Chapter 15 - THE OTHER SISTER
Ivy woke in a bedroom she did not recognize.
Sunlight streamed through white curtains.
Her wrists were free.
She wore clean clothes, and her pendant had been placed neatly on a table beside the bed.
Outside the window stretched a blue ocean.
She was no longer in Bellhaven.
She rushed to the door.
Unlocked.
Beyond it lay a wide hallway decorated with framed photographs.
Ivy stopped at the first one.
It showed her as a baby in Miriam Vale’s arms.
The second showed Clara holding Rose beside the carousel.
The third had been taken after the laboratory fire.
A woman carried a sleeping child toward an airplane.
Ivy moved closer.
The child was Rose.
The woman carrying her was not Margaret.
It was Helena.
At the end of the hall, music played from another room.
The lullaby from Ivy’s dreams.
She followed it.
A breakfast table had been set beside open glass doors overlooking the sea.
Arthur Bell sat at one end.
He no longer wore his respirator or formal suit. He appeared relaxed, almost ordinary.
“Where is Celeste?”
“Alive.”
“Ellen?”
“The woman you call Ellen is safe.”
“Thomas?”
“Recovering.”
“Margaret?”
Arthur poured tea.
“That is a more complicated answer.”
“I want to go home.”
“You do not know where home is.”
“Home is where the people who love me are.”
“A beautiful answer.”
“I’m not staying here.”
Arthur gestured toward the chair opposite him.
“Eat first.”
Ivy swept the plate onto the floor.
Porcelain shattered.
Arthur did not react.
“You have Celeste’s temper.”
“She has my temper.”
He smiled.
“Yes. I suppose she does.”
Ivy looked toward the open terrace. The property stood high above the ocean, surrounded by cliffs. Guards watched the lower road.
“Why did you bring me here?”
“Because the Meridian Archive is incomplete.”
“You stole a data wafer.”
“The wafer contains a directory, not the full archive.”
“Then where is the rest?”
“Inside the surviving subjects.”
Ivy touched her head.
“Inside me?”
“Partly.”
Arthur opened a folder.
Inside were records from Ivy’s childhood: drawings, school essays, medical scans, photographs, and recordings of her sleeping.
Someone had documented her entire life.
“Your foster placement was not random,” he said. “Your teachers were selected. Your doctors reported to us. Even your nightmares were recorded.”
Ivy wanted to tear the folder apart, but she forced herself to remain still.
“Who is us?”
“The descendants of those who created Meridian.”
“You mean Orpheus.”
“Orpheus was the name given to the continuity network.”
“And Miriam divided herself among six people.”
“Not exactly. She divided a map of her identity. No subject carries the complete person.”
“Do I carry part of her?”
Arthur studied her.
“You carry something no other subject has.”
“What?”
“Resistance.”
Ivy almost laughed.
“You kidnapped me because I resist you?”
“We rescued you from people who would activate the full sequence without understanding the consequences.”
“Celeste would never hurt me.”
“Celeste already activated the chapel.”
“To find the truth.”
“And nearly released data capable of rewriting human memory.”
Ivy thought of Elias’s recording.
“He wanted Meridian destroyed.”
“Elias lied.”
“You expect me to trust you?”
“No. Trust is simply a memory attached to repeated behavior. It can be manufactured.”
Footsteps sounded in the hallway.
Arthur stood.
“She is awake.”
Ivy turned toward the doorway.
A girl entered.
She was about Ivy’s age.
She had the same dark eyes.
The same shape of face.
The same small scar above her eyebrow.
Around her neck hung another half-sun pendant.
Ivy stared at her.
“That’s impossible.”
The girl looked equally shocked.
Arthur stepped between them.
“Ivy, this is Iris.”
Iris moved closer.
For a moment, neither girl spoke.
Then Iris whispered, “He told me you died at the station.”
Ivy’s heart pounded.
“Who are you?”
The girl’s eyes filled with tears.
“My name was Rose.”
“No. I was Rose.”
Arthur watched them carefully.
Iris pulled a folded photograph from her pocket.
It was almost identical to the photograph from Celeste’s wallet.
Clara and Rose stood beside the carousel.
But in this version, a third little girl stood behind them.
Someone had scratched her face away.
Iris turned the photograph over.
Three names were written on the back.
Clara.
Rose.
Ivy.
The room became silent except for the waves below.
Arthur walked toward the terrace.
“The Vale records contained two birth certificates,” he said.
“But Miriam gave birth to three daughters.”
Ivy shook her head.
“No.”
“One child was hidden from Elias. One was hidden from Eleanor. One was hidden from the trust.”
“Which one am I?”
Arthur looked over his shoulder.
“That is the question everyone has been killing to answer.”
A phone rang on the table.
Arthur checked the screen.
His expression changed.
“What happened?” Iris asked.
He did not answer.
Ivy seized the phone before he could stop her.
A live security image filled the display.
Celeste stood outside the coastal gates.
Her emerald suit was torn. Blood marked one side of her face. Margaret stood beside her holding a shotgun.
Behind them waited three black vehicles.
Celeste looked directly into the gate camera.
“I know you can hear me, Arthur.”
Ivy’s breath caught.
Celeste continued.
“Release my sister.”
Arthur reached for the phone.
Ivy moved away.
On the screen, Margaret opened a metal case.
Inside rested the original photograph and a sealed document bearing Miriam Vale’s signature.
Margaret held the document toward the camera.
“You gave Ivy the wrong sister,” she announced.
Arthur went pale.
For the first time since Ivy awakened, he looked genuinely afraid.
Iris stepped closer to the screen.
“What does she mean?”
Arthur said nothing.
Celeste raised a detonator.
“The truth is underneath this house.”
The ocean-facing windows began to tremble.
A deep mechanical sound rose from the cliffs.
Far below the mansion, something enormous opened beneath the water.
Arthur turned toward Ivy and Iris.
“Both of you need to run.”
“Why?” Ivy demanded.
A siren began screaming through the house.
Arthur stared at the two identical girls.
“Because there were never three Vale daughters.”
The floor shook violently.
He pointed toward the dark passage appearing behind the fireplace.
May you like
“There were four.”
And from somewhere beneath the mansion, a child’s voice began singing the lullaby from Ivy’s dreams.
