Burn (Pure #3)(48)

The story stuns Partridge. He’s only able to mutter, “Don’t say that. Suicide is never the answer.”

“This wasn’t suicide. It was a death that I was owed a long time ago.”

He’s panicking. How can he make this right? “My wedding is something to look forward to. I want you to be there—your whole family—in the front row.”

“You spoke the truth.”

“What if I was lying?”

“You weren’t.”

“What if I told you…” And for a few seconds, he stops breathing. Can he tell her the truth? Can he accept some of her guilt to spare her? “I’m a murderer too.”

“You were too young. You didn’t understand what was happening—not like we did. No.”

“You don’t understand,” he says. “I killed him. I’m a murderer.”

Mrs. Hollenback searches his face. “You killed him?” she says, but he’s sure she knows who he’s talking about.

“I had to stop my father.” Now that he’s said these words aloud, he wants to tell her everything. “I had no choice. He was planning to—”

With one hand, she presses her fingers to his mouth and with the other brings her fingertips to her own blackened lips. Her eyes quiver with tears. She shakes her head and then lets her hands fall to her bed. She stares up at the ceiling.

“Forgive us,” she whispers. “Forgive us all.”





PRESSIA





FRESH SMOKE




Pressia is leaning out of the airship. She’s going to lower Fignan to Hastings, who will then give him to Fandra. Then they’ll have to drag Hastings up into the airship. The wind whips Pressia’s hair into her mouth, across her cheeks, stinging her eyes. She holds Fignan tightly and leans deeper toward Hastings, trusting Bradwell’s grip on her waist, familiar and yet foreign. His wings are rustling, buffeted by the gusts.

“It’s okay,” Bradwell reassures her. “I’ve got you. I do.”

Fignan is blaring out the Crazy John-Johns theme park music so loud it’s already caused a few Dusts to start to retreat. But still, some Dusts are slamming at the foundation of the ruined roller coaster. Hastings has his arms held high, and Fandra crouches beside him, flinching each time the Dusts thump the base.

“Slower! Tell him to go slower!” Pressia yells into the wind at Bradwell. It feels good to scream at him after their argument and all the distance between them.

“He’s doing what he can!” Bradwell says at her back. She knows his face so well—the long scars, his eyebrows, his lashes—that she can imagine the face he’s making right now, grimacing to hold on to her, furrowing his brow with effort. She’s so close she can see the wrinkles on Hastings’ knuckles, the fine sand blowing against his cheek, the shine of the guns on his arms.

Suddenly the wind lifts the front end of the airship. It’s as if Hastings is falling beneath her. She wants to drop Fignan to Fandra, hoping she’ll catch him, but can’t risk it.

“We missed!” she yells.

The heavier drone means that El Capitan knows and is pulling up to circle around for another try. They were so close.

Bradwell pulls her back into the hull, and they sit breathing heavily.

“Maybe he can reapproach facing the wind,” Bradwell says without looking at her. “He almost had it.”

“We were really close,” Pressia says. And as she hears herself say these words to Bradwell, she wants to say them to him about them. They were so close. They were in love. Now this: the long silence, the tension, the disappointment. She wants back that tingle when he walked near her, not the thud of dread. Sitting this close to Bradwell should make her feel confident, happy, even as she’s about to lean out of the airship hundreds of feet off the ground.

“We’ll get it this time,” Bradwell says.

Pressia nods. But there’s no hope for the two of them, is there? She looks back toward the amusement park, the roller coaster like a giant sliced serpent, the gray horizon. This has been Fandra’s home, and Pressia is going to help her save it. Pressia misses her own home. As dirty and wrecked as it is, she’s almost back, which is a strange comfort.

The airship moves in, closing on Hastings’ outstretched hands.

Pressia faces the opening again and leans to Hastings, Bradwell’s strong hands on her hips. The airship lurches up briefly and then into almost a complete halt that allows Pressia to drop Fignan just a couple of inches into Hastings’ grip.

“He’s got it!” she yells.

Hastings turns quickly with the little black box playing its haunting melody and gives it to Fandra. He says something to Fandra, who looks up at Hastings through her wind-crazed hair, through the pelting sand and dust and ash. She smiles. And Hastings turns away and leaps at one of the airship’s legs. He balances there for a few moments, and then makes eye contact with Pressia, readying himself to swing up to her.

“When I count to three,” Bradwell says.

She nods.

Bradwell tightens his grip. “One, two, three!”

Hastings swings off the leg of the airship and clasps Pressia’s hand. She pulls with all her strength; Bradwell’s arms flex, pull her to his chest. The ground below is a blur. The wind fills her lungs, the airship noise roars in her ears—overwhelming. Hastings’ eyes are shot through with confident determination, and she feels the depth of her own strength as she and Bradwell pull Hastings toward the safety of the airship. Pressia is a link, saving Hastings from the sky and then the ground. Bradwell reels them all the way in, falling backward on his enormous wings, pulling Pressia with him.