There was no doubt as she spoke; her tone was absolute certainty. She tilted her head to one side, looking at him as though curious to know if there could be any opposition. Single-minded, but always sure. If he loved one thing about her, it must be that. He inhabited a world of greys and doubts, a world that constantly shrank and receded. Adelaide held it still. She had made herself blinkered because she refused to look at alternatives.
Except in coming here.
“Why did you come, Adelaide?”
“I don’t think, Vikram, that you truly wish to know. Things weren’t so… agreeable… between us, when we parted last.”
“What did you expect?” he flashed. “I was sent underwater because of you. You can’t understand what it does to you, that place.”
“I tried to get you out,” she insisted.
“You had no chance. Your own family locked you up, you were fooling us both. You’re an idiot.”
A slow dripping in the corner reminded him of time ticking down.
“I’m cold,” said Adelaide.
He pulled her against him, wrapping his arms around her, resting his chin on her head. One of her hands curled around his wrist. She was too weak for tricks. He was holding what was left of Adelaide Mystik. Or Adelaide Rechnov, or whoever she was. She felt fragile, strangely malleable, and tense all at once. She felt like the scent of dried roses.
Instinctively, he tightened his arms.
“That better?”
“I was never this cold before. You were, weren’t you.”
“Yes. Yes, I’ve been this cold. Lots of times.”
He had told himself there was a way out, a way to save her and to save them. He could ask himself what Keli would have done, what Eirik would have done, even what his old self would have done. But all of those people, one way or another, were already a part of him. The decision was his own to live with — or not.
If he got her out — if he took her back east, and Linus kept his word — the guilt would corrode him from the inside out. Sooner or later he would blame Adelaide, and eventually, he would hate her.
He pressed his lips against her dirty hair. Between the roots, her scalp was chalk white.
“It was my destiny to come here,” Adelaide whispered.
Vikram’s throat was tight. He swallowed, quietly, so she would not hear. “You, of all people, make your own destiny.”
“It’s written in the stars. It’s written in the salt.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The Teller told me. And Second Grandmother, a long time ago.”
“That’s why you came to the west? Because of some stupid prediction?”
“I had to come. I had to follow Axel.”
“You think he’s here.”
She didn’t answer. His eyes were wet and he blinked the moisture away. He owed her the truth, at least.
“He’s not, Adelaide. I know that because… he wrote to you. He wrote you a letter.”
The silence stretched out.
“It was before we went to Council. A woman came to your apartment with a letter for you. I don’t know who she was — a westerner, I think. An airlift. She gave me the letter. I read it.”
“And what did this letter say?” Adelaide’s voice was a tumble of hard little stones.
He told it to her, word by word, sentence by sentence. The image it of was glued to his mind. He saw Axel’s handwriting, the green loops of the ys and the gs, the paper folded into a horse’s head. Adelaide was shaking.
“Where is it?”
“I gave it to Linus.”
“Oh.”
“Adie—”
“Don’t.”
“He was saying goodbye. Adelaide, it was a suicide note.”
“Don’t you dare judge him.”
“I’m not judging him. I’m not saying that what he did was wrong.”
“He would never do that. He couldn’t—”
“I’m sorry. But I think the letter makes it clear. There was no conspiracy. Axel was ill, you told me that yourself.”
She wrenched away from him. Her face crumpled.
“Don’t you say his name. Axel would never do that. He would never leave me. Don’t you understand, Vik? Axel would never leave me.”
“I’m so sorry, Adie.”
“Get out!” Her voice broke. “Did you come in here to torment me? Is this another of your people’s games? Get out!”
Vikram felt numb. Seeing her face, he wished now that he had not said anything. What had been the point? If Pekko had his way, Adelaide Mystik would be dead by daylight.
43 ¦ ADELAIDE
Vikram backed away but he did not leave.
“Stop looking at me,” she said, but no sound came out. The words stuck in a pump that refused to work. A dam built there. The ache swelled, spread through her lungs and throat until it packed against the backs of her eyes.
She tried to shut out the images; the penthouse, the balcony, her brother sitting on the rails, standing, believing that he could fly. She would not believe it. But more images came. The room full of balloons. Radir’s reports. The horses, always the horses. Axel, on the balcony, his red hair bright on a dull day. Axel, aged sixteen, leaping from a boat, his arms wide to embrace the unknown shock of the sea.
Vikram was speaking.
“If you ever get out of here, go to Branch 18 of the Silk Vault. There’s a deposit box under the name of Mikkeli, only you and I have access to it. I put a copy of the letter there. There was something with it. A necklace, with a shark tooth. It’s in the deposit box.”
“Axel,” she whispered.
Her dream came back to her, looking for him, not finding him. She was bad luck. She knew the truth about Axel in the same moment as she knew the truth about herself. Even the sting of humiliation attached to his suicide gave way to incredulity — not at Axel’s actions, but at her own blindness. Axel had skipped out of life. That had been her twin’s final stunt.
She thought of the argument in Feodor’s office months ago, demanding the keys, convinced that her father’s refusal was proof of complicity. He had known something after alclass="underline" he had known the truth, and if there had been any evidence of suicide in Axel’s penthouse, she could be sure he would have erased it before anyone else got there. The Rechnov name always came first.
She felt hollow.
“I should have told you before,” said Vikram. “I tried to, so many times. I meant to. I just…”
The tears that had fallen dried on her cheeks. She did not know who they were for. She thought of her brother’s body sinking to the ocean floor and she knew the fish had stripped it to the bone.
“I wouldn’t have believed you,” she said.
A dull thud, as though something had struck the tower deep underwater, resonated through the walls. The floor shook beneath them.
She froze.
“What…?”
They stood, motionless. The second shake knocked them sideways. The torch went out. Plaster tumbled down the walls, clouds of dust rising in the aftermath. She heard Vikram scrabbling for the torch. The light flicked on, illuminating their dust-coated faces.
“A quake…?” Her uncertain response failed to convince even herself. Vikram shook his head. His face was grim.
“Skadi,” he said. “They’ve found us.”
She stared at him. Her brain, as numb as ice, gave way to a dawning comprehension.
“They’re tracking you,” she said.
Vikram’s hand went to the back of his neck.
“No, Ilona found it, she dampened it…”
“That doesn’t do anything, Vik, the tracker’s in your blood. It’s a classic security bluff — I’m so sorry.”
He turned very pale. They stared at each other. She did not question what his original intent had been. In this moment, everything was changing. She wiped the moisture from her cheeks. He helped her to her feet.