The Tower (22 page)

While I helped Cindy cook dinner, Alia took Terry on a tour through the penthouse. Terry couldn’t get over the fact that I shared my room with my little sister, and teased me about it all evening until, near bedtime, she saw me in my girly pink pajamas. After that, no amount of glaring could quell her laughter, and I eventually had to give up and turn in early.

Chapter 7: The Secret War

For the first few meals, we literally had too many cooks in the kitchen. Terry’s culinary style was less exacting than Cindy’s and mine. Terry liked to throw everything into the pot and hope it would sort itself out later. When we found bits of egg shell in our morning omelets, Cindy suggested that Terry leave the cooking to me and help out with other chores. Terry wasn’t much of a homemaker in other areas either, but seemed determined to make a contribution in the house.

Three days into Terry’s stay, she and I were in the kitchen loading the dishwasher when Alia came in and, seeing me there, immediately gave me an apprehensive look.

“You want a glass of water?” I asked her.

Alia nodded, frowning. It wasn’t like she couldn’t get her own glass of water, but I was deliberately blocking the faucet, and my sister knew why.

I grinned at her. “Say the words, Alia.”

Alia let out an audible groan.
“Oh, not again...”

Getting my sister to mumble even the simplest of words was like pulling teeth. She had made as much progress in mouth-speaking during the last six weeks as she had last year: absolutely none at all.

Once, out of sheer frustration, I had even considered pointing out that the Wolves wouldn’t have tortured her so badly had she been able to speak to them. I decided against that tactic, however. It was a bit too insensitive, especially considering the real reason she had been put through that.

“Say the words,” I repeated firmly. “Say ‘water.’”

Alia scowled at the floor and mumbled, “Wawa.”

“Water, Alia,” I persisted. “Say it with me. Say, ‘I want water.’”

Silence.

“Come on, Ali,” I begged. “Just three words. ‘I want water.’”

“Awa-wawa,” she said, not quite as loud as a mouse.

“Water,” I repeated slowly.

“Wa-er.”

“Water, Alia.”

“Waw-wer,” said Alia, her eyes misting up.

“Okay, okay, good enough,” I said hastily, filling a glass for her. As far as I was concerned, “waw-wer” was actually a pretty good try for her.

Terry, who had been silently watching us do this routine ever since she moved in, had a different opinion that she finally decided to voice. “Is that really the best she can do?”

I saw Alia instantly tense up, so I said quietly to Terry, “Stay out of this.”

Terry ignored my demand and asked, “How long have you been working with her, Adrian?”

“A few months,” I replied. “But we had a big break in between.”

“It’s not like she doesn’t know the language, right?” Terry asked the obvious, and I could tell that Alia, who I had already pushed to her limit, was on the verge of tears.

“Please stay out of this, Terry,” I said stiffly.

But Terry had no intention of backing down. “Do you ever wonder why she doesn’t make any progress?”

“She is making progress,” I insisted.

“Wawawawa?” said Terry, raising her eyebrows, and a teardrop rolled down Alia’s cheek.

“Shut up, Terry!” I said, glaring.

Terry shot back defiantly, “She’d learn if she had to!”

“What’s that suppose to mean?” I demanded.

“It means you’re a big softy on her.”

“I am not!”

Terry shook her head, saying, “If she really had to speak, Adrian, she’d learn.”

“It’s not easy for her, Terry. We’re working on it.”

I heard Alia in my head say crossly,
“Addy, would you please stop talking about me like I’m not even in the room?!”

“Tell it to Terry, Alia,” I said.

“I did. She ignored me.”

I sighed, realizing once again that my sister wouldn’t have to keep repeating herself if only she could speak aloud.

I stopped glaring and asked Terry, “What are you suggesting?”

“The same thing that worked for you,” Terry replied simply. “Drain her. Keep her drained all day and force her to speak.”

“No,” I said firmly.

“Why not?”

“Because...” I started, but I realized that I was no longer quite sure.

“Why not?!” repeated Terry. “You think you’re doing her a favor by letting her slip by with ‘wawawa’?”

“But I can’t just keep her drained all the time!” I said, giving Terry an incredulous look.

“Alia isn’t as weak as you, Adrian,” Terry said nastily. “She doesn’t collapse just because a little metal is touching her.”

That was below the belt, even for Terry. However, infuriatingly enough, she did have a point. Cindy had once said to me last year, “Experiment. Do whatever works.” I wondered if constantly draining Alia was within experimental bounds. If Dr. Otis had suggested something like this, I would have objected. It was just too cruel.

“We can try,” I said slowly.

“Addy! No!”
Alia yelled in my head.

“You know something, Alia?” I said, turning to her. “Terry might be right.”

Alia started crying for real now, stamping her feet and saying,
“No! No! No! Please, Addy!”

“We’ll need something to drain her with,” said Terry. “Something she won’t be able to take off by herself.”

Hearing that, Alia bolted for the kitchen door, but I used my telekinesis to slam it shut before she could reach it. Then I levitated her back toward me.

“No, Addy! Put me down! Put me down!”

“Adrian!” Terry cried in alarm. “You can’t do that!”

“What do you mean?” I asked, keeping Alia’s flailing feet from touching the kitchen floor. “It was your idea.”

“No! You can’t use your power against another Guardian. Not even her, Adrian. That’s Guardian law!”

“Oh, yeah,” I said, grinning. “But you know what, Terry? Alia isn’t a Guardian.”

“Wow,” said Terry, whistling softly, “and I thought I was heartless. Listen, I’ll run downstairs and see what I can find for her. Your control band is too big.”

Terry left, and I walked to the living room, Alia wailing and bobbing along in my wake.

“Put me down, Addy! Put me down right now!”

“No,” I said simply. “Not until you calm down.”

“I’m telling Cindy!”

“Go ahead. But you’ll have to tell her with your mouth.”

“No!”

I turned to her. “Please stop crying, Alia. I’ll put you down, okay?”

I set my sister down on a couch and then cautiously sat down next to her. I was relieved that she didn’t try to run away. Alia stopped crying, wiping her eyes with the back of her hands, but I could see that she was well on her way to a full-blown pout.

“You’re so mean,”
she said, staring off into space.

“Yeah,” I agreed quietly, “I am.”

“That’s not funny.”

“Neither is your handicap, Alia.”

“What’s so great about being able to speak with your mouth, anyway?!”

I grinned and said, “Well, you could shout for help when Terry returns with whatever she’s getting.”

Alia glared at me, and I mumbled, “Sorry, I guess that wasn’t funny either.”

Alia wiped her eyes again.
“I just can’t do it, Addy. Honest.”

“I know you can speak, Alia. You just need to practice.”

“But I don’t want to practice! It’s too hard.”

I looked into her puffy eyes and said, “Come on, Alia, you’re tougher than that. Think of everything we’ve been through. Think of everything you did just this summer. You learned how to ride a bike. You learned how to swim. Are you really going to spend the rest of your life avoiding telephone calls and babbling like a baby?”

Staring down at her knees, Alia slowly shook her head.

I put an arm around her and, pulling her closer, continued gently, “Alia, Terry was right about me. Thanks to you, I’m learning to balance my power. I can actually cut my own nails now. I may even be able to go back to school. Terry might be just as right about you. I know it’s hard. It’s always hard to learn something you’re bad at. What do you think I’ve been doing in the dojo all these weeks? You’ve been there. You know it’s not fun. But you can’t give up just because something is hard.”

Alia remained silent, but I could see in her eyes that she wasn’t tuned out. She was thinking it over.

The front door opened, and Terry stepped into the living room. She was holding something behind her back, and to her credit, she didn’t force it upon Alia. Instead, Terry looked at me and asked, “Is she ready?”

“I don’t know,” I replied. “You’d better ask her yourself.”

Terry knelt down in front of Alia. Looking carefully into my sister’s eyes, she asked quietly, “What’s it going to be, Alia?”

We waited a few seconds, and then Alia nodded.

Terry smiled. “Okay, then. Let’s do it.”

Terry showed us what she had brought. It was a pair of steel handcuffs. Terry snapped both cuffs onto Alia’s left ankle so that they hung there like a pair of anklets. I wondered for a moment what kind of place Terry lived in on the fourth floor that would have control bands and handcuffs lying around.

Terry tossed me the key to the cuffs and said, “Let’s just try this for one day and see how it goes, okay?”

Fingering the silver key and trying not to show how drained it was making me, I asked, “Are you sure you trust me with this, Terry?”

Terry laughed. “Of course I don’t trust you with it, Adrian. But Alia does. Be strong, okay?”

“I’ll try,” I said, pocketing the key.

The truth is, before the end of that very day, I already missed hearing Alia’s voice in my head. After confirming that Alia was a (grudgingly) willing participant in this experiment, Cindy did not comment one way or the other. But I could tell that she felt, as I certainly did, that this was borderline abuse.

In the days that followed, my sister took to her shock treatment with the strength of one who had gone through far worse and survived. The constant draining effect made her slightly clumsy and lethargic, which for her meant scraped knees and longer naps, but otherwise she was okay. So that she couldn’t cheat and have her cuffs removed whenever she needed to say something difficult, we agreed that she would remain drained from before breakfast until just before her bedtime. She still cheated a little, saving up what she wanted to say until the cuffs were removed, but we let her slip by, knowing that even Alia couldn’t keep silent for an entire day. My sister survived her daylight hours through a mixture of enigmatic pantomimes and frustratingly inaccurate pronunciation. Before the week ended, Terry bought a silver ring to replace the handcuffs so that Alia could go outside without attracting attention to her clinking left ankle. Alia could easily remove the ring herself, but rarely did so without my consent.

Aside from the obvious difficulty in communication with Alia, I realized that her draining caused another problem for me. Though my sister couldn’t ease my regular muscle pains, she was my designated healer for all of my CQC-related cuts and bruises. In an emergency, such as a broken finger or perhaps even a nosebleed, Alia would temporarily remove her ring and heal me, but considering what she was going through now, I felt it somewhat dishonorable to ask her to heal my lesser bruises during the day.