Unbound (2 page)

"We're almost there," he told her. She turned the radio on but it hissed static all the way through the signal search, and she switched it off in frustration. Her dad had made her leave her headphones, which sucked, but he said it was important to listen. What she was listening
to
, other than him, she had no idea. "You'll leave your tablet in the car, along with your phone. No electronics of any kind inside the Citadel. Don't forget that."

"You've told me a million times. I know."

He reached out a hand and put it palm up on the velour seat between them. "I'm proud of you, Sammy. You know that, don't you?"

"I know," she said, and as the car rounded a vast, tight corner of the road, the trees broke apart on the stone of the mountain, and she found herself gripping his hand in sudden, electric fear.

The Citadel.

Surrounded by a no-man's-land of three separate fences, with nothing growing between them, the building was an enormous, lightless block rising far higher than she'd ever expected. It was real.
Real.
And suddenly, the weight of what she was expected to do hit her in ways that she had never understood. She clutched her tablet in her right hand, still holding onto her dad with the other, and had a wild impulse to take a photo of this place and send it to her friends. She knew she couldn't do that. Couldn't tell them where she was going, or why.

Because the world out there, down the mountain . . . the world couldn't know.

Chatar Singh stopped at the first of the gates and typed in a long string of code numbers at a keypad. The process repeated, with different numbers, at the next gate. The third required a retinal scan as well as a new code. "Once you begin, you'll receive your personal entrance codes when your duty period begins," he told Sammy. "You'll be expected to memorize them. They change every month, and you can't cheat and put them in your phone."

"Okay." Her voice was small now as the last gate cranked open. There were armed guards patrolling this last fence, in plain black uniforms with no insignia on them. No flag emblems. Her dad parked the Nissan in the lot off to the left; there were about thirty cars and trucks, all civilian models. "How long has this place been here?"

"Not long. Less than fifty years. But the Citadel . . ." He hesitated for a few seconds, then shrugged. "It isn't a place, exactly. More of an entrance to the place. You'll see."

She didn't want to let go of her dad's hand, but she knew she had to. He'd expect her to be courageous. He always had. "Before we go in there, I have to ask you something," she said. "You're not going to like it. But I—need to know."

"All right."

"Did you and Mom ever really love each other?"

It surprised him, and he stopped unbuckling his seatbelt to turn to stare at her. "Of course! Your mother and I were very much in love. Our marriage was as it should have been: one spirit, two bodies. Why would you think . . . ?" He caught himself and shook his head. "Because of our divorce. Why wouldn't you?"

"Well, it is kind of a clue something went wrong. What? Because she won't tell me. Was it me?" She'd always believed that, in some vague, undefined way.

"No. Of course not." He was silent for a few seconds, and she saw the discomfort in the set of his mouth, the way he focused away from her. "She saw something that shook her faith. Made her doubt—everything. And she retreated. I couldn't hold her. I still love your mother, but we have to be separate now. It's better for her that way."

"Was it because of this place? Did she come here with you?"

"Once." He cleared his throat, as if it had suddenly started to pain him. "Did she tell you that?"

"No, I just sort of figured it out. It's why you told me not to tell her. Right? She wouldn't want me to come here. She wouldn't let you bring me if she knew."

"Yes. That's true. Your mother wants to protect you."

"And what do you want?"

He didn't answer. He let go of her and unfastened his restraint and was out of the car before she could draw breath to ask anything else.

There wasn't much choice. She couldn't cower in here like a child. Sammy popped the door and got out, remembering to lay her phone and tablet on the car seat at the last minute.
No electronics.
It felt weird.

Her father, standing, topped her by almost a foot, and she was not a small young woman; she liked sports, and exercise, and she had long legs built for running. Today, she wore jeans and a simple bright-blue top; she hadn't intended the color to match her dad's
chola
, but it almost did. She didn't wear the scarf anymore, though she had for a while. She'd gotten too much hassle for it in school, and since she wasn't a fully practicing Sikh anymore, it didn't seem worth it.

She knew he was disappointed by that and didn't know quite how to explain to him how sorry she was. But at the same time, not soked. It seemed impossible. Terrifying, in a way. "He did all of this? How long has he been here?"

"In the Citadel?" Her father shrugged. "For as long as I can remember. But the Citadel is not always where we entered. He's
here
. Just not always
there.
"

That didn't make sense. None of this made
sense.

The hissing of chalk was louder here, and her father slowed and pulled her closer. "Sammy. I talk, you don't. If he tries to speak to you, don't answer. Understand?"

"I understand." She didn't, but she would try.

He kissed her on the forehead and embraced her, and she realized that
he
was scared . . . not for himself. For her. "I love you," he said. "And I know you are brave. Now come."

It hit her how much she'd missed him, suddenly, and it was because of the scent of clean sandalwood and lemon and faint, masculine sweat. It unlocked so many memories of being a little girl, carried in strong arms, of playing in the sun, of love and joy. She melted into his arms and found herself on the verge of tears, suddenly, but then she remembered that she wasn't a little girl, and this wasn't a reunion.

She pulled back and made herself strong again.

"Remember," he said, "he isn't what he seems to be. Ever. You can't trust what you see."

She'd asked her father many times about the captive, but he had never answered her. The book he'd had her read hadn't cast much light on the mystery, either, and as they turned the corner, she knew why. After one long, unblinking stare, Sammy averted her gaze from the man kneeling in front of the wall. Her heart lurched, then pounded in a frenzied rhythm, and she felt hot, as if she'd stood in the full glare of the sun for too long. It wasn't that he glowed; he was just a man, on his knees in the corner, painstakingly chalking tiny words on a wall. A
young
man, beautiful, with skin the color of old bronze, and hair of silky black, cut loose around his face. He hadn't turned to face her.

She wasn't sure she could bear it if he did.

Her father had stopped with one hand on his
kirpan.
When she looked at him, she saw that he was staring at a spot in the middle distance, not focusing on the captive at all. It helped, when she tried it. She could see the outlines of the man, but not the detail. He could have been anyone.

That didn't slow her heartbeat, or calm her irrational terror.

"
Salve
, honored sir," her father said, in a quiet, calm voice. "How are you today?"

"I am well, Chatar," the man said. "And who is this lovely creature you bring today?" He had not turned, nor stopped his delicate, constant writing, even though the chalk was worn down to a thin sliver held tight in his fingers. He wore a loose white robe and his feet were bare.

He had called her lovely
.

"I present my daughter Samarjit. We call her Sammy, for short."

"Samarjit," the man repeated, and in his mouth, it was glorious music. "It means
one who wins the war
. Did you know that, Sammy?" Except for how he said her name, he had no accent at all, to her ears, which meant he had an American accent like a newscaster's, from somewhere in the Midwest like Kansas or Iowa or Indiana. "When I was last in the world, it was still a name only for boys. I see that situation has improved."

She started to answer, because he was speaking to her, to
her
, but her father's touch on her arm reminded her better. She kept silent, and her dad said, "My daughter is true to her name. You may count on that."

"You haven't called me by
my
name, Chatar. Are you afraid to have her hear it?"

"She must decide your name for herself, as you know. What she sees is not what I see. What she hears is not what I hear. That is your gift."

"More of a curse, to be fair." The chalk snapped suddenly and fell from his fingers, and he scrabbled desperately around him for the pieces. His fingers trembled, and she saw his whole body convulse when the tiny fragments powdered in his grip. He reached out for a box next to him, and found it empty. "No. No.
No.
"

"Allow me," Chatar Singh said. He stepped forward and crouched a few feet from the man, opened the box of chalk he held, and extended one. It was white chalk, the same color as what had broken. He placed the box down in easy reach of the captive, and then the second box, filled with blue. "We are here to be of service."

The man sobbed and snatched the fresh chalk from her father's hand, and began scribbling frantically, as if he had time to make up. After a few seconds, he breathed easier, and the rhythm slowed to a more deliberate speed. "Thank you," he said. "You are a wise man. Have you explained me to your daughter yet?"

"Only you can explain what you are."

The man laughed. It sounded weird and hollow, and she thought that it might have been angry, too. "Of course, Chatar Singh. Now that she's here, I know why you love her more than anything in this world. It explains why you named me as you did."

Her father said nothing to that. He stood up and backed away, still staring into the unfocused distance, and made a formal bow. He turned and walked back to Samarjit, and whispered, "Take him your chalk. Do not get close."

She didn't want to do this anymore. She felt sick and light-headed now, and it was hard to breathe. But she couldn't let her father see her fear, could she? He expected more of her, and she had never wanted to disappoint him. Not the way her mother had.

She walked forward and crouched down, in exactly the same spot her father had chosen. She took the top off the box and slid that offering over next to the other two her father had delivered.

Her hand was still extended when the captive turned fast as the hiss of a whip, and his fingers wrapped around her wrist. The contact burned like a bracelet of heated metal, and she cried out and tried to jerk backward, but it made no difference. No difference at all. She was not strong enough to break free.

No one could be that strong.

"Samarjit." He sounded different, so close, so soft. Her name still sounded like a prayer on his lips. "Are you afraid of death?"

She looked at him, directly into his face, into the endless black fall of his eyes, the madness of his smile. The feelings that swept over her were indescribable . . . longing, need, anguish, horror, hunger, rage, so many, so fast, so intense that she felt burned black by them.

And then she saw him.
Truly
saw him. Not the pretty, pretty face or the flawless skin or silken hair. Not the disguise he wore to save those who came here.

She saw the whole world dying in blood and horror and pain and fear and fire, dying and being reborn, over and over. His lips were close to her ear now, close enough that his cool breath puffed against her hair. "I am not mad. The world is mad. It must be made sane." He smelled of burning and blood.

Her father was shouting her name, and she saw from the corner of her eye that he was lunging forward with his
kirpan
out and ready to strike. It took only a single, sharp glance from the captive to freeze him in place, with his
kirpan
half raised. She could see the panic in his eyes, the struggle to be free and come to her.

The captive held tight to Sammy's right wrist, and she could no more have broken that hold than ripped away her own arm. The screaming inside her faded to a whisper—not gone, no, never gone now, but she could keep it quiet.

"What are you?" she whispered then. It sounded rational, calm, controlled. It was not.
She
was not.

"Name me and we will both know," he said.

"I can't!" She stared past him, at the frozen-in-place form of her father, who was breathing in short, agonized gasps. There were tears running from his eyes down his cheeks, wetting his beard. "Please let my father go," she said. "Please."

"If I let him go now, I will have to kill him. Is that what you want?"

"No!"

"Then he must stay there until you name me," the captive said. He was still writing with his left hand. He had never stopped, she realized, even as he held on to her. "What am I?"

"You're—you're a demon!"

"So speaks the Christian in you. What if I told you that this is
my
hell? And you are
my
demons?"

"I'm not!"

"Sweet Samarjit, you are exactly that to me. Demon. Master. Slaver.
Monster
." He smiled wider this time, and she caught her breath at the sharpness of his teeth. "All these things, you are. And so you must name me."

"Or?"

"There is no
or
. Name me and I let you go."

"What does my father call you?"

"That's his name. It isn't yours. If you want to live,
name me
!" His face twisted into something no longer beautiful, and she saw his hunger, saw how he wanted to destroy her, her father, the Citadel, the
world.
He was a wounded and angry creature, hobbled and helpless, and it hurt to see it.

"No," she said.

He snapped her wrist.

She screamed. It was a high, thin, shocked sound, more surprise than pain at first, but the pain came fast behind in electric waves that pulsed red behind her eyes. "Let go!"

"Name me!" he roared and twisted her arm. More bones shattered. She shrieked and cried and battered at him, and while he broke her apart, one bone at a time, his left hand continued that steady, rapid scrape of chalk on walls. "Name me and live!"