Page 15

The word, sharp and sudden, constricts my chest, seeming to bring the world back to this room, this moment. Dirk has been gagged. I glance him past Cassandra, his shirt pulled askew, one man holding his arms while the other grips his head to stop him from whipping the gag clear of his mouth.

White specks of light flash. Cameras, from the other side of the street. I feel disconnected from them, like a fish inside a tank, with children tapping on the glass. Meanwhile I'm in here with sharks.

Someone else inside this room yells. Everyone stops. And then I see why.

Tristan has the gun, my gun, levelled at Cassandra. She looks surprised, but then her smile returns, even if it is tremulous. "You won't shoot me, Tris."

He doesn’t respond, but I see the waver in his cuffed hands as he keeps the gun levelled. I hear my heart pounding in my ears. "I said let them both go. You can take your grief out on me. Not them."

"I don't want to!" she screams, like a petulant child, or the absolute nut-job of a woman that she is, and her next words are spoken so evenly that I briefly believe she might be lucid after all, "And you won't pull that trigger."

She’s not sane, but she’s right. The moment the gun wavers, lowering just an inch, I know we’re done. I know my future is that metal frame and plaster and death.

Dirk’s lunge is almost too fast to register.

He shouldn’t have been able to break away from the two men holding him. But one of them was distracted trying to gag him, to stop him from drawing attention up from the street, and the other was holding his arms alone. Only because of that, is he able to tear free for the split second it takes to dive forward.

At the last moment, Cassandra sees him coming for her, and she tries to back away. But too late.

Dirk’s hand snaps around her throat, his knuckles white and bulging with the power and the anger of his grip. One arm holds her frail body out at arm’s length. I see the pads of his fingers digging deep into her tendons, and he turns to pull her further out, over the edge, until her heels dangle over nothing but space.

Shouts lift from below. They’ve seen her. They’ll see him too. The cameras are flashing from the other rooftop.

"Dirk don't!" I scream.

He doesn't move. Cassandra chokes, the sounds almost soft, her feet scrabbling for the edge.

Tristan has already levelled the gun at Dirk instead. I stumble forward, a step away from being in the path of the bullet should Tristan fire. "Just because I saved you once doesn't mean I won't shoot you now," Tristan tells him. "Let. Her. Go."

Still, Dirk doesn't move. I see Cassandra’s veins stick out on her forehead. "You shoot me, she drops. I’ll make sure of that," he says, gaze never leaving the struggling woman, his torturer, at the end of his arm. The fire glows off him, new fuel flaring through Crennick.

"Dirk, don't! Please," I sob the last word.

Dirk is speaking to her, not me, not Tristan. "He won't kill you, but I fucking will."

Cassandra tries to speak but croaks instead. Her eyes find Tristan, pleading, bulging.

"You were going to kill her. You were going to kill me. You tried to ruin my life." Dirk’s hand, somehow, finds room to tighten. Her neck is scored red where his fingers have dragged. "You dug your little knives in…" He’s on the edge, about to squeeze the life out of her, or throw her and accept the bullet. Even if it’s not the bullet, everyone will see what he’s done. He’ll have committed murder with cameras and the eyes of all Tregam on him.

A siren bleeps again then is cut off, followed by the sound of a car window smashing. Probably our backup. I don’t care. They won’t get here in time.

"Don’t!" I cry, and finally, Dirk’s eyes, haunted, confused and lost, find me. Even if he survives killing her, he'll go to prison. "I want you here, with me,” I plead, my voice giving out as I go on, “Please don't go."

His eyes drift back to Cassandra. I'm losing him.

“I said let her go.” Tristan’s voice joins the mix, and he steps forward, as though to make Dirk heed the gun. But one look from Dirk and he stops in his tracks, perhaps seeing intention behind his eyes. Any closer, and he’ll kill her.

Cassandra’s men have moved forward, finally working out that they should do something, lifting their own weapons. But they don’t know who to worry about—Tristan, Dirk, or me. One with a baseball bat stands behind Dirk, waiting, perhaps on the edge of trying something brave.

So many ways I could be about to watch him die..

I’m broken by the fear, by needing to make it to the end of this moment, and fearing how that end will come. How can it end with Dirk alive? And still mine? I need a miracle, and those don’t come often in Tregam.

The words are weak from my lips, hopeless; "I love you, Dirk. Please, don't go," But he's already lost to me. I’m on my knees, at the end of how much I can bear. To lose him now will destroy me. But that’s what’s going to happen.

Moments pass. Cassandra’s gurgling continues. I lift my head.

And find that Dirk is watching me instead. I must paint a broken picture. Infinitesimally, Dirk’s brow softens, and the real him returns to the light behind his eyes.

Cassandra is gasping her last in his hand. Abruptly, suddenly, Dirk lets her go.

But not off the side of the building. He tosses her back to the rubble, where she heaves for breath through a destroyed throat. Dirk throws himself down to me, holding me tight in his arms, but I can't stop sobbing, the utter destruction of thinking he was lost to me worse than when she'd chosen me. I clutch him desperately, wetting his shoulder with my face.

Within moments, Cassandra has stumbled to her feet with a pain-overcoming ability only the mad have. "Kill them!” Her voice croaks out. “Both! Shoot them!"

Dirk’s hand comes over my head, surrounding me with himself.

Needler doesn't give them a chance to get a shot off. Before Cassandra’s words are done leaving her mouth, he shoots the two men who’d handled Dirk, each square between the eyes, and then the morbidly fat man who dragged me. He goes tumbling out of the building, the loud wet thump reaching us amid shocked screams seconds later.

The three left hesitate, knowing they can shoot at us, but none are game or brave enough to reach for their gun first. They didn't sign up for their own deaths. Just other peoples.

Cassandra’s small fists shake. "I have more of them! They’re coming."

She’s telling the truth. I hear the footsteps, either they’re retreating from the mob at their gates, or they’ve come because of the commotion, to serve their mad chosen leader till the end.

I remember them, so armed, so ready to use them. When they get here…

I close my eyes, burying my face into Dirk's shoulder. I so wanted a life with him, to move in together, to go home to him, to wake up with him. To find ease through practice in saying the words I love you .

The footsteps are closer, pounding up the stairs. "It’s okay,” Dirk is murmuring, the rage of moments ago forgotten in a voice now gentle. His thumb strokes my hair. But I feel his tears against my neck. Neither of us wanted this to be over.

The men are here, calling to Cassandra. She never stopped screaming, shouting. I just stopped hearing it. I know she’s pointing at us as she orders them to shoot.

There's a bang. I flinch.

But it’s just the one. No more.

Cowering, I brave looking up from the comfort of Dirk’s chest.

Cassandra stands with her back to Tregam. There’s a dark spot in the middle of her chest, and Needler is lowering his gun slowly, watching on in something like surprise and closer to horror.

For her part, Cassandra looks shocked, confused, and then scared. Dark ink drips down her chest, her stomach, and by the time it registers to me as blood, she’s tipping backwards, out and down.

I barely hear her connect with the ground, but I hear the gasps of the crowd.

Dirk’s arms loosen, and my hand trembles in his as I climb to my feet.

The tar of the road below is shiny, wet from sleet but glowing from the fires.

Her body is contorted. Blood has sprayed in an uneven circle around her, a circle now treated like yellow tape by the crowd. They lean over it, peering at her.

I’m waiting for her to move. That, like a cockroach, she’ll crawl back up through the drain.

The people are thick on the road now. It could really be half of Tregam. The name Cocooner circulates, soft, almost whispered. Maybe they don’t believe the Cocooner could be dead either.

But she is dead.

Cocooner is dead. And in the end, it was Needler, after all.

When I turn, Dirk is staring down, his brow smooth. Not smiling, not quite that, but peaceful.

Her men are still in the room. They look between each other now, bereft of their leader. Needler has his back to them, motionless, staring at the spot Cassandra disappeared from. They could shoot him. Nothing could stop them if they wanted to.

Dirk steps up to Tristan, snatching the gun from where it dangles from his fingertips.

He doesn’t point it, only faces the group. "She's dead! The mob is on its way to tear you lot apart. Want to piss them off more by killing the city darling?"

I don’t know if he’s talking about himself or Needler. If they know, it doesn’t seem to matter. What was holding them together shatters, and when the first one turns, the rest scamper after him.

The smell of smoke is oppressive now. This building will be going up too before long.

Tristan sways, blank, still rooted to the spot from where he killed his sister. As though what he’s just done was real, but what’s coming now is a dream. I step up to him, touching his shoulder. "Thank you."

He looks at me, blinking. I don’t know if he sees me at all. "She wasn't going to stop," he says softly, like he's just now realising that. I see now that he’d held out hope. That she could be saved, could become the girl he grew up with again. But that was always impossible. She could never come back from that. And maybe Tristan can’t either.

His eyes search my face, and I’m certain at that moment that he’s slipped somewhere beyond here, beyond functioning. Dirk grabs his arm as he starts to sway, throwing it over his shoulder to hold our killer up. I step back as Dirk turns them toward the door. "What’s wrong with him? Did she…"

"It’s just shock," Dirk says. "We need to get out of here. Before it burns to the ground."

Needler comes back sometime around the oval, pulling away, stumbling, falling to all fours in the dirt. The shouts towards the entry tell me Cassandra’s followers have been caught or are in the process of being run down by the same mobs that have set fires across Crennick. A helicopter flies somewhere above, the spotlight cutting through the smoke high above. Too far above to be of use. They can’t get caught in the thickest of the smoke.

Sirens are popping up from all directions. Backup didn’t go quite the way we planned, the mob too dense. I see now, just how many people turned out tonight. They flood into the school, some searching the corners and the buildings for any more of Cassandra’s followers, but most swarm the oval. If there’s so many here, there must be thousands out there.

Behind them, the police are shouting, a vain attempt to gain order. They may as well give up.

The city belongs to the people tonight. It’s been taken back from Cocooner.

The crowd falls past us like a flood. Dirk turns, craning his neck in the direction of the police shouts. Our names are on their tongues. Not just for us. They want to get Needler back before it’s too late. They think he’s going to slip away, this ruined man clutching the ground like the world is trying to spin him right off. Needler has sat back on his heels, staring sightlessly at his hands. When Dirk looks at me, I nod slightly.

I come to the other side as he claps Tristan on the back. "Come on," Dirk grunts, pulling the near-limp man to his feet. Once he’s stable, Dirk lets him go and turns his back. With a last lingering look at me, he’s lost in the crowd, out of sight in the direction of the police and the media. People bump into Tristan and me as they fill the oval, retreating from the acrid smoke thick on the air outside.

I cup Tristan’s face in my hands, making him still. "Breathe."

He does as I say, and awareness comes back to his eyes, along with the grief, the fresh guilt. The anger of rioters has dissipated. The object of their ire smashed is on the pavement, her followers beaten. Now the violence turns to quiet vigil. We two have become a central point, whispers spreading outwards.

Here is Needler. And he killed Cocooner for them.

"You're Needler,” I tell him. “You did what you had to do."

"Not anymore." He manages a difficult smile, hand coming up, his fingers brushing mine where I hold his face. "Little Shadow."

I laugh at the name, tears rolling down my face.

I'm never going to see him again.

"Isn't there something you have to do?" he asks me.

"There is." I smile. But it’s not arresting him. Leaning in, I briefly press my lips to his, then step towards him, pushing him back into the waiting arms of those who have loved him all along. "Goodbye," I say. He frowns briefly in wonder or confusion. The gentle hands are taking him, whisking him through the ranks, far away from here and any waiting cell.

I watch his blond head disappear in the sea of people.

He’s gone.

I take a trembling breath, feeling a hollow space in my chest ache.

Dirk’s hand on my hip tells me he's back. The rioters linger on the field, largely numb to the demands of the police still railing at the edges. They won't find Needler, I'm sure of that. I lean back as Dirk’s arms encircle me. Now that it’s done, I’m bone tired, weary beyond measure.

"It was the right thing?" I ask.

His lips brush my temple. I close my eyes. The oval is clearing as smoke sifts down. "It was the right thing," he promises.

Dean and Howie find us. Dean has a bruise forming on his temple, and Howie looks somehow singed but otherwise none the worse for wear. "Where’s Needler?" Dean asks, out of breath.

"He escaped in the confusion after Cocooner fell."

“Jesus, maybe they’ll find him.”

“Maybe.”

"So that was really her?" Dean asks eagerly, then shares a look with Howie. "It’s over?"

Howie shakes his head. "The night’s not over for us."

We push through back towards the exit. The street is crowded, though some filter off to find a safe place from the blaze now glowing off of Crennick.

“This will get the guard called on Tregam for sure,” I say.

“Why? It’s just a fire, it got out of hand,” Howie returns, and I give him a look.

“He’s right. If Syr comes through, there won’t be anything about arson or rioters in the state news until the ash has settled.”

“You can’t bury something like this,” I point out, grimacing at the flames licking high from an old wooden slum.

“You don’t need to bury it,” Howie tells me. “You just need to delay it long enough that they don’t care about the truth when they do know it.”

Maybe he’s right. Maybe I’m too tired to care anymore. Let the guard come. What more can be done to us?

The street is wide, the heat a sharp glow on the sides of our faces as we walk down the opposite side. If anything, the closest flames seem to be dying, running out of fuel as the fire’s trajectory takes it further into the heart of Crennick

We reach the corner and the one police car still stationed by the two dead bodies that fell from above. There are no police in sight, and the patrol car has smashed windows. Someone tried to set up yellow tape around the bodies, but it’s trampled and rolling in the slight breeze now.

Cassandra’s body is a contorted, blackened figure. Someone set her on fire, and half of her is burned away, the other half easily recognisable. Her eye is open.

For a moment, the four of us just stare at her. She seems so small, so insignificant now. For everything she did.

The wail of the fire engines makes me realise how fast everything happened. It can’t have been much more than an hour since we first pulled up. A whole lifetime can fit into an hour when it needs to.

The heat makes us sweat, and we're all slick with soot. As our backup rolls up, we turn away from Cassandra’s body and try to help pull the onlookers back from the burning side of the road.

“The fire truck can’t get through,” I tell one girl.

“I know.” She tugs away from me. Looking at her, I realise she might only be a teenager. And I see what they’re doing as I glance down the line of the curb. The fire engine hoots vainly. And the people all stay in a line, hands linked.

A dozen or so men in protective gear hop out of the truck, facing the crowd which doesn't want to let them through. More sirens in other directions cut off. I can imagine they’re coming up against similar barriers to this one, all along the edge of Crennick.

Because the people have decided. Crennick is beyond saving.

Tonight, it all burns.

"What do we do?" I murmur.

"It’s time to let it go," Howie says. Dirk’s hand slips into mine, and I see the flames reflected in his eyes.

We all stand back, and do nothing.

***