12

The burning in my chest refuses to go away. But the rage I feel is nothing compared to the bloody, deadly heat Jared throws off.

Jared snarls, showing teeth. “I’ll kill that little weasel. I’m going to enjoy ripping his limbs from his body.” He paces the sidewalk before us in long, violent strides, his legs and back gaining that telltale thickness as the bones in his face lengthen.

“No, I’ll do it.” I pinch at the bones of my nose in an effort to shake loose from the violent headache that suddenly come upon me.

“Yesss,” Jared mouths, his tongue thick and uneasy in his mouth, “but I can break him into tiny pieces for you first.”

I lean over, wanting to vomit. Ali lied to me. And I bought it—all because I thought it would help Ali. Because I had the delusional thought that it might, somehow, bring Jared and me closer. More fool I. The gold of the necklace jangles against my chin. And suddenly I can’t stand it another second. I want it off. I stand up straight and motion to Serena. “Help me get it off.”

The Salvager shakes her head slowly. “I’m not sure that’s such a good idea. I think we should speak with Storm first.”

“What? Why?” I paw at the back of the necklace, but I can’t seem to find the clasp. In a panic, I pull on it, hard enough to bite into the skin of my neck. The chain holds fast.

“You don’t recognize it?” Serena lets out an unhappy puff of breath. “Here,” she says, tracing the stamped horns with her finger. Serena’s voice drops to a whisper. “Can’t you feel it? This coin is not just a piece of gold, Lucy Lu. It’s as old as people. This tiny little coin sparkles. Sparkles and zaps like the Prayer Tree in Heaven Square.”

“So? It will be just as sparkly off my neck.”

But Serena shakes her head again. “No, leave it be, Lucy. You don’t know what this necklace is.”

“I can’t! I won’t. Carl, please, get it off me!” I plead. The marmalade cat man looks back and forth at us in alarm before stepping forward and grasping the chain of the necklace with both hands.

“Carl.” Serena drops just one quiet syllable. Carl steps back, a look of regret stamped on his fur-lined face.

I gasp in outrage. “Jared,” I say, lifting my chin proudly. “Take it off. Do it!” I command. But even though his eyes spit poison, as though he’d gladly tear the world in two, he shakes his head with a wry, thoughtful look.

“Maybe Serena’s right,” he says slowly.

My face burns. How can they leave me to suffer such humiliation? “Please take me back to Storm’s,” I command, dismissing them all as I look away.

Jared murmurs something, presumably speaking through his earpiece. He’s shaking with barely contained rage as he comes to stand in front of me and open the door of Storm’s vehicle that has just pulled up.

“I’ll take you back. And then I’m going hunting,” he promises.

…

Storm’s is quiet by the time we return. I immediately stomp in the direction of his office, Jared still heaving with anger two steps behind me. Kira pops out from nowhere, the ivory oval of her face bathed in shadows.

“Hey, Lucy, hold up there.”

“I need to see Storm.”

“Not right now.” Kira calmly throws up a hand to halt us.

“Kira? If you don’t get out of the way right now, I swear to God—”

Kira rolls her eyes at Jared. “Whatever, Prince Pain in the Ass. Hold your horses. Storm’s in a meeting and can’t be disturbed right now.”

Jared narrows his eyes but steps back, the air of menace hanging around him notching down. “This can’t wait.”

“Oh, but it can. And it will.” Kira twirls a strand of auburn hair between her fingers.

Jared’s a narrow hair’s length from turning. As the bones of his face lengthen, he snarls in the low, angry tones of a jungle cat.

If he shifts, blood will spill. And it will be my fault.

I press myself against Jared’s chest, ignoring Kira and her dropping jaw. Jared blinks in surprise, too, the inhuman sheen brightening at my nearness. I trace my fingers across his cheek. Somehow the skin gets harder when he’s this close to turning. But I feel him relax. A tense few moments later, Jared rests his forehead against mine as though exhausted from fighting something.

The world falls away from us. I don’t know how much time passes before prickles of awareness creep in. Emotions drift through me like clouds. Joy, a sharp feeling of homesickness, and in there with the rest is a thick, awful blanket of misery. I pull back from Jared, unsure of how to put into words that something has happened. Then I feel it again: a sharp tug on that other sense, the one that marks me one of two.

Something is happening. And that something involves Margot.

Kira loudly clears her throat, stretching it out so there’s no mistaking the fact that she’s probably done it a number of times with no effect. One of her eyebrows is hitched so high it’s crawled under her hair.

“You’d best keep that just between the two of you,” she says, crossing her arms. “Stand down. I hear them.”

Three seconds later, the door swings open. Storm’s magnificent silhouette blocks the rest of the room, but he beckons us forward.

My eyes light on Margot, who sits on the cream-colored couch like a timid cat. She’s pale but happy enough, so I’m able to focus on the man sitting across from her in beaten, dirt-caked leathers. I rub my eyes, happy disbelief burning a hole in me.

“Shane!” I yell.

Then I throw myself on our father’s man.

The big man squeezes his fists. The gesture is so familiar it washes me with homesickness. A host of memories float through me: Shane taking Margot and me to school. Shane picking us up when we fell off our bikes. Kisses on the top of our heads. A hearty laugh when we behaved like monkeys. He’d been our father’s man for nearly as long as we girls have drawn breath and was as much a part of our family landscape—in some cases more so—than our parents. Having him return is like getting back a piece of our missing life. Still, it’s clear he’s not the same Shane we’ve known for years. The creases on his face ring his eyes more deeply. His hair has grown in, a long shag rather than the tightly cropped military cut he’s sported for years.

The last time we saw Shane was the night of our Reveal party. Margot and I were to learn our fate: Splicer, Laster, or True Born. Instead we learned that our future was trickier still than these. That was the night our parents disappeared and Margot along with them. We’ve spent months putting out quiet inquiries to learn the fate of our parents. Now, after all this time, our father’s head merc may be able to finally put the missing pieces together.

The tiny cup Shane holds rattles in his large hand as though he’s developed a palsy. He nods in Margot’s direction. “I lost sight of Margot and your folks in the scrum that night.”

Storm leans casually against his desk, arms crossed as he coolly assesses the man before him. Jared, on the other hand, greeted Shane with a warm handshake and a clasp on the back, though now he stands against the wall, one foot propped on the plaster, looking strange in Storm’s finery.

“Heard through my contacts the next day they’d gotten on a private ship with that Russian count or whatever he is. And by the time I heard back from my old buddies in the Wasteland, it was too late to do ’en’thin’ but look for another post.” Shane blinks and stares at us.

The Wasteland. It’s the mercs’ word for the Siberian plains. The mercs train there because it’s a hard land, we’ve heard Shane explain often enough.

It doesn’t make sense to me. Why would our parents leave Shane behind without so much as a word? Why didn’t they take their head merc? But there will be time for questions like that much later. For now it is enough to know that he is alive.

“What have you been doing to make a living?”

Shane scratches his whiskered face. “Oh, this and that. Picked up a few security gigs, nothing too stable. Kept hoping the Foxes would return to the den, reckon.”

A pang goes through me, but it’s Margot’s rather than my own. “Do you think they’re still in Russia?” she asks.

Shane nods. “I do. I have people keeping radar out. I’m makin’ sure that smarmy Russian bastard doesn’t do something he’ll regret.” The heat in Shane’s words is not as surprising as the realization that he’s right. All this time, I had supposed that our parents had been, at the very least, misguided participants in whatever crimes Leo Resnikov had dreamed up.

Horror washes through me, both Margot’s and my own. Until this moment, we’d both barely considered the alternative. Our parents could be in trouble. They could be dead. And then who will we be? a little voice inside me mocks. I tamp it down, disgusted with myself, as Margot reaches for my fingers.

“You’re welcome to stay here tonight,” Storm tells Shane. But it’s not a voice I’m accustomed to hearing from our guardian. He casts a long, tangled shadow across the room. It stretches over Shane like a shroud, ending in extravagant antlers. His eyes burn mercury. “But while I extend my hospitality, there are certain rules you’ll need to abide by. No weapons. Lucy and Margot are under my protection now. And should anyone try to harm them or interfere with my guardianship, I will respond with swift and certain justice.”

Shane accepts the unsubtle threat with a crooked grin, his one gold tooth glimmering in his mouth. “Grateful to you, Mr. Storm. A bed and a wash would come in handy. I just want to find some steady work and to do right by these two here.” He nods at us.

“Good. We’ll talk further in the morning. But now”—Storm turns his attention to Margot and me—“ladies, I think it’s time you were off to bed. You have a tutorial tomorrow, don’t you?”

“But—” I start to argue, only to be met with the shade of winter thrown off by Storm’s eyes. I snap my mouth closed. There will be no dealing with Alastair’s betrayal. Not tonight, at any rate.

…

The clock ticks. Eight. Nine. I turn over onto my side. The sheets tangle in my legs, boiling my too-sensitive skin. I can still feel the trace of Jared’s hands on my knees from earlier in the evening. My mind hums like a swarm of bees and ticks through the relentless pieces of a maddening puzzle.

Shane. The Watchers. Father Wes. Theodore Nash. Resnikov. Our parents. Alastair. Storm. Doc Raines.

Jared.

Ten. I start counting all over again. There are so many tangles I can’t possibly sort through them all. And the biggest of all: our own blood, Margot’s and mine, and what it might be capable of.

It’s thoughts of my sister that finally set me to my feet. I pull on a robe and tie it hastily, then shove my feet into slippers. It’s not like it was at our home, when Margot and I would dash into each other’s rooms as though they were our own. Here we are separated by yards of hallway, walls, doors that don’t join our rooms. And most troubling of all: Margot’s secrets.

I rap softly on her door. “Mar?” The door isn’t locked, so I let myself in, feeling the strange distance between us, like a skin we no longer share. The room is quiet, still. The curtain flaps gently at its ends where the window is cracked open. The form on the bed doesn’t move. But she is not sleeping.

Her wakefulness calls me. “Margot,” I call out in our quiet-quiet way. Threading my way through clothes strewn about the floor like land mines, I sit on the bed beside her. My hand rests on her ribs. “Mar.”

She turns and stares at me through glittery eyes. For a moment I have the vertiginous sense of looking back at myself through her eyes. An illusion. Must be. Margot flips to her back and moves over. I flop onto the warm spot left by her body. Our fingers reach out automatically to touch.

“What’s wrong?” The silence of the room almost swallows my sister’s hushed voice.

“Don’t you mean, what’s wrong now?” I try to joke, but it comes out flat. This is no laughing matter.

“Sure. That.” My sister lets go of my fingers and eases a hand over my hair. Her touch is soft, gentle. It soothes me in ways I can’t describe. It almost breaks my heart.

I swallow past the lump in my throat. “Turns out I might be in a bit of trouble.”

“You?” There’s laughter in her voice. When did the tables tip so completely? When did I become the trouble-magnet sister? “Well, might as well tell me, then. Maybe I can help.”

“It’s Shane. Well, it’s sort of Shane.”

Margot plays with a skein of my hair. “It’s wonderful to see him, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” I admit.

“So why are you upset? What has this got to do with your troubles, Lu?” She props herself up to see me better.

“Makes you realize, I reckon. They had such high expectations for us. How can we ever live up to them while we’re here, living this life?” And high up on their list, along with top grades and making the right connections, was achieving the right marriage. In our world, marriage is a political alliance that furthers the family’s interests.

Margot’s hands still, her expression grim. “Why do you think we’d have to? It’s enough that Storm has us finishing our degrees.”

“We’re still the Fox sisters. They’re still our parents. They may come back.”

“Lucy.” Margot lets out a huffy breath. “I think you need to face facts. It’s really doubtful they’ll come back.”

“Why? What do you know?” Because she does know something. She’s holding back. I feel the wall between us, so thick it might as well be a prison.

“I know they’ve likely washed their hands of us.”

“But why? What did we do?” The tears start, the ones I’d been refusing since the moment our house was demolished and Margot was ripped away from me.

“Nothing. We did nothing, Lu. Listen to me.” And I can’t help but respond to the note of authority in her voice. “We. Did. Nothing. This is their fault.”

I ponder this thread for a moment before speaking again. “Would you have married him?” She doesn’t need me to say the name. It hangs there between us. Resnikov.

“Yes,” she coughs out.

“Really?”

She doesn’t answer. But inside her unfurls a hard, bright emotion I don’t have a name for. She’s hiding this from me, comes the treacherous thought. And then, What did that lunatic do to her? For a lunatic Leo Resnikov surely was. And our parents—God only knows what kind of deal they had worked out between them, but I reckon it was a bad one.

“Mar.” I still her hand on my hair and touch her cheek. “You know you can tell me anything.”

She nods, her eyes bright with unshed tears. But there it is, a still seed within her, a secret she won’t share. I hate it. It makes me feel sick that she’d keep things from me. And yet, I have to admit I have been keeping my own secrets, too.

As if she’s read my mind, Margot asks in a bright, curious voice, “Will you marry Ali?” I choke and sit up to cough it out. Mar pounds me on the back. “You okay?”

I nod through the tears, feeling foolish and about ten years old. Because I don’t think I can admit to my sister the truth of my folly, the mess I’m in.

“No,” I finally say, but in answer to which question, I’m not sure.

“No, you’re right,” Margot muses with a peal of laughter. “You’ll likely marry Storm.”

“What?” I screech. My stomach curls into knots and I find I want to dive under the covers rather than reply. Has Margot seen the shift in Storm’s attitude towards me? “Why would you say that? He’s our guardian.”

Margot shrugs. “It’s the smart move. Storm is the most powerful man in Dominion right now.”

“You reckon Father might have matched us?”

Margot sighs, and a husk of her hair floats away from her face. “I don’t know, Lu. I don’t think I know what our parents would or wouldn’t do any longer. And I’m not even sure it matters.” There it is again: a secret. “All I know is, Nolan Storm is quickly becoming one of the most important men in Nor-Am. And on top of that, he’s our guardian. And on top of that…” Her smile is lopsided and strange, accompanied by something sharp and bright in her words, her heart, that I don’t understand. “I reckon he’s grooming you for the position.”

My mouth flaps open and closed as I sit there in stunned silence. And yet, Margot’s not wrong. I can try to ignore it or deny it all I want, but maybe it would be smarter to start thinking about what Nolan Storm might want from me, and me alone. “You’re joking.”

“I’m a Fox,” Margot says in tones so black I’d as soon call them shadows. “I’d never joke about marriage.”

…

You can smell despair on every street corner as the preacher men set up their soap boxes and talk of the coming of peace, of Plague Cure. Yet safe in Storm’s keep, we’re treated to the crumbs of our old life of privilege, safety. Certainty.

Blinking, I drag myself out of bed and try to ignore the sinking feeling in my gut as I stare at the empty chair across from me, its lacy, girlish pillows intact. But this morning is different, I remind myself. Everything is different today.

Margot’s brightness zings through me. I rush into the kitchen and throw myself into Shane’s arms for a massive hug. His biceps are huge, covered in the intricate Celtic knot work he says is his religion—if a merc like him could be said to have a religion other than death dealing.

“Mornin’.” He snuffles into my hair, then pulls back to put a heavy hand on my head. “Holy Plague Fire, you girls are growing up to be fine ladies.” He grins that familiar grin. But the lines of his face are tight, and the smile doesn’t quite stretch to his eyes. I sit down beside Margot. We watch our father’s man happily for a moment as he quietly sips his coffee and studies us from under half-lowered lids.

“You got a reason for staring, you sassy Foxes?” His voice booms across the room.

Beside me, Margot giggles. I delight in how she feels, lighter than she’s been in months, as though suddenly the hands of the clock have tumbled us back to a simpler time. I grab a piece of toast from the pile Alma has left, though she’s nowhere to be seen.

“Shane.” She giggles some more, half covering her mouth. “Will you take us to the school this morning? For old time’s sake?”

Shane sets down his coffee mug and shoots us a curious look. “Now why on earth would you girls be heading back to Grayguard? Didn’t you finish that place off last year?”

Margot and I share a startled glance. She taps a finger on the table. You tell him.

“Well…” I pause to diplomatically compose our downfall—though to save Shane’s feelings or our own, I’m not certain. “Margot was in Russia and didn’t get to finish the year. And I was… Well, I was too busy to finish…” I blush. “So when Margot returned, Storm made a deal with the school that will see us finish up our credits.”

Margot’s mouth turns down into a pout. “Essentially he’s making us do this. He says the piece of paper is important. We’re almost there, though. Just two more exams.”

Shane’s face crumbles. “Oh, girls.” He hangs his head. His long hair tangles down so I can see dirty blond streaks mixed with white and black. When Shane finally looks at us again, his eyes are suspiciously bright. He runs a hand over his stubbled cheeks. “I don’t even know what to say. You don’t have a clue how many nights I lay awake just praying you were both alive.” Alarm skitters through me, though it’s not my own. “I owe you both a debt of honor, and I hope you’ll forgive me for letting this happen to you. I’ll do whatever it takes to make it up to you.”

Shane’s eyes travel back to his hands, where he grips his coffee mug like it’s a pistol. I fold my fingers over his callused flesh. “This isn’t your doing, Shane. Mother and Father…” I start. But I am at a loss as to how to finish that thought. I offer him a brittle smile. “We’re fine. The True Borns took us in like we were their own.”

“They shouldn’t have had to save you. It should have been me.” He thumps his chest with a meaty hand. But what is the sense in wading back into the past? I wonder. It’s littered only with the bones of what might have been.

…

We enter the cavernous foyer of Grayguard. I feel sick as I rehearse what I’m going to say should Ali be foolish enough to show his face today. At the same time, I try to ignore the feeling of déjà vu that pricked me with unease, like a squeeze to the neck, as Shane dropped us at the huge wooden doors of the school this morning. Margot gently reaches across my back and tugs a lock of my hair. It feels soft and sweet, a reminder of times past.

“What is it?”

I heave my bag higher on my shoulder. “Doesn’t it feel strange to you?” I whisper back.

Eyes on us. Eyes everywhere as the other students fill the hall, rambunctious with laughter and chatter. I lower my gaze and concentrate on my feet as we walk toward our lockers. If I can’t see them, maybe they can’t see me. Margot clears her throat. I know she’s feeling the same way I am. Exposed. “What? This?”

I shake my head. “Shane. Here he is, returned and picking up right where we all left off. But how can he? Our old life is gone. I don’t know how to make the two fit.”

Margot takes a second to consider before she nods. “I reckon you’re right.” Her chin dips she answers me. “I sometimes wish we could go back, believe it or not. Things were so much…simpler. There is no way, I know that. But I’m not sure I can imagine a way forward, either. And…what if we’re just stuck, right here, forever?”

“Do you trust him?”

I don’t realize how much I want my sister to say yes, she trusts Shane without reservation, until she nods. “As much as anybody, outside of you. I mean, I trust him more than Mother and Father. Don’t you?”

“We have only a handful of allies, and he’s one of them. We don’t really have the luxury of mistrusting him. Do we?”

We stop in the midst of the crowded hall, our troubled eyes locked on each other. Murmurs and grunts of disapproval fill the air as all around us the student body flows like water flowing past two rocks.

There’s an old proverb in Dominion, bandied about the Upper Circle, but it flies like a poison arrow to our hearts.

An Upper Circler won’t survive without family.