Witch and Wizard_ The Fire - James Patterson [3]
And then I see them.
A hundred posters, or a thousand, on every pole and window. Wisty and me.
I whip around again, hyperventilating. I feel eyes on me everywhere. An old woman grins up at me with a mouthful of missing teeth. A couple of suits trot down the white marble steps of the Capitol building, their cigars pointed our way. There’s a little girl standing off to the side, her wide, gray eyes boring into me. She knows.
They all know.
Right on cue, the squad storms through the entrance to the square, their heads flicking around in search of us. And then, like something out of a horror movie, the zombie wolves start to howl.
There’s a small, partially bombed-out stone building down a side street that I can spot from here, and it looks promising. Or at least more promising than the jaws of the half-dead mutts. I slink toward it as inconspicuously as possible and slip in through a side door.
A gargantuan painting of The One Who Is The One greets me, his bald head and Technicolor eyes bearing down, and a sign on the wall reads: CONFESS YOUR CRIMES TO THE NEW ORDER AND YOU WILL BE SPARED. THE ONE ALREADY KNOWS ALL. There are bullet shells on the floor.
This could be … really bad.
But there’s no one here. We’re safe — for now.
My shoulders and lower back muscles are screaming, so I finally slide my sister down to the floor. She looks like the image of death. I sit her up in my lap. “Come on, Wisty,” I plead, wiping her face with my shirt. “Stay with me.”
Her red hair is matted with sweat, but her teeth are chattering. I hold her clammy hand, whisper the words of some of my surefire healing spells over her, and add every ounce of hope I have into the mix.
Only … nothing works.
How can my power be bone-dry? I’m a wizard, but I can’t even save my sister. She’s my constant, my best friend. I can’t just sit here and watch her get weaker, watch her eyes puff up as the blood leaks into them, watch her float in and out of consciousness until her world finally goes dark. I can’t keep watching the people I care about most die.
I already did that.
Twice.
I wince, thinking of Mom and Dad. If they’d only taught me a bit more about how to wield this power before …
I can’t finish the thought.
It’s not just a problem with my power, I’m sure of it. There’s something in the air here in the capital — like The One poisoned it or something — and it’s turning the New Order followers into empty, nodding pod people, and the poor, potential dissenters into writhing, moaning Blood Plague victims.
The survival rates haven’t been high.
“Why did you have to volunteer at that stupid plague camp and get sick, Wisty?” I whisper-shout at her through angry tears. “We’ve seen what The One can do, and if he wants every single freethinker in the ghetto to get sick, then no amount of healing spells is going to make you immune!”
I need my sister, the often annoying know-it-all, rebel leader, greatest threat to the New Order, unexpectedly rockin’ musician, witch extraordinaire. … I can’t do this alone. No — I can’t do this without her. She was the only one I had left in the world.
My breath catches in my throat. I’ve already been thinking of Wisty in the past tense.
I feel everything within me explode at once. I smash my hand into the painting of The One, but it’s as if it’s made of metal, and my hand throbs in agony.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” a voice says from the door. I whip around to find a young soldier seemingly dressed in his daddy’s too-big uniform, pointing a gun at me from the entrance.
I almost laugh. This is the twerp who’s bringing us in?
“Yeah, I kind of figured that out now, thanks,” I say, cradling my injured hand. I look behind him. No one seems to have followed him here.
“On behalf of the New Order and in the name of The One Who Is The One” — he looks up at the painting reverently —“I demand that you surrender your power and turn over The One Who Has The Gift.”
He means Wisty. The One wants her fire. I take