Nil Page 24

  “Stay,” I told her. “Better yet, find Rives.”

  Charley was already running toward the sound. Taking off after her, I heard the cry again. A thin scream, shouting a name. I didn’t recognize the voice, but I recognized the name.

  Rives.

  CHAPTER

  44

  CHARLEY

  DAY 34, MORNING

  “Rives!”

  A girl’s voice, laced with panic. The pauses between shouts were as terrifying as the shouts themselves.

  Thad caught me as the trail widened. Our legs matched each other, stride for stride, and I knew if we kept going, eventually we’d hit the valley, the one before the rain forest. But I also knew we’d never get that far—that we’d find something first. Or someone.

  A girl staggered from the trees. No, two. One was Asian, with slick dark hair, tiny like Li but younger, with eyes full of fear. The other girl was Talla. Bloody and unconscious, her head lolled like a rag doll as the smaller girl half dragged, half carried her up the path, crying for Rives.

  The instant she saw us, the tiny girl collapsed, shouldering Talla to the ground.

  “Want me to help find Rives?” I asked as we closed in on the girls.

  “No. Stay.” Thad’s voice was clipped.

  Talla’s arms and face were scratched, and a jagged, bloody gash slashed up her forearm and wrapped around her elbow, exposing bone. Her left arm hung at a funny angle. She needed a hospital, but all she had was us.

  The whimpering girl seemed to have shrunk. She rocked Talla on the ground, tears staining her childlike face. “Do you speak English?” Thad asked gently.

  She nodded.

  “I’m Thad,” he said, using the same soft, steady tone. “What’s your name?”

  “Mi-Miya.” Her word jerked through tight breaths.

  “Okay, Miya. Do you know what happened?” Thad pointed to Talla, who was unconscious.

  “Wolf. She save me from wolf.”

  Where’s Miguel? And Heesham? And Bart? Where’s her team?

  Thad was obviously thinking the same thing, because he asked Miya, “Did you see anyone else with her? Boys?”

  She shook her head.

  Rives came running, with Jillian limping behind. It turned out Jillian’s mom was a physical therapist, and Jillian was now the de facto head of island medicine. “I don’t know crap,” she said, her voice shaking. “But her shoulder looks dislocated to me.” Gently, Rives lifted Talla, his face drawn.

  Back in the City, Thad and Rives reset Talla’s shoulder. Her scream was bloodcurdling, then she passed back out, which was probably good. Jillian took over when Thad left. Rives refused to leave Talla’s side.

  Feeling helpless, I brought Rives a plate of pineapple. “Rives, you need to eat.”

  Rives didn’t move. I set the plate on the small table.

  “Can I get you anything else?”

  “Deadleaf,” Rives said. “We’re out.”

  His eyes never left Talla.

  “Where do I get it?”

  “Closest strand is near the groves.” Rives turned to me and, for an instant, purpose replaced desperation. “It’s a haul, I know. Don’t go alone. Take Thad, or Jason. And don’t touch the leaves.”

  “Why?”

  Jillian answered. “Because your hand will go numb. The leaves weep white juice; it’s an instant anesthetic. Sabine’s the one who taught us about it. If you crush the leaves, they make a numbing compress. When you harvest, one person cuts, and one packs. Don’t touch. And don’t eat the fruit. Not that you’d want to—it smells terrible—but the fruit’s poisonous.”

  I stopped. “It smells bad? Like throw up?”

  “Yup.” Jillian crinkled her nose. Rives was intent on Talla. He held her hand, watching her closed eyes.

  “Are the leaves super shiny green?” I asked Jillian.

  “Yup.” She nodded.

  “I think I know where a bush is. Be back soon.”

  Outside Talla’s hut, I grabbed Jason and told him about the bush at the end of Black Bay, the one I suspected was a deadleaf plant. Sure enough, it was a deadleaf orphan, growing out of place. According to Jason, they usually grew in clumps on the eastern side of the island.

  The leaves smelled grassy when cut, but like Jillian warned, they oozed milky juice, making them hard to pack. On the other hand, the fruit smelled awful, and the odor intensified when plucked. The smell was overpowering, almost suffocating.

  “I thought the fruit was poisonous,” I told Jason, swallowing repeatedly as Jason packed the fruit in a separate satchel.

  “It is,” he said, sounding nasal as he breathed through his mouth. “But maybe we can use the island’s defenses to our own advantage.” Now he grinned. “Thad’s idea. We’re going to sow some seeds around the City. See what grows.”

  Sacks full, we headed back. It was frustrating to be so close to the Arches and not visit, but Talla came first.

  She was still unconscious.

  “I’ve got a bad feeling about Talla’s team,” Jason told me and Thad as we hung our newly washed satchels by the Shack to dry. “A wolf attack is not a good sign.”

  “And getting separated from your team is even worse,” Thad added, his voice grim.

  A crashing noise echoed through the trees.

  Thad spun in front of me and crouched, knife in hand. Jason raised his spear. I stood there, empty-handed, feeling helpless. What could I do, throw my sandal at the wolf?

  A long moment later, Heesham stumbled out of the trees. Dirt streaked his face, arms, and clothes, and he was swearing. With a start, I realized it wasn’t dirt that coated his skin; it was dried blood.

  “Talla,” Heesham gasped as he stormed closer. “Is she here?”

  “Yeah.” Thad answered. Heesham’s relief was obvious. “What happened? Word is a wolf attacked. Was it a pack? Where’s Miguel, and Bart?”

  I pressed on Thad’s arm. “Heesham,” I said gently. “Let’s get you something to drink, then you can talk.” Heesham looked ready to fall down, or fall apart. I’d never seen him like this, and it threw me.

  Thad looked embarrassed. “My bad. Charley’s right. Are you hurt?”

  “Nope. Not my blood.” Heesham looked even angrier.

  I grabbed a water gourd, which Heesham emptied in a quick minute. Striding to the clearing, he plopped down on a rock—the same rock where Sabine had sat on my first morning here.

  Then he leaned forward, his massive hands clenched. “Talla and I were getting firewood. Miguel and Bart were tracking a rabbit. We hadn’t made good time. We were still near the rain forest, instead of where we’d planned to be that day. So we were hustling to restock fruit and game, getting ready to launch the next morning. Next thing I know, Bart’s flying at us, telling us to run. Says a giant monkey thing with a ghost face jumped Miguel, that it dropped from a tree and landed on Miguel’s shoulders, and that more animals came out of the trees and took Miguel down.”

  Heesham swallowed. “I lit into him right then. I wasn’t buying his pack-of-monkeys story. There aren’t packs of anything on Nil, except us.

  “I made him lead us back to where he said Miguel was attacked, but Miguel wasn’t there. Then Bart changed his story, kept insisting we couldn’t find Miguel because he was gone. Said a gate flashed and took Miguel and the monkey thing through it but he hadn’t told us because he didn’t think we would believe him because gates rarely flash in the rain forest.”

  “So he lied,” I said.

  Everyone jerked their heads to me.

  “Sorry,” I said to Heesham, feeling rude, “but two things can’t take the same gate. Remember that girl? The one who died after an outbound zapped her?”

  “Two people can’t go, but I don’t know about a person and animal.” Thad frowned.

  “No, he lied,” Heesham said, his voice hard. “We started hunting in circles, spreading out, calling out to each other to stay in range. Then Bart stopped answering. Talla and I hooked back up, but B
art had disappeared. So had our food and maps.”

  Everyone was silent, listening. The breeze had even slowed.

  “Now it was just me and Talla. We kept looking, and next thing you know, we found a dead monkey. Big sucker, with white around its eyes and nose. It’d been stabbed.” He looked at us. “The monkey thing with a white face that supposedly took Miguel through a gate was dead. And Miguel’s knife was stuck in its gut.

  “So now we knew Miguel was around. We called for him, tried to follow blood trails, but we’d walked so long we were turned around and night was falling. Plus, for all we knew, Miguel was walking in circles, too, and we were missing each other. So we stopped. That night, Talla and I stayed put, alternating watch. The next morning, we walked a tight grid, searching for Miguel. We found him, leaning against a rock, barely alive, his face messed up. One eye gone. The baboon did a number on him.”

  Heesham looked at Thad, his face furious. “Bart left him there, bro. Bart was Miguel’s support, and when Miguel needed him, he bailed.”

  Thad’s jaw ticked.

  “Miguel couldn’t walk, and he was really out of it,” Heesham continued. “So I picked him up and started back to the City. We’d been walking for maybe an hour, when we heard a girl scream. A little girl scream, you know? At first I thought it was another monkey, a trick of my head. Then we saw a girl, running naked. She was fast, man, like the wind. Then we saw the wolf. Mangy-looking thing, it was after her. It happened fast. I had Miguel; Talla’s hands were free. She took my blade and went running. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to leave Miguel; he couldn’t protect himself. And I didn’t know if Talla could handle the wolf, and it was too late to follow.” Heesham took a deep breath, visibly struggling to hold it together.

  “So I tracked toward the City. Alone for hours, carrying Miguel and keeping him talking. Then like a gift from Allah, an outbound flashed four meters out. I ran, said a prayer, and threw Miguel in. He’s gone.”

  Everyone sat silent.

  The moment was surreal.

  The blue sky, free of clouds. The gentle breeze, making the trees sing. The ocean roaring, the fire crackling, the fish baking. Talla bloody and unconscious, Heesham bloody and furious. Miya, bloody and fragile, a wounded bird, curled by the fire. Miguel bloody and gone. Bart missing.

  Julio came up from the beach, soaking wet. “Miguel made it?” he asked.

  “Yeah.” Heesham’s face was blank.

  Throwing his fist in the air, Julio shouted something in Spanish. Still grinning, he asked, “And Talla’s back?”

  As Heesham nodded. Julio frowned, looking over our group. “Where’s Bart?”

  “Don’t know,” Heesham said. “But when we find him, I get him first.”

  “Take a number,” Rives said, appearing by the fire. His face was stormy. “Talla’s got a fever.”

  CHAPTER

  45

  CHARLEY

  DAY 35, TWILIGHT

  Please let Talla’s fever break tonight.

  I’d never thought about what it would be like to be sick on Nil, and Talla was worse than ever. Floating in and out of consciousness, her skin burned hotter than a gate.

  The past two days had been awful. Jillian packed Talla’s wound with deadleaf, but her fevered sleep stayed restless, and none of us knew how to brew Sabine’s deadsleep tea to help ease Talla’s pain. Too strong and it would kill rather than soothe; it was a risk no one was willing to take. Sabine’s loss had never been more apparent. Without the tea, both Rives and Jillian worked in shifts to keep Talla cool and comfortable, but Rives’s frustration was evident.

  We need a doctor, Rives vented to Thad after dinner tonight. A real doctor, with real meds.

  Thad had gripped Rives’s shoulder. We’re doing all we can. And she has you, and our prayers. The rest is up to her. Talla’s strong, Rives. Don’t count her out.

  Thad’s words made me feel better. If anyone could beat the fever, it was Talla. After all, she’d survived Rory, she’d fought the wolf, and she’d saved Miya.

  Now she had to save herself.

  CHAPTER

  46

  THAD

  DAY 303, EARLY MORNING

  Talla died last night.

  She just didn’t wake up.

  Bart. I wanted to beat the coward into the ground, make him pay for Talla’s death. But he hadn’t come back. Maybe the traitor was too afraid to show his face, no balls to own up to what he’d done. Maybe he’d caught a gate. Maybe something had caught him.

  I couldn’t help thinking that if he hadn’t bailed on Miguel, Talla might be alive. Miguel might never have been hurt, and Heesham would’ve been free to help Talla. A dozen other choices, a dozen other outcomes. But like Charley said weeks ago, the what-if game went nowhere.

  I was so sick of the games. Nil’s games, head games.

  Dead games.

  “Ready?” Charley asked.

  “No,” I said, taking her hand and walking anyway.

  The burial ground sat at the edge of the Flower Field. We trekked as a silent group, all dressed in matching dingy white funeral wear. Our mourning clothes were our morning clothes, and our afternoon clothes and our night clothes. There was no getting away from them, unless Nil tossed a little luck and a gate your way.

  Talla’s luck had run out.

  Dressed in burial white, she rested in Rives’s arms, her eyes closed forever. Rives looked both stormy and empty, like he’d lost something he’d just found. Next to Rives, Johan’s head was bowed in prayer.

  Once we were gathered, Rives nodded to Jillian, who was already crying. She placed a lei of flowers around Talla’s neck. “Sleep well, my friend,” she whispered. “I’ll miss you.”

  As Jillian stepped away, Rives kissed Talla’s forehead, then looked up at Johan, tears streaming down his face. Seeing Rives’s pain, I nearly lost it myself.

  Johan’s deep voice drifted over the group. “Heavenly Father, we gather to honor Talla, and in our hour of need, we call on your words. The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want…”

  Rives gently laid Talla in her grave. Heesham, Jason, and I began covering her with dirt, and as the black Nil ground swallowed Talla forever, pictures of past funerals flickered through my brain.

  Today’s burial was so much worse.

  “He maketh me to lie down in green pastures…”

  Wrong! my gut screamed. Talla’s death was wrong—out of order. She should have said good-bye to me, not the other way around. But with nine months left on the clock, Talla was gone, claimed by Nil forever.

  The grave was level, a raw island wound. Quan had carved a sleek wooden cross as a marker. It made me thankful Quan had chosen to stay. But it was Rives who placed the cross on Talla’s grave.

  “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me…”

  The shadow of death. It loomed larger than ever. I held Charley’s hand, holding tight to the goodness in my world—the goodness that had nothing to do with Nil’s shadow and everything to do with Charley. Because Nil was evil. Fate had brought Charley here, but it was Nil who would rip her away.

  I watched Rives fall to his knees and sink into the fresh dirt at the edge of Talla’s grave. As he bowed his head, my blood went cold. Will Charley have to bury me? Please, God, no. And I prayed I wouldn’t have to bury her. I didn’t think I could survive it.

  I prayed that I’d make it.

  And that she’d make it.

  And that somehow we’d live happily ever after on the other side.

  But fairy tales were for little girls in polyester princess getups, not for seventeen-year-old boys daring to hope. And Nil was no fairy godmother, that was for damn sure. Still, I hoped, because I had to.

  I tuned back just in time for Johan’s Amen.

  “Amen,” Charley murmured. Her “A” sounded strong, like she sent her prayers up with a little extra power. Beside me, Jillian sobbed quietly. Rives stayed on his k
nees.

  Charley dropped my hand. “Be right back,” she whispered. She walked up to Rives and touched his shoulder. “Come,” she said softly. “I’m not your twin, or your Talla, but I hate to see you hurting. We miss her, too.”

  Rives looked at Charley, his eyes shockingly empty. “I’d just figured out who she was. It was like we always played each other, you know? But she’d finally let me in. I knew her, Charley. Talla was my girl. I can’t believe that’s her.” He pointed to the fresh grave.

  “It’s not,” Charley said, kneeling. “She’s here”—Charley touched Rives’s chest, then his forehead—“and here. And you’re still with us. Take a minute, say your good-byes. Then come with us, okay?”

  Rives looked at Talla’s grave. Slowly he lifted his fingers to his lips, then reached out and touched her cross.

  My chest was so tight I could barely get air. Grief for Rives, grief for Talla, fear for me and for Charley, all twisting into one massive life-sucking terror. The shadow of death had never felt colder. Or closer.

  “Thanks,” I told Charley when I could finally speak.

  “For what?”

  “For what you said to Rives. He’s solid.”

  She slid her hand into mine. “He told me the same thing about you once.”

  As a tribute to Talla, the girl who loved the water more than anyone, we grabbed boards and the group of us hit the water together. With each stroke, I thought of Talla. Of how she owned the water and dreamed of Olympic gold. I’m sorry, Talla. You deserved more time.

  Don’t we all, the waves murmured, full of their adrenaline rushes. Don’t we all.

  The swell pitched, rising like a mountain. Vaulting to my feet, I rode the line, going for speed, racing away from the shadow of death. Water flew under my board, then like a fast run downhill, the ride was over. The wave closed out, and as the foamball churned, for a second it looked like I was riding snow.

  Then the wind kicked up, onshore and cross. Soon the sea looked like a washing machine, like the water was protesting Talla’s death, too.