The Green And The Gray

33

The room was bathed in the soft twilight of a half-moon peeking in through the threadbare curtains, the dimness occasionally brightening as drafts sneaking around the ancient window panes rustled the curtains. Curled beneath her stack of blankets, Caroline stared at the shifting patterns of light across the ceiling as she listened to the wordless voices swirling around her. She couldn't tell what was going on, but one thing was clear.

The Greens were very busy tonight.

She let the almost-sound wash across her mind, straining as she tried to pick out a nuance here or a flicker of recognizable emotion there. There was a pattern to it—that much she was sure of—and she had the nagging feeling that if she could just get a handle on that pattern she might be able to understand what was being said. But try as she might, she couldn't break the code.

Though maybe that was because she had more important things on her mind.

Had Roger made it off the estate? Sylvia had implied that he had, but that could have been a ruse to keep her from trying anything herself in the false hope that he would be returning to rescue her. Had the Warriors caught him, either by forcing the car into a tree or ditch or by using their trassks directly against him? Had he been injured, or even—

Firmly, she shook the thought away. She wouldn't even think about that. Not now.

And if he had reached the highway, had he made it back to the city? Or had there been Green sentries waiting along the road where they could ambush him as he drove? Had they called back to the rest of the Warriors in New York and set up an attack for him there? Had they been waiting at the apartment, on the chance he'd be too weary to think of the potential for danger there?

And even if he'd survived all of that, what then? Would he go to Detective Powell, who was half convinced he and Caroline had been involved in Detective Fierenzo's disappearance?

Or would he go to Torvald and the Grays?

She shivered at the thought. Velovsky had said the war was still in its pre-combat stage; but if Torvald decided this was his opportunity to score a major coup by attacking and wiping out a small group of caretaker Greens, there might be no going back. Once a spark was lit between these two peoples there seemed to be no stopping it.

Which led to the really difficult question: what should she herself be doing at this point? Should she be trying to escape, or at least trying to get word to the outside world? Or should she just continue on the path she'd begun at dinner tonight, cultivating a relationship with Sylvia and trying to convince her of the value of human lives?

Because the Wednesday deadline Nikolos had warned them about was fast approaching. Whatever Caroline decided, there wasn't a lot of time left for her to work with.

She frowned suddenly at the ceiling as the humming in her mind interrupted the flow of her thoughts. There was a lot of Green talking going on out there. Even with her limited experience, it seemed more than could be explained by twenty Laborers and a handful of Warriors.

What exactly was going on?

Steeling herself, she pushed back the blankets and swung her legs out of the bed, wincing as her bare feet touched the cold wooden floor. Carefully avoiding the handful of creaking boards she'd discovered during her bedtime preparations, she crossed to one of the dormer windows and pulled back a corner of the curtain.

Outside, the moonlight played softly across the expanse of forest stretching over the hills behind the house. No one was visible, but with Greens and trees that didn't mean much. The window latch clearly hadn't been moved in years, but with a little effort she pried it free and pulled the window open.

The cold air flowed in full force, and she shivered again. There was still nothing to see; but now that the window was open, she could hear faint sounds of movement and scuffling wafting over the roof with the breeze. Whatever was happening, it was happening on the other side of the house.

She got a grip on the side of the window and leaned out, peering around the side of the dormer at the peak of the roof a couple of feet above her head. The shingles on the dormer itself looked a little treacherous, but the rest of the roof seemed in reasonable shape and not too steep to climb. If she was careful, and if she could find enough handholds on the dormer, she ought to be able to walk her way the rest of the way up the roof and see what was going on over there.

First, though, she needed to make sure she didn't freeze to death out there. And, just as importantly, make sure she wasn't seen.

Her brown coat and navy slacks, she judged, would be dark enough to adequately hide her against the moonlight. Her shoes were dark, too, but the soles weren't designed for climbing. She would have to go with bare feet and hope there was no one on this side of the house who might spot a couple of pale spots pressed against the shingles.

Her face, though, was a different matter. She took two turns around the room, looking for something to use to cover it, before inspiration finally struck. Untucking the blankets from beneath the mattress, she got her small fold-up scissors out of her purse and cut a four-inch strip from the end of the darkest one. Tucking everything back into place, she folded her new scarf back across her forehead as if putting on a headband, then crossed the two ends behind her head and brought them forward again around her nose and mouth. Crossing the ends one more time, she tied them together behind her head, leaving only a narrow strip around her eyes uncovered. Returning to the window, she pulled it open, took a deep breath, and climbed out onto the roof.

The shingles seemed even colder than the floor, and she had a fleeting longing for the jogging shoes tucked in the back of her closet in Manhattan. She got a grip on the peak of the dormer and carefully made her way up the slope to the top.

And found herself faced with an extraordinary sight. All across the wide lawn in front of the house shadowy figures were on the move: running or ducking, crouching beside the trees at the edge of the lawn, apparently even dancing with each other. Some of them had dark objects in their hands, and she could hear faint and sporadic chuffing sounds. She caught a flicker of slightly brighter light from one of the figures, and spotted the knife in his hand.

And with that, she suddenly understood. The chuffing objects were paintball guns; the flickering knives were converted trassks; the dancing figures were in fact Greens wrestling in close hand-tohand combat.

These weren't late-night exercises. These were war games.

She lifted her head a little higher. There were more Greens inside the edges of the forest, she could see now, slipping in and out of trees as they ambushed those carrying paintball guns or dodged their shots. To her right, on one of the wings angling off from the main part of the house, she could see several Greens firing from the rooftop and through some of the upper windows. Using the house to simulate Gray attacks from the buildings of New York, she realized, her stomach tightening at the thought. Another look at the forest revealed more Greens at the tops of some of the taller trees, also shooting paintballs at their comrades below.

And standing where the main section of the house angled into the right-hand wing, like a rock at the edge of a swiftly flowing river, was Sylvia.

She stood with her hands on her hips, silently observing the activities, just far enough to the side to be out of the way. Occasionally she would give a hand signal, and twice she summoned a group of Greens to her for a brief conversation before waving them back to their positions. But mostly, she just watched.

For several minutes Caroline did the same, a mixture of fascination and horror swirling within her.

There was a strange beauty to the Warriors' movements, a ballet-like grace to the way they fought their mock battles. Green Laborers, Sylvia had said, were the best in the world. Clearly, Green Warriors were in that same class.

But all the grace and skill in the world couldn't mask the ultimate purpose of their game. They were training and practicing to kill. Soon, perhaps within days, they would be in downtown Manhattan using those knives against the Grays.

She squeezed the shingles hard. There was still a chance to stop this. There had to be.

Off to her left, a flicker of orange light caught the corner of her eye. A car had emerged from the woods and was approaching the house, wending its way cautiously through the melee with only its parking lights showing.

Caroline froze in place, her eyes just above the peak of the roof, as the car rolled to a stop and a tall Green got out. He paused beside the car for a moment, scanning the battleground. Then, making sure to stay out of the way, he crossed the lawn to Sylvia.

Caroline frowned, squinting down at them. She couldn't see very clearly in the darkness, but there was something about the altered texture of the voices whispering through her mind that told her the newcomer was Nikolos himself. For a minute he and Sylvia talked together, Sylvia gesturing at different parts of the grounds as she apparently reported on the war games' progress. Occasionally Nikolos made a comment or gesture, but for the most part it was definitely Sylvia's show.

And then, Sylvia pointed toward the house.

Caroline stiffened with sudden premonition. Not waiting to see any more, she eased her head back down and started moving as quickly as she dared along the roof. She reached the dormer opening and stepped through into her room, closing and latching the window behind her. Whipping off her coat and slacks, she laid them across one of the chairs, then shoved her scarf/mask out of sight between the mattress and box spring. With her heart pounding in her ears, she slipped back under the blankets.

She had barely gotten settled when there was a quiet tap on her door.

She froze, her throat tightening, her mind spinning with possibilities. Had Sylvia or someone spotted her up there on the roof and come to check? Surely not—they wouldn't be bothering to knock if they had. She should answer the knock, then, feigning innocence and making it sound like she'd been sound asleep.

But no. A knock that soft wouldn't have woken her up at home, so she probably shouldn't react to it.

She should wait for a louder knock, or possibly someone to call her name.

She was still trying to figure out her best move when, with a sudden squeak, the door swung open.

She twitched violently in reaction, the bed creaking in protest. "What?" she gasped.

"It's me, Nestor," one of her guards' voices came. "You have a visitor downstairs."

With an effort, Caroline got her breathing under control, feeling a tiny flicker of relief. Her reaction at being startled that way had probably been more appropriate to a suddenly awakened sleeper than anything she could have devised on her own. "Now? Who is it?"

"Command-Tactician Nikolos," Nestor told her. "He told me to send his apologies for the lateness of the hour, and promised it would only take a few minutes."

Caroline took a deep breath. "All right. Let me get dressed, and I'll be right down."

A few minutes later she came down the stairs, blinking against the handful of lights that had been turned on. Nestor and a female Warrior were waiting at the foot of the steps, showing no signs of the strenuous exercise they'd just been participating in outside. Silently, they led her to the library where she and Sylvia had first met.

Nikolos was waiting there alone, standing with his back to her as he gazed out the window into the night. "Ah—Caroline," he said, turning as Nestor ushered her inside and closed the door behind her.

"My apologies for waking you at this hour."

"That's all right," Caroline said, taking one of the chairs in front of the desk. "My dreams weren't very pleasant, anyway."

"I'm not surprised," he said, swiveling one of the other chairs around to face her and sitting down in it. "I've been having rather unpleasant dreams myself lately. Dreams involving the destruction of my people."

"I'm worried about my people, too," Caroline said evenly. "What can I do for you?"

He seemed to brace himself. "We need to find out, once and for all, who it was who gave Melantha to you last Wednesday night."

"We've been through that," Caroline reminded him, feeling a stirring of annoyance. "With, I think, just about everyone involved in this, on both sides. We don't know who it was."

"I'll settle for a description," Nikolos persisted. "Starting with whether he was a Green or a Gray."

"That's an odd question," she said. "I thought all the Grays wanted her dead. Why would any of them stick his neck out to rescue her?"

For a moment Nikolos stared hard into her eyes. Then, reluctantly, he lowered his gaze. "Let me lay my cards on the table," he said, rubbing at his cheek. Clean-shaven at two in the morning, Caroline noted absently. Either that, or else Greens simply didn't have much facial hair in the first place. "It's been learned that a Gray named Jonah McClung, who was assigned to sentry duty at Sara D.

Roosevelt Park, has been shirking his duty while his younger brother Jordan covered for him."

"And this information comes from where?"

Nikolos lifted his eyebrows. "So you recognize the names?"

"I've never heard either of them," Caroline said. "I just wanted to know the source before I put any effort into thinking about it."

"It was Halfdan Gray's people who discovered there was something odd going on with Jonah,"

Nikolos said. "When they began to suspect it might have something to do with Melantha's disappearance, Halfdan informed Cyril, who then informed me."

"And you trust this Halfdan?"

"As far as I trust any Gray," Nikolos said. "Halfdan and Cyril are the ones who worked out the original peace agreement between our peoples."

"The one that involved Melantha's murder."

Nikolos's lip twitched. "Yes. What I need from you is anything that would either confirm Jonah was the one involved or else clear him so that we can stop wasting time looking for him."

"What do you mean, looking for him?" Caroline asked, frowning. "Don't you keep track of the Grays?"

"Not as well as we thought, obviously," Nikolos said sourly. "Both Jonah and his brother seem to have gone to ground somewhere. Halfdan has repeatedly tried to contact them, but they're refusing to answer."

"Maybe they can't," Caroline suggested. "Maybe Aleksander got to them, the same way someone got to Melantha."

"Or maybe it's Jonah and Jordan themselves who have Melantha," Nikolos countered. "Tell me what happened Wednesday."

"Why?" Caroline asked. "So you can find Melantha and use her to destroy our city?"

Nikolos took a deep breath. "Listen to me, Caroline," he said, lowering his voice. "Things are not the way you think. I give you my word that if we get Melantha back she won't have to do anything to anyone. Not to the Grays; not to your city."

"I thought she was the keystone of your defense."

"Nonetheless, I give you my word," Nikolos repeated. "Melantha won't have to do anything in this war."

Caroline stared at him, her skin prickling as the pieces suddenly fell together. "Oh, my God," she murmured. "Damian is another Groundshaker."

"Who told you that?" Nikolos asked sharply.

"You did," Caroline told him. "You said you didn't need Melantha because you had Damian."

For a long moment Nikolos gazed at her. "Sylvia was right," he murmured at last. "You're more perceptive than I thought."

"So it was a fraud from the very beginning, wasn't it?" Caroline said, feeling cold all over. "You never intended to use Melantha against the Grays at all."

"Of course we intended to use her," Nikolos said. "But not as a weapon. She's still too weak and unpredictable in her Gift."

"But not too weak to be used as a decoy," Caroline said. "Someone to distract the Grays and keep their eyes away from this place and Damian."

"You make it sound so harsh," Nikolos reproved her. "Aleksander and I knew from the beginning that the Grays would never let us live in peace, that the minute they found an opportunity they would move to exploit it. But we also knew Cyril would never believe that until it was demonstrated."

"So you figured you'd lull the Grays by letting him kill Melantha," Caroline said acidly. "Never mind that it would cost the life of an innocent young girl."

Nikolos shook his head. "You must understand that what we do, we do for the best," he said, his voice strangely earnest. "Yes, it would cost Melantha her life; but once she'd been sacrificed and the Grays moved to attack, Cyril would finally recognize his error and rejoin us. At that point, we could bring Damian in and gain a swift victory over our enemies. With her life, Melantha would have purchased a lasting peace for her people."

"Such a noble plan," Caroline bit out. "Too bad someone had to go and ruin it."

Nikolos drew himself up in his chair. "I've been patient with you up to now, Caroline," he said, his voice tight. "I've assumed you've been so fixated on Melantha that you couldn't see the big picture.

But now you know what's at stake, and what must happen if our people are to survive. I've assured you that Melantha will live; I've assured you that we'll do everything possible to win a quick victory over the Grays and thereby cause as little collateral damage as possible. But I will know who delivered Melantha to you."

Caroline shook her head. "No."

"I could remind you that Melantha herself agreed with the decision."

"I could remind you that twelve-year-olds usually do what adults tell them," Caroline countered, getting to her feet. "Sorry you wasted the drive up here. Good night, Commander Nikolos."

His lip twitched. "Good night, Caroline."

She turned her back on him, passed through the doorway and between the silent Warriors, and returned to her room. Two minutes later, she was back under the blankets, staring at the play of light across the ceiling and wondering dully if the war games had resumed on the other side of the house.

So it had been for nothing. All of it. Whether Melantha lived or died; whether she or Roger or Fierenzo lived or died or succeeded or failed—none of it mattered. From the very beginning Nikolos had had his plan in place for the Grays' destruction.

And there was nothing she could do to stop him. He was a Command-Tactician; and as Green Laborers and Warriors were the best in their fields, he was surely the best in his. He would have thought of every move that could possibly be made against him, and would already have a contingency in place to counter it.

She took a deep breath, fighting back the despair threatening to drown her. No, she told herself firmly. It hadn't been for nothing. They'd helped keep Melantha alive, at least for a few days, and they'd unearthed this vital bit of information about Damian and gotten Roger back to the outside world with it. That had to be at least moderately disruptive to Nikolos's neat plans. Maybe Roger was talking to the police or the Grays at this very moment, in fact, proposing or cajoling or arguing them into taking some kind of action.

Or maybe he wasn't, she realized with a sinking feeling. Roger, argue someone into action? Hardly.

That would require him to deliberately walk into a confrontation, and he avoided confrontations like the plague itself.

Or did he?

She frowned at the ceiling, the events of the past few days playing across her memory. Roger standing up to Ingvar and Bergan until the two Grays literally forced them off Greenwich Avenue at gunpoint. Roger driving past, around, possibly even through Green Warriors to get out of here and go for help. For that matter, Roger refusing to tell Sylvia or Torvald or Nikolos anything about Melantha in the first place.

Maybe it wasn't that he avoided conflicts because he wasn't man enough to stand up for himself.

Maybe it was simply that he avoided the petty and unnecessary ones, saving his focus for those that were important. Maybe she just hadn't seen him before in a situation where he had to take this kind of aggressive moral stand.

If true, it was something she'd never known about him. But then, perhaps he hadn't realized it about himself. The quiet routine of their normal lives didn't lend itself to heroics, after all. Maybe he'd never before had anything this important to measure himself against.

Throwing off the blankets, she got out of bed and crossed to the chair where she'd put her purse. A

little probing, and she came up with her pen and the pack of chewing gum she kept for the people in her office who seemed perennially in the throes of cigarette withdrawal. The bedroom curtains weren't thick enough to keep out curious eyes, but the bathroom window was made of frosted glass.

Taking the pen and gum in there, she closed the door and turned on the light.

There wasn't a lot of writing space on the silvery paper that came wrapped around a single stick of gum. But years of filling out real estate forms had given her plenty of practice in microscopic writing.

Roger: Damian Groundshaker, ready move on NYC—time unknown. Melantha not here. Sylvia Group Com in charge. Don't bring Grays. I love you, C.

She added their home phone number and laid her pen aside, gazing down at the note. There was so much more she wanted to say to him. So much more she needed to say. But there was no room for inessentials like love and hope and trust. Carefully, she refolded the paper around the gum and slid it back inside its outer wrapper. She would just have to hope that they would both make it through to the other end of this alive, and she could say it in person.

Turning off the light, she left the bathroom and returned the gum and pen to her purse. Then, one final time, she climbed wearily into bed. It was time to get some rest, and to prepare herself for the crucial day ahead.