Page 76 of The Quiet
CHAPTER 21
NEW LIFE
CROW’S BLUE EYES narrowed on hers. “Ella,” he acknowledged in cold recognition. “How did you get here?”
“Put the gun down. We’ve been looking for you,” she demanded, reeling back her shock at his sudden appearance.
Crow inspected them both carefully, before lowering the gun. His brown hair had grown down to his shoulders “You know about the illusion?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said, “you do too?” Jackson stood close to her back as if to reassure her that he was there for the conflict to come.
“It’s why I came here looking for answers,” Crow replied, putting the gun back into its holster on his utility belt. He was still wearing some of the same gear he’d worn before the embolism. “I haven’t been able to find my way back and was stranded after my injuries. That thing–that…Strike, I wouldn’t have gotten away if it hadn’t eaten everyone that chased me into those ruins. I watched it all burn from a cave up on the hills. I wasn’t sure what I’d find down here. The last thing I was expecting was you.”
Ella didn’t speak immediately, unsure what question she wanted to ask next. It had made sense for Crow to be here, if the Spirit of Death had in fact been a haven for criminals running from the law.
Crow seemed relieved to see her, but not because it was her, but because it was aid.
“You jumped through the embolism on purpose,” she confirmed, her exhausted body and mind trying to wrestle all of the events into a cohesive story.
“Yes,” he said, looking between her and Jackson questioningly. He didn’t step any closer to them despite putting his gun away, and it made Ella wonder what expression Jackson wore behind her.
Crow was stoic and calm. He always had been, but it felt out of place now, as if nothing had happened between them at all.
“You’re going back? You’re wanted there,” Ella continued, intentionally avoiding the subject she knew would trigger every dangerous emotion she had. Jackson allowed them to have their space as she stepped forward to engage Crow more deeply.
“Yeah, sure, but what are they really going to do to me? I know what they don’t,” Crow replied easily, “using their own terminology, I’m enlightened now. I won their game.”
Game.Ella could no longer restrain her anger. If she weren’t so exhausted already, she was convinced she would have leaped at him right then and there.
“You know what you did bringing us to the embolism. Alex is dead. I would have died. Jade almost–” Ella asked, rage building as Jackson reached for her arm.
“How do you know, Ella?” Crow shot back with surprising harshness. “Look, I didn’t even know anyone else was even real.”
“What do you mean? We were a family.” She urged forward again, stepping through the mud and ash and closer to theshelter of trees. She felt that Crow might dissolve behind them any second.
“No,” Crow said, “You needed a family, alright? I woke up all on my own.”
Ella withdrew and her anger curled in on itself in hurt. In that objection, Crow revealed more of his true feelings than perhaps she’d ever seen. The fog and forest and scorched mire were silent all around them. Crow and Jackson didn’t move around her.
“So that’s it then?” she asked in soft defeat. “All those years, we were just objects to you?”
“Not objects,” he replied, shaking his head. She heard the smallest suggestion of sympathy. There was no regret, no remorse, just a faint glimmer of tenderness. He seemed to hesitate then, and she wondered if he was thinking through their shared travels over the years.
“Just,” he began again, “it’s all just a game. You can’t blame me for wanting to get ahead, alright? There’s an inner circle in the Imperia, people who know the truth about the illusion and use it to get ahead, to be powerful, to be successful. You should understand it better than anyone, Ella. You knew what it was like to be at the bottom and not believe everything people at the top were feeding you. It’s why we respected each other.”
Respected each other? He used the words, but she felt nothing. This didn’t feel like respect at all.
Ella didn’t reply. He’d been pretending all along, assuming none of them were real. It couldn’t have always been that way.
“That monster ate the horses and most of the gear,” Crow said after a while, perhaps uncomfortable with the extended silence. “Do you know the way back?”
“I do,” Jackson said, and she was grateful. They both looked at him.
They wouldn’t call upon Lambspeak.
Lambspeak had helped her beyond their agreed upon favors, and she was concerned that the next time she saw him, he’d come to collect, whatever that meant.
“Let’s go,” Jackson said when neither of them spoke. “It’s best if we get out of here quickly and it’s a long way back.”
