“And this was your plan?” I ask, almost tempted to laugh. “You really thought you could sway me with a bit of good cop, bad cop?” I look at Nouria. “And I take it you’re the bad cop?”
“We have more to do than ever before,” Nouria says angrily. “We can hardly get our own cabins rebuilt. People need privacy, and proper places to sleep. We need to get the schools running again for the children. We need to stop living off generators and automat dinners.” She gesticulates wildly with her arm, accidentally knocking a stack of papers to the floor. “We’re struggling to take care of our own people—how can we be expected to take care of the people of 241, or the sectors beyond that?”
She drops her emotional armor for only a second, but I feel it: the weight of her grief is profound.
“We’re drowning,” she says quietly, running a hand down her face. “We need help. We lost too many of our own in the battle. The Sanctuary is falling apart, and we don’t have time to rebuild slowly. The whole world is watching us now. We need more hands on deck, more crews to come in and help us do the work. If we don’t, we’re going to fail before we’ve even had a chance to start.”
For a moment, I’m silent.
Nouria’s not wrong; the Sanctuary is a disaster. So, too, is the planet. I’ve already sent Haider and Stephan and Lena and the twins back to their respective continents; we needed capable proxies on the ground assessing the current situation abroad—neutralizing chaos wherever possible—and no one was better suited. Nazeera is the only one who stayed behind, claiming that Haider would be fine on his own, that she wanted to stick around for my wedding. I might’ve been flattered by this nonsense if I didn’t know she was lying.
She wanted to stay here to be with Kenji.
Still, I’ve been grateful for her presence. Nazeera is smart and resourceful and has been an immense help these last couple of weeks. The Sanctuary had enough to do when it was trying only to keep its own people alive; now the entire world is looking to us for direction.
Looking to Ella for direction.
What they don’t know, of course, is that she’s been conscious for only four days. When she finally woke up there was so much for her to do—the world had been waiting for proof that Juliette Ferrars had survived—and despite my many, many protests, she agreed to make limited appearances, to issue statements, to begin discussing what the future might look like for the people. She insisted that we get started right away, that we put together a committee responsible for designing the world’s largest public works project—rebuilding towns, schools, hospitals. Investing in infrastructure. Creating jobs, remapping cities.
On a global scale.
Even so, there’s hardly been time to think about these things. I spent most of the last two weeks doing what I could to keep Ella alive while trying to put out as many fires as possible. In a moment of honesty I might even be willing to admit that Kenji’s mistake—knocking down the wrong building—was almost inevitable. There is an infinite number of things to do and never enough people to do it, or to oversee the details.
Which means we’re often making mistakes.
On a micro level, we’re also required to pitch in, rebuild our cabins. Cut the grass. Cook the food. Wash the dishes. Ella dragged me into the kitchen as soon as she was able, slapping a pair of questionable rubber gloves against my chest before tugging on a grimy pair of her own, all the while grinning at the gluey bottom of an oatmeal-encrusted cauldron like it was a gift. If Ella were a house, she would be a grand home, one with many rooms and doors, all of which were easily unlocked, flung open.
If I were a house, I would be haunted.
“And I would remind you,” Nouria says, her brittle voice returning me to the present, “that you are not the only person on earth ever to have been married. I’m sorry you can’t bear to be separated from your fiancée long enough to have a single vital discussion about our failing world, but the rest of us must continue to move, Warner, even if it means deprioritizing your personal happiness.”
Her words strike a raw nerve.
“Too true,” I say quietly. “There are few, indeed, who’ve ever prioritized my personal happiness. I wouldn’t expect you to be the exception.”
I regret the words the moment they’ve left my mouth.
I steel myself as Nouria reels, processing my uncomfortable moment of honesty. She looks away, guilt flickering, fighting with irritation. Her anger ultimately wins the battle, but when she meets my eyes again, there’s a note of regret there, in her gaze, and I realize only then that I have been tricked.
There is more.
I take an imperceptible breath; the true purpose of this meeting is only now about to be revealed to me.
“While we’re on the subject,” Nouria says, sparing her father an anxious glance. “I—well. I’m really sorry, Warner, but we’re going to have to postpone the wedding.”
I stare at her.
My body goes slowly solid, a dull panic working its way through my nervous system. I feel multiple things at once—anger, grief, confusion. A strange sort of resignation rises up above them all, crowning a familiar pain, a familiar fear: that joy, like dew, evaporates from my life the moment I begin to trust the sun.
This is it, then. Par for the course.
“Postpone the wedding,” I say, hollow.
“Today is just turning out to be a bad day for everyone,” she says, rushing to get the words out. “There’s too much going on. There’s a major sewage problem we need to get under control, which is using up most of our manpower at the moment, and everyone else is knee-deep in other projects. We don’t have enough hands to set up or break things down—and we tried, we really tried to make it work, but we just can’t spare the generator tonight. Our electricity has been touch and go, and the temperatures are supposed to be brutal tonight; we can’t let the kids freeze in their beds.”
“I don’t understand. I spoke with Brendan, he offered—”
“Brendan is drained. We’ve been relying on him too much lately. Winston has already threatened to kill me if we don’t let him sleep tonight.”
“I see.” I stare at the table, then my hands. I have turned to stone, even as my heart races in my chest. “We’d need the generator for only an hour.”
“An hour?” Nouria laughs, but she seems unnerved. “Have you ever been to a wedding? Outside? At night? You’d need lights and heat and music. Not to mention all that we’d have to do to get the kitchen going that late, and distributing food— We never got around to making a cake—”
“I don’t need a wedding,” I say, cutting her off. I sound strange even to myself, nervous. “I just need an officiant. It doesn’t have to be a big deal.”
“I think it might be a big deal to Juliette.”
I look up at that.
I have no worthy response; I can’t speak for Ella. I’d never deny her a real wedding if it’s what she wants.
The whole thing feels suddenly doomed. The day after I proposed to Ella, she was attacked by her sister, after which she fell into a coma and came home to me nearly dead. We were supposed to have been married this morning, except that her dress was destroyed, and now—