“I just do,” I say, making an impatient gesture at the footprints. “I’m sorting the signs.”
Indie looks at me. She can’t decide whether or not to believe me. She thinks I’m sick from the tablet, that I’m losing my mind.
But she saw my name on the tree and she knows that I didn’t carve it there.
“I still think you should rest,” Indie says, one last time.
“I can’t,” I say, and she can see that it’s true.
I hear it not long after we leave the settlement. A sound of footsteps behind us. We’re near the water and I stop.
“Someone’s here,” I say, turning to face Indie. “Someone is following us.”
Indie looks at me, her expression wary. “I think you’re hearing things that aren’t there. Just like you were seeing things that don’t exist.”
“No,” I say. “Listen.”
We both stand still, listening to the canyon. It’s quiet except for the rustling of leaves as the wind moves through them. The wind stops and the rattling ceases, but still I hear something. Feet on sand? A hand brushing against stone for support? Something. “There,” I say to Indie. “You must have heard that.”
“I don’t hear anything,” Indie says, but she looks unnerved. “You’re not well. Maybe we should rest a little.”
I answer her by walking again. I listen for the sound of someone behind us, but all I hear are the leaves, skittering and moving again on the canyon breeze.
We walk until dark, and then we use our flashlights and we keep on. Indie was right; I don’t feel anyone following us now. I only hear my own breath, feel my own self, the weakness in each vein of my body, each bend of my muscle, every tired step of my feet. I will not let anything stop me when I am this close to Ky. I will take more tablets. I don’t think Indie’s right about them.
When she isn’t looking, I open another tablet but my hands tremble too much. It falls to the ground and so does a tiny whisper of paper. And then I remember. Xander’s notes. I wanted to read them.
The paper slips away on the wind, and it seems like far too much work to chase it down or to try to find blue in the dark.
Chapter 19
KY
I wake to the sound of something big in the sky.
When did they start firing so early in the morning? I think frantically. It’s lighter and later than I thought. I must have been tired.
“Eli!” I call out.
“I’m right here!”
“Where’s Vick?”
“He wanted to get in a couple of hours of fishing before we left,” Eli says. “He told me to stay behind and to let you sleep.”
“No, no, no,” I say, and then neither of us says anything more, because the sound of the machines overhead is too loud. The firing sounds different, too. Heavy and ponderous. Precise. Not the scatter of rain we are used to. This sounds like hailstones as big as boulders pounding from the sky.
When it stops, I don’t wait even though I should. “Stay here,” I tell Eli, and I run out to the plain, start crawling through the grass, heading for that damn stream, that damn marsh.
But Eli follows me, and I let him. I crawl to that place on the bank and then I don’t look.
I believe what I see. So if I don’t see Vick dead it won’t be true.
Instead I look at the stream where something has exploded. Brown and green marsh grasses are partly hidden beneath the dirt like the long tangled hair of bodies pulled under.
The force of the explosion has thrown earth into the stream and dammed it. Turned it into pools. Little pieces of river with nowhere to run.
I walk a few strides downstream, far enough to see that they’ve done it again and again and again all along the length of the river.
I hear the sound of Eli sobbing.
Then I turn and look at Vick.
“Ky,” Eli says. “Can you help him?”
“No,” I say.
Whatever fell hit with such impact that it looks like it sent Vick flying; his neck was broken. He must have died instantly. I know I should be glad for that. But I’m not. I look at those empty eyes that reflect back the blue of the sky because there is nothing left of Vick himself.
What drew him out here? Why didn’t he fish under the cover of the trees instead of in this open place?
I see the reason in the pool near him, trapped in the newly stilled water. I know instantly what kind of fish it is though I’ve never seen one before.
A rainbow. Its colors flash in the light as it struggles.
Did Vick see it? Is that why he came out into the open?
The pool grows darker. Something, a large round sphere, sits at the bottom of the water. As I look closer, I see that the sphere lets off a slow release of toxin.
They didn’t mean to kill Vick. They do mean to kill this stream.
As I watch the rainbow turns over, its white belly up. It rises to the surface.
Dead like Vick.
I want to laugh and scream at the same time.
“He had something in his hand,” Eli says. I look at him. He has the piece of wood carved with Laney’s name. “It fell when he did.” Eli reaches for Vick’s hand and holds it for a moment. Then he crosses Vick’s arms across his chest. “Do something,” Eli tells me with tears streaming down his face.
I turn away and tear off my coat.
“What are you doing?” Eli asks in horror. “You can’t leave him like this.”
I don’t have time to answer. I throw my coat to the ground and plunge my hands into the nearest pool of water—the one with the dead rainbow. The cold hurts. Moving water rarely freezes, but this water isn’t moving anymore. Using both hands, I hoist the sphere out while it keeps spewing poison. It’s heavy, but I run it over to the side, put it near a rock, and start looking for the next one. I can’t clear all the dirt that has exploded, blocking the river in many places, but I can take the poison out of some of the pools. I know this is as futile as everything I’ve done. Like trying to get back to Cassia in a Society that wants me dead.
But I can’t stop.
Eli comes over and reaches into the water too.
“It’s too dangerous,” I tell him. “Get back in the trees.”
He doesn’t answer but instead helps me lift out the next sphere. I remember Vick helping me with the bodies and I let Eli stay.
All day long, Vick talks to me. I know it means I’m crazy but I can’t help hearing him.