Matter of Truth, A (15 page)

I can do this, I tell myself. I can press the numbers and
say the words:
I’m sorry, I love you, I’m coming home.
I can do this.

I can’t do this.

And yet . . .

I
have
to do this.

I close my eyes and press the phone against my forehead.
This is excruciating. I abandoned him. I loved him and abandoned him after he
found me when I thought I’d lost him forever. He came for me, and I love him,
still love him so much, maybe more now than before—and I have to do this. No
matter what, I have to make this call.

I let out a long breath and lower the phone. And then I
punch his numbers in and wait.

Three rings, and then, “Whitecomb here.”

My words dissipate and fly away. My tongue goes asleep. My
brain flat lines. Because, gods, I love his voice. But I do not love hearing
what sounds like gunshots in the background. Karl mentioned a difficult
mission, but—

“Karl?”

Chloe, I want to say. It’s Chloe.

There’s an exasperated sigh and then a dial tone.

With trembling fingers, I redial the number. Why are there
gunshots going off where he is? Two rings this time before he answer with,
“Don’t waste my time, Karl. I’m already late to the rendezvous point thanks to
Rosemary’s incompetency at reading maps.”

Somebody screams in the background, a blood-curdling shriek
that vocalizes pain and terror. My stomach twists until I’m breathless. I
search frantically for my voice. And then, barely vocalized, “It’s me.”

Silence.

I clear my throat. Louder now, “Jonah, it’s—it’s Chloe.”

There’s an intake of breath over the line, one loud enough
to act like defibrillators on my light speed racing, aching heart. But he still
doesn’t say anything.

“I’m . . . Karl’s with me. He, uh, I’m on his phone, and I
wanted to call you and let you know . . .” Do not cry, Chloe. He does not need
to listen to you have a breakdown, especially if he’s in a warzone. “I’m okay.”

His words are just as broken as mine. “Where are you?”

I clench my eyes shut and lower my head. “Alaska. We’re in .
. .” A futile attempt at swallowing the water balloon in my throat is attempted
only to fail. “Anchorage.”

What sounds like an explosion goes off at his end, sending
me off the couch in alarm. It takes Jonah a good five seconds before he answers.
“I . . . Anchorage? Is that near a portal? I’m—fuck. I’m in Kuergal right now.
But I can get there in—”

An inner dam breaks and the only thing holding back the
deluge is my self-imposed blindness in the moment. “No. You—you just said
you’re late for your rendezvous. I don’t—don’t just drop that because I’m . .
.” I grapple for my coherency. “You don’t need to come here. You need—it sounds
like you need to find somewhere safe. Don’t risk—I’m not . . .” Why can’t I get
out the right words? My nails dig into my palm in my free hand. “I’ll be back
in Annar soon with Karl. I just . . . I wanted to let you know I’m okay. To
tell you I—” I’m flat out flailing. “Just . . . stay safe. Please just . . .
stay safe.” Oh, gods, this is awful. I’m doing a horrible job at this. I might
as well rip my heart out and stab it to the ground right now, it hurts so much.
Plus, I apparently cannot string together cohesive sentences and now I sound
like a total fool. The last thing he needs when guns and bombs are going off
around him in fricking Kuergal, a country on the Elvin plane renown for its
violence, is dealing with me on the phone. “Can you . . . when I get back, can
I see you? Can you—” Another explosion goes off, leaving my ears ringing.
Jesus, how can I do this? “Can you and your brother come to see me? There are a
lot of things,”—another fruitless attempt at swallowing—“I, uh,
we
need
to talk about.”

There’s a pause in which I debate a thousand times whether
or not I just made another massive mistake. Finally, like he’s saying the
hardest thing he’s ever had to admit, “You don’t want me to come get you?”

More gunshots fill the background. Angry voices yelling a
language I don’t know punctuate the tiny bursts of silence between explosions.
My fingers tighten around the phone.

I don’t know how I’m going to do this. Misery and shame and
love and a dozen other messy emotions bloom and threaten to cripple me. “It’s
not that I don’t,” I choke out. “But, you’ve got a job, and . . . It’s . . .
I’m so sorry. I need to do this. I need—I need to come back to Annar and I need
some time to think.” Gods, how selfish does that sound? Time to
think
?
Like I haven’t already spent six months thinking? I’m butchering this. Flat-out
hacking to pieces this lousy first contact between us in months.

Somebody on his end shouts at him, this time in English; I
can only pick a few words out, but they’re terrifying ones:
hide, protect
you, get the fuck out of here, anarchy
. He ignores them to ask me, “You
swear you’re okay?”

My crystalline heart shatters as it drops to my feet. He
sounds like I’m the one with the gun, and I’ve shot him right in the chest
while grinning. “I swear,” I tell him, even though at the moment, I’m not even
close to fine. And then, because I am the worst kind of girl, I put my foot on
top of his bleeding chest, like a hunter with a smoking rifle downing my trophy
and posing for a victory photo, because I say next, “I’ll text you the address
I’ll be staying at when I get back to Annar.”

Getting air into my lungs is becoming increasingly
difficult.

I love you, I want to shout. I miss you. I choose you. YOU.
I love you. I’m so sorry.

But my lips don’t move. His do, though. “That’s . . . that’s
what you want? To
text
me an address where you’ll be staying when you
get back to Annar?” He says it like he can’t believe he’s saying it. Like it’s
a jumble of foreign words he’s merely regurgitating.

My voice shatters entirely when I tell him it is.

Another explosion fills the phone, and then there’s silence.
Our connection is broken.

I’ve never felt more panicked in my entire life.

Kuergal is in chaos.

I’m staring in horror at the small television set I’ve just
created, as it runs cellphone videos of anarchy at its worst. Whoever was
yelling at Jonah wasn’t kidding about that. Cars and buildings are burning,
people are dying, and guns and bombs are going off.

I’m two seconds close to creating a portal in the Dane’s
living room to get myself to the Elvin plane when Karl comes back inside from
his perimeter check. “Ah,” he says quietly. “You got through to Jonah.”

All I’m capable of is a number of gurgling sounds. I decide
right then and there that I need to make sure Jonah’s okay. I need to see it
for myself. I make myself a screen, but Karl snatches it away from me the
moment a picture flickers to life.

He crushes it between his hands. “Things have gotten really
bad in Kuergal lately,” he says, sitting next to me on the couch. I stare at
the mangled screen, still dangling from his fingers. “That’s why Jonah’s there.
He’s trying to get the conflict to end.” Karl drops the mess on the coffee
table and scrubs at his hair. “Funny thing is, the civil war didn’t even start
due to any of our missions. Took the Council totally by surprise; things had
been quiet there for a good few years now.” He pauses. “Well, quiet for them,
at least.”

It’s a weird relief, knowing Jonah wasn’t the cause behind
this madness. Still, since I can’t see how he’s doing and the line I just
called him at seems to be dead, I drill Karl for information. “Does he have a
team with him?”

“Yes. He brought four additional Emotionals with him,
including Kellan. This is a really tough gig, though. There are a lot of
deep-seated prejudices and hatreds in that area that need more than a quickie
Emotional hit.”

So, Kellan is there, too. I . . . I don’t even . . .

“That’s all he has? Emotionals? Nobody else to back him up?”

“There are some other Magicals working in Kuergal right now,
but Jonah felt it best that, for what he was going to do, he work with
Emotionals.” Karl taps a finger against his knee. “According to mission specs,
they were supposed to separate today to work in different quadrants of the
city. I can’t promise you right now he has anyone with him.”

But he did. Somebody was trying to get him out of wherever
he was, so at least there’s that. Even still, it’s nearly impossible to just
continue sitting here and do nothing. What if he gets hurt before I have the
chance to try to make things right between us? “He wanted to come here. Come
get me. I told him no. To stay there and find somewhere safe.”

A heavy hand curls around my shoulder. “Which was the right
thing to say, Chloe. As much as I know this has been . . . tough on the two of
you, he’s desperately needed there.”

There is so much blood on the TV. So much pain and
suffering.

“What if—”

“He’ll be fine.” Coming from Karl, it sounds like it’s the
promised truth. “You think he’s going to let somebody take him down now that he
knows you’re coming home? Please. He’s got a fire under his ass now. Kuergal is
going to turn into the happiest place in all the worlds. Just you wait and
see.”

Jonah’s in a warzone. A freaking
warzone,
risking his
life so he can help people. And here I am, like a coward, in Alaska, with
blonde hair and a fake name, shirking her duties, and I have never, ever felt
more worthless in my life.

Something in me hardens. That girl? That stupid, pointless,
coward of a girl? She’s gone. Dead.

I will never, ever be her again.

I’m seconds out of the bathroom, towel around my wet hair,
when Will comes to tell me I need to come out to the living room. Cameron and
Karl are already out there, talking to the Elvin nurse practitioner that
patched me up the other day.

Thank goodness I’ve been wearing sweats to bed.

“It’s bad,” Erik is saying. “People are scared. Nobody knows
what to do. There’s talk of splitting up the colonies, at least until things
die down. We thought this was over, but it’s starting anew.”

Karl’s brows are drawn down, like he’s caught between being
pissed and worried. Cameron’s obviously concerned, too, but his frown attempts
to hide behind his beard. “There’s safety in numbers, Erik. I think it’s best
to stay put.”

I pull the towel off and comb my fingers through my hair.
“What are you guys talking about? What colonies?”

There’s a strange look in Erik’s eyes when he regards me.
When he was sewing me up, or helping me through alcohol poisoning, he’d been
cool and professional. Now, there’s a bit of fear and distrust mixed in with
concern. “Can we truly trust her?” he asks Cameron. And then, motioning toward
Karl, “Them? Their sort isn’t known for being sympathetic to us, after all.”

Both Karl and I bristle. “Look,” Karl bites out. “You can’t
hold any of this against Chloe or me. It’s not like we were aware of the
situation.”

This angers Erik, who flushes red under his brown skin.
“Your people chose to ignore our plights for years. Pardon me if I’m not too
eager to lay my faith in a group of people who believe I’m an abomination and
treat me worse than the dirt on their shoes.”

Whoa. “I don’t think—” I begin, but Karl’s already on this.

“If Annar knew and ignored it, then that’s definitely
something that needs to be addressed.” He’s obviously trying to keep his temper
in check, but his hands have curled into fists. “And I vow to you, it will be.
But instead of bitching about hurt feelings, know you’ve got two high-ranking
Council members who happen to also be on the Guard listening
now
.
Neither of us will turn our backs on you.”

It’s an overly generous thing of Karl to say about me,
considering I’d done just that on Annar and my loved ones back home six months
prior. This promise of his only steels my resolve to be a better person.

A better Creator.

A better
Chloe
.

“You’re here to take the Creator home.” Erik’s sneer is
ugly. “Which is all well and good, considering she’s most likely the reason
this is happening!”

“What’s going on?” I try again. I mean, if the dude’s going
to blame me for something, I at least deserve to know the reason why.

Will snaps his fingers. “Everyone, just shut up for a
moment.” His hands form a tee for time-out. “Cheers. Let’s catch Chloe up.”

Cameron gives me a small, tired smile. “Hen, the shape
shifting monsters—”

“Elders,” Karl quickly corrects.

Cameron nods. “The Elders have attacked and killed several
Métis recently, including one on the outskirts of Anchorage earlier tonight.
People are scared.”

Uh . . . “Métis?”

The sneer Erik gave me moments before has nothing on the one
he’s angling toward me now.

“Erik,” Cameron says quietly, “do not take your anger toward
Annar out on Chloe. As Karl has just explained, she is ignorant of all of this,
which shouldn’t come as a surprise as our communities have made supreme efforts
to keep Magical-kind just so.”

Erik gives a tight nod, and then another to me in reluctant
apology.

“Hen, the Métis are what the people and families I told you
about earlier—the ones like me and Molly and now Will—are called, where there
is Magical blood but no powers in children from mixed unions. Many of our kind
have either married into the Métis or are children of Magicals.”

Jesus. I have truly been ignorant and blind for years.
Apparently Karl has, too, because he’s just as surprised as me. “You said there
are multiple colonies of Métis? How many?”

Erik’s answer is less hostile than before. “It varies on
each plane, but on ours, there are six, including Anchorage. Comparatively,
this is one of the larger groups; at last census, we totaled seventy-three.”

Karl’s eyes widen. “All with Magical bloodlines?”

“Yes,” Cameron answers. “But remember, a lot of the Métis
might be several generations removed from their Magical forbearer.”

“But—Magicals can only produce one pregnancy,” I say. This
is unreal.

“True. But Métis like Will or myself,” Erik says, “are no
longer bound by such genetics. Many Métis families have multiple children in
them.”

Will’s pissed. “Is everyone else kept in the dark, or was
that just me?”

Cameron sighs. “Son—”

“No, I’m curious,” Will retorts. “If there are so many of
these so-called colonies, and they even have a fancy name for us half-breeds,
then one would assume that it’s public knowledge, at least amongst the
citizens. Right?”

Erik looks at Will like he’s nothing more than an annoying
toddler. “Many Métis children are not told until they’re older for the safety
of the colonies.”

“Because children are blabbermouths, right?” Will asks
darkly. “That would have been my first impulse. Tell everyone in Glasgow so
they could come after us with pitchforks and torches. But let’s not forget I am
no longer a child—or is twenty-two still considered infancy amongst you wise,
elderly folk?”

I lay a hand on his arm. His sarcasm, so easily accessed
when he’s in defense mode, isn’t going to help any of us right now. “People
fear what they don’t understand. I know it seems hard to believe, but your
parents were looking out for you.”

“Don’t do that,” he snaps. “You railed about how your
parents kept you in the dark. Don’t go excusing why mine were just as guilty.”

His anger is painful to see. “It’s true I grew up knowing I
was a Magical. But I also had the ability to protect myself if somebody ever
tried to hurt me. Your mom and dad—they didn’t want you to get hurt.”

He clearly doesn’t believe me.

“Look. I have a friend back in Annar who is like you. A
Métis. She grew up knowing what she was, surrounded by Magicals, and . . . it
was hard for her. She’s struggled with self-esteem issues her whole life.” I
squeeze his arm gently. “You mom and dad cared enough about you to take you out
of Annar when you were little. You grew up never thinking you were any
different from anybody else. That you were any less than them. That was a gift,
Will. I know it’s hard to see that now, but it really was.”

His face is blank when he asks, “Is that the case now? That
you think I’m less of a person because I’m only half of a Magical with no powers
to show for?”

I can’t help but smile a little. “Do you think less of me,
knowing what I am, what I’m capable of? After all, you’ve seen me destroy
things. Some would call me a monster.”

“No.” His words are hushed. “You’re just Chloe to me.”

“And you’re just Will to me.” The corners of my lips lift
higher. “Plus, Magical or not, you would have made your mom proud with the way
you handled a sword and helped take down an Elder. Maybe you do have a bit of
Smith in you after all.”

He kisses the back of my hand and then turns back to the
rest of the group. “Fine. I’m being a bloody prat. There are obviously loads
more important issues to be dealt with than me kicking my feet and fists
against the floor. Shall we commence on figuring out what to do about people
dying?”

“Have the Elders attacked the Métis before?” Karl asks. He’s
got his phone out, typing in notes like he does at mission briefings. I love
that he’s doing it, that he sees this here—these people I’ve grown to
love—equally as worthy of his time as the Magicals back home.

There’s a tense silence that has Erik and Cameron debating
whether or not to answer his question. It hurts to see Cameron hesitating, but
I guess old habits prefer slow deaths. Finally, Erik says, “Yes. I don’t have
specifics, but I think they’ve murdered a few dozen of our kind over the last
ten years.”

My eyes fly to Karl’s. He’s uncharacteristically grim, and
that’s saying something. Because I think we both realized something at the same
time.

In their quest for vengeance, the Elders are killing more
than just Magicals. They’re killing the Métis, too.

The situation just got a thousand times more serious.