“There.” Something dark in the sand caught my eye. I raced down the dock, ignoring the burning in my lungs and the ache in my muscles. My dress clung to my legs, slowing me down. Edward’s footsteps echoed behind me. My feet sank into the deep sand, and I froze when I saw I was treading on fresh footprints.
Edward wiped the water and blood from his face, breathing hard. “What is it?”
The sand in front of us was rough and disturbed. Footprints led from the shore into the jungle. About every five feet was a dark spot. Blood.
I pressed my hand into one of the footprints.
Still wet.
Which made it easy to count the unusual number of toes, the abnormally large size of prints that could only belong to beasts. The sun beat down, burning our salty skin.
“Look, there’s a smaller set of prints,” Edward said.
I found the ones he was looking at. Smaller boot prints, the size of a man’s. I realized the drips of blood were heavier around these tracks.
Panic rose again. “He’s bleeding.”
“That means he’s alive,” Edward said. “And he’s walking. They weren’t dragging him, at least.”
A strange cry came from the ocean behind us—a seal’s guttural bark, only more high-pitched. But the sea looked so calm. I shivered.
“The footprints end at the jungle,” Edward said. “I don’t think we can track him any farther.”
“We can’t,” I said. “But my father can.”
WE RAN AND RAN along the rutted wagon road, the jungle a blur, feet aching.
The front gate was open. They’d been waiting for us.
We slowed to a walk. My body was spent. My dress clung to my skin—hot, salt-stained, damp with sweat. Edward’s face burned with sun and exhaustion. The road from the beach to the compound had been achingly long. With each pounding step, my panic had transformed to anger.
The beasts had taken Montgomery. Father owed it to us to help get him back.
In the garden, we found Balthasar kneeling to replant the few delicate tomato seedlings he’d been able to salvage. My heart twisted coldly at the sight. Life couldn’t just continue. Alice’s ashes still floated on the wind. Montgomery was God knew where, dead maybe. The monster was out there, lurking, waiting.
“Don’t bother, Balthasar,” I muttered. “There’ll be no one left to eat them once the monster finishes with us all.”
“That’s not true,” Edward said.
“Yes it is!” The chickens scattered at my yell. “You know it is. And it’s Father’s fault.” I grabbed Balthasar’s shirt. My fingers left streaks of dirt on his collar. “Where is he?”
His lips fumbled. “The laboratory, miss.”
I felt Edward’s hand on my shoulder. I let Balthasar go, and he slunk away like a wounded dog. Good. He was right to fear anyone with Moreau blood—we were all a little mad.
I stumbled to my feet, wiping the dirt off my palms. I’d thought the island was driving Edward mad, but maybe it wasn’t his mind the island had polluted, but rather my own.
Edward’s hand tightened. “Juliet, think carefully. He locked Montgomery in a cage. Why would he help us go after someone he hates?”
“He doesn’t hate him,” I said, stumbling away. “He loves him like a son.”
The latch to the laboratory door was just like the others—deceptively simple, a symbol of Father’s arrogance. I slid my fingers into the special holes and squeezed, bristling at his vanity. No locks—he thought himself indestructible.
He was a fool.
I wrenched the door open and found him sitting inside at his desk, peering into the monkey’s cage, scribbling notes on a tablet. A set of roughly made children’s blocks—Montgomery’s handiwork, no doubt—were stacked on the table. Father didn’t look up as I approached.
My footsteps echoed along the wall of cabinets. The broken glass had been swept away. The new batch of my serum sat tidily in its box on a polished worktable. No trace remained of our earlier fight save the one empty windowpane. He kept writing, pausing to watch the monkey fiddle with a toy block, then jotted down a few more notes in his tight, meticulous handwriting. I had expected an argument. I’d even expected to be slapped again. But I hadn’t expected to be quietly ignored.
“Father,” I said.
“I’m trying something new,” he muttered, not looking at me. “A new technique. It doesn’t involve surgery, but alteration of a different kind. It changes the constitution on a cellular level, without ever having to use a scalpel. If it works, the ramifications could be tremendous.”
I stepped deeper into the room, my shadow casting over the tablet. “After everything that’s happened, you’re still focused on your work. Aren’t you going to tell me what a horrid, disobedient child I am?” I picked up one of the blocks, inspecting the carefully carved letters on all sides. “Or do I have to play with blocks like the monkey for you to pay me attention?”
He made another notation on his tablet. “Unlike the monkey, you no longer show any promise. So I’m content to throw you out with the rest of my failures.”
I slammed the block against the table, toppling the stack. The crash sent my pulse racing, making me hungry for more destruction. I leaned on the table, my hair falling like a fortune-teller’s veil over my face.
“Your failures are going to find you and kill you. That’s what you get for throwing them out.”
He stacked the blocks back into an orderly pile. His refusal to grow angry only made my own rage seethe. “I’ve given them a precious gift. Do you really think they would turn on their creator?”