Shards and Ashes

me.

“What’s the biggest danger on this ship, boy?” he growls.

I think for a moment, but Eldest is emanating impatience. “Disease,” I say quickly, thinking of the Plague that decimated our population a few gens ago.

Eldest shakes his head. “We can recover from disease. The thing we couldn’t recover from?” He waits a moment, but I have no answer. “Mutiny. We’re alone out here, boy. Alone. Ain’t nothing on the other side of the ship’s walls but the vacuum of space. Nowhere to go. If this ship rises up in mutiny, we’ll kill ourselves. The mission will be lost. A revolution would be suicide for everyone.”

I think about what he says, my eyes drifting to the heavy steel walls that line the room.

“This stuff?” Eldest kicks the bucket. “This stuff prevents mutiny. This saves us all.”

I stare at the two stacks of books I’ve arranged on the metal table.

With a broad sweep of my arm, I topple them into each other, mixing the titles.

It’s not as simple as black-and-white, right or wrong.

When I first started questioning Eldest, I was doing just that: asking questions. But I realized soon enough that asking questions was the worst possible thing I could ever do.

I did it anyway.

But even now, I’m still asking questions. Only now, instead of questioning Eldest, I’m starting to question myself. Would a revolution be good? Should I risk everything—even the lives of everyone on board this ship—for what I think is right?

“What are you doing?” Mag’s voice cuts through my concentration and makes me jump in surprise.

“I didn’t know you’d be back so soon!” I say, masking my worry with a smile.

She doesn’t return my grin; her eyes are rimmed with red, her jaw clenched. “I’ve been gone for two hours.”

I bite back a word of surprise. I’d not realized I’d been in the book room so long.

She crosses the small room and sits opposite me. “Are you reading all these?”

“Already read them.”

Mag is silent for a long moment. Her eyes stare at the books, but I don’t think she’s really seeing them.

“What am I doing, Mag?” I say to the mixed-up books on the table. “I thought . . . I thought it would all be worth it.” My fingers go unconsciously to the spiderweb scar behind my left ear, where I removed my wi-com in order to hide from Eldest. “But now I’m just spending my life in hiding, not even fighting.” I pause. “Not even sure if I should fight. Maybe Eldest isn’t entirely wrong.”

“The drugs are wrong.” Mag spits out the words, vehemence making her voice rise. “And Eldest is wrong for using them.”

I look up at her. I’d noticed her red eyes when she came in, but now I see the sorrow mixed with rage behind them. “Did you see your grandfather?” I ask gently.

Mag growls.

“What happened?” I say.

She looks down at the mess of books on the table, over to the shelves behind me, up at the tiny window high in the wall. She looks everywhere but at me. “He was on Phydus.”

She finally meets my eyes. “It’s like he was dead inside.”

That’s what Phydus does. It turns you into a mindless drone, a worker for Eldest to use, and nothing more.

“Weren’t you on Phydus before your grandfather gave you his spot here?” I ask.

Mag nods. “Of course. I didn’t even know about Phydus. He brought me here and started giving me half doses using his own meds. He’d pop the capsules open and sprinkle the Inhibitor med onto my breakfast. There was a short time—maybe a week?—when I was starting to come out of the influence of Phydus, and he was starting to fall under it.”

“What did it feel like?” I ask. As Eldest’s chosen heir, I was always on the meds that prevent Phydus from controlling me.

Mag’s eyes lose focus as she remembers. “It was like . . . nothing. It was like living in a state of nothing. Nothing ever really hurt. Nothing bothered me. Everything was so . . . peaceful.”

Her answer surprises me. “It sounds nice.”

“I think it was nice,” she says. “At least, it was nice to be the one on Phydus. But now that I take Inhibitor pills, I see others on Phydus. I see Granddad. And . . . it’s not nice to see him like that.”

I try to imagine Mag on Phydus. She’s so vibrant, it’s hard to picture her with empty eyes. But then I remember the way Eldest’s face hardened when he told me about mutiny. Rage burns within Mag like a smoldering ember.

I don’t know if I fear that rage . . . or love it.

I can trace back to that day in the library as the day everything changed. I don’t know if it was my words that affected Mag or if it was seeing her grandfather on Phydus, but that smoldering ember grew into a flame. First she read the books I had spread out on the table—all of them. That took her nearly a month, but although she was silent and reserved, I could tell that her passion was only growing.

Then one morning, Eldest makes an announcement.

He coms everyone just as the solar lamp turns on the 132nd day I’ve been in hiding, ordering them to meet at the statue of the Plague Eldest in the garden behind the Hospital. Mag goes early, but even though so many months have passed and I think I would blend into the crowd, I fear getting too close to Eldest. Instead, I watch from the art gallery’s windows in the Recorder Hall.

Eldest takes the grav tube from his level to this one. He doesn’t avoid the Keeper Level, but he does make sure that every time he graces the lowest level with his presence, people notice.

He moves quickly from the grav tube entrance down the path, toward the garden. He carries something in his arms, something bundled up and wiggly. I press against the glass to see what he has—and as soon as I do, Eldest pauses and looks up at the Recorder Hall. I draw immediately back into the shadows, afraid he’s noticed me, but his attention is quickly diverted back to the thing in his arms.

The sleeves of his elaborately embroidered robe slip, and I dare to lean forward, straining to see. . . .

A baby.

He’s carrying a baby.

My replacement.

I watch as Eldest carries the baby to the garden and then raises it up for all the crowd to see. I don’t need to hear his words to know what he’s saying. He’s saying this child is the new heir. He’s saying this baby will reign after him now that I am—apparently—gone for good.

I turn away before the crowd starts to disperse and trudge down to the civics book room. The books Mag has been reading are still scattered on the metal table, with tabs and notes sticking out of many pages. She didn’t divide the books up by right or wrong, Eldest or not, as I did; instead, she’s found something in each title.

I’m just not sure what.

I hear the heavy front doors open—she’s back. I rush out of the book room and toward the hall that leads to the main entryway. I’m almost to the front when I hear Mag speak in a loud, ringing voice.

“Just this way, sir!”

I immediately press against the wall, hoping that the shadows of the poorly lit hallway are enough to hide me. Sir. That could only mean—

“Thank you,” Eldest’s voice says, much softer, but the sound is one I’ll never forget.

Another sound wafts through the Hall and into the shadows where I lurk: a whimper. Barely audible, soft and gentle. The baby.

“He’s a handsome boy,” Mag says, but her tone belies her friendly words.

The baby huffs as, I think, Eldest shifts him in his arms. I dare to glance around the doorway—Eldest and Mag are facing the other direction, toward the outer door, and the baby, over Eldest’s shoulder, is looking directly at