The Violet Hour (17 page)

Dora turned around and started talking Stubin down from the ledge, putting her hand on his knee and soothing him with whispered words. Mei Mei and then Adam squeezed in and shut the doors, just as the door to the Forbidden City swung open and Watchers streamed out, stepping over the limp body of the Watcher who’d brought us to freedom. Several of them already had their guns drawn, taking aim. I thought our driver was just going to remain parked there—that we had made some horrible miscalculation—but then he nodded, fired up the engine, and swerved the car recklessly off the sidewalk, into the chaotic stream of traffic.

A single bullet glanced off the side of the car as we turned a sharp corner. The Forbidden City receded into the distance. I closed my eyes and breathed in, for what felt like the first time since I’d spoken those first words to the crowd. It was crazy—I’d staked my claim as leader of VisionCrest, yet I could never go back. Sacristan Wang and his coconspirators would undoubtedly capture me and invalidate my right to the Fellowship on the grounds that I was not yet an advanced initiate. None of us would ever see the light of day again, on the off chance we were allowed to live at all. At the same time, I
was the leader of the most powerful religion the world had ever seen.

Stubin’s labored breathing grew marginally calmer in the backseat, and our driver grunted as he stepped on the accelerator. I heard the rip of fabric, and then Adam quietly
reached around from the backseat and wrapped my hand in the tattered remnants of his shirt’s hem.

The sting of the knife wound was nothing compared to the sting of what I had just done. I had no idea where we were going, but there was definitely no going back.

THE RESISTANCE

The dull roar of the engines couldn’t drown out the static buzz of Isiris’s presence growing nearer. Our mystery chauffeur had driven us to a small corporate airfield; there was a Gulfstream jet waiting on the runway, already humming and ready to go. It had a giant eye in an upside-down triangle emblazoned on its side—it was the General’s personal plane, The Flying Eye. I had no idea how they’d done it, but the Resistance clearly had connections. The driver pulled right up to the stairway, grunted, and pointed.

I was the last one to board. The captain of the plane went down to one knee, then rose back up with his eyes cast down in deference.

“I’ll be taking you to the Resistance, Sister Wintergreen. They’ll take care of everything,” he said.

“Actually, I want you to take us to Rota—it’s an island in the Pacific Ocean, south of Japan,” I said. “The Fellowship has a small compound there, and it’s a U.S. Commonwealth, so we’ll get a little more protection.” I glanced over my shoulder. It would only be a matter of minutes before our enemies tracked us here, if they weren’t already en route.

The captain met my eye with an apologetic grimace. “I’m sorry, Sister. But I’m under strict orders to bring you to the Resistance.”

“They can just come meet us at Rota—I’d be happy to meet with them and figure out how we can work together.”

The set of his jaw got firmer. It dawned on me that I wasn’t calling the shots here, either; I had just traded one prison for another.

“I see. Then will you at least tell me where we’re going?” I asked.

He shook his head.

“Fine. Let’s just get in the freaking air before we all get killed.” I stormed away. It took every ounce of strength I had to bite back the tears of frustration, but all that mattered in that moment was getting in the air. Figuring out how to escape yet another group of nefarious strangers would have to wait.

Once we were above the clouds, I turned to look at my battle-weary group, assembled on the leather couches that flanked both sides of the plane. Every surface gleamed with cherrywood paneling. There was a wet bar in the corner. Stubin was stretched out on a couch, his head resting in Dora’s lap. His asthma attack was under control for now, but I worried about what lay ahead. I doubted he could withstand another episode. One lens of Dora’s glasses was smashed from her tussle with the Watchers, and she was absently stroking Stubin’s hair, shell-shocked. Mei Mei sat sideways, mute and mysterious as ever, seeming to look out the window even though blindfolded. Adam was hunched over, his head in his hands.

Only one of them deserved to face what came next, at my side. I knew what I had to do.

I cleared my throat. “Adam, we need to talk. In private.”

He looked up slowly, his blue eyes burning into mine, and a thousand thoughts were laid bare. Shared grief for the loss of our fathers. Fear for the terror that surely awaited us. A mutual inability to forgive him for what he’d done.

Dora stirred back to awareness long enough to give me a blank look.

I attempted a smile, but my parchment-paper lips wouldn’t cooperate. My bones felt like I’d slept a hundred years and needed a hundred more before they would hold me up again. She drifted away, looking back into the distance.

Adam stood, and I walked to the back of the plane, conscious of his presence behind me. I slipped into the stateroom—my father’s former bedroom—and heard Adam click the door shut behind him. I turned to face him.

Standing in front of him like this, I realized how tall and solid he was. Part of me wanted him to fold me into his arms and tell me it was all just a bad dream.

The corners of his mouth turned down. “I’m sorry,” he said, reaching out for me.

I stepped away.

“Please,” he said, his voice hoarse. I relented, just for a moment, letting him pull me close.

I could hear his heartbeat through the thin cotton of his T-shirt, rough against my cheek. He was warm, just like on those summer days behind the carriage house. It was a reminder of everything he’d ruined, and I couldn’t keep the tears from spilling over.

“We need to make an escape plan,” I said.

“What do you mean? I thought the pilot was taking us to the Resistance.”

I pushed him away. “Exactly! We have no idea who the hell these people are, but I guarantee you they’re not looking to throw me a parade. Madam Wang is charming and all, but I seriously doubt that she or her cronies have my best interests, or the Fellowship’s, at heart. Don’t forget—they’re traitors, too.”

“They’re the only protection we’ve got. The entire Ministry was just ripped apart at the seams,” he said.

“For all we know, they’re just as bad as Wang. People do all kinds of twisted things for power. To them I’m just a pawn, but there’s a much larger game than control of the Fellowship in play.”

“You’re not a pawn,” Adam said.

“No, I’m not. Isiris is planning a genocide, and I’m the only one who can stop her. That means I’m now the Queen.”

“You were always the Queen,” he said.

I didn’t have anything to say in response.

“We’re never going to find her,” Adam finally said. “Our fathers were the only ones who knew how to find her, and they’re both … gone.”

The words hung heavy in the air between us.

“Your father didn’t let that happen,” I told him. “The words he whispered to you—that tattoo on your wrist—it’s the latitude and longitude of Isiris’s temple.”

Adam instinctively grabbed for the ink on his skin, as if covering it from view could erase its existence. “Who told you that?” he asked, his eyes narrowing.

“Isiris did,” I said. “We’re going to find her and stop her.”

“Stubin needs a hospital. Mei Mei’s just a little girl. You can’t ask them to do that.” His eyes were wild.

“I don’t plan to. They’re not coming with us.”

Understanding dawned on his face.

“Us,” he repeated. His searching eyes rested only on mine.

“Yep. You and me,” I said.

I walked over to the headboard of my father’s bed. Inlaid in gold filigree was the VisionCrest logo. Only my father and I knew that it was also a safe—the General was fond of stashing valuables in hidden places, just in case. I always thought he was just being paranoid, but apparently he was onto something. I twisted the iris of the eye counterclockwise, and a springloaded lock snapped open.

“When we get wherever we’re going, you’re going to do two things: figure out where exactly those coordinates point to, and sell these to fund our getaway. I don’t know how—you’re just going to have to improvise. When the time comes, we’ll make a run for it together.” I reached into the eye and pulled out a wad of cash and loose gems.

“There’s no way that’s going to work. Dora will never let you go without her,” he said.

He was right about Dora—she wouldn’t step back willingly. A plan to leave her behind was already forming in my mind, but I couldn’t bring myself to say it; it was too awful to verbalize.

“Let me worry about that part. You worry about keeping this safe until you can hock it,” I said, dumping the goods into his hands. “And just for the record, I still don’t trust you. You’re just the best of my bad options.”

“Thanks for the reminder,” he said.

I felt a little hypocritical. Dora was in the next room and I was planning to betray her, just like Adam had betrayed me. Well, maybe not
just
like, but what I was planning would hurt her. Under normal circumstances, I’d never be able to pull the wool over Dora’s eyes. But right now she was in tatters. Not knowing I was eventually going to give her the slip was for her own good. At least that’s what I told myself.

“Where do you think they’re taking us?” Adam asked.

I shook my head, hopelessness writhing in the pit of my stomach. “I have no idea. It could be anywhere.”

“Let’s just hope we get lucky. You’re not exactly inconspicuous. Even if we manage to get away from the Resistance, pretty much everyone in the world is going to be looking for you.”

Six hours later, the plane bumped to a landing on an abandoned airstrip, in the midst of a tropical jungle. Vegetation was swallowing the asphalt by inches, and the carcasses of corrugated metal hangars littered the surroundings like cockroach shells. Hazy mountains loomed in the near distance. The whole place had the bombed-out resonance of a forgotten war.

Dora looked at me, her eyes accusatory. “Where are we? Stubin needs a hospital.”

Stubin winced, his ears getting red. “I’m fine now. We should just worry about getting everyone to a safe place.”

Dora set her shoulders back and looked out the window, putting an invisible wall between herself and me. Adam was squinting at a tattered flag hanging limp in the torpid air. He looked at me with grim determination.

“Danang,” he said. “Vietnam.”

It felt like my skin was too tight across my forehead. Vietnam was just about the worst place we could be, other than back in Beijing. It was the only country from which the Fellowship had ever been expelled. Its extreme danger for VisionCrest devotees was probably what made it a great place for the Resistance to hide out in. Here we were, landing the Flying Eye on an unused runway—we might as well announce our presence with a fireworks display.

As the plane taxied to a halt, I waited for alarms to sound or troops to flood out of hiding. But the engines powered down and the tarmac remained still. The cockpit door opened and the captain emerged, taking his hat off and mopping his sweaty brow with his forearm.

“We made it,” he said, leaning against the doorway and sighing.

“Isn’t this, like, the least safe place we could be?” I asked.

“Other than with you, you mean,” Dora said. There
was a very un-Dora bite of bitterness in her voice.

The captain tipped his head toward the window. “I’ll let them explain all that.”

A gray van with tinted windows was idling outside. It had practically materialized out of nowhere. The captain hoisted himself upright and set about opening the door. Adam and I exchanged a heavy look. There was no telling how things would go from here—if we’d be separated or even remotely capable of escaping.

Mei Mei stood up and walked over to me, taking my hand as if she knew what to do. I stood up, knowing exactly why she’d done it and appreciating the show of solidarity from the only person who held any political sway with the people waiting on the tarmac.

Right before we descended the stairs, I turned and met the stares of Dora, Stubin, and Adam. They’d risen, unsure whether to follow.

“I’ll do whatever it takes to make sure you’re all safe. That much I promise,” I said.

Then we walked out together—me and my tiny emissary—to the Resistance, ready to face our new frenemies together.

We drove for twenty minutes along a two-lane highway, sandwiched, on bench seats in the back of the van, between four paramilitary-looking dudes in gray camo. Nobody said a word to us the entire ride, opting to grunt their instructions instead. The driver and the person in the passenger seat were wearing hoodies and sunglasses, so I couldn’t get a good look at them other than to determine that the driver was a woman. I tried to ask where we were going, but they maintained a monastic silence. Mei Mei squeezed my hand.

“Not exactly my idea of a welcome wagon,” Dora said. Her eyes darted to mine before looking away. If things went my way, she would remain spitting mad at me. It was for the best.

The highway gave way to city roads as we entered a ramshackle district of slope-roofed houses that looked like they’d been built hundreds of years before. They were illuminated by the light of colored silk lanterns, which were strung from every cornice and balcony. The further we pushed into the heart of the city, the more brightly lit the buildings became. The entire town was one giant flaming torch.

Finally, we turned down a narrow alley and the van slowed to a crawl. We took a sudden, sharp turn and pulled up onto the sidewalk.

“Everybody out,” the driver instructed.

The gray-suit dudes hustled us onto the darkened street. On a balcony above us, the glowing red tip of a cigarette made the rhythmic journey to and from an old man’s mouth, lighting his face up like a ghoul in ten-second intervals.

The driver walked around the front of the van and whipped off her hood. Her face was illuminated by the thin light coming from inside the dilapidated apartments above us. She was blond, shorter than I’d realized, and older. The person in the passenger seat climbed out too, and a vague bell of recognition sounded in my brain. The last time I’d seen him, he was wearing a shroud and helping initiate me into the first mystery.

All the feelings from that night came rushing back, mixed with the confused feelings of my twelve-year-old crush, as Hayes pulled off his hood and slid his sunglasses up on his head. His sandy hair was disheveled, and his brown eyes were flecked with gold. I couldn’t help but notice how tall and athletic he was now—something I couldn’t appreciate in the darkness of the Tokyo temple.

“Hayes Cantor,” he said, his lips quirking into that half smile as he extended his hand to me. “We’ve met before.” He arched one dark brow, and a meaningful look passed between us. Adam’s posture stiffened as he sensed a rival.

“I remember,” I said.

“I’m Adam, and this is Stubin, Dora, and Mei Mei,” Adam broke in, his voice tight.

“Oh, we know Mei Mei,” the blond lady said, putting her arm around Mei Mei’s shoulders. “I’m Sister Cantor, Hayes’s mother. Welcome to Hoi An.” The clipped edges of her British accent somehow made me feel more secure than I really was.

“Sister Cantor! You’re the architect who designed the All Knowing, at the compound,” Stubin said.

She ducked her head, clearly uncomfortable. “Please, call me Emily. And I was once, yes. Now I have a far greater purpose.” Her eyes moved to Hayes, who stood up a little straighter.

“Right. Well, the channel is this way,” Hayes said. “We’ll boat the rest of the way. Almost there.” He motioned ahead of us down the dark alleyway and began to walk.

The gray-suits nudged us from behind.