by Lenore, Lani
“Despite this misfortune, what I need from all of you is to hear what you know, factually, about this situation – not just about Rifter but about the island and anything on it that might apply. I also want your personal beliefs on the matter, not only because it will help me gather my thoughts, but I think every one of us deserves to know what the other is thinking. We each need to know where the other stands.”
Around the circle formed in the cool night breeze that swiftly wrapped around them, there was silence. Gazes shifted nervously, proving that no one was eager to speak. This was disappointing to Sly. Someone would have to begin, but it was not long before his pointed ears twitched, letting him hear something he should not have been able to. Within the group, there was one who had a very strong opinion of the situation.
“Finn,” Sly called out, placing all attention on the boy with the glowing eyes. “Would you like to go first?”
Finn ran a fingerless glove over his short hair, hesitant, but soon had abandoned his caution and spoke freely.
“I think that Rifter is evil,” he said openly. “And Nix has been lying to us.”
2
Within the tent, Nix had assembled himself swiftly. He pulled his satchel across his body, having readied all his weapons for the journey back. There were just a few steps until he reached the flap of the hide, and when he opened it and stepped out, he would not pass through the midst of the camp but creep around it. No one would see him; he would simply be gone. He would be free of them all.
He took those steps now. He did not need to tell Wren that he was going, though he would have liked to tell her goodbye.
No; no I wouldn’t. After the shadow play he had seen, he didn’t want to go near her. Resolute, he strode to the exit.
When he lifted the flap, letting in the cool night, he was immediately thwarted. Wren was standing there, just outside the tent, resolute in his path. He did not recoil in shock, but felt a wrenching disturbance as though he had just met the person he hated most in all existence.
But that’s not true.
She raised her blue eyes to him, staring accusingly. How long had she been waiting there? She must have heard him gathering his things and decided to wait until he would try to leave. Clever girl.
“I thought you’d at least say goodbye,” she said, holding her folded arms to guard against the chill.
“Perhaps I was just off to do that very thing,” he picked up without a hitch.
“Perhaps not,” she said doubtfully.
She stepped forward, forcing him back. He didn’t even want to look at her – wearing that pale gown that was smudged with dirt and tainted with blood. Her hair hung in those full waves that looked so attractive cascading down her form. Standing there, he wanted to sigh and turn away, but he forced himself to gaze at her. Now would be their confrontation, but all he wanted was to touch her. To avoid it, he knew he needed to get angry, and he needed to manage it fast. That was the only way he could escape this.
“Before you go, I want you to tell me the truth,” she said suddenly. Her resolve did not waver.
“What truth?” These words had exited his mouth calmly and without emotion. Perhaps there was hope after all.
“Tell me what you have refused to tell me. You are leaving and so it does not matter.”
“Or maybe it does,” he countered.
Wren took a heated step forward, staring straight up into his face. Her features were tipped with tenacity.
“Why won’t you go into that camp and look at his face? You must be curious as to what he would say, but you act as though you are not. So what is it, Nix?”
At the sound of his name, he cringed. He worked to anger himself at her raised voice, but he felt much too calm. If anything, he felt like laughing.
“Are you afraid?” she asked, searching his face for a reaction. “Do you think he will finish what he started with you?”
He looked back at her in shock. How could she bring this up? Afraid? Him? He was afraid of nothing. Not even the thought of losing her bothered him so much anymore. He was still willing to leave her.
One thing was sure now. She had succeeded in making him angry.
He took his hands from the strap of his satchel, gripping her shoulders to jerk her forward against him. She looked surprised and a bit frightened, but he did not feel sorry for it, bringing his face closer to hers.
“There are several reasons, Wren,” he said darkly, “and since you are so insistent, I will reveal one of them to you. It is, I believe, the most obvious, but I don’t think you noticed at all.”
Her eyes searched his face, but to his disappointment, she found nothing there. He became disgusted with her in that moment. She was looking right at him and she did not know the answer. How could she not know?
“I care about you, Wren. I might be curious about where all this is going, yes, and I might want to be with my brothers, but if you expect me to go there with you, and in the end watch you leave with him, then you are crueler than even this curse.”
She understood these words; he saw it on her face. As pleasant as it was, holding her so close to him even in anger, he forced himself to let her go.
“The truth of it is,” he continued on calmly, “that I am not affected by this at all. The broken bonds can never be patched. In the end, I am left with nothing. Perhaps the darkness will never go away, but one thing is sure: he will take you and he will have their loyalty. I will still be alone, and the only difference will be whether I am hunting nightmares in a green wood or one that is on fire. No, I have no stock in this – not anymore. Except you. And now you are here, begging me to stay, but in your heart you are with him, and so there is no room for me.”
He could see that she was shocked by his words, but he knew that his attempt at cruelty was working.
Hold on just a little longer and this feeling will pass, he coached silently, and as he forced himself to stare into her eyes, he prayed that he was right.
3
Wren looked back at Nix, flabbergasted. How could he be saying this? After all they had been through and all the horrible things they had seen, how could he say he did not care about the land at all? His home!
She knew he was trying to mislead her. She could see his bluff. He was being purposefully hateful, even as he had confessed his feelings. Perhaps his concession explained why he would not go farther, but it did not cover everything that he had been hiding from her – not near it.
She nodded understandingly – disgustedly. This was why, then? This was why he was leaving. The real reason. It had nothing to do with Rifter’s right or wrong? It was only because, somewhere along the way, he had decided that he cared about her? No, she did not fully believe that.
“That’s it then?” she assumed. The words were somewhat of an instinct.
“That’s it.”
She did not believe him. There was a waver in his eye. He did not mean all of those words that he had said, yet she could do nothing but stare at him incredulously. While looking back at her, he was fighting something within himself; she could tell. There was something else he wanted to tell her.
Suddenly, something caught her eye, and it surprised her to see it so much that she gasped aloud. There, at the corner of his harsh mouth, was a kiss.
Wren stared at it, knowing it was one of those strange, elusive kisses that could always be spotted but never claimed. Even if one could manage some kiss from those lips, that particular kiss could never be won. It could not be stolen, only given. She looked at it with surprise and interest. There was no question whether she wanted it. It was meant for her.
When she opened her mouth, absent words came out.
“You’re lying…”
The intensity between them had become too much, and not only for her. Nix snapped, breaking through what he had tried so hard to maintain. His hand slipped to the back of her neck, turning up her lips to catch his. A shiver ran through her, flush down her neck. She wanted this.
Nix gave her that kiss she had been coveting, and the sensation of his mouth against hers made her weak with desire. She did not think of Rifter at all then, willing to lose herself here – now – but at what only seemed like the slightest taste of his lips, he pulled away.
“No…” he breathed suddenly, and then he was gone from her. “Not like this.”
Wren stood there, confused and bewildered at his abrupt halt, but was not able to find her voice. Nix was moving past her.
He did not say goodbye; he did not say good luck. Nix passed beneath the flap of the tent, leaving her alone.
Wren knew she could not go after him, for if she did, she would be making a choice that she was not allowed to make. She loved Rifter, but she had willingly betrayed him – not only now, but each time she had been comfortable without him. She had found new feelings for Nix – she had to admit that to herself – but she knew she could only love Rifter. She doubted him, truly she did, but things would turn out right in the end. He would remove those doubts. Then they could share in that love that she’d always dreamed about.
So why am I still standing here, hoping Nix will return?
Wren stood there for a long while, thinking he would come back. When the wave of finality rolled over her and she realized he was gone, she sank down onto the floor. There were no thoughts in her mind, only a hurtful feeling of abandonment, but it was done now – too late.
She curled herself upon the blankets, confused within herself as the hours of the night passed by, cold and lonely.
4
Finn looked around the circle at all their faces, trying to read how they felt about his proclamation. Rifter is evil; Nix is lying. Mach seemed intrigued by the idea, while Toss beside him appeared crestfallen, as if his own beliefs had been crushed by the statement. Calico gazed at Finn intently, urging him forward. He already knew that she shared many of his own thoughts, though not all. Sly only waited patiently for the sound of his words. Finally, Finn explained himself.
“I say that Rifter is evil because, even though I have not seen him in quite some time, I don’t believe that Rifter is himself in that body any longer. I say that Rifter is no more – dead – and the demon has taken over his body as a vessel, like it wanted in the beginning. On top of that, I believe that it was Nix who killed Rifter. That body is just a shell.”
Toss gasped shortly at that. Mach rubbed his chin with great interest. Finn felt a bit lighter for having put his beliefs out in the open. He’d wanted to speak it aloud, but at the same time, he was glad that Wren was not here. He did not wish bad thoughts on her. She did seem to care about Rifter very much, and it would hurt her to think he was dead.
Finn went on to explain. “Though Nix and Rifter both denied it, I believe that they did, in fact, meet each other again when Rifter went looking for him. I believe that there was another fight, and I believe Rifter was killed. Calico has told me that Rifter has a long scar running fully down his torso, as if, at some time, he had been cut open. Oddly, even though he came back to us, I was unaware of this scar. I believe that to be the killing blow. The demon somehow managed to heal it and then took over the body.”
Finn was not sure how they received what he was saying, but he did not want his brothers to think badly of him because of his harshness. Especially for Toss’ sake, he felt the need to backtrack a bit.
“I know it seems strange that I would pick Nix for this murder over the Scourge, but I do not believe that the Scourge has been back in years. But the captain is, I think, responsible for what happened to the island. He brought on this darkness that has destroyed us, but he is not the one to focus on now. It is the nightmare demon.”
Sly folded his clawed hands. His mouth twisted in consideration. “Interesting theories, though perhaps without full evidence. However, Nix is a prominent figure in my mind. I have little doubt that he has a role in this, though I cannot say what just yet. But his involvement only concerns Rifter and not this corruption. That much, I know.”
“I agree with Finn,” Calico said to Sly, her voice rising up next. “We have had discussions among ourselves, and while I believe that Nix is the one who gave Rifter that great wound, I don’t believe Rifter to have died. There was something human to him still. I was certain I saw it when I was with him. But perhaps also the demon was able to come out in him more often because the wound had weakened him. I cannot believe Rifter is evil – unless the demon is making him so – and I know that Nix is not responsible for the darkness, but he could have tried to help Rifter. Truthfully,” she said, lowering her head, “you all could have tried a bit harder.”
The boys looked as though they had all been slapped across the face.
“If he can prove me wrong, I’ll be the first one in line to help him, love,” Finn chimed in.
Sly brought his knees up and folded his hands over them. Behind him, his tails twitched. His ears leaned back in discontentment, but it did not seem to be for Calico’s statement. He seemed not to have heard it at all.
“Why do you believe Nix killed, or harmed, Rifter?” he asked.
“It was that look on his face,” Calico said.
“Yes,” Finn said, taking it up. “We both saw it. In the Vork tunnels when we were looking for Wren, he got angry at something Calico said about him – about Rifter. Bloody scorching! But it was strange. It wasn’t the sort of anger that’s really anger, you know. It was the sort of anger that you force because you’re trying to hide something else.”
“I knew then it was because he was hiding something bigger,” Calico noted, reflecting. “There was something between Rifter and Nix that we didn’t know.”
Sly’s face twisted. What was this feeling at those words?
“Toss,” he addressed, bringing the silent boy into the spotlight. “Do you have anything you might be so gracious to add?”
Toss shifted a bit uncomfortably in the grass.
“I don’t really have much of a theory,” he said in his drawling voice. “I can only say what I know and what I have seen with my own eyes. I saw Rifter leave, and I saw him return. Yes, he looked and seemed different to me, but I must have seemed different to him as well. We’d all aged. I put it from my mind. I didn’t think on it much more at all until the day Nix left. I saw them cut each other–”
The great boy paused, putting a hand to his scruffy face in thought.
“There is one thing I’ve been thinking of. It was something I said to Wren, and ever since then I have had it on my mind, but no matter how hard I try, I cannot seem to get at the way of it. As best I can remember, after the fight, it was Rifter who went to the ground before Nix. Just afterward, Nix fled into the trees. They were both bleeding. Wren told me that it was Rifter who cut out Nix’s eye, because Nix has a damaged face, but I cannot quite say that it went like that. I do not remember a damaged eye. And the more I thought on it, I came to realize that if someone had suggested to me that it had not been Nix that had been fighting before my eyes, I don’t believe I could insist so without doubting myself. Though I know it must have been Nix, I just cannot be sure. The memory is faded. It’s a blur. Since I can’t even remember this, I don’t know how much my testimony will count at all. I-I’m sorry.”
“Do not apologize, brother,” Sly said, holding up his hand. “What you have said has brought familiar ideas back to mind. Unfortunately, nothing I have heard has cleared those images. I find that all of these theories and thoughts can be supported by my choppy visions; however, I feel at the same time that I can disprove them all.”
Mach shook his head, drawing Sly’s attention, even though he could not see.
“There is something else then?”
“It all just seems so incredible to me!” Mach exclaimed, scratching his head. “I was unaware – or I’d just never heard this side of it before.”
“This side? You mean you know the other?” Finn asked with great interest.
“Aye.” When they all stared at him, he understood that he should elaborate. “W
hen we left Rifter – Mech and I –
“Ah, so you do remember after all,” Finn said knowingly.
Mach sighed. “I guess I was just a bit hesitant to admit it,” he said. “I was afraid of a lot of things, but most of all I didn’t want to know what you’d think of me if I said that Mech and I didn’t care about answers. We were glad to be free of Rifter. And when we left, we went straight out to join the pirates.”
Everyone seemed to lean forward at this revelation. Mach went on.
“It wasn’t because I believed all that shit about the Scourge coming back. We were young, angry, feeling reckless. It seemed a natural choice. For a while, I lost myself to it, but eventually, I started to pay attention. I thought it would be the best way to separate what was true and what was false. Interestingly enough, they seem to date the time of the corruption back to the same time that Rifter returned with the demon, which we know is not true because the corruption began long before that! We saw it that night, coming in over the sea – a terrible black cloud.”
Everyone nodded in agreement.
“That doesn’t keep Rifter from being possessed, but it does prove that the darkness was not created by him in the first place,” Mach went on. “About the Scourge… there was always rumor and dark uttering. One rumor was that the Scourge had greater intentions at the volcano than we knew of – that he had intended to pull the land apart and open the mouth of hell to envelope this place. Though why he would do that to a world he wanted to control is beyond me. But again, this is rumor only. I have no proof.”
They had perhaps hoped that Mach’s evidence would have been more definite, but the talk of the Scourge did ease their hearts somewhat about Rifter. Even Finn felt a tiny bit of relief that maybe, just maybe, he was wrong.
“Have we helped at all?” Toss asked Sly hesitantly. The wind tossed his messy hair.
Sly clenched his knees and sighed. What could he tell them? It had helped, but he still could not place everything together in a linear fashion. Some things would not fit in certain places because of facts that proved them not to have happened at the time he’d thought. Perhaps he would not be able to rely on his visions and be forced to think this out logically.
