Thirty Melinoë
Thirty
Melino?
I’m sure the cameras loved it. Our unchecked, desperate fury. Azrael would find it very cinematic. It’s nothing anyone has ever seen before: an Angel, finally cracking her cold facade. The clips will be famous. But I’ll never get to see them. I won’t kill Inesa, and he’ll Wipe me the moment the helicopter touches down in the City.
I lift my gaze to Inesa’s face. I see every detail of it, from the constellation of freckles across her nose to the nameless green-brown color of her eyes, and think, I’ll forget this, too. I’ll forget how it feels to touch her, to be held by her.
The bile of rage rises in my throat. We both breathe heavily into the silence.
And then, suddenly, Inesa bites out, “ No .”
My brow creases with an unspoken question.
“ No ,” she repeats, her voice trembling. “This can’t be it. This isn’t how it ends. I won’t let it.”
I feel my heart cracking with an emotion I’m not supposed to feel. But it overrides my programming. It washes over me like a dark wave, but it doesn’t drown me. I’m just carried aloft in its great tide.
“There’s nothing you can do,” I whisper. “This is how it ends for me. How it ends for every Angel.”
“No,” she repeats stubbornly. Her hands are balled into fists.
“They’ll kill him.” My stomach feels acid with anger. “Luka.”
At that, Inesa draws in a breath. She sits back on her knees, falling into silence. I look around at the mess we’ve made, all of Azrael’s neatly packaged supplies, destroyed. It doesn’t matter. They were useless against Caerus. He only sent them to serve his narrative. So the audience could be convinced that Inesa had a fighting chance. I have to swallow to keep from screaming.
Then, seemingly out of nowhere, Inesa cocks her head and asks, “Have you ever heard of the Drowned County?”
The unexpectedness of the question momentarily cleaves through the fog of despair. “No,” I say. “What is that?”
Inesa hesitates a moment, as if she’s listening for something. “They’re not watching,” she says. “Azrael has cut the cameras.”
“What? How do you know?” I can’t hear their faint buzzing, but only because Azrael is purposefully keeping them out of earshot now.
“He did it before,” Inesa says. “When Luka and I talked about the Drowned County. Caerus doesn’t want anyone to know it exists. It’s a place north of here, near the border with New England. It’s where Luka and I were headed. It’s off the grid.”
I believe her—about the cameras, at least. Especially now, with so many people tuned in, Azrael will be very, very careful about what he allows the audience to see and hear. But the rest?
“It can’t be.” I shake my head. “Nothing exists off the grid. Just bombed-out wastelands.”
“That’s what Caerus wants you to believe.” Inesa reaches into her pocket. She pulls something out, clenches it in her fist. “They don’t want anyone to know it’s real. I thought it was just a myth, one of my Dad’s stories, but...” She holds out her hand. On her open palm there’s a tiny scrap of paper. “He left this for us. They’re coordinates.”
I stare down at the sequence of numbers. The ink is blurred, but legible. Degrees of latitude and longitude.
“I forgot about it until now,” she admits. “Until Luka showed his half of the compass. Dad left the coordinates tucked inside it.”
I just keep staring at it. A tiny scrap of paper with some hastily scrawled numbers. How can we stake three lives on it? Hers, mine, and Luka’s. What she’s talking about—this Drowned County—sounds like a fantasy. There’s not supposed to be anything along the border with New England except for the irradiated aftermath of exploded nukes. If there were, Caerus would have destroyed it.
“No,” I say, shaking my head again. “Caerus wouldn’t allow something like that to exist.”
“Maybe they don’t know it’s real.” Inesa closes her fingers around the scrap of paper, hard enough to turn her knuckles white. “And they couldn’t wipe it out—it’s too close to the border. It would break the stalemate with New England.”
I consider it. Inside the bubble of the City, all the talk of nuclear winter and radiation poisoning seemed hazy and unreal, like scenes from a movie. Horrible, yet too distant to fear. But I’ve already seen impossible things out here, things that shouldn’t exist. Deer with webbed feet and scales. All sorts of creatures, adapting to a drowning world.
“Even if it is real,” I say, “what about your brother?”
At that, all the color drains from Inesa’s face. Her gaze flickers briefly, and then the light returns to her eyes, that blaze of determination, of defiance. I didn’t see it in her photo, when Azrael first showed it to me on the holoscreen. But I saw it on Luka’s face, and on her father’s. Now the family resemblance is finally clear.
“He wants me to go,” she says softly. “That’s why he held up the compass. That’s why he said he knew I could make it.”
Luka’s voice echoes: I know she’s strong enough to make it. Please, Nesa.
Is it him making a sacrifice? Giving up his life for his sister’s? I think back to the rest of the interview, to Zetamon’s comments. Everyone say hi to New Amsterdam’s latest internet boyfriend. The most famous guy in New Amsterdam right now. I can believe it. I know exactly how much the audience loathes me, and how desperate they are to see me—or any Angel—fail. Watching Luka—handsome, strong, and charismatic in his brooding silence—knock me out has probably become one of the most-watched clips of all time. And it’s skyrocketed him to fame and adoration, instantly.
Which means Azrael can’t afford to kill him. With how beloved Luka is, his death would provoke much worse than hacked holoboards. A Lamb dying on a Gauntlet is one thing—it’s supposed to happen. Everyone has accepted this level of brutality. Azrael has done a lot of things, but he’s never coldly executed an unchosen civilian. It’s beyond what even the callousness of the audience would allow. The ratings of the Gauntlet would plummet. The CEO would pull the plug on the Angel program. And Azrael would be the most hated person in New Amsterdam.
I meet Inesa’s unflinching gaze, and I know she’s come to the same conclusion. The unspoken message sparks between us, like a current through an electrical wire. That’s what all of this is—every one of our gestures, down to our blinks or swallows—sparks that could kindle a blaze. The whole of New Amsterdam is watching. Which means that Azrael finally has something to lose.
Caerus wasn’t always invincible. I have to remind myself of that, too. Their domination happened slowly.
Debts. It all began with debts. Student loans, medical bills, mortgages, credit cards—all of it weighing down New Amsterdam’s government like an anchor attached to a bloated corpse. People died and passed their debts on to their children, on to their children’s children. Shackled by the debt that followed them for generations, people stopped buying houses and cars. The birth rate plummeted. There was a shortage of doctors and skilled professionals because who was going to take on the extra debt of getting an advanced degree, on top of everything else?
In an act of apparent benevolence, Caerus bought all of New Amsterdam’s debts. They began a staggered program of loan forgiveness to jump-start the economy. This was all while northern New Amsterdam was being ravaged by border skirmishes with New England. And in order to entice people to buy houses and cars and to get their degrees, Caerus offered a massive line of credit to anyone purchasing their products: up to five hundred thousand credits.
The number was shocking. At first people couldn’t believe it was real—five hundred thousand credits to spend on everything from groceries to home goods, anything that was sold on the Caerus website. The economy recovered in record time. The governor of New Amsterdam created a special cabinet post—economy czar—for Caerus’s CEO, to help guide the state’s recovery from its crippling depression.
To mitigate the effects of climate change that devastated the outlying Counties, Caerus was also given the grant for the Hudson River Valley Relief Project. They were supposed to build reservoirs, plant trees, mend power lines, and provide compensation to people whose homes were destroyed by flooding. And that’s what they did, at first. But then they stretched the margins of the bill’s purview. In order to account for who was receiving aid, where people were being relocated, and to track demographic trends, everyone in the outlying Counties was given a Caerus ID number. With the tablets they distributed freely to every New Amsterdam resident, Caerus could track your online activity, your movements, listen to your conversations. Everything.
At the time, the Outliers were all assured this was a temporary measure. Just until the recession ended. Just until the Counties were rebuilt, the flooding was managed, the border wars with New England settled with an armistice.
Looking back, anyone could’ve predicted what happened next. The erosion of lines between corporation and government. People clamoring for Caerus’s CEO to replace the governor. An election with questionable democratic integrity. Schools that used to be state-run dissolved and replaced with a new standard curriculum created by Caerus.
At the time, I’m sure it all seemed understandable, efficient. Caerus was running every other aspect of life in New Amsterdam—why not education, too? Why not military and defense? Why not housing and transportation? Why not health and human services?
But in spite of the Gauntlets, in spite of the economy that never really bounced back, the flooding that never really ceased, the border wars that continued to drag on to this day... approval ratings for Caerus’s CEO are still above 90 percent. Because the truth is, things could always be worse. Sure, some people can’t pay their debts and have to die for it, but those people are the stupid, the indulgent, the weak. As long as it’s always somebody else, it’s easy to blame them, easy, even, to cheer for their deaths.
I didn’t fully understand it before. The Outliers love Caerus the same way I love Azrael. You can hate the person who imprisons you, but you can’t hate the person who sets you free. So what do you do when they’re one and the same?
The love is what Azrael—and Caerus—can’t afford to lose. And maybe that makes love the most powerful force in the world, after all.
Inesa sets down the scrap of paper and the compass case, and the metal clinks against the wooden floor, jolting me from my thoughts. Then she raises her arms and takes my face in her hands.
“Trust me,” she whispers.
I just squeeze my eyes shut. It feels like too much to bear. All the systems so carefully constructed within me are short-circuiting, crumbling down.
Inesa pulls me closer. “Believe me.”
Seconds drag past us. Outside, the snow melts into the earth. The dark soil rises again, fed by the cold, clear water from the sky. Finally, I open my eyes. I can’t speak a word, but I give the slowest, faintest nod.
We can’t risk saying much more. The cameras are greedily taking in every word, every expression. I’ve long lost my ability to keep my face a cold mask, revealing nothing. And everyone in New Amsterdam has now seen me stripped down to the bone, naked in ways deeper than my skin. Azrael is right. It will take a lot to undo what I’ve done, not just for my own reputation, but for the reputation of all the Angels.
It might be enough, on its own, to shutter the program completely. It might cost him everything. I should cheer at the thought. And yet a painful lump solidifies in the center of my chest.
He abandoned you , a voice reminds me. It’s not the first time such a voice has spoken to me, but it’s the first time it’s felt like a voice of my own. And then he exposed you to the whole world.
Still, I can’t exorcise the pain. Not entirely. My mind hurls memories at me: every time he embraced me, every time he pulled me into a helicopter and laid a Mylar blanket over me, stroking my hair as I shivered from withdrawal. I hate him for leaving me. I love him for saving me. All living creatures have a place they call home. And the instinct to return home is as essential as the drawing of breath.
Home. The cold metal of an operating table. The darkness of the shooting range, made sickly green in my prosthetic’s night vision. The floor-to-ceiling window of my bedroom, showing me the glittering cityscape below, all the places I’ll never reach.
Home. The low, smoky heat of the woodstove. The warm glow of the oil lamps, casting everything in pale gold. Inesa’s hair spread out across the pillow, turned shiny in the moonlight that slips between the cracks in the wall. I could live like this, I realize. In just the spaces between walls.
Inesa is bending over the table, arranging the messy pile of supplies. We destroyed almost everything, but I can’t make myself regret it. There’s something freeing about being able to feel it, finally: All the rage that washed through me left a scorched wasteland behind. And yet even I know that flowers grow most brilliantly from ashes.
I join Inesa at the table. With fingers trembling faintly, I shove the intact supplies into a bag. There are some painkillers, a few bandages. A crumbling handful of decon-tabs. My gaze wanders to the white dress puddled on the floor. Part of me wishes I had torn it apart. Instead, I pick it up and let it unfurl.
It’s a long dress, reaching nearly to my ankles. It has blousy peasant sleeves and looks strikingly chaste, like a nightgown. Or something a child would wear.
At that, I realize why Azrael sent it. He sent it for the same reason he chose Inesa for this Gauntlet. He wants to see if I can do it, if I can kill another girl from Esopus Creek. He wants this to be my redemption, and his redemption, too.
I have to swallow the bile that rises in my throat.
Inesa sees me holding the dress and says, “I can’t imagine it will be very flattering. Not really my style.”
Gallows humor. I wish I could force a smile onto my face for her. I can’t deny that it would be cinematic: me in my black hunting suit, a stark contrast to my pale hair and face, descending on the innocent Lamb in her little white dress. Any concerns about my brutality or my fitness would be silenced. If nothing else, Azrael knows what makes a good show.
But there’s no point in antagonizing him unnecessarily, of testing his limits further. Wordlessly, I hand the dress to Inesa and pick up the new hunting suit.
I don’t have any modesty left to preserve; this Gauntlet has taken it all. The shame of being exposed is secondary to the physical pain of pulling the skintight suit over the blisters and burns on my legs. I bite down hard on my lower lip. Every tug of the fabric is pure agony.
Inesa helps me draw up the suit around my shoulders and then zip it in the back. With one final snick of the zipper, all my scars are hidden. With long, deliberate strokes, I comb through the tangles in my hair, and then pull it into a ponytail, sleek and high on my head. I could be fresh out of the helicopter, at the beginning of the Gauntlet. I can almost see the pleased gleam in Azrael’s dark eyes.
When Inesa starts removing her boots, a sudden, fierce feeling of protectiveness overcomes me. I snatch the quilt from the bed and hold it out around her, like a curtain.
A smile lifts the corner of her mouth. “Thank you.”
Behind the quilt, she slips off her shirt and pants. I stare down at the floor. Every thought in my mind is collapsing, like matter into a black hole. I go so long without blinking that my real eye starts to burn.
“I’m not used to saying that.” Inesa’s voice, sudden and unexpected, breaks the strange trance.
“Saying what?”
“‘Thank you.’” She pulls on the sleeves of the dress, covering her bare shoulders. “It’s kind of taboo, in Esopus... it sounds silly, but it’s true. No one really likes the idea of being indebted to someone else. And you definitely never want to be the one who’s needing.”
I realize how much strength it must have taken for Luka to say please in front of the camera, in front of all of New Amsterdam. I swallow, not trusting myself to speak.
“It’s funny, though,” Inesa goes on, “because if we didn’t need each other, we’d have nothing. Society wouldn’t work. So it’s a burden and a blessing at once. Even nature is the same. The plants drink the rainwater and the animals eat the plants and each other. Nothing is created without need. When we see flowers blooming or hear birds singing, we think it’s beautiful. But when people need each other, it seems so ugly.”
“Caerus has poisoned everything.” The bitterness in my voice curdles my tongue.
Inesa bites her lip. Silence settles over us, like new-fallen snow. Then she says, “Will you help me with the buttons?”
I let the quilt slide from my hands and puddle to the floor. There’s a line of tiny white buttons up the back of the dress, each one made to fit an equally tiny loop. Inesa reaches back and sweeps her hair out of the way. I’m careful not to catch any of the angling strands. Slowly, her bare skin vanishes, clad in impossibly clean white linen. The buttons go all the way up to her throat, the final one closing over the soft flesh at the nape of her neck.
When I’m finished, she lets go of her hair and it tumbles down around her shoulders. “Thanks,” she says quietly.
My instinct is just to nod. But I force my mouth open and reply, “You’re welcome.” It feels strange to say the words, but not unpleasant.
“Well,” Inesa says, tugging the sleeves down to her wrists and turning around, “how do I look?”
My eyes follow the line of her body, clothed in all white, from the bodice to the hem of the flared skirt, which falls to her ankles. My vision blurs. Reality starts to shiver away, and the memory rises up in its place, licking at me like flame.
“You look like her,” I whisper. “Sanne.”
The name I know and the face I’ll never forget. She doesn’t look anything like Inesa, not really, but my mind is caught on that memory like a fishhook, and it won’t let go. Her limp body in the mud, rain pelting over us both, her skin growing colder and colder under my hands. And as the real world shudders in and out of my vision, the bald and ugly truth I’ve always known seeps into my skin: that I am a predator and she is the prey. That for me to survive, she has to die.
My fingers are shaking uncontrollably. Inesa reaches out and takes them, pressing my hands to her chest. Her heartbeat thrums through my skin.
“It’s okay,” she says. “It’s okay.”
She leans forward, and I lean forward to meet her. The tips of our noses brush. I think about how, just over a day ago, I wanted so badly to touch her but never thought I would get the chance. How do people love, I wonder, knowing that every moment is so precarious, that at any second, it could all melt like snow, or turn to ash?
“If, somehow,” I start, in a strangled voice, “we knew each other before, without all of this, do you think...”
I can’t finish, but Inesa knows what I mean to say. A small smile spreads across her face.
“If you were just another City dweller who came into my shop one day,” she says, “I think I would be so flustered, I’d make a complete idiot of myself. And then I’d think: She hates me, she’s never coming back.”
“But I would come back,” I whisper.
“Yeah,” Inesa says. “But I’m clueless, so I’d probably think you were coming back because you have an extreme passion for stuffed deer.”
I laugh, a low, breathy sound. “No, I’d just run myself broke buying them, so I’d have an excuse to see you again.”
In this universe, there are no credits, no debts. No Gauntlets.
“And would you come live in Esopus with me?” Inesa’s tone becomes hesitant.
“I suppose,” I say. “I could hunt. You could cook. It would be very domestic.”
This time, she laughs. “I’m a terrible cook. I’ll microwave you pasta, but that’s the best you’re going to get.”
“Deer meat and microwaved pasta.” I chew my lip. “What a life it would be.”
“Yeah,” Inesa says. Her voice is soft. “A life.”