Of Beast and Beauty (30 page)

A knock at the door makes us both turn our heads. Needle stands in the doorway with the rope she took to Gem the night we left for the desert, and an expression that clearly communicates she thinks it’s time for him to go.

“Just a few more minutes,” I say, profoundly relieved Gem preferred to talk instead of kiss. I can’t believe I didn’t think about the open door. If Needle had come to fetch Gem and had found us kissing, or worse, she would have been scandalized. She would be scandalized if it were any boy, but a Monstrous boy …

I pause, studying Needle as she studies Gem. What does she think of him? She set him free, and sent me out into the desert with him. She must trust him, or at least trust me enough to have faith in my judgment. And she didn’t seem afraid when he crawled onto the balcony. She seemed more afraid of Bo, so … maybe …

“We’ll join you in the music room when he’s ready,” I say. The hope that I might be able to talk to Needle about the way I feel about Gem lifts my spirits. At least a little.

Needle moves a hand to her lips and then rubs the same hand in a circle on her stomach, but I shake my head. “No, we don’t need anything else to eat or drink,” I say. “Thank you.”

She takes a step back into the hall, but I can tell she’s reluctant to go.

Every minute Gem’s here is another minute we could be discovered. Bo could be fetching his father and a team of guards right now. I don’t think he would risk his future—he wants to be king and understands how stubborn I can be if I don’t get my way—but Needle’s right. We won’t be safe until Gem’s back in his cell.

“Don’t worry,” I assure her. “We’ll be quick. I promise.”

Needle smiles—a grin that transforms her simple face into something truly beautiful—and nods before disappearing down the hall toward the music room.

“She’s happy you can see her,” Gem says.

“I’m happy I can see her, too.” I turn back to him. “I never

understood how much I was missing. We have our own language, but she says a hundred things at once with her face.”

“She does. And she’s right. I should go. We can—”

“Not yet,” I beg, wishing he never had to go. “Tell me your people’s version of the story. It won’t take long, will it?”

Gem’s forehead wrinkles, the scales there crinkling like tissue paper.

“Not too long …” He takes a breath, and his forehead smoothes. “The legends of my people say the old ships brought too many colonists. They expected many of the settlers to die in the first years here, falling prey to predators or disease. But this world was good to them. Their numbers grew, and by the time the domes were complete, there wasn’t enough room inside for everyone. The people who organized the expeditions, those in power, the people you call the nobles, saw what was coming and took steps to protect themselves. They crept into the domes in the night and locked the other colonists out.”

“Because they had mutated?”

“A little, but back then my people still looked more like the Smooth Skins,” he says, taking my hand in his and turning it over, running his finger over the flaky skin where my claws would be if I had them. “They didn’t fully mutate until months later.… The summer heat was brutal that year, and brought new predators from the mountains. My people were dying of sunstroke and animal attacks. They left their settlement and returned to New Hope to—”

“One of the first cities,” I say, pleased I paid attention to my history lessons. “But that’s hundreds of miles south, past Port South even.”

“My people were originally part of the New Hope settlement,” he says. “So they returned there, begging to be allowed in until the heat passed, but the people inside refused to open the gates. That’s when my ancestors started north. They hoped the summer would be easier here, but it wasn’t. They made it as far as Yuan before being taken in by another group of outsiders. They had built shelters with the remains of their ship and were weathering the heat a little better.”

He crosses his arms, emphasizing the breadth of his shoulders. It was hard for me to imagine him being descended from the same people as the small, narrow men of this city. Learning that half of his people came from somewhere else makes sense.

“The real changes started not long after,” he continues. “But my

ancestors were grateful. They considered the mutations a blessing.

Mutation allowed them to survive the heat, and fight off predators. In those days, there were still giant horned cats hunting the lands here.”

I blink. “Horned cats?”

He nods. “At first, the creatures left us alone, but when the land outside the domes began to die, their usual prey died along with it and they began hunting people.”

“It’s strange to think of the world being so … different.”

“But it
was
different,” he says with a passion that assures me this isn’t just a story for him. This is his history, the legacy of his people. “There were forests and grasslands and fruit and game. In the early days, there was no reason for my people to envy the people in the domed cities. We had everything we needed. Even when the forests died and the grassland turned to desert, we survived. After the mutations, our children were all born larger and stronger than Smooth Skins, with scales and claws and other adaptations that allowed us to survive.”

“Then why …” I hesitate, knowing I’ll have to phrase my question carefully. “Why did your people and the others outside the domes attack the cities? I understand you need food
now
,” I hurry to add, “and it’s a matter of survival, but the first of the domes fell four hundred years ago.”

“That’s when the tribes began to realize the truth,” he says. “That while our land was dying, the land beneath the domes grew more and more fruitful. Our elders said it was bad magic, and some of the more violent tribes decided it was time for the cities to be destroyed.”

“But if that’s true,” I say, finally understanding all his talk of Yuan robbing the land beyond our walls, “then why hasn’t the desert come back to life? Almost all of the domed cities have fallen. There are only three left.

Shouldn’t the world beyond the domes have recovered with fewer cities … draining the lands outside?”

Gem looks away, watching the lamp on my bedside table burn, uncertainty clear in his eyes. “Some of the tribes to the north think
all
of the cities must fall before the planet will begin to heal.”

“What do you think?”

“I don’t know,” he says. “Maybe they’re right. My chief thought …”

“She thought what?”

“She thought …” When his gaze returns to me, his eyes are so full of pain, it summons a sound from my throat.

“What’s wrong?” I ask, coming to my knees on the floor in front of him.

He shakes his head. “I can’t …”

“Tell me.” I run my fingers down his cheeks, over the whiskers on his chin. They’re black, even blacker than his hair, and sharp enough to tickle the skin around my mouth when we kiss.

A kiss. It seems the thing to do. I lean in, pressing my lips to his forehead the way he pressed his to mine, offering comfort, but after only a moment he takes me by the shoulders and sets me gently away.

“I should go.” He rises from the floor in one effortless movement and starts toward the door.

“All right,” I say, trying not to be hurt by his eagerness to leave. He’s right. We’ve already been longer than the “moment” I promised Needle.

“I’ll send the guards at the usual time tomorrow.” I come to my feet much less gracefully, struggling with my skirts, and follow him down the hall to the music room. “We can talk more while we work in the garden.”

He casts a narrow look over his shoulder.

“I know what you said about the bulbs, but it will give us an excuse to meet.” I clear my throat, pushing down the sadness rising inside me as Needle hands Gem the rope and gathers her sweater.

It doesn’t matter that the garden is a lie. I’m not tainted, and Gem isn’t a monster. There might be no need for herbs to impede mutation. If the people in the Banished camp have scales or claws or other mutant characteristics, there’s nothing wrong with that. What’s wrong is the way the rest of the city treats them. I’ll find a way to convince the whole citizens that they have nothing to fear from those who look different.

“Tomorrow, then?” I ask, voice rising sharply as Needle hurries past me to the tower stair and Gem follows without saying a word.

What have I done? Why does he suddenly seem so cold?

“Gem?” My voice breaks in the middle of his name, betraying how much it hurts for him to leave this way.

He stops, his entire back rigid, before he turns and walks back down the hall toward me. He looks angry, furious, and for a moment I’m afraid of what he’ll say, but he doesn’t say a word. He pulls me into his arms, lifting me off my feet, silencing my breath of surprise with a kiss.

Kiss
. The word is inadequate for urgent hands and bruised lips and his taste filling my mouth and his breath in my lungs and need strong

enough to rattle my bones, shake me to the core until all I can do is dig my fingers into his shoulders and hope to survive being so close. It’s wonderful and awful and all I ever want. Forever. I don’t want it to stop. I never want him to leave.

He has to leave. I know that, but knowing doesn’t keep my chest from aching like it will split in two when Gem sets me back on my feet.

“Don’t go,” I whisper, my arms still tangled around his neck.

“Find the covenant,” he says. “If it’s written, you should be able to read it for yourself. There has to be some way.”

Some way to save me without destroying my city. Some way to spare his people without sacrificing the safety of mine.

“I’ll ask Junjie to bring it to me tomorrow,” I promise. “We can read it together.”

He smoothes my hair from my face. “But I’m still learning. I—”

“That’s all right. Needle can read. She can—”

Needle
. Oh, no. Oh. No …

The blood drains from my face as I peek around Gem’s wide body to find Needle standing at the door to the stairs, her eyes fixed on the carpet and the ghost of a smile on her lips. There’s no chance she missed that kiss, and still, she’s smiling.

I didn’t think it was possible to love her more, but I do. Instantly.

“Bring it to me, then,” Gem says, backing away. “If there are words I don’t know, Needle can help.”

I nod and warn them to be careful as they start down the stairs. As soon as they’re out of sight, I hurry to the balcony to search the moonlit world far below for soldiers, but there are none in sight. Not on the path that runs by the tower, not in the cabbage fields, not in the browning stalks that are all that’s left of the autumn sunflowers.

When the two shadows—one slight and swift, one tall and broad but no less swift—emerge from the tower, they cross the road unobserved.

Well, almost unobserved.

I
observe them. I watch them with the miracle of my new eyes until they disappear into the field of dead flowers, bound for the orchard beyond and the royal garden beyond that, where the roses will see them race by, hurrying to get Gem back into his cell before he’s discovered.

I imagine the way the blooms will twist subtly on their thick stems, turning their unblinking eyes on my friend and the mutant who kissed me,

and I shiver. What was it Gem said? Something darker … Something darker was at work.

It isn’t hard to imagine something darker at work in the earth beneath the roses, something greedy and so desperate for blood that it refuses to sustain life without taking life in return. Perhaps the covenant will shed some light on that dark thing’s identity. I will ask Junjie to bring me the document first thing, before the sun has a chance to rise or his son has a chance to come knocking at his door telling tales.

And then I will ask for a tour of my city and watch his face very carefully as he realizes the queen is no longer blind.