Prodigy

Page 20

My throat tightens painfully. Win his trust. That’s my role, my sole reason for being here. “I’m sorry to hear that,” I whisper. “And about your mother.”
Anden inclines his head, accepting my condolences. “My mother was the Senate’s Princeps. My father never once talked about her . . . but I’m glad they’re together now.”
I’d heard rumors about the late Princeps. How she’d died of some autoimmune disease right after giving birth. Only the Elector can name a leader for the Senate—so there hasn’t been one in two decades, not since Anden’s mother died. I try to forget the comfort I’d felt while talking to him about Drake, but it’s harder to do than I thought. Think of Day. I remind myself how excited he’d been about the Patriots’ plan, and about a new Republic. “I’m glad your parents are at peace,” I say. “I do understand how it feels to lose loved ones.”
Anden contemplates my words with two fingers pressed to his lips. His jaw looks tight and uncomfortable. He may have taken ownership of his role, but he’s still a boy, I realize. His father cut a fearsome figure, but Anden? He’s not strong enough to hold this country together by himself. Suddenly I’m reminded of the early nights after Metias’s murder, when I wept until the dark hours before dawn with my brother’s lifeless face burned into my thoughts. Does Anden have the same sleepless nights? What must it feel like to lose a father that you aren’t allowed to publicly mourn, however evil that father was? Did Anden love him?
I wait as he watches me, my dinner long forgotten. After what feels like hours, Anden lowers his hands and sighs. “It’s no secret that he’d been ill for a long time. When you’ve been waiting for a loved one to die . . . for years . . .” He winces visibly here, allowing me to see very naked pain. “Well, I’m sure it is a different feeling from when that passing comes . . . unexpectedly.” He looks up at me right as he says the last word.
I’m not sure whether he’s referring to my parents or to Metias—perhaps to both—but the way he says it leaves little doubt in my mind. He’s trying to say that he knows what happened to my family. And that he disapproves.
“I know what your experience with assumptions is. Some people think I poisoned my father, so I could take his place.”
It’s almost like he’s trying to talk to me in code. You’d once assumed that Day had killed your brother. That your parents’ deaths were accidents. But now you know the truth.
“The people of the Republic assume that I’m their enemy. That I’m the same man my father was. That I don’t want this country to change. They think I’m an empty figurehead, a puppet who simply inherited a throne through my father’s will.” After a brief hesitation, he turns his eyes on me with an intensity that takes my breath away. “I’m not. But if I stay alone . . . if I remain the only one left, then I can’t change anything. If I stay alone, I am the same as my father.”
No wonder he wanted to have this dinner with me. Something groundbreaking is stirring in Anden. And he needs me. He doesn’t have the people’s support, and he doesn’t have the Senate’s. He needs someone to win over the people for him. And the two people in the Republic with the most power over the people . . . are me and Day.
The turn in this conversation confuses me. Anden isn’t—doesn’t seem to be—the man the Patriots described; a figurehead standing in the way of a glorious revolution. If he actually wants to win over the people, if Anden is telling the truth . . . why would the Patriots want him dead? Maybe I’m missing something. Maybe there’s something about Anden that Razor knows and that I don’t.
“Can I trust you?” Anden says. His expression has changed into something earnest, with lifted eyebrows and widened eyes.
I lift my chin and meet his gaze. Can I trust him? I’m not sure, but for now, I whisper the safe answer. “Yes.”
Anden straightens and pushes away from the table. I can’t quite tell if he believes me. “We’ll keep this between us. I’ll tell my guards about your warning. I hope we find your pair of traitors.” Anden smiles at me, then tilts his head and smiles. “If we do find them, June, I’d like for us to talk again. We seem to have a lot in common.” His words make my cheeks burn.
And that’s it. “Please, finish dinner at your leisure. My soldiers will bring you back to your cell quarters when you’re ready.”
I murmur a quiet thanks. Anden turns away and heads out of the chamber as soldiers file back inside, the echoing clatter of their boots breaking the silence that had permeated this space only moments earlier. I turn my head down and pretend to pick at the rest of my food. There’s more to Anden than I’d first thought. Only now do I realize that my breath is coming out shorter than usual, and that my heart is racing. Can I trust Anden? Or do I trust Razor? I steady myself against the edge of the table. Whatever the truth is, I’ll have to play this all very carefully.
* * *
After dinner, instead of being taken to a typical prison cell, I’m delivered to a clean, luxurious apartment, a carpeted chamber with thick double doors and a large, soft bed. There are no windows. Aside from the bed, there’s no furniture in the room at all, nothing for me to pick up and turn into a weapon. The only decoration is the ever-present portrait of Anden, embedded into the plaster of one wall. I locate the security cam immediately—it’s right above the double doors, a small, subtle knob in the ceiling. A half-dozen guards stand ready outside.
I doze fitfully throughout the night. Soldiers rotate shifts. Early in the morning a guard taps me awake. “So far, so good,” she whispers. “Remember who the enemy is.” Then she steps out of the chamber and a new guard replaces her.
I dress silently in a warm velvet nightgown, my senses now on high alert, my hands shaking ever so slightly. The shackles on my wrists clank softly. I couldn’t have been sure before, but now I know that the Patriots are watching my every step. Razor’s soldiers are slowly getting into position and closing in. I might never see that guard again—but now I study the face of every soldier around me, wondering who is loyal, and who is a Patriot.
ANOTHER DREAM.
I’m up way too early on the morning of my eighth birthday. Light has just started filtering in through our windows, chasing away the navy and gray of a disappearing night. I sit up in bed and rub my eyes. A half-empty glass of water balances near the edge of the old night table. Our lone plant—an ivy that Eden dragged home from some junkyard—sits in the corner, vines snaking across the floor, searching for sun. John’s snoring loudly in his corner. His feet stick out from under a patched blanket and hang off the end of the cot. Eden’s nowhere to be seen; he’s probably with Mom.
Usually if I wake up too early I can lie back down and think of something calming, like a bird or a lake, and eventually relax enough to snooze a little longer. But it’s no good today. I swing my legs over the side of the bed and pull mismatched socks over my feet.
The instant I step into the living room, I know something’s off. Mom lies asleep on the couch with Eden in her arms, the blanket pulled up to her shoulders. But Dad isn’t here. My eyes dart around the room. He just got back from the warfront last night, and he usually stays home for at least three or four days. It’s too soon for him to be gone.
“Dad?” I whisper. Mom stirs a little and I fall silent again.
Then I hear the faint sound of our screen door against wood. My eyes widen. I hurry over to the door and poke my head outside. A rush of cool air greets me. “Dad?” I whisper again.
At first, no one’s there. Then I see his shape emerge from the shadows. Dad.
I start running—I don’t care if the dirt and pavement scratch me through the threadbare fabric of my socks. The figure in the shadows walks a few more steps, then hears me and turns around. Now I see my father’s light brown hair and narrow, honey-colored eyes, that faint scruff on his chin, his tall frame, his effortlessly graceful stance. Mom always said he looked like he stepped right out of some old Mongolian fable. I break into a sprint.
“Dad,” I blurt out when I reach him in the shadows. He kneels down and scoops me into his arms. “You’re leaving already?”
“I’m sorry, Daniel,” he whispers. He sounds tired. “I’ve been called back to the warfront.”
My eyes well up with tears. “Already?”
“You need to get back in the house right now. Don’t let the street police see you causing a scene.”
“But you just got here,” I try to argue. “You—it’s my birthday today, and I—”
My father puts a hand on each of my shoulders. His eyes are two warnings, full of everything he wishes he could say out loud. I want to stay, he’s trying to tell me. But I have to go. You know the drill. Don’t talk about this. Instead, he says, “Go back home, Daniel. Kiss your mother for me.”
My voice starts to shake, but I tell myself to be brave. “When will we see you again?”
“I’ll come back soon. I love you.” He puts a hand on my head. “Keep an eye out for when I come back, all right?”
I nod. He lingers with me for a moment, then gets up and walks away. I go home.
That was the last time I ever saw him.
* * *
A day’s passed. I’m sitting alone on my assigned Patriot bed in one of the bunk rooms, studying the pendant looped around my neck. My hair falls around my face, making me feel like I’m looking at the pendant through a bright veil. Before my shower earlier, Kaede had given me a bottle of gel that stripped the fake color from my hair. For the next part of the plan, she’d told me.
Someone knocks on the door.
“Day?” The voice sounds muffled from the other side of the wood. It takes me a second to reorient myself and recognize Tess. I’d woken up from a nightmare about my eighth birthday. I can still see everything like it happened yesterday, and my eyes feel red and swollen from crying. When I woke up, my mind started producing images of Eden strapped to a gurney, screaming as lab techs inject him with chemicals, and John standing blindfolded before a squad of soldiers. And Mom. I can’t stop all this goddy stuff from replaying in my head, and it pisses me off so much. If I find Eden, what then? How the hell do I take him from the Republic? I have to assume that Razor will be able to help me get him back. And in order to get him back, I’ve absolutely got to make sure Anden dies.
My arms are sore from spending most of the morning under Kaede’s and Pascao’s supervision, learning how to shoot a gun. “Don’t worry if you miss the Elector,” Pascao said as we worked on my aim. He ran his hands along my arm enough to make me blush. “Won’t matter. There will be others with you who will finish the job, regardless. Razor just wants the image of you pointing a gun at the Elector. Isn’t it perfect? The Elector, at the warfront to give morale-boosting speeches to the soldiers, gunned down with hundreds of troops in the vicinity. Oh, the irony!” Pascao then gave me one of his signature grins. “The people’s hero kills the tyrant. What a story that will be.”