One of Us (16 page)

I want to ask him who Ril is. And tell him that I made a mistake. I look at him again. The breeze lifts his sandy hair. I promised him I would do this. I'm letting him down. My heart begins to hammer as I open my mouth to speak.

But Oskar speaks first.

“K,” he says, shifting sideways so that he can look straight at me. In the glittering sunlight his eyes look green. “There's something I have to tell you. It might come as a bit of a shock.”

Is this about the list? Or have they found something? Not about Greg? I feel the blood drumming in my ears.

“It's about your name,” says Oskar. “K Child. Your real name.”

He pauses, and I don't say anything, so he goes on.
“The thing is,” he says, “we've had to get rid of K Child.”

My hand grasps the metal railing.

“K Child is . . . gone,” says Oskar.

“What do you mean?” My voice is thin and dry.

Oskar's hand skims my back. He looks into my eyes and smiles. “K Child is dead.”

CHAPTER 17

E
VERYTHING GOES STILL
. All I can hear is the pulse deep inside my ears.
Dead. Dead. Dead.
The sunlight glints off the waves and into my eyes. I let myself breathe out, very slowly. The only thing that feels real is the metal railing I'm gripping.

“What do you mean?” I say again. I'm surprised how clear my voice sounds. “Dead?”

Oskar keeps his eyes on mine, but now his expression shifts. He looks relieved. “A girl was found,” he says. “Drowned. She was identified as K Child.”

“By ‘Sue Smith'?” I can't hide the hostility in my voice. “Or by you? What have you done? Who do you work for?”

Oskar puts his hand on my arm, stopping me from getting up. “No, actually,” he says, “it was staff from the halfway house, initially. You were registered missing. Sue Smith confirmed it. And you know who I work for, K.” He hesitates. “You have to remember the body was in the sea for a while. Decomposed beyond recognition.”

“Whose body?” Below us, green water swirls around the harbor supports.

Oskar shrugs. “Who knows? Just a girl. Nobody was looking for her. It was simply good timing.”

I try not to think about that girl, who has taken
my name to the grave. But I can't stop myself from asking. “What happened to her?” I don't care that my voice is shaky.

Oskar stares at me. “What?”

“Her body. What happened to it?”

Oskar looks out across the harbor. “It—she—would have been cremated. I suppose they scatter the ashes in the crematorium if nobody wants them.” He puts his arm across my shoulders and pats my back. “You're shocked,” he says. “Of course you are. Let's go back and have breakfast.”

“I don't want to be Verity Nekton anymore.” My voice is high and small, not like my voice at all. I can barely breathe.

“You don't have any choice,” says Oskar quietly.

“What if I find someone who remembers me? What then?”

Oskar takes hold of my arm. I can feel his fingers and thumb on either side of the bone. I stare into his eyes, and in the glare his pupils have receded to dots. He's going to push me off the harbor wall!

Then he laughs, and pulls me toward him. “It's not very likely,” he says. “You've got no papers—not anymore; Ril has seen to that. You hardly went to your school in the New City. You've moved around a lot, and we confirmed as part of our initial background check that your last foster parents emigrated to the southern hemisphere. The staff at the halfway house have changed since you left. Who else is there?” He jumps up. “Come on, let's go and get breakfast.”

I'm not hungry anymore. And my hand is fastened
around the railing. Frozen in place. It takes me a moment to uncurl my white knuckles. I twist my legs around and over, and slide down from the wall. Of course Oskar wasn't going to push me in. All the same, the trust we had feels broken.

I walk beside Oskar back along the promenade. Seagulls swoop and shriek over the nets on the mudflats. I wish I had Serafina's pink cardigan wrapped around me. The jeans are too big, and as I walk they crease into ridges behind my knees.

I stop beside the path that leads up to the castle. A dull ache grips my forehead. “Why did you do it?”

Oskar looks down at me. “Do what, K?”

“Take away my name,” I say. “Why did you take away my name?”

Oskar puts both his hands on my shoulders. “It's only a name.” He turns me to face him. “Bigger things were at stake. The Brotherhood are trying to destroy our whole society. And you agreed to it. Don't you remember, K?”

I shake my head. I don't remember anything now. But I see that I don't matter much in Oskar's world.

“I explained it all to you. You read the Manual about the Brotherhood so you'd know how to live like one.”

“But not forever!” I cry. “I thought it would only be until school finished!”

“You can't have thought that.” Oskar's voice is slow and patient. “What would be the use of that? You have a Brotherhood identity now; your fingerprints are in the Brotherhood database.”

“What?” I pull away from Oskar. “I never agreed to that!”

Oskar steps closer. “Yes, you did, K. Remember, in the cafe, when we got everything ready for your new ID card? We did it then—together.”

I cast my mind back, trying to remember. Did I read about the fingerprint database in Oskar's Manual? I don't know anymore.

Oskar puts his arm around my shoulders again. “The whole point is that you are now a trusted member of the Brotherhood. You've infiltrated the Institute—just as you were supposed to. And now you carry on until we need you.” He lets go of me and starts walking up the castle path.

I watch his back as he walks away. Then I run to catch up to him. I think of the suspicious way Brer Magnus looked at me in the hospital. I think of Greg following me. All the details I should report back to Oskar like a proper little spy. But I don't say them. I don't want Oskar ever to hear Greg's name.

“They might not let me stay on at the Institute,” I say when I reach Oskar. “What will happen then?”

He puts his arm back around me. “K,” he says. “Do you think we won't look after you? You're one of us now. Of course we won't leave you on your own.” He pulls me closer, into a hug. “You worry too much. Hasn't everything happened that I said would happen? Ril came to the school, and here you are now.”

Ril. “That's another thing.” I stop walking. “Who is Ril? Is she really a social worker?”

Oskar laughs. “I thought I explained it all before,” he says. “We don't operate within normal boundaries. Let's just say Ril's a talented computer programmer.”

“But then you planned it all before you even asked me!”

“Of course we did.” Oskar looks amused. “We're good at what we do.”

My special friendship with Oskar shatters into pieces. He just needed a girl who nobody would miss.

We walk on in silence through the castle playground, past children swinging and shouting in the bright spring sunshine. Then we cross the road and come out into a square where a tall building blocks out the sun.

It's Grandma's community center. I stare up at the oak door until I've eaten my tears. Oh, what would Grandma say, if she knew that I'd taken a Brotherhood girl's identity? I walk up the steps so that Oskar won't see my face.

A Brotherhood girl's identity.

Horror rushes through me. What if they killed the real one? Can the police do that? Maybe they can if they're antiterrorism? I feel myself become very still. Frozen, again.

“You're a bit quiet,” says Oskar.

I turn around. “The girl who drowned.”

Oskar has to lean forward to catch my whisper. Suddenly I feel scared again. What else might he be capable of? But I have to know.

“Was she . . . was she the real Verity Nekton?”

He stares at me in blank astonishment. Then he bursts out laughing. “No!” He splutters again. “No, no, no!”

“Why are you laughing?”

Oskar stops himself. “Sorry. Sorry.” But his eyes are still dancing. “It's your face.” He puts his arm
around me. “
You
are Verity Nekton. Or nobody is. It's just a name, that's all.”

“Not hers?”

“No!” He gives me a friendly shake.

Is he telling the truth? There are no twitches or tells of a liar. The terror evaporates.

“But I've lost everything.” I can let myself feel angry with him now. “My name. My things. My future. I don't know who I am anymore. And the Institute's not like I thought it would be either. It's pretty normal, really. It's just kids and teachers. They don't believe in violence. They're too busy trying to be good.” I kick one foot up and down the step, and wrap my arms around myself.

“K.” Oskar looks at me earnestly. “I told you it would be like that. But who knows what they're hiding?”

“But what's the point of me being there?”

“There
is
a militant cell linked to the Institute,” says Oskar. “You know there is. You gave us the name, Jeremiah Elyard—you'll give us the list of names from the Spring Meeting. They're the enemy within, you must never forget that. And maybe you'll be able to find something out now.”

“I don't know for sure that Jeremiah's involved in anything! I'm not a detective. I don't know how to do it.”

“It's early days, K,” says Oskar. “All you have to do is point out to me anyone you might suspect. No matter how trivial. Just indicate who to watch. We'll do the rest. If someone had done that before the Gatesbrooke bomb, think of how many people would still be alive.”

I go up a couple of steps so that he has to look up at me. “I don't know.”

“It's not for long.”

“How long?”

Oskar pauses. Then he says, “A year. Just one year.”

A year sounds a lot different from forever. I could plan my own future when it's over.

“And then I wouldn't have to be Verity Nekton anymore?”

“Absolutely not. You could choose a new name.”

People do that, don't they? Change their name. It's not
that
unusual. Look at me, I've already had two.

“What about my fingerprints?” I ask.

“Well,” says Oskar, “I'm sure Ril could find a way to get them removed from the database.”

I step down on to the pavement.

Oskar stays on the steps. I let my life run past me in a slide show of losses. The bomb that killed my parents. Grandma dying. Being moved when foster parents got sick or had a baby. I can't lose Oskar too. He saved my life. I can never forget that.

The only thing I chose to do myself was to go to the Institute. If I go back, I'll see them all again: Serafina, Celestina, Emanuel. And even Greg. I know we can't really be friends. But maybe it could lead to me being an artist. Maybe it could still be OK.

Oskar waits, smiling patiently.

“I don't know,” I say.

He comes down the steps. “Would it help if you could contact me whenever you want? I'll get you a cell phone you can use.” He touches my shoulder. “What about some breakfast first?” His eyes are alight with concern.

“OK.” I look back up at the community center. Why did Grandma go there every week but never take me? She never took me anywhere.

We pass through an alley that leads to the yard at the back of the cottage. Oskar stoops to take the key from under an upturned fire bucket. When he opens the door, the scent of sizzling bacon makes me feel almost faint with hunger. I follow him in.

Col is sitting at the kitchen table working through some papers. He looks up inquiringly at Oskar, who half-nods with a look of relief. In the front room the TV is blasting out the news channel. Oskar goes through the arch between the two rooms and sits down on the couch.

Ril is at the stove. “Tea, K?” She passes me a mug.

“Thanks.” I hover by the table. On the news they're showing another Brotherhood demonstration. Close-ups of chanting faces, and angry shouting that masks the actual words. I bet they never even filmed the citizen mob outside the Institute.

Col walks over to the archway to look at the TV. “Hoods.” His voice rises, competing with the television. “They always argue that they've been around for longer. That's true. But what they don't realize is that makes them obsolete. Like all life forms that don't evolve, eventually they'll just wither away.” He crosses the room in a couple of strides and turns off the TV.

I suddenly think of Fred, that day after the bomb:
Hoods—they'd kill us all if they could.

I take a sip of tea. If it wasn't so hot, I'd gulp it down in one go. Col doesn't seem to need a response.
Ril drops an egg into the pan. In the new silence it makes a soft hiss.