The Choosing (30 page)

“No, Auth . . . Authority Knight.”

“Ah yes. You are the one with the stutter. Dodson speaks highly of you.”

“Thank y . . . you.”

Remko glanced toward the hallway where his men were gathering the last of their things. His eyes moved up the wall to see a portrait of Isaac’s father hanging above a narrow hallway table, a large marble plaque resting in the center of the polished surface below.

“My father used to say that was the only thing that mattered in life,” Isaac said, pointing to the words engraved there. “‘Follow God and His holy mission, forsaking all others.’ I never understood it until I was much older. Now I know the truth in these words.”

Remko read the statement again but didn’t have time to ponder it long. Dodson stepped inside the house and thanked Isaac for being so gracious, and they left.

“Anything?” Dodson asked when they were outside.

Remko shook his head, and Dodson swore. “We have to find this girl. The city can’t afford to lose another.”

Carrington whirled a long strand of golden grass between her fingers. The wind smelled like fall, crisp and clean, with a nice hint of a chill that made her want to snuggle deeper into the grass.

“He’s going to kill me,” Carrington said.

Aaron was perched on his stump again, his legs crossed underneath him, his eyes following the slowly moving clouds. “His soul is very lost.”

“If I just give him what he wants, I can be saved.”

“That won’t save you; it will only imprison you.”

“So then I just die.”

“Why does it have to be death or imprisonment? Is there not another option?”

“He would never let me go.”

Aaron smiled and shot her a wink. “Ye of little faith.”

“I can’t save my life by simply believing.”

“Carrington, you are missing the whole point. It is
only
by believing that you can save your life. Only when you believe in your true Father, only when you know who you are and who lives within you, can you truly be saved.”

Carrington rolled over and lay back with her head in the grass. She watched the clouds shift and sway as they inched across the blue sky.

“You would be surprised at the power you hold,” Aaron said.

“And I can access that power by believing?”

“Like a superhero.”

Carrington giggled and Aaron’s warm chuckle bounced across the sky.

Suddenly she felt filled with fear and sorrow. This was all just a dream, and when she woke up she wouldn’t be wrapped in kindness, secure in the grass. She would be chained like an animal in Isaac’s cellar, her face broken, her body bruised. And he would feed her poison and she would die, slowly and painfully.

How could she let herself suffer through such agony? Tears filled her eyes and the wind dried them as they slipped down her cheeks.

Yet hadn’t she already been suffering for the past few months? Wasn’t being owned by Isaac just as painful as swallowing bleach? She longed for freedom as much as she longed for life, but she couldn’t imagine a scenario where she achieved both. She rolled onto her side and pulled her legs up toward her chest. Maybe this was what she deserved. Freedom was an illusion, but death was real. Isaac had chosen her and she couldn’t change that. He possessed her. Wouldn’t it be better to accept the inevitable and save herself all the pain?

“The voices of hate are strong,” Aaron said.

Carrington didn’t move and sniffed as large tears plopped onto the grass. She heard feet shuffle through the dirt toward
her, but she felt ashamed of her tears and didn’t want Aaron to see her face.

He sat down in the grass beside her, his presence comforting her wounded soul. “The biggest struggle you will ever face is to ignore the lies that feel so familiar.”

“They feel like truth,” Carrington said.

“The truth is beautiful, like you. The truth is you have been made perfect and are wholly loved. Chosen simply because you breathe, because you exist, because of who created you. I know this world has led you to believe that your worth is measurable. Life has always told that lie
 
—that you have to work for love or change to be accepted. But the truth is different. Truth has existed since before time began, and its message is that because you were born, because you grow, because you take steps, because you laugh, you are loved and worth the greatest sacrifice.”

Carrington sat up and turned so she was sitting side by side with Aaron, the grass dancing around them, the breeze playing through their hair, the sun beaming against their skin.

“I want to believe that truth,” Carrington said.

Aaron took Carrington’s hand and held it softly in his own. “Truth is a journey. A constant cycle of remembering and forgetting. Remember who abides within you.”

“Will I always forget?”

“I don’t know. That is your journey. I can’t predict the future. All I can do is help you remember.”

Suddenly Aaron jumped up and pulled Carrington into
a standing position. “We need to practice remembering the truth.” He whirled around in a complete circle, his arms outstretched wide to either side. “I am chosen!”

He stopped and looked at Carrington. “Come on, dance with me.”

Carrington giggled and shook her head. He looked ridiculous
 
—coordination wasn’t his strong suit.

“Join me!”

Hesitantly she opened her arms about halfway and muttered, “I am chosen.”

Aaron shook his head. “You don’t sound like you believe.”

Feeling silly, she spread her arms out and raised her voice. “I am chosen.”

Aaron laughed. “I am loved!”

“I am loved!”

“Dance now; spin with me. Dancing makes every truth seem more real.”

Carrington spun and laughed like a child, her dress swirling out around her legs and moving in the wind.

“I am chosen!” Aaron yelled.

“I am loved!” Carrington yelled.

“I am free!”

“I am free!”

They ran and jumped and danced, screaming truth into the wind, the grass moving with them, the trees all around swaying to their movements until Carrington toppled over in a fit of laughter, her body filled with warmth, tears of joy leaking down her cheeks.

For the first time in her life, she thought she understood what real worth was, and she noticed that the pervasive lie of her worthlessness was gone.

Remko stood over Dodson’s desk. The place was becoming less and less foreign. Even the excessive stench of smoke and ash that hung permanently in the air didn’t bother him like it used to. It was almost comforting.

The search of Isaac’s place felt like a waste. Nothing new had been discovered, and they’d spent valuable time there when they could have been exploring other leads. The problem was now they were out of leads to follow and they were quickly approaching the twenty-four-hour mark since Carrington’s disappearance.

Dodson walked back and forth, his usual cigarette stuck between his lips. Lieutenant Smith stood in the corner, reviewing a file of statements from Isaac’s household employees. Remko was rummaging through the evidence collected on Dodson’s desk. As in any investigation, gathering the pieces was the easy part. It was the way the puzzle was rearranged that made the real clues evident. He had to believe that what they needed to find Carrington was in this pile somewhere.

Smith walked forward and slapped his folder onto the desk. “It’s all the same each time I read it. There is nothing here.”

“I think we need to call it a night, get a couple hours of sleep, and come at it with fresh eyes early tomorrow,” Dodson said.

“It’s here
 
—I’ll fi . . . fi . . . find it,” Remko said.

Smith rubbed the bridge of his nose between his fingers and sighed.

“Wishing evidence was there won’t make it suddenly appear,” Dodson said.

Remko continued to dig through the information and ignored his captain.

“Go home, Smith. See you first thing,” Dodson said.

Smith nodded and threw Remko a pitying look, then left.

Dodson snuffed out his cigarette in the ashtray near Remko’s hand, a puff of smoke rising into Remko’s face. “We have been over this stuff a hundred times. What are you hoping will change?”

Remko rolled out a set of blueprints labeled
Knight Estate
and compared it to the detailed reports he had of each room. He tried to imagine Carrington moving through the house, the way she walked, the places she would be most likely to visit. “I’m waiting for per . . . perspective.”

One by one he reviewed the outlines of the rooms on the map in front of him and used the reports to visualize each space.

“You’re doing what I taught you, which I appreciate,
but without rest your mind will grow dull. We need to sleep on this, Remko.”

He flipped to the next report, which described the basement. He searched the blueprint for the diagrammed area and found nothing. “There’s n . . . no ba . . . ba . . . basement here.”

“What?”

Remko flipped the blueprints to face Dodson and pointed to the basement report. “The ba . . . ba . . . basement isn’t in the o . . . original plans.”

“Yeah, Isaac had a basement added after his father passed.”

“Why?”

Dodson shrugged. “Does it matter? We surveyed the space and found nothing.”

Remko studied the plans and felt a tingling suspicion prick across his skin. “The dimensions are wr . . . wrong.”

“What are you getting at?”

“He on . . . only dug out half the ba . . . ba . . .”

“Stop stuttering.” Dodson yanked the reports toward him. “So he didn’t add the basement to the entirety of the house. So what?” Dodson questioned, looking up at Remko. “We surveyed the portion that was added and found zip.”

“Look here.” Remko passed another report to Dodson. This one described a small ventilation shaft spotted at the base of an outer wall on the east side of Isaac’s house. A similar shaft was reported on the west side, but neither
the blueprints nor the written reports showed a basement beneath that half of the house. The nagging feeling that this was more than what it appeared was too strong for Remko to ignore.

“This means nothing, Remko. It’s probably a mistake.”

“Sir, I th . . . think . . .”

“Whatever you’re thinking, stop. Isaac Knight is a fundamental part of this city’s leadership. That look behind your eyes is dangerous.”

“There is some . . . something here.”

“All you have is a man who added half a basement to his house
 
—a man, mind you, who could easily have you thrown in prison and will in a heartbeat if you wrongly accuse him.” Dodson grabbed the blueprints and rolled them up. “We are through with this for now. Lack of sleep is sucking the oxygen from your brain.”

“Sir
 
—”

“Drop it, Remko! I mean it. Now get out.”

Remko pushed away from the desk and headed for the door.

“Remko,” Dodson said, his voice low and worried.

Remko turned his head, his hand still resting on the doorknob.

“For your own sake, let this go. I would hate to see you end up on Isaac’s bad side.”

Remko nodded and pushed out through Dodson’s door. He hopped up into his CityWatch vehicle and punched in
the coordinates for the barracks. The car pulled forward and Remko turned inward to his thoughts.

Warning bells were ringing in his brain, vibrating down into the rest of his body. His skin felt electrified. The same questions circled through his mind:
Why have ventilation placed on both sides of the house if the basement only occupies one hal
f
? Could it have just been a mistake?
Could he ignore the red flags? Should he risk digging deeper?

And why couldn’t he shake the final words Isaac had said?
“‘Follow God and His holy mission, forsaking all others.’ I never understood it until I was much older. Now I know the truth in these words.”

Remko slammed his hand on the steering wheel and switched the car into manual. He yanked the wheel away from his current destination and onto a small side road that led into the woods. He jerked it to a stop and let it hover while his eyes bored into the darkness.

The desperation to find Carrington grew stronger the longer he stared. It seeped into his heart and pulled at his soul. The thought of living without her, of facing alone a world that no longer made sense, tore at him.

He reminded himself that even if he found her, she would still belong to another and would never be his. He didn’t want to own her; he didn’t want her to be his possession. He only wanted to love her, to protect her, to see her smile.

He leaned his forehead against the steering wheel and fought for control of his memories as they tumbled across
his vision. Helms, Carrington, the dead Lints
 
—all their faces, all the pain he’d watched them suffer
 
—they were weights sitting on his neck, threatening to break it. He couldn’t save Helms from the murdering hands of spiteful men, and now Carrington would be lost to him as well.

Wave upon wave, crashing, rushing against his reality, his sanity . . . memories sharp as weapons.

A thought broke through the sea and Remko felt his heart beat once and pause. Mills’s words echoed in the back of his mind, words about the man who thought he was carrying out some kind of holy mission.

Remko pulled his head from the steering wheel and considered the possibility that had already sprouted in his gut hours earlier. Dodson had ordered him to ignore it, but he couldn’t
 
—not if it meant possibly saving her.

He steered his vehicle back onto the main road and started toward Isaac’s house. He switched off his logic, ignored the warning that if he was wrong it would probably cost him everything.

Remko didn’t care about much anymore, but he cared about her. And, he decided, she was worth the risk.