The Retribution of Mara Dyer

  Fuck you. “Okay.”

  Wayne opened a case he’d been carrying and laid out the contents on a small tray next to the bed. I turned my head to the side and watched, but then wished that I hadn’t. Scalpels, syringes, and needles of different sizes gleamed against the black fabric.

  “We are going to measure your response to your fear of needles today,” she said, and on cue Wayne lifted a plastic-capped cylinder. He pinched the cap between his fingers and twisted it. The seal broke with a loud snick. He fitted the needle onto a large syringe.

  “You’ve certainly seen plenty of these, considering your time in hospitals, and judging from your records, your instinct is to fight back when touched nonconsensually by medical professionals,” she said, raising her penciled brows a fraction. “You punched a nurse on your first hospital stay in Providence after the asylum incident, in response to being touched and forcibly held.” She looked down at a small notepad. “And then you hit the nurse at the psychiatric unit in the hospital when you were admitted after you attempted suicide.”

  At that moment two images competed for space in my mind. The first one was sharp and clear, of me standing alone on a dock and taking the shining blade of a box cutter to my pale wrists. In the other image, blurred and soft, the outline of Jude stood behind me, whispering into my ear, threatening me and my family until the box cutter bit deep into my skin.

  My mind clamped down on the second image, the one with Jude. I hadn’t tried to kill myself. Jude had just tried to make it look like I had. And Kells, somehow, was trying to make me forget it.

  Wayne bent down then and withdrew something from below the bed, beyond my range of vision. He stood up, holding a complicated-looking system of leather and metal restraints. Shackles, really. Still no fear.

  But then Kells said, “Just relax.”

  Her words echoed in my mind, in someone else’s voice.

  Just relax.

  There was a little flip in my chest, and the monitor beside my bed beeped. I didn’t understand. Was it the words? A bead of sweat rolled down Wayne’s forehead. He wiped it away with his sleeved forearm, then moved his thick fingers to the crook of my elbow. My mind flinched and my muscles went tense.

  Wayne seemed to feel it. “Are you sure—are you sure she’s stable?” He was nervous. Good.

  Kells looked at my arm. “Mara, I want your body, your arms, and your hands to go limp.”

  As soon as the words left her mouth, they did. I looked at myself in the ceiling mirror. My expression was slack.

  “When you see something you’re afraid of, your mind tells your body to react. It tells your kidneys to release adrenaline, which makes your heart rate increase, and your pulse, and your rate of breathing. This is to prepare you to run away from, or to fight, the thing you’re afraid of, regardless of whether that fear is rational. In your case fear triggers your anomaly. So what we’re doing is making sure that the medicine we’ve developed to help you is doing what it’s supposed to, which is to separate your mental reactions from your physical reactions. The main goal, of course, is total aversion—blocking the pathway that transforms your . . .” She rubbed a thumb over her bottom lip as she searched for words. “Negative thoughts,” she finally said, “into action. Anemosyne doesn’t prevent your thoughts, but it prevents the physical consequences of them, rendering you as harmless as a non-carrier. Now turn her,” she said to Wayne.

  Wayne swallowed, his jowls trembling with the movement as he took me by the shoulders and began to turn me over. At some point an attachment had been fitted to the bed that allowed me to lie on my stomach without craning my neck to either side. I stared at the floor, grateful that it too wasn’t mirrored. At least I wouldn’t have to watch.

  My ankles were strapped down. He positioned each arm so that it hung over the side, then shackled my wrists together, like I was hugging the bed.

  “Show her the syringe,” Dr. Kells said to him.

  Wayne moved the needle in front of my eyes, letting me see it from every angle. My heartbeat sped up, and with it, the monitor.

  “Should her heart be beating like that?” Wayne asked nervously.

  “Just a reflex,” Kells explained. “Her body is still capable of responding to reflexes, but her emotions, her fear, can’t trigger her ability regardless of what she thinks,” she said matter-of-factly. “Consciously or subconsciously.”

  Wayne lifted the back of the white hospital gown they’d dressed me in. I didn’t want him touching me, but I couldn’t do anything about it.

  Then something scraped, slid toward me on the floor. A mirror. It showed me my face, which was white and bloodless, and in the ceiling mirror I saw my exposed back. I looked thin. Unhealthy.

  I didn’t want to see whatever it was they were going to do to me, and that I could do something about. I squeezed my eyes shut.

  “Open your eyes,” Dr. Kells said, and I did. I had to, and I hated it.

  She angled the mirror, and I watched as Wayne took a cotton ball from the metal stand beside the bed and drenched it in iodine. I flinched when he rubbed it on my back.

  He noticed. “What does that mean?”

  “Just a reflex,” Kells said, her voice thin. Exasperated. “To the cold,” she said to him. Then to me, “If I were to hit your knee with a hammer, Mara, it would jerk. It’s just your response to fear that we’re trying to dull. If we’re successful, you’ll be able to live a normal, productive life unhindered by your irrational fears, and without having to worry that you will unintentionally will consequences that could be disastrous for the people you love and others.”

  I vaguely remembered that I used to care about that.

  “We’re going to extract some of your spinal fluid first,” Kells said, and Wayne positioned the needle closer to my skin. “This will only hurt a little.”

  Every movement from that moment on was processed in slow motion. The needle as Wayne allowed it to hover just millimeters from my skin. The feel of cold steel piercing my skin, first a pinch; then, as it went deeper, a sting, an ache, a burn, and I wanted to thrash but I didn’t move, couldn’t move. Kells told me to watch my face in the mirror, and I did. It was still blank. A mask of skin hiding every feeling. My mind screamed but my mouth stayed shut.

  There was pressure as the syringe sucked fluid from my spine. “You’re doing very well,” Kells said, her voice toneless. “Isn’t this better, Mara? There’s nothing to be afraid of. It’s just a needle and it’s only pain. Pain is just a feeling, and feelings aren’t real.”

  After what felt like hours Wayne withdrew the needle, and the pressure stopped but the pain didn’t. Something cold and wet trickled slowly down my skin before Wayne pressed a piece of gauze to absorb it. My breath was deep and even. I didn’t gasp, I didn’t throw up. I’d thought those were reflexes. Guess not.

  Wayne cleaned up my back, unshackled my wrists, unbuckled the straps from my ankles, and then gently, in a way that made my mind sick, turned me over onto my back.

  “I know that wasn’t pleasant for you, Mara,” Kells said. “But despite your internal discomfort, it was a very successful test. What the drug is allowing you to do right now is separate your mental reactions from your physical reactions. The side effect, though, is also quite exciting.” She didn’t sound excited at all.

  “I’m sure you wanted to react during that procedure. I’m sure you wanted to scream and probably cry. But thanks to the drug, your physical reflexes will remain intact, but they’re divorced from your emotions. In other words, with Anemosyne, if someone chops onions near you, or if an eyelash is stuck in your eye, you’ll still tear in response to stimuli. Your eyes will try to flush out the irritant. But you’ll no longer cry because of fear, or because of sadness or frustration. It severs that connection to prevent you from losing control.” She hovered over me. “I know it’s a strange sensation for you now, but you’ll adapt. And the benefit to you, and others, will be enormous. Once we settle on the appropriate dosage for you, we’ll
need to boost your infusions only every few months. You’ll eventually be able to go home to your family, come to therapy with me, and have the normal life that you wanted, as this drug keeps working.” She reached out to smooth my hair in what I supposed was meant to be a maternal gesture, and I felt the urge to bite her.

  “We’re going to give you another drug now so that you won’t even remember today’s unpleasantness. Won’t that be nice?” A smile snaked across her lips, but then her eyebrows pinched together. “Wayne, what’s the current room temperature?”

  Wayne moved over to the left, pressing a spot on the mirrored wall with his thumb. Numbers appeared in the glass. Fancy.

  “Seventy degrees.”

  Kells pressed the back of her hand to my forehead. “She’s hot. And sweating.” She wiped her hand on the blanket.

  “Is that . . . normal?”

  “It’s atypical,” Kells said. “She hasn’t reacted this way to any of the previous tests.”

  Previous tests? How many had there been?

  Kells withdrew a penlight from her pocket and said to me, “Don’t squint.”

  I didn’t squint. She shined the light into my eyes; I wanted to close them but couldn’t.

  “Her pupils are dilated. I don’t understand. The procedure’s over.” Her voice wavered just slightly. “Wayne, the Amylethe, please?”

  He withdrew something from the black case. Another needle. But he must have been sweating too, because he fumbled with it. It fell to the floor and rolled.

  “Christ,” Kells muttered under her breath.

  “Sorry, sorry.” He reached for a new syringe but stopped when the monitor by the bed beeped.

  Kells looked over at it. “Her blood pressure’s falling. She’s having some kind of reaction. Could you be any slower?”

  I’d never heard her sound anything less than completely composed. But looking at her now, her body was tense. The tendons in her neck were corded. I was probably imagining it, but I could practically smell her fear.

  She was terrified. Of me? For me? I didn’t know, but I liked it.

  Wayne clenched his jaw shut and unscrewed the cap on the syringe. He reached for my arm and stabbed my shoulder with the needle.

  My vision swam, and my head went thick. “Take her to the examination room,” was the last thing I heard before I blacked out.

  4

  BEFORE

  India, Unknown Province

  THE DAY AUNTIE DIED, OUR neighbors watched warily as we walked from the village bearing her body. The air was as dead as she was; the river sickness had taken her just days after Uncle had brought me home. Auntie had been the only reason they’d tolerated him, in his different clothes, always blue, with his different words and different looks. She’d been special, Uncle had told me. When she would assist at a birth, the baby would rush out of its mother’s womb to meet her. Without her we were unprotected. I did not understand what he meant until he died.

  Word of us spread from village to village. Wherever we went, plague and death had already struck, and we followed in its wake. Uncle did his best for the people, sharing remedies, making poultices, but whispers followed in our footsteps. Mara, they called us. Demons.

  One night Uncle roused us from sleep and told me and Sister to leave at once. We must not ask questions, just obey. We crept from our hut in darkness, and once we set foot in the jungle, we heard his scream.

  A column of smoke rose in the air, carrying his cries with it. I wanted to go to him, to fix it, but Sister said that we’d promised not to, that we would suffer the same fate if we did. I had taken nothing but my doll. I would never leave it behind.

  My long, tangled hair stuck to my neck and shoulders in the damp nighttime heat as Uncle’s screams were replaced with the sounds of the forest, rising with the moon. We did not sleep that night, and as the sun broke through the clouds and hunger gripped my belly, I thought we would have to beg for bread, like the orphans. But we did not. Sister spoke to the trees, and they gave up their fruit for her. The ground gave up its water. The earth nourished us, sustained us, until we reached the city.

  Sister took me straight to the tallest building at the port to see the man with glasses. He called himself Mr. Barbary, and Sister walked straight toward him. We were dirty and tired and looked very much like we did not belong.

  “Yes?” he said when we stood before his desk. “What is it you want?”

  Sister told him who she was, who her father had been. He saw us with new eyes.

  “I did not recognize her. She has grown.”

  “Yes,” I said. “I have.”

  I had never spoken to him before, or anyone except Sister and Uncle. I had never needed to. But I knew why we were here, and I wanted to impress him.

  It worked. His eyes grew wide, and his smile spread beneath the funny bow of hair above his lip. “Why, she talks!”

  I could do more than that.

  He asked me questions about what had happened to us, and about other things too—what I had learned since I had last seen him, what talents I had developed, whether I had fallen ill. Then he measured how much I’d grown. After, he gave Sister a pouch, and she bowed her head in gratitude.

  “I must inform her benefactor of your change in circumstances, you understand,” he explained.

  Sister nodded, but her face was a mask. “I understand. But her education has not yet been completed. Please inform him that I will take over for my father, if I am allowed.”

  Mr. Barbary nodded and then excused us, and Sister led me out of the building by my hand. I wondered at how she knew the city so well. She had never come with Uncle and me before.

  Sister paid a man to find us lodging, and then she bought us clothes, fine clothes, the sort Uncle used to wear. She purchased a meal for us to eat in our room.

  It was like nothing I had ever seen, with tall beds carved from trees that were dressed in linens as soft as feathers. Sister washed me and dressed me, and then we ate.

  “We will leave after dark,” she said, scooping up fragrant yellow rice with her bread.

  As my belly filled, I began to feel pleasant and drowsy. “Why not stay?” The room was solid, empty of dust and drafts, and the beds looked so clean. I longed to bury myself in one.

  “It is better to go unnoticed for as long as we can, until we find a new home.”

  I did not argue. I trusted Sister. She had taken care of me when I was little, as she would take care of me until she died.

  It happened long after Uncle had been killed, though I don’t know how long. Time held no meaning for me—it was marked only by my visits to Mr. Barbary for inspection. Uncle kept no calendars, and neither did Sister. I did not even know my age. We moved along the outskirts of villages like ghosts, until we were driven even from the fringes. Then we moved to the next.

  “Why must we keep moving?” I asked her as we walked. “Why won’t they let us stay?”

  It was envy, Sister said. The people we lived among were not gifted like us. They were as ordinary as blades of grass, but we were like flowers, beautiful and rare. They suspected our differences and hated us for it. So we had to pretend to be what we were not, so we would not be harmed for what we were.

  But they harmed us anyway. No matter how hard we tried to remain unseen, someone would always recognize or suspect us. On our third day in the most recent village, they took Sister as night fell, the way they’d taken Uncle. The way they tried to take me.

  Arms pinched my flesh and I was grabbed from my mat. Sister was screaming, begging them not to hurt me, swearing to our innocence, our harmlessness, but before I was even properly awake, her words were cut short. A man had smashed a rock into her head. Just once, but it had been enough.

  I went slack in the arms of my captor as the same man raised the rock again to hit me with it. I wanted him to die.

  His body shuddered, and something ripped inside him, sending a torrent of blood from his nose. He dropped his rock and moaned, backing away from me. br />
  The others backed away as well. I did not speak to them. I did not scream at them. I looked at Sister, her mouth slack, her body limp, her hair glistening with blood, and I wanted.

  I wanted them to feel as she felt. I wanted them to never see another sunrise, since she would not either.

  I sat beside her, cradling her crushed skull in my lap. The others formed a wide circle around us. Then someone threw a stone.

  It missed me. And struck someone else.

  Shouts erupted, and the air filled with fear. The village emptied that night as the men—the murderers—fled, taking their women and children with them.

  I saw tools but ignored them. I began to scoop dirt with my hands, and buried Sister when I finished digging her shallow grave, right where she had fallen. I slept there until the following day. Even the insects did not disturb me. When I woke, I began walking to Calcutta alone. I passed the scattered bodies of the villagers on my way. The skin above their lips was smeared with blood, but the flies did not touch them. They did not dare.

  I avoided people. I bathed in my bloody, simple shift. The forest would not give up its gifts for me, so I skirted villages and stole from them to eat. I was ignorant of everything but my loneliness. I missed Sister, and Uncle, too, in my way. But they were gone now, and all I had left of them and my life with them was ash and dust and the doll Sister had made me, and the words Uncle had given me, taught me, so that I could speak with my benefactor in England someday.

  Someday had arrived.

  I walked to the port, to Mr. Barbary, unaccompanied for the first time in memory. He took in my stained clothes and my matted hair. I looked like a wild thing, but I spoke as cleanly and crisply as he did, and in his own tongue at that. I told him my education was complete. He sent me to an inn nearby, and would fetch me when my passage to England had been arranged, he said.