Relic

XXXVIII: Aprilus 28 and 29 Year 242, A.H.

How can I sleep? I’m bone-tired, but my mind won’t rest. What is Lukas going to tell me? That the Testing is a sham, and that Eamon meant to challenge it? I’ve already started believing that myself. Or is it something else entirely?

Not for one more tick can I sit in this claustrophobic bedroom, doing nothing. I can’t take the heat anymore; my body has grown too accustomed to deep cold. I slip on my kamiks and put my sealskin cloak on top of my nightdress. Slowly, I creak open my bedroom door and check the corridor. No one stirs in the house, so I tiptoe down the hall to the turret doorway.

The heavy wooden door groans when I push it open. I stiffen, certain that someone will wake up and catch me. But I hear nothing, so I proceed. My kamiks glide up the familiar spiral stairwell, and I settle onto the hard stone bench lining the turret wall. The night is blue and still and cold, but not nearly as frigid as what I’ve felt outside the Aerie. I wrap my sealskin cloak around me like a blanket, and within a few ticks I’m comfortable enough. I spend the bells recording the past days in this journal.

When dawn comes and daybreak crests over the turret wall, I’m waiting.

Lukas jumps when he sees me. “How long have you been out here, Eva?”

“Not long. A few bells,” I lie as I stand up to face him.

“That’s long enough on a frigid night like this.”

“Not when you’ve been beyond the Ring, Lukas.”

“You’re right. Sometimes I forget that you were really out there.” He looks a little sad. As if it was somehow his fault that I’d entered the Testing. But I have no more patience for his so-called “secrets.”

“What do you have to tell me? About my Apple altar?”

“I think it might be better seen than told.”

Lukas is still making no sense, and I’m furious. “Are you deliberately trying to confuse me? Do you know what I’m risking?”

“Of course. But you have to understand: this isn’t what you think. You were taught in School that this is a diptych, a folding altarpiece like many New North people keep in their homes to pray to their Gods. Except, supposedly the pre-Healing people used this to pray to the false god Apple, instead. Right?”

“Right.” Why is he stating the obvious? Something every Schoolchild in the Aerie knows?

“It’s actually something called a computer.”

“A computer?” I’ve never heard the term before. Now he’s speaking gibberish.

“It’s a Tech device through which the pre-Healing people received images and information.”

“Where they received information from the false god Apple?”

Altar in hand, Lukas moves closer to me. “No, Eva. It’s a device were they received images and information from other pre-Healing people. They didn’t use it to pray. They used it to communicate. Like we do by carrier pigeon. It’s hard to explain, so maybe I should just show you.” He starts opening the altar and pressing its edges.

“What are you doing?” I gasp. Instinctively I reach for it. I don’t like him handling it so roughly.

Lukas gently moves my hand away. “Turning it on.” He tears his gaze away from the altar to look at me. “Eva, this device captures power from the sun. I’ve been charging it since dawn. Just watch.”

I stand next to him so I can get a better view of the altar’s face. I still have absolutely no idea what he means by “on,” but I figure I should wait and see. In a few ticks, the face of the altar begins to come alive with a jumble of color. I stifle a scream and jump back. It’s evil, just like we’ve been taught. It has powers not of the Gods—not the Earth or Sun or Moon—nor The Lex. This is Tech. I have a terrible premonition that just by witnessing its power, I will die.

Lukas reaches out a hand to steady me. “There’s nothing to be afraid of Eva. This is what I meant about turning the computer ‘on.’ In a few ticks, we’ll see what kind of images it stores.”

I have no choice but to stare. I am too paralyzed with fear. The face turns bright blue. Pictures of the constellations begin to appear on it. How can the nighttime sky be appearing on this thing? It makes no sense. Without realizing, I reach out to touch it. To see if it’s real.

Lukas grabs my hand before I make contact. “Don’t. After all that time in the ice, it’s pretty delicate. We don’t want to break it before we see what’s inside.”

“We’re going to open it up?”

“No. I don’t mean actually opening it. We’ll look at the screen.”

“The screen?” All these new terms are making my head spin. How does Lukas know all this? And why hasn’t he ever said anything about these things before?

“What you’d call the face of the altar,” he clarifies. He begins to press on some small squares on the other side of the altar, and after a tick or so, a rectangle appears on the face. He taps on the altar again, and Elizabet’s image emerges.

“By the Gods, it’s Elizabet!” I’m so excited to see her face that I nearly forget the terror. Lukas clamps a hand over my mouth, but I’m squealing underneath his fingers.

“I want to see her,” I mumble.

“Will you keep quiet?”

I nod, and Lukas removes his hand. I stare at the image. The blonde hair, light eyes, and sinewy limbs are exactly the same as all the pictures in her pink pack.

“It’s really her. She looks just like the images in the Kirov Ballet book,” I say.

“Would you like to hear Elizabet speak?”

“Speak? You can make her speak?” I sound like a child. I feel like one. It’s as if my wish to make Elizabet come alive is becoming true.

The ever-humble Lukas puffs up a little. “I think so. Let me try.”

He presses some squares again, and she moves. Her voice is shaky, and although her English is accented, her words are articulate and clear. She speaks directly to the computer. And there are tears running down her face. “Robert, are you out there? It’s me, Elizabet. I’m just praying that you get this post. Our connections have been getting weaker as the ocean waters have risen. Do you have any Internet connection left? I haven’t received anything from you since last night …”

I’ve stopped breathing. The world has shrunk to this miraculous vision.

Elizabet pauses to wipe the tears away from her eyes. Her eyes are bright, and very blue. “My kultanen, I saved your message.” She rubs the amulet around her neck. “Here, so I can keep it close to my heart. No matter what happens. The captain finally told me where we are going. Our course is due north, once we make it to the North Sea from the Baltic Sea, that is. We are heading for some obscure island in the Arctic, a place the captain says will be safe from the rising ocean waters. My family supposedly will be waiting for me there.”

Shaking her head, Elizabet says, “I’m still trying to make sense of what he told me. I mean, how did my family know to go to this Arctic island? How do they know it’s safe? The melting of the polar ice caps happened so suddenly. What would make them leave the safety of their Finnish palace almost a week before the catastrophe started? The captain said that my dad and the men from some of these other families were there because they’d been working on a joint venture oil project on this Arctic island. But that still doesn’t explain the timing.”

I turn to Lukas, wide-eyed, but he raises a finger to his lips, his brow furrowed in concentration.

Elizabet laugh a little ruefully. “But you know me, I didn’t want to leave the Kirov until the last possible second. I just had to debut the La Bayadere at the Mariinsky Theater, Armageddon or not. I just had to secure that glory and fame, didn’t I? Stupid, huh? Stubborn, at best.” The laughter stops. “Did you get on that boat, my kultanen? You know, the one you tried for in Helsinki.”

As she fingers the amulet she wears around her neck, the tears start again. She says, “I’ve been praying that you did. I’ve been praying that your silence means you’re safely on that ship and you just don’t have any connectivity. And that soon we will be together again.” Her eyes narrow and darken. “I will never forgive my parents for not getting you on their ship. They’ve always been so controlling, but this is evil. I will never—”

The face of the altar—the screen of the computer—goes blank.