Page 86 of Odder Still
“You’re forgiven.” No edge, no stipulations. The words slip from Tavish like they were born in the world’s earliest days, just waiting for the right time to be uttered. “The moment I left, you were my only concern. If I had gained the whole city but you had died, it would have been for nothing.” Now he’s the one who kisses me, soft and passionate all at once.
My lips tingle by the time we part, warmth spreading through me despite the cold of the table. “Lucky me, I have a strong, scheming prince to come to my rescue. Though, I think his city might require a bit more of his help.” Gently, I nudge Tavish toward the company heads who wouldn’t raise a finger to help Maraheem as a whole, but all of whom I know Tavish can control with ease if he puts his mind to it. “So go do your thing, princeling.”
“Still not a prince.” Tavish chuckles, all wind chimes and starlight. He turns back to the chaos of aristocrats.
My parasite warms me in his place. I can’t tell if it’s hope that floods us or the lingering effect of Tavish’s kiss, a kiss to savor, whether we both make time for another or not. He’s done it: won over the company heads, dethroned his mother, become one with his own flesh. He won his war.
The effects of it spiral through the lab. Greer takes inventory, trailed by the head of Druiminn Health and one of the Callums as though none of them quite trust each other to create an impartial tally. Raghnaid watches with narrowed eyes, her usual authority replaced by a bitter vacuum. There will be some kind of inferno to put down in her eventually. But after what Tavish has done today, I know he will handle it.
The loss of Lachlan’s minuscule power sets him aflame as well, but he clearly has not the insight to restrain it. He grabs Greer’s arm. A shock transfers between them, as though this is the first touch the siblings have shared in a decade. “This is my research,” he shouts. “I worked for this—I married that fiend for this! You cannot take it away from me.”
“Let go, Lach,” Greer hisses. They shake him off with a harsh twist.
He jerks back. “But this is mine; it should all be mine!”
Their argument continues, but my parasite pulls our attention to the tank. Our vision shimmers as our shared eye focuses past the bonds of my human vision, turning the world to a silvery veil. We see the auroras as they are—filaments of light and dark forming into the shape of a feather duster worm with iridescent strings which stretch between the fabric of reality, connecting them to some other place. Some other dimension.
But even with my parasite’s view, they look wrong. Half of their filaments glow with a brilliant white twined with shimmering black, while the rest appear hollow, as though ravenous termites have swooped in and left them with only weak husks of their flesh. And this disease, this corruption, this death, is spreading. We can nearly feel it turning our bones brittle and slashing ribbons out of our muscles.
All the energy—hope and fear, relief and doubt—that had filled me just minutes before leaks out, leaving me with the kind of exhaustion that sticks inside the chest, clogging up and weighing down. Tavish has won his war, but my parasite and I still have to win ours.
Apprehension slams us in the gut, so strong we nearly gag. A flicker of confusion—my confusion—proves the feeling isn’t mine. With a deep breath, I filter through it to find its source. Desire sits on one hand, affection and agony on the other. And I understand: we’re asking for these auroras to die for us, to die so we—so my parasite—might find a way to live. It tears at my heart, too.
Who are we to make that choice for them, for anyone? Who are we at all, two minds strung into one mess of a body, half apart and half each other? We, to save an ecosystem, a world, a life?
We are nothing. We are a hangover, a hollow threat, the bark without the bite, empty and aching and useless.
‘You are stronger still.’My parasite whispers the phrase, but as it does, it curls itself around the words I’d spoken next, like it’s claiming them, branding them into itself: ‘I’m not perfect either.’
Maybe perfection is overrated. A hollow threat is a threat, and to ache means to live. We breathe in, and out, and in again.It’s their choice, I think.If the auroras want to give us their strength, then it’s their choice. They can believe in us or not. We’ll do what we can with what they decide.
My parasite releases a sob that makes me think of flower petals soaking up my mother’s blood, but a calm affirmation fills us. Together, we’re strong. We’ll be stronger still.
Before we can attempt to slide from the table, though, one of the Callums swears loudly and calls for the radio to be turned to the emergency broadcast channel. It emits a soft, static-garbled alarm. All commotion stumbles to a halt as the announcer’s quavering voice comes on.
“The BA has cut off the primary rebel party at the main gate and is securing the premises as we speak, but the small faction who came through during the initial breach an hour ago seemed to be continuing their ascension when we lost track of them again beneath the Findlay Estates two minutes past. Reports state that this group carries an ignit device which incapacities by some kind of hypnosis. All citizens between the Bubble Communication Center and the Findlay Estates are to shelter inside with their doors locked until further notice.”
I wish my own heart didn’t mirror the dread that creeps from face to face. I wish I could cheer the rebellion on and hope for the selfish snobbery of the upper districts to finally feel the spines of those they’ve been stepping on. But if Lilias takes this city, then the city itself will be better off, while everyone Lilias was willing to step on to gain the upper will be crushed alongside it.
My stomach turns.
“An update will be released as soon as we have one,” the announcer reports, and with a click, the static returns.
The head of Bubble Entertainment squeals into the stillness and rushes the hallway exit like a panicked parrot, her glam and wealth flashing in her wake.
A bodyguard steps in. She grabs the frantic woman by the arm, looking as though she’s trying her upmost to be polite as she says, “Ma’am, they’re likely already in the building.”
That simple statement launches the room into a ruckus of shouts and overlapping conversations from scientists and company heads and bodyguards alike, most too difficult to track with so many unfamiliar voices speaking at once.
“Can we barricade ourselves behind the air lock?”
“We build these large, single-entrance buildings without manual triggers for safety purposes. To activate it, the entire outcropping would have to break off from the main—”
“I saw Raghnaid’s personal underboat docked off the tower entrance on our way in! We could—”
“We shouldn’t run, we should fight!” Lachlan is easy enough to identify, his face so red he looks like he might combust. “The ignation mutants are a viable weapon, and this—this rebellion is the experiment of a lifetime. We have everything we need right here!”
“She’s the one they’re coming for.” Greer points at Raghnaid. “If they passed every other estate to get here, you know they want her head.”
