Instead, I hear only whispers of ghostly screams that sound like Peri. I don’t want to gain control of myself.
I want to be empty.
I want to be free.
When my voice fades, I drop to the steps.
That’s when I see it.
Movement, a person walking out of the shadows of the nearest alleyway.
Silver hair.
That’s all I need to see to know it’s her. I stand up and run, sprinting across the street, until my mother and I are standing face-to-face.
“Meadow,” she says, and it is the sound of the past.
The sound of safety.
I do what I never thought I would do, ever again. I fall into her arms.
And I sob.
She wraps me up, holds me close. Her hands find the Regulator at my neck, and she gasps. “I knew it. I knew they would do this to you.” I hear her voice as she whispers into my ear, as she strokes my hair, holds me tighter. “My god, look at the precision on this. Who did they match you with?”
I bristle, start to pull away, but she reaches out.
“It’s all right, Meadow. I’m here now. I’m here.”
“Peri,” I say. “They’ve been torturing her. . . . She’s in pain.”
“My poor child,” she says. I hear her holding back a sob. She swallows it. “Your sister is fine, I promise. The pain is real, but it will not kill her. If anything, it will teach her to be strong. I designed the program myself, years ago. Beautiful thing, isn’t it?”
I gasp. “No, it’s not beautiful.” For one second, can’t she just be the mother I need her to be? The mother who brought comfort to me, so many years ago? “They showed me a video. Her hair is gone, her body is . . . I have to get to her. Before it’s too late.”
My mother stumbles. “There’s no way out, Meadow.”
“So we’ll make one,” I say, but she is already shaking her head.
Tears well up in her eyes, and she presses her hands to her temples. “I did this, my god, it was all me.”
She reaches out to touch me, pull me in for a hug, but I take a step back. “You’re coming with me,” I say. “The Initiative needs you. You can tell them what they want to hear, and they’ll get rid of the Regulators. Peri will be okay again.”
“She’ll never be okay,” my mother whispers. “Pain like that is something you don’t easily forget. My daughter, my littlest daughter. She never was strong, Meadow. Not like you.”
She laughs, stares at the sky.
It sounds exactly like the laughs that have come from my lips recently.
“We’ll start over,” my mother says. “We’ll make the Shallows a better place, together. It was always meant to be this way.”
“You’re wrong,” I say. I wrap my hand around her wrist, start to pull her away.
“Wait,” she says. “Meadow, you must know the truth.”
“The truth can wait. It’s time to go. For once in your life, stop trying to get out of doing the right thing. You will fix this. If not for me, then for Peri. For my father and Koi.”
She holds steady. “This is the right thing,” she says. “Please. You have to know, Meadow, you have to understand my mistake.”
Footsteps come from the darkness.
I hold tighter to her wrist, assuming it to be Initiative guards. Soon they will come and bind her with MagnaCuffs, take her back to Headquarters. She doesn’t run.
She stays by my side. There is a sudden change in her eyes, a sadness that wasn’t there before, as she looks at me.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers. “I’m so sorry, Meadow.”
“Sorry for what?” I ask.
She opens her mouth, leans in to whisper. I hear her words, beg them not to be true.
What she is saying cannot be true. My world shatters.
“Meadow . . .”
“Stop,” I say. I shove her words away. Lock them deep in my heart and choose to believe they are false.
She opens her mouth to speak, and for one moment, I think she is going to apologize for everything. Everything she’s done to me, to my family, to the world, for the secret she just told me. I need this moment. To truly begin to forgive her, I need to hear her apology.
But she never gets the chance to say it.
Instead, she lurches forward, like she has been pushed from behind.
She gasps.
A trickle of blood slides from her lips.
“No,” she whispers. “No!”
Then she falls.
I see it all happen in slow motion, hear myself screaming, feel myself drop to her side. “Mom!”
There is an arrow protruding from her chest. Blood blooms like a fresh rose on the fabric of her shirt.
I don’t have to see the wound to know it was a perfect hit. I know she has seconds before she dies. I know that everything around me is a blur, and I can’t focus on the hidden killer.
All I see is my mother.
Dying.
Again.
She coughs, gasps for breath. She opens and closes her mouth like a fish. “You have to . . .” she gasps. “Stay.”
“I’m not leaving you,” I whisper. “You’re going to be okay.” I rip the arrow out, push my hands to her chest, but blood bubbles through my fingertips.
A gushing river.
It’s too much. Too fast.
She is going to die.
“No!” she yells, and her eyes go wild, like she’s staring into bright light. About to cross over. “The revenge order,” she gasps, and suddenly she’s gripping my wrists so tight that I cry out. “Stay!”
“I will,” I promise. She is leaving the world behind. Leaving me behind. I thought I’d gotten her back. I thought I wouldn’t be alone in this any longer. She could have taken control again, sent me to the Ridge, set Peri free, removed our Regulators, or demanded my family to be sent home. She could have fixed it all.
Tears splash down my cheeks, onto her forehead, as her grip goes slack. I can’t stop the bleeding. “Don’t. Don’t go. Don’t leave me again. Not now. You can’t!”
A tear rolls down her cheek. “Forgive me,” she says. She reaches up to touch my Regulator.
She takes a deep, sputtering breath.
Then her eyes glaze over. Her hand drops, leaving a trail of blood on my cheek.
I am vaguely aware of a voice that sounds like Zephyr’s, calling my name, and the footsteps of many, racing toward me.
But none of that matters.
Nothing in this world matters, not even me.
My mother is dead.
CHAPTER 25
ZEPHYR
L ark Woodson is dead.
The Creator is finally, finally dead.
And I shot the arrow that killed her.
It’s the only thing I can think. The only thing that comes to mind.
I should be happy. I should feel my entire body relax, my heart grow so full it’s about to burst. The woman who ruined my life has finally gotten what she deserves. I see Sparrow hobbling next to Rhone, rushing from the shadows.