Chapter 70
That was the Georgians. They loved bringing order from chaos, and symmetrical rubble was the perfect representation.
The home had been used by both the British and the Continental Armies during the Revolutionary War.
Years ago, when I was barely six years old, I’d needed an easy place to train as a pickpocket.
A trio of slipshots had brought me here for an afternoon.
They were tired of Central Park, Times Square, and Grand Central.
Anyway, all those years ago, I’d seen a few figment soldiers. They’d been sitting around a campfire on the green, grassy grounds in front of the mansion. Now, those figments were nowhere to be seen.
In fact, I misled you. Van Cortlandt Mansion wasn’t anywhere to be seen either. There was only the footprint of where it used to stand, with its misshapen rubblestone lining the edge of a shallow crater.
I hopped off the train, landing in the thick grass, and blinked as the air stung my eyes. It smelled like someone had set a tar pit on fire and then poured gallons of Furtig on top of the blaze. The bitumen scent burned my lungs.
Luvic crouched next to me, sniffing the air, snarling at the distant rumbling sounds.
“That isn’t thunder, is it?” I looked over at Finn.
He slowly surveyed the park, his lips turned down at the corners. “No.”
The trees surrounding the hole were ink-stain black, but the dark sky was red-smoked, the color of the Fourth of July when hundreds of fireworks were set aflame.
Luvic stepped closer to me, bumping his shoulder against my side.
“Do you want me to command you to become a man?” I whispered, pressing my hand into his coarse fur.
His upper lip curled as he let out a sharp huff, and then he loped away, heading toward the mansion’s ruins.
Guess not.
Finn’s eyes narrowed as he watched Luvic. He was picking his way around the scarred edge of the mansion, sniffing at the ground, and cocking his head as he listened for sounds that maybe only a jackaltooth could hear.
“I don’t think I’ll be able to kill another jackaltooth. Not if . . .” Finn trailed off, frowning. He shoved a hand through his hair, making it stand on end.
Maybe he was remembering the dozens he’d killed during the games, or maybe he was remembering how they’d ripped my intestines out and dismembered me when I was only a child.
“Not every jackaltooth is like Luvic,” I said. Then I added, “I’ve seen them conjured. Not all of them are . . .” I trailed off, thinking about the doorman at the Bard mansion. Had he been a human turning jackaltooth, just like Luvic?
Finn turned, and slowly, as if I were a wild animal that might startle, he took my hands. “This is the last time I’m coming to you,” he said. “Whatever happens tonight. It’s the last time. After this, you’ll be free.”
His hands were warm. They gently cupped mine.
“Free of you?”
“No.” His mouth twisted into a half-smile. “I was yours before we were born. That isn’t something we could ever be free of. If I didn’t love you like I do, then I’d love you another way. There’s a thousand ways to see a sunrise. There’s a thousand ways for me to be yours.”
I smiled and ran my pointer finger over the calluses on his hands. “Then free of Jagger,” I said, feeling the burn of the words on my tongue.
Finn untangled his hand from mine and reached out to push the strands of blowing hair back from my face. “You’ll have to trust me. Just like I’ll trust you.”
I was far enough from Jagger’s hold to shake my head, my throat tightening as I whispered, “Don’t.”
He stared at me, struck by something in my expression.
“Mari—”
He broke off when Luvic bounded over, skidding to a stop.
He barred his teeth and growled at an approaching man.
He was a Smith. It was obvious from his military-like clothing, his precise way of moving, and the hard planes of his body.
He was running across the field at a fast clip.
At first, I thought he was running toward us, but then I realized he was going to sprint past without stopping.
Finn stepped forward, cutting off Luvic, and called out to the man.
The man looked surprised. Then he veered toward us.
I was surprised too. Usually, in these dreams, there was only Finn, me, and the figments.
No one had been aware of us except for the concierge in my last dream.
But this Smith could see us too. He glanced at Finn, taking in his appearance, his size, and that undefinable aura other men instinctually recognized—it made them want to fight him or follow him.
The man snapped straight and saluted. “Sir. Are you here with the reserves?”
Finn tilted his head, scanning the man’s exhausted expression. He looked like he hadn’t shaved in days and hadn’t slept for even longer. If he’d had enough energy for it, there might’ve been hope, but I think he was too tired for even that.
Finn looked over at me, and I gave a slight nod. “Yes,” he said decisively. “We are.”
“Sir.” The man looked around, baffled. “The city’s falling. We’re overrun. Where are the rest of them?”
Finn grinned. “We are the rest of them.”
* * *
The man brought us to a single-story concrete building squatting under the trees at the edge of the park.
Men and women, who looked even more exhausted than the man we were following, raced in and out of the front door.
The bunker was like a hive that had been swatted with a baseball bat, and now all the bees were buzzing in a frenzy around it.
Some of the people did a double take when they saw Finn, me, and our growling jackaltooth, but most of them ignored us, hurrying away on some undefined mission.
On our previous rides on the ghost train, Finn and I had stayed in the present with figments from the past. But none of this was in the present or the past. It was some strange alternate reality or terrible future.
The thunderous rumblings were louder, more frequent.
Some shook the ground. The red-sky taint was bloodiest to the south. Over Manhattan.
As we hurried into the concrete-bunker-like building, the acrid, bitumen air cleared, giving way to a cool, damp, cave-like scent. The activity around the entry trickled away, until we were the only ones walking through the hallways.
At a metal door, the man knocked twice with his knuckles and murmured, “He’s in there.”
The man hurried off so quickly I wondered if I’d imagined his exhaustion.
At a muffled call to enter, Finn reached over and gave my hand a quick squeeze. He let go before I could look at him. All I could do was follow as he pushed open the door and strolled inside.
Finn jerked to a halt, and I ran into his firm back, thudding to a stop.
He made a stunned noise, and Luvic crouched next to him, his tail swishing like a knife sharpening on a whetstone.
I shook my head, steadying myself, then stepped around Finn.
I stumbled when I saw the man sitting in the corner. Finn’s hand darted out, steadying me.
“What are you doing here?” Finn asked, his voice more menacing than I’d ever heard it.
There was a slight ringing in my ears and a nauseous churning in my stomach. It rolled, seasick with fear. I knew this man. This being.
Before, I’d claimed I’d never spoken to him, but now, the memories of our interactions opened before me like seedlings sprouting from the thawed spring ground. One. Two. Three.
The first time was the day I became a nine.
It was my fourth birthday. I’d been running down the hallway after my blue rubber ball.
I’d dropped it, and it had bounced ahead of me.
My shoe was untied, and I’d nearly tripped as I’d raced to catch it.
Then, a shadow had stepped from the stone wall, and the man had stopped my ball with his booted foot.
I’d cowered under his probing stare, hating the cold, inhuman feel of him.
“Careful,” he’d said, his voice like the grinding of bones to ash. “We don’t want you to fall.”
I’d snatched the ball and run away. Hours later, I’d fallen down the stairs and died my first death.
The second time I saw him, I was eight years old.
He’d slipped from Jagger’s office like a rock breaking off a cliff wall.
I’d recognized him before I’d seen his face.
The feel of being near to him was the same: a nauseous, primordial fear that left me weak-kneed, breaking into a cold sweat, with every instinct screaming that this thing was so antihuman, so antilife, I must run.
I couldn’t. I’d been frozen, pressed to the wall, shaking with terror.
He’d known I was there—I could feel his attention.
But he hadn’t slowed, turned, or acknowledged me as he’d slid through the hall, leaving Hell Gate.
Minutes later, Jagger had found me, and I’d almost wept at his cold, familiar, rocklike feel.
Jagger had been in a rage. He’d sent me to the Clark’s, where I’d failed to do what he asked, so he’d chained me to a brick wall for days. And then I’d met Finn for the first time.
The last time I saw this man was the day Justice became a mine.
He’d been there while Justice was still coming back to himself, chained in the conjurer’s cage.
I’d watched as he slipped from the basement, wondering what he’d said to Justice or what he’d done.
He’d seen me shiver at his passing. When he did, he’d paused and said in that same creaky bone-to-ashes voice, “Are you afraid of me, or are you afraid of what’s in the mirror? ”
I knew better than to answer, and so I’d stayed quiet, hushing my heartbeat.
His mouth was too wide for a human. It was as if he’d been a fish caught on a hook and someone had ripped the edges of his mouth all the way to his ears, trying to free the lure.
He’d smiled at me, his lips pulling wide. “The world is your mirror. It reflects your soul. What you see is what you are. What I am is what you’ll be. Don’t believe me?”
I’d held my breath, not wanting to breathe in his musty-cave scent.