"Beautiful."
"Very."
There was a hint of laughter to the word, and she turned her head to see the scene reflected in his glasses, twin moons which obscured but did not hide eyes focused on her face. A charged moment, chained lightning. Then Madeleine decided she was tired of small steps and took a big one, dropping her head to press her mouth to his.
Barely a kiss, simple contact. He exhaled as she drew back, and she felt the feather-touch of his breath. They stared at each other, then uncertainty turned into forward motion, and this time they both moved, found lips, discovered the tingle of tongues entwined.
Technicalities. What felt right, what didn’t. A stop-start exploration of reaction, then relaxation into sheer enjoyment. Madeleine shifted her hand from the sill to his shoulder, and Fisher moved his to her waist. As their kisses grew deeper, he pulled her forward, and she slid into his lap.
Like all Blues, Fisher’s palms were covered with stain, though most of his fingers were free of it. Breath coming faster, he slid both hands from her waist to the small of her back, where her tracksuit top and the shirt below had ridden up. The contrast of sensation, velvet and flesh, made her shiver and tighten arms around his neck. Encouraged, he moved further up her back.
Sitting as she was, Madeleine was completely clear about the effect she was having on him. This was no longer merely a big step, was becoming an outright leap, and she found she was fine with that, though maybe not on the library window seat. She slowed her kisses, then drew back, and the small noise he made was all about her weight shifting.
She had to smile, because his glasses had steamed up, and he looked ruffled and owl-like, but when she lifted them carefully away his cinnamon-brown gaze transfixed her. He took the glasses, put them on the windowsill, then, slowly, constantly monitoring her reaction, reached for the zipper-pull of her tracksuit top, and drew it down.
Her shirt, form-fitting and dark green, had been rucked up by his exploration of her back, and the very tips of his fingers brushed glimmering skin.
Moth song.
They both leapt as if struck, Fisher so violently that Madeleine would have been propelled into a nosedive if he hadn’t caught at her arm. She staggered to her feet, ready to run, to hide, and was turning toward the study when she recognised a quality of distance.
"It’s the Spire."
Only the second time the Spire had sung. The Moths mightn’t be near, but this suggested a change, perhaps new instructions for the Greens. Muffled, hurried footsteps on the floor below revealed Min’s reaction, and down the hall the door to the Wonder Woman room was wrenched open, though Noi had slowed to a less urgent place by the time she reached the library.
"Well that was better than an alarm clock," she said, looking at them both standing by the window. "Do we dive for the study yet again?"
Fisher was frowning ferociously, head cocked to one side, but responded after a pause with a quick headshake. "Prepare for it, perhaps. I’ll see if I can spot anything on the city webcams." He went into the study, mouth set in a grim line.
"I was feeling peckish anyway," Noi remarked, and tugged Madeleine’s shirt down.
Most of Sydney’s webcams were set in uselessly scenic places. They had two views of the skyline, three of the Bridge, one of Bondi, a couple in Circular Quay, but around Hyde Park where the Moths were most active, only the hastily-rigged cam pointing at the Spire. At night, that didn’t tell them anything.
Dawn added little.
When the Spire stopped singing mid-morning, Madeleine went to bed, too tired to care anymore. She woke sour-mouthed and headachy in the late afternoon, feeling cheated of something she’d wanted. A long shower eased her temper, and she dressed with care, nothing out of the ordinary, but neatly. The Spire’s interruption had thoroughly shattered the moment for her and Fisher, but the step had still been taken. As often as she’d looked at him since, she’d found him looking back, and Madeleine was surprised at the comfortable acceptance she felt. Mutual liking thoroughly acknowledged, action postponed.
She had tried to think about the situation in wider terms, with words like love and belonging. But it was difficult to look beyond the now of allies facing an incredible situation. Too soon and too strange to be sure of more than wanting there to be another moment.
Stomach rumbling, she headed downstairs. The buzz of a newsreader’s voice was the only sound, and everyone was gathered around the television. No surprise – it was around the time when, if they stuck to schedule, the Moths announced the details of the next challenge. Which city would be their next plaything.
Everyone was so still. Statues, faces stiff with shock, staring at the screen. Only Emily looked around, and she jumped to her a feet with a cry and rushed to throw her arms around Madeleine’s waist. But by then Madeleine had joined the others in being frozen, staring at the newsreader, and the over the shoulder graphic clearly labelled "SYDNEY CHALLENGE".
The image was the figure of a girl, cut off at neck level. A noodle-like figure in short shorts and a crochet halter neck top, and all the rest of her, stars.
Chapter Sixteen
"Okay, enough freaking out. We need to think this through."
They had responded to the announcement as Blues: with a massive injection of sugar pretending to be hot tea. Madeleine had been firmly sat down on the couch, a steaming mug pushed into her hands, with Emily curled comfortingly along one side, and Fisher a more restrained support on the other.
"At minimum, one hundred and fifty-five Moths," Noi went on, eyeing Madeleine with open concern. "About sixty of them with Rovers, if they’re allowed to bring them along. Maybe the dragons as well, for better coverage. Given the first Rover found us at the garage, I think the wharf party’s over guys. Time to run."
"But," Nash said.
Noi looked at him, sitting tensely upright on the opposite couch, and sighed. "Yeah, big bloody but. I think we can guess what the Spire was singing about last night."
"A cordon."
"They’d be mad to announce a Blue hunt without putting up a fence first. You slept through it, Maddie, but another of the big Navy ships moved out around lunchtime."
"There’s no way there’s enough Blues and Greens in Sydney to guard every possible route," Pan said. "We’ve just got to pick the right direction to run."
"They’ve had days to drive cars across every back street," Min pointed out. "Along with that they just need spotters, and that dragon. If I were them I’d have spent the day setting up my own webcam network. At least given Greens a number to call and told them to lurk at all the through-streets."
"Why do they even think Maddie’s still in the city?" Pan asked. "Gav thought we were leaving. We all thought we were leaving."
"The film from the beach." Fisher reached for one of the laptops, and began typing in a search. "The discussion of Madeleine fending off one of the Moths has never completely died down. The uninfected are doing the Moths' job for them." He turned the computer so Madeleine could see her name on the screen. "My fault, ultimately, for posting the Subject M data."
He moved one hand to brush against her back, a gesture of apology or reassurance.
"Still a big assumption to base one of their challenges on," Noi said. "Though I guess they might consider Maddie prime suspect in Reasons Rover Didn’t Come Home."
"I should go."
The words were faint, finding their way out of Madeleine’s throat almost against her will. She made herself continue, facing up to the impossibility of any other choice.