The Last Oracle (54 page)

Pyotr found her cowering in the train, rocking. She had hid out of sight of the cameras because he had asked it of her. She was part of the pattern. But for the moment, nothing mattered. He hurt, deeper than he’d ever been hurt. He simply needed her. Reaching her old heart, he cupped the flame gently and sent her all his love and his need.

She knew he was there and hooted gently, reaching to the empty air. In the dark tunnel, they wrapped around each other, sharing emotions at a level deeper than anyone else.

It was one of their secrets.

He had known the truth the moment they’d first touched hands. Pyotr knew the reason so many children loved Marta, came to her for comfort, to cry in her arms or to simply be held.

She had a talent, unknown to her keepers, a strong gift of empathy, like Pyotr. Two kindred spirits. So he kept her secret, and she kept his.

But it wasn’t their only secret.

There was a darker one, wrapped in terror, revealed in a way neither understood but both knew to be true. From the moment they first saw each other, they knew they would die together.

Gray watched the train accelerate down the tunnel toward the site of Operation Saturn. Monk had given him a thumbnail version of the purpose.

“But who’s in the train?” he asked. “Can we communicate with them?”

Monk held the boy as his small fingers were splayed on the screen. “I think Pyotr is already there. The boy knows how to operate the train.”

“But who’s on the train?”

“A friend.”

On the screen displaying the heart of Operation Saturn, the train pulled into view at the edge and braked. A dark shape hopped out of the front car and loped into the chamber.

“Is that a monkey?” Kowalski asked, stepping back.

“Ape,” Rosauro corrected with a sigh, as if she was tired of correcting the man. “A chimpanzee.”

“It’s Marta,” Monk said.

Gray heard the pain in his voice. A storm of radiation had to be surging through there. The figure moved slowly, slipping, knuckling awkwardly, already sick.

“What’s she trying to do?” Gray asked.

“Trying to save us all,” Monk answered.

Pyotr stayed with Marta. He pulled her flame close to his, not enough to be consumed, but so he could feed her his strength, let her know what she had to do, that she wasn’t alone. Likewise, he caught glimpses through her eyes, through her sharper senses.

He saw the column of roaring water. He felt a heat weakening and burning Marta. The air smelled like rotting fish and frightened both of them, a flow of dark water, from their shared nightmares.

Deadlier than any river.

But they faced it together.

Marta skirted around the gaping hole that swallowed the water so thirstily. It had to be stopped.

There was only one way.

Pyotr knew and told Marta. Konstantin had explained in detail how all the equipment worked: about the explosive charges, about the radio transmitters, about the giant silo doors.

He had also told Pyotr about the lever.

Marta needed no help. She spotted the rod of steel behind a piece of equipment. It could close the silo doors and stop the flow into the heart of the world. Pyotr felt the soft hoots of fear coming from her. He felt them under his own ribs.

You can do it, Marta…

She struggled, her skin burned, her fur fell like pine needles, her knuckles blistered in contact with the spray of water on the rock.

Pyotr held her flame and willed her strength.

She reached the lever. It was tilted close to the floor. It needed to be raised straight up. She hunched a shoulder under it, gripped the length with both hands, and heaved with her legs.

The steel would not move.

As death flowed behind her in a burning current, Pyotr felt the strain in her back, in her legs, in her heart.

Her flame flickered in his hands.

Marta…

But the lever would not move.

Monk watched Marta struggle with the lever. She was too weak. It would not budge. Pyotr began breathing hard, sharing the old chimpanzee’s fear and pain.

“Why won’t it move?” Gray asked.

“C’mon, you damn monkey!” Kowalski yelled.

Monk leaned closer, placing his own palm on the screen. He tried to remember the brief glimpse into the room as he had hurried past. As he
strained, a sharp jab of electric pain shot through his head. Images from another time and place flashed.

…a man covered in coal soot…a plunging ride in an ore car…a white grin against dusty skin…that’s a boy!…just like, Daddy…

Then it was gone.

Monk struggled to retain something, but like a dream upon waking, memory began to dissolve through his fingers. Why did that particular memory dredge up? Buried in it must be something important.

As the memory faded, he caught a glimpse of that coal-dust-covered man slowing the ore car by squeezing the—

“Hand brake!” he gasped out.

He flashed back to the brief peek into the mine site before. He pictured the lever. It’d had a handgrip at its end.

Monk turned to Pyotr. He leaned and whispered in his feverish ear. “Marta must reach to the end of the lever. She must squeeze the handle. Then it will move for her.”

Pyotr continued to stare, as if deaf to his words, and maybe the boy truly could not hear. Monk had to get him to listen.

Seeming to understand his frustration, the woman Rosauro stepped next to him. “How are they communicating? Telepathically?”

“No. I think
empathically.
Sharing emotions. I’ve seen him do it with her before. Just not at such a distance.”

“Then you’ll have to reach him the same way.”

Monk glanced at her, as if she were a madwoman.

Gray spoke. “Rosauro’s specialty is neurology. Listen to her.”

The woman spoke slowly. “Empathy is all about sensation and tactility. You might be able to reach them the same way. Offer something that comforts him. It may open a path.”

Monk pictured Pyotr and Marta. They had been always touching, rubbing, grazing against each other, but Monk remembered what brought the boy the greatest sense of security and comfort.

Shifting, he wrapped his arms around Pyotr as he had seen Marta do so often. He felt the boy’s heart race like a hummingbird’s. Rocking the boy very gently, Monk huffed in his ear and whispered what must be done.

He willed it with all his heart.

Squeeze the hand brake…

Pyotr stayed with Marta as she struggled with the lever—then felt a familiar warmth coming from behind him. He glanced over his shoulder and found a strong heart there, casting a fierce flame. He stared into that fire and sensed what must be done as much as he heard it.

He turned back to Marta and clasped to her, letting her know, too.

But his friend trembled and burned, growing so weak.

Please…

She hooted, scared, but one of her large hands slid up the lever and found the grip there. Long fingers wrapped around it and squeezed. Then she heaved again, shouldering the lever and pushing with her legs.

The lever moved, but it was still heavy. With shaking limbs, she fought it straight up and shoved it back. Something snapped loudly.

A great grind of gears sounded.

Exhausted and spent, Marta slumped to the ground.

“She did it!” Gray said.

On the screen, the hole in the floor began closing, snipping off the stream with a steel iris. The river of water, no longer able to drain below, flooded into the mining chamber.

The chimpanzee was flushed out of the room and into the tunnel, but more and more water followed. Though clearly exhausted and burned, she gained her feet and swung atop the train car. As black water rose around her, she loped back and forth across the roof, scribing a path of panic and distress.

Gray’s heart went out to the poor creature.

“Get that damned monkey out of there, for Christ’s sake!” Kowalski bellowed. He slammed a fist on the broken control board.

But there was nothing they could do. The doors were jammed, and water was swiftly filling the tunnel, which was sealed at both ends. Even if
they could open the doors, the radiation level would kill them all. And ultimately, the chimpanzee had already been exposed to many times the lethal dosage.

Rosauro turned her back and stepped away, covering her mouth with concern.

Finally, the old chimpanzee settled to her haunches, hugging her knees. She began to rock. She knew what was coming.

Monk clutched the boy, a single tear running down his cheek.

In his arms, the boy rocked, too, in exact synch with his friend in the tunnel.

Pyotr stayed with Marta as the waters rose. Her heart flashed and swirled in fear. She’d always known the dark water would kill her. He held her now, as she had done with him so many times in the past. He wrapped his warm arms around her and pulled her tight. They rocked together one last time, two hearts sharing one flame.

Marta knew his secret, too.

She hooted softly and leaned her cheek against him.

Pyotr…

I love you, Marta…

As the waters rose to consume his friend, Pyotr looked into the dark sea that filled him, shining with seventy-seven bright lights, swirling around a brighter fire that was his own heart. One of his teachers had told him how planets circled suns, trapped in their orbits.

He understood.

He knew by consuming those stars he could never let them go. This was no nightmare where he stole only a little of their skill. He had crossed a line of no return. As he stared, he saw those stolen lights grow infinitesimally dimmer. He was burning them up, consuming his friends, his sister.

There was only one way to let them go.

It was the other reason he came to Marta.

He needed her.

Pyotr…no…

You must…

He felt her hands reach tentatively to that bright light inside his dark sea. Her long warm fingers wrapped around his own heart.

Pyotr…

But she knew. For the others to live, there was only one path. The others were trapped in his orbit, and if left unchecked, he would burn through them all. The only way to free them was to take away the sun that held them. Then the stars could fly back and return to where they belonged.

So Marta squeezed and squeezed as dark waters rose around her. Focused on him, she was no longer scared. As they rocked, she closed her fingers tenderly, but it still hurt.

Then just before Pyotr’s light fully died, he reached to a single star in that dark sea, slightly brighter still than the rest.

Sasha,
he whispered and told his sister a secret.

The boy suddenly slumped in his arms. His small hand fell away from the screen. He saw Marta’s body get washed from the top of the train and swirl off into the darkness of the tunnel.

Monk lowered the boy to the floor. “Pyotr?

The boy stared blindly toward the ceiling, pupils dilated. Monk checked for a pulse. He found one but barely. The boy’s chest rose and fell.

Overhead, small cries and screams echoed down. The other children. They were waking, rising to find a room full of dead bodies.

Gray pointed. “Rosauro, Kowalski, go up and help them!”

Monk glanced to the grainy image from the other end of the tunnel. He watched kids stirring, others already standing. He saw Konstantin help Kiska sit up.

They were okay.

“What about the boy?” Gray asked.

Monk sat on the floor and cradled his thin body. Pyotr breathed, his blood pumped, but Monk stared into his blank eyes and knew the boy was gone.

Pyotr…why?

Gray joined him and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Maybe it’s shock. Maybe with time…”

Monk appreciated the offer of hope, but he knew the truth. As he had held the boy, he had felt the child let go. Monk’s gaze returned to the screen full of stirring children. Monk knew. Pyotr had sacrificed his life for them, for all his brothers and sisters.

Gray settled to his haunches next to him, keeping vigil with him.

The stranger seemed like a good man, and in this quiet moment alone, Monk felt a certain comfort around the guy. Not a memory, just a sensation that he could drop his guard without fear.

So Monk felt no shame as tears rolled heavily and he rocked Pyotr one last time, now just an empty shell of a boy.

22

September 28, 4:21 P.M.
Washington, D.C.

Painter crossed through the rabble of tents and wagons covering the national Mall. The Gypsy encampment filled the grassy fields and long meadows of the Mall. The tents were a mix of traditional structures made of hazel rods thrust into the ground and covered in sailcloth, and more modern tents, fresh from a sporting goods store. The wagons were just as diverse, from simple structures to massive homes with smoking chimneys resting on tall painted wheels.

The Romani had come from all around the world to this great gathering. Horses were corralled in makeshift pens, children ran throughout, music rang out, great bouts of laughter echoed. And more and more were arriving each day.

The president had an official thank-you ceremony scheduled for the end of the week. Nothing like saving someone’s life to get them to extend a grateful hand of hospitality. Not to mention saving the world.

Painter followed a path through the chaos as dogs barked and children scampered out of his way. Tourists also shared the crooked alleyways and narrow bazaars, buying trinkets, having their fortunes told, or merely ogling the merry mayhem. Painter glanced up at the Washington Monument to help align himself and continued onward.

Stepping around a corner, a space opened in front of him, backed by one of the largest and most elaborately decorated wagons. Its wooden doors stood open. Painter spotted a cozy home with a raised double bed,
cabinets brightly painted and lacquered in yellows and reds. There was even a small stove with a fancifully carved mantelpiece.

On the steps leading up to the wagon, Painter found Luca sitting with Gray, deep in conversation. The commander’s arm was still in a sling. A few steps away, Shay Rosauro was playing a game of daggers with a group of Gypsy men. One of her blades whistled through the air and hit the bull’s-eye, knocking off an opponent’s knife. From their plaintive calls for mercy, she must be soundly besting them.