Firewalker (Worldwalker 2)

“Every day when the sun goes down,” he says with haunted reverence.

We spend the morning clinging to each other. We don’t talk. When a canteen of water is passed around at noon I refuse, allowing the boy to drink my share. He thinks I’m being kind, but really I’m only doing it to protect myself. I doubt anyone who gets put in the barn gets fed, but the less food or drink I allow into my body, the longer it will take for me to pass my willstones. The extra dose of water gives the boy a burst of energy—enough to speak anyway.

“Are you a witch?” he asks, half holding his breath in excitement.

I nod and mime swallowing my willstone. He smiles at me brightly, and then his face falls. “They took mine and smashed it. They smashed all our willstones to make us quiet.”

That’s why they’re all so docile. And why our captors had no qualms about throwing me in the barn with them, no matter how strong a witch I might be. If the lambs don’t have willstones, I can’t claim them and fill them with power so we can fight our way out. The boy nestled against me has talent, too. He senses I’m a witch and he feels the need to be close to me. He could have been a mechanic.

“You look like the Lady of Salem,” he whispers.

I smile at him, but I don’t answer. I don’t know if admitting it would get me killed faster or not.

“You still have your willstone,” he presses. “Could you help us?”

I look around at the squalor and despair surrounding me. There’s nothing to burn and no source of energy. “Right now I can’t even help myself,” I say. The boy goes quiet, his last ray of hope snuffed out.

I look at the lambs. There are well over fifty people here, crammed close to share their body heat. A dark thought occurs to me. They’re all dying anyway. I push the thought away, clinging to my humanity for as long as I can.

The day drags by, marked only by the change in position of the shafts of dusty light piercing through the darkness. As the light lengthens, the lambs grow restless. Panicky. The doctor is on his way.

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At sunset, the doors burst open and the lambs start screaming. They push to the back, stepping over one another in a desperate bid to get away. I stand where I am, hiding the boy behind me. Let them try and take him away from me.

Armed men push into the room, laughing. Enjoying the chaos and fear of a riot. They avoid me, shouting for everyone to steer clear of me. I notice that they are guarding one lean shape in the middle of their group. His long, silky black hair is braided with vulture feathers.

“That’s him!” the boy squeals, hiding his face in my skirts. “That’s the doctor.”

I know him. The shape of his sensitive mouth, the way he walks, even the curve of his broad shoulders is as familiar to me as the moon in the sky because he gave these features to someone I love more than I love anything. I stagger forward, thinking that if I come closer to him his face will somehow change. That he won’t be who I know he is.

“River Fall!” I shout, hoping beyond hope that he doesn’t respond. But he turns to me. Tears burn my eyes and grip at my throat.

“Lillian,” he says. No emotion. There’s nothing inside of him. He comes toward me and his guards move swiftly to pin me down with their noose poles. I’m too stunned to fight. They capture me by the neck and push me against the wall, choking me. The boy lets go of my skirts and rushes forward, attacking my assailants with his little fists, and gets himself captured.

“No,” I beg. Not River. He’s the gentlest, kindest man I’d ever met. “It can’t be you.”

“Where is my son, Lillian?” he asks, his deep voice rumbling.

“I don’t—” I stop and reach out for Rowan. I can’t feel him at all in this world. There’s simply no vibration where his huge and powerful presence should be. “He’s dead, River.”

River’s eyes blaze and he comes toward me, snarling. “He’s alive! He’s alive and he will set all this right again,” River says. He makes a wide gesture with his arms, taking in not just the horror inside the barn, but the broken world outside the barn’s doors. “My son was taken by another ranch and they hold him hostage. I send them food”—he points at the lambs, spit flying from his mouth—“and they keep him alive. But he’ll be back. Rowan will be back and he’ll fix everything. My son is the most powerful mechanic ever. He’ll fix all of this.”

His grief has made him mad. River grabs the boy by his hair, and pulls. I try to scream, but the noose poles cut off my air. I strain and grab, pressing against the rope, but the boy is out of reach. River drags him by his hair to the back of the barn, where the chopping block lies. The boy is screaming and begging, and in a moment I hear him scream even louder.

Inhuman sounds. Almost like a hawk. I wonder if River is taking his arm or his leg …

Lily didn’t struggle or try to end the memory, but Lillian spared her and stopped. She knew Lily had seen enough anyway.

Do you understand now, Lily? Do you understand why I couldn’t explain what I had learned to anyone? Why I pushed Rowan away and wouldn’t let him see my memories of the cinder world—not even to make him understand why I had to stop Alaric and his scientists?

Yes, Lillian. You didn’t trust yourself enough to only show part of the cinder-world memory. You were afraid Rowan would keep digging until he found his father. He’s relentless when he wants to see a memory—like when he wanted to know what Carrick had done to me in the oubliette.

When I first came back I was so weak and sick my mind would have been an open book to him. No one must ever know, Lily. No one but us.

Caleb told me that River was the first person you hanged. You did that in case you failed and the bombs went off, didn’t you? You killed River first to make sure he never became that thing in the barn.

If Rowan ever knew, it would change him. I broke his heart, but seeing his father like that would break something much deeper in him. Something much more precious. Have you ever seen Rowan’s core?