Nil Unlocked (31 page)

“No doubt,” Rives said, kneeling by Paulo. “Hey, buddy, I’m Rives. And you’re gonna have to come with us. We’ve got someone who can help you. And right now you need some help.”

Paulo moaned, tears running down his face.

I knelt beside Rives. “You can trust him, Paulo. I promise. We’ll take good care of you.” It struck me he was more worried about accepting our help than getting the help he needed. “You can’t stay here,” I added. “It’s not safe. Not when you can’t run.”
Or even walk
, I thought.

Without a word, Paulo nodded.

Rives pulled out a funky collapsible island stretcher from his satchel.
Had he expected something bad would happen?
I wondered. He caught my eye as he efficiently snapped it together. “Better prepared than not,” he said grimly.

The four of us carried Paulo back in near silence. Pale, sweating, and breathing shallowly, Paulo looked absolutely miserable. From what I knew of him, being taken into the City he’d been working so hard to avoid was probably as painful as his leg.

I realized he’d been following us.

With a start, I also realized his arm’s tattoos matched the designs in the Looking Glass cavern. Except for the sun one. I’d seen the design before; I just couldn’t place where.

I mulled over his sun tattoo the entire way back. It was easier than thinking about the fact that
Rives almost just left.

“Head to my hut,” Rives instructed when we saw the City. A few minutes later, Paulo was moaning on Rives’s bed. “Jason, find Jillian,” Rives said. “She’ll know if we can set it. At least the bone didn’t break the skin.” He looked at Paulo, who hadn’t stopped crying. “But setting that break is gonna hurt like a mother.”

Jillian came running. She gingerly felt Paulo’s shin, wincing as he screamed. “It feels broken. But clean. I think we should set it. Basically just immobilize it so it can heal. But there are no guarantees either way.” Her face looked majorly stressed. “I’m no orthopedist.”

Paulo writhed in pain.

“We’re going to need some more people to hold him down to set it,” she said. “And we’re going to need sticks and cloth.”

Rives nodded. “Jills, go get Dex to help. Jason, go grab three solid sticks, all just short of a meter. Use my blade, cut branches so we have green wood. Miya, go to the Shack and get cloth. We’ll wait with Paulo.”

Everyone nodded and ran out, all except me.

The minute the others left, Rives turned to me. “Stay with him, Skye. I’ll be right back.”

Rives ducked out of his hut, and when he returned a minute later, he carried two coconut shell cups. Both were filled with light amber liquid.

“Deadsleep tea,” he said. “Did they have it in your uncle’s time?”

“No.”

“Well, we do. It’ll knock Paulo out so Jillian can set his leg properly.” He set one cup on the table and looked directly at me as he held up the other cup. “Skye, I’m going to drink this. And then I’m going to pass out. If I’m still breathing in ten minutes, give the other cup to Paulo. If I’m not”—he shrugged—“don’t.”

“What? No!” I looked at Rives, appalled. “Don’t drink that!”

“Count to sixty ten times,” Rives said, backing up toward the other bed. “Make it eleven for good measure.” He grinned. “Bottoms up!”

I lunged to knock it out of his hand as he threw back the cup and gulped.

“Too slow,” he said, grabbing my wrist and smiling. “This time.” Rives’s eyes took on a glazed look. “Skye, I want … I…” His words slurred. Stumbling, he fell back onto the bed, taking me with him. “Skye.”

My name was thick on his tongue.

“Rives!” I shouted.

But he was already gone. I knew it because his grip on my wrist slackened, then let go completely. This was not how I envisioned lying in bed with Rives.

“Rives?” I gently patted his cheek. He was completely unresponsive. Unconscious, maybe worse. I rested my head on his chest, listening. He was still breathing—for now.

What if Rives died?

The thought made me shake; it left me cold and empty and furious all at once. I couldn’t imagine Nil without Rives; it was as if all the colors of Nil had dulled, shifted to a lifeless gray. First the gate had threatened to take him, now the deadsleep tea. A minute ago Rives was the person most alive on the entire island. Now he was slipping away—by choice.

“Stupid!” I punched the pillow beside Rives. “You are so stupid!”

“Oh my God,” Jillian said. “He didn’t.” She’d come into Rives’s hut, Dex right behind her.

“That bloody idiot,” Dex said. He laced his fingers together on top of his head and stared at Rives.

Jillian’s and Dex’s expressions were mirror images: shock, denial, and, if I wasn’t mistaken, fury. “He told me that if he was still breathing in ten minutes, to give the other cup to Paulo.” My voice shook. “That it would knock Paulo out so you could set his leg.”

Dex cursed under his breath.

“He called it deadsleep tea,” I added.

“I know what it is,” Jillian snapped. I knew her anger wasn’t for me.

“I tried to knock it out of his hand.”

“I wish you’d knocked him in the head instead.” Jillian looked close to tears. “Maybe that would help.” She took a deep breath, glanced briefly at Paulo, then looked back at me. “So how long has it been?”

I’d totally forgotten to count.

“Crap.” I almost burst into tears myself. “I think two minutes.”

The next eight minutes were an eternity in hell I never want to repeat. I sat on Rives’s bed; Jillian and Dex stood beside it. Every thirty seconds I’d bend down to listen to Rives’s breathing. Slow and steady. Rives didn’t move. He didn’t even twitch. He was, as the expression went, dead to the world.

I’d never use that expression again.

Three minutes left.

Paulo was still moaning. None of us said a word.

Two minutes.

One.

“Time’s up,” Dex finally said.

Rives’s chest continued to rise and fall. The three of us exhaled a collective breath. “I don’t know if I want to hug him or wallop him,” Dex said.

“When he wakes up, I’m going to kill him,” Jillian said. Her wet eyes shot daggers at Rives. Then she turned to Paulo, who was staring at us with wide eyes. “Thirsty yet?”

Paulo drank his tea, passed out cold, and didn’t make a peep while Dex and Jillian set his leg. Miya and Jason returned with a trio of sticks and cloth, and Jillian amazed me with her island splinting skills.

“You did great,” I told her when she finished.

“Thanks.” She looked exhausted. “At least it makes me feel like I’m doing something.” She glanced at Rives.

“I know what you mean,” I said.

Jillian closed her eyes. “I can’t believe he pulled this stunt again.”

“Again?” I asked.

“Yup.” She blinked. “The first time was after Jason broke his finger. Rives can’t stand to see people hurting. But I swear the boy has a death wish. I thought lately it had gotten better.” She looked at me sharply. “Dex,” she said, still looking at me. “Will you stay with the guys? I want to talk to Skye a minute.”

“Your wish is my command, my lady,” Dex said grandly.

Jillian gave Dex a quick smile, then gestured to me to follow her. She led me outside, out of earshot of everyone, still talking in low tones.

“Skye, Rives is going to be out for at least a day. Last time it was almost three. And I didn’t want to talk in front of him in case somehow he can hear in his deadsleep coma.” She looked directly at me. “But when he wakes up, if you hurt him, I personally will kill you.” Jillian looked at me like a lethal Pippi Longstocking, then she sighed. Her shoulders drooped.

“Not really. I’m actually a pretty nonviolent person. Before I showed up here I didn’t even squash bugs. But you know what I mean.” Jillian exhaled slowly. “The thing is, Rives has been through a lot. More than you can imagine. He doesn’t deserve any more pain. So don’t lead him on, okay? Just know he isn’t someone to play with, and he deserves better than to have his heart ripped out and crushed again.”

“What are you talking about? I’m not playing with Rives.”
Was I?

“I didn’t say you were. I just said don’t.” She paused, studying me. “You haven’t been here long, but time on Nil is compressed. Fewer distractions of meaningless crap, a pressure cooker of survival. And I see how you two are together. I see how he looks at you, Skye. Like you’re all he sees. It doesn’t take long to connect with someone, especially here.”

She studied me. “And I see the way you look at him, too. It’s a mirror of Rives. Maybe you don’t even know it. Maybe there’s someone holding you back. Is there?”

“Is there what?” I asked, stunned by this entire conversation.

“Someone at home holding you back. Someone you’re going back to.”

I shook my head. “No. My life back home is kind of”—I was going to say crazy, but that seemed to fit my life more on Nil—“different. I dated a little but not much. During the year, I study with Mom and do things her way, and then I spend summers training with my dad and going strange places. This may sound weird, but I’d assumed my life—the one
I
wanted—would start when I went to college.”

She nodded. “I’m torn between telling you to stay far away from Rives and encouraging you to go for it.” Jillian sighed. “Waiting around for your life to start is a very bad idea, especially here. Like the old saying goes, today is the only today you’ll ever have, so why waste it? And here, you may not get a tomorrow. Tomorrow isn’t guaranteed for anyone, anywhere, but on Nil? We have a finite number of tomorrows, and sometimes they just don’t show.”

She glanced back at Rives’s hut. “He’s more like himself when he’s with you,” she said softly.

A quiet moment passed. Rives filled my head, even though he lay unconscious twenty feet away.

“I’ve got a question.” I kept my voice low. “I overheard you and Dex talking about Rives being reckless ever since something, but I didn’t hear what. What happened?”

She chewed her lip. “I’m not sure I should be the one to tell you. But then again, I think you should know.”

I stood quietly, waiting.

“Okay. A few months before you got here, Rives lost someone he really cared about. Her name was Talla.”

Talla.

“She got attacked by a wolf,” Jillian continued, “and she died. In Rives’s arms. He buried her, and it almost killed him. After that, he started taking risks. They’ve been getting worse. Sometimes I think he’s got a death wish, or at least he’s lost his fear of death.”

My uncle’s words flashed behind my eyes.
I fear nothing
. Despite the sun, I shivered.

Jillian looked at me. “Maybe you can talk some sense into him. God knows I’ve tried. Same for Dex. If he’s going to listen to anyone now, it’s you.”

Everyone’s afraid of something,
I had told Rives once. I hoped that was the case. Because if Rives was truly without fear, that frightened me more than anything else on Nil.

“One more thing.” Jillian hesitated. “Your hair. It’s getting really matted.” She looked guilty. “Not to get in your business, but if you want, we’ve got a couple wide combs that I think might help you. Totally up to you, but I think if you don’t start working on the knots, they may never come out. And you might have to cut it off.” She shrugged. “It’s happened before.”

I pictured myself like a shorn sheep and grimaced. “I’ll take the comb. And thanks,” I added. “For everything.”

Jillian hugged me. “That’s what friends are for.”

*   *   *

I sat by Rives’s bed the rest of the day, working out the knots in my hair, cursing my curls, but at least it gave me something to do other than stare at Rives’s chest. Jillian flitted in and out but seemed content to let me be.

Neither Rives nor Paulo stirred.

In sleep, the hard lines of worry relaxed, making Rives look like your average teenager, not the burdened Leader of a makeshift camp of people stuck on a freaky deserted island full of dangers and death, the greatest of which was simply time. I wondered if that’s why Rives looked so relaxed: In sleep, he was blissfully unaware of time’s passage.

In sleep, he was absolutely beautiful.

A furious sea god without the fury. I studied his face, as if the perfect lines would help me sort out my feelings, knowing I could take all the time I wanted, that he wasn’t going to open his eyes to catch me anytime soon.

Voyeur,
my conscience chided.

Duh,
I thought. Then I told my conscience to shut the heck up.

Am I playing with him?
I lowered my comb and considered the thought.

I was drawn to him, that I knew. I looked for him constantly; I purposefully sought him out. I trusted him more than anyone, even Jillian. I’d had a sense of him before I’d even met him, but the Rives in person was even more impressive than the Rives Charley had described: strong, honest, and downright gorgeous, not to mention an amazing Leader with an endless capacity for compassion that I’d witnessed time and time again. And if I was honest with myself, Rives made my breath catch whenever he got close; he had since the moment I’d met him, even in those moments when he made me absolutely furious. He made me feel things that scared me, things that thrilled me. Things that made me wonder if we could be
more.

If we
were
more.

I’d known him less than two weeks, but two weeks on Nil was like two months back home. Jillian wasn’t kidding about time being compressed here.

No,
I decided
. I wasn’t playing with him.

But I didn’t know if he was playing with me, or interested at all.

For the first time, it occurred to me that the one thing I’d never expected Nil to break was my heart.

CHAPTER

43

RIVES

DAY 291, SOMETIME IN THE NIGHT

Nothing like a deadsleep coma to give you an adrenaline jolt.

I opened my eyes to the night, wide-awake and fully rested. I wondered how long I’d been out this time.

I looked over and was shocked to see Skye. Someone had wedged a bed between me and Paulo, and Skye was curled in a ball under her cheetah pelt. Eyes closed, she didn’t move, didn’t twitch, like she’d sucked down deadsleep tea, too. But my gut said she was smarter than that. Smarter than me.