Relic

XXXIX: Aprilus 29 Year 242, A.H.

“What’s wrong, Lukas?” I clutch his arm. This can’t be the end. I have to hear what happened to Elizabet. What really happened, not what I dreamed up for my Chronicle.

“The battery is dead, Eva. I’ll have to play with the solar charging.”

Battery? Solar charging? He’s speaking another language. This is probably how he feels when we Aerie people speak and read in Latin in his presence. “What do you mean?”

“It’s hard to explain. I leave for the Boundary lands today. If you’ll let me take this back with me, I might be able to recover the rest of Elizabet’s story.”

“How in the Gods would it help to bring a Relic to the Boundary lands?” I ask, unable to keep the irritation out of my voice.

Lukas is acting irrationally. He must be playing a card against me. Those who live in the Boundary lands are native to New North—not those chosen by the Gods like the Founders. They are a wild and desperate lot, except for the few selected to serve in the Aerie homes. That’s why they need the support and structure of the Aerie rule. They’re not all like Lukas.

“Eva, the Boundary lands are nothing like you think. Nor are the Boundary people.” Breaking his gaze from the blank altar, he looks up at me. “Tech never died in the Boundary lands, Eva. After the Healing, when all Tech was outlawed, we Boundary people brought it underground and preserved it. I have the tools to fix your computer there.”

I am aghast. I stammer. “In-in-in violation of The Lex?”

“Yes. My people are used to keeping secrets. It’s part of our history.”

“Tech is evil, Lukas. Aren’t you afraid of it? Of Apple?”

Lukas takes his hands off the altar and wraps them around mine. “Eva, Tech is not evil in and of itself. Evil depends on the hand that wields it. And Apple is not a god or a demon, no matter what you’ve been told. The pre-Healing people never thought of Apple as a god. The Apple is just a symbol of their Tech.”

I can’t bring myself to look at him. I stare down at his hands. If the pre-Healing people never thought of Apple as a god, then my Chronicle is a lie. But how can that be true? I want to believe him, but it goes against everything I’ve been taught. Against everything that all of New North has been taught. “Is this what you meant that everything I believed in is wrong?”

“In part.”

I squeeze my eyes shut. Nothing makes sense right now. Not my appreciation of Elizabet and the pre-Healing life. Not my beliefs about Tech and the supposed false god Apple. Not the Lexors and Basilikons and Archons. Not even The Lex itself.

“If I let you take this … thing into the Boundary lands, how will I ever be able to see it again? There’s no guarantee that your next assignment will bring us in contact.”

“You might just have to come to me.”

My eyes fly open. “Seriously?”

“Come on, a Maiden like you who conquered the Taiga, the Tundra, and the Frozen Shores can’t handle the Boundary lands?”

I purse my lips. “I’m not in the mood for a joke, Lukas.”

There’s no humor in his face. “I’m not joking, Eva. There are ways into the Boundary lands that wouldn’t require you to scale the Ring or pass through the Gate. And, after all the stories I heard about you from my uncle, I think you can handle the route I have in mind.”

“Your uncle?” With each explanation Lukas offers me, I end up more perplexed.

“The Boundary Climber with the streak of white hair. I asked him to look out for you.”

So Lukas was with me all along. By proxy, anyway. I find some comfort in the knowledge that not all of my wild imaginings were off-base. I was being protected; I just never knew by whom. And it wasn’t my father. “That’s why he helped me.”

Lukas smiles. “So will you come? To the Boundary lands?”

“Even though I could be exiled for trying?” I ask. After the distances I’ve crossed—to survive beyond the Ring, to win the Archon Laurels, to endure my grief over Eamon—does Lukas truly mean for me to jeopardize everything? I could just as easily say goodbye and forget.

“Don’t you think the truth is worth the risk?” he asks.