Total pages in book: 57
Estimated words: 55221 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 276(@200wpm)___ 221(@250wpm)___ 184(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 55221 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 276(@200wpm)___ 221(@250wpm)___ 184(@300wpm)
“Just try to get some sleep. You’ll need it for when Coal gets back.”
He turns around, his shoulders drooping as he meets my gaze. “I’ll be around, and …”
“What?”
“Your sister—” He groans, the seems to wrestle with what he wants to say. “Look, I don’t like her.” He holds up a hand in a ‘don’t get the wrong idea’ way. “Not even a little. I actually think she’s awful.”
I blink at him. “Okay?”
“But when I would go feed her when she was still in her cell, she asked about you. Every time. Every night I went down there, you were the first thing she’d check on. Wanting to know if you were all right. She’d ask more, trying to think of ways to help you. She helped Melody figure out what food you’d eat, what clothes to get you. She’s insane, don’t get me wrong, but I just wanted you to know you were on her mind. Such as it is.”
I cross my arms over my stomach. He’s not attacking me, not judging me at all, but I still feel defensive. Unsure, too.
“I don’t know if that means anything to you, but I figured … well, she’s the only family you have, so … Anyway.” He glances at the cracked stone. “I’ll fix it later.” Then he leaves, his words about Juno still hanging heavily in the air.
Eyes watering, I grapple with a million unwanted feelings. Nothing is simple. Not even family. Especially not family. Running myself a shower, I step into the cold spray as a tiny self-punishment, then wait in the freezing flow until it warms. I can’t fall apart like this, can’t let my emotions get the better of me when I need to keep a level head. But Juno, this new iteration of her, brings out the worst in me. And what I said merely scratched the surface of everything I feel toward her, toward what she’s done. It doesn’t matter if she asked about me every day, I tell myself. It doesn’t change anything, doesn’t fix anything.
What did Melody make of her, I wonder. I wish I could ask her, could get some guidance, could sit with her while she pours me tea and I get irrationally jealous of her gorgeous style.
I rest my forehead against the cold tile and close my eyes. For a brief fraction of a second, I miss the times when I didn’t know Juno had survived. Mourning her was easier when I thought she was gone, when whatever recriminations I had for her would go unspoken, unrequited. A selfish thought, but one that’s there all the same.
Once I’ve sulked for long enough, the steam of the shower hiding me from everything except my thoughts, I get out and wrap my hair in a towel. I swipe the fog from the mirror over the sink, then study my face. Blue circles under my eyes, freckles faded, skin pale—I’m a ghost of my old self. A husk like the creatures trapped several floors below. I let the glass fog again.
“Ugh.” I dig out my clothes and get dressed, then plop down on my bed.
Something flutters to the floor between my bed and the wall. I lean over and snatch it up. A notecard, pale yellow paper with a watercolor lotus in the background. I’d recognize it anywhere—Fatima always used these cards around the office.
It only has one word on it in her looping, beautiful script: Outside.
9
Istare at the note. How long has it been waiting? I didn’t see it when I stormed in after my confrontation with Juno, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t here. It must’ve been tucked under my blanket up toward my pillow.
Fatima got in somehow and left it for me. The when and the how don’t matter as much as the why. Is it a trick? Like Juno, this new version of Fatima is an irritating mystery. We have a past, but the present is something completely different. Whatever trust used to exist is twisted and confusing.
I chew what’s left of my thumbnail as I flip the note over once, twice, and again—looking for some secret message somewhere on it. But the message is loud and clear: go outside.
The sun’s been up for at least an hour as I’ve been sitting here trying to figure out what to do. My options are slim. I can alert Druin to the note, and then I’m certain he’d forbid me to investigate. Or maybe he knew the note was here? He’d aided Fatima before. Somehow, though, I don’t think he knows about this. He would’ve said something or stolen it outright so I never saw it.
My other option—asking Juno for advice—is dead and buried. No chance I’m asking her a damn thing.
“Shit,” I mutter under my breath, then rise and go to my closet. I grab a sweater and slip on some shoes, foreboding making a home in my gut as I try to guess what sort of trap this might be.