Solon's body stiffened and fell forward. He crashed to the veranda like a felled tree. Eureka rolled him onto his back and tore at the chain mail near his neck until her fingers burned. The mask was as welded to Solon as he had been devoted to his final mission.
"Is he dead?" Cat asked.
Eureka rested her head against his chest. Still as ice. The smooth silk of Solon's bathrobe was wet against her cheek. She waited for breath.
A single labored wheeze came from Solon's chest. Eureka grasped his shoulders. She wanted his face to reveal the truth of things--why he had done this, what Ander's fate was, what would become of Eureka and her quest to save the world--but his expression behind the mask was cloudy.
Maybe it was a lie. Maybe artemisia didn't kill Seedbearers vicariously. Maybe Ander was still alive underwater and would ride a wave over the rail of the veranda, so she could hold him like she had in her bedroom in Lafayette, when love was new.
Maybe the next time she saw Brooks he would just be Brooks, and what possessed him would be gone like a disease someone found a cure for.
Maybe she hadn't flooded the world with her tears. Maybe she had nothing to do with it. Maybe it was another rumor spun by girls leaning into water fountains.
Maybe her parents and Madame Blavatsky and Rhoda and the Poet were alive and could inspire and frustrate and love her still.
Maybe the nightmare of these past months really was a nightmare, an indulgence of her wild imagination, and soon she would wake up, put on her running shoes, race the sun as it rose along the misty bayou, before Brooks swung by to pick her up for school, a steamy cinnamon latte waiting for her in the cup holder.
Solon's body convulsed. He gripped his neck and strained for air. He punched once, twice, three times against the side of the mask. There was a hiss, and then a jigsaw crack split the mask down its center. It fell in two pieces on either side of Solon's face. Acid-green artemisia fumes met their death in the rain. Eureka inhaled a whiff of licorice-scented air--then the vapor was gone.
Solon's eyes were closed. Scraggly gray stubble had sprouted into a thick beard that crept down his neck like lichen. His close-cropped hair was now the color of a snow leopard and his skin was extravagantly wrinkled, mottled with the freckles of old age.
"Solon," Eureka whispered.
His eyes flashed open. His lips wavered toward a smile. With a trembling hand he reached inside the pocket of his robe and withdrew a gray envelope. He pressed it into Eureka's hand. It felt silky and strange.
"I wanted a good death," Solon whispered. He looked around, like he was deciding whether this one qualified. Then he closed his eyes and was gone.
"It was good," Eureka said.
A deep, guttural scream grabbed her attention. Albion was staggering toward her. He lumbered forward, off-kilter, like a drunk.
"You're coming with us," he wheezed, and lunged for Eureka, stumbling over Solon's legs, falling onto the body of his dead cousin. He writhed. His fingers tore at his neck. Phlegm dribbled from the sides of his mouth.
Behind Albion, Critias doubled over, wheezing. Chora and Starling were already on the ground. Painful gasps and coughs echoed off the rocks. Eureka, Cat, and the twins held each other as the Seedbearers' breathing slowed. Albion strained to reach Eureka's ankle. It was his last act.
All of them were dead.
Which meant Ander was dead. Eureka clutched her head.
She thought of Ovid. He was downstairs, close enough to acquire these new ghosts. Dad and Seyma ... and now Solon, and the other Seedbearers. Were they all together now?
Was Ander there?
She faced the water. Where was he? How had he spent his final breaths? Her mind rewound to the first moment they had spoken when he slammed into her car, the weird and lovely way he'd caught her tear. How had they gotten from there to here? Eureka wished she'd done everything differently. She wished she could have said goodbye.
She ached for the release that only tears could bring. She knew she couldn't, knew she wouldn't, but as much as she tried to be as unfeeling as Ovid, Eureka was a human girl trapped inside a human body. Heat welled in her eyes.
A great splash erupted near the edge of the pond. A spout of water crested above the veranda's rail. A blond head appeared in its center.
Ander spilled himself out of the water, which fell back into the pond. He was bleeding and straining to breathe. How much time did he have left?
Eureka flung her arms around his neck. He spun her around like her weight was a wonderful surprise. Their lips were centimeters apart when Eureka pulled away. She'd been so sure she'd lost him. She put a hand against his chest, wanting to feel his heartbeat, the rise and fall of his chest.
"Is he here?" Ander asked.
"Who?"
"Atlas! Did you see which way he went?"
Eureka shook her head. She opened her mouth but couldn't find the words to say he had only moments left to live.
"Why are you looking at me like that?"
Eureka stepped aside to reveal his family.
Ander raked his fingers through his hair. He leaned down and held his hand in front of Albion's face.
"Am I a ghost?"
Eureka touched the tips of Ander's hair. It felt so good, so alive, that she caressed his scalp, his brow, his cheek, his neck. He turned his head into her hand.
"No," she said. She wondered whether Ander knew what she knew about Ovid and the Filling.
"I don't understand. When one Seedbearer dies--"
"All of them die."
"But I'm still here," Ander whispered. "How?"
Eureka remembered the envelope Solon had given her. She'd stuffed it in the pocket of her jeans. She pulled it out, lifted its flap. Inside was the lachrymatory containing her tears, wrapped in a piece of paper covered in lovely cursive.
Eureka quickly slipped the vial inside her pocket. She unfolded the paper and read aloud:
"To Whom It May Concern (Eureka):
"Am I dead yet?
"Good.
"There is a fine bottle of brandy in the pocket of the farthest silk robe in my closet. You will know it from its antique bamboo hanger. Once you are safely ensconced inside, crack it open, and gather round you all those who remain and care. Or perhaps just those who remain. Then you shall know a portion of the truth."
Eureka looked up as Cat, William, and Claire stepped over Seedbearers to draw closer.
"What else does he say?" William asked.
Eureka read on:
"I'm serious. Go inside.
"Eureka, lest you became paralyzed by indecision: You won't waste Ander's final moments rifling through a closet full of silly silk robes, hunting for booze like a lucky bum who swung in through the window. The boy could live to taste a million of your kisses, barring catastrophes out of my control. I'll explain everything in a moment."
"We should honor his request," Ander said. He kicked Albion aside and lifted Solon from the ground.
They descended the stairs into Solon's salon. Ander laid Solon's body on the rug next to his chair, where he could be near the waterfall. He went downstairs to retrieve the brandy. William brought out the witches' torch for light, and Eureka sat atop the broken dining table and read aloud:
"Are you still mad at me? You should have seen your face when you realized what I'd done. Yes, I wrote this letter before I saw your face, but I know how angry you will be and were. I'm exploding time and tense in my last testament!
"I'm not unvain enough to say it didn't bother me to grow old in the dusk of my existence. I didn't wish to care for you all so deeply, but I did.
"Brave, bold Claire--may you grow up and remain fearless.
"Enigmatic William--hold on to your mystery.
"Cat, you nuclear bomb, in another life, I'll seduce you.
"Ander. Survivor. You are the only man I've ever admired.
"And Eureka. Of course, my feeling began with you. You draw emotion from the stoniest souls.
"I summoned t
he Seedbearers, to kill them and to kill myself using the artemisia in the orichalcum chest. But what about Ander? you'll be wondering. The truth is beautiful: Ander was raised by Seedbearers, but he is not a Seedbearer. He was born to an irresponsible mortal family in California with a weakness for joining cults. They were persuaded to give him over to the Seedbearers backstage at an auditorium in Stockton. And so he was raised to believe he was bound by Seedbearer laws. They needed an age-appropriate decoy, someone to blend into the background of your youth.
"But he was never one of us! And so ...
"He lives!
"For some time I have suspected that something wasn't right about him--or rather, that something wasn't wrong--but I couldn't be sure until the witches revealed that he saw nothing in the Glimmering.
"The witches only care about returning home to Atlantis, so their Glimmering only reveals one's reflected Atlantean identity. Because Ander has no true lineage connecting him to the Sleeping World, he has no reflection in its mirror. The Glimmering would have killed him if your thunderstone had not protected you both.
"Ander does not belong in Atlantis, bless him. Not belonging is the greatest gift. Always remember that.
"Once I discovered my death would not kill Ander--that, indeed, my death would help you by removing the Seedbearers from the equation--I had no choice but to take the ancient plunge all my heroes have taken. Two stones, one bird, as the Poet might say. I hope I shall see him soon."
"I don't understand," Ander interrupted. "If I'm not a Seedbearer, how can my breath do the same things the others' can?"
"The Poet told me this story," Cat said, "about quirk thieves who sneak into hospital nurseries and study babies' magic. Maybe the Seedbearers chose you because they knew they could make your quirk blend with the things they wanted you to do."
While the others speculated, Eureka studied the rest of Solon's letter. After the first page, the paper stock changed ... to parchment--the same parchment in The Book of Love. Here was the same cryptic writing Eureka had hired Madame Blavatsky to translate. Here were the missing pages from The Book of Love.
Enclosed are pages from your book. I'm sorry I couldn't tell you sooner; I've had them all along. Years ago, I made a vow to Byblis never to share their contents. They were her deepest shame. But I think she would have wanted you to see them and know the truth.
The gossipwitches can be employed as translators. Use this envelope to find them. Make a deal. You're smarter than they are.
You may not like what you discover. That's the nature of discovery. Byblis was never the same after she learned the truth of her history. I can't guess how you will handle the news, but you deserve to know.
I was never meant to be your guide. A leader is a dealer in hope. This explains my failure, and it explains why you, Eureka, must triumph.
From the other side,
Solon
P.S. The witches hold more than an understanding of your text. There is something else I bartered to them years ago. It is yours. Get it back. And then get going. You have all you need to travel to the Marais. From there, it's up to you. Atlas will be waiting. Hurry but don't rush. You know what I mean.
P.P.S. Do not neglect to bring Ovid! You'll need him more than you can know. If you don't kill each other, you might become great friends. He possesses unsuspected depths....
22
MOTHER TONGUE
"No, they don't hurt," Ander was saying to Cat when Eureka finished reading.
He had lifted his shirt to reveal his gills. The twins were mesmerized, gathered around him, examining his skin. When Cat leaned down, the bees on the back of her head buzzed and crawled. Every few moments she winced as one stung her.
No one but Eureka saw the envelope in her hands pulse with a light as purple as the gossipwitches' caftans. Eureka blinked and the light was gone.
"I went to the Glimmering to see what they meant ...," she heard Ander say.
Then the envelope pulsed with light again. This time Eureka saw that the top flap fluttered like a wing. She opened her palm. The envelope fluttered a second time, then rose above her hand in the air. It was not like a wing--the envelope was made of wings. Two large gray moths had embraced to carry Solon's letter. They'd been still until now, when they slowly separated, as if waking from an enchanted sleep. They pulsed with amethyst light, then swooped toward the entrance of the cave.
Eureka looked to see if the others had noticed. They were still absorbed by Ander's gills. "Solon thinks Atlas tried to possess me but I fended him off."
Eureka sensed the moths wanted her to follow them. She tucked the letter and the torn pages of The Book of Love into her pocket next to the lachrymatory. She reached for her purple bag, which hung on a hook-shaped stalagmite near the door. She lifted the eternal torch from another stalagmite where William had rested it and crept silently away, like she had in the old days with Madame Blavatsky's lovebird Polaris.
"What was it like to have no reflection?" William asked Ander as the moths led Eureka into the skull-lined hall.
"What did Eureka see in the Glimmering?" Cat's voice trailed down the hallway, and Maya Cayce's reflection flashed through Eureka's mind. Somewhere all of this makes sense, Ander had said. She hurried away from the memory of her reflection, from Cat's question, and from her loved ones.
"Eureka?" Ander's voice called.
They would try to stop her from going to the witches. But Solon had never been so clear about her needing to do something. She would go to the witches to retrieve what was hers.
She ran after the moths, skulls grinning as she passed them in the dark. Outside, rain blasted her, cold and ferocious, slashing sideways like a wall of whips. The sun was rising, lightening a low section of the dark gray sky.
Something was different. Behind her, the glazeless entrance to Solon's cave was visible to the outside world. The depression in the rock looked so mundane, so obvious, so bereft of magic unfolding within.
The moths pulsed, calling Eureka with their glowing purple light when she thought she'd lost them in the rain. She followed them up a series of slopes that looked like gargantuan anthills, rounded a corner, and found even higher mountains.
In the distance, on top of the tallest peak balanced an immense rectangular rock. Dark crevices suggested doors and windows. A flat landing marked the entrance to the witches' home.
"How do I get up there?" Eureka asked the moths.
They hung in the sky, glowing, disappearing into fog, glowing. She touched her thunderstone, her locket, the ribbon, and began to climb.
Mud oozed between her fingers as she picked her way up the rock. When the cliff grew sheer and Eureka didn't know how she could continue, the guiding moths wove around her hands, gesturing whether the surest route up was a few inches to the left or right. Loose rocks plummeted as Eureka climbed above them. The peak was so treacherous she wondered if it had ever been approached by anything that couldn't fly.
At last Eureka stood before a doorway. It was made of a thousand dark gray moth wings woven together, fluttering, alive, in the shape of one majestic pair.
"Do I knock?" she asked the guiding moths. They flitted against the door until it absorbed them. Eureka could no longer distinguish them from the other wings.
The door parted, softly severing a vast web of tiny connections, revealing a dazzling room inside.
The walls were made of amethyst; the floor was strewn with orchid petals. Twenty or so gossipwitches lounged around a purple fire. Three of them shared a giant, swaying moth-wing bower. One hung upside down from a brilliant purple pole, her caftan draped over her face.
The witches smoked a long, reedy pipe that curled to a spiral tip. Bright green, licorice-scented fumes swirled in the air above the pipes' embers. They were smoking artemisia, but unlike the Seedbearers, the gossipwitches seemed to thrive on the drug. They laughed as tipsy bees bumped clumsily around their heads.
Eureka spotted Esme on the far side of the room. She looked revived,
as if the secret void in her head had never been exposed, her butterfly never crushed between Cat's fingers. Eureka tensed with rage and fear that Cat would never recover as completely.
Esme whispered in another youthful witch's ear, her hands cupped over her mouth, exuding glee over some secret. The way the witches giggled reminded Eureka of girls at Evangeline, girls she would never see again.
When Esme looked up at Eureka, her crystal teardrop necklace gleamed in the shallow of her collarbone. Suddenly Eureka knew what it was, why it had always drawn her eye.
"Your necklace," Eureka said, feeling light-headed from the fumes.
Esme twirled the charm on its silver chain. "This old thing? Solon gave it to me ages ago. Don't tell me he wants it back. Unless he changed his mind about the robot?"
"Solon is dead."
Esme slid one hand onto her hip and walked directly through the fire to Eureka. "Isn't it a pity," she lisped through her forked tongue.
"That necklace wasn't his to trade. It belongs to me."
Eureka had come for more than the necklace, but since she had nothing to offer in return, she'd decided to make one demand at a time.
The witches whispered to each other, forked tongues flicking over their teeth. The sound became a single wet hiss that snaked its scaly way into Eureka's bad ear.
Then the hissing stopped. Pouring rain flowed into the silence.
"You may have your family heirloom back." Esme slipped her hands behind her neck and unfastened the chain.
Eureka nodded stoically, though she wanted to cheer. She reached for the chain, but Esme swung the teardrop crystal inches from Eureka's hand. Then the gossipwitch jerked it back and cupped it in her own palm. She whispered into Eureka's bad ear, her replenished stock of bees grazing Eureka's cheek.
"You will owe us something in exchange."
"The necklace is mine. I owe you nothing."
"Perhaps you're right. But you will still deliver what we want. Fear not, you want it, too." She smiled. "May I fasten the clasp for you?"
Esme wrapped her long fingers around Eureka's neck. She smelled like honey and licorice. Her touch was like the soft fuzz of a bee, or a rose just before you're pricked.
"There," Esme breathed.