”