His voice tightens, thick with memory. ‘I’ve seen them before. Believe me, Thea, there’s no other way we get those injuries. The villagers attacked us last night.’
Thea examines the bruises, then recalls the broken ribs and swollen faces of the villagers. Hephaestus is the only person on the island who’s ever taken a life before. He knows how to fight, and how to kill. If they came for him, it’s possible he could have done that to them.
‘Do you have any poison?’ he asks suddenly.
‘Poison?’
‘Once the villagers have moved all our supplies up to the cauldron, we’ll need to put them all down. Poison would be the quickest way; otherwise I’ll have to slit a hundred and fourteen throats.’ He sighs at the labour ahead. ‘It’s the only way to make sure this doesn’t happen again.’
Thea blinks at the brutality of it, stunned by how reasonable a course of action he believes this to be. He doesn’t sound angry, or afraid, or regretful. He’s talking like they’ve run out of milk.
‘I cannot allow that,’ I interrupt. ‘Niema left instructions that I was to protect the villagers. They’re the future of humanity.’
‘Is that why you sat back and let them kill her?’ he growls, irritated at my interference. ‘It was your job to keep her safe.’
‘I regret I was unable to prevent Niema’s death, but revenge will only exacerbate our current plight. You depend on the villagers for food and water. They maintain your equipment. Killing them is a dreadful survival strategy.’
‘You always know what to say,’ he snorts angrily. ‘Every word is tuned perfectly to elicit the response you want. I don’t trust you, Abi. I never have. I saw how you wormed your way into my mother’s confidence, persuading her to give you more and more autonomy. She forgot that you don’t think the way we do, that you feign emotion rather than feel it.’
Normally, I wouldn’t care about his anger, but it’s igniting pockets of resentment in Thea, stirring up old suspicions I’ve worked hard to bury.
‘I may have a way to stop the fog,’ I say suddenly. ‘The deadman’s switch was created to disincentivise attempts on Niema’s life, but its secondary purpose was to ensure her killer wouldn’t survive the crime. I’m bound by Niema’s orders, but there is a loophole we can exploit. If you can prove she was murdered, and execute her killer, the deadman’s switch will have fulfilled its stated function. I’ll be able to raise the barrier again.’
Thea lets out a low animal growl of frustration. ‘How are we supposed to find her killer if we can’t remember anything that happened last night?’
‘I can’t answer that for you, but I want it understood that this offer is dependent on conducting a thorough investigation. I will require a compelling case to be brought, with a confession if possible. If I feel you’re unnecessarily harming the villagers, I will not raise the barrier – no matter what answers your methods reveal.’
‘Niema’s dead and suddenly you’re making demands,’ explodes Hephaestus. ‘You’re a surveillance system with a bedside manner! When was it decided that you were in charge?’
‘When your mother gave me control of the barrier,’ I say forthrightly. ‘In forty-six hours the fog will reach the coast, and I’m offering you a way to stop it. Rather than standing here arguing, I suggest you get to work.’
‘Where would we even start?’ asks Thea despairingly.
‘With Emory,’ I say.
THIRTY
They arrive in the exercise yard to find that the bird bath has been pushed a few feet to the left, revealing the huge blood stain that was previously hidden underneath it.
Clara’s kneeling in the dirt, scraping soil into wooden boxes for testing, while Emory strides forward to greet them. I’ve already told her about the fog and the barriers, and my deal with the elders. She knows they’re coming, and how important everything that happens next will be.
‘The bird bath was in the wrong place,’ she blurts out, without preamble. ‘It’s twelve feet to the left of where it was last night, which means it was moved to hide that blood patch.’
She points towards it, as if the enormous carpet of dried blood might have eluded them. ‘For some reason, we weren’t supposed to know that Niema died here.’
‘You’re Emory?’ demands Hephaestus, wrong-footed by the rapid-fire declarations coming out of this tiny, curly-haired woman.
‘Yes,’ she replies, brought up short.
Hephaestus throws a look at Thea. ‘One of yours?’
‘Not any more,’ she says tightly. ‘Emory was only an apprentice for two months, though she still holds the record for being the most annoying one I ever had.’
Hephaestus snorts, glancing at the blood patch and then back towards the smouldering warehouse.
‘The body was moved because her murderer was trying to make it look like an accident,’ he says, ignoring Emory and speaking to Thea. ‘They must have killed her in this spot, carried her body to the warehouse and set the fire, hoping the flames would cover up what happened. Probably would have worked, except the rain quenched the blaze.’
‘Murder?’ repeats Emory, exchanging a horrified look with her daughter. She’d half suspected it wasn’t an accident, but she hadn’t wanted to believe it.
Their stunned silence is broken by a screech of metal as Hephaestus gives the bird bath an experimental shove.
‘It’s heavy,’ he grunts, inspecting the red mark the rim has left on his palm. ‘It would have taken a lot of people to move this.’
‘Four of us in the end,’ confirms Emory, trying not to think about the fog. ‘I had to call people down from the farms to help, but you’re much stronger than any of us. You might have been able to do it on your own.’
Hephaestus offers her a sharp glance, but her expression is entirely innocent, her tone matter-of-fact. He looks across at Thea for support, but she’s walking in circles around the patch of blood.
‘Nobody could have lost this amount and survived,’ she says. ‘Not with the barbaric medical equipment we have at our disposal. Have you considered that it might belong to Hui?’ She offers Emory a challenging stare. ‘It’s my understanding that she’s missing, as well.’
Clara winces, imagining Hui lying on the ground, blood pouring out of a stab wound.
‘That’s why I’m collecting these samples,’ she says, wiping dust from her eyes. ‘I’m going to take them to your lab after we’re done.’
‘If this blood belongs to Hui, where is her body?’ demands Emory. ‘She’s not in the warehouse with the others, and there are no trails leading away from this spot to suggest she walked off. You said yourself, she couldn’t have got very far.’
Thea considers this point from every angle, trying to find a sharp edge she can toss back at Emory, but it’s a well-reasoned argument.
‘Who cares about another dead crum?’ demands Hephaestus belligerently, still angry at being implicated by Emory. ‘It’s just one less suspect, if you ask me. The villagers killed Niema, and the villagers moved this bird bath to cover it up. The fog’s getting closer and we’re wasting time on questions that don’t matter.’ He stares at Thea. ‘You can listen to all of this if you want, but I’m going to find proof I’m right.’
He storms off towards the gate, kicking up a cloud of dust.
‘He can’t honestly believe we killed Niema,’ says Emory, in a bewildered voice. ‘We loved her.’
‘Only because you didn’t really know her,’ replies Thea enigmatically.
‘I found something,’ says Clara, lifting the needle of a shattered syringe out of the congealed blood.
She offers it to her mother, but Thea plucks it from her fingers en route.