The Gypsy Morph

Candle looked at her, her gaze intense. “Sparrow, do you think the other kids still like me?”

  Sparrow stared at her in shock. “Of course they like you.”

  “Don’t say it just because you think I want to hear it. Tell me the truth. Do they?”

  “Candle, why wouldn’t they like you?”

  The little girl didn’t say. She just ducked her head, looked at her feet, at Cheney, and then off into the darkness as if the answer was out there somewhere. “Just because.”

  “Has someone said something?”

  Candle shook her head.

  “Done something?”

  Another shake of the moppet head.

  “Then I don’t understand. Why would you think that, all of a sudden, for no reason, they don’t like you?”

  “What if there was a reason?”

  Sparrow thought she knew what was coming, but she didn’t want to be the one to say it. Candle needed to do that. Speaking the words was the first step toward coming to terms with what they meant.

  “What sort of reason?” she asked.

  Candle shrugged. “No one needs me anymore.” She was still looking at her feet as she paused, not finished, but not ready to continue, either. “You know.”

  Sparrow reached over and put a hand on her chin and lifted her face so that they were looking right at each other. “No, I don’t know. You have to tell me.”

  Another long pause. Then, “I can’t sense when we’re in danger anymore.”

  There it was. Out in the open. Sparrow breathed a sigh of relief. Now maybe she could do something about it. She reached out for Candle and hugged her close. “Oh, Candle,” she whispered.

  Then she backed away so that they were looking at each other again. “My mother told me something once. I was just about your age. I thought my mother was the most wonderful person in the world. I loved her, but I admired her even more than I loved her. I wanted to be her.”

  She smiled. “You know this. I’ve told you before. Anyway, I was worried that it wasn’t going to happen, that it didn’t matter what I wanted. I was small and not very good at anything. I told her this. I said I didn’t think I would ever be like her, not even a little bit. This is what she told me. She told me that we don’t know who we’re going to be or what we’re going to do when we’re still children. She told me we don’t find that out until after we’ve grown up. So you can’t ever know what’s supposed to happen until you get there.”

  She squeezed Candle’s thin shoulders. “My mother was right. I had to be a lot older before I found out that maybe I would be like her.”

  “You are like her,” Candle said quietly. “You are brave and strong. You killed that centipede.”

  “That’s right. But I couldn’t have done that even a year ago. I couldn’t have fought like that, like my mother. But look at you, Candle. You already know you have a special gift. And even if it isn’t working right now, that doesn’t mean it won’t work sometime later. Maybe it’s resting. Maybe you are trying too hard. But even if it never comes back, even if it’s gone forever, your family will still love you. The Ghosts will always love you and want you to be with them.”

  “Are you sure?” The little girl looked doubtful.

  “They don’t love you and want you in the family because of your gift, Candle. They love you for who you are inside.”

  She leaned over and kissed Candle’s forehead and cheek, smoothed the thick red hair. She could barely keep the tears from her eyes. “We would never not want you in the family,” she whispered.

  “Okay,” the little girl replied, her voice so small it was barely audible.

  “Your family needs you, Candle. We always will.”

  She gave Candle a reassuring smile, but the little girl didn’t smile back.

  SOME DISTANCE AWAY FROM THE OTHERS, concealed by the night’s darkness, Hawk was talking quietly with Tessa. They were crouched within the shadow of a grove of withered ash, their heads bent close so that they could see each other’s faces clearly in the starlight, their hands clasped together. It was their time alone, something they knew would be a rarity in the days ahead.

  “It’s nice when it’s like this,” he told her, giving her hands a squeeze. “Just you and me. Just the dark and the silence.”

  He could hear the others talking, their words soft and indistinct, but it was almost like silence. He was tired and more than a little worried, not only about their present situation, out here on the road, slowed to a crawl, but also about their future. He hadn’t said anything, but he was already wondering how much more he could do to fulfill the charge he had been given by the King of the Silver River. His doubts and fears mounted every time he thought about how poorly prepared and ill equipped he was to help anyone.

  “You’re awfully quiet,” she told him.

  “Just thinking.”

  She bent forward and kissed him. Her face glowed in the starlight, and her eyes were so bright and clear and revealing that he could read the love mirrored there. It was welcome reassurance that at least one person believed in him.

  “You can do this, Hawk,” she told him. “I know you’re worried. I know you think you have been given too much. But I know how you are. You’re different from other people. Not just because you have Faerie blood or magic you can use. But because you have an inner strength that makes it possible for you to do things other people couldn’t even begin to think of doing.”

  He smiled despite himself. “That sounds pretty good.”

  “Don’t laugh at me,” she said at once, her expression changing from soft to hard. “I’m not telling you this just to make you feel better about yourself. I’m telling you this because it’s true and you need to remember it.”

  The smile faded. “Okay, I didn’t mean to make fun. I know how you feel about me. It’s the same way I feel about you. I know how you are, too. I saw how strong you were in the compound at our trial. Even when the judges didn’t want you to speak up for me. Even when your mother wouldn’t stand up for you. Even after they said they would throw us from the walls.”

  He paused. “Even when they did.”

  She kissed him again, harder this time, her seal of confidence. “Then you should believe me when I tell you that you can do the things you’ve been asked to do. It doesn’t matter how impossible they sound. You can do them. You can find a way.”

  She leaned back from him. “There’s something else I need to say, and I need you to listen carefully and not interrupt. And not judge me.”

  He gave her a look. “I don’t have the right to judge you.”

  “You haven’t heard what I have to say yet.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” he insisted. “You can say anything.”

  “All right.” She gripped his hands again, held them tight. “When we stood before the judges at our trial in the compound and it seemed that everything was against us and we had no hope, I told the judges that I was bonded to you and carrying your child. I did so to save us, to persuade the judges not to have us thrown from the walls. But the judges didn’t care. They wouldn’t recognize the marriage or the child. They made that clear.”

  Hawk started to speak, but she quickly put her finger to his lips to silence him. “You promised not to interrupt,” she reminded him. She took her finger away. “When we were on the walls afterward, you asked me if I had told the truth, if there was a child. I said that there wasn’t, that I had told the judges this just to try to save us.”

  She paused. “I lied to you. There is a child. Our child. But I couldn’t tell you. I couldn’t watch you die knowing that we had a child and that our child was dying with us. So I lied.”

  She gave him a small smile. “That was why I couldn’t jump when you asked me to do so. I couldn’t make myself kill our child even if there seemed to be no hope left. I couldn’t do that.”

  She looked at him, studied his face carefully. “Okay, it’s your turn. Now you can say anything.”

  He shook his head in wonder. “Can I
say how happy I am?”

  She nodded, tears in her eyes. “That would be nice.”

  “Can I tell you that I don’t care about anything—anything!—as much as I care about this? When you told those judges we would have a baby, when I heard you say that, I couldn’t believe it. But later, back in my cell, I thought about it. I thought it was sad and terrible and wonderful, and I wanted it so badly I could hardly stand to think about it because I didn’t believe it could happen. We were sentenced to die. We would never have a child. So I asked you on the wall, and I was relieved when you said there was no child.”

  He exhaled sharply. “But now. Now, Tessa, I am so happy. I don’t care that you lied. I know you did it forme. I know that. But I want this child. No matter what else happens, I want it. The newest member of our family. Of the Ghosts. But not another Ghost that will haunt the ruins that our parents destroyed. Not that. This will be a child who will help rebuild the world. This child will be the beginning of something wonderful.”

  “I’m glad you’re not mad at me,” she said.

  “Mad at you? I could never be mad at you. I understand why you lied. I would have done the same. That’s in the past. We can forget all that. We have a new beginning.” He shook his head, still smiling. “I can’t believe it. A child. Our child.”

  She leaned close. “A special child,” she whispered. “Born of you and me, of our two worlds, of our two bloods. A child who’ll be a leader, like you. I know it. I can feel it.”

  He drew her against him and hugged her fiercely. He had never loved her so much as he did in that moment. He thought maybe he would never love her so much again.

  A child.

  SPARROW STOOD IN THE SHADOWS, her heart racing. She had heard everything. She had heard it all. There was to be a child. Hawk and Tessa were going to have a baby, and it would be the first of a new generation of children.

  She had come looking for Hawk to ask him to speak with Candle, to reassure the little girl about her place in the family, knowing that it would mean more coming from him than from her. She had not meant to overhear but she had not been able to help herself. She had found them just as Tessa was telling him about the baby, and she could not help listening to everything.

  She stood rooted in place, undecided about what to do next. Should she reveal herself to them? She felt like a spy, hiding in the shadows, hearing secrets not meant for her ears. How would they feel if she stepped out now and let them know?

  Perhaps it was better to wait. If she said nothing, she could wait until they told the others, and then she could pretend she was hearing it for the first time. That might be better. More comfortable for everyone.

  She backed away noiselessly, leaving Hawk and Tessa alone, wrapped in their joy and their love. She would like to have that someday, she thought. She would like to have someone to share her life.

  The secret of the baby was hers to keep, but halfway back to rejoin the others she had already decided she was going to tell Owl.

  SIXTEEN

  T HE SUNRISE WAS BLOOD RED. Hawk had never seen one like it, and it disturbed him for reasons he could not explain. It was more than the strangeness of it. It wasn’t even that it felt ominous. It was that it signaled something, a shift in the order of things perhaps, that wasn’t apparent on the surface but that he could feel somewhere deep down inside where such things wedge themselves and refuse to be dislodged.

  Still flushed with the news of Tessa’s pregnancy, he had risen in the best and most hopeful of moods. No matter the odds, no matter the obstacles, no matter anything that might lie ahead, he and Tessa would overcome it because they had a child to nurture and protect. He knew little of babies, but everything of children, and he was ready to see that his was given every chance at growing up strong and healthy. Even in a world that was all but destroyed. Even in a world he was trying to leave. Hawk wanted this as he had wanted little else in his life. His child, his and Tessa’s. Its birth would be the most beautiful thing that had ever happened to him. It gave him hope; it made him feel that everything he had gone through or might go through in the days ahead was worth it.

  His euphoria was dimmed but not overwhelmed by the odd sunrise, and when they set out that morning he was still smiling inwardly at the thought of his secret. A baby. What could be more wonderful than that?

  He went to Tessa while she was still sleeping and woke her, hugging her close, kissing her and telling her how much he loved her, how pleased and excited he was. She hugged him back, and for a few moments the oppressiveness of the sunrise faded behind the bright veil of their happiness.

  “We’ll tell the others at breakfast,” he whispered to her.

  “Not until tonight,” she urged. “I want to tell Owl first. I want her to know before anyone else.”

  He was quick to agree, and he went about the business of rousting the others and preparing for them to set out with such enthusiasm that more than a few looked at him as if he had lost his mind. He ignored the looks and the mumbled comments and all the rest, caught up in his own celebration.

  “Try to get a grip, Bird-Man,” Panther grumbled at one point, his minimal patience with such euphoria quickly exhausted. “You look possessed or something. Real scary-like.”

  Owl, wheeling herself over to the AV, overheard the comment. She stopped long enough to tug on Hawk’s sleeve. “Don’t listen to him.”

  Hawk glanced down and shrugged. “Don’t worry. He’s just being Panther.”

  “I know. But nevertheless.” She grinned. “What you look like is someone who has a secret that he ought to share.”

  He gave her a sharp look, caught the satisfaction reflected in her eyes. “You know, don’t you?”

  “I might.”

  “Tessa told you?”

  “Sparrow. She overheard you talking last night.”

  He shook his head. “Jeez. Why don’t we just post a big sign for everyone to read?”

  “Why don’t you just tell everybody and get it over with?”

  “Tessa wanted to wait until tonight.”

  Owl nodded. “It might not keep that long. You know how this bunch is with secrets.”

  He wheeled her over to the AV and helped her inside, where Candle and River were already waiting. He called Tessa over and tried to put her in the vehicle, too, but she waved him off. “You ride for a while,” she told him. “You never ride.”

  “Yeah, you must be exhausted, what with all that baby-making and stuff,” Panther sniffed, walking by.

  Just like that. He didn’t slow as he said it, didn’t even look back as he strolled on. Hawk stared after him, openmouthed.

  River leaned forward from the backseat. “What are you going to name the baby, Hawk?”

  “Is it going to be a little boy or a little girl?” Candle wanted to know. Her blue eyes were bright and eager. “I’m going to have a little brother or sister. Sort of. Almost. I can pretend, I think.”

  “As I was saying,” Owl declared softly.

  Hawk rolled his eyes and walked away, calling for Fixit to take the wheel of the Lightning and Chalk to keep him company. So much for secrets and surprise announcements.

  They rolled east into the mountains, winding through a pass that took them away from the banks of the Columbia and up into the higher elevations. For a time, it looked as if they were going to cross quickly and be back on the flats beyond. But by midday, they had encountered a section of roadway riddled with rockslides and sinkholes too wide to be avoided, and they were forced to abandon the hay wagon, pack what supplies they could atop the AV, and continue with half their number afoot. Progress slowed, and the day seeped away like water through cupped hands.

  By nightfall, they were still only midway across, still high in the passes and forced to sleep on ground virtually empty of grasses and littered with rocks. Owl, River, and Candle slept in the AV, but Sparrow turned up her nose at the idea, declaring she was as tough as any boy, and Tessa slept with Hawk, curled up against him, sharing her warmth and
the promise of their future.

  Hawk did make the baby announcement that night at dinner, but by then it was old news to almost everyone but Fixit and Chalk, who were always the last to know everything. Cheers and smiles greeted the news anyway, even by those who had known all day, and only Cat kept pointedly aloof from the celebration.

  “Sort of silly, all this celebrating about a baby not even born yet,” Panther sneered quietly, sitting down next to her when things had quieted down.

  “I don’t think it’s silly,” she replied.

  He looked at her. “Well, your face says something else.”

  “My face, huh?”

  “Sure.” He sounded less certain. “Says different.”

  She looked him full on, her mottled face set in a hard glare. “Says different, you think?”

  He didn’t say anything this time, just nodded.

  “You’re awful quick with that mouth of yours.”

  He dropped his eyes. “Sometimes.”

  “Here’s the thing, Panther. When you look like me, you don’t want to hear about other people’s babies. That kind of happiness isn’t ever going to be yours. You don’t want to even think about it. You just want to hurry up and get on with your life.”

  He stared back at her, his dark face flushed. Then he shrugged away his discomfort and said, “Sorry. I didn’t mean nuthin’ bad. I was just talking.”

  “Well, don’t,” she snapped. She stared at him a moment longer, anger reflected in her green eyes. Then she reached up suddenly with her hand and stroked his cheek. Her voice softened. “Just don’t.”

  The next day was another slog through the passes under skies turned dark with clouds and the air grown thick with dust and ash. Where this weather had come from was anybody’s guess, but it wasn’t friendly and it wasn’t conducive to good thoughts. The Ghosts walked all day, navigating a roadway littered with rocks and debris, some of which had to be removed by hand on numerous occasions to permit passage for the AV. It rained at one point, a thick spattering of heavy droplets that barely dampened the concrete of the highway and the earth of the surrounding countryside before being absorbed. The air turned hot and cold by turns, and the haze came and went.