Butler, Octavia - Fledgling

They dared me to taste the coffee, and I tasted it. It was less appealing than plain water, but not disgusting. I wondered what other human food or drink I could tolerate. When I had more time, I might find out.

We talked for a while longer, then got up and headed back. Suddenly there was confusion and shouting. Not too far ahead of us, people came spilling out of Henry’s house. Before I could understand what was going on, Katharine Dahlman was there in front of us. She had run from Henry’s house, run faster than a human could, but not that fast for an Ina. She was holding something in front of her, clutched in both

hands.

It took a moment for me to understand that she was holding a rifle. She ran ahead of the crowd, then stopped suddenly and leveled the gun at my symbionts and me.

I charged her. I was terrified that she would kill another of my symbionts before I could stop her. Again, I had not kept them safe.

She fired.

And I felt as though I’d been punched hard, hammered in the stomach by something impossibly strong. It was as though I hung in midair for an instant, not going forward, not dropping. It didn’t happen that

way, of course, but I felt as though it did. In fact, my momentum carried me into her. I hit her with my feet, and she started to fall. I hit the rifle with my hand, shoved it upward, and made her next shot go wild. Her weapon was an old bolt-action rifle, perhaps one of those kept handy while the Gordons were

worried about being attacked. If it had been automatic like the ones our attackers had used against us, or if Katharine had been quick with it, she might have shot me again before I reached her. She might have battered me down with bullets, then while I was helpless, she could have finished killing me.

Instead, I reached her. As we struggled on the ground I tore the gun from her hands and threw it away. I was surprised that I could. She was an adult and larger than I was, even though she was small for an Ina. I could feel her in my hands as she twisted and tried to push me away, tried to tear herself free of me, tried to bite me.

My own strength was bleeding away. She was winning, holding on to me, pulling me close so that she could bite and tear. With the last of my strength, I rammed my hand upward, hit her hard under the chin, pulled myself up, and bit down hard into the flesh of her throat.

She screamed. Either she was terrified of my getting control of her or her pain overwhelmed her. I had not bitten her for nourishment or out of affection. I meant to destroy her throat, tear it to pieces. She let go of my shoulders to grab my head and push my face away, and in the instant of opportunity that gave me, I went for a better grip on her with my teeth. I bit through her larynx. She would do no more screaming for a while. And I broke her neck—or tried to. I wasn’t sure whether I managed it or not because I lost consciousness before the worst of my own pain could catch up with me.

And then it was over.

epilogue

I regained consciousness slowly. It was like struggling up through mud.

I was naked except for one of Wright’s big T-shirts. Someone had undressed me and put me to bed. The room was very dark, and I lay alone in bed. I couldn’t see well at first. I wasn’t in pain from my wound, but I felt weak—weak on a whole different scale from anything I’d felt since the cave. In fact, this felt like awakening in the cave. This time, though, I thought I’d only lost a night or two.

Then I smelled meat somewhere just beyond to bed. I turned toward it, literally starving. My body had used up its resources healing itself and had reached the point of beginning to consume its own muscle tissue as fuel.

I scuttled toward the meat, desperate for it. Someone said, “Stop, Shori!”

And I stopped. It was Wright. My first.

I pulled back, seeing him now, tall, broad, and shadowy, sitting in a chair next to the bed. I hadn’t touched him, wouldn’t touch him. I pulled back, away from him, clutching the mattress, whimpering. The hunger was a massive twisting hurt inside me, but I would not touch him. I heard him moving around, then I caught a different scent. Beef. Food.

“Here,” he said. “Take it. Eat.” He gave me a big dish filled with lean pieces of raw meat. It wasn’t as freshly killed as I would have preferred, but it was good enough. I gulped the meat, bit the pieces into smaller chunks, and swallowed them barely chewed, then gulped more. I finished the platter and grabbed the new one that Wright offered me, gulping much of it, then, with growing contentment, finishing the rest more slowly, actually chewing before I swallowed, feeling almost content, finally content.

I put the platter down, leaned back against the headboard, and sighed. “Thank you,” I said. “But next time—if this ever happens again—don’t stay with me. Just leave the meat.”

“I don’t see where you put it all,” he said. “You’re so small. If you were human, I’d expect you to be sick after eating like that.”

“I was sick—from the need to eat.”

“I know but ... oh, it doesn’t matter. I’m just grateful you’re all right.”

“You shouldn’t have been here,” I told him again. I shook my head, tried to shake off the memory of

Hugh Tang. “How could the Gordons let you stay here with me?”

“They didn’t,” he said. “They said we should put the meat in a cooler and leave it in here with you. They said none of us should go in, that we should wait until you came out.”

“You should have.”

He put something in my hands. It turned out to be several disposable wipes. I used them to clean my hands and face. Then he poured water from a pitcher into a glass and handed me the glass. I had seen neither the pitcher nor the glass until he picked them up from the night table. I was focused on him—his scent, the sound of his heartbeat, his breathing, his voice. It was so good to have him nearby even though he shouldn’t have been.

I took the glass and drank. “Thank you,” I said. “Why did you disobey the Gordons? You know what I

could have done.”

“I’m not Hugh Tang,” he said. “And you didn’t have a head wound this time. I knew you wouldn’t hurt me.”

I stared at him, amazed and angry. “You don’t understand. The hunger is so terrible . . . Even without a head wound, I might have killed you.”

“You stopped the instant I spoke. I don’t believe you would have touched me. In fact, without the head injury, I don’t think you would have touched anyone else who had the presence of mind to speak to you. I was pretty sure I was safe here.”

“You don’t know what it’s like to be so . . . so hungry.”

He put his hand on my arm. “I don’t. And I wish you hadn’t had to go through it. I know you were afraid Katharine was going to shoot one of us.” Very slowly, he gathered me to him. I let him because it felt so good, so completely comfortable to rest against him.

“Are the others all right?” I asked, knowing they were. His manner would have been very different if someone had been badly injured. Or killed.

He smiled. “They’re fine. They’re worried about you. They’ve been sitting with you when I had to take breaks. It’s been three nights. Preston told us it would be at least three nights. Hayden said it would more likely be five or six nights, but Joel said that for Ina medical problems, you can just about always trust Preston.”

I shook my head, amazed, thinking about what could have happened. What if I had awakened and scared Celia or Brook or attacked them because they tried to run away? “I’m glad I woke when you were here.”

“Me too.”

“And . . . what about Katharine?”

“Dead. Wells and Manning took care of it since executions are the business of the host family. They can do it themselves or bring in other families to help. But this time they didn’t need help. They beheaded her, then burned both the head and the body. She might have healed from what you did to her. Her throat