A month passed, before I could see Ash again. She was busy, of course. Meetings and trainings and lessons and long-delayed quality time with her mother. Which was mostly spent arguing, according to the stories Niv was not supposed to be telling me.
High overhead, the lights of the bridge came on. Ash sat beside the riversea. Soldiers on ankylosauruses were stationed all around her, and they tried to block me and Maraud when we rode up, but Ash barked “Let them through” and the line parted for us.
They had put me on her schedule between meditation time and history reading. She’d missed out on all her basic education from the age of twelve on, so there was a lot of general stuff to catch up on—at the same time as she was learning the very specific family business.
The meditation was supposed to help her control her ability. Give her the kind of clarity and insight to see what she needed to see. And to tune out all the stressful stuff that cluttered her royal mind.
It didn’t seem to be working.
She opened her eyes when I climbed down from Maraud, and frowned. “I hate meditation,” she said.
“I hate broccoli,” I said. “But I’ve got to eat it.”
“I missed you,” she said, standing up. The hug I got was intense. “I’m sorry I haven’t been able to see you sooner.”
“How have you been?” I looked into her eyes when I asked, but she looked away.
“It’s so much, Solomon. I thought I understood, before, how complex this city was. How hard my mother’s work is. But what I knew—what the public knows—that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Our intelligence reports stuff to us every day that would make you cry. Or scream. Or run away to live in a cabin somewhere superfar from the nearest human being.”
“We’re the worst,” I said.
“For real.”
I took pictures. One where Ash was looking off into the distance. One where she was picking absentmindedly at a scuffed spot on the regal black sweater/cape/robe/gown that she wore. One where she was stroking Maraud’s neck. One where she was smiling at me, rolling her eyes.
“Speaking of complex,” I said. “What’s going to happen to Commissioner Bahrr?”
“I don’t know,” Ash said. “And even if I did, you know I can’t tell someone who works for a newspaper.”
“I’d keep the secret,” I said, but I sensed that this was a distraction. Getting me to take it personally, so I wouldn’t pursue the conversation about the police commissioner. She was clearly learning a lot in her training.
“He should be in jail,” I said.
“Not my call to make,” Ash said. “But my mother knows everything now. She’ll be keeping him on a much tighter chain from now on.”
“I hope that’s true,” I said.
“I’m not happy, Solomon. I thought I would be.”
“I know,” I said, and reached for her, but she had turned away.
“I thought it would be easy to fix things. I thought all I had to do was be brave and be strong and smart and do the right thing. . . .”
“Me too,” I said.
Maraud screeched, and dove into the water. Came up a few seconds later with a jeweled eel in her jaws, spewing rubies.
I could see it in Ash’s face. Her light was dimmed. She’d been damaged by her experience, and she might not ever heal.
“I’ll help you,” I said. “I don’t know how much help I can be, but I’ll do whatever I can. And there’s a lot of other people who will help too.”
She smiled. Then her eyes narrowed, looking at me, and the smile went away from her face.
“What?” I said, laughing. “What did you see?”
“Nothing,” she said, and turned away. So I knew it was something.
“Something about me?” I asked.
“About us,” she said.
“I don’t want to know,” I told her.
“Good,” she said. “It’s stupid.”
“This place gets the best sunsets,” I said, pointing out over the riversea. The sky was painted in broad messy strokes of mauve and orange and blue gray. Ms. Jackson spoke softly from the radio around Maraud’s neck. New things to be afraid of, and to feel hopeful about.
“It does,” Ash said, and reached out her hand. I took it, and I held it.
I wanted certainty. Clarity. The belief that everything would be fine. That we’d be strong enough to survive whatever the future hit us with.
But life doesn’t give us those things. Anything could happen. New threats, sudden sicknesses, a slow change into someone new and different. Violent political uprisings. Irreconcilable interpersonal differences. Kaiju accidentally stomping half the city.
“We can do this,” I said.
Ash smiled, and then she said, “We can do this.”
Nothing is promised. Nothing is truly ours. All we ever really have is the moment we’re in—and in that moment, we had each other.