rodent.”
Septum screws up his face. “Wait, maybe those words mean the same thing.”
“Of course they don’t mean the same thing,” Craw says, rolling his eyes. “Being sly is actually a little bit of a compliment. I’m talking about pure filth. Harvey. Vermin.”
As they continue to argue, Blaine grabs my arm and says, “Come on. We need to talk.”
He ushers me from the table and we leave the dining hall through a side door that opens into a small, circular courtyard surrounded by the tall walls of Union Central. The morning air is still cool and damp and the place is deserted. I’m finally starting to feel the side effects of fatigue. It was late when I left Claysoot—nearly dawn—and I still have not slept.
“That was really stupid, Gray.”
I’m surprised to hear anger in his voice. “Stupid?”
“Climbing.” He folds his hands across his chest and gives me a disappointed big brother look. “Do you know how lucky you are that the Order managed to find you? Save you? Why’d you do it?”
All the anger and betrayal and hurt I’d felt when I first discovered Ma’s note comes surging back.
“I climbed because of you, Blaine,” I snap. “I did it because you lied to me and you kept the truth from me. Maybe if you and Ma trusted me enough to be honest, I wouldn’t have gone searching for answers myself.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The fact that we’re twins, Blaine. You and me. Born on the same, exact day.” I pull Ma’s note from my pants pocket and throw it at him. “Next time you don’t want me discovering something, you should burn your evidence.”
He smooths out the letter and his eyes grow heavy as he recognizes it. When he speaks again, he sounds embarrassed. “And you pieced it together? This page doesn’t even admit anything.”
“Well, Ma was right about one thing—I did go looking for answers. Carter’s records, her private ones, had an interesting note claiming that you and I are twins, born the very same day back in year twenty-nine.”
“You weren’t supposed to know,” he says quietly.
“What was on the second page, Blaine?”
“I’m sorry, Gray. I didn’t think it would matter. Ma . . . I thought she was crazy. She gave me that letter and I didn’t want to disgrace her memory by betraying her trust. But I swear I thought you’d be Heisted with me. I always thought it would be the two of us.”
The memory flashes before my eyes. How Blaine had winked at me, said we’d see each other again soon. Inside I am burning, angry and hurt, and yet I cannot raise my voice. I slowly repeat myself. “Blaine, what was on the second page?”
He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a piece of parchment. I take it from him and unfold it with unsteady hands. I remember where the previous page left off—Gray is, in fact—and begin reading.
your twin. You are not a year apart but several minutes. I did not know I was carrying two, and when Gray arrived just moments later, I saw my chance to test things. I had Carter keep Gray’s birth secret. A full year later, after a faked pregnancy, Carter returned to “deliver” Gray. She deemed him “sickly” and forbade him visitors. Gray saw his first day of sunlight at age two and a half. By then, no one questioned a thing. You were nearly identical, but brothers, believed to be a year apart.
If the Heist really is just a part of life, none of this will matter. I had wanted to see this myself, so that I could finally accept the mysteries of Claysoot, but I will not, and so the rest is on your shoulders. Should you and Gray disappear together, you can accept the Heist for me. But in case the Heist is something more, well, this is why Gray must not know. His knowing will foster questions, and I fear with questions he will not stay put. And if he is spared, he must. He will be proof that some of our boys have a chance.
Carter and I have devised a plan if this is the case, but the closer death creeps, the more likely it seems that the Heist is just an unfair portion of life I never managed to accept. I hope you do not hate me for this, for turning your lives into an experiment. I love you both very, very much. Not a day goes by that I don’t