Page 11 of Arch Conspirator
“Not to beExtracted,” he said. “Excluded from the Archive.”
The words were like cold water spilling down my spine.
“What?”
Haemon looked at me. Then looked away.
“That was his decree earlier this morning,” he said. “Violators will be subject to the highest penalty.”
“Thehighestpenalty.”
He gave me a pointed look.
“Execution,” I said.
He nodded.
“Because Kreon thinks Polyneikes doesn’t have a soul?” I demanded. “Or because of his crime?”
“I assume,” Haemon said, “it’s a combination of both. But the stated reason is the latter.”
“Even my father was not excluded from the Archive,” I said. “None of those who participated in the riots were, either.”
“I know. Apparently he feels that a stronger tactic is needed to discourage further… attempts.”
I knew there was nothing of Kreon in Haemon. He hadn’t even provided the vessel in which Haemon grew to term. Still I wanted to hit Haemon and see if his father could feel it; I wanted to lash out as wild as I had been a few hours ago, struggling to get back to my brother.
Instead, I sat on the edge of the bed again. I dug the toes of my bare foot into the stone until it hurt.
“I’ll leave you to your grief,” he said.
The Extractor Polyneikes gave me was still in my bag, shoved under my bed with the spiders. I had not been able to imagine using it, not really, but now the absence of its weight in my hand felt like another thing excised from me. The most zealous in our city would say there was no point in storing Polyneikes’ ichor because it was only cells, with no substance. But I knew my brother had a soul. I knew he was not empty.
Haemon paused by the door.
“I’ll talk to him,” he said, and my sharp laugh followed him out.
7Ismene
One of the servants walked me back to my room, and I tried not to be offended that they didn’t even think me troublesome enough to warrant a guard. She didn’t speak to me, though I was desperate to hear something normal, some chatter about breakfast or discussion of the weather, something, anything to make the world feel like it had before, even if it was just for a second.
I went straight to the bathroom and stood in the tub as it filled, the water turning pink from the blood on the soles of my feet. Staring down at my toes, I got the unsettling feeling that I had been here before, and I remembered the art project we did in school, the teacher painting our palms and our feet and instructing us to make shapes on a big piece of paper with our footprints and handprints. We each got a color, and mine was red.
I looked again at the pale pink water, and vomited.
I moved through the rest of the morning like something was chasing me, urging me to move faster. Emptied the tub and scrubbed my legs and feet until they were flushed with color. Braided my hair and chose a dress. Chose a different one whenI remembered I was mourning. Laced my shoes tight around my ankles. Ate my breakfast in bits and pieces. Pinches of toast and bites of apple. Dry and sour and nauseating.
I heard the decree from there. Not the exact words, but the shapes of them, the timbre of Kreon’s voice recognizable even through the windowpanes and walls. There were horns throughout our district for announcements such as these. I had stood beneath them before, to hear warnings for storms, for fire, for high levels of radiation, for curfews.
It was the maid who brought my lunch who told me what he said.
Then Eurydice came, with all the quiet that usually attended her, her eyes red and the fine hair that framed her cheeks a little wet, as if she’d splashed water on her face.
“I’m so sorry,” she said.
I was crying. It had been happening all day, tears just leaking out of my body, as passive as bleeding.
“What for?” I asked her, a touch of bitterness in my voice. “Have you done something I’m not aware of?” I tilted my head. “Or perhaps failed to do something?”
