The Unbound (4 page)

We start walking toward the dining hall, but then we reach a split. Even though I can see the highly trafficked main building rising on our right, Wes veers left down a narrow, vacant path. Despite my rumbling stomach, I follow. I can’t stop looking at him, focusing and unfocusing my eyes to find both versions.

“Go ahead.” He keeps his eyes on the path ahead. “Say it.”

I swallow. “You look different.”

He shrugs. “Hyde has a dress code. They discourage eccentricity, which is unfortunate since, as we both know, I’m quite a fan.” He looks at me then, as intensely as I’m looking at him. “You look tired, Mac. Are you sleeping?”

I shrug. I don’t want to talk about it.

I mentioned my nightmares a while back, but when they didn’t go away I decided to stop talking about them. It’s bad enough having my parents coat me with their worry. The last thing I need is someone who knows the truth pitying me. And maybe Wes would have bad dreams, too, if he could remember that day; but he has a twenty-four-hour stretch of black in his mind and only my account and a scar from Owen’s knife to go on. I envy him until I remember that I wanted to remember. I chose.

“Is there anything I can do to help or—”

“How long have you been back?” I cut in. “Or did you even go away?”

His brow furrows. “I got in last night. Haven’t even had a chance to unpack, let alone come by and check on you. Or Jill. You been keeping an eye on the brat for me?”

I ignore his deflection. “Why didn’t you tell me you went to school here?”

He shoves his hands in his pockets and shrugs. “At first it was just a reflex. I didn’t know how to handle the fact that you were going to cross more than one of my paths, so I kept it to myself.”

“I get that, Wes, I do.” The Archive teaches us to break our lives into pieces and to keep those pieces secret, separate. “But what about later?” I ask, the words barely a whisper. “Is it because of what happened in the garden?”

“No,” he says firmly. “It doesn’t have anything to do with that.”

“Then why?” I snap. “You spent the last few weeks reading me books you already knew because you read them here last year. You watched me stress out about this place, and you never spoke up.”

His mouth twitches playfully. “Would you believe me if I said I just wanted to surprise you?”

I give him a long, hard look. “Well, you succeeded. But I have a hard time believing you lied to me for weeks just to see the look on my face—”

“I didn’t lie,” he says shortly. “You never asked me where I went.”

The words hit like a dull punch. I didn’t ask that specific question, he’s right. But only because Wesley never wants to talk about his life. It’s not that I don’t want to be a part of his; I’ve just grown used to him being a part of
mine
.

“I told myself,” continues Wes, “that if you asked, I’d tell you. But you didn’t. You made an assumption, and I didn’t correct you.”

“Why not?”

He pulls his hand from his pocket and runs it through his hair. It’s so strange to see it move through his fingers—soft, black, ungelled. I want to touch it myself, but I stifle the urge.

“I don’t know,” he continues. “Maybe I thought if you knew I went here, you’d think differently of me.”

“But why would I judge you for going here?” I ask, gesturing down to my uniform. “I go here, too.”

“Yeah, but you hate it,” he snaps, coming to a stop. “You don’t even know this place and you hate it. You’ve spent weeks dreading it, mocking it.…” I cringe, regretting the time I decided to don a posh accent and do a dramatic reading of a few key passages from the handbook. “But I grew up here. I didn’t choose it, and I can’t help it, but I did. And I was afraid you’d judge
me
if you knew.” He laughs nervously, his eyes focused on the path instead. “Big surprise, Mac, I care what you think of me.”

I feel the heat spreading across my face as he adds, “But I’m sorry. I knew you were stressed about Hyde, and I could have made it better and I didn’t. I should have told you.”

And he should have. But I think of all the times I kept things from Wes in the beginning, either out of habit or fear, and how it took him nearly dying and the Archive stealing his memories for me to finally tell him the truth. I feel my anger diminishing.

“So you have a preppy schoolboy alter ego,” I say. “Anything else you want to tell me?”

The relief that sweeps across his face is obvious—relief that we’re okay—but he doesn’t miss a beat. “I really hate eggplant.”

“Seriously?” I ask.

“Seriously,” he replies, bouncing a little on his toes. “But I also hate explaining that it’s because of the name and the fact that I grew up thinking it was a plant made of eggs, so instead I just tell people I’m allergic.”

I laugh, and his smile broadens—and just like that, my Wesley is back. Doling out jokes and crooked grins, eyes glittering even without the makeup.

We start off again down the path.

“I’m happy you’re here,” I say under my breath, but he doesn’t seem to hear me. I raise my voice, but instead of repeating myself, I simply ask, “Where are we going?”

He glances back and quirks a brow. “Isn’t it obvious?” he asks. “I’m leading you astray.”

A
DOZEN STRIDES LATER,
the tree-lined path dead-ends at a stone courtyard. It’s raised a few steps off the ground, each of its four corners marked by a pillar. Three students are lounging on the platform, and in the very center of it stands a statue of a man in a hooded cloak.

“It’s the only human sculpture on campus,” explains Wesley, “so it’s probably meant to be Saint Francis, the patron saint of animals. But everyone calls him the Alchemist.”

I can see why. Standing in his shrouds, the statue looks more like a druid than a priest. His elbows are tucked in and his palms are turned up, his head bowed as if focusing on a spell. The mystique is only slightly diminished by the fact that his stone hands are currently holding aloft a pizza box.

“This,” says Wes, gesturing to the platform, “is the Court.”

The students look up at the sound of Wesley’s voice. One of them I’ve already met. Cash is sitting with his legs stretched out on the stairs.

“Mackenzie Bishop,” he calls as we make our way up to the platform. “I will never again make the mistake of calling you a damsel.”

Wesley frowns a little. “You two have met?”

“I tried to save her,” says Cash. “Turned out she didn’t need my help.”

Wesley glances my way and winks. “I think Mac can take care of herself.”

Cash’s smile is surprisingly tight. “You seem awfully friendly toward a girl who just kicked your ass. I take it you know each other?”

“We met over the summer,” Wes answers, climbing the steps. “While you and Saf were off boating in—where was it, Spain? Portugal? I can never keep the Graham family excursions straight.”

It’s brilliant, watching Wesley work other people, twisting the conversation back toward them. Away from himself.

“Don’t be bitter,” says Cash. “You know you’ve got an open invitation.”

Wesley makes a noncommittal sound. “I don’t like boats,” he says, retrieving a slice of pizza from the statue’s outstretched arms, nodding for me to join him.

“The
Saint-Marie
,” says Cash with a flourish, “isn’t just a
boat
.”

“So sorry,” says Wes, mimicking the flourish. “I don’t like
yachts
.”

I can’t tell if they’re joking.

“I see you’ve already begun defacing our poor Alchemist again,” adds Wes, waving the pizza slice at the statue.

“Just be glad Safia hasn’t
played dress-up
with him,” says a girl’s voice, and my attention shifts to a pair of students sitting on the platform steps: a junior boy sitting cross-legged, and a redheaded senior with her head in his lap.

“Very true,” says Cash as the girl shifts up onto one elbow and looks at me.

“You’ve brought a stray,” she says, but there’s no malice in her voice, and her smile quirks in a teasing way.

“She’s not a stray, Amber,” says the boy she’s been using as a pillow. “She’s a junior.”

He looks up at me then, and my stomach drops. There’s a silver stripe across his uniform, but he looks like he can’t be more than fifteen. He’s small and slim, dark hair curling across his forehead, and between the pair of black-framed glasses perched on his nose and the notes scribbled on the backs of his hands, he looks so much like my brother that it hurts. If Ben had lived—if he had been given five more birthdays—he might have looked just like this.

He looks away and I blink, and the resemblance thins to nearly nothing. Still, it leaves me shaken as I head up the steps and join Wesley by the statue. He grabs a soda from the Alchemist’s feet and gestures toward the other students.

“So you’ve met Cassius,” he says.

“Dear god, please don’t call me that,” says Cash.

“That’s Gavin with the glasses,” continues Wes, “and Amber is in his lap.”

“Amber Kinney,” she corrects. “There are two gold Ambers at Hyde and one silver, and it’s not a name that lends itself to shortened forms, trust me, so if you hear someone use the name Kinney—which I hate, by the way, never do it—that’s me.”

I take a soda. “I’m Mackenzie Bishop. New student.”

“Of course you are,” says Gavin, and I blush until he adds, “Because it’s a small school and we know everybody else.”

“Yeah, well, you can call me Mackenzie or Mac, if you want. Just not Kenzie.” Kenzie was Da’s word; it sounds wrong on everyone else’s lips. “Or M.” M was the name I’d dreamt of being called for years. M was the version of me that didn’t hunt Histories or read memories. M was the person I could have been if I hadn’t joined the Archive. And M was ruined by Owen when he whispered it in my ear like a promise, right before he tried to kill me.

“Well, Mackenzie,” says Gavin, emphasizing each of the three syllables evenly, just the way Ben did, “welcome to Hyde.”

“Mackenzie, will you help me?”


We’re sitting at the table, Ben and I, while Mom hums in the background, making dinner. I’m twirling my silver ring and reading a passage for my freshman English class, and Ben’s trying to do his fourth-grade math, but it’s not his best subject.


“Mackenzie
…
?”


I’ve always loved the way Ben says my name.


He was never one of those kids who couldn’t speak, who skipped syllables and squeezed words down into sounds. By the time he was four, he prided himself on pronouncing everything. Mom was never
Mama
, Dad was never
Daddy
, Da was never
Da
but
Da Antony
, and I was never
Muh-ken-zee
or
Mc-kin-zee
, and certainly not
Kenzie
, but always
Mah-Ken-Zee
, the three beats set like stones in order.


“Will you show me how to do this problem?”


At nine, even his questions are precise. He has this obsession with being a grown-up; not just wearing one of Dad’s ties or holding his knife and fork like Mom, but putting on airs, mimicking posture and attitude and articulation. He has the makings of a Keeper, really. Da didn’t live long enough to see him taking shape, but I can see it.


I know I already took Da’s spot, but I often wonder if the Archive could make a place for Ben, too.


It’s a selfish wish, I know. Some might even call it a wrong wish. I should want to protect him from everything, including
—
no,
especially
—
the Archive. But as I sit there, turning my silver ring and watching Ben work, I think I might give anything to have him beside me.


I get why Da did it. Why he chose me. I get why everyone chooses someone. It’s not just so that someone takes their place. It’s so that
—
at least for a little while
—
they don’t have to be alone. Alone with what they do and who they are. Alone with all those secrets.


It is selfish and it is wrong and it is human, and as I sit there, watching Ben work, I think that I would do it. I would choose him. I would take my little brother with me. If they’d let me.


Of course, I never find out.


In truth, Gavin looks very little like Ben. I know because I’ve been staring at him—and then trying not to stare—for the last fifteen minutes. Luckily, between a long shower and the walk with Wes, fifteen minutes is all I have before the bell rings.

It turns out that even though we’re a grade apart, Amber and I have Physiology together. She tells me on the way how it’s all part of her pre-premed plan, how her grandmother was some incredible war surgeon behind the blood-slicked camp curtains, and how she has steady hands just like her. Between the Court and the science hall—marked by a statue of a snake—I discover my favorite thing about Amber Kinney.

She likes to talk.

She likes to talk even more than Lyndsey, and as far as I can tell it’s not out of a need to fill the quiet so much as a simple lack of filter between her brain and mouth—which is fine with me, because she’s surprisingly interesting. She tells me random facts about the school, and then about each member of the Court: Gavin won’t eat anything green and has a brother who sleepwalks; Cash speaks four languages and tears up at sappy commercials; Safia—because apparently Amber is actually
friends
with her—used to be so shy she barely spoke, and still hasn’t quite figured out how to speak
nicely
; Wesley is a sarcastic flirt and allergic to eggplant and…

Amber trails off. “But you already know Wesley,” she says.

“Not as well as you’d think,” I say carefully.

Amber smiles. “Join the club. I’ve known Wes for
years
, and there are times I still don’t feel like I
know
him. But I think he likes it that way—an air of mystery—so we all let him have his secrets.”

I wish everybody felt the way Amber Kinney does about secrets. My life would be a lot easier.

“So,” I say, “Wesley’s a flirt?”

Amber rolls her eyes and holds the door open for me. “Let’s just say that air of mystery tends to work in his favor.” I feel the heat creeping into my face as she glances my way. “Don’t tell me you’ve already fallen for it.”

I chuckle. “Hardly.” And that much is true. After all, it’s not Wesley’s
secrets
that make my pulse climb. It’s the fact that we have the same ones. Or, at least, most of the same ones. I can’t help but wonder, after the shock of seeing him here, what else I don’t know.

His voice echoes in my head:
You didn’t ask.

We reach the Physiology room and snag two seats side by side as the bell rings. A surprisingly young woman named Ms. Hill walks us through our syllabus, and I spend the next few minutes flipping through the textbook, trying to figure out which bones Owen snapped inside my wrist. It’s funny—looking at the maps of bone and muscle and nerve, the diagrams of body flexion and movement and potential—how much of this I’ve learned already. More through trial and error and application than assigned reading, but it’s still nice to find that some of the knowledge translates. I run my fingertips lightly over the illustrated fingers on the page.

I make it through the lecture, and Amber points me in the direction of my last class: Government. It’s taught by Mr. Lowell, a man in his fifties with a mop of graying curls and a soft, even voice. I’m prepared to have to stab myself with my pen to stay awake, but then he starts talking.

“Everything that rises will fall,” he says. “Empires, societies, governments. None of them lasts forever. Why? Because even though they are the products of change, they become resistant
to
change. The longer a society survives, the more it clings to its power, and the more it resists progress. The more it resists progress—resists
change
—the more its citizens demand it. In response, the society tightens its grip, desperate to maintain control. It’s afraid of losing its hold.”

I stiffen in my seat.

Do you know why the Archive has so many rules, Miss Bishop?
Owen asked me on the roof that day.
It’s because they’re afraid of us. Terrified.

“Societies are afraid of their citizens,” echoes Mr. Lowell. “The more a society tightens its grip, the more the people fight that grip.” He draws a circle in the air with his index finger, going around and around, and each time he does, the circle gets smaller. “Tighter and tighter, and the resistance grows and grows until it spills over into action. That action takes one of two forms.”

He writes two words on the board:
REVOLUTION
and
REFORM
.

“The first segment of this class,” says Mr. Lowell, “will be dedicated to the language of revolution; the second segment will be dedicated to the language of reform.” He erases the word
REFORM
from the board.

“You’ve all heard the language of revolution. The rhetoric. For instance, a government can be called corrupt.” He writes the word
corrupt
on the board. “Give me some other words.”

“The government is rotten,” says a girl at the front of the class.

“The company is abusing power,” says a boy.

“The system is broken,” adds another.

“Very good, very good,” says Mr. Lowell. “Keep going.”

I cringe as Owen’s voice echoes in my head.
The Archive is a
prison.

“A prison,” I say, my voice carrying over the others before I even realize I’ve spoken out loud. The room quiets as the teacher considers me. Finally he nods.

“Rhetoric of imprisonment and, conversely, the call for freedom. One of the most classic examples of revolutionary thought. Well done, Miss…”

“Bishop.”

He nods again and turns his attention back to the class. “Anyone else?”

By the time school lets out, my edges are starting to fray.

The morning coffee and lunch soda can’t make up for the days—weeks, really—without sleep. And having Owen in my head for most of last period hasn’t helped my nerves. A shaky yawn escapes as I push open the outer doors of the history hall and step into the afternoon sun, abandoning the crowded path for a secluded patch of grass where I can stop and soak up the light and clear my head. I free my Keeper list from my shirt pocket and am relieved to see that there’s still only one name on the page.

“Who’s Harker?” asks Cash over my shoulder. I jump a little at the sound of his voice, then unfold the paper slowly, careful to seem unconcerned.

“Just a neighbor,” I say, tucking the paper back into my pocket. “I promised to pick up some info on the school for him. He’s thinking about it for next year.” The lie is easy, effortless, and I try not to relish it.

“Ah, well, we can swing by the office on the way to the parking lot.” He sets off down the path.

“You really don’t have to escort me,” I say, following. “I’m sure I can find my way.”

“I have no doubt, but I’d still like—”

“Look,” I cut him off. “I know you’re just doing your job.”

He frowns, but doesn’t slow his pace. “Saf tell you that?” I shrug. “Well, yes, okay. It’s my job, but I chose it. And it’s not like I was assigned to you. I could be imposing my assistance on any of the unsuspecting
freshman
. I’d rather be accompanying you.” He chews his lip and squints up toward the summer sun before he continues. “If you’ll let me.”