Chapter 20

She paced back and forth on her balcony, squeezing the cup of tea to keep her hands from shaking. For the first time in her life, she'd had a dream that was so visceral, so real to life, that it caused her to feel genuine fear. The cold Alaskan night air dried the sweat from her face. She had no doubt in her mind, now. Soon she'd be welcomed into complete madness.

She recited the digits, but she couldn't empty herself of the dark, lingering feelings of the dream. She remembered every moment, as if it had imprinted itself deep within her cells: hunted down by a metal machine, fire falling from the sky, arrows plunging into bodies.

Alexandra took a sip of tea.

It's not fire, it's just the northern lights that have returned, she told herself as she looked out to the sky. But even she couldn't ignore the red parts of the Aurora Borealis that had grown in strength over the last few days. Red was not a calming color. It was not a color of Evolution, it was a color of danger. The color of fire. Of War. Get it together, Alex.

The Flaring Discipline be damned, the last thing she needed was going mad like Mikhail with his constant talk of dreams and visions. Nicholas did this to her. He must have known she'd try to take over and poisoned her so that she'd slowly go crazy. That must be it? She set down the tea and pushed it away from her along with the Crank-headed thoughts. No, she thought, that's just the madness talking.

Paranoia and fear can turn a person inside out.

That was it. It was simply the paranoia from earlier, the Pilgrim shouting in the streets of Alexandra's guilt. She heard it, Flint heard it, everyone heard it. The war she'd dreamed of was just a war within herself—her subconscious mind alerting her conscious mind of the arrows pointed her way. She needed a plan to calm the situation. She looked down at her tea. She smiled to herself. What calmed her would calm the entire situation.

She knew exactly how to put out the flames of paranoia and accusations.

She grabbed her mustard-yellow cloak and what else she needed from the apartment, then left, headed to the Guardroom.

Alexandra went through the digits as she walked between bushes and brush in the midnight Alaskan air, timing them with her steps. The sky above helped to illuminate the very plant she was looking for: bog rosemary. It grew from the ground with spiky arms to the heavens. Some of the herbs produced flowers, but despite their bog-ridden beauty, she needed only the leaves. After finding it, she snapped off several arms of the plant until she had more than enough rosemary needles, and shoved them into the depths of her cloak.

She walked quickly back toward the Guardroom as she developed her plan. Would her entry be smoother with a disguise? No. The Evolutionary Guard had been on heightened alert since Nicholas' death. She'd need to enter the Guardroom as the Godhead she was and quell any suspicions for her late night visit.

"1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34 . . ." She whispered without thinking. The digits were more than just nature's favorite numbers—they constituted the golden ratio, the spiral that held the start and the end of every single life cycle within them. Trees grew their branches to the specs of the digits. Flowers bloomed seeds to the spiral of the ratio. And Alexandra would help the world evolve to its purest sequence, just as nature intended.

Nature was the great equalizer.

In a matter of hours, she'd address the Pilgrims and all those in New Petersburg with her announcement: the official start of the Evolution. Never mind her own evolution or whatever the fear growing inside her should be called; she couldn't give it a name other than what it was: Madness. She'd push this nightmare aside and speak to the people in the morning. Delivering hope and solutions to the Pilgrims would be the easy part; they worshiped her and feared the Flare. Convincing the Villa to get the first round of the Cure dispensed, on the other hand, would take some creativity. She'd worry about that later. One plan at a time.

As she approached the Guardroom—the building in town that most resembled the Maze—she waved at two Evolutionary Guards. Not unlike the Maze, this place held its own kind of prisoners.

"Goddess, are you okay?" They rushed to her side. It pleased her to know she still had their loyalty despite the crazed rumors of the Godhead killing their own.

"I had a terrible nightmare and needed to come before morning. The woman who shouted from the streets about Nicholas' murder? I need to see her." Before she'd even finished, the Guards ushered her inside the heavily fortified walls of the building. They were all too eager to appease her.

"She's in the back," one of the guards said.

The musty air of the Guardroom choked Alexandra. She coughed and coughed. Mold. These older buildings were filled with it. "Is it possible to get some hot water?" She cleared her throat from the thick air that the Guards were probably used to.

"Of course." One of them led her back while the other went for the water. Alexandra thanked them and followed the Guard through the intricate paths of crumbling arches. She tried to hide her disgust at the state of the Guardroom. It smelled like a warm toilet. Cobwebs gently swayed back and forth in single strands as she walked under them. She wouldn't be staying long, but she hated that she had to come at all.

"Here you are." The Guard motioned to a woman behind bars, sleeping on a filthy floor.

Alexandra nodded, putting on her best face of grief and desperation. She held her hand over her heart as she studied the woman's sleeping face. The poor wretch had thought it blasphemy to play out the betrayal of Nicholas at such a holy time, but there'd never been a more fitting time for betrayal. Alexandra woke up the woman with slow, loud claps for her abysmal performance in town. Startled, she snapped to attention and shuffled to the back of her cell.

She had no pillow, no bed, no pot to piss in.

"Wha—what are you doing here?" The Pilgrim's empty hands reached below her.

"I just wanted to applaud your performance. You've got the town in quite a stir over the Godhead turning on their own."

"I—I didn't mention you or Mannus," the woman whispered, trembling from head to toe.

Alexandra met her absurdity with silence. She would remind the Pilgrim of what it meant to be devout. To have faith. Honor. After a full, uncomfortable minute, Alexandra spoke. "I think it's terribly unfair that they put you in here for seeking justice in Nicholas' murder." The Evolutionary Guard arrived with her hot water. She nodded for him to leave her alone with the prisoner.

"What do you really want?" the unfaithful Pilgrim asked, barely lifting her head.

Alexandra mixed the bog rosemary into the water for tea. She stirred it and stirred it until the smell of rosemary needles intoxicated the air. The prisoner's eyes widened when instead of sipping the brew, the Goddess offered it to the Pilgrim. "I want you to return to your faith. That is all." The woman hesitated to take it but Alexandra insisted. "A Goddess is nothing without her people, and you are special to me even if you feel your purpose has been overlooked."

She accepted the cup. "Thank you. They've given me nothing all day." She sipped the bog rosemary tea. "The air in here is very musty."

"Dreadful. That will soothe your soul." Alexa watched as the Pilgrim drank the tea a few sips at a time. She told her the story of the Maze Trials, one she knew by heart. A story of faith and deceit. The Goddess recited all of her favorite parts loud enough for the Evolutionary Guards to hear, and when she was done, she left the Pilgrim and the Guards warmly.

There would be no uprising. No rogue Pilgrim. Not today.

Because within six hours, the bog rosemary would release its andromedotoxin to its fullest effect. The Pilgrim would start to have watery eyes and a runny nose that slowly turned into low blood pressure and vomiting, eventually progressing to convulsions and paralysis. By the time Alexandra addressed the town tomorrow at noon, the woman's physical body would appear as crazy as her mind. Spasms. Slurring. If the woman's tongue worked enough to form any words at all, no one would believe a single thing she said.

The Berg half-crashed, half-landed in a space well hidden by tree cover, smoke pouring out the back end. Colors spoke to him and sounds took shape as he floated in and out of consciousness. His fever raged. Maybe that little bugger did stab him closer to the kidneys than he'd thought. Everything around Mikhail moved in slow motion. He watched six Bergs fly overhead in war-formation, and the vapor trails spinning out behind them formed into letters, then into words, but in a language that he couldn't read. And then the vapors from the Bergs turned into colors, and the colors hardened into the Alaskan night sky with the colorful Aurora Borealis.

Madness.

Mikhail laid back in the captain's seat. He knew better than to close his eyes with so many physical woes, but he couldn't trust his sight and he could only think of visiting the Infinite Glade. Maybe this time would be the last time.

He took his slow, deep breath, in for three seconds, hold for three, out for three. He listened for the sounds of war as he exhaled.

Destruction was the only way to create.

Death was the only way to bring new life.

The people of Alaska would never truly know why the war happened. They might assume the usual—power, control, to stop the Evolution . . . and they'd be right on all three accounts. But if the war was successful, they would never truly know why the Evolution needed to be stopped in the first place. The greater destruction it would cause if the world walked the path of Alexandra.

Mikhail entered the Infinite Glade inside his mind and found nothing there. Did Nicholas have any premonitions before he died? He must have, but dear Nicholas had no defensive wounds on his hands when the body was found. How could someone who sees and hears so much not see his own death?

And maybe that was it.

Perhaps one could not see their own death coming even when they could see the death of an entire people.

Mikhail wandered the Infinite Glade.

She hadn't slept through a single night since they'd left the shore, and it made her miss Old Man Frypan even more. On the Maze Cutter, there wasn't a fire to sit by or anyone to offer her advice. It was just her now, wide awake on her cot, listening to the boat creak and moan.

She sat up and moved over to the small window, lit by moonlight, and opened up The Book of Newt. If reading helped Frypan sleep, maybe it would help her, too. She didn't have the courage to read it front to back and witness her great uncle Newt losing his mind, but she hoped that flipping to a random page would reveal comforting words. She closed her eyes and her finger ran through the pages until it stopped on page 74 of Newt's journal:

You can't bloody prepare for what's next when what comes next has never happened before.

His words, in Frypan's handwriting, sent a chill from her feet all the way to the hairs on top of her head. He was bloody right. And it's exactly how she felt preparing to meet the Godhead. How could she prepare when she—or anyone on their ship for that matter—had never met a member of the Godhead before? Much less all three.

Dominic's snores echoed louder and louder. Sadina took in a slow breath through her nose and put all her fears into it, closed her eyes, and exhaled like Minho had taught her. The snores stopped. The Orphan was a miracle worker, indeed.

"Hey," Trish whispered.

Sadina jumped a little. "Sorry. Did I wake you?" She made room for Trish by the window, and they snuggled in the soft, bluish glow of moonlight.

"No, Dom woke me up. But then I woke him up and told him to lie on his side. When that kid's on his back his tongue clogs up his airway and makes him sound like a beached whale."

"Yeah, he gets pretty loud, huh?"

"Like those air horns we had back on the island. For the hurricanes. Actually, Dom is worse." Trish smirked but then her smile faded. "Sadina?"

"Yeah?"

"Do you think we'll ever get back home?"

Sadina was afraid to get Trish's hopes up. Every single day since they'd left the island felt like it took them further and further away—not just literally, not just from their old life, but from ever being able to return to life as they knew it. Lacey and Carson were dead, as were two members of the Congress who'd helped plan their escape. Kletter was super dead, and with her mom not well, Sadina didn't know if she even wanted to go home when all of this was over.

"I don't know . . ." She finally said. "I honestly don't know."

"Can I tell you something without you getting mad?" Trish nervously played with the driftwood pendant around her neck that Sadina had made for her.

"Of course."

Trish paused and rubbed her forehead. "Don't be mad."

"I won't, I promise. What is it?"

"I left a note on the island . . ."

"Trish!" Sadina almost forgot everyone was sleeping. "Why? What did you say?" They'd all agreed when they left the amphitheater that no one on the island would know the truth. "We were supposed to pretend that Kletter did all that. The poisoning, the kidnapping, so that when we came back everything could be blamed on her!"

"I know, I know!" Trish held the piece of driftwood tighter. "But you had your mom with you and I was leaving my whole family behind. I couldn't not tell them. I didn't want them to worry. You know it would have killed my mom."

Sadina tried to find patience, to keep her promise. She understood why Trish did it, but she didn't want Trish's mom and dad telling the rest of the island. "What did the note say?" Sadina pressed. "I'm not mad. I get it. But I need to know what you told them."

Trish was on the edge of tears. "I don't even remember. I wrote it right before we left." She rubbed her head again. "I mostly just wanted to tell them that I was okay, I loved them, and that I'd be back soon. That we were going on an adventure."

Sadina sighed.

"You're mad."

"I'm not mad. It's actually perfectly understandable." She opened The Book of Newt. If Congress hadn't been split in the first place, then they could've just told the truth instead of leaving the island in a big cloud of mystery. "If you trust that they won't say anything then I trust them, too."

They sat in silence for a while, holding each other. Dominic started snoring again.

Trish motioned to the book and spoke softly, "Did you circle these pages because they're your favorites?"

Sadina didn't know what she meant. She hadn't circled anything so it must've been Frypan. She flipped through the book and to her surprise there were quite a few page numbers circled. She went through and said the circled numbers out loud, "1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233. Page 1 is circled twice, I wonder what that means?"

"Maybe Old Man Frypan is a doodler."

"Maybe." But this didn't feel random. They felt connected. Like a code. She flipped through the pages with her thumb, again and again, repeating the circled numbers in her head until something literally started to add up.

"Trish. Look, these numbers, I don't think they're just page numbers . . . these . . . every single one of them, when added to the one that came before it, equals the number that comes after it. Simple math. Like, look, 5 plus 3 is 8. 8 plus 5 is 13. 21 plus 13 is—"

"34." Trish finished in wonderment. "But what does it mean?"

"I think . . ." Sadina's thoughts conflicted with the reality in front of her, they were just numbers but numbers that grew and evolved in a perfectly measured sequence. "I think it has something to do with the Evolution . . ."