The Seeds of Wither Read online

  “You shouldn’t have been locked in a room to begin with,” he says.

  I realize all at once that I want to know him. That I’ve begun to see his blue eyes and coppery brown hair as the signs of a friend, and have for a while now. I like that we’re speaking, finally, about things more important than what’s for lunch or what I’m reading or if I want some lemons with my tea. (I never do.)

  I want to know more about him, and I want to tell him more about myself. My real, unmarried self, my self from before I ever saw the inside of this mansion—when I lived in a dangerous place but I had my freedom and I was happy with it. I open my mouth, but immediately he stops me by grabbing my arm and yanking me into one of the dark side hallways. I don’t have a chance to protest before I hear the clatter of something approaching.

  We press ourselves against the wall. We try to be the shadows that cover us. We will the whites of our eyes to be dim.

  There are voices getting closer. “—cremation isn’t possible, of course—”

  “Shame to destroy that poor girl.” A sigh; a tsk tsk.

  “It’s for the greater good, if it will save lives.”

  The voices are unfamiliar. If I spent the rest of my life in this house, I might never know all its rooms, all the attendants. But as the voices approach, I can see that the people aren’t dressed like attendants. They are dressed in white, their heads protected by the same white hoods that my parents wore to work, with plastic covering their faces. Biohazard suits. They’re wheeling a cart.

  Gabriel grabs my wrist, squeezes it, and I don’t understand why. I don’t understand what’s happening at all until the cart gets closer to us and I can see what’s on it.

  A body covered by a sheet. Rose’s blond hair trailing out around the edges. And her cold, white hand, with fingernails still painted pink.

  Turn the page to read an all-new, previously unpublished short story from Lauren DeStefano!

  See how it all began in The First Bride.

  At age eleven I found myself in the strange predicament of marriage.

  Linden, my husband, was barely twelve, and while I had made up my mind that we would be enemies, it was hard to be hateful once I first saw him. Wiry and round-eyed, he was as frightened of me as I had prepared to be of him. His hands shook as he placed the ring on my finger.

  For the first days, we didn’t speak. I kept the door to my bedroom closed, and though it didn’t lock, my husband never entered. I would lie on the rug, watching the shadow he cast in the hallway as he tried to work up the courage to knock.

  Eventually we worked our way up to friendship. We rode his father’s horses in a circle around the parameters of the rose garden. Linden thought the roses would be my favorite, since I was named for them, but it was the orange blossoms that intrigued me. I loved the soft white petals that grew in that maddening tangle of brush. I loved watching the oranges grow fat and heavy on the branch. I always felt like something was hidden in the leaves and branches, a passageway to something more eternal than anything on this dying earth.

  We were standing there the first time he touched my hand. And a year into our marriage, it was where I summoned the courage to kiss him. He tasted like the rubbery blossoms and the earth and the hot July sunlight that burned my scalp, and I knew for certain that I loved him. He was smaller than I was, and he was timid; I wanted to be his protector.

  Years went by in autumns and winters and springs and summers. Linden grew much taller than I was. He sketched blueprints of houses while I lay beside him and found shapes in the clouds, both of us daydreaming what it would be like to live in his designs.

  After my eighteenth birthday I gave birth to our daughter in the middle of the brightest autumn I’d ever seen, when the leaves were filled with fire as they glided from their branches.

  We never saw our daughter take so much as a breath. We scattered her ashes in the orange grove. For the first time in our marriage, Linden was the strong one. He held me steady as I staggered, dizzy and sobbing, back toward the house. That night in bed he cupped his hand over my ear and whispered, “I won’t let you die.”

  I worried for him. Who would care for him once I was gone? There’s a poison in all of us. Women don’t live past twenty, and men don’t live past twenty-five. It’s the only thing promised to us when we’re born. It has caused the world to go insane, and sometimes I’m grateful to be locked up in his mansion, where it’s just Linden and me, where I can look at his flawless drawings of houses that will never be built and pretend the whole world is as peaceful as it is here.

  My twentieth birthday came and went without acknowledgment. But Linden knows. He has his own bedroom, but he sleeps beside me every night, as though he can shield me from what’s coming. I’ve been hiding my symptoms. In the morning he touches my face, checking for a fever while I pretend to sleep. I create a second face with makeup, and when my knees are weak and my vision is doubling, I giggle at his little jokes. I crane my neck and accept his kisses.

  He’s fooled by my efforts. Last night at dinner he cheerfully announced that he thinks I was wrong about my birthday. There was a mistake somewhere. Maybe I’m really just nineteen. But I haven’t fooled my father-in-law. The scientist. The madman convinced he can cure us all. For as long as I’ve been a bride, he’s been drawing my blood and Linden’s, marking up the vials. He takes samples of our eyelashes, our nail beds, anything that strikes him. He’s noticed how little I’ve eaten lately, and he’s seen me stumble through waves of vertigo. It won’t be a secret much longer. Soon he’ll want to put me on some sort of torturous regiment of pills and IVs. He’ll want to plug a monitor into my skin, force me to breathe when my body decides it’s over.

  And as I’m dying slowly, morning light creeps over my body and fills the curls in Linden’s dark hair. And I know it’s time.

  I disentangle myself from his coiled arm, and I want to whisper that I love him. I want to kiss his parted mouth. But I can’t afford to wake him. I can’t have him follow me, because he won’t let me go.

  By the time I reach the orange grove, its leaves are rustling with birds. My head and heart are pounding. I crawl into the high grass and make a bed for myself there.

  Death has always seemed large and frightening, but it comes quietly if you lie still and listen for it. After weeks of coughing secret blood into crumpled napkins, and wearing long sleeves in summer heat to hide the bruised skin, I am finally unafraid. It will be done by the time Linden finds me here. He won’t have seen the grotesqueness of it. He won’t spend weeks panicking at my bedside while his father prolongs the inevitable.

  I can taste the blood in my throat, but I can also taste the heat that’s rising from the earth. There’s a brilliant feeling of finality here, a knowledge that I’ll fall asleep. And there’s the hope that, when I awaken, I’ll be beyond the orange grove.

  But Linden’s voice shatters the darkness. “Rose,” he’s calling. Pleading. The weight returns to my body, and I feel him lifting me up from the grass, touching my neck to find a pulse, whispering panicked things, shouting for his father to help him. He’s come to make good on his promise. He won’t let death claim me so easily. I try to talk, but blood bubbles up in my throat, and I struggle and gag.

  “Rose,” he’s saying. “Rose.”

  In answer, I open my eyes.

  Here on earth, living is the highest honor we humans can imagine. Death is the enemy, even if it’s the only voice of reason. I can hear my father-in-law and his team of doctors coming for me. They mean to make me live.

  I hate seeing Linden like this, so serious and sad. He’s not brave enough to be angry with me. I’ve broken our promise to never keep secrets from each other. It’s been weeks of torturous medications and IVs and steam baths, when I can barely draw a breath.

  Today is not one of the better days. I want to have this conversation on the verandah while the sun is still shining in the winter sky, or at the very least over dinner. But I’ve been too dizzy to get out o
f bed, and that only reinforces what I need to say.

  “Linden? I think it’s time to consider the other bedrooms.”

  He’s lying beside me, staring at the ceiling. He stops breathing.

  “Linden.”

  “No,” he says.

  “You have to remarry, love,” I say. “Your father’s been patient, but he’s not going to be for much longer.”

  “He wants a grandchild,” Linden sighs.

  I roll onto my side, prop myself up on my elbow, and face him. His eyes find mine immediately, like they’ve been waiting for me. “That’s not what I’m worried about. I don’t want you to be alone.”

  He closes his eyes. His voice is stern and measured. “No.”

  “No?” I trace my index finger across his lips. “You’re going to mope in bed and wait to die?”

  “Stop it.” He swats at my hand without actually touching me. “This is my decision.”

  “Well, it’s not a good one. Your father is going to force new wives on you whether you decide to remarry or not. And I think you should. You’ve been stagnant. You haven’t designed any buildings since I got sick. You don’t go to any parties—”

  “Parties are the furthest things from my mind.” He opens his eyes and looks at me. “All I’m concerned about is you.”

  In a display of awful timing, the room doubles. A wave of dizziness and nausea overtakes me. Linden notices; he’s a pro at this by now. He moves immediately, helping me to sit up, holding the sick basin in front of me and gathering my hair back an instant before I start gagging and vomiting.

  I’m exhausted when it’s through. My vision is tunneled. My heart beats too slowly in my chest, like it’s trying to stop but something won’t let it. My skin is swollen with goose bumps. Linden dabs at my mouth with a tissue, and it takes away my red lipstick and my illusion of health. “Was that all of it?” he asks, all gentleness.

  “I don’t know,” I manage. “I think so.”

  He rubs my back. “Let’s keep you sitting up until you’re sure, then.”

  It’s all so pathetic and frustrating, how powerless we both are. “You owe me,” I say after he’s moved the basin to the floor and as he’s propping me against the headboard.

  “You’re delirious, sweetheart,” he coos. “It’s not one of your better days.”

  I may not be able to keep my eyes open right now, but I know the truth. If Linden hadn’t found me in that orange grove, if he’d let me go, he wouldn’t have wasted the past several weeks keeping bedside vigil. His father would have insisted on a remarriage by now. I wouldn’t be enduring these futile attempts to fight this virus that asserts its dominance over all my vital organs.

  “You owe me,” I repeat.

  He positions himself beside me and guides my head to his shoulder. “I know.” His voice is unsteady with tears.

  “You need a muse,” I say.

  He kisses the top of my head. “Oh, yeah?”

  “To get you drawing again. You’ll need a pretty one. Blond. Lots and lots of blond hair.”

  “What shall I do with this blond muse, then?” he asks.

  “If you get a real one, you won’t have to do anything. The magic will just happen on its own.”

  He chuckles, but even with my eyes closed I can tell he’s still crying. “You’ve always been my muse.”

  “Well, now I am handing down over my torch. But pick a good one.”

  “All right,” he says. “We’ll talk about this later.”

  This is progress. It’ll take more work to convince him to fill the three empty bedrooms that are reserved for more brides. And even more time for him to adjust. He might never adjust. But girls have a way of filling up a space, making it bright, full of chatter and perfumes and life. And surely that’s better than silence.

  But for now I’ve laid out my demand, and he’s heard it. The other brides can wait for just a while longer. For now it’s only his timid sobs, and mine.

  When I can no longer stay awake, I have a beautiful dream that I’ve tripped and fallen into the green of my husband’s eyes. And while I’m there, he marries three beautiful muses who adore him and sing him songs.

  If only I could make Linden understand, I’d tell him that’s where I’d like to be. I’d like to die and be forever in all that green. I’d wait for him there.

  1

  WE RUN, with water in our shoes and the smell of the ocean clinging to our frozen skin.

  I laugh, and Gabriel looks at me like I’m crazy, and we’re both out of breath, but I’m able to say, “We made it,” over the sound of distant sirens. Seagulls circle over us impassively. The sun is melting down into the horizon, setting it ablaze. I look back once, long enough to see men pulling our escape boat to shore. They’ll be expecting passengers, but all they’ll find are the empty wrappers from the packaged sweets we ate from the boat owner’s stash. We abandoned ship before we reached the shore, and we felt for each other in the water and held our breath and hurried away from the commotion.

  Our footprints emerge from the ocean, like ghosts are roaming the beach. I like that. We are the ghosts of sunken countries. We were once explorers when the world was full, in a past life, and now we’re back from the dead.

  We come to a mound of rocks that forms a natural barrier between the beach and the city, and we collapse in its shadows. From where we’re huddled we can hear men shouting commands to one another.

  “There must have been a sensor that tripped the alarm when we got close to shore,” I say. I should have known that stealing the boat had been too easy. I’ve set enough traps in my own home to know that people like to protect what’s theirs.

  “What happens if they catch us?” Gabriel says.

  “They don’t care about us,” I say. “Someone paid a lot of money to make sure that boat is returned to them, I bet.”

  My parents used to tell me stories about people who wore uniforms and kept order in the world. I barely believed those stories. How can a few uniforms possibly keep a whole world in order? Now there are only the private detectives who are employed by the wealthy to locate stolen property, and security guards who keep the wives trapped at luxurious parties. And the Gatherers, of course, who patrol the streets for girls to sell.

  I collapse against the sand, faceup. Gabriel takes my shivering hand in both of his. “You’re bleeding,” he says.

  “Look.” I cant my head skyward. “You can already see the stars coming through.”

  He looks; the setting sun lights up his face, making his eyes brighter than I’ve ever seen, but he still looks worried. Growing up in the mansion has left him permanently burdened. “It’s okay,” I tell him, and pull him down beside me. “Just lie with me and look at the sky for a while.”

  “You’re bleeding,” he insists. His bottom lip is trembling.

  “I’ll live.”

  He holds up my hand, enclosed in both of his. Blood is dripping down our wrists in bizarre little river lines. I must have sliced my palm on a rock as we crawled to shore. I roll down my sleeve so that the blood doesn’t ruin the white cabled sweater that Deirdre knitted for me. The yarn is inlaid with diamonds and pearls—the very last of my housewife riches.

  Well, those and my wedding ring.

  A breeze rolls up from the water, and I realize at once how numb the cold air and wet clothes have made me. We should find someplace to stay, but where? I sit up and take in our surroundings. There’s sand and rocks for several more yards, but beyond that I can see the shadows of buildings. A lone freight truck lumbers down a faraway road, and I think soon it’ll be dark enough for Gatherer vans to start patrolling the area with their lights off. This would be the perfect place for them to hunt; there don’t appear to be any streetlights, and the alleyways between those buildings could be full of scarlet district girls.

  Gabriel, of course, is more concerned about the blood. He’s trying to wrap my palm with a piece of seaweed, and the salt is burning the wound. I just need a minute to take th
is all in, and then I’ll worry about the cut. This time yesterday I was a House Governor’s bride. I had sister wives. At the end of my life, my body would have ended up with the wives who’d died before me, on a rolling cart in my father-in-law’s basement, for him to do only he knows what.

  But now there’s the smell of salt, sound of the ocean. There’s a hermit crab making its way up a sand dune. And something else, too. My brother, Rowan, is somewhere out here. And there’s nothing stopping me from getting home to him.

  I thought the freedom would excite me, and it does, but there’s terror, too. A steady march of what-ifs making their way through all of my deliciously attainable hopes.

  What if he’s not there?

  What if something goes wrong?

  What if Vaughn finds you?

  What if …

  “What are those lights?” Gabriel asks. I look where he’s pointing and see it too, a giant wheel of lights spinning lazily in the distance.

  “I’ve never seen anything like it,” I say.

  “Well, someone must be over there. Come on.”

  He pulls me to my feet and tugs my bleeding hand, but I stop him. “We can’t just go wandering off into lights. You don’t know what’s over there.”

  “What’s the plan, then?” he asks.

  The plan? The plan was only to escape. Accomplished. And now the plan is to reach my brother, a thought I romanticized over the sullen months of my marriage. He became almost a figment of my imagination, a fantasy, and the thought that I’ll be reunited with him soon makes me light-headed with joy.

  I had thought we could at least make it to land dry, and during the daylight, but we ran out of fuel. And we’re losing daylight by the second; it’s not any safer here than anywhere else, and at least there are lights over there, eerie as they may be, spinning like that. “Okay,” I say. “We’ll check it out.”