The Book Eaters(99)

The compass slid cold against her chest. Clarity doused her nerves like a bucket of water to the face. Leaving him was not an option. Courage, she told herself. Breathe in, breathe out; endure.

She squeezed the compass tight. The important thing was to focus on her goal. To not let Ramsey and Uncle Aike and Matley and all the rest win; to not fail Cai as she’d already failed Salem.

Focus.

Find Jarrow.

Lay out her plan, get him on-side.

Find the sodding Ravenscars.

Steal drugs for Cai.

And after that—

In the still darkness of her hotel room, the phone began to ring, rattling the bedside table with its vibrations. She scrambled for the mobile, flipping open the clamshell lid.

An unknown number, using an unfamiliar area code.

Her heart pounded a frantic rhythm. “Hello?”

“It’s me.” Ragged, tired, reedy and—unmistakably—Jarrow Easterbrook. “I got your package, but I can’t talk long on here. How far are you from Brighton?”





ACT 5

HIGH NOON





29

GRENDEL AND HIS MOTHER





PRESENT DAY


Maybe every monster is a miracle meant to change the world.

—Maria Dahvana Headley, The Mere Wife

The room Cai had chosen was a big, overdecorated space, reminiscent of the quarters Devon had occupied as a girl in Fairweather Manor. Teak shelves and faded paintings of frog-eyed humans jostled for space, overlooking a four-poster bed and scattered furniture. The fireplace was cold and once-lush wallpaper peeled and flaked, patches of it subtly mottled by rising damp.

Cai sat on the bed, legs crossed and back to her, bent over something. Devon assumed it was the Game Boy until she spotted the little console resting next to him atop the duvet.

“Hey.” She crossed the oak-paneled floors on still-bare feet, filthy from miles of travel, and perched on the duvet next to her son. “What’s up?”

Cai twisted around and glowered with such hostility that she stopped abruptly.

“Someone’s been texting you,” he said. And held out her phone, the one she’d left behind for her conversation with Killock and Hester.

New Message, the icon declared. Three of them, in fact, and all from Ramsey.

“That’s mine,” Devon said stupidly, and reached to take the mobile off him.

But Cai withdrew from her, holding the phone close. “I heard your phone beeping, so I checked it. Who are you texting? I thought you only used this to find the Ravenscars’ suppliers.”

Her voice had disappeared along with her courage, and she wished the ground could swallow her whole. This wasn’t how she’d wanted her confession moment to go. All the danger Devon had faced in her life and yet, somehow, this was the most afraid she’d ever been.

“Why are you hiding things from me?” He was beginning to redden, a slow flush creeping up his neck. “I thought you were the one person I could trust, who’s supposed to be on my side! Who is texting you?”

“It’s a long and complex explanation,” she said, sounding weak even to herself.

“Then explain it!” He glared at her from under a mop of dark curls. “You’re lying to everyone about something and I’m tired of it. Who is texting you?”

“One of my brothers,” she snapped, then clapped both hands over her mouth because she hadn’t meant to shout at him. The strain of a long, conflict-laden day.

Cai’s hostility melted into shock. “You have brothers?”

“Of course,” she said wearily. “Everyone in a manor is related to each other, so all the Fairweather men are my brothers or uncles.” Or father.

“But you never talk about them!”

“No, I don’t.” Devon exhaled through her nose. She’d never talked about childhood adventures with Ramsey, or the heather-grown moors full of rabbits and foxes. About breaking into forbidden library wings or scrambling on parapets. To Cai, the Families were simply a shadowy fear in perpetual pursuit of him. “You’re right. I’ve been hiding things from you.”

“No shit!”

“Hey! Watch your mouth.”

“Watch my mouth? You’re the bloody liar!”

Devon jammed both hands behind her back to keep from slapping him. “I’m your protector. Your mother. I do what I need to. Are you going to hear me out, or not?”

“Hear what?” he shouted, tearful with brimming emotions; still a child at heart. “I thought we left the Families behind and you’re talking to them in secret!”

“I have no choice!” She caught him by the shoulders, gripping hard. “You’re carrying a surgically implanted explosive in the peritoneal cavity of your abdomen, which the knights deliberately put there. Do you understand the words I’m saying?”

Cai hiccupped and choked at the same time, too startled to protest or twist away from her touch as he usually did.

“I don’t know whether to be relieved or exasperated that you never asked about the scar on your belly, or the missing eight months of your life,” she said. “Do you remember anything at all between eating Matley, and arriving at the Oxford train station?”

“Flashes,” he said in a small voice. “Just bits.”