Chaos by Sarah Fine Page A

head on my shoulder, whimpering softly.
    “Hi,” I said, hating the way all eyes in the room were fixed on me. “How are you?”
    I had no idea what to say to her. Once upon a time, we had shared a language and she had loved me. I had loved her, too. She had been the ground beneath me until she crumbled and fell apart, leaving me with nowhere to plant my feet. Now she was a stranger with familiar eyes. We needed a translator to understand each other. And in looking at her, I wasn’t even sure that would be enough. She was rocking again, humming vacantly to music only she could hear. Finally, she started to whisper to no one in particular, a rapid-fire mumble of Spanish.
    Ana tried to translate in hushed tones, but after a few seconds she shook her head. “I can’ t . . . Lela, she’s not making sense. I’m not sure how t o . . . ”
    “Don’t bother.” I closed my eyes and bowed my head against my knees. My mother stroked a tentative hand down my arm while I fought the urge to pull away. “My mom’s mentally ill. Schizophrenia. Heard of it?”
    From the corner, Zip let out an anxious whine. Ana and Takeshi were silent. They were from different times and places, and I didn’t expect the term to make sense to them. It barely made sense to me. All I knew was that my mom had lost her grip on reality, that her world was flimsy and drifting. She couldn’t take care of herself, let alone her daughter. Sil had told me that when the Mazikin took over her body, my mother’s soul slipped free without a struggle, because it had been hanging on by a thread. And now she was here—one more thing I had to worry about.
    I raised my head and looked at her, feeling the trail of bitter regret for what should have been. In that moment, I missed Diane so badly that it was a physical pain. If she were here, she wouldn’t be huddling against my arm, singing to herself. She’d be fussing over me in a way I used to hate but had grown to count on.
    Rita, on the other hand, seemed like she was the one who needed to be fussed over. She sounded forlorn and lost as her bony fingers touched the back of my hand. She squinted, leaning forward and placing her palm against mine, lining up our hands. Ana looked worried, probably because she’d witnessed me flinch away from touch on more than one occasion. I was more able to tolerate it now, but not without some effort. The only person in the world whose touch I craved wa s . . . I pulled my hand away from my mother’s and rubbed my palm along my pants. “I’m sorry,” I said as her eyes met mine for the first time.
    “Lela?” she whispered.
    “Yeah.” And—I couldn’t help it—hearing her say my name did funny things to my heart.
    She mumbled something else and curled against my side, sinking into herself again.
    I drew a slow, determined breath. “Can somebody tell me how we’re going to get Malachi out of that square?” I couldn’t bear the thought of him suffering a moment more than was necessary. “And then how we’re going to get to the portal?”
    Takeshi gave Ana a sidelong glance and looked away.
    “What is it?” Ana asked.
    “I want to free Malachi as badly as you do. If you’d never shown up, I would have done it by myself. But destroying the portal and killing the Queen? That is an impossible mission,” he said. “It was cruel for the Judge to send you here, but it doesn’t surprise me in the least.”
    “She didn’t force us,” I said. “We pretty much demanded a chance to come.”
    “That doesn’t mean you owe the Judge anything.”
    “Are you saying you want to let the Mazikin keep possessing people?” I stared at him.
    “I’m saying I’m not particularly interested in what the Judge wants.”
    “What about us?” Ana whispered. “If we do this, we could get out, Tak. We could be free.”
    He laughed. “What makes you think the Judge will ever set you free, love?”
    Ana’s jaw clenched, and Takeshi pulled her into his arms and kissed