Brother to Dragons, Companion to Owls (7 page)

She trails off.

I reach and touch her arm. “Now with his love, so his colde grave, alone withouten any compaignye.”

“Yes, Sarah,” she says. “You do understand, don't you?”

As we hurry to When I Was Hungry, Abalone tells Professor Isabella about Peep's rumor.

“Odd,” she says when the report is finished. “I've heard
nothing about this, yet I'm certain that at least two of the Tabaqui who are usually by the Station are from the Home. No one has come looking for them.”

Troubled, Abalone starts to slow, but a cold gust of wind pushes her along. We talk little more until we are at the table in the steamy soup kitchen, seated a bit apart from the rest. Jerome has noticed our arrival, but it will be sometime before he can join us.

I am wiping the extra cream sauce from Between's jaw when Jerome comes over. He carries a coffeepot and seems relaxed.

“Evening, folks,” he says. “Getting too cold these nights for man or beast, so we're going to be staying open with hot coffee and tea and a space for those who'll doss on the floor or tabletop. Pass the word to those who might need it.”

Delicately, he does not speak as if we need this help. I wonder if he will ever learn that Abalone has been anonymously dropping the kitchen supplies—a case of coffee last time. Suddenly, it occurs to me that her generosity may be the reason that the place is staying open later and I feel good.

“Speaking of getting the word,” Abalone says, “we hear that the Home is taking back some of the nutcases they pitched out.”

Jerome's dark face creases. “I haven't heard any of that, Abalone. Rumor runs the other way—that we may lose more bed space. Your source good?”

“Thought so, spoke as if worried for Sarah, like they'd make her go back.”

Jerome pats my hand. “No, you're safe, Sarah. Odd com
pany you keep, but you do seem to be doing just fine. Not like some. I saw two of your old pals. Remember Francis and Ali?”

I nod, wrinkling my nose in distaste.

He laughs, but memory stills the laughter in his throat.

“They looked terrible. Ragged and filthy, hungry, sick. It tore me to send them on with just a meal.”

“Were they here?” Abalone asks and I know she means to find them.

“Yes…No, wait!” Jerome looks puzzled. “It was at the Home—a week or so ago. I remember because I slid them both double portions of pancakes and we never do anything that fancy here. Sorry, one chow line runs into another after a while.”

“Strange,” Professor Isabella says. “Very strange. There may be something to your rumor, Abalone.”

Abalone nods slowly. “Yeah, Jerome, could you ask, quiet-like, about why those guys were brought back in and maybe about this rumor? Please.”

She bats her eyelashes at him and with her fiery buzz and blue lips is such a ludicrous parody of the little girl that we all burst out laughing.

“I'll do what I can,” Jerome promises, “but I'm not exactly in Admin Center.”

Professor Isabella smiles, almost wickedly. “Do what you can, Jerome, but don't get yourself in trouble. I may know someone in the Admin Center.”

We finish our coffee and step into the cold. As we hustle along toward one of our safe spots, I search and find almost
the question I want to ask. When we pause at a crosswalk, I ask Professor Isabella.

“Who are you? Are you nobody, too?”

She looks at me, deciphering. “Who am I? Am I nobody, too? Ah! Clever, Sarah.”

We cross and she continues, “Yes, I am nobody, Sarah, but I still know someone in the Admin Center. So do you.”

Puzzled, I review the sea of faces, most without names, from my years at the Home. Most of those I knew well enough to beg a favor of—if I could make them understand me—were like Jerome or Nani, my sewing teacher, staff, not administration. I shrug.

“I'm nobody,” I admit. “Who are you? Are you nobody, too?”

“Yes”—she nudges Abalone who has been listening with lively interest—“but I know someone who can get us into Admin Center's very heart. Abalone here, with her skillful tappety-tap.”

“Hmm.” The blue lips curl. “Yes, let's rent a room.” We check into an automated facility, Abalone resisting the urge to reprogram the computer to give us our room for free. Once in, Professor Isabella goes to shower and I sit and whisper with Betwixt and Between so that I will not disturb Abalone.

She mutters to herself as she secures us from tracing and then starts into the Home's systems. If I try, I can hear her tappety-tap answering her—cursing back when she swears, cheering along with her as they break a security code, sniffling indignantly at the slovenly programming.

When Abalone was teaching me to drive, I learned that she heard nothing but the flat synthetic voice used by some programs. Now, I try not to hear because it seems like eavesdropping on lovers, but sadder because the beloved is deaf to the whispered endearments, encouragement, and support.

My dragons have been unusually quiet since the previous evening's conversation with Conejito Moreno and the events following. I wonder if they are still worrying that I will freak out. Surely that would be terrible for them, because they have already lost Dylan. I scratch Betwixt's eye ridge, rubbing in front of Between's nose horn at the same time.

Both seem to stretch and lean into my fingers.

“In much wisdom is much grief,” I say softly, breathing mute thanksgiving to those mad-folk who raved in passages from the Bible, “and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.”

“Think we're sad, Sarah?” Betwixt asks.

I nod.

“Yeah, we are but—Hey! Don't stop scratching!—You scared us. We thought we'd hurt you.”

“I am a brother to dragons, a companion to owls,” I repeat.

The red eyes sparkle gratefully.

Between says, “We do know stuff from when you were little, back in the Institute. You're a success, Sarah. The only one who ended up crazy and out of there. We lost Dylan; we don't want to lose you.”

Questions for which I lack words flutter into my throat and get trapped there. My hands rise to shake them free.

“Easy, Sarah.” Professor Isabella has reemerged, wrapped in a towel. “Calm down.”

I let my hands fall and the dragons look at each other, sighing simultaneously so that they blow up each other's noses. Unable to help myself, I giggle. Professor Isabella shakes her head with concern and retreats to dress. I realize that she too, is worried that I am losing control.

Between nods thoughtfully. “We can't explain it, Sarah. We're just us and the Institute people weren't exactly chatty.”

Betwixt interrupts. “You know the Bible quote? ‘Eyes have they, but they see not. They have ears, but they hear not'? Someone wanted people who could hear and see what most people can't and that's you and that's Dylan and that's too much for any human.”

I nod and hold up my hand, signaling “enough.” I need to think, to reflect. Memories without words are rising up and I know if I do not carefully handle them, I will be drowned.

When Professor Isabella returns, coifed and wearing only one skirt and sweater, Abalone ignores her questions and keeps working. She does nod thanks when the professor supplies her with cocoa from a vending machine. Then the two of us withdraw to a corner and Professor begins to read to me from the collected works of Mark Twain.

We are both so immersed in the essay she is reading that when Abalone lets out a long whistle of amazement, we both jump.

“Found something?” Professor Isabella asks, flipping off the portable library screen that Abalone had bought soon after our first meeting.

“And something,” Abalone confirms, rumpling her unrumpleable hair. “The outer programs were a breeze. I could have gotten through them when I…I got through them easily. When I started on the records for this latest ‘purge' and some Dr. Haas who was in charge of Sarah's case, well…”

She shakes her head in amazement.

“So you didn't learn anything?” Professor Isabella asks.

Abalone raises her eyebrows indignantly, “I didn't say that. I just said it wasn't easy. C'mere.

“I didn't want to be too direct about this,” Abalone begins once we have positioned ourselves so that we can see her screen. “If someone is really looking for Sarah, her files might be flagged so that unauthorized entry would be noticed. So I went on a less obvious tangent.”

She pauses to sip her cocoa, grimacing when she finds it has grown cold.

“I knew about when Sarah appeared on the street, so I worked backward through the files, looking for when the orders came down. When I found them, I cross-checked by matching not only Sarah's name, but Ali and Francis, those two fellows Jerome mentioned. Then, when I was sure I had the right group I checked who the controlling authorities were. There were three physicians or psychiatrists, Doctors Davidoff, N'goya, and Haas, who came in from outside. I found next that Haas had been the one who selected Sarah as one of those to be pitched into the cold cruel.”

This time she looks at the cold cocoa before sipping.

“Let me go pee. Will you get refills, Sarah? Maybe some chips or other junk?”

She tosses me a credit slip and I head out, proud that I can do this without panicking. Behind me, Betwixt and Between call for me to remember a treat for them.

When I return, Abalone is back in her perch on the bed. I am pleased that the story has waited for me. Once we are settled with cocoa and cake and chips and the rest of my loot from the vending machines, Abalone continues her report.

“Well, the next jump was a leap of faith. I still didn't want to try Sarah's file or code a search with her specs, not until I knew more. Then it occurred to me. Someone may want Sarah back—it may be a private individual even, but whoever it is is using the Home. This is where the faith came in—what if someone screwed up letting Sarah out? I decided that made sense, since that would clear up why someone was trying to get her back. Well, the candidate for prime screwup was this Dr. Haas, who cleared Sarah to go.”

Abalone pauses, swigs, and hits an icon on her screen. The screen shifts, but the pattern of numbers and letters remains unintelligible to me. Professor Isabella leans forward, though, scans and grunts.

“Bingo, Abalone. Bingo!”

Beaming, Abalone continues, “With the Haas name as a tracer, I did some more snooping. Not only does she have permission to readmit Sarah if she's found, but she was the one who had Ali and Francis dragged in. I bet they were questioned and then junked when they couldn't say where our friend here was.”

“Did you ever go after Sarah's files?” Professor Isabella asks, her hand clasped tight around her drink.

“Yep, I couldn't give up, not when things were going so well. Something might have made it tougher for me later.”

“Pshaw,” Professor Isabella chuckles.

I giggle.

“All right, I'm curious. This gets weirder the more I look. I expected to find either that Peep was exaggerating or that a simple recall had been issued. I find neither one nor the other, a mixture of both.”

She touches a few icons and this time I recognize my face up in one corner of the screen. The words mean nothing, but I remember the computer in the outpatient processing center reciting: “Sarah. No surname. No precise date of birth. Admitted from Ivy Green Institute, a private sanatorium.”

I tense, waiting for the flashing lights, the warning “Classified!”

Nothing happens and slowly I let my muscles unknot, realizing that Abalone has failed to alert the warning.

“Ivy Green Institute,” Professor Isabella muses. “Yes, that's where Sarah was brought from. I remember hearing something about it. Did you check them out?”

“Not yet. I wanted to see if I could get into Sarah's file at the Home. I avoided a Classified flag—it was pretty plain, meant to keep out peeping staff grunts.”

“What did you find?”

Abalone's smile vanishes. “It's been rewritten, look.”

The screen flickers. The same picture is there, but in the
swimming characters is information that makes Professor Isabella gasp.

“To be ignorant of one's ignorance is the malady of the ignorant,” I hint, tired of being ignored.

“Sorry, Sarah,” Professor Isabella apologizes. “Ignorance may be bliss, here. Abalone's right, the file describes a young woman of about your age and appearance, but nothing else is the same. The woman is not listed as a possible autistic, but as a probably dangerous paranoid. Your little identifying traits—like speaking in quotes—are completely missing.”

I look with puzzlement at Abalone and she wrinkles her brow. “I don't know, Sarah, but I got out of that file as fast as I could. I checked the recall on Ali and Francis—not much help there except that Dr. Haas issued it. I think she's behind the search for you—well, at least involved with it.”

Professor Isabella is still looking at the altered file.

“This frightens me, girls. The woman depicted here is dangerous—if she was ‘accidentally' killed or, worse, doped to the gills, there aren't many who would question the wisdom of the action. By then, she could not defend herself.”

“Wolf's Heart!” Abalone cries, kicking a chair leg. “Can Sarah, anyhow? You really need to listen to follow her as it is. She could be dragged off before anyone could understand her and decide to step in.”

“That he is mad”—I point to myself—“'tis true: 'tis true 'tis pity; And pity 'tis 'tis true.”

“Sarah, honey”—Professor Isabella pats my hand—“there is a method to your madness but Abalone is right, not many
will take time to find it. Abalone, how long until they find she is in the Jungle?”

“Peep says Edelweiss knows someone wants Sarah. That means others do, too. My guess is until Sarah gets more time with Head Wolf than the others like. The Law doesn't forbid Pack members to fight, just demands that the fight is ‘alone and afar.'”