Curio (7 page)

Whit mumbled into the mattress. “Whose?”

Grey got to her knees once again and put her face close to Whit's. “It's mine.”

His gaze sharpened. “No.” He winced but repeated, “No.”

“Look at me, Whit. I'm well. I skipped my ration this morning, and I'm right here in front of you. Not sick.” Grey eyed the potion bottle in Josephine's hand. “You need this. It's my fault they did this to you. Now let me help.”

He held her gaze as if willing himself to concentrate through the pain. His eyes blurred as he struggled to stay conscious.

Grey locked her arms against her sides and packed her overwhelming need to hold him and to avenge his suffering into one word. “Please.”

His attention broke, lids fluttering to reveal white beneath the dark fringe of his lashes.

Josephine ducked closer, edging Grey away from the bed. “Help me, Maire. I can't get it into him like this.”

Mother slipped to the other side of the bed, and Grey stood.

“Grey, go into the parlor.” Mother's quiet command hung in the room.

Grey opened her mouth but words stalled on her tongue.

Mother's small hands reached over Whit's body to grasp his arm and bandaged side. He cried out at her touch.

“Go, Grey,” Mother said.

Grey backed toward the door. Whit screamed and she fled.

The Bryacres' parlor shrank around Grey until she was a giant in a land of faded miniatures.

Chemist greed will bleed this city dry
, Granddad had said. Bleed it dry.

Beneath her red coat, Grey's chest heaved.

The bloody lines on Whit's back filled her vision.
Bleed us dry.

Red pressed in all around her. She dropped into a chair and closed her eyes but couldn't escape the color of blood. A trace of stone-like strength curled outward from her midsection, but dizziness won out. Grey touched her forehead to her knees.

A hand on her shoulder brought her upright.

Mother gazed down at her, worry dragging at her thin mouth.

Grey straightened in her seat and pushed the hair out of her face. “How is he?”

She set Grey's empty ration bottle on a table. “We got it down him before he went under.”

Grey braced for a lecture, but her mother fixated on the potion bottle. “You've got the Haward gift, same as your father and Olan. I wouldn't have made it till noon without the potion. Have you eaten at all today?”

“No. I'm afraid to. What if it only appears that I've inherited Father's traits, but inside I have the starvation disease? What if I'm hiding both traits, like one of Mendel's pea plants?”

Mother cupped Grey's chin, her brown eyes soft. “You're not like me, Grey.” She touched a hand to her faded red blouse. “You've never had this weakness.”

“Then why wouldn't you let me help with Father's work or Granddad's? You let Banner.”

“And it cost your brother his life,” Mother snapped. Her lips crumpled and she covered her mouth. After a deep breath, she dropped her hand. “Banner made a choice just as your father and grandfather did. Just as you did today.”

Grey pressed her thumbs into her eyes, stopping the tears, stopping the red haze that lingered at the edges of her
vision. She thrust out her chin. “Then Father can take my potion with him to the mountains. From now on.”

“We'll discuss that later. Let's get you home.” She made a sweep around the parlor as if checking for deputies. “After what they did to Whit, I wouldn't be surprised if they lowered the age of your Stripe. Especially with that leech Adante sniffing about.”

Grey's hollow stomach knotted. Adante had called her spirited. He knew of her insolence. People assumed the Chemist Council dictated the Age of the Stripe to coincide with a citizen reaching adulthood. She'd stood before the deputies who took Whit and all but declared her status. Adante didn't need to lower her age. Grey'd done it herself.

Mother padded toward the back of the house. “Come. There's nothing more we can do for Jo and Whit tonight.”

Grey snagged the empty bottle from the table, slid it into her pocket, and followed.

She stiffened the moment she stepped into the kitchen. Ahead, Mother caught her breath and froze. Muted voices, punctuated by Father's taut tone, carried from the front of the house.

Mother edged around the benches shoved against the table and walked under the arch into the living room. Grey followed, stopping with one foot on the worn carpet and one still on the tile. Father's large shape blocked her view of whoever stood on the front porch.

The soft swish of the back door sent a cold breeze snaking over Grey's skin. She threw a glance over her shoulder and released a pent-up breath. Granddad stood just inside the mudroom, his eyes shining in the shadows.

“Get out of my way, Steinar.” The voice oozed past the shield of her father's body to coil around Grey. A green glow washed the parlor, turning it into a nightmare scene. Sweat broke on Grey's forehead, and she hung as if suspended between consciousness and a surreal dream.

Adante.
Here
.

Two deputies pushed inside, grabbing her father and forcing him into the parlor. He towered over both men, but they trained clotters on him. Relief washed over his face when he spied Grey and her mother standing in the archway.

A green-edged silhouette appeared in the doorway. He flickered in and out of focus as though the air bent around him. Grey squinted, but she didn't need to see his features to know his mood. Energy pushed ahead of Adante as he stalked to where the deputies restrained her father.

“This is the Haward home, then?” His pale eyes roamed the shabby interior, lighting on Grey and her mother before moving on to the kitchen. “Olan, hiding again?”

Granddad sprung forward but stopped himself.

The Chemist's gaze flicked to Grey, and he raised his green-tinted monocle to scrutinize the length of her body. His voice slowed to a languid drip. “Not out defying authority tonight, are you, Grey?”

The empty bottle was still in the pocket of her cloak. Grey suppressed the thought and straightened her shoulders as Adante strode closer.

He stopped inches from her. The sickeningly sweet odor of potion clung to his clothes. Slippery words licked her ears. “Did you know, Grey, that once the Chemists discovered the cure for the First Disease, we never again needed the potion? All those of Regian blood were changed, perfected.” With long, green-nailed fingers, he gestured to his face. “We are different now, a race above.”

In a movement too quick to see, his hand came to hover over Grey's shoulder. Mother's squeak of protest fell into silence. Adante's fingers skimmed over her coat as he traced the length of her arm.

“It is our position—separate from our citizens—that affords us the wisdom to govern. Those who witnessed the degradation and disorder that birthed the First Disease vowed to create a better society. You can understand our abhorrence for those who would break the law now.”

“Adante.” Granddad's voice boomed from behind Grey. Did the Chemist flinch or was it a fluctuation in his power?

Adante hesitated, his fingers poised over Grey's hand where it hung at her side. He held her gaze, squinting through the Chemia-laced monocle. His glare carried words into her head.

You're no stranger to touch, are you, girl? Ah, yes. Heat. A blush. The deputies tell me the boy, Whitland, held you last night.

Grey willed her eyes to shut, but she couldn't blink. He was right. Her skin burned as each moment of contact with Whit replayed. Fingers of shame raked through her thoughts.

The boy deserved his punishment, but you . . . You deserve much more, don't you, Grey?

Bravery replaced the humiliation inside. She'd done nothing wrong. Neither had Whit. She narrowed her eyes, her rebellion unspoken but unmistakable.

A flame leapt in Adante's eyes. He spoke aloud. “There it is. You can't hide your offenses from me.”

His hand darted into the pocket of her coat. The maneuver drew a gasp from everyone else, but Grey kept her rigid stance as he withdrew the bottle and presented it on his palm between their bodies.

Adante took a swift step backward and raised his voice. “Grey Haward, you were seen entering your neighbor's house after curfew. Your thoughts reveal your guilt. And this”—he
held up the bottle—“confirms the purpose of your visit.” He unbuttoned his top coat and stored the glass tube in the belt that held a number of other vials: many green, some purple, and a few blood red.

Grey's mouth went dry. An image of Whit's carved back flashed before her eyes. A chill snaked down her spine.

With a tilt of his head, Adante signaled the deputies. One man stepped forward, holstering his clotter. The other agent remained guarding her father. Mother whimpered.

Adante halted the deputy just before he reached Grey. “Ration dealing carries the death penalty, but I think we all realize this is a special case. Don't we, Olan?”

Grey tracked Adante's gaze as he looked past her to Granddad. Flint encased her grandfather's expression, but his eyes widened. Fear. He'd never shown it before. Her own panic surged and the defiance slipped away. Pain was coming.

“Hawards are special, Grey. Did your grandfather tell you? Of course he didn't, because that would break our little agreement.” Adante lifted his hand, mimicking the action of cupping her cheek though his fingers never touched her skin. “It'd be a shame to waste blood such as yours.”

“Enough.” Father's voice hurtled into the spell of Adante's words. He didn't move from his position under guard, but his presence seemed to expand, pushing into the very corners of the room. Even the muscled deputy at his side inched a step to the left.

“That wasn't Grey's ration. It was mine. She simply brought the bottle back.”

Adante whirled around. “You can't prove she took her ration.”

A voice in Grey's head argued that neither could Adante prove, outside of Chemist mind tricks, that she'd given her ration to Whit. Not that proof mattered with the Council.

Father inched his hand up in a cautious arc toward his pocket. “May I?” He reached into his coat and withdrew a ration bottle.

Grey scrutinized his face. Had he saved his own ration knowing she'd give hers away—knowing her actions had plucked Adante's suspicion? The realization carved a pit in her stomach. Who had died, up in the mountains, because Steinar Haward brought no potion today?

Adante swooped down on the bottle, snatched it from her father, and yanked the cork. He sniffed the potion and let a drop fall into his palm. A tiny puff of purple smoke lifted from his hand.

“You saw us this morning.” Father's explanation sounded prepared. “I received the ration for my family, but with Josephine Bryacre's unexpected condition, I neglected to give Grey her ration before she left with my father.”

“Then why is she not ill?” Adante's voice drawled. “And why are you not ill, for that matter, if it was your potion your daughter gave to the boy?”

Granddad inserted himself into the living room, a sneer on his face. “No more games. You know the answers to these questions.”

The Chemist's crow-like head cocked toward Granddad. His lips spread in a wide grin. “Indeed, I do. And I have proof that you've broken the law, Olan. You, your son, and your granddaughter.”

Again Father's silhouette loomed, but his voice remained even and low. “You have proof that I've disobeyed the law. Let Grey obey the law and take her ration now. Take me to your Council. In exchange my father will keep our family's treaty with you. Your secret will remain hidden.”

The smile fled Adante's face. His whole body shook as he bore down on her father, one finger aimed at his face.
“Don't!” His voice fell but rage roughened his words. “Don't threaten me, or I will make your death longer than any on record.”