7. Chapter Seven
Chapter seven
D ozens and dozens of people stare up at me as I take the podium at the edge of the island, the sky that envelops us softly blue. As if it knows we need to be treated gently today. The crowd before me are dressed in a mixture of the weightless dresses, and pants and vests, of the concierges, and the more vibrant and varied clothes of the prisoners. The forest around us is sombre. Its glossy dark green leaves bowing to the earth as if they, too, are under the weight of the emotions that run through the clearing.
My fingertips tremble and I fight the urge to press them to my numb lips.
I am but one of a number of speakers, chosen to represent the staff in my case, but the honour of doing so is not one I’m sure I will live up to. The Warden was almost a father-type figure to me, someone who didn’t seem to share the same disappointment in me as my own, and he certainly eased my transition to this life far more than any other would have. It was so natural to me that he would help me get off the island and move into the next phase, and now … I clear my throat.
Claudius had a view of service being an honour but it’s hard to feel that way about it when it strips you away from everything you know. Yet he never judged me for my struggles and helped me perfect my mask of calm, hone my ability to focus on the rhythm of my tasks instead of the doubting in my heart.
And it’s that ability I need to draw on now. Perhaps it’s that mask that made him think I’d be good in Parliament?
I glance at the ornate urn where it sits on its own pedestal next to me. Surrounded by a carpet of white flowers that pick up the glare of the sun that streams in from behind me, trying to pierce the forest through the clearing. The cloying scent of the island’s jasmine is almost suffocating as the image of him slumped on his desk, the colour drained from his face, slams into me.
Bringing my hands together at my front and linking my fingers, I grip them hard enough for my nails to dig into my skin. Pulling me back to the present and the small sea of people in front of me. Mostly concierges and prisoners, but there are others I don’t recognise.
And, of course, Traelen.
Traelen looked after all the security for today and Hunters are dotted inconspicuously around the meadow on the edge of the island, their presence needed so people from the mainland could be here without realising where they are. Traelen told me one of the Claytis he has on staff will be obscuring the edges of the island so the Hunters are to make sure they don’t wander too far. All they will know is this clearing and the room for the celebration of this life that comes after. Which, as far as they will be concerned, is somewhere secure on the Nuntainia mainland. Dimly, I wonder how much the Hunters are here to watch our engagement with the visitors as well – to make sure no unnecessary information is shared.
I’d wondered if it would be easier to bury him below, on Nuntainia, but the Warden was clear in his last wishes – he wanted his service here, and then …
Traelen offers me a small nod and I clear my throat.
‘Claudius,’ I begin, trying to project my voice, ‘was a man deeply respected and admired by all who knew him.’ My gaze lands on Nix and River as I talk, Nix smiling gently to encourage me on. A look that bolsters me. ‘And I was no different.’
My mouth knows how to form the words I practised last night, and I concentrate on keeping my breathing steady and the tears from falling. Blossom nods at me as I go. She listened to me practise, helped me refine what I was to say.
‘One of his favourite games was to pretend he didn’t know of the parties we’d have in the garden, until dropping incriminating tidbits of gossip with a sly grin,’ I say. My focus dances over the crowd, my voice coming to my ears as if it belongs to someone else. ‘A tradition we hope – at least the part about ignoring our celebrations – continues in his absence.’
A stilted laughter moves through the concierges.
The wind whips up suddenly and I press my dress back to my sides, willing it to stay in place. The generous amounts of fabric in the skirt wave like a flag towards the crowd until the breeze settles again and it stirs mildly around my ankles. And yet, I keep talking.
A few people dab their eyes. Emeris, standing with Bloss, wraps an arm around her shoulders and she leans into him gratefully. Janly lifts her chin and stares, resolutely, at the urn. I find a tall man with dark-brown skin and a black mark on his neck at the back of the crowd.
Please don’t be his family, I think as I look away and back to Nix, who’s still smiling softly as I talk.
But I find my awareness pulled back to the man at the back. He doesn’t smile.
Just stares intently at me.
Despite the intimidating strength of his watchful gaze, it settles my nervous heart and I deliver the rest of my tribute to the Warden – carefully worded to be genuine and not giving away any details of how, and where, we worked together – while locked in silent communication with this stranger, his stare keeping my feet rooted to the spot.
‘My mentor,’ I say, my voice growing softer as I reach the end, ‘was one of the best men I’ve ever known.’ I swallow thickly. ‘I will forever treasure his belief in me, and in my friends,’ I try to stifle a loud sniff. ‘I wish you nothing but joy and peace in the next world, Claudius.’ My voice breaks on the last bit and a tear slips my defenses.
‘Go well.’ They are the last words I can get out before I know the torrent will come.
I slip off the stage in the silence that follows and Traelen takes my place.
My feet almost trip over themselves in my urgency to get away, the tears flowing harder now. But I won’t let the others see me break down, I can’t. I owe it to the Warden to keep it together, to ‘steer the ship easy into the night’, as he would say.
Walking as quickly as I can, back down the path that led us to the clearing, I breathe deeply into the cool and shadowed forest, leaving the ceremony behind me. But I don’t want to go back to the prison, either. Going back means completely taking on everything he left behind. Just when I thought I was going to be starting to live my life to the full, I will now be trying not to be caught breaking Nuntainian law.
I stop in the middle of the path, looking both ways, my heart pounding at the decision.
As I study the ground, an angry heat rising on my cheeks at my hesitation, I notice a slightly worn path through the trees and I take it. Relief to be moving again washes over me, but not more than the knowledge I now won’t be found until I want to be.
Only a few minutes in another small clearing appears, large enough for me to see the sky again, and I sigh. The short path I followed was cool, a place where it was harder for the sun to shine her warmth, but I have grown used to being able to see the sky. More than that – feeling at one with the sky. Her soft, gentle blueness caresses my senses and I calm my pace as I circle the space.
The silent tears fall freely now, taking all the energy I have to stand, and I sink into the soft grass. A carpet of scarlet flowers scatters out from my knees and I pick one, caressing its velvet petals between my fingers. The rhythm and the smoothness of petals beneath my fingertips helps soothe my heaving tears and they settle into a steady, but slower, beat down my cheeks and into the grass.
I’ve seen these flowers on the island before and I vastly prefer them to the white that surround the prison, particularly the jasmine, and I wonder if Claudius did, too. There’s something jarring about the purity of white around our walls. Despite not being able to know the prisoners’ sins, I know they must be there.
Lifting the almost palm sized flower to my nose, I close my eyes and inhale its vanilla-like scent before spinning the now short stem in my fingers. My thumb and index fingers rubbing together as I watch the petals whirl. They look like I imagine the inside of me does now, as well – ordered in its chaos, but ready to stop.
‘Are you okay?’
I practically leap out of my skin, dropping the flower as I jump to my feet and spin to face the deep voice.
The man from the back of the crowd stares back at me, as still as if he’d always been standing there. I blink furiously and wipe the tears from my cheeks. It’s pointless to pretend I haven’t been crying, and I take the time to gently press the length of my fingers under my bottom lashes to catch any remaining tears.
‘I’m fine,’ I say, giving a shaky smile as my heart rate attempts to regain its rhythm.
He doesn’t respond, his steely gaze raising the hairs on my arms. I glance at the trees around us and back to him.
‘How did you know him?’ I ask to break the silence.
Eyes that match the forest around us flick over my face.
‘In a number of ways,’ he says, not entirely answering my question, and I find I don’t care. Instead, I feel lighter at the thought of avoiding that false conversation we seem to have with everyone at a mourning. Relieved, almost, that someone has seen the pain I feel at losing the Warden without asking me what comes next.
He walks towards me slowly until he’s within arm’s reach. My body thrums as it wars with itself to run, but unsure of which direction – away from, or to, the man in front of me.
I let my eyes travel his chest and neck where I realise the mark I’d seen is a tattoo. It shimmers in the dappled light of the clearing and I can’t make out what it is. As I follow its trail down into his shirt, I find myself staring at his broad chest again. His black, high-collared shirt straining ever so slightly across his breadth.
He dips to a crouch before me and my breath hitches as I watch him.
Collecting the flower I’d dropped from the grass, he holds it out to me as he stands. I look between the flower and his face. My fingers brush his brown ones as I reach to take it, so much darker than my own pale skin, and our gazes slowly come back to find the other’s.
We stay like that a moment, our hands joined by the flower, my heart hammering, completely unable to look away.
‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ he whispers.
‘And you,’ I say, finally taking the flower from him.
I glance around the clearing, realising I no longer know where the path is but I feel steadier about returning to the prison. There are people relying on me there.
‘Would you like me to walk you back?’ he asks, and my insides warm a little at his kindness.
I nod slowly.
We walk, side by side, at a careful distance from each other back through the forest until we get to the main path. It’s quiet here still, but I can hear the soft murmur of voices along both ends of the path – of those still in the clearing and those headed back towards the prison. People slowly scattering in the quiet aftermath of the mourning ceremony. Even if many of them will still be hemmed in by the Hunters, even though they don’t really know it.
I look back to where the Warden’s ashes will have now been scattered over the side of the island – one final nod to freedom – and decide I’m ready to go back and find Blossom. Nix, too, but he didn’t know the Warden like Bloss did and, right now, I don’t feel up to worrying if I will get gentle or angry Nix. As soon as I think it, a pang of guilt presses in behind my ribs – there was nothing but support in his face when he watched me give my speech.
‘I should—’ I break off, gesturing towards the prison that can’t be seen from here. The one he can’t know about other than the room he will be taken to via the special portal I know Traelen arranged somehow.
He inclines his head.
‘Thank you,’ I say, lifting my flower weakly.
‘It won’t necessarily get easier,’ he says gently. ‘But it helps to believe everything happens for a reason.’
‘Does it though? Did this?’ I blurt.
The corners of his mouth tug up in a half-attempt at a smile. ‘I don’t know. I said it helps, not that I can do it.’
I laugh softly.
‘I should let you go,’ he says after a moment. ‘I’m sure you have people you’d like to be with at this time.’
Yes , I think. And a huge job to wrap my head around .
‘Thank you for checking on me.’
‘I found I couldn’t help it,’ he says. ‘Your speech was very moving. I’m sure he would have been honoured.’
I hope so. Just as I hope I can follow the path the Warden laid out as he intended.
‘I’ll give you a moment.’ I watch him walk away and towards the clearing before I head in the direction of the prison.
After three steps, I’m unable to stop myself turning around.
The path is empty.
‘Hey,’ Blossom says when I get back to our apartment.
The day is fading and we have a dinner in honour of the Warden I will need to make sure we’re prepared for soon. But, right now, the weight of the loss and the day is starting to drive me into the ground. My face feels swollen and my eyes sting from too many tears. Normally, we’d get a day off a week but I have no doubt that will be a thing of the past in my running of the prison – the thought of that alone adds to my exhaustion. Despite my personal reactions to always being second to something, being Warden of this prison was never on my wish list. Not that it would be expected of a concierge to aspire to that anyway – concierges don’t make Wardens.
‘Hey,’ I reply as I sink into the couch beside her, placing my blood-red flower on the glass table.
I hoist the layers of my ivory dress up and over my knees and lean forward to undo the ties on my sandals. They wind around and around my calves and my skin all but exhales as I loosen and finally remove them completely. Rubbing my thumbs into the soles of my feet briefly, I collapse back on the couch cushions.
‘How are you traveling?’ I ask, turning my head to Blossom.
She stares out at the sky.
‘I don’t know,’ she says heavily. ‘I’m sad for the Warden. He clearly had … unfinished business here.’ She turns her own head on the couch to look at me. ‘But I’m mostly sick to my stomach about how far you will go to work it all out now Nix and River are here, without him to help you.’
I look away, back out across the balcony. It’s true – right now there doesn’t feel like there is anything I wouldn’t do to understand the bigger picture here, or make sure Nix and River have a way off the island before being forced to go to Vana. But that feels easy to say when I have no idea where to even start.
‘I don’t have to involve—’ I start, pushing against the memory of Claudius telling us we should both be gone before the next collection. A whole year before Blossom’s duty is up.
‘Bullshit. I’m already involved. But I’m not worried about me, Luka. I have nothing to go back to, anyway. Nothing but time to work it out.’
The heartbreak in her voice chips at me.
‘But I do worry about you throwing away your future,’ she says. ‘You know I want to ask you to let them manage themselves, right?’ My chest constricts. ‘If they end up on the other side for any reason, you can’t go there too, Luka.’ Her voice is a touch gentler now and I know she doesn’t mean to chide me. The worry is real.
‘He’s not just anyone, Bloss. Neither’s River.’ I don’t know how else to explain that I’d give it all up to keep them safe. ‘They were my brothers before I even thought to want them. Claudius wasn’t just anyone, either.’
She studies me for a while and I can see the thoughts whirling behind her eyes. ‘No … that’s why I’m going to help you with three things: managing the prison and keeping Traelen onside – meaning you need that recommendation and a legal way off the island, regardless how those brothers leave – understanding exactly what the Warden wanted from you, us, and making sure those boys are done with whatever … mission they’re on as soon as possible.’ She inches her hand across the space between us and grips mine in hers. ‘But my priority is getting you through all of this unscathed, do you understand?’ She squeezes my hand without waiting for a response. ‘You don’t have to be their contact, but, being in Parliament will give you options you need to keep open.’ She pauses for a long moment, seemingly warring with something. ‘Do you know exactly what the role is? The actual one you were going to have to show you were doing, not just that Claudius wanted you as their group’s contact.’
I shake my head. Understanding what role he was going to recommend me for feels like an important part of the puzzle.
‘Traelen will,’ Bloss says. ‘But he doesn’t know you as well as the Warden. He’s going to be much more involved now, at least until there is a new Warden. So your priority is making sure he knows how good you are at this. We don’t want any hiccups with your recommendation.’
My stomach sinks a little. I should have thought about that already – the … former … Warden was highly regarded, but I imagine there is only so far a dead man’s recommendation can go. But, for me, his requests can’t go unanswered.
‘I’m not sure what I did to deserve you, Bloss,’ I say, turning my head on the couch to look at her. ‘Do you have any thoughts on where we start? ‘Breaking out a prisoner from Vana might be tricky,’ I say. ‘It’s not like we can waltz in.’
‘At this point, there are only two people we can ask without fear of repercussions,’ Blossom says carefully, as if she only half believes it. ‘But, first, we finish Claudius’s send off.’