The first thing she knows, when she knows anything at all, is pain. Swimming around in the dim grey of unconsciousness, she feels something grab hold of her leg and sink its teeth in. And she tries to pull away, but it comes with her, won’t let her go. And then she’s awake and lying in a bed in the Infirmary and crimson agony shoots through her body and eats her alive.
Romy freezes where she lies. If moving makes the pain worse, then maybe lying still will make it stop. The fierce, mauling pain recedes, but still, down in the upper reaches of her right leg, a ball of molten metal throbs with every beat of her heart. She waits, forces herself to focus, and listens to the rest of her body to see if there is pain elsewhere.
There is. Another throbbing pain, in her head. I remember hitting that, she thinks. On a car. I was standing in the courtyard, and ...
Her head thumps.
What was I doing there? There were people. I remember, there were people.
Nothing.
There’s a crumpled, chalky pain in her middle fingers. She gingerly raises the hand to see in the dim light from the pharmacy door. The fingers are wrapped together and held with a splint. Where else? A graze, down her upper arm, covered in gauze and held on with more sticky tape. I was wearing a jacket, she thinks, and is thankful that she was.
She lifts her other hand and feels her face. Tender places, but the skin feels intact. A lucky break, she thinks, then chuckles internally at her pun. Then she falls asleep again, as quickly as if someone had thrown a switch on her consciousness.
Daylight. The pain is worse. Now her whole leg is made of molten lead. I must have been drugged last night, she thinks. Lies still and concentrates on breathing the pain away.
The pillows are deep. And yet at the same time light. They must be filled with feathers.
She wakes, and it’s evening, and this time the pain is so strong that she lets out a groan. In the ante-room someone moves, and Ursola pops her head out to look. ‘Oh, thank God,’ she says, ‘you’re awake. We were starting to get worried.’
The pain soaks her in sweat. She grits her teeth, tries to pull herself upright, but the drag of her heel across the mattress wrings a gasp from her lips.
‘Don’t move,’ says Ursola. ‘You want to keep that leg as still as you can. I’ve got it splinted, but you’ve got to stay still. It was a nasty break, that. I’ll rig up a sling tomorrow. Get it into the air out of harm’s way.’
‘What happened?’
‘You’ve had an accident.’
‘I can tell,’ she says, but the rudeness just makes Ursola smile. ‘What have I done?’
‘Broken your leg. Clean snap through the tibia, as far as I can see, and it looks as if you’ve torn the ligament that attaches your fibula to your knee. Your foot turned clean round, you know.’
Hearing the detail does little to reduce the pain.
‘And you’ve bashed your head. And a couple of fingers. You’ve been out for the count for—’ she looks at her watch ‘—nearly thirty hours. What do you remember?’
‘I was in the courtyard,’ she says. But she doesn’t remember why.
‘Oh, well, that’s good. At least you remember something. How’s the pain?’
Be stoical. Be a Spartan. Come on. You’re a survivor.
‘Awful,’ she replies, in a tiny voice.
‘I’ll get Vita,’ says Ursola.
Vita swishes in, and she’s aged two decades. Lines have embedded themselves in her skin like cracks in a riverbed and her eyes are rimmed with violet. She takes her pulse and feels her forehead, and Romy winces, for she’s bruised where Vita’s hand touches.
‘How do you feel?’
‘Not great.’
‘I’m not surprised. You took quite a bash. How’s your head?’
She thinks. Better than when she first woke, but there’s a blank space where there should be memories. ‘I don’t remember anything. But my leg’s worse.’
‘Yeah,’ says Vita. ‘Well, a broken tibia’s a big thing. You won’t be getting up for a while.’
‘How long?’
‘We’re not talking days,’ says Vita. ‘I’ll get you some morphine.’
‘I – Vita, I’m pregnant.’
A million emotions. Then Vita’s eyes fill with tears. ‘So you did it,’ she says. ‘Oh, my darling,’ and Romy doesn’t know if she’s referring to her, or to Lucien. Then she shakes her head. ‘It’s okay,’ she says. ‘Acute pain will be worse for both of you than a bit of morphine. You should have an antibiotic as well. Broad-spectrum. You’ve quite a few cuts.’
‘We have an ...?’ she starts to ask, but shuts her mouth and thinks better of it.
Vita leans in close, grips her by the wrist and looks her hard in the eye. ‘Romy, listen. There will be changes, now. Big changes, I have no doubt, and I can’t be sure of the way they’ll go. But you’ve got to promise me two things. That you’ll stay with the Ark, whatever you do, whoever’s in charge. And that you’ll never tell that man who your baby’s father is. Ever. Do you hear me? I realise now. It doesn’t matter whether or not people know that the One is the One. That’s not how it needs to be. I wish he’d never started that now. Making them special. Making them stand out. The One will rise whether they’re known or not, do you see? But you must never, ever tell Uri, because Uri can never be trusted.’