Buck Eighth strolled out onto the stage and raised his hand to greet the crowd. Lights switched to flood the stage in colorless black and white, and the screens flashed with his life.
Buck's stitches were brown, gray, silver, gold, and black. The screens filled with images of Buck throwing himself in front of an assassin's bullet to save a head of House, Buck defusing a bomb set in the middle of a city, Buck taking down the top ten crime lords in Hong Kong.
Buck standing next to John Black.
Next up was Abraham. And while I was curious about what parts of his past would be put on display, I knew this was my chance to duck out.
The lights filtered to smoky gray and Abraham strode out onto the stage.
That was my cue. No one was paying attention to me. I snuck out the door we'd come in and followed the hallways until I was back at the waiting room. I slipped out that door and into the main lobby of the building.
The crowds had thinned, but there were still plenty of people gathered here, watching the big event on screens placed throughout the space.
I scanned the crowd, looking for a likely House Brown person willing to sneak the message out on the low.
Usually House Brown stayed out of cities and out of sight. But the chance to see the galvanized who had become an icon of House Brown heroism would draw in even the most city-shy person. I was counting on a higher-than-expected number of House Brown people to be
among the crowds, especially if any of them were working unsanctioned temporary jobs for local businesses.
A man lounging by the outer door caught my gaze. I tapped two fingers on my thigh, and he nodded.
I walked over to him. “I need a favor,” I said.
“All right,” he drawled in a slow accent that made me smile. He was probably twenty years my senior, his hair combed back and short, his long face tanned and wrinkled. “What can I do for you, miss?”
“Do you live in city?”
“I spot job. Get home to the wife every three months or so.”
“Can you get a message to someone for me? A friend? His name is Neds Harris. Works the Case property. Have you heard of him?”
“Can't say that I have. You know where about Mr. Harris might be?”
“This morning he was in Chicago, Gray Towers. Do you have a way to reach that far?”
“Isn't anywhere on earth House Brown can't reach,” he said with a soft chuckle.
“Thank you. Um, I don't have much,” I unzipped my duffel, digging through the things I'd stashed there. I pulled out two packets of seeds. “Tomatoes for you. Gladiolas for your wife.”
He regarded the seeds like they were made of gold.
“Thank you,” he said. “Thank you so much.” I handed him the seeds with the note tucked between them, and they disappeared into his pocket.
He, rightly, offered me a trinket in exchange. Every inch of the city was wired with cameras and other recording devices. What they would see was me paying him for a thing, not for running a message.
Out of his other pocket he drew a small cloth. He unfolded it and plucked out a tiny doll. It was made of twine, carefully wound and tied into the shape of a little girl.
“She's good luck,” he said.
“Thank you. I think I need her.”
“Earth to you,” he said.
“And the wind,” I replied.
He went back to watching the screens, and I walked away, tucking the little doll in my pocket.
I glanced up at the screen. All the galvanized were on stage, taking questions from the audience. Good. While they were busy, I could do a little more footwork.
If anyone asked, I was just looking around. Enjoying the wonder of it all.
It took me a few minutes, but I finally found the data room on the third floor. I sat in the corner of the room nearest the door so I could dash out if I needed to, and tapped into the screen.
Just because I'd been raised in the sticks didn't mean I was a slouch with modern technology. Far from it, actually. I'd been data smuggling for most my life.
I hitched into the stream, dumped off into a subpar gutter line, and backtracked through enough antiquated systems, I was immediately lost to the noise.
This kind of data mining took longer, but it was as untraceable as a person could be while sitting in the middle of a city network. Minutes slipped past, rolling into a half hour, then an hour.
There was time. I still had time. The event was still rolling. People were still watching.
Abraham hadn't noticed I was missing.
Yet.
That was good, right?
I slipped a frequency, chewed on my fingernail as another twenty minutes ticked away. People came in and out of the room at a pretty steady pace, and I tried not to look up in panic every time a shadow crossed the doorway.
Finally, I got to where I wanted to be: a few hits outside the hub on my property. If I were lucky, there would be an echo of Quinten's message here. If I were really
lucky, he would have sent a copy of the message to our brother-sister private off-site pocket.
“Come on, Quinten. Be a brilliant boy,” I muttered as I keyed my way into the pocket.
One new message.
Cheers rolled through the building. I glanced at the event feed. The question-and-answer session was done and everyone was walking off stage.
Which meant Abraham was about to find out I wasn't sitting backstage.
Crap.
I just hoped he would have to go straight to autographs and pictures instead of hunting for me. And I hoped the other galvanized did the same.
Just in case I was at the top of his or anyone else's priority list, I quickly pulled up the message and read through it.
I could tell it was from Quinten because it began with the letters: QCTMBMITW, which was the acronym of a title I'd teased him with years ago:
Quinten Case, the most brilliant man in the world.
Not even the Neds knew I called him that.
My heart was pounding.
The message was coded yesterday and simply said:
House Orange. Hidden enemy. WoM coordinates: 13.09. 2210.2400
I erased it, backed out of the connection, blowing it as I went, backtracking and scrubbing my trail. I glanced at the clock while the minutes ticked down. To clean up everything, I'd need almost as much time backtracking as it took me to get into the info.
“Hurry, hurry,” I whispered.
A half hour crawled by, an hour. I glanced up at the screen. Highlights of the question-and-answer session scrolled across it.
Recorded highlights. They must be done by now. They might even be looking for me.
Fifteen minutes. Fifteen more . . . and . . . yes!
I shut it all down, shouldered my duffel, and hurried out of there. Got down a flight of stairs and one more, then slowed my pace. I needed to find the autograph area, make it look like I'd ducked out to use the ladies' room again, and everything would be gold.
I rounded a corner.
And nearly ran into Abraham.
“Where have you been?” he asked.
“Looking for you,” I said, not even lying. “I got turned around.”
“For two hours?”
“It's all a little overwhelming.”
“You hunt feral beasts in untrackable scrub.” Abraham leaned against the wall, mostly in shadow. That didn't stop people from noticing him or from noticing me with him.
“Well, this isn't the scrub,” I said. “Also, I'm not supposed to be seen, right?” More than a few people snapped pictures of us. “I was staying unseen.”
He narrowed his eyes. I wasn't lying, but I wasn't telling him the whole truth either.
“We might want to move,” I said. “Before everyone gets a picture of us. Do you have another event to attend?”
A man pushed past me, brushing against my shoulder as he did so. He whispered, “Done,” and moved on.
“Here?” Abraham asked, while I snuck a look at the guy who just bumped into me. It was the man from House Brown who had taken my message out to Neds. Good. Very good.
“No,” he said. “It's time for us to go.” He nodded toward the nearest elevator and started off that way.
“Where are we going?” I asked.
“Training.”
Right. Of course. For the big all-House public gathering I couldn't screw up.
We stepped into the elevator. Even though there were other people waiting, they didn't follow, giving us space and privacy. Abraham pressed a button. The doors closed, shutting away the people, the crowd, and my chance of tracking down anything more to help Quinten.
A new human-rights bill, ushered in by a new House Gray, ensured just treatment and fair process to all the people of the world. Except for the galvanized. The twelve bargained for human freedom for House Brown and became slaves once again.â2160
âfrom the journal of L.U.C.
T
he house was set on top of a rise, whalebone-gray siding, wraparound decks, and framing that supported more windows than I could count. It had three stories at least, the main-floor windows wrapped around a huge open living space that angled up for two floors of view.
Even though it was night and we'd been driving the streets for over an hour, it felt like we were worlds away from the bright, busy jumble.
“We're training here?” I asked.
“This is where we'll stay for the night.”
“Who's place is it?
“Dotty's.”
House Green. “And you're sure she's all right with us staying?”
He pulled up to a half-circle enclosure where he parked the car in one of the available stalls. “I'm sure. Did you find anything more about your brother's message?”
“What makes you think I looked?”
He just raised his eyebrow. “Matilda.”
“Yes?”
“What did you find?”
I searched his face, and for a moment all the old House Brown secrecy kicked up in me. I didn't want to tell him what the message said if it would hurt Quinten. But it was just as likely that Quinten was already in some kind of trouble, already hurt and in need of rescuing.
I told him what it said.
“How did you find it?”
I shook my head. “You know. Carefully.”
“Did anyone see you looking for it?”
“No.”
He rubbed his fingers across the bottom of his jaw. “Are you sure it was from your brother?”
“Yes. He used a code that only he and I know. It was from him.”
“Do the numbers mean something to you?”
“That's your takeaway? Numbers? What about
House Orange, hidden enemy
?”
“House Orange is an enemy to a lot of people, hidden or not. House Orange also
has
a lot of enemies. But if he felt this was his one chance to pass on important information, why those numbers?
WoM coordinates
doesn't mean anything to me. But the sequence could be time.”
I ran the numbers through my head. “Five days from now?”
He nodded.
“Is there anything important happening five days from now?” I asked.
“Your brother must think so, but I don't know what it would be.” He opened the door and walked back to the trunk for our luggage.
I didn't know what it could be either. I got out with my duffel and rifle. The air was cool and damp and slightly salty. I wondered how far away from the ocean we were.
“Rifle stays in the car,” he said.
I reluctantly set the rifle back in the car but didn't mention I still had my revolver in my duffel.
“Oscar had a meeting with Reeves Silver,” Abraham
said. “It appears the head of House Vice was unaware Quinten was under his employ.”
Since Reeves Silver was the head of Viceâit made sense he might not know the names of all the people working beneath him. Houses were huge, world-sprawling conglomerates, made of multiple companies and industries all held together beneath the House umbrella.
I glanced over at the scowl Abraham was wearing. “You don't believe him?”
“I think there isn't a thing that happens in House Silver without Reeve's knowledge.”
“Do you think he's . . . holding him prisoner?” There it was. My fear. That my brother was held against his will, hurt and alone.
“I don't know,” he said, then softer: “I really do not know, Matilda. But we can't jump to conclusions about your brother and risk losing you. Things are rarely as they seem between the Houses. Reeves Silver may or may not be involved. He may have your brother working a project he doesn't want House Gray to know about. He may have subcontracted your brother to another House, or there may be a contractual agreement between your brother and him that necessitates secrecy. Quinten could be fine.”
From his tone of voice, even he didn't believe that.
“All right,” I said. “Let's say it's one of those things. What do we do?”
“We find out who's lying, who's telling the truth, and we find your brother. I'll check in with Oscar again. Tell him what the message you found said. We don't make a move until we have House Gray behind us on this. I need you to agree to that, Matilda. If you want the power of House Gray to help you, if you want to remain with us, do not undermine our efforts to help you.”
“Okay,” I said, “okay.”
Quinten was smart and strong and patient. Plus there was one other thing about the message I hadn't told Abraham. Quinten hadn't said good-bye. If he thought
his life was in danger, if he thought he was going to die, I was sure he'd say good-bye to me.
Wouldn't he?
We walked past what looked like a courtyard of flowers and bushes with little paths that led to benches and maybe a pond, then stepped up to the wood-and-glass door. There was a lot of light coming through the windows.
He pushed the door wide.
The room itself was huge, soft lights shining against those tall, tall windows to catch copper in the amber woodwork and white walls. I would have taken a little more time to marvel over the place: the thin sun shades covering the highest windows, the rounded edges of the kitchen that was open to this great room, the tasteful but built-for-comfort couches, chairs, tables, and throw rugs adding pops of color to the place.
But the galvanized, all of them except Foster First and the missing Robert Orange, were lounging around the room, playing cards, relaxing.
“Bram!” Loy called out. “Found her, I see.”
“Everything all right?” Buck asked.
“Oh, the poor little thing,” January cooed, “I can't imagine how frightened she must have been, all alone in all that fancy light and noise.”
Well, wasn't she a peach?
“She's fine,” Abraham said, answering Loy and Buck and throwing January a look.
“I'm glad you made it.” Dotty wiped her hands on a towel and strolled out of the kitchen. “It's been a long day for us all. Welcome to my home. Let me show you to your room.”
“Home?” I asked.
“Abraham's told you why we're here, hasn't he?”
“To train for the gathering?”
Bede and Vance chuckled.
“Abraham,” Dotty scolded. “You had this poor girl thinking she was going to be fighting for her life?”
“No,” he said. “I just said there'd be training, and there will be. She's never been to a gathering before. I thought we could talk her through it.”
Wila
tsk
ed through her teeth. “I suppose all the Houses want to stake claim to you.”
“I'm happy with House Gray,” I said.
Dotty poked a finger at Abraham. “Shame on you for worrying the girl. Take her luggage to her room. Main floor with the south view.”
“Is that an order?”
“Do I need to remind you to mind your elders, young man?”
“No, ma'am.”
“Go on, then.”
“Yes, ma'am.”
“And Matilda?” she said. “Don't worry yourself. There is no training, just a few guidelines for what is expected at the gathering. We're all friends here.”
“Thank you,” I said.
“Room's this way,” Abraham said.
I followed him down a wide hall and past several rooms and through an open door. He dropped the suitcases at the foot of the bed. The room smelled of lavender and mint.
“No training, eh?” I asked.
“Not so much, no.”
I grinned. “Jerk.”
He chuckled.
“I might need it anyway. Being polite isn't as easy as I'd thought. I'll be lucky to get through the night without January wanting to stab me.”
“Don't worry about her. She just doesn't like competition.”
“For what?”
“Everything.” He strolled across the room, moved the curtain to look outside, then walked back toward the door.
“If I'm the only one who hasn't been to a gathering, why is everyone else here?”
“We all request the time from our Houses every year.”
“So you can get a day off?”
“So we can get a day off, together, without being bothered by anyone in the world. It's . . . rare to relax, game, eat, gossip. For a full twenty-four hours, we aren't galvanized. We're just people.” He smiled, but old regret shadowed his eyes. One day of freedom wasn't nearly enough compared to years of captivity.
I opened my mouth to tell him I was sorry, or maybe to say something comforting and cheerful, but he shook his head and changed the subject.
“There is something else we should take care of,” he said. “I hoped we'd have time to do this in-city, but maybe here is better.”
“What?”
He held a small liquid packet the size of my thumbnail in his palm. “Your mother's recording that sent me out to your property, looking for you and your father. I know now that she's gone, but I promised I'd let you see this.”
I stared at the drop of liquid. I hadn't forgotten. It seemed so strange that a message from my long-dead mother had mysteriously surfaced and sent him out to my farm. Changing my life so completely.
“Do you know where it came from?”
He shook his head. “We traced it but couldn't catch the origin.”
Maybe Quinten had sent it. No, he had worked hard to keep our farm and me a secret. But who else would have access to such an old recording? And who would benefit from House Gray sending Abraham to look for me?
“I never asked,” I said, settling on the foot of the bed. “How did you get that gut wound?”
“In a fight.”
“With whom?”
“Someone else who intercepted this message. Robert.”
“Robert? The galvanized from House Orange?”
“Yes.”
“I thought you said he was your friend.”
“He is.”
“Your
friend
split you open and nearly bled you out.”
“True. But he didn't behead me, which I appreciate.”
“That is the lowest bar for friendship I've ever heard of.”
He chuckled. “Trust me, Robert is a good man.”
“Trust the word of a man who thinks a beheading is a flesh wound?”
“I didn't say it wouldn't have been inconvenient.”
“Death is inconvenient?”
“Being dismembered is inconvenient. I don't know about death.” He crossed his arms and leaned on the wall. “We had to put on a good show so Slater Orange would believe him when he said he tried to stop me, and that I got away with the message before he could.”
“Robert wanted you to find me?”
“Robert caught the message and brought it to me. House Orange would not have taken you in with kindness. Slater Orange is a vicious dictator.”
“Which makes him so different from the other heads of Houses?”
“Which makes him different from Oscar.”
“What about House White?”
“What about it?”
“They showed up on my farm. Looking for you.”
“I know. We don't know who tipped them off.”
“Maybe your friend Robert?”
“I don't think so.” At my look, he shrugged. “It's possible, but I'd be surprised. We go back a long way. So?”
“So?” I echoed.
He held up the drop with my mother's message. “If
you want, I'll leave you alone to watch it. Or I can sit with you.”
“I think . . . I think I'd rather watch it alone.” I got up and he pressed the little packet onto my palm.
“If you need me,” he said, running his warm fingers down the outside of my arm, “I'll be right out there on the other side of the door.”
“I know. I'll be out soon.”
He shut the door, and I sat on the edge of the bed and rubbed my eyes. I felt like I'd been up for days. Considering how little sleep I'd gotten before Neds and I had gone out for coffee this morning, I really had been up for almost two days straight.
At least here in the room it was quiet and quasiprivate. That reduced my chances of saying or doing something stupid in front of the others. I didn't want to ruin my hope of staying with House Gray, even though it meant giving up my freedom.
What I wanted was sleep.
What I needed was to talk to Neds. If he could use House Brown's network to figure out what Quinten's message meant or maybe to find where it originated, I would at least have a trail to follow that might lead to my brother.
I stared down at the drop in my hand.
What I had to do was watch this message.
It had been so long since I'd seen my mom, since I'd heard her voice. It seemed strange I'd be seeing her here, now, so far away from the home and surroundings in which I knew her in most.
I moved to the head of the bed and pressed the drop into the small indent in the bedside table.
An image caught fire on the wall across from me.
A woman's face appeared there, a little out of focus and bathed in a soft green light, but clear enough to make out her features.
I held my breath, memories clutching at me with
sharp fingers. She looked older, thinner, her hair cut so short it made her eyes look too wide and robbed her of the softness I remembered. But that was her. Definitely her. My mother.
I exhaled and pulled my shoulders back.
Mom's thumb was pressed against the screen of whatever recording device she was holding. The room around her was dark, just a slice of light coming in from under what must be a door.
“My name is Professor Edith Case,” she said in a rough whisper that stilled my heart. “If you receive this message, I implore you take it to House Gray and invoke the decency of jury and trial offered to all human citizens. I believe my husband, Dr. Renault Case, may be alive and on the property registered in the name of Case under House Green.”