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“Not Anomalies and Citizens,” Vick says. “And most people don’t celebrate their Contract. ”
I draw in my breath. She was an Anomaly? They celebrated their Contract?
“It wasn’t sanctioned by the Society,” he says. “But when the time came I chose not to be Matched. And I asked her parents if I could Contract with her. They said yes. The Anomalies have their own ceremony. No one recognizes it but them. ”
“I didn’t know that,” I say, and I dig the agate deeper into the wood. I wasn’t sure Anomalies other than the ones in the Carving still existed so recently or so close to Society. In Oria no one had seen or heard of any in years, except for the one who killed my cousin, the first Markham boy.
“I asked her parents on the day I saw the rainbow,” Vick says. “I pulled it out of the river and saw the colors flash in the sun. I put it back right away when I saw what it was. When I told her parents about it, they said it was a good omen. A sign. You know what that is?”
I nod. My father talked about signs sometimes.
“I haven’t seen one since,” Vick says. “A rainbow trout, I mean. And it wasn’t a good omen after all. ” He takes a deep breath. “Only two weeks later I heard that the Officials were coming for us. I went to find her, but she was gone. So was her family. ”
Vick reaches for the cottonwood. I hand it back to him although I haven’t finished. He turns the piece and studies the way her name looks right now—LAN—almost all straight lines. Like notches in a boot. And suddenly I know what he has been marking all along. Not time survived in the Outer Provinces—time lived without her.
“The Society found me before I got home,” Vick says. “They took me to the Outer Provinces right away. ” He hands the carving back to me and I start working on it again. The firelight plays on the agate like the sun might have on the scales of the rainbow when Vick pulled it from the water.
“What happened to your family?” I ask Vick.
“Nothing, I hope,” he says. “The Society Reclassified me automatically, of course. But I wasn’t the parent. My family should be fine. ” I hear the uncertainty in his voice.
“I’m sure they are,” I tell him.
Vick looks at me. “Really?”
“If the Society gets rid of Aberrations and Anomalies, that’s one thing. If they get rid of everyone connected to them, there won’t be anyone left. ” This is what I hope—then Patrick and Aida might be all right, too.
Vick nods, lets out his breath. “You know what I thought?”
“What?” I ask.
“You’ll laugh,” Vick says. “But when you said that poem the first time, I didn’t just wonder if you were part of the Rising. I also hoped that you’d come to get me out of there. My own personal Pilot. ”
“Why would you think that?” I ask.
“My father was high up in the Army,” Vick says. “Very high up. I thought for sure he’d send someone out to save me. I thought it was you. ”
“Sorry to have disappointed you,” I say. My voice sounds cold.
“You didn’t disappoint,” Vick says. “You got us out of there, didn’t you?”
In spite of myself I have a small feeling of satisfaction when Vick says that. I smile in the darkness.
“What do you think happened to her?” I ask after a few moments.
“I think her family ran away,” Vick says. “The Anomalies and Aberrations around us were disappearing, but I don’t think the Society got them all. Maybe her family left to try to find the Pilot. ”
“Do you think they did?” I wish now that I hadn’t said so much about the Pilot not being real.
“I hope so,” Vick says. His voice sounds hollow now that the story is told.
I give him the piece of cottonwood carved with her name. He looks at it for a moment and then puts it in his pocket.
“So,” Vick says. “Now. Let’s think about getting across this plain and back to whoever we can find. I’m going to keep following you for a while. ”
“You have to stop saying that,” I tell Vick. “I’m not leading. We’re working together. ” I look up at the sky with all its stars. How they shine and burn I don’t know.
My father wanted to be the person who changed everything and saved everyone. It was dangerous. But they all believed in him. The villagers. My mother. Me. Then I grew older and realized he could never win. I stopped believing. I didn’t die with him because I no longer went to any of the meetings.
“All right,” Vick says. “But thank you for getting us this far. ”
“You too,” I say.
Vick nods. Before he falls asleep, he takes out his own piece of stone and carves another notch in his boot. One more day lived without her.
Chapter 18
CASSIA
You don’t look right,” Indie says. “Do you think we should slow down?”
“No,” I say. “We can’t. ” If I stop I’ll never start again.
“It doesn’t do anyone any good if you die on the way,” she says, sounding angry.
I laugh. “I won’t. ” Though I’m exhausted, hollow and dry and aching, the idea of dying is ridiculous. I can’t die now when I might draw closer to Ky with every step I take. And besides, I have the blue tablets. I smile, imagining what the other scraps inside might say.
I search and search for another sign from Ky. Though I’m not dying, I may be more ill than I first thought, because I find signs in everything. I think I see a message from Ky in the pattern of cracked mud on the canyon floor, where it rained once and then hardened into something that I think could be interpreted as letters. I crouch down to look at it. “What does this look like to you?” I ask Indie.
“Mud,” she tells me.
“No,” I say. “Look more closely. ”
