E (16 page)

I feel myself go a little pale.  Maybe it's the blood
loss.  Maybe. 

Matthew's fingers twitch against my elbow.  His eyes are
slightly rounded, wider with awareness, but not alarm.  He doesn't look
angry, though, as he turns and faces me, his free hand coming up to my other
elbow.  His eyes move over my face, his expression softening. 
"It's OK," he says.  "You can bleed on my floor anytime you
like."

My mouth tugs into a smile despite the weariness that the rest of
my body feels.  He smiles down at me.  I have the impression, for a
moment, that he's going to say something.  Then I think he's going to kiss
me, instead.  I brace myself, which is all I can do.  But he squeezes
my arms and draws away, opens the front door. 

Outside, the two thugs that dragged me here turn toward us. 
Not surprising.  They go visibly pale as Matt's gaze falls on them. 
One of them is shaking.

"Did I
ask
you to bring her here?" Matt says in a
voice that is very, very quiet. 

They stutter and stumble over their replies.  The briefest
sideways glance of one of them is filled with suppressed rage.  If I let
them be in trouble for this, then I might always be a target.

I set my hand on Matthew's arm, gently, and say to him, "They
saved me from Donegan's men.  And if they hadn't brought me to you, I'd
probably be bleeding to death in an alley right now."

From the way his body tenses, I can tell it annoys him that I do
this.  He shrugs me off of his arm, but nods, still holding the gaze of
his men.  They look away and down first.  Then Matt turns to
me.  His voice, though, is for his men.  "See that she gets home
safely
."

They nod quickly, eager to obey.  I step away from Matt, off
the walk and into the street between the two of them.  Matt nods at
them.  I throw him a quick smile, and start away.  We walk down the
dark street listening to the ground crunching beneath our boots.  Neither
of Matt's men speaks, nor do I feel inclined to do so.  I lead the way, a
pace or so ahead of them.  Again, my thoughts turn to Jonas.  I'm
almost home, and I still have the medicine. 

Suddenly, I remember the beating I have taken, and the small
plastic vials.  I've not had a chance to check them.  A sheet of ice
cuts my body in half.  I'm tearing at my jacket, fumbling with the zipper
so I can reach the inside pocket.  I can feel my companions' eyes on my
back.  "Just checking something," I mumble, reassuring them I'm
not drawing a weapon.  I hardly notice their response.  My fingers
sink into my inner pocket and touch the smooth plastic.  The vials are
both, miraculously, intact.  My shoulders slump with relief.  I tilt
my face to the sky, feeling the cool night air against my skin. 
Everything will be OK.

We turn the final corner and begin down the last stretch before
home.  The Outpost is quiet here most nights, as if the darkness sucks the
noise from the streets into its black abyss.  But as we walk, voices float
on the night air, penetrating just above the sound of our footsteps. 
Voices.  Shouts.  The noise of something crashing.  They're
coming from ahead.  From the direction of home.  I start running.

My bruised body protests against the exertion, but I sprint down
the street, ignoring the sharp pain in my knee, the burning of my
ribcage.  The heavy boot steps of Matt's men thunder just behind me. 
As the small shack I call home comes into view in front of me, three figures
run from the yard into the street, rushing away in the opposite
direction.  I skid to a stop at the opening in the junk wall and peer
toward the building.  Framed against the light of the open door is
Neveah's figure, a metal bar in her hand.  She sees me now, and drops into
a crouch, placing the bar aside.  She bends over a figure sprawled on the
front steps.  They are black shadows against the light inside, so details
elude me.  But from the sheer size of the still body, I know at once that
it could only be Apollon.

I'm home now.  Matthew's men dismiss themselves, uninterested
in what has befallen my family.  I run to Neveah, to Apollon.  His
arms are holding his midsection.  I put my hand over them and feel the
stickiness of blood. 

"Oscar," I shout.  Neveah and I begin dragging
Apollon inside, her struggling with his shoulders and me stumbling around with
his legs and feet.  He must weigh as much as the both of us combined, all
bone and muscle.  Still, we have him halfway through the threshold by the
time Oscar joins us.

"Eden," he says, "Jonas and Miranda are
worse.  They need me."

"Go," I grunt, panting and trying to get Apollon's feet
through the door.  He's limp, and I'm terrified that we're dragging only a
body inside.  Blood hammers at the insides of my skull.  I'm not
thinking.  I need to think.  I drop Apollon's feet
unceremoniously.  Not like bruised heels will do that much more
damage.  "Here," I pant, fishing inside my pocket.  I
thrust the vials at Neveah, who looks at me wide-eyed, frozen, half-falling
under Apollon's weight.  She glances down at his face, at the vials,
toward Jonas and Miranda.  She eases his weight onto the floor much more
carefully than I did.  Her hand trembles as she takes the vials from me.

As she moves away, I scramble around to crouch beside Apollon's
head.  His face is white.  His cheek feels cold.  We're halfway
inside, and light is spilling over him now.  I gingerly move his hands
away from his stomach long enough to take a peek.  His jacket is slick
with blood.  "Get me the towel," I hiss, and Oscar scurries
toward the bathroom.  In an instant, he's by my side, pressing the towel
into my hand.  I wad it up against Apollon's stomach.  He groans,
flooding me with relief.  He's still alive, which at least gives us a
chance.  "It's OK," I tell him softly.  "You're going
to be OK."

"Is he?" Oscar whispers beside me.

I want to lie to him, but I can't.  "I don't know,"
I whisper back, hoping it's quiet enough that Apollon can't hear.

Tears well up in Oscar's eyes-- tears that I think he's been
holding back all night.  Even now, his chin jerks up in an attempt to defy
them.  But his forehead, then his chin, crinkles.  His lips pucker as
his chest caves in a little sob.  He shakes his head ferociously,
breathing in.  "What can I do?" he squeaks.

"Hold this."

He places his hands over the towel.

I move to Apollon's feet, and try to get his bottom half inside
the door.  I have to bend him sideways, which can't be good for him, but
the open door is an invitation for disaster.  I slam it, and bolt
it.  Neveah is administering V2 to Miranda.  Jonas is lying deadly
still next to her, his face paler even than Apollon's.  Has Neveah already
dosed him?  The question niggles at me.  She wouldn't do Miranda
first, would she?  Jonas was symptomatic first.  He's worse
off.  She would have dosed him first.

Focus.  Oscar, kneeling beside Apollon, looks smaller than
normal as he gazes up at me with his deep brown eyes. 

I kneel beside him and carefully unfasten Apollon's jacket,
working it out from under the towel.  I don't have my knife, so I rip his
shirt open with my fists.  Oscar's hands move gently away and I push the
cloth to the sides, revealing Apollon's bloodied stomach.  The actual
wound, when I find it in all the blood, is not very large.  Less than an
inch long, at the side of his stomach.  I take the towel from Oscar and
press it against the gash.  Not very big, I'm saying over and over
again.  Not very big.  But then, how deep?

Apollon's chest rises and falls, his breathing quicker, shallower
than usual.  I have Oscar hold the towel again, and I take off my
jacket.  I drape it over Apollon.  Our only blanket is under Jonas
and Miranda.  I straighten Apollon's legs as best I can, and sit on my
knees, his feet lifted into my lap.  What else can I do for him?  I
draw a blank.  A feeling of hopelessness sinks in as I realize I don't
know how to make him better.  Oscar, having bravely fought back his tears,
talks softly to Apollon.  Telling him it's OK.  Telling him I will
take care of him.  Suddenly, my own tears are like a spring flood, rushing
from me without consent, a thing beyond my control.  I bend over Apollon's
feet, my fingers closing around the soles of his boots.  I expect to sob,
but my body is so tired, all that comes are silent tears.  My chest is
still, aching with hollowness, as I watch my tears plop like fat raindrops onto
Apollon's pant legs.

A hand touches my shoulder.  I don't look up.  Neveah
kneels beside Oscar with a needle and catgut in her hands.  I watch how
gentle her touch is as she removes the towel.  Underneath, it is soaked
through with shiny red.  She turns it over and blots delicately around the
wound before beginning her repairs.  The needle moves deftly in her hands,
each stroke certain and precise.  I stare.  Her skin is creased, dry,
pale enough that the veins in the back of her hands stand out, but her fingers
are long and delicate.  There's something soothing about the way they
move.  I'm hypnotized by them.  The world drifts far away, and by the
time she has finished sewing up Apollon's stomach, I'm half-nodding asleep.

Only when she stands do I blink my eyes awake.  Oscar looks
from her to me, and back.

"Will he..." I begin, but then I'm glancing toward the
bed.  "Will they...?"

She looks toward the bed, too, and then down at Apollon.  Her
gaze flickers.  She says nothing, and turns away to clean her needle.

Oscar moves suddenly to my side and leans in against me, half
sprawling over Apollon's feet to do so.  I wrap my arm around him, and
close my eyes.  I picture the men running from the pathway.  Who were
they?  Cold sinks into me as I consider the possibility that they were
Donegan's men.  That they came here because of me.  Apollon may die,
and if he does, will it be my fault?  Have I failed my only family? 
Shivering, I glance toward the bed again, toward Jonas, who lies corpse-still. 
How fragile life is.  How easily we can lose everything.  Our fingers
reach and grasp and claw, trying to cling to what we have, but in the end, life
runs through them like water.  We cannot hold it.

My arm tightens around Oscar, whom I can hold onto for just this moment. 
I lean my head against him, and close my eyes, and try not to imagine his
little body turning to dust and scattering on the wind. 

***

Miranda is out of bed now, which I hate her for, because Jonas has
still not moved.  He's opened his eyes, but he has not so much as rolled
over on his own.  I've stayed home to tend to him, Miranda, and Apollon,
while Neveah works in the marketplace.  So, for days now, I've been
perched by his side, waiting for some sign that he will be OK.  A couple
of days ago, when I rolled him over, he looked up at me through eyes that
seemed to want to cross.  He frowned, and mumbled at me, something like,
"Mmflb lilll."  I stroked his face, and nodded, and, since it
seemed he thought he was telling me something important, I replied softly,
"Yes, you're very ill.  But you'll be OK.  We gave you medicine
and you're on the mend."  He closed his eyes.  He hasn't looked
at me since. 

My fingers graze his face again now.  His fever is mostly
gone, but he doesn't look right.  He needs me, and Neveah, and Oscar to do
everything for him.  To turn him over and move his arms and legs so he
doesn't get bedsore.  To try to trickle broth into his mouth, hoping he'll
swallow it.  To clean him when he urinates, which is not often, because he
has so little fluid in his body.  Miranda was the same way, for a day or
so.  Apollon was as well, but now, surprisingly, he wakes fully, and can
help us a bit in our endeavors.  He's sleeping, now, stretched on the
couch.  How we ever got him there I'm not sure.  But he hasn't been
up, and I doubt he will anytime soon.  Nor has he been forthright in
answering our questions about the men who attacked him.  I suspect it's
because he knows how guilty I already feel.  It had to be Donegan.

Miranda is sitting in the chair at the table, huffing and puffing
over walking to the counter to pick up a piece of bread.  I've been trying
to ignore her, but now I glance at her and she's a little pale.

"Do you need anything?" I ask quietly.

"Five minutes ago, maybe," she snaps. 
"Thanks."

I turn my face away from her and look at Jonas.  His chest
rises and falls quickly, making me feel breathless.  My back and shoulders
burn with tension.  I straighten and roll my shoulders in slow circles,
press my fingers into the back of my neck.  The pressure hurts and feels
good at the same time, but raising my arms still makes my ribcage protest with
a sharp stab of pain.  I look at Jonas again, and sigh.  I can't help
it.  How much longer will he be like this?

"You don't fuss over me like that," comes Apollon's low
voice from around the end of the bed.  I have to stretch and lean sideways
to see him, but when I do he's grinning at me.  He's been in a great mood,
for someone who's been stabbed.

"You do too good of a job pretending not to be hurt," I
say, walking to him.  I sit on the edge of the couch, careful not to jar
him. 

He looks up at me thoughtfully, speculatively.  But he says,
"I thought girls liked the tough-guy thing."

"We like it better when our tough guys avoid being skewered,"
I say, squeezing his hand.

His face stretches into a smile, but he suppresses the
laugh.  Laughing is not a good thing for Apollon right now.  He's
quiet for a long moment, then he mumbles, "I'm bored."

"I bet."

"If I didn't have your pretty face to look at..."

I roll my eyes.  "Drink something?"

He shakes his head.  We sit and look at each other.  In
a moment, his eyelids are drooping.  He blinks a few times, and he's
asleep.  I slide my hand out of his, stand up.  There's really not
enough room in our house for pacing.  Miranda is giving me a dirty look,
so I stop.  I consider my perch beside Jonas, but I'm so tired of sitting
there.  Instead, I crawl up into the bed, and stretch out beside
him.  Facing him, a couple of feet away, I watch his still features, watch
him breathe.  I reach out and touch his face, run my fingers down his
cheek.

"Stop bothering him," Miranda says.  "He
doesn't like that."

I grind my teeth rather than jump up and beat her.  She's
right.  When she did the same thing yesterday, he frowned and twitched
away from her.  Reluctantly, I draw my hand away.  As my fingers
leave his face, Jonas moves his hand.  It's a clumsy, tired swipe, but he
manages to get his hand over mine, mid-air, and lets it drop.  Our hands
flop onto the bed between us, and stay there, his covering mine.  I look
at them, and look at his face.  His eyes are closed, but he's awake. 
Possibly more awake than he's been.  He seems so peaceful.  There's
the vaguest suggestion of a smile across his lips.  Amusement lingering
under the exhaustion.  Does he think this is funny?

The corners of my mouth quirk into a smile and I suppress a
laugh.  For the first time in so long, I feel like Jonas is here with
me.  Joy rushes in.  Instead of laughing, I sigh, and close my
eyes.  My body, my tired muscles, sink into the bed.  Sleep comes for
me quickly, and this time, I don't struggle against it.  I let the dreams
take me because I know, if they turn into nightmares, there will be someone to
keep them from claiming me.

***

Miranda, of all people, is by my side as we walk toward the
Rustler.  Jonas has been awake, but groggy, from time to time. 
Apollon insists one moment that he's fine.  The next he's in agony. 
Neveah has managed to keep an infection away by tending him with her herbs, but
the healing process will be slow.  Neveah is home now, so I'm heading out
to try to scrape up some money.  I have one silver and a few coppers in my
pocket.  Once that's gone, we have nothing.  Neveah might be able to
make enough in a week to pay for one meal for our family.  That means it's
up to me to provide.  If I lose this game, I'm going rat-hunting.

"Do you have to walk so fast?" Miranda hisses beside me,
shuffling to keep up.  She's not as tall as me, and she's still feeling the
after-effects of the illness.  I should feel bad for her, but I don't.

"I didn't ask you to come along."  I shoulder my
way past two old men.  "Why don't you go back?"  It's true,
I don't want her with me.  I was out by myself yesterday, and I was fine. 
I was more than fine.  No one bothered me.  No one even looked at me
crossly.  In fact, most people made a good effort to avoid my gaze
entirely.  Today I'm wondering if I'll notice the same effect.  I'm
pretty sure I will.  I'm also pretty sure I know why, even though I don't
want to.

Miranda looks startled at my suggestion.  She's brave enough
to insist on coming along in some idiotic but noble attempt at watching my
back, but she's too much of a coward to make the trek back to our house
alone.  If I ditched her here, she would freak.  I glance at her
face, considering.

She flushes, but whether from anger or embarrassment, I'm not
sure.  "I'm trying to help," she insists.  Anger, then.