NeverSeen, page 23
Tracer opened his eyes for the first time since jumping in the boat and looked around. They were still in the boat in the freezing, smoldering tunnel. At least, it seemed like the same tunnel. But it couldn’t be. They’d floated away from where they’d landed, and another tunnel had swallowed them up. He looked back upstream. What did you expect to see? he thought, Something other than darkness? But there was light where they had come from and the orange glow of the fire. It appeared that there was more than one explosion caused by their escape, and it was following them. Fast.
Tracer turned to face downstream. Splinters of light broke through ahead, illuminating the scores of rescued children, some still unconscious. The rumble of fire grew behind them, and the tunnel felt like an oven. Moonlight refracted through streams of water ahead of the boat. The horrible shriek of the fire howled around them. All at once they were soaked from above and fell into the open air, and the fireball that nearly consumed them crashed head-on into the waterfall.
The plume of steam stole his sense of direction, but he knew which way was down when they hit the water. He tumbled back, landing in a pool of twiggy arms and legs. All that was heard was the panting of children and the thunder of the storm swirling over them like an inverted whirlpool. Their teeth chattered and, like him, they shivered madly in the frigid hours of the night.
Shortly after, they ran aground in the soft soil of the cave. Over the course of several long minutes, the tangled mass of kids discombobulated themselves and set to tending to their injuries, satisfying their immense hunger by way of edible mosses and flowers, and seeking shelter from the rain coming from the few cracks in the cavern’s roof. Raven heated small rocks for warmth with Emma’s staff.
Catching his breath and waiting for Raven to come to his end of the group, Tracer took in his surroundings. So we haven’t gone through one of the main waterfalls at all, he thought, just a minor outlet into this giant place. That’s fine and dandy not to be drowned, but it’s still absurdly cold.
It was a surprisingly large quarry, and a deep one at that. The entrance to it was almost straight up a steep slope, a lot like the one they’d tumbled down. He wondered if it led somewhere, maybe to a tributary of the river. If it did, it would plummet down the sharp twists and turns of the cliffs, run between the growing fields, and flow under the great Wall into the lifeless land beyond. That’s what they’d been told. But there was nothing he’d been told anymore that he could trust, except the knowledge that he had fiercely loyal friends, and they were in the same cave as he was. And Emma, wherever they’d locked her up, and if she was still…
Exhausted and shaken and unsure what to do next, if he could do anything, Tracer stared up through the entrance. Between the sweeping curtains of rain, he saw no stars, and horribly red moons, and…a strange, flickering glow on the clouds.
His heart jumped into his throat. “Nn-no-OO!”
Tracer stumbled to his feet and sprinted up the slope at the edge of the quarry, phased neither by the weight from his waterlogged wings nor the sheerness of the ground. He didn’t hear the other boys running after him, hopping between arms and legs and coughing bodies. They clambered up the slope after him, afraid to find out what he had discovered. Raven crested the ridge and gasped.
Tracer was standing in the damp grass below the knoll, his hands hanging limp at his sides. His face was lit a pale orange, and his eyes and cheeks glistened as his tears fell. Raven drew himself reluctantly out of the shelter of the cave’s mouth and into the dark rain—and shrieked.
Far in the distance, parting the river into its falls and rising like a beacon from the far end of the lush islet, burned Skyglass Temple.
I didn’t have a Plan B. All I had was this crazy idea, the kind you only get when you’re about to be executed in the middle of the only place you know by all the influential people you’ve ever respected and obeyed. It was stupid and insane and had a 99.999 percent chance of failing, but it was all I had.
I had to melt the blade.
My blood surged with fiery pressure, my soul-fire erupting inside my chest. I was focused so hard on turning into a super-heated torch-person that when the piercing, biting pain in my wings vanished, I didn’t notice.
Then it hit me.
It was very cold and very dark.
There was no rescue in this rain: there was no way for anybody to fly there safely to perform an air rescue. There was no hope for the people in Skyglass. Raven wailed with grief, at how long the list of victims would be, and how many funerals there would be, for entire families, maybe even generations…
“I killed her, I killed her!” screamed Tracer. He fell to his knees on the soaking grass and sat cross-legged, blindly staring into the bonfire of broken trust. He brought his broad, gentle hands to his glistening face and sobbed.
The other boys reached the summit and came out into the unyielding rain. Falcon thought back to their last conversation with Emmaline, right before she was captured. Emma had been so unyielding about taking the fall on her own. She wouldn’t let a single one of them come with her. A fury so powerful he couldn’t decide what to do with exploded inside of him. He threw off his pack and proceeded to break the branches scattered across the ground, screaming at the tree so far away. Kael cursed profusely, kicking rocks down the slope. Gator and Wayk fell down beside their distraught comrade in the wet grass; Gator just barely engaged enough to continue bandaging Wayk’s shoulder.
Tracer blubbered behind his hands. To Gator, it sounded vaguely like, “She’s dead, and it’s all my fault. Why did I let her go?” The rain had slowed to a trickle where they were, but far off over Skyglass, they could see the sheets of rain, pale and silky in the light of the twin moons. Cautious about startling him, Wayk gently put his hand on Tracer’s shuddering back.
Tracer sat up quickly, wiping his tears and drying his hands on his pants. He side-glanced at both Wayk and Gator repeatedly, mortified to be caught. But it didn’t stop him from sobbing.
Gator sat back from his work and turned his weary eyes to the burning Temple. It was fully engulfed now; not even the torrential rain could hinder its destruction. The avenging actions of Falcon and the foul words spilling from Kael’s mouth were mournful whispers over the tree’s requiem.
Tracer put his hands to his face again and blubbered something again.
“What?” Gator whispered gently.
Tracer took his hands away, letting them lay limply over his crossed legs. He sniffled away another heaving sob and sighed. “I…I never got to tell her.”
“Emmaline?”
Tracer nodded his head, watching the tree beginning to tilt to one side. More tears raced down his cheek.
“What did you want to tell her?” Gator whispered, barely capable of containing his own chaotic emotions. With a breaking voice, Tracer wept, “I never got to tell her…how…how much I loved her.” He wiped his face with his hands, unable to speak anymore.
“She already knew, Tracer.”
Falcon, Kael, and Raven stood behind them further up the slope. Kael repeated, “She already knew,” then took his glasses off in a hurry. The other boys were wiping tears away and sniffling, struggling to remain strong in spite of everything. Falcon added with a shaky voice, “We all knew.” Tracer stayed quiet, hiding his face, but Gator felt him still trembling. Behind them in the mouth of the cave came a trickle of rescuees. A little boy who stepped into the open and saw the burning tree collapsed to the ground, wailing. Those who followed him joined his chorus of despair with howls, screams, and moans, crying for the home they’d prayed to be delivered back to for all the years they’d been locked away and were now banished from once again.
The overflowing catharsis broke the final barriers of the teen titans. Losing control as the tears streamed down their faces, they collapsed by their friends, arms around each other’s backs, and mourned the loss of all the goodness they knew.
“Umala, let’s go!” yelled Ashleeka, as the smoke filtered up through the windows. It was getting harder to see. The smoke stung her eyes and choked her. She coughed violently as another plume enveloped her.
The floor suddenly jerked under her feet. She fought for her balance as Umala zoomed back around the corner with the pack. It held their lives in it: food, clothes, and a few precious artifacts. Ashleeka grabbed Umala in her arms and raced for the master bedroom. For a moment she forgot where it was. The girls were staying in a guest room in Skyglass for storm protection and for an important assembly in which their parents were required to “decide on something very important,” as they had said. Yes, I would say that voting to have your eldest child’s wings confiscated is rather important, thought Ashleeka darkly.
Another change in the angle of the tree sent her flying through the air, and she smacked her head on the edge of a door. She would’ve fallen if Umala hadn’t kept them up and pulled them the rest of the way. Ashleeka peered through the stream of red coming down her face to see Umala lift a chair with the flick of her finger and shoot it at the window. With everything she had left, Ashleeka pulled Umala to her chest and fell out the window.
Heat blinded them and they choked on the smoke invading their lungs. The flames reached like greedy hands and fingers out of the windows and passages, perforating the immense side of the tree. Ashleeka struggled to stay conscious as she angled right and left, but the fire seemed to follow her, reaching out further and further. Umala, she thought, what’s going on? I can’t get away!
The tree is going to fall into the river. Turn left!
But the right bank is closer!
Just do it! Umala screamed. The tree groaned, leaning, exhausted, out over the river’s dark waves.
Ashleeka angled her wings as hard as she could, but it wasn’t enough. They were diving too steep and too fast, and she didn’t have the strength to make it to the other side of the river. She lost consciousness and they continued to plummet from the smoke-filled sky.
Stumbling up the stairs to the exit at the back of the arena, I knew I was supposed to be dead. I hadn’t melted the blade. My wings were gone. I’d awoken in a scarlet pool of my own blood, abandoned in the arena, screaming from the most malicious pain imaginable, with the executioner’s saber knife in my red and white hand. I didn’t know if I’d taken it or if it was given to me. I ran. The ground rumbled under my feet, and the blistering heat told me that despite every last desperate prayer I’d made, my nightmare was reality. I threw the door open. Columns of smoke rolled up through the great spiral staircase, in through the windows, and encased people in dark poison. Men grabbed buckets of water from the spouting fountains, but it made little difference. The fire was outside, coming in. Flames already crept up the stairs, sending people screaming in every direction.
A Guard crashed into the wall next to me and grabbed the emergency phone, shouting, “Fire on level five! Fire on level five! Evacuate immediately! No, sir, we can’t stop it! Something is working against us here!” He paused as he realized whom he was looking at. As I sprinted up the clearest passage, I heard his yells follow me, telling the soldiers to stop the Sorceress.
“Stop right there! You’re under arrest!”
I’d reached the top levels of Skyglass with almost no memory of how I’d gotten there. Snippets of screams echoing in burning hallways were all I could recall. Balancing precariously on one of the branches protruding from the side of one of the greater branches, I glanced back to see the face of someone I’d once loved like a sister, hiding behind a pointed arrow, glistening with poison.
“Sameela O’Klurn, you are my friend. You always will be.”
She opened her mouth for the next order but hesitated. “Drop the weapon! Hands in the air!”
Remembering the knife, I looked down in my hand to realize it was streaming with blood from my back. Blood was everywhere, on the singed green dress, on my skin, in my hair. “Or what?” I laughed despondently. “You gonna shoot me? Throw me back in a cell?” I held my hands out around me. “Look around you, Sam! The people needed protection from the High Order, not from me. Why else do you think I’m leaving? Nobody can stay here and live to see tomorrow!” My vision blurred but stayed enough to see Sam flex her hand on the bow hilt.
“Who are you?” she asked, more in bewilderment than anger.
I shook my head, just able to whisper. “I don’t know anymore.”
My hand tossed the knife. It arced gracefully through the air and clattered at Sam’s feet. She stared at it, longer than a Guard should. Her bow twitched downward as she looked back at me, her rusty hair waving in the scorching breeze. “You’re my best friend, Sam,” I breathed. “Don’t die on my account.” The tree shifted. My legs folded under me, and l fell off the branch into the endless inferno.
Umala watched the river’s surface approaching ever faster. Ashleeka would never wake in time. She brought her tiny hands by Ashleeka’s ears. An enormous shaft of light appeared, shining out from between her fingers. She squeezed her eyes shut in concentration, and a pulsing light grew out of her chest. When the light became blinding, Umala opened her eyes.
The radiant beam shot from her chest into Ashleeka’s. Ashleeka’s arms and wings flew out rigid, and her eyes flew open, pupils shining white. She caught Umala tight again in her arms and guided them safely over the swirling depths of the river and spraying breaks on the rocks. They were halfway to the far bank, away from the Temple and the tragedy, when they crashed off the shore of a small island. The rocks stung as she waddled up the slope on her knees, but Ashleeka wasn’t thinking about the pain. She’d just been Regenerated from her baby sister turning into a star. Her heart still raced. She crawled into the grove of trees, dropped her pack on the ground, and fell onto her back, Umala lying on her heaving chest.
How in Heaven’s name did you do that?
There was no answer. Instead Ashleeka found Umala sound asleep, drained, and she had nothing left to do but to stare at the waters glistening orange with the firelight.
Still sniffing, the friends of Emmaline O’Meern lay against each other, too tired and too full of grief to speak. Gator absentmindedly rested his head against Tracer’s shoulder, gazing gloomily into the dying glow of the remains of Skyglass, now leaning precariously over the river racing below it. Nothing stood in the way of falling asleep to shut out the grief, but he couldn’t. None of them could. Something deep in their hearts told them that Emma couldn’t be gone. But there was no proof she would come back, and as the terrible night wore on, hope was painfully draining out of them.
Tracer broke the aching silence first.
“What do we do now?” was all he asked.
Gator breathed heavily. “I don’t know.”
“Can we go home?” moaned Raven, half asleep, from Wayk’s lap.
“Are you kidding?” exclaimed Kael, looking down the row. “Those Guards saw us! And there are, like, a million cameras in every tree. You really think they wouldn’t put two and two together?”
“Yeah, he’s right,” Falcon groaned solemnly, running his fingers through his short, dirty hair. “They’ll have records of our attack. The second any of us step inside the boundary again, we’re all hashed.” He made eye contact with everyone, searching their faces for understanding. “We can’t go back.”
A sudden noise from across the darkness made them snap their heads around. A critical support root of the tree had finally collapsed with a vicious crack, and the still-burning tree moaned its last. They watched as the Temple slowly tilted, then gained momentum and plunged into the dark river, hissing like a thousand evil serpents as fire met water. Its death was a final piercing into the hearts of everyone: their Temple was lost, their friends and family were lost, and Emmaline, dear, brave Emmaline, was lost. There was nothing left for them here.
Raven hid his face from the sight and began whimpering into Wayk’s leg. Gator, Falcon, and Tracer wiped newly sprung tears from their eyes, and Kael shielded his face behind his tendrils of blond-turned-brown hair. Wayk stared at the shadowless landscape in front of him and wondered aloud, “Where are we supposed to go?”
“We go home, we die. We stay here, we die. There’s no way to escape this madhouse,” ruminated Tracer. “Dang it, I’m so tired of fighting this place, its rules, its secrets. Why does everything have to be so screwed up?”
As the immense, stubborn fire continued blazing from the river, enough that ash began to fall, Gator inquired, “Couldn’t…couldn’t we change our names? Make disguises? You know, like on spy movies? Or—”
Falcon laughed frantically. “I don’t know, Gator, I just don’t know. I’m too tired to even think about thinking about it, and frankly I’m not sure I care anymore!” He stood up abruptly, fumbled his way a few feet down the slope and turned around. “Don’t you guys get it?” he demanded incredulously. “There is no way out of this! We’re trapped! We always have been.” He waved his arms about, trying to convey the hopelessness of their situation. “We can’t pass the Wall, and we can’t stay here either! Even if we did manage to keep low, whoever’s left of the Guard will search every corner of NeverSeen until they find us! See? There’s no place that we can hide, no place that we can rest! They’re going to hunt us down and make us Traitors! They’ll kill us just like Emmaline!”
Tracer jumped up, yelling, “Shut up! SHUT! UP!” Gator and Kael were dragged several feet down the slope as they seized him, struggling to hold him back. The fury churning in his eyes startled them all, but it smoldered back into grief. “I knew we were in the wrong place. Why didn’t she tell us…” he murmured as ash settled on his head. Wayk, Kael, Gator, and Falcon returned to their seats around him, unable to speak.
It was several hours of waves of grief, anger, and hopelessness laced by semiconsciousness. The fire had faded greatly by then, and its light was replaced gradually with the glow of dawn: burnt blacks, raging reds, and poisonous pinks with smoke blanketing the forest. Ash fell steadily now, making a quilt of its own amongst the trees and across the lush green fields. It settled on the rescuees and the rescuers, all consumed by universal misery. There was nothing to do or go back to. So everybody did nothing at all. If and when they slept, they found no rest.
