34
HIGHER LAWS
IT IS TRULY FUCKING JARRING, reading my mother’s journal. Perhaps the one bit of good parenting my father can be credited with is that he never let me know it existed. Maybe he even read that bit himself.
I don’t notice how much time’s passed till stompingly loud footsteps rattle the staircase and someone knocks on the door.
I snap the journal shut, along with the trunk. I open the door to find Jamie on the other side of it, and my promise to Daniel comes to mind, but at the moment I just need air.
“Didn’t mean to interrupt,” he says cautiously.
I brush past him. “Then why did you?”
“Your phone’s been buzzing with texts from Mara—”
“What?” I round on him. “She’s not with you?”
Jamie looks at me warily. “No . . .” He draws out the word. “That’s what the texts are about. She wanted to stay.”
“Why?”
“Maybe she texted you why . . . .”
“Is there something in particular you’d like to say to me, Jamie?”
“Not in your current state, no.”
I close my eyes and take a deep breath. “Sorry. I’m a prick.”
He smiles brightly. “You are. It’s nice to hear you admit it.” He airily walks past me and down the stairs. I follow.
“So what happened today?” I force the words out.
“With the Brownstoners, you mean.”
“Cute,” I say as he swings toward the pool table. Not green, this one; a dark teal setting off the copper rails.
He arranges the set. “Fancy a game?”
“You mock me.”
“Your friend Goosey’s rubbing off on me.” Jamie swipes one of the cues from the rack. “I wouldn’t mind if he actually rubbed one off on me.”
“Indeed?”
“Indeed,” Jamie says. He offers a cue. “Am I his type?”
Type. I literally can’t escape this.
“I’ve never known Goose to abstain from indulging in pleasure of any sort,” I say.
Jamie crouches into position. “Excellent news.”
“Pray tell.”
He calls the first shot. “Mostly what we expected—shit I’ve seen before. They’ve got the Doctor Kells: The Early Years stuff, her twin experiments, crap from Horizons like my generous psychological profile, yours, Mara’s, The List.” The cue ball spins and sinks the striped 6.
“The List?” I wonder how ignorant I can pretend to be. Daniel’s a known quantity to me, but the relationship between Mara and Jamie—I can’t be sure. Especially not after this afternoon.
“The Kells list.”
“Right. I’ve never actually seen it.”
Jamie looks up, sets his cue up right. “Shut up.” A lift of my eyebrows. “You’ve never seen that?”
“Am I going to have to bribe you with sexual favours in order for you to tell me about it?”
“Don’t you wish, love. But I know all the places you’ve been.”
“Did you take a photo?”
Jamie shakes his head. “But Mara took one.”
I race to check my mobile—there are indeed a thousand texts from her. Some pictures, some just blocks and blocks of text. She’s coming round to Leo, it seems. Even Sophie. And is sharing literally every detail with me. Well and good. I scroll through for images as I skim her texts. Finally, I see it—initials, our last names—
I walk back to the pool table, staring at my phone. “This it?”
Jamie takes it, swipes to zoom in. “Yup,” he says, popping the p.
Double-Blind
S. Benicia, manifested (G1821 carrier, origin unknown); side effects(?): anorexia, bulimia, self-harm. Responsive to administered pharmaceuticals. Contraindications suspected but unknown.
T. Burrows, non-carrier, deceased.
M. Cannon, non-carrier, sedated.
M. Dyer, manifesting (G1821 carrier, original); side effects: co-occurring PTSD, hallucinations, self-harm, poss. schizophrenia/paranoid subtype. Responsive to midazolam. Contraindications: suspected n.e.s.s.?
J. Roth, manifesting (G1821 carrier, suspected original), induced; side effects: poss. borderline personality disorder, poss. mood disorder. Contraindications suspected but unknown.
A. Kendall: non-carrier, deceased.
J. L.: artificially manifested, Lenaurd protocol, early induction; side effects: multiple personality disorder (unresponsive), antisocial personality disorder (unresponsive); migraines, extreme aggression (unresponsive). No known contraindications.
C. L.: artificially manifested, Lenaurd protocol, early induction, deceased.
P. Reynard: non-carrier, deceased.
N. Shaw: manifested (G1821 carrier, original); side effects(?): self-harm, poss. oppositional defiant disorder (unresponsive), conduct disorder? (unresponsive); tested: class a barbiturates (unresponsive), class b (unresponsive), class c (unresponsive); unresponsive to all classes; (test m.a.d.), deceased.
Generalized side effects: nausea, elevated temp., insomnia, night terrors
I stare long enough for Jamie to snap his fingers in my face.
“You kosher?”
“Dandy,” I say, though my voice faded at the edges. I feel dizzy, light-headed—I can count on one hand the times I’ve felt ill, and all were in the presence of Mara. But she’s nowhere near here.
“Jamie,” I say, placing the phone down, more for something solid to hold on to than anything else. “It mentions the Lenaurd protocol.” I lower myself over the cue and call, “Three, side pocket.”
A shadow passes over his face as I sink the ball. “Yes . . . .”
“As in, Armin, Abel, et cetera.”
“Yes . . . .”
“As in, the man who created the blueprint for the shit-box FKA Jude.”
“Yes.”
“When was the last time you saw him?” And, done.
Jamie’s breath catches, but he recovers quickly. “Why?”
“I think he might be why Stella’s missing,” I say plainly.
Jamie shoots at a ball, and it bounces off. “Then you should probably ask him about it.”
“Perhaps I would, if I knew where to find him. Unsurprisingly, you haven’t answered my question.”
“I’m not Lukumi’s keeper.”
“Is that even what you call him?”
“Actually, no, but I liked the wordplay.”
“Grand.” I roll my eyes. “How old is he?”
“Dude, can we not?”
“Why’s it such a mystery?” I saunter to the other end of the table, because I’m not that interested, just asking out of bored curiosity, obviously.
“Doesn’t have to be,” he says, feigning indifference, but even without Goose, I hear that rise in pulse, that tell-tale heartbeat. “We all got letters and something with them. You don’t wear yours, but you know where it is, don’t you?”
“I do,” I say. Mara keeps them in a tiny sewn pouch that she slips into every pocket or carryall. They’re with her, always, but I don’t have to look at mine to know every etching, each curve and line by heart—ours are mirror images of each other’s, not meant to form one whole. I glance at Jamie—the silver blinks through the collar of his shirt as he leans over the table, but I can’t quite get a glimpse of how his was cast. I can’t see which side is the feather and which is the sword.
“So put it on and ask him your questions yourself.”
“Is that what you do?” I press. “Have you asked him why your friend’s gone missing? Why we’re killing ourselves?”
Jamie makes as if to line up his pool cue, but he’s restless and edgy now. He stands straight. “It’s not like that.”
“Of course not,” I say. “I don’t understand—he’s supposedly the Architect of some Better World but can’t achieve it without using us as tools—”
“I’m nobody’s tool.”
There it is, a thread I can pull. “You are though,” I say. “You report to him, don’t you?”
He sighs, leans his cue next to one of the clocks, and hitches up on the table’s edge, his legs long enough now that he can barely swing them.
“Your letter,” I say, and watch the shadow pass over Jamie’s face. “Whatever you read made you commit, at that moment, to the mission of a man who’s been manipulating us for months—years. God, decades even. Before we were even born, in my case.” Still he was silent. “Maybe in yours as well,” I finish, hoping to provoke an answer. To get that much from him, at least.
“Like you said, he’s trying to make the world a better place.”
“How? Has he told you that? Has he told you exactly how?
Jamie’s quiet, which is all the answer I need.
“That letter doesn’t define who you are. Or what you do. That’s your choice. Only yours.”
“You’re right, it is.”
“Not your parents’.”
There’s steel in his eyes, now. “You don’t know anything about my parents.”
“You’re right,” I say. “And I barely know anything about you, except that Mara loves you, and she doesn’t love lightly. But three people’ve died, and someone you know is missing, and you’re in a position to ask someone who claims to have all the answers, but you won’t?”
Jamie is silent, but he doesn’t avoid my gaze. He’s not rattled.
“What happened to thinking for yourself?”
At this, Jamie just rolls his eyes. “Classic splitting.”
“Pardon?”
“Didn’t all those years in therapy cover this? Splitting: Everything’s black-and-white with you. I’m interested in what the professor’s doing, so to you that means I’ve given up my autonomy. It’s all or nothing. Good or evil.”
I lean against the wall, languorous, casual. “Is that right? Explain Mara, then.”
I watch him think for a moment. “She’s your tragic flaw, I guess.” His lips curve into a smile. “Every hero has one.”
“Don’t tell me you believe my father’s bullshit. Please don’t tell me that.”
Apathetic shrug. “It’s not your father, Noah. It’s just—who you are. Not lawful good, but chaotic good.”
“Do you plan to make sense anytime soon?”
His eyes turn to the clock face behind me, and he stares at some spot in the middle distance. “Daniel’s lawful good.”
“Still have no idea what the shit you’re talking about.”
“Alignment. Dungeons & Dragons? Wait, don’t tell me.” Jamie holds up a finger. “You’ve never played it. Quelle surprise.” He tugs one of his dreadlocks, stares at it. “How does Mara even talk to you? You’re barely nerd-compatible.”
“We make it work,” I say archly.
Jamie holds up a hand, a look of horror on his face. “Say no more. Please. Okay, lawful good is basically, you believe in the morals of the world you live in, and you live by those morals always—or you try your best to, at least.”
“Daniel,” I say.
“Precisely.”
“But chaotic good is different. The player is less rigid about the ways he tries to achieve what are still ultimately good goals—good in the eyes of the world of the game. Still with me?”
“Clinging on, thanks for checking in, though.”
“NP,” he says, leaning farther back on the table.
“So what does that make you?” I ask.
“Chaotic neutral,” he says without hesitation. “When the player has their own moral code, and has the flexibility to achieve his goals according to his code.”
Mara. “Or hers.”
Tips his head, acknowledging. “Or hers.” He goes on, “You never know which way he’s going to go, which other players he’s going to become allies with, or enemies with.”
I’m reminded of Daniel’s earlier wariness, but I just . . . don’t feel it myself. “So what you’re saying is”—injecting sarcasm into the words—“you’re a wild card.”
He shrugs a shoulder. “You could say that.”
“Rebelling against the mores of society. So, this is how you think of Mara as well?”
“Totally.”
“Chaotic neutral,” I repeat. Another way of saying “dissonant,” which does fit.
“Yep.” But he pauses, long enough for the silence to stretch from pensive to awkward. “We don’t have the same code though.”
His voice sounds bruised. There’s a weakness there—to exploit. And so:
“You killed Anna Greenly, I hear.”
He blinks at the name, reacting as though he’s never heard it before. But then, “Yeah. Guess I did.”
Me, neutral. “Do you feel guilty?”
He hops off the table, picks up the cue. “Not really.” I can’t see his face now, which is no doubt intentional.
“Because of your code?”
“No . . . .” He draws out the word, arranges the pool cue between his fingers. “First of all, I wouldn’t have killed her if I’d known that, like, just telling someone to drive off a cliff meant that they’d basically do the equivalent. Not all of us are perfectly in control of our Gifts all of the time.” He aims for a ball and pockets it. “But I’m not sorry she’s dead.”
Oh?
Tilting his head at the table, he says, “The bullies never remember, but the bullied never forget.”
I’ve known Jamie for nearly three years now. I’d seen how he’d been treated, by Anna, others. But I want him to keep talking. I need to keep learning. “What if she would’ve changed someday?”
At that, he scoffs. “Nobody changes. We are who we are until we die.”
I raise an eyebrow. “Well, that’s not dramatic at all.”
He inhales, circling the table after I sink the ball. “People grow up into slightly more complex versions of their infant-slash-childhood-slash-adolescent selves, but that usually means they get worse with age. More apathetic. Less passionate. Bored.” He glances up. “Numb.” Another ball, another pocket.
He’s the one pressing on my bruise now, except it’s worse than that—it’s a raw wound. I can’t seem to help but rise to the bait. “So according to your philosophy, I’m the Hero, and there’s nothing that’ll change that.”
“Nope.” He laughs, a mixture of genuine mirth and sarcasm. “You walk into a room preceded by the scent of sandalwood and unicorns or whatever. Your skin sparkles in the sunlight.”
“Why, Jamie,” I said. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were bitter.”
“Not bitter, just annoyed. There’s a difference.”
“Do tell.”
“Because it’s so fucking obvious!” He spins, throws his back against the wall. “Privileged white kid—now officially an orphan—with a troubled past—destined to save the world. Come the fuck on, man. You’ve read that book a thousand times.”
“I have,” I say tonelessly.
“And surely you must look in the mirror,” he says, mimicking my accent now. Poorly. “Your strong jaw, your perfectly mussed-up hair, the lean but somehow still muscular body, the height—you’re practically Captain America.”
“Except English.”
“Even worse!”
“True. But surely, mate,” I say, exaggerating my own accent, playing right back, “you’ve seen yourself in the mirror? You know how you look, how people look at you—men and women both. I mean, I’d fuck you, if you asked politely.”
“Hard pass,” Jamie says, but he’s unstoppable now. “Okay, I’m not wearing my Greek chorus T-shirt, but I’ll play anyway: You’re so focused on avoiding your family shit, on not becoming your father, or what your father said you would be, that you’re totally unwilling to look for answers in the only places that matter.”
The air in the room changes. It’s feverish, electric.
“And it’s not because you don’t want to help Stella, or the others, because you do. Why do you think I haven’t really given you shit about it?”
“Because you don’t care?”
He breaks into a grin. “Sure, deflect by being an asshole.”
He’s right. Jamie’s many things, but not callous. He almost left when Stella did. Because Mara would’ve killed people who didn’t deserve it, so Stella claimed.
“That’s shit,” I say, conceding. “Sorry.”
Jamie shrugs. “You heard what your father said: You’re the Hero. You so don’t want to be the Hero that you’re letting your dad write the only other part you can play from beyond the grave.”
“Which is . . . ?”
“The Fool,” Jamie says.
Another archetype. The hair rises on the back of my neck. I try to hide it by taking a shot. “What about the others?” I ask as the ball bounces off the edge.
“Before you deflect, consider the reverse psychology in handing you the keys to his kingdom, knowing how much you fucking loathe the king. Basically guarantees you’ll never actually explore the kingdom, doesn’t it?”
“Wow, Jamie. That’s some next-level insight there.”
“Thanks. I try.”
“Five, corner pocket,” I say, and then proceed to miss. “Assuming you’re right, what precisely do you think is buried in said kingdom that I’m trying subconsciously to avoid?”
He rolls the cue between his palms. “Something about Mara, I’d guess. Probably something that means you can’t be together.”
“Nothing means we can’t be together,” I say, and the words are hardly out of my mouth before a Cheshire grin appears on Jamie’s lips.
“See? That’s your endgame. And hers. Alas, you’re the hero, she’s the villain—the star-crossed lovers, fated to be apart.”
“You honestly think Mara’s behind this?” I ask. He doesn’t call her a Shadow, at least, though that makes it harder to know if he’s speaking abstractly, in tropes, or if he actually believes whatever nonsense my father was spouting.
“No, I’m saying that we all have roles—the ones we think we’re playing, the ones other people think we’re playing, and the ones we’re actually playing. But the game’s been set up long before any of us appeared on the board.” He makes his next shot.
“So I’m fated to play whatever part’s been assigned to me?” I ask, unable to hide my disgust. “You truly believe that?”
“Your dad wasn’t wrong about everything, Noah. We’ve all got legacies. Own your shit.”
I once told Mara, “Own yourself.” God, I am the Fool.
“So what about Stella?” I ask as I line up my cue, miss yet again. “What’s her alignment?”
“Stella.” He drags out the sound of her name. “If you asked me before shit got real, I’d have said lawful good.”
“But now?”
“I don’t know. Before she vanished, I got a different read off her. Chaotic good, I think. Haven’t quite figured it out yet. Eight ball, corner pocket,” he says, positioning his stroke.
“Let me know when you do?”
He makes the shot. Game over.
“Well done,” I say, letting my cue fall against the others, turning away from him and the conversation as quickly as possible. I hear Jamie’s voice behind me as I head upstairs with my mobile.
“Only play the games you can win.”