The Fever King (Feverwake #1)(4)

It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s okay, a voice kept repeating in Noam’s head.

He dumped his father’s body on the bed, skinny limbs sprawling. Noam tried to nudge him into a more comfortable position, but even that took effort. But this . . . it was more than he’d done for his mother. He’d left her corpse swinging on that rope for hours before Brennan showed up to take her down.

His father still breathed, for now.

How long did it take to die? God, Noam couldn’t remember.

On shaky legs, Noam made his way back to the chair by the window. He couldn’t manage much more. The television kept turning itself on and off again, images blazing across a field of static snow and vanishing just as quickly. Noam saw it out of the corners of his eyes even when he tried not to look, the same way he saw his father’s unconscious body. That would be Noam soon.

Magic crawled like ivy up the sides of the fire escape next door.

Noam imagined his mother waiting for him with a smile and open arms, the past three years just a blink against eternity.

His hands sparked with something silver-blue and bright. Bolts shot between his fingers and flickered up his arms. The effect would have been beautiful were it not so deadly. And yet . . .

A shiver ricocheted up his spine.

Noam held a storm in his hands, and he couldn’t feel a thing.





CHAPTER TWO

Noam drowned in a sea of white heat and electric current. A dizzy free fall into the ocean, salt water drenching his lungs.

Then the tide receded. The storm cleared. Noam opened his eyes to bright light.

Everything hurt.

God, everything . . . his body was a knot of pain and exhaustion. Noam shivered as he shoved the bedsheets down, pushing upright. His mind blurred, and he couldn’t remember—

Noam tipped his head back, a fresh wave of heat searing down his spine.

Where was he?

The room smelled of spoiled meat. He looked to the left.

A girl lay on the bed next to his with her mouth open, her face a solid gray mask, frozen midbreath.

Noam lurched out of bed, ankle catching in the sheets and sending him crashing sideways into an abandoned metal cart. The girl stared back with white eyes.

Jesus—how long had she been there? Days? Perhaps even weeks, her flesh rotting into the mattress three feet away while Noam shook through his fever and never noticed.

Door. There was a door. Get to the door.

Noam stumbled across the room, bare feet sticking to whatever fluid had congealed on the tile. He swore—swore—he could feel the bones of the building, cameras overhead, little electrical signals sizzling down the wires.

Hallucinating, that was it. Identifying patterns in the world, seeing himself—but from the outside, all edges and too-long pants.

Madness.

The hall was a long white ribbon stretching toward a pair of steel doors.

And silence. The sort of silence that suffocated, pouring into Noam’s nose and mouth and ears like black water.

A camera gazed dispassionately down from the ceiling. Noam gazed back.

“Hello?”

His voice didn’t sound like his own.

A crash behind him. Noam spun around, half expecting to see the girl from his room with skeleton fingers reaching for his throat—but there was nothing. Just empty hallway, fluorescent lights flickering on tile.

He had to get out. Anywhere was better than being in this dead air.

Noam faltered toward the double doors. He had made it three feet before they crashed open, spilling a small army of aliens in strange white space suits, oxygen tanks strapped to their backs and gloved hands held aloft.

“Hey, there,” one of them said. His voice came out sounding odd, synthetic. “Hey, now. Take it easy. Stay where you are.”

“Who—” Noam’s throat was raw. It hurt to speak. He staggered against the wall and leaned there, cheek pressed against cold plaster. “Who are you?”

“We’re doctors,” the space suit said. “We’re here to help. You’ve been very sick.” He gestured at one of the others, who stepped toward Noam, dragging a stretcher. “Just relax. It’s all okay.”

I am relaxed, Noam wanted to say, but he could barely keep his eyes open. He slumped farther down the wall. It was almost a relief when the other doctor reached him, grabbing Noam’s arm to help hoist him onto the stretcher.

The doctor injected him with a clear fluid.

“Whassat?” Noam mumbled.

“Sedative. Just to keep you calm, honey. Can’t have you accidentally blowing this place to high heaven, now, can we?” The doctor patted him on the sternum with one huge gloved hand.

Noam tipped his head back and closed his eyes. He felt like he was spinning in place. Something buzzed between his ears like static.

He was distantly aware of the other space suits moving toward him, a low hubbub of untranslatable conversation. Someone plastered sticky sensors onto his chest.

“What’s happening?” he managed to get out.

“Shh, it’s all right. We’re gonna get you out of here.”

He gave up arguing.

They rolled him out those double doors, through an air lock that sprayed some acrid disinfectant all over him. Then out again, into a white-walled maze of corridors and too many machines, beeping, buzzing, the sound loud enough it shuddered down into his bones.