Chapter 52
Everything I’ve learned since Jonas’s cruel Harvest has coalesced into a single, awful vision.
Jarek’s worship of the Founders’ items, the food and the newfangled weapons and that pile of explosives that Gryphon said is his father’s passion.
How Jarek is having his Guardians train with noise makers so they learn to fight without being thrown off by loud explosions.
The cage-like structure Eero had said the Carpenter House was being forced to build to keep something out.
“I think Jarek wants to blow open the Wall.” My whole body is shaking. “He craves power. And wants things he cannot have. I’ll bet he imagines both lie Beyond.”
I expect gasps, argument. Instead, all four go as still as stone.
“Gryphon also suspects that,” Meryl finally says.
The ground seems to drop out from beneath me.
Meryl looks at the others. “It’s time we tell her everything. No more secrets. They’re hungry and they bite everyone, especially the ones keeping them.”
“None of us knew if we could trust you,” Oscar says matter-of-factly. “Even after you started training.”
I’m flabbergasted. “But you trust Gryphon!”
“We do.” They nod, practically in unison.
“And it’d save us a lot of time if you did, too,” Meryl says. “He suspects his dad, and he wants to stop him.”
“How?” I ask. I don’t bother responding about Gryphon. She can’t seriously expect me to trust him while admitting he’s kept a secret this huge from me.
“We don’t know yet.”
A stone apron of exhaustion drops onto my shoulders. So many secrets have led us to waste so much time. I hold up the balm. “The sooner we get this on, the better you’ll feel.”
They hesitate, and then Oscar turns, lifting his shirt. I try not to weep at the sight of his swollen, bloody back. I apply the ointment as gently as possible. He flinches at my touch and then sighs. I made the balm myself. It draws out pain, reduces swelling, and speeds up healing.
“Did Gryphon know about the vines?” I ask. I think not. He seemed genuinely stunned by the earlier attack.
Eero shakes his head, glancing enviously at Oscar. “No. None of us did, until today.”
I carefully pull Oscar’s shirt down—the balm will keep it from fusing to his flesh—and move on to Eero. When I finish with him, I indicate Sal is next, but she gestures toward Meryl instead.
“The poison Uncle Richard referred to,” I say, “the one my mother confronted Jarek about? It does repel the plant. I saw it with my own eyes when it attacked in the quarantined area. But it’s poisonous to humans, too.”
Meryl’s head whips around, causing her to grimace at the pain. “The quarantined area? Holy Wall…it’s the Vex, isn’t it? They were trying to destroy the plant and killed villagers instead.”
I nod, impressed with her quick thinking. These four deserve to know as much as I do. Should I also share my plan to save Jonas? Even despite what we’ve been through, it’s hard for me to trust them. I remember what Augustus said, though.
If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.
“I’m going up the Wall on Friday.” The words start out tentative and then pour out in a rush. “To save Jonas. When I come back down—if I come back down—I want Jarek Harvested. With him out of the way, we can figure out as a village how to move forward.”
“You want to get Jarek Harvested…” Sal trails off, incredulous. “And how exactly do you plan to do that? Bat your mom’s eyelashes and ask him nicely to get in the basket?”
Meryl lightly smacks Salvatora on the arm, but Sal’s right. It does sound unlikely, when she puts it like that. “I figure he’ll have no choice if everyone learns what he’s been hiding from them,” I offer weakly.
“They won’t believe you. Not over the man whose orders they’ve been following for so long,” Sal says. She watches me finish applying balm to Meryl and then sighs with relief as I begin treating her back.
“Sal’s right,” Meryl says apologetically. “Maybe if we’d stood up to Jarek right away, we’d have had a fighting chance. But he’s trained us to lose a little bit of freedom, day by day. People are ready to follow him to the death now. It’s that, or admit what they’ve allowed him to get away with.”
“We’re losing sight of the real issue,” Oscar chimes in.
“Which is?” I ask.
Oscar glances at the floor before drawing a circle in the dust that’s accumulated in the corner. “This is Noah’s Valley,” he says, pointing at it. “We’ve lived here peacefully for what, over a hundred years?”
I bite my tongue to keep from saying the exact number: 120. We all nod.
“Sure, the Valley needs improvements. But we didn’t have problems like this”—he gestures to his own swollen back—“until Jarek got a taste for power. And items from Beyond, it sounds like.”
I blink at his circle, feeling stupid. “What’re you saying?”
“I’m saying we wreck the Harvest basket, the tablet, and whatever explosives he plans to use to break open the Wall,” Oscar says, dropping back on his heels. “Ensure there is no going Beyond, ever. With the temptation gone, Jarek should be easier to get back in line.”
Eero shakes his head. “The Engineer House will just make more explosives.”
“No,” I say, finally hopeful. “Gryphon was clear we don’t have the materials inside the Wall to recreate them.
” I add the next part slowly. It’s so important they understand.
“I think it’s a great idea to get rid of Jarek’s stash.
But if we destroy the tablet and the basket, Jonas will be trapped atop the Wall forever. ”
Oscar’s expression tells me everything he won’t say. The same knowledge is reflected in Sal, Eero, and Meryl’s faces. They believe my twin is dead.
“I’m sorry,” Meryl says, her expression miserable.
“But I think Oscar’s spot-on. We can’t risk Jarek ever having access to the outside world.
We don’t know what horrors might follow him back in.
And it’s not like we can continue with the Harvests, now that there might be something up there…
attacking those who are honored. The only way to guarantee our safety is to destroy the weapons and the tablet.
Once those are gone, we can tell the villagers about the poison and show them the threat at Eden’s Gate.
Together, we can figure out how to fight it. Right?”
She holds out a hand. Sal slides hers on top, then Oscar, then Eero, and lastly, reluctantly, me.
I make the deal because I know they’re right.
The Founders’ stash in the vault started all of this, simple greed eroding decades of community.
If it’s not Jarek trying to blow a hole in the Wall, now that those inside have a taste for the Beyond, it’ll be someone else.
We must permanently destroy their access to such dangers.
My friends don’t need to know that I’ll be up the Wall with my brother by the time they do.