The Gender Game by Bella Forrest (historical books to read txt) 📗

paper straight. This strange letter exploded a dozen questions in my mind, but I could focus on only one.

The boys. What had Lee discovered about the boys?

Folding up the paper, I slipped it back into the bag. My heart palpitating, I continued to search through its contents. I discovered a small silver key in one of the side pockets. Retrieving it, I stood up again and opened the seat. I planted the backpack inside before reaching down to scoop up the egg. I placed it on my lap as I resettled.

The keyhole was near the base. Attempting to still my hands, I managed to insert the key into the hole and twisted it clockwise. It moved two hundred and seventy degrees before stopping. There was a click, and then a smooth crack appeared around the center of the egg. Drying my hands of perspiration against my ripped dress, I eased open the egg's lid… and stared.

Only the top half of the silver casing would unlatch and it lifted to expose a second, smaller egg that fit snugly inside it. Its walls appeared to be made of some kind of extremely thick glass, and within it swirled… a sack of liquid. The sack's wall was thick, spongy and transparent. It stuck flush to the glass like it had been glued there. The liquid's texture was gooey and semi-transparent, its color brownish-amber. I touched the exterior with my finger. It was warm. Shockingly warm. The very bottom of the egg was taken up by a black plate whose base was concave, to fit the shape of the egg. I guessed that was some sort of temperature-controlling device. Shining my flashlight directly through the murky liquid, I spotted something else. It was small, smaller than the center of my palm.

It looked like an embryo.

What type of embryo, exactly, I wasn't knowledgeable enough about biology to tell. It was still in early stages of development. I could make out the bulge of a head, the curve of a back, several bumps which I guessed would be limbs. A translucent cord was attached to its midriff. The cord connected the embryo to the center of the egg's base, that strange plate thing.

What is this?

Why do Matrus and Patrus want it so badly?

What did Lee want with it?

It could be an animal… It could be a human.

A sudden gust of wind shook me out of my stupor. It was strong enough to wobble the aircraft. Given that I hadn't been holding on to anything for support—and I still couldn't with the egg in my hands—my feet shot outward over the floor to steady myself. In the process, my heel shifted a lever at the base of my seat that I hadn't even noticed.

Two alarmingly loud creaks emanated from the wooden boxes fixed to either end of the motorcycle. I tensed up, petrified I'd done something fatal.

What I was not expecting was for the bases of the wooden boxes to suddenly flap open, and for four bodies to tumble out.

Four male bodies.

I almost choked on my tongue as I realized I recognized one of them: his faded dungarees, his gray-speckled hair. His frozen, stubbled face. It was Chris the mechanic.

Hurtling down with the other three men to a quiet suburban street, they made contact with the concrete with a sickening splat.

The other three men. They had to be the other three red dots on Lee's monitor. Duncan, Seb, and Jacob.

Lee was a madman. What was he doing carrying them in his aircraft? He must have murdered them shortly before the banquet, and stored them in the boxes out of convenience. Maybe he'd been planning to dump them in The Green. Clearly, I'd never known the real Lee. The flat, Matrian-male persona he'd put forward throughout my stay with him had been an act.

Unable to focus on the egg any longer, I closed and locked it up before replacing it in the seat compartment with more care than I'd previously handled it. There was a life in that thing.

After zipping up the key in the backpack, I sat down and faced forward. I gripped the handles for support. I felt like throwing up.

Lee's letter replayed in my mind.

Desmond.

Why was it addressed to Desmond? That was one of the strangest things about the letter.

Desmond was Lee's middle name. Perhaps the letter was some kind of journal entry, an upheaval of guilt before the night. But still, it didn't make any sense to me that he would use his middle name. Why not address it to Lee? He'd called himself only Lee around me, and I hadn't heard a single person address him as Desmond either.

As I recalled the explanation Lee had given me for the name, the very first night I had arrived in Patrus, a thought struck me.

"My full name is Lee Desmond Bertrand. Named Lee by my father, Desmond by my mother… I'm native to neither Matrus nor Patrus. In fact, I was born in the middle."

It drew my mind back to a question I had mulled over and posed to Viggo the evening we’d sat atop the roof in his backyard.

What happens to someone who doesn't feel they belong in either nation?

Lee's father was a Patrian. His mother a Matrian.

Lee of Patrus.

Desmond of Matrus.

A chill ran down my spine as I wondered if Lee truly was insane.

Maybe he had some kind of split-personality disorder. Maybe his childhood had messed him up.

Maybe I finally had an answer to my question and Lee was an extreme case of what could happen to a person who felt they belonged in neither nation. They rebelled against both.

Suddenly, the night seemed to grow much colder. I shivered.

I was beginning to near The Green.

Ms. Dale had been right. She'd told me, not far away from where I soared now, that once I reached the other side of the river I should trust no one. I just hadn't considered Lee to be a member of the other side.

Now, whether I liked it or