The Keepers (48 page)

“I'm Chloe,” she said aloud.

“Indeed you are.”

She turned her head toward the voice. Mr. Meister. Of course . . . this was his office. She was in the Great Burrow. Chloe sat up, surprised to discover that she could move her body. “Was I asleep?”

“Only for mere minutes. One does not sleep with the grulna inside.”

Chloe laid a hand on her belly, half expecting to feel the heat from inside her radiating through her skin. “The grulna. That's what you gave me?”

“Yes,” Mr. Meister said. “We saved your life, perhaps. And in time, it seems, the lives of others as well.”

“I feel . . . like the tin man.”

He smiled thinly. “That is an apt description of the effects of the grulna. You feel shackled, yes? Confined? But powerful too. Like a fortress.”

Chloe bent all her limbs. They worked like puppet arms. “What is this thing? What did you do to me?”

“The grulna is a temporary fix for your predicament. It gives you no power, of course, but it is an artificial substitute for the connection that has been lost.”

“A substitute. You've got to be kidding.”

“Hardly. One might say that when you are cut off from your Tan'ji, you are a leaking vessel, doomed to fail. The grulna seals those leaks for a time, makes you self-contained. A poor substitute, yes, but your identity is intact. Your mind can function again.”

Chloe felt her chest, rubbed her throat. She swallowed painfully. “It's dangerous, though. You and Mrs. Hapsteade were arguing about it.”

“If you are given the grulna again, you will die,” he said, and then waved off the words as if that was neither here nor there. “I know you have questions, Chloe, but please understand, I have many questions of my own. Though Neptune has told us much already, we must know everything that happened in the nest tonight.”

“Must you?” Chloe lay back down. Questions of his own, he said. But all that mattered was that she get back to the nest, back to the Alvalaithen. Back to Horace, her father. Gabriel too. Everything depended upon her now, and this
foreign rock of fire that fueled her. “Tell me how long this grulna thing will last. Tell me what'll happen then.”

“It will last a full day, at the very best. If the effects of the grulna wear off before the Alvalaithen returns, you will be dispossessed.”

“What time is it now?”

“A quarter till five in the morning.”

Five o'clock. Her own words came back to her, her last sight of the dragonfly:
“Three thirteen. Do it, then.”
“A full day, at best—what does that mean? Do I have a full day or not?”

“I am sorry to say you have what you have. It must be enough.”
Mr. Meister leaned forward, his glasses glinting in the light. “Tell me what happened, Chloe. Why did Horace send the Alvalaithen through the box?”

The Alvalaithen. Chloe fiddled with the empty cord around her neck. There was an absence there, but the fire in her belly burned hotter than that now. And the sad, fragile look on Mr. Meister's face—what a nervous man he was. How funny to be worried when you sat back here in the safety of the Warren while others risked everything. “He had to send it. He saw me get captured, so he sent the dragonfly forward for me. He's waiting in the nest. I promised I would come back, and I will.”

“He is safe?”

“I'll save him.”

“And what of the Fel'Daera?”

“What did I just say?”

Mr. Meister steepled his fingers in front of his face. “I took the grulna once myself, you know. It saved my life. But an interesting side effect of the grulna is that it strips us down to those essentials of our personality most likely to pull us through. Our strongest traits are thrown into high—sometimes intolerable—relief.”

“Let me guess. You were unbearably mysterious. Or no—insufferably manipulative.” The old man scowled deeply, but his irritation hardly touched her. “It doesn't matter. It's Horace who's suffering now. He stayed behind so I could get away. He's probably been captured already.”

“Is that so? I wish I knew more of it.”

“Why? You won't do anything about it. All you can offer in return is advice, and I'm fresh out of space to keep it.”

Mr. Meister stood. “Is that it, then? Nothing you can tell me? Nothing I can do to help?”

Chloe shrugged. “You can leave me alone. And when it's time for me to go back, you can call me a cab.”

He left without another word. Let him be angry. What a waste—he wasn't going anywhere it would be needed.

Chloe lay there but could not sleep. Time passed—how quickly, she did not know, here underground. Eventually she got up and puttered around Mr. Meister's office for a while, then walked to the back of the Great Burrow and sat at the top of the stone steps that led into the abyss below. She dangled her feet over the edge. She leaned out as far as she dared, wondering how far she would fall. She felt no impatience, no
regret, no real worry. She pulled a mint from her pocket and cracked it between her teeth. She hardly tasted it. She spit a chunk of it out into the black, watched it fall and fade.

Later she walked back toward Vithra's Eye, and on the way there she heard people talking in the little doba where she'd bathed and slept after the fire. Inside she found Mr. Meister and Mrs. Hapsteade sitting with Neptune and the boy with glasses . . . Brian. All four of them were looking at her; Neptune must have sensed her coming. Brian was wearing a black T-shirt that made his pale skin look even paler. It said
PLEASE SEND HELP
.

“What time is it?” Chloe asked.

“Just after noon,” Neptune said.

Seven hours! It hadn't felt even a fraction as long. “Get me when it's time.”

“We will find you, Keeper,” said Mr. Meister.

“It feels like I should be hungry, or thirsty. But I'm not.”

“That is the grulna. And it is just as well, since it is better if you neither eat nor drink while the grulna lasts.”

“I had a mint. I think I might have another.”

“Certainly you will do as you please, Keeper. I assume you're not asking my permission.”

“No.” As she turned to go, Chloe hesitated. “This was Ingrid's doba, right?”

“That's right,” Mrs. Hapsteade replied, just as Mr. Meister said, “It is.”

“Does she play the flute?” Every face went blank with
shock. When no one spoke, she went on. “I guess she does. I doubt she'll be coming back. She looked right at home when I saw her in the nest.”

Mr. Meister shot to his feet so abruptly that his chair skittered back and toppled. Mrs. Hapsteade reached out and laid a hand on his wrist. “You saw Ingrid?” she said.

“I saw someone with a flute. She plays it, and sees me when she shouldn't. She was with the Riven last night. They looked . . . friendly.”

Every eye was on her, waiting for her to say more, but Chloe was bored with this talk, bored even with the old man's dismay. She left them. She went back to the water and sat, watching the owls quietly carve the darkness. She ate mint after mint until they were gone.

She was just thinking she might walk through the center of Vithra's Eye—find out what lay at the heart of the Nevren—when they came for her. It felt like only an hour had passed. Mrs. Hapsteade and Neptune approached, looking solemn. Mrs. Hapsteade took Chloe's jithandra from her without a word of explanation.

“Why are you doing that?” Chloe asked, not really bothered but wanting to make the woman explain.

“This should not fall into the hands of the Riven. Return, and it'll be yours again.”

“You don't think I can do this.”

“Since you've explained nothing to us, I'm in no position to judge. I don't understand exactly what it is you're
attempting to do. All I know is the Fel'Daera has asked for your trust again, and you seem willing to give it.”

“Not the Fel'Daera,” Chloe said. “Horace.”

“Neptune will take you across the water.” Mrs. Hapsteade tucked the jithandra into the pocket of her apron and stubbed her fists into her hips, glowering down at Chloe. “I will say this. If I had to choose one of us to throw into the dangerous unknown, it would be you.”

Chloe studied her. “I'm going to take that as a compliment,” she said.

“You'll take it with a grain of salt, if I know the grulna,” Mrs. Hapsteade replied, turning to walk away.

“And
do
you?” Chloe called out. “Do you know it?”

Mrs. Hapsteade stopped and spoke back over her shoulder. “I know things I wish you never had to learn, but learn you will. Go back now. Find your father. Find your friends. Bring everyone back to us. When the stone of your fear returns to you—and I hope it does—may it be light.” She swept into motion again, swift and effortless, sliding back toward the Great Burrow.

Neptune stood quietly by Vithra's Eye, waiting, looking out over the water. Something about her calmness pulled Chloe forward. “I had to leave, you know,” Chloe said, not even sure why she was saying it.

“I know. And they had to stay.”

“I'll get them out.”

Neptune sighed, a sweet and thoughtful sound. “You'll get each other out.”

Chloe looked at her. The girl really was pretty, in a way. Too bad her face only went from blank to blanker. “So tell me,” Chloe said. “Who's Ingrid?”

Neptune stiffened. “It's not my place to tell you about Ingrid.”

“Oh, well, god forbid you should forget your place.”

The girl gave Chloe a sharp glance. So she did know how to get angry, after all. “Ingrid is—was—a Warden. She turned, about a year ago.”

“She went over to the other side, you mean. But why?”

“I don't know. Gabriel might have some idea. The two of them were . . . close.”

“And why did Mr. Meister get all pissy when I brought her up?”

Another sigh, this one sad. “He still believes in her.”

“Why?”

She shrugged. “He always believes in us.” Neptune pulled out her jithandra, richly violet, and approached the water's edge. “It's time. Let's go.”

C
HLOE FOLLOWED
N
EPTUNE
across the lake. The Nevren didn't touch her at all. Before she knew it, they were in Beck's cab, and the trip back to her house happened in a flash. The streetlights passed by rhythmically, like heartbeats. No one spoke a word. In the cab, Beck's eyes kept finding Chloe in the mirror, but Chloe found she had nothing to say. Let them stare. Neither of them was going back to the nest. Neither of them could.

They arrived at the wreckage of her home, and at one thirty Chloe stepped out of the cab. Behind her, Neptune rustled into the cloudless sky without a word. The moon Chloe couldn't see the night before now sat like a sickle over the train yard. She let the heat of the grulna drive her forward, up into the ashes of her house. Ashes everywhere. Ashes for everyone. Perhaps she herself would be full of ashes soon.

She went to the ruined hallway and waited, standing perhaps in her own yesterday's footsteps. Within moments, a shadow slid along the back property line. Despite everything—despite the grulna—a brief twinge of fear darted through her as Dr. Jericho approached. He was so huge, and now she was encountering him without the dragonfly.

He began to whistle as he came near, a piercing tune that stabbed at her ears. She focused instead on the sizzle of the grulna. The Mordin grinned down at her from his great height. He bent and inhaled deeply, smelling her, his eyes sliding closed. “Oh, how lovely to find you here, my dear,” he said, showing his teeth, his voice a song. “I heard a rumor you were dead.”

H
ORACE CONCENTRATED ON HIS BREATHING, DEEP AND SLOW
. He fought back the panic that made his heart pound and turned his skin to broken glass.

The floor of the boiler was hard and cold and gritty. Inches above his face, a heavy steel grate spanned the length of the space, separating the ash bin from the main boiler chamber. Whenever he brushed against the grate, little spills of ash trickled down through the holes in the grate and onto his clenched eyes, across his sealed lips, into his nose. He couldn't sit up, not even close. He could stretch out—the chamber was exactly as long as his body—and he could roll over, but it was so narrow that he could not turn around. Not that he wanted to—it was better that his face was next to the ash door, where at least he could sip in the occasional thin breath of fresh air.

When Dr. Jericho first swung the heavy door shut, sealing Horace inside the cold boiler, he buried Horace in a horror so crushing and so pure and so complete—obliterating every other thought and memory and sense of being—that Horace was not completely sure he had not died in that moment. He suspected that at least a part of him had. But he was breathing still. He felt his ribs expand as air filled his lungs. So he just breathed. Deep and slow.