Relic (The Books of Eva I) (27 page)

Lukas studies my face as realization after realization dawns. “And I shared with him what I knew. What my people know.”

Confusion melts away, like ice floes in the sun. I know now why he was so scared, so intent on his training. But one huge block remains. “I still don’t get what this has to do with Eamon’s death.”

“Eva, Eamon wanted to win the Archon spot to uncover the full truth about New North. But someone found out about Eamon’s knowledge and his intentions. So, before he could become the Archon and change everything, he was killed.”

I shake my head. This is impossible. Eamon was alone out there. “Who?”

“We don’t know. Our best guess is someone in the Aerie did it, someone with a lot to lose if Eamon became the Archon. But that could be so many different people. Or one of many different factions.”

“Like?”

“Well, the Triad—or one of their minions—is an obvious choice. But they could have been oblivious to Eamon’s work, and it could easily be one of their lesser cogs who had a lot at stake if Eamon really changed the rules of the Aerie. Or it could be one of the other Testors.”

Faces and names flash through my mind. The Triad? There is no way my father could have been involved in such an act, no matter the consequences. Unless some rogue member had the foresight to set me up to be the Archon because he believed I’d be a malleable Maiden? What about the Testors? Aleksandr, Neils, the others? Murder seems beyond their small selves, but it’s possible. Jasper? No, that’s ridiculous.

What about someone like Scout Okpik, who looked Boundary-born but benefitted so much from the Aerie ways? It would certainly explain his behavior toward me. He needed to make sure that I didn’t stand a chance of winning, just in case I knew what Eamon knew, and he became uninterested in me once he believed I no longer had a shot.

I feel sick. I start to retch and run out the front door. Lukas races out after me and holds back my hair as I empty the meager contents of my stomach in a snow bank just outside.

Once my breathing has evened, Lukas leads me back inside. He settles me onto a chair and moves to the kitchen. When he returns, he has a cup of steaming tea with him. I’m guessing his
aanak
prepared it for me. Has she been listening to our conversation? I bet she knows everything that Lukas has told me. Even before he said it aloud.

As he sits down in the other chair, Lukas opens his mouth. Then he closes it and takes a moment. “We of the Boundary have always suspected the same things that Eamon learned, but we’ve never known the full truth about the Healing and the state of our Earth. Only someone on the inside—someone with access to the information that the Triad has hidden away—could do that. Eamon wanted to be that person. I’m not talking about Chief Archon. I’m talking about someone who could bridge the many worlds with the truth.”

Now I see where he’s going. Why he brought me out here. It wasn’t simply to show me the secrets of Elizabet Laine. “He would have become the
Angakkuq
. He was the one your people have been waiting for. Like your
aanak
wants?” I ask.

“I guess so, Eva,” he says.

I whisper, mostly to myself. “So this is what Eamon meant. ‘
Will they still love me when I do what I must
?’ ”

Lukas stares hard at me over the steaming tea. “What did you say to him when he asked that question?”

For some reason, I don’t want to tell Lukas about the journal entries. Instead, I create a fiction. Why shouldn’t I? “Just that I would love him no matter what. But I am the Archon now. I will find out the truth—just like Eamon would have done.”

“No, Eva. I don’t think you should. It’s too dangerous, and they’d be watching you. After what happened with Eamon.”

I’m surprised. I was expecting Lukas to summon his
aanak
. To tell me what I could do in Eamon’s place.

Lukas’s voice grows urgent. “Why not stay here, disappear into the Boundary lands with me? We have ways of hiding people. If you really feel you have to continue Eamon’s legacy, why not undertake it more safely, from this side of the Ring? With me helping you?”

I draw back. “Why would you have encouraged me to come to the Boundary lands and hear Elizabet’s story unless you wanted me to learn the truth? Unless you wanted me to become the
Angakkuq?
”

Lukas shakes his head. “Maybe part of me wanted that, Eva. At the start. But now that you’re here, and now that I stare into your eyes, I don’t want you to become an Archon or the
Angakkuq
.” He lunges for me and grabs my shoulders,
so forcefully that it hurts. “Do you really want to end up like your brother? Please don’t do this to me.”

“It has nothing to do with you, Lukas.”

“Are you blind? Can’t you see how I feel about you?”

I stare into his dark eyes, and see more truths. Maybe they were always there. Maybe I overlooked underneath Lukas’s stoicism. Maybe I’ve suppressed them in myself too. The Maiden in me—so trained in the ways of modesty—tries to convince me to lower my gaze and play dumb. But I fight her, and answer honestly, “I think I do, Lukas.”

“Do you share my feelings at all? I know it’s forbidden by your precious Lex, but even just a hint of—”

I press my finger to his lips. I think I do share his feelings—at least, a little—but we can’t think about them. Besides, I need time with my feelings. And I don’t have time. So I say, “How can I possibly act on that now?”

He kisses my finger and lets it go. “So where does that leave us?”

I say the answer he already knows. “I must fulfill Eamon’s destiny.”

I allow myself a single, final indulgence. As Lukas and I hurry back through the Boundary lands and into the centuries-old tunnel through the Ring, I hold his hand. And I permit myself to fantasize about a life I will never have. An honest life with Lukas.

Before I squeeze through the narrow part of the passage, Lukas and I pause for an awkward moment to say our farewells. Will I ever see him again? He will be re-assigned to the Aerie, and there our paths might cross as Maiden and Attendant or Archon and Attendant, depending on when and where we meet. But it will never be the same as this moment. We will never have this freedom again, alone with our truths.

Lukas answers my unspoken question. “I’ll never really
leave you, Eva. Even when you don’t see me, I’ll be watching over you.”

“Just like you did during the Testing?”

He smiles. “Much the same way. I’ll find a way to keep tabs on what you’re doing. My people are everywhere and nowhere. You know that now. And I’ll find a way to protect you—even get you out of the Aerie if need be—if you really insist on moving forward with Eamon’s mission.”

“I’d like that, Lukas. It would make me feel less alone.”

“You’ll never be alone, Eva. I promise you.”

I don’t want this moment to end, but I’m starting to get scared. Daylight is coming soon, and with it, the distinct possibility of discovery. I must make my way back to the Aerie and into my warm, downy bed before I’m found out. Or I’ll never get to start my work as the
Angakkuq
, as Archon, as Eamon’s successor. I release his hand. “Take good care of Elizabet’s Relic, Lukas.”

“I will, Eva. Remember what I told you about where to look for information. Look for Tech and the old stories; the truth will lie there. Remember what I taught you about not getting caught. And … believe.”

“I will. Goodbye, Lukas.”

He grabs my hand one last time. “What was it Robert said to Elizabet? ‘I shall say good night till it be morrow.’ Good night, Eva.”

I break away from him before I start crying.

W
HEN THE ICE WALLS
narrow and squeeze down tightly on my chest, I welcome the sensation. It forces me to think about something other than the revelations of this night. I finally push through the gap and out into the crisp night air,
gasping for breath. And happy about the distraction. When I look up—and around—I freeze. I’m not alone.

Jasper is waiting for me on the other side of the Ring.

“What in the Gods are you doing out here?” I nearly shout, then bite my lip.

“I could ask you the very same question. It’s not safe for you to be out here,” he says. His voice is oddly toneless.

“Nor for you. Did you follow me?”

“Yes.”

My eyes narrow. “How far?”

“Only to this spot.”

“Why would you take such a risk?”

“I’ve been concerned about you.”

“So you thought you’d hide outside my family’s home and follow me in the dead of the night?” I figure that, if I act offended, he might not pry so hard into my whereabouts. “What have I ever done to make you trust me so little?”

He bows his head. “You’ve been so cold, so removed, ever since we got back from the Testing. You only talk to me—or smile at me—when we’re in some public place. Anyone would think I’d won the Archon Laurels and you were mad at me.”

“You know better than that, Jasper. Why didn’t you visit me at home? Instead of stalking me?”

He lifts his head, his eyes flashing in the light of Her Moon. “Do you think I haven’t tried to see you at home? You’re always at the Basilika, or off in your room praying to the Gods at the diptych.”

I offer him up the only plausible excuse and silently beg my poor brother for forgiveness for invoking his name this way. I fight to keep the desperation out of my voice. “Jasper, since I’ve gotten back from the Testing, I’ve been
struggling with my grief over Eamon. Before we left, I had the Testing to focus on. But now, I feel the loss of Eamon everywhere.”

His eyes are glistening now. “Eva, I’m sorry. And here I’ve been selfishly thinking it had something to do with me. How stupid of me.”

It’s his Gallant voice, yet I know it’s sincere. And I actually feel terrible that he believes my fiction so readily. But since it’s working, I take it one step further. “That’s why I’m out here tonight.”

“What do you mean?”

“This is the spot where my brother died. I woke up in the middle of the night, and I felt compelled to come out here and say goodbye to him. I thought it would help me put him to rest.”

Jasper reaches out for my hand. I take it. “I understand, Eva.”

A bright blueish light flashes down on from above. It’s a Ring-Guard on his rounds. How could I have been so stupid as to stand here and chat with Jasper? Not for a tick should I have forgotten that the real threat comes from above.

Instinctively, we duck down, as if that would hide us at all. Hands linked, we start to run toward the town. Even though we’re horribly exposed.

“Halt!”

We keep running. I hear the Warning Bell sound in the distance—jarring and dissonant—unlike the daily bells that govern the Aerie life. Two Ring-Guards run toward us, brandishing lamps that produce the same unholy Tech glow. It occurs to me that I’ve never witnessed what happens during an actual Warning Bell. And I recognize the black tubular devices. They look just like the one I found
in Elizabet’s pink pack. My jaw tightens. The Aerie leaders use Tech for their own purposes. My father among them. He will answer me soon enough. This is what Lukas meant by needing someone on the inside to discern the truth.

I have only one chance to rescue myself—and Jasper—from this mess. I slow my pace. I square my shoulders. And I stare at the Ring-Guards. Both are thick and strong; they could crack me in half like a fire log. The heavier one scurries forward.

“What in the Gods do you think you are doing?” I ask, imperiously.

“How dare you speak to us that way!” he barks.

I do not flinch. Instead, I answer, “How dare
you
? Don’t you recognize your new Archon?”

The Ring-Guard lowers his arm, slowly. He’s still suspicious, but I watch as they take in my Testor uniform. And my face.

The smaller Ring-Guard cries, “By the Gods, you’re Eva!”

“Yes. If either one of you stood in the town square twenty-one days ago when the Testing ended, you would have seen me wearing the Archon Laurels.”

The first Ring-Guard looks me up and down. Frost coats his beard. His eyes flash to Jasper. “That doesn’t give you the right to be out at the Ring in the dead of night.”

My heart is pounding, but I pray to the Gods that he can’t hear my voice quiver. Attitude is everything right now. That, and my knowledge of The Lex.

“In truth it does. The Lex explicitly states that Archons—along with Lexors and Basilkons—have the right to travel at will, regardless of the hour.”

The Ring-Guards are silent. I know that this is beyond their limited knowledge of right and wrong. The smaller
says, “She’s right. Let’s just walk away. Imagine the squawking if we tried to arrest New North’s Archon heroine.”

The first Ring-Guard backs away, then stops. “I’m willing to let her go. But what about him?” He points to Jasper. “He’s no Archon. I saw him stand on the stage next to her. He lost the Testing.”

I will myself to stand taller. “Do not insult this Gallant.”

“That’s no insult, just simple truth. He’s got to obey The Lex like the rest of us.”

I smile at him. “Really? He has the right to be out here, same as me.”

“Oh yeah? Why is that, Maiden Archon?”