Chapter 8
Not a Bird, Not a Plane, But Five Feet of Villainy
TIA
After a week of lab re-induction and touring universities, Niko’s finally brought in samples of the new strain of moonstones, and each lab table has been given a palm-sized rock to chip away at and analyse.
This means it’s the first time I have to actually work with Harper in a lab lesson, and last night’s unspoken suffocates us.
It was a long night. The Sentinels managed to keep the bulk of the moonstones, but despite my best efforts, a Fox had got away with one case.
This means, thanks to me, the uncalibrated, unresearched, extremely volatile moonstones are now officially part of the Foxes’ arsenal – and in the fucking wake of a bomb blueprint theft.
Even worse is that the reason for my embarrassing defeat was that I’d been struck in the skull with a car, and I spent the rest of the night fighting off concussion nausea.
My mother used to say I was never made to be a Sentinel.
She pledged my heart was too soft, and therefore so was my body, and thus my resolve, and then my spirit.
Supposedly Tia Njauw was a walking failure pretending to succeed, and being a Sentinel gave me too huge an opportunity to disappoint the world.
Supposedly being gentle meant being too weak to hold the world on my shoulders.
So I was careful when Harper appeared like an apparition in the kitchen last night. I walled my weakness behind small talk and long hair so she wouldn’t see the weakness my mother saw.
Falling down the stairs was a poor lie, admittedly, but time erodes memory like it buries wounds. If we can end the day without either of us speaking about last night, yesterday’s altercation might fade into the ether in a week.
I’m so focused on avoiding the topic that it takes an hour to notice the slight limp in Harper’s step, her pale lips, her sunken face. Whatever was plaguing her last night is still here.
I dig my thumbnail into my index finger. ‘What’s wrong with you?’
She rolls her eyes and collapses into a lab chair. The light in her gaze flickers to nothing.
No comeback. Harper is either dying, or she’s been replaced by her better alternative self. ‘I’m serious. Should I get Niko to start digging a grave?’
‘Only if it’s for you, when I’m done with you,’ Harper snaps. She inches out of the chair and draws herself to stand. ‘If you’re done insulting me, we have work to do.’
She’s literally bent over the table.
With Harper around, the dull headache from my lingering concussion returns, and I pinch my nose. ‘Tell me what you need.’
The words seem to brawl in her mouth for a good few seconds, her lips twisting and her cheeks pinched. ‘Painkillers. My bag, end of the table.’
I rummage through her overused rucksack and come back with a half-empty blister film. Harper’s palm waits as I push a pill into it, and she swallows it dry.
‘Thanks, or whatever.’
‘Don’t thank me.’ I fold my arms and lean against the table. ‘You look like you crawled out of a sewer.’
The death stare I receive in response feels like a prize, until Harper says, ‘You looked like shit last night too. The media would have a field day if I’d gotten a photo, you know.
Singapore’s favourite Sentinel can’t cope with her responsibilities and suffers crippling insomnia. Or was it anxiety? Probably both?’
My joy extinguishes. ‘We both had an awful night. Let’s leave it there.’
Harper sighs and passes me the moonstone sample. She holds it with bare hands because she has no sense of lab protocol, and I glare at her as I receive it with pincers. ‘Use gloves. We don’t know what these stones can do.’
‘What’s the worst? I’m also a descendant. These things are good for me, anyway.’
‘You barely have magic – don’t be dramatic. But sure, go risk it. I’m due for a different labmate, anyway.’ I begin to prep a sample of moonstone, weighing it and sanding it down.
When I glance up, Harper’s looking at me funny. ‘Descendants with less magic also need moonstones.’
I frown. ‘Since when?’
Her eyes widen. ‘What? Since forever? I mean, I guess it’s still kind of new, but more recent generations with less magic need them just to function.
It’s, like, usually you need moonstones to supplement your magic because using magic depletes your energy quicker.
But kids born now don’t have anywhere near your level of magic, and they’re still physically weaker, and sicker.
We don’t know why, but it’s like when a descendant has less magic, the weaker they become.
All my younger cousins need moonstones. How do you not . . . know?’
I blink. ‘I’ve only ever seen descendants with magic take moonstones. Like Niko, Kiran, me. People with high levels of magic.’
Harper levels a flat stare. ‘Those are the only people you can think of? What about our classmates in school?’
I feel my face heat. ‘No one spoke about it. You know people didn’t really speak to us.’
‘God, you actually need friends.’ Harper pulls out a block of testing material. ‘Why do you think the Foxes and Nagas are always stealing moonstones?’
‘That’s above your classification level.
’ I raise a brow. The moonstones have always been rampant on the black market, thanks to the Nagas and Foxes.
Regardless of whether Harper knows about the Foxes’ bomb plans, given she’s an estranged Fox member, it’s not something I can disclose. ‘Why do you think they do it?’
‘I—’ Harper clears her throat. She loads the moonstone sample into the testing material and seals it off in a reinforced glass box. ‘Well, I think it’s because they need it. Easy as that. Why would there be anything else?’
She doesn’t know about the bombs. Not like I ever really doubted it, but it still sometimes surprises me to have confirmation that Harper isn’t connected to the clan at all.
‘I’m just saying, if that’s all the Foxes and Nagas needed, we wouldn’t be chasing them like we do now.’
Harper seems to chew on this as we wait for the moonstone sample to activate.
There’s a blinding flash of light, and the box shudders.
I’d flinched at the explosion, but I peer through the charcoal smoke swirling through the glass. Ash litters the bottom of the box. There’s nothing left in there.
Harper frowns as she re-approaches the box. ‘Wow, okay. It’s all gone?’
‘I think so.’ I swallow. We’ve never had moonstones this flammable. Never had moonstones this strong. If these are genuinely turned into bombs, then . . .
We have to catch Raven soon.
HARPER
‘Neither the Foxes nor the Nagas have been planning to use the moonstones for anything aside from supplements, right?’ I ask as I edge my finger under translucent prawn shell and peel it off to reveal pink flesh. A barb sticks me in the thumb and I hiss, jerking back.
Maria, who’s slicing fishcakes into a bowl, glances over. ‘Why do you care?’
‘It’s just . . .’ I grab another prawn. Rip its head off. ‘In the labs this week, Tia was being weird about moonstones and the clan.’
Maria looks over her shoulder at the Elders seated in the dining area behind us. A young Fox teen greets the Elders before turning to join the large, cling-wrapped dining table, where all the Fox kids are rolling tangyuan.
It’s the fifteenth day of the Lunar New Year, which means a Fox family opens their house for the Elders and clan members – both the magical and magic-less divisions of the clan – to drop by and eat glutinous rice balls together.
I miss messing with the dough. Now I’m older, I’ve been exiled to lunch duty with Maria – bad. Also, we’re in Maria’s house – extra bad.
I don’t remember the last time I was here, but I remember everything else.
Like how the family leaves their keys in the knobbly pottery I gave Maria when we were kids, and the gaudy IKEA art that blocks out large sections of the cream walls, and the turquoise sofa we used to laze on together, spending afternoons with bodies pressed together, sometimes napping, sometimes talking, sometimes more.
Still, some things have changed. They’ve bought a dishwasher, and there are fake plants in the bathroom where there weren’t any before. There’s no manual on how to react to that, so I don’t.
‘No idea,’ Maria says, yanking me back to reality. Her gaze drops to her hands, and she returns to prepping the kway teow for frying. ‘You’re the leader, not me.’
The comment bristles something in me that I fight to ignore. ‘Well, do you know anything about the blueprints we handed off to the Nagas last week?’
‘I know that’s something only Ah Ma knows.’ Maria jerks her chin to the living room. ‘Go ask her yourself. Or maybe kill a Sentinel and she’ll tell you.’
I put down the prawn and toss my hands up. ‘You really want to do this with me? During a Chinese New Year gathering? Seriously?’
‘I’m just reminding you. Calm down.’ Maria has the kway teow over the sizzling frying pan, and she pauses. ‘How are you preparing for that, anyway?’
‘I mean, the Elders are developing a poison based on Tia’s painkillers, and it’ll weaken her powers enough to subdue her in battle.
I’ve been getting close to her, as planned.
Aside from that, just training my powers and exercising.
Why do you have to make me feel like a kid who hasn’t done her homework?
’ I pass the bowl of prawns to Maria, keeping my voice steady even as my mind races.
Between the blueprints and what Tia said, I feel like I’m missing something.
What are the Elders and the Nagas up to?
Maria dumps the prawns into the kway teow, but her gaze doesn’t leave mine.
‘You know your entire leadership hinges on this assessment, right? The Elders will be there watching. You know how it goes. If you mess this up, everything you’ve worked for will be gone.
And I know this leadership is your way of being close to—’