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I said nothing to the man before me now. The vitality I remembered so clearly in him was gone; his cheeks were sunken, skin ashen, eyes hollow. Like a walking death. “Sorry for all the secrecy,” Nik said. “I was afraid you wouldn’t come and it was imperative that I see you.”
“I would have come.”
He shrugged. “I couldn’t risk that you wouldn’t. I told Eric to get you by any means.”
“Good for you. Why?”
“I needed to tell you some things, before it’s too late.”
“You’re dying.” It wasn’t a question but he nodded.
“I am. We all are, actually, but I’m on my way out right now.”
“What’s wrong with you?”
“I don’t know. But I’m not getting any better.”
Eric cleared his throat. “Can I bring Lexi in now?” he asked.
Nik raised his eyebrows. “Lexi?”
“A friend. She knows,” I said.
“Not good.”
I knew how Nik believed we should deal with problems. He tended to think permanent solutions were always the most effective. It was the primary reason we’d parted company. “This guy knows, ” I said.
“He works for me,” Nik said. “He knows he’ll be well paid, if he does what he’s told. And what will happen if he doesn’t. Fear and money make excellent companions.”
“She actually cares about me.”
“So much less binding, when the affection starts to wane.”
Eric shifted and coughed slightly. “She’s out there waiting. She saved his life, you know, Nik.”
“She did? You’re a lucky man, Joshua. I just wish –“ he turned his gaze to Eric again, “that you’d let me know you were bringing her. But you might as well invite her in now.” I didn’t like the way he said it, but I couldn’t very well leave her in the car forever. And he knew about her now, anyway. As Eric disappeared, Nik said, “We have much to talk about, Joshua. But not right now.”
Lexi came in, looking hesitant, and I reached out my hand to her. She took it quickly. “Lexi. Good to meet you.” His steely blue eyes met her gaze directly, and his voice communicated no warmth. “I’m Nik.” She glanced at me sharply.
“Nik.”
“Ah, you’ve heard about me. All good things, of course.”
“Of course.” I felt the pressure on my hand tighten, and I squeezed hers quickly in return.
“Come, sit. It’s late. Or early, depending on how you want to think of it. I’ve made coffee.”
Things were uncomfortable, at best. We sat at the kitchen table. Nik’s coffee was strong, like he’d always made it, and I saw Lexi grimace as she swallowed. She cleared her throat. “So, how do you and Eric know each other?” she asked.
“I noticed that the young man was in need of gainful employment. I decided I’d offer him some work.”
“That was generous of you.” Lexi looked at me.
“Yes. I’m the true definition of a philanthropist,” he said dryly.
“It was a pretty sweet deal,” Eric added, taking a swig of his drink. “Takes me off the street, lets me live here, and then pays me to find this guy.” He gestured with his free hand at me. “Easiest money I ever made.”
“How did you find me?”
“Easy. Nik said you like looking for money in condos way up in the air. I started reading a bunch of newspapers online from all over the place for stories about strings of high-rise robberies. I kept looking until I found the right city. And then I just watched the skies in the pricey neighborhoods. Eventually, there you were. I followed you.”
“Pretty good.”
“I taught him to outsmart even you, my boy.” Nik smiled thinly across the table at me. “It’s too bad you were so easily found.”
“Not really,” Eric interjected quickly. “If I hadn’t found him, he probably woulda bled out.”
Lexi blanched slightly, and I tried to steer the topic to lighter things. “So, how’d you find this place?”
“Bank was auctioning it off. The family all died in a tragic accident. Carbon monoxide, I think they said.” So much for lighter conversation. Carbon monoxide. Right.
“So you own it?”
“I do. Free and clear. This and a dozen other properties. Bet you never thought you’d see the day when I owned my own land.”
“Can’t say I did.”
“It’s a lovely home,” Lexi said.
“Home indeed.” We fell, then, into an uncomfortable silence.
He drained his cup and stood abruptly. “Time to talk, Joshua. You and I.”
I took Lexi’s hand. “I’m not leaving her alone here,” I said. I’d come to a decision at the table. “She already knows about me, obviously. Anything you plan to say can be said in front of her.”
Nik tilted his head thoughtfully. “As you wish then.” I was certain he saw her as a threat; he must feel that way about Eric too and, if that were true, Eric was no safer here than Lexi. I knew exactly how Nik felt about liabilities. As we settled down in the living room—Lexi and I on the couch, Nik standing awkwardly across the room against the wall—I could hear the clink of dishes as Eric began cleaning up.
Nik cleared his throat. He looked almost vulnerable, standing there, trying to figure out how to begin. I’d never seen the man look so unsure of himself. “I didn’t want to leave anything unsaid.”
“Is this where you tell me you’ve always loved me like a son?”
“No. This is where I tell you who you really are.” Lexi inhaled sharply beside me, and it took me a moment to realize I was holding my breath too. He waited for us to exhale, and then he continued. “I knew your mother and father—your real ones. You might as well know—I was in love with your mother, and I was there the day you were taken.” The room was so still that we could have been in a painting. A thousand questions rushed to mind, but I couldn’t seem to give voice to any of them. “We used to live with others of our kind—in parts of Siberia, up in the mountain caves. Ours is one tribe of many. Your mother and I –” He hesitated and then seemed to decide something. “There’s a much easier way to do this.” He crossed the room, stopping directly in front of me.
“Do what?”
“Make you understand where you came from.”
He placed his hand on my cheek. “What...” I started, but I felt the question die in my throat as a rush of memories flooded my senses. The sharp scent of trees, the cool winter air, the drifting snow—and her. I could see her in my mind as clearly as I saw Nik standing before me. She grinned, her dark familiar eyes gleaming at me in the twilight and her wings extending from the back of her white fur tunic.
Except she wasn’t really looking at me, I realized. These were Nik’s memories. She was looking at him. Together, they were flying downwards towards a low, white clearing, far below the snow-capped mountaintops. Nik was flying.
“What’s happening?” Lexi’s voice was panicked.
I couldn’t look away from Nik’s face, but she was waiting for some kind of answer. I groped for words to explain what was happening. “I’m pretty sure I can see Nik’s memories.”
“How?” she asked.
“Pay attention,” Nik whispered to me, ignoring Lexi. In his thoughts, he and my mother landed amid trees. She was holding a small bundle securely against her body with one hand and, with her other, she touched his. I could feel, through the emotion in his thoughts, how much he loved her. There was an air of excitement about them, too: a thrill and a newness. She looked down, her smile faltering, and I realized then that the bundle in her arms was a small baby, with eyes like hers, like mine.
“Is that me?” I asked, interrupting his vision.
He nodded. “We’d meet like this, every few days, while she was out gathering snow for water. She’d bring you, and we’d leave you in a small outcropping of rocks among the cave while we—enjoyed—each other’s company. Your father didn’t know.”
In the memory, she placed me down on the snowy ground. My wings were fanned out around me. She took Nik’s hand again, and they flew off a ways, leaving me lying there alone.
“We should never have been flying below the tree line. But the knowledge came too late.” I heard my mother’s scream ring out—a loud, broken sound. She grasped at the ground, frantically, clinging to the empty blanket. Nik was looking around quickly, scanning the woods and the trees. The retreating figures of two people with backpacks, a high-powered flashlight to guide their way, were just visible in the distance. Nik flew after them, leaving my mother behind him in a heap on the snow. He closed in on the couple and, with a sudden surge of speed, pushed the man to the ground. I could see, through his eyes, the fight. In the periphery, I saw a woman clutching the baby close, tears streaming down her face. She looked familiar. I knew that face. I knew that woman. Nik’s attention, though, was on the man. They were fighting; Nik was powerful and angry, but the man was more sure on his feet. The ground was home to the man and foreign to Nik. Gear was everywhere, and Nik’s hand was around the man’s throat. I could hear the woman screaming in the background. “Let him go! Stop! Please!” They were words spoken in English. So familiar. Then I heard a loud crack, and Nik’s vision went black.
“I tried so hard to get you back. But I failed. They were climbers; adventurers on some kind of pointless exposition. And we left you right in their path. They took you, Joshua. Stole you. By the time I came to, they were long gone through the woods, daylight was coming, and your mother was destroyed.”
“Joshua?” Lexi’s voice broke through again. “What’s going on?” I blinked quickly and moved my head back, away from Nik’s touch.
“I’m sorry, Lexi,” I said, feeling like I couldn’t even quite catch my breath, feeling ashamed for shutting Lexi out completely. “I just—Nik was showing me my mother. My real one.”
“Showing you?” Her eyes were wide as she studied my face. “How?”
I looked at Nik and repeated the question. “How?”
“We –and others like us—have abilities that they—” he steadied a pointed gaze at Lexi, “don’t.”
“Like?” I asked.
“Like flight, as you know, and the ability to see without light. Like our preference and tolerance for cold extremes. We need less sleep; we heal faster.” He looked back at me and shrugged. “These things you know, of course. But we can also share memories, images, and emotions with others like ourselves, at will. Our energies connect through skin contact.”
Lexi’s brow furrowed, and she opened her mouth to ask another question, but then closed it again. “Nik used to be like me.” I told her. Her gaze shifted to my wings and then back to my face. “What are we?” I asked the question for her.
“Human, or so I’ve been told. Whether it’s adaptation or mutation, we don’t really know. We just know that they,” he gestured to Lexi again, “don’t like it. So we stay hidden.”
“What happened after they took me?”
“The climbers lost one of their backpacks in the scuffle. It contained the woman’s passport. We couldn’t read it, of course. Despite what Americans think, English is not a universally known language. But there was a clear picture of her, and I knew it was only a matter of time until I figured out what the markings on the paper meant. When we met with the council, they made the unanimous decision that going after you was not an option. The likelihood of finding you was so slight, and the risk of exposure of our kind too great. Instead, the action we took was to move deeper into the mountains, find new, more remote caves, hope they couldn’t trace your existence back to us. So we moved. Your mother was never the same after you disappeared.”
“And my father?”
“He could barely bring himself to speak to her at first. But your siblings needed him—and her.” Brothers. Sisters. Family. “So I offered to go after you, to find you. She knew I could never bring you back, since it was forbidden even to look for you. But the idea that I would find you, protect you, look after you, teach you to exist among the strangers was what she needed to be able to continue living. And I think it also helped her to have me leave. So I had my wings removed.” In a fluid motion, he turned and pulled up his shirt, revealing the white, jagged scars along his emaciated back. Removed. The thought had never even occurred to me, so natural a part of me were they. To suddenly be unable to fly must have been unbearable. How had he adjusted to sudden life on the ground?
“You did that for me?”
He shook his head. “For your mother. And it took a very long time for me to fulfill my promise to her. After I had made my way through Russia, I didn’t even know where else to begin. I had nothing but that passport. So I systematically traced every rumor, every snatch of hearsay, every single local legend or hint of a sighting. I lived in the shadows and moved at night. I learned more languages in a year than most people do in a lifetime. Eventually, I found myself in the middle of nowhere, USA. Eleven years after I had started looking, there you were. The explorer and his wife had smuggled you out of Russia, brought you home, and kept you, like some kind of pet.”
“Child,” I said softly.
“Prisoner! Don’t fool yourself with sentimentality. You were forbidden to use your wings. Did you know you had never flown until you met me? They’d made you forget who you were and hide what you are. I gave my wings to find you; they’d taught you to pretend you didn’t even have yours!”
I was remembering, now, the woman without wings who brought me up as her own; I saw her smiling brown eyes with laugh lines around the edges—my mother. I touched his arm, almost automatically. I could hear her voice in my head and, as I listened, I knew he could hear it too. In the great green room, there was a telephone—Good Night Moon. She’d read it every night to me, before bed. It was the strangest feeling—listening to the hate in Nik’s voice, feeling it vibrate through him, while, at the same time, knowing he could feel with me the warmth of my blue comforter wrapped around my body and hear with me the soothing tenor of my mother’s voice. Good night, Joshua. I love you.
Nik shook me off violently. “Don’t you understand? I couldn’t let them get away with it.” I reached out to touch him again, to show him how soft her touch was when she dried my tears after a nightmare, when she brushed my hair from my face. He had to understand. His thoughts overpowered mine, and I saw them, mixed with my own sudden memories. Flames, now. Thick smoke. Nik’s eyes, filled with blind fury. My father’s strong arms, carrying me through the building, shielding me with his body from the falling debris. And then, my mother’s frantic hands, pulling me from his grasp, lifting me through the side window and, as my feet touched the gravel driveway outside, pushing me, her urgent voice instructing me to run, run. Don’t stop; don’t look back. Run. I heard the screams behind me as I ran until my legs ached, my lungs burned, and my body finally collapsed in the snow. I remembered lying there, under the stars, my hands clasped tightly over my ears, trying to shut out the sound of terror that I’d left behind me. My world finally faded. When I awoke, Nik was there, standing over me. I didn’t recognize him at all, and my life before that point was suddenly shrouded from my mind. I’d believed every lie he’d told me since then.
Sick, I swallowed my horror. I’d run away and left them to die. And then, what was worse, I allowed the murderer to teach me, to raise me, to take their place.
“You killed my family.” I spoke without emotion, not asking a question, just stating a fact.
“Not your family. Not your real family. And they were the ones who killed you. Took you, made you hide, made you forget, made you afraid of your own abilities.” He touched my shoulder again, the heat repulsive this time. “They didn’t deserve to live.”
I was on my feet then, my hands around his throat, pinning him against the wall. He didn’t even attempt to resist, his hollow eyes looking unflinchingly into mine as my grasp tightened.