Blood Colony (5 page)

Fana didn’t recognize the silver hydro sedan parked ahead of them, probably a rental, but she knew her father had driven it. The car was empty, but its hood would be warm if she touched it. Dad had beaten them here by only a minute or two. Her muscles clenched tight again.

“I hope that’s David…,” Jessica murmured. Her mother veered between calling her father
Dawit,
the name his Brothers used, and
David,
the name she had first known him by. Mom called him
David
most often when he was away, her name for his memory.

The path from the woods ended at the Square, which was really a hexagon and served as their tiny colony’s nexus. The Square’s centerpiece was a large fountain and its large twin marble lions, the maned male and his female mate, who seemed to stand guard while water arced from their open mouths, shooting skyward. The two streams of water crossed in the air like liquid swords. Her father had sculpted the lions—another talent he’d had no luck passing on to her. The exquisite black marble fountain was Fana’s favorite part of her home.

Since it was one o’clock, the younger children were in school instead of playing in the Square, so all Fana heard as she climbed out of the car was the hairy woodpeckers fussing in the trees. Someone—not Gramma Bea—was cooking. She smelled stewing meat, a scent that always made Fana feel ill.

She felt sicker than usual today, but not because of the meat.

Not more than five acres separated any of the structures at the colony from any of the others. They all lived within shouting distance, as Gramma Bea liked to say. For safety.

Fana’s house, which she shared with her parents and grandmother, was at the end of the cobblestone garden path. Her aunt Alex and uncle Lucas lived in the elegant wood-frame house closest to theirs, and the Duharts lived with their three children east, on the other side of the fountain. The remaining buildings were the meeting hall, the library, the schoolhouse, the lab, and—set back farther in the woods than the others—a long, dormitory-style Council Hall shared by eight men her father had known longer than any other men had lived. Those men preferred each other’s fellowship best.

Fana could make out a huddle of people walking toward the Council Hall, almost out of sight behind the black walnut tree. She recognized her father’s walk first, Teferi tall above them, and then wiry Teka. Fana saw pale skin, too: Caitlin was here, and her father.

Seeing Caitlin made Fana forget her own problems. No one was touching Caitlin, but she and her father moved reluctantly. Caitlin and her father had been
brought
.

“Dad is here. And Caitlin.” Fana sprinted after them to confront her fate head-on.

“Caitlin?” she heard her mother say in delighted ignorance. “That’s a nice surprise!”

When Teka turned because he sensed Fana’s approach, the group’s progress halted. They all stood still, watching Fana run toward them. Justin O’Neal, Caitlin’s sandy-haired father, was dressed in a rumpled three-piece suit, his tie hanging unwound. His face was devoid of the smile he usually welcomed her with. There were no smiles from this group—especially from her father.

Dad’s eyes slowed Fana’s feet.

Caitlin broke into a run toward Fana that made Mr. O’Neal stiffen. Fana saw her father rest his hand on Mr. O’Neal’s shoulder, holding him in place.

Even before Caitlin was within ten yards, Fana felt her friend’s frantic thoughts punching her:
OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD
Caitlin’s cheeks were bright red, and tears filled her eyes as she tripped, hugging Fana.

“Oh, God, Fana,” Caitlin whispered. “They—”

“It’s all right if they know,” Fana said calmly, hugging her. “I’ll say it was my idea.”

“P-please don’t let them hurt me and my dad.
Please
.”

Caitlin’s memories charged into Fana’s head. Suddenly, Fana saw an inversion of her dream: A man dressed in black held helpless, an arm wound tightly around his throat, then his neck cracked with a wrenching motion, like juicing an orange. The image replayed itself in a frenzy; it had been the only thing on Caitlin’s mind for hours. Suddenly, Fana saw her father in Caitlin’s memory, too—he stood behind the man wearing black, his arm wrapped around his neck. Dad’s face was a mask of rage Fana had never seen.

Fana looked at her father, who stood watching her beside Caitlin’s father on the path to the Council Hall. Her father’s face churned with hurt. And anger. Maybe a trace of shame.

She had brought trouble to Caitlin. She had brought trouble to all of them.

Fana forced herself to reclaim the images from her dream, hoping to find solace there.

A priest in white ceremonial regalia and a cardinal’s cap kneels on the floor before her father, grasping a golden chalice full of blood. Her father walks behind the priest.

“I’m a priest,” the man in the white robe says.

“A dead one,” her father says, and swiftly breaks his neck. The chalice’s spilled blood soaks the corpse’s white robe crimson.

The priest’s bloody robe flutters, and he stirs.

The corpse isn’t dead at all.

A
Camel wobbled between Caitlin’s thin fingers as she sat on the bare bed with her legs hiked up like a child’s, close to her body. Thanks to Gramps, Caitlin O’Neal had been chain-smoking since she was sixteen. He’d let her smoke her first cigarette when she was seven, the same year he’d died. Gramps had not been a nice man. If Caitlin had been able to go back in time, she would have kicked him in the balls. But the habit had outlived him, and the nicotine beat back the panic trying to fill her throat.
Calm down, Caitlin. There’s a way out of this. There has to be.

Where was her father? It had been an hour since Uncle Teferi had taken him away.

Uncle Teferi had called this narrow room the “guest quarters,” but since there was no window and only two narrow twin beds, it was just a cell. She’d been afraid of being locked up since the night she’d first met Fana at the border of the woods, when Fana had given her a backpack hiding an ounce of her blood. But she hadn’t expected to be locked up here, a place that had been a second home most of her life.

Casey had warned her. Even without really knowing, her twin had known about the Glow.
You’re looking for a quick trip to jail, or worse,
Casey had said a month before Mari had died.

Caitlin’s heart bucked when the door opened.

Fana slipped inside. As the door closed behind her, Caitlin saw the shadow of a man who must have been a guard.
Shit.
They weren’t going to let her leave.

Caitlin choked, coughing. “Thank God it’s you,” she said. “Where’s my dad? They—”

“He’s fine, I swear. They’re asking him questions.”

Fana looked like she had been crying, too. Caitlin hadn’t seen Fana in three years, since the night she’d gotten the blood, and Caitlin was surprised at how tall Fana was now. She didn’t look like a kid anymore. Fana hugged Caitlin; and it felt good to be hugged. With Fana here and a nicotine bath, Caitlin felt safe for the first time since Seattle, like being in her mother’s arms.

“I promise I’ll get you out of here,” Fana said. “Just tell me what happened.”

“We’re busted, that’s what happened. I nearly got killed. But Dad doesn’t have anything to do with it. He doesn’t know anything.”

“Tell me everything, Caitlin.”

“Are you sure I should?”

“Of course.” Fana looked hurt, but Fana was one of them. Caitlin couldn’t forget that.

Right before Caitlin had gone to college, when Fana was fourteen, Fana had announced that Caitlin was her best friend—and she’d wanted to show her true self. As it had turned out, Fana’s “true self” had included freaky mind-tricks. And the blood.

Fana had told her the truth about Dad’s work: Caitlin’s father was using his corporation as a front to help Fana’s people distribute their blood in secrecy to heal sick people in parts of Africa and Asia. Caitlin had thought it was the most miraculous thing she’d ever heard. She used to.

Caitlin had tried to put the awful sound of Father Arturo’s cracking neck out of her mind, but now she had to relive it as she spoke in a hush directly into Fana’s ear. She’d be a fool not to think the room was bugged. “It’s Sunday night, and I’m meeting with Father A. People I trust vouched for him, and he was about to pass his six-month screen. That night, I went to meet him at his shelter for battered women. After I got there, your father broke his neck. I
saw
him do it.”

Fana’s eyes swam, lost. “I don’t understand. Why would Dad do that?”

Caitlin shrugged. “You tell me.”

Fana looked away from her, as if she’d been slapped. Fana was a Daddy’s girl to the bone. Some subjects were best avoided between them—especially the bloody day in Florida when their families had met for the first time. That day, Gramps had died, and Fana’s aunt and uncle had nearly died, too. Dad said that Dawit Wolde was the most frightening man he had ever met.

He killed her
.

Maritza’s face came to Caitlin’s mind suddenly; a perfect oval, like a doll. The thought of Maritza brought the memory of her hair’s smell; sweet milk and vanilla. Caitlin almost turned around to make sure Maritza wasn’t sitting behind them on the bed.

Fana reached over to squeeze Caitlin’s hand, and Caitlin held on tight.

Fana’s face had been the first to appear on her mobile video phone the night Maritza’s body had been found, not even ten minutes after Caitlin had gotten the news from the Miami Beach police. The memory of that night was still a cold blade in Caitlin’s stomach. It was the only memory worse than seeing Father Arturo killed.

Caitlin wiped her eyes. “I think they killed Maritza, Fana. Your p-people.”

“Why would they do that?”

Caitlin bit back her anger at Fana’s naivete. “Because she was counseling AIDS patients, and…” Caitlin’s voice broke off. She could not talk to Fana here. She couldn’t tell Fana how Mari had cleaned out thirty men, women and children, setting them free of the system, unless Fana mined it from her head. “Maritza was a good person, Fana.”

“I know she was.”

Caitlin took a deep breath. “Your father—”

Fana cut her off. “Dad didn’t kill Maritza. He wouldn’t do that.”

For all of her amazing gifts, Fana lived in a dreamworld, Caitlin thought. Just like Mari, who’d been laughing on the phone instead of using the right codes. Mari had never learned how to hide, to the point where patients had knocked on their apartment door late into the night.

“Do you really know he didn’t?” Caitlin said. “Or do you just hope not?”

“Something like that would have…come through.” Fana lowered her eyes. She always looked embarrassed when she talked about the way she had access to people’s heads.

Could Fana hear what she was thinking now?
Your father is a fucking murderer. Wake the hell up, Fana, or he and those other freaks will kill my whole family.

But Fana’s face didn’t change. Fana hadn’t heard, or she was ignoring her.

“Are you sure you know your father?” Caitlin said.

“I’m…pretty sure.”

So much for all-knowing. Caitlin shook her head, almost chuckling. “Don’t be.”

The weight across Fana’s eyebrows made her look like she wasn’t sure of her own name.

Stealing
. That word made Justin O’Neal clear his throat and pour another glass of water from the crystal decanter with an unsteady hand. No matter how much he drank, he couldn’t kill his thirst as he sat across the large oak table from his questioners. The large hall’s cedar scent was as sharp as incense, burning his throat.

Yesterday, Justin had gone to his office at Clarion World Health overlooking the East River on Wall Street like it had been any other day. He’d been preparing for a lunch with the ambassador from Ghana when they’d come with the news about Caitlin. Just yesterday.

Today, he and his daughter might be about to die. Caitlin had told him she’d seen Dawit kill a man yesterday. A priest! How did he know that Caitlin was still alive now; that they hadn’t killed Caitlin as soon as she was alone?

“I took five milliliters,” Justin said, his voice shaky. “Half a vial.”

“That was an intricate plan, Mr. O’Neal.” The man’s voice was almost congratulatory.

Two weeks ago, Justin had been in Ghana to inspect the two clinics in the Volta region, and he’d been pissed and scared: After he’d spent ten years helping them build their distribution network, these men still wouldn’t let him keep a few drops of the blood for his family’s safety. Their bigotry against anyone without the blood was infuriating. He wasn’t asking to live forever—he just wanted an emergency supply. How could they expect him to help thousands of other patients and leave his own family vulnerable?

But Justin never would have taken the blood if he had known Caitlin was selling Glow.

Justin raised his eyes to face the five dark men dressed in matching white tunics who sat in judgment in the tomblike, unadorned Council Hall. Justin kept his eyes on the small-boned man who had recited his offenses, the one they called Teka. Teka’s slight frame and immature face made him look like a boy, and his eyes were the only compassionate ones.

This was a trial, all right, but not by his peers. Could they even be called human?

Justin had been a defense lawyer before he’d gone corporate. He’d always been paid well for his ability to paint a bright picture, but he couldn’t choose a strategy. How could he keep Caitlin out of trouble without getting himself killed?

Justin glanced at Dawit Wolde, and the immortal’s eyes drove him away. He was wearing white hair and stage makeup, but Dawit’s eyes hadn’t changed.

“Remind me,” Dawit said. “How much do we pay you a year?”

“Two million, sir.”

“That’s a lot of money, even for someone with your expensive tastes,” Dawit said. “And how did we treat you when your wife had cancer?”

Justin’s hands curled into fists as he remembered the scare with Holly four years earlier. Ovarian cancer. She’d been so far along that her young doctor had blanched when he’d probed Holly’s insides with his hand. “You treated us well, sir. You saved her life.”

“Did Teferi refuse you what she needed? Did any of us object?”

“No, sir. Teferi treated me like a son.” Justin’s voice broke. “Dawit, it was
half a vial
—”

Dawit rose to his feet. “Yes. Half a vial. After we warned you that we do not tolerate theft of our blood. After we explained that we take the matter very personally, and that you must petition for personal use. We said this rule was
cardinal
. And you agreed, did you not?”

“Yes, sir. I broke that rule.”

Dawit gave him a bitter, steel smile. “In your father’s footsteps,” he said, glowering. “None of us need wonder why your daughter has so prodigiously taken up your family tradition. Caitlin far outshines you, I might add. Her offenses are far more impressive.”

He and Caitlin were both dead if they would be judged by his father!

More than a decade ago, long before Justin had imagined himself in this place or known about these people, Dad had prodded him into an outlandish plan to try to find “magic blood” he’d believed to be a part of their family history. Justin had thought his father had lost his mind, but as it had turned out, he had not. His medical reports had proven it: Dad had found a miraculous cure.

But Dad had always been greedy. He’d bullied Justin into hiring mercenaries to track down a clinic in Botswana for sick children—which, unfortunately, had been run by Dawit’s wife. The mercenaries had narrowly missed abducting Dawit’s wife and child, but they’d found blood. A lot of it.

They had also captured a scientist and a physician, a woman. Tortured and nearly killed them. The woman had been Dawit’s sister-in-law. During her rescue, Justin’s father had been shot and killed before his eyes.

Of course, Dad had had it coming. Justin knew that. But some of the dead had been innocent, undeserving of the massacre. They had died because Justin had made a telephone call, doing his father’s bidding. Justin was only alive to remember his shame because Teferi had pled with the other Africans to spare him after discovering that Justin was his direct descendant, two hundred years removed. And his position at his company, Clarion, had made him useful to them.

The choice is clear to us: Trust you or kill you,
Teferi had said.
We choose trust
.

Now their trust was gone.

“Do what you want with me, but please don’t touch my family,” Justin heard himself say. “I’m begging you. Whatever Caitlin’s told you, I talked her into it. She never wanted to have anything to do with the blood. I convinced her.”

A burly African who hadn’t spoken muttered something in a melodic language Justin didn’t understand, and the others chuckled. The chuckles horrified Justin in a way Dawit’s eyes had not. Was he only a plaything to these men?

“Justin.” Teka spoke quietly. The small man’s voice was fatherly, and Justin felt his fear melt away. Such a caring voice promised a reprieve. Teka went on: “In this Hall, among my Brothers, deception is your worst course. Each lie is known to us and serves as a deeper insult. Never lie to us again.”

Justin gazed at the knowing eyes around the table and felt scalded by the truth of Teka’s warning. These men not only had remarkable blood and lived for generations but they also knew when he was lying? Now he didn’t have to wonder how they had found out about the stolen vial!

“Jesus help me,” Justin whispered. His mind felt cast adrift.
Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name…
Justin couldn’t remember what came next in the prayer. He hadn’t been to a church in years.

“So, to clarify…,” Teka said. “You did not supply your daughter with diluted blood being sold outside of this colony. You did not know Caitlin was involved in the sale of this blood.”

Justin could only shake his head. His tongue was a useless lump in his mouth.

“Show him the photograph,” Teka said.

A color photo appeared on the table in front of him; Justin was so dazed that he didn’t see who had given it to him. An autopsy photo. Justin saw a nude, dark-haired woman, visible to midchest, her mouth hanging open in a face streaked with blood. Her chest was a collection of dark bruises and punctures that looked like knife wounds. Too many to count. The poor woman looked like a speared fish, her wounds gaping and fresh.