IT TAKES A FEW DAYS’ travel to get to the river that is supposed to take me and Luokai to the Post. At its mouth, the current tugs at our boat, trying to push us back out into the open ocean. The very idea—even looking into that flat, gray horizon—feels like old meat in my stomach. So. Many. Ways. To. Drown. The wind sits beside me, chilling my hands where they stick out from my cuffs, but I’m glad she’s there.
Luokai does something to the engine to make us go faster, his eyes on the white-ridged waves curling around us. He must sense the fear in me, because he breaks the careful silence between us, as if noise is some kind of medicine for distress.
“Tell me how you ended up with my brother.” He actually smiles, sort of. Luokai’s face is too calm for a smile like Sev’s, which was always full of warmth. Or Howl’s, half dangerous, half joking. “Or maybe just who you are. I only know you’re named June because Howl told me.”
My wind twists toward his voice. I like that she seems to like him, even if she isn’t always the best judge of people. She chose Dad, after all. But that was before SS. I’ve got new family to take care of me now.
The gore chuckles. Howl and Sev watched Luokai infect you and did nothing. You call that taking care of you?
“I think you’re a qilin in disguise.” Luokai’s voice comes again. The water is choppier here, and he’s speaking so slowly and calmly. He must be able to see the way the waves make me grip the boat’s railing, my knuckles white. “My mother used to tell me stories about them. Shy creatures so peaceful they refused to bruise grass by walking over it. You have to be lucky to have brought my brother back to me.” The Speaker cocks his head, the gesture so Howl-like that I have to blink it away. “You aren’t hiding horns, are you?”
I’ve heard of qilin before, and they didn’t sound so peaceful. A story of teeth and claws that made Howl look at Sev to see if she was paying attention, and Sev blush and look up at the stars as if she wasn’t. Howl must have heard about the beasts from his mom too—the same person, maybe even the same story, but he and his brother heard two different things. I scan the water, the river lapping up at the sides of the boat like a great tongue straining for a taste. I shrink lower on my bench, staring at my boots.
“If you’re a qilin, then maybe we’ll have enough good luck to—”
I look up as Luokai’s voice squeezes tight in a watery gag, our boat jerking to the side as he does something to the engine. The water begins to push us sideways, the engine coughing into silence. Luokai stills, just like Parhat always did when SS whispered into his ear.
And that’s when I realize that Luokai wasn’t talking for me. He was talking to distract himself from a compulsion.
The gore inside me howls. Nowhere to hide. No way to run. Water water WATER caging me in. For a fraction of a second I grope for the length of metal inside my coat, but then reason comes back into my brain, and I lurch toward the poles tethered to the side of the boat, fingers shaking as I untie one.
Luokai jerks out of his SS-induced stupor, slithering down into the covered portion of the boat. He slams into the door just as I shove against the other side and stick the pole through the handle to jam it shut.
The handle rattles, but the pole holds. A wave hits the side of the boat with a hollow slop, the water around us choppy, the current pushing us away from the river mouth. The next wave is larger, rocking the boat sideways.
My fingers don’t want to let go of the pole keeping Luokai inside the room and me safe on the deck, but the next wave throws me to my knees, almost toppling the boat.
I go on my toes, straining for a look at the boat’s controls. If I don’t do something, the water will swallow us down. Maybe if I climb over the canopy, start up the engine the way I’ve seen Luokai do, then point us toward the river—
Only, there’s a trapdoor up there that leads into the room Luokai’s stuck in. He scratches at the door between me and him just like Parhat used to. His knife dug into whatever it could reach. The gore’s voice is so loud. X after x carved into trees, into the ground, into his arms, into you.
Another wave begins to swell toward us, and my wind strokes through my hair, pushing me toward the canopy. My hands shake as I let go of the pole holding the door shut, sweat slipping across my palm. But I start climbing, pulling myself up onto the metal roof. The wave catches the boat just as I grab hold of the railing above, my fingers screaming as I cling to the metal bars, the boat pitching and swinging wild under my feet. My feet skid across the rusty roof, deep gray Underneath foaming around the boat hungrily as it watches me slide toward it.
Muscles screaming, I pull myself through the railing and hold tight until the worst of the rocking stops. My eyes skip over the trapdoor, propped open, a yellow light leaking from inside. There’s a low scritch-scratch of fingernails on wood and heavy gasps for air that sneak up through the opening. He must still be trying to open the door.
Keeping my feet quiet, I creep over to the boat’s wheel and buttons and dials. Biting my lip, I mimic what I’ve seen Luokai do, pressing the red button and turning a key while jamming a foot onto the lower pedal.
The boat jerks forward, choking to life.
Grabbing the wheel, I keep my foot on the pedal, trying to straighten our course. It goes slower than two snails, but the boat’s nose obeys, turning back toward land. I grip the wheel with white knuckles, keeping us pointed into the river’s wide mouth, my heart jolting loose every time the water tries to nip and twist us to the side.
But that’s when the scratching down inside the canopy stops. My throat closes, memories of Parhat, Cas, Tian, of Dad creeping toward me with SS’s ugly snarl. This time there’s nowhere to run.
Luokai’s footsteps trip toward the ladder. I hold myself perfectly still, my back pressed into the banister so hard I couldn’t breathe even if I wanted to. The strip of metal I pulled from the ship’s railing below digs into my side, the sharp edge jabbing my ribs through my shirt.
Luokai’s head comes into view at the bottom of the ladder, his head jerking this way and that until he looks up.
His eyes find mine.
The gore inside me snarls, but I look away, my whole body rigid as I pretend to be a piece of scrap metal, an extra rung on the ladder, a breath of wind.
The ladder squeaks as he climbs. One of my hands sneaks into my coat to touch the metal strip. Eyes are one of those things that can make you look threatening. Can remind SS you’re there.
“Are you okay? Did I scare you?” Luokai’s voice sounds pained, holding more feelings than I’ve seen from him this whole time on the boat.
The gore hasn’t lain back down inside me, though, isn’t letting me uncurl my fingers from around the metal strip. My wind pulls at me as I turn away from Luokai, gritting my teeth so hard it’s like I’m biting myself. How many days have I been on this boat, eating Luokai’s food, burrowed in the blankets he gave me, remembering how much he looks like Howl and talks like Sev? You can never trust a Seph, no matter how nice they are, no matter how sorry they look after doing something bad. You have to run and run and run until they can’t find you. It’s what Dad should have known all along. Even if it hurt worse than dying when he finally told me to go. It’s what Luokai knew, why he let his family go.
But I’m not his family. I’m his hostage. His way to a cure.
Later, when the engine and the sun have gone to bed, I creep into the room where Luokai sleeps. The last few days stretch tight across my chest, the things he’s done for me when he didn’t have to. He’s nice. I know it. And he means well, has kept me firm in this boat every time SS tried to send me into the water. But it’s not enough, because it’s not just Luokai inside his head.
I pull Luokai’s pack out from under the bed and unzip it slowly enough that it doesn’t make noise, then take the things I’ll need to leave him behind.