Ten Thousand Skies Above You by Claudia Gray Read Free Book Online

work—the doctors have no idea what to make of it.”
    Mom started counting off points on her fingers as she paced between the rows of chairs. “He’s anemic. His lungs show signs of damage, as if he’d been suffering from untreated tuberculosis for years, which of course he hasn’t. And the muscles in his feet and lower legs—the degeneration made one physician suggest Theo might have early-stage distal muscular dystrophy.”
    I bit my lower lip, hoping the pain would keep back any tears. Paul’s voice sounded thick as he said, “He doesn’t, does he?”
    My mother shook her head. “Possible, but doubtful. We all know the most probable cause.”
    Nightthief.
    â€œWhatever negative effects the drug had on Theo’s body didn’t end when he stopped taking it,” Mom said. “Apparently the damage had already reached a point of no return.”
    Her meaning was obvious, but I didn’t understand. I wouldn’t let myself understand. Something in my brain refused to take in the words. “He’ll get better, though. Right? Now that he’s finally seeing a doctor?”
    Dad spoke gently. “At this point, we don’t know. The medical team doesn’t understand his condition, which means they can’t form any meaningful prognosis. But the fact that his condition has continued to worsen this long after his final dose of Nightthief . . . well, that worries me.”
    Mom made a small sound in her throat—the sound she makes when she won’t let herself cry out in pain. I’d heard that sound from her only once before, when she opened the door to see a policeman standing there, his hat in his hand. It was like she’d known she was about to be told that my father was dead, but she refused to believe it until the moment she had to.
    That night, she believed the worst about Theo.
    He might die because Wyatt Conley sent a spy to drug him over and over and over again, for months. Because of Conley’s power play. Because of his grandiose dreams of dominating the multiverse.
    I hadn’t thought it was possible to hate Wyatt Conley more than I already did. I was wrong.
    I beat myself up about it that whole night.
    Why had I acted so stupidly around Theo? He accepted that I’d chosen Paul, and he never once tried to make either of us feel weird about it. If I’d taken Theo at his word, believed him that he was okay with Paul and me being together, maybe we would’ve spent more time with him. Then maybe I would have noticed things going wrong.
    The next day, after Josie arrived, I told her as much, but she didn’t buy it.
    â€œListen, Marguerite.” Josie stood in our kitchen, drinking her third cup of coffee. The caffeine was supposed to make up for the fact that she’d changed her flight to 6:30 a.m. to get home ASAP. “You didn’t know because Theo didn’t want you to know. He hid his symptoms from everyone, and that’s on him.”
    â€œIt’s not like Theo to keep that kind of secret,” I protested. Paul? Sure. He locks his feelings and his fears inside, sometimes for too long. But Theo likes to gripe about everything from hockey teams to parking in Berkeley. “If he didn’t feel strange about being around me and Paul, he would’ve said something.”
    Josie put down her mug and placed her hands on my shoulders. “I know it’s been easy to lose sight of this lately, what with Triad treating you like the Holy Grail, but noteverything is about you, okay?”
    That stung. “Then why did Theo stop telling us everything all of a sudden?”
    â€œHonestly? My guess is the symptoms scared him. Probably he was trying to deny anything serious was going on. He couldn’t tell you guys what was happening until he admitted it to himself.”
    I weighed what she said, and sensed there was truth to it. No, it wasn’t the whole story. But at least I felt