“You mean it wasn’t just because you’re such a great uncle?” Zigmund asked sarcastically.
Rainart narrowed his eyes at the boy. “I took love from my sister, your mother, for years. Taking the two of you in and giving you the tools to be competent adults is how I will repay that love.”
“Because it would have been too much to ask for you to just love her back, right?” Zigmund was becoming flippant. The wounds from the other night were opening again, and he was losing the ability to hold his tongue.
“My responsibility is defined by my capability,” Rainart said, raising his voice, “and that brings me to my point. That is exactly why I have brought you out here today.”
At this moment Zerah felt very strange about being so far from the shore. All too quickly it became apparent they were at the mercy of their uncle and whatever insane lesson he thought he needed to give them.
“Oh,” Zigmund continued, laying on as much sarcasm as he could, “you’ve brought us out here to teach us how to be a heartless prick. Thanks so much, Uncle Rainart.” Zigmund flashed a fake smile and then gestured at his uncle with his middle finger.
“No, you little shit,” Rainart growled. “I brought you out here so one of you would realize how great her capabilities have become and that it’s time she take on a higher level of responsibility.”
Rainart reached inside of the duffel bag and pulled out a revolver. He flashed a smile, cocked the hammer, and shot Zigmund directly in the stomach. The boy cursed in pain and clutched his abdomen as blood soaked his shirt. Zerah screamed and lurched, almost tipping the boat.
“You killed him!” she screamed, her eyes wide with shock.
“No, I shot him,” Rainart said. “Whether he lives or dies is up to you, Zerah. Now, we are too far from shore for anyone else to help him. He would bleed out before we even got him back. I’m not going to help him, because one, he pissed me off, and two, that would make this trip worthless. So that leaves you. You are your brother’s only hope of survival.”
“You’re crazy!” the girl screamed. “You killed him!”
Rainart shot forward and grabbed Zerah by the head, forcing her to look him directly in the eyes. “You need to calm down and get a grip on two things. Your brother is dying, and you have the power to save him. You have amazing power, Zerah, and because of that you have a greater responsibility for the people you have taken from. Those are the rules we all live by.”
Rainart let the girl go and reached back inside the duffel bag. Quickly, he brought out a clear plastic bag full of a reddish-brown dust that looked almost like sand. He grabbed Zerah’s hand and opened her palm. Into it he poured half the bag of red-brown stuff.
“That is zulis,” Rainart said, “and it is going to help you save your brother’s life. Zerah, look at me.” The girl was shaking and whimpering, tears falling from her eyes. “Look at me!” Rainart bellowed. “Tell me you are going to save your brother’s life.”
“I…I can’t!” Zerah cried.
“Tell me you are going to save Zigmund’s life!” Rainart repeated.
“I-I’m going to save h-his life,” the girl warbled.
“Now put the zulis on his wound, and think of nothing but healing him.” Rainart moved over to the boy and flipped him onto his back. Zigmund was enthralled in pain, and his blood was everywhere. Rainart ripped the boy’s shirt off, exposing his wound, and then looked at Zerah. “Do it now. You can do this because you love him. You will do this because it is your responsibility.”
Zerah cried and pressed her palms down on her brother’s wound, his blood soaking the zulis and covering her hands. The girl closed her eyes, sobbing and thinking of nothing but bringing her brother back from the edge of death. Please, Zigmund, please.
Rainart sat back in the boat and waited. The world was so silent even the gulls couldn’t be heard. Zerah was crouched beside her brother, her hands against his wound, mumbling prayers and crying. Then Zigmund opened his eyes, and Rainart smiled. The boy’s face was awash with astonishment. He lurched backward, throwing himself against the boat and almost tipping it. He clutched at his abdomen, his bloody hands scrabbling over his naked torso. There was no wound, and there was no pain. Zerah brought her knees into her chest and cried harder than she could remember ever having cried before.
Rainart went back into the duffel bag and pulled out two more guns. He tossed one of them to Zigmund, and the stunned boy bobbled it in the air. Once he caught hold of it, he gripped the gun tightly and pointed it directly at his uncle. Zigmund gritted his teeth and shook with anger.
“I didn’t give you that so you could shoot me,” Rainart said with a crooked smile.
“Give me one damn reason why I shouldn’t,” Zigmund grunted.
“Well,” Rainart said, “it’s probably going to take all three of us to fight off the red specters.”
• • •
Kadira Feldspar stood alone on the observation deck of the Space Needle, watching the sun come up and illuminate Mount Rainer in the distance. The deck of the Space Needle wasn’t open to the public this early, but Kadira wasn’t the public. She was about as far from being representative of the public as any one person could be. She had access to things, or more accurately, she had access to almost everything. In a country separated by walls, she could pass through them like a ghost. For three years she had been the head of IONH, the youngest head of IONH in the organization’s history. In a world full of villains, she was a superhero, and access was her superpower.
Great wafts of misty morning clouds drifted by Mount Rainer as it stood in its wide sumo wrestler stance. The morning sun gave the old mountain an almost-red glow that made Kadira hungry. The color red always made her hungry. In her mind she attributed this occurrence to an innate superiority, a killer instinct, an almost-preternatural ability to achieve anything she set out to. When something desirable entered Kadira’s sight, it was a foregone conclusion that it would be hers. She was a primal warrior, and the sight of red brought out her hunger, in all its manifestations. Hunger for food, hunger for power, hunger for access—it was all the same.
Suddenly, Kadira could hear the voice of her grandmother laughing at her. Her subconscious mind was scoffing at her self-aggrandizement with that high-pitched giddy sneer her grandmother always threw at her when she was taking herself too seriously. That woman’s laugh haunted Kadira, even now, long after Mema Feldspar had departed from this mortal coil. That damn voice was still knocking her down.
Red? The voice cackled derisively. Girl, red makes you hungry ’cause your Mema made a hell of a cayenne sauce. Ain’t nothing to do with you being better than other people. You ain’t better than nobody. You’re always trying to find a way to one-up people. What you need to do is find a man who’s gonna put up with your skinny ass.
Kadira wanted to laugh at the voice, but she couldn’t. She wanted to hate the voice, but she couldn’t do that either. Her grandmother had raised her as best she could. The woman hadn’t been smart, hadn’t been raised in privilege—hell, even her philosophy of raising children through condescension and tough love was rudimentary at best—but she had loved Kadira. Mema Feldspar had been forced to raise her granddaughter after Kadira’s mother had died in a public kitchen food line. That woman did the best she could. Kadira reminded herself of that every time the memory of the old woman’s condescension haunted her, harassed her, or pissed her off.
Remembering her mother’s death caused Kadira to reflexively check the news feed on her phone. She did this so often she sometimes didn’t even realize she had done it in the first place, much in the same way others check their wrists for the time. Kadira dipped her hand into the pocket of her slate-gray coat, swiped her thumb across the phone to call up the news feed, scrolled, looked up, and slid the phone back into her pocket. She hadn’t read anything, had barely looked at the phone before returning it to her pocket. It had become a meaningless habit, a nervous tic, something to do while thinking of something else. What she
had really been thinking of was her mother’s name coming up on the news feed all those years ago. At the end of each feed were the names of those who had died in the food lines. It was a daily thing. It hadn’t always been that way. It hadn’t been back when Kadira lost her mother, but it was now. Every city had food lines these days. They weren’t just something for the larger metropolitan areas. Now, you could find a public kitchen food line in every poor county, as well as most of the middle-class ones.
Kadira picked at the red nail polish on her fingers as she plunged into the memories she had surrounding her mother’s death. She hadn’t been allowed to accompany her mother to the food line. Not that day, at least. Back in Chicago thirty years ago, Kadira had been a five-year-old little girl, and even then people knew enough not to bring a child into a public kitchen food line unless they had to. A couple of times, Kadira’s mother was left without anyone to watch the young girl and so had to bring her, but it wasn’t what she wanted.
Kadira remembered the fear of standing in those lines, holding her mother’s hand, and looking all around as if waiting for a monster to jump out at her. A woman behind her mother was yelling at someone; she didn’t know why, but she could feel people becoming uneasy. A strange man with a sparsely toothed smile warned Kadira’s mother to watch out for people trying to snatch her baby up and hold her for ransom. One man held a knife for protection. He kept nervously spinning it in his hand. Even at five years old, Kadira knew the food lines were a bad place to be.
A public kitchen food line was for those who hadn’t earned enough money that day. It was a way to get food without having to pay for it. So naturally, it also became a line for anyone who wanted to spend the money they did have on things that weren’t food, while still being able to eat. Good people, down on their luck, stood in line with junkies, criminals, and God knows who else and waited to be given whatever the public kitchens had left over after a day of servicing paying customers. Those who waited in line were issued one public demerit for taking from the public kitchens, and after someone accrued enough demerits, the person was bound to public servitude until the demerits were absolved from his or her record.
It was the issuance of these demerits that created the true danger in these food lines. Food supplies were low everywhere. Everyone wanted more food, especially in Kadira’s old neighborhood, but no one wanted to be bound to public servitude to get it. So once someone received his or her food from the public kitchen and walked away from the line, the person became a target. Oftentimes, much more often in recent years, these targets ended up dead, and that was exactly what had happened to Kadira’s mother. She had gotten food, received her demerits, and walked away, and then she was pulled into an alley just three blocks from her home. She never came out of that alley again. The attack on Kadira’s mother, along with the attacks on thousands of others, had served as a warning. Nowadays, you didn’t wait in a food line unless you were literally starving. Unfortunately, the food lines were as packed now as they had ever been. Starving people were becoming the new normal.
Kadira still remembered seeing her mother’s name at the bottom of the news feed, up on the screen that hung so high above her five-year-old head. Her mother had been so proud that Kadira could read at a young age. It wasn’t something to be proud of that day. The guilt about what had happened always hung at the back of Kadira’s mind, further back now than it used to, but there nonetheless. She used to blame herself all the time for her mother’s death. After all, she had been an extra mouth to feed, she had been someone who needed watching when her mother could have been working and earning more, and she had been the reason her mother had left a good, safe home in the first place. Her grandmother reminded her of that even now, in her haunting memories.
Your daddy was a devil, the voice of her Mema said. He wasn’t gonna stay in my house and abide my rules. I would have kept your momma safe if it weren’t for him…and for you. Your momma wouldn’t leave her man when she was with his child. She was a damn fool. Don’t you be no damn fool, Kadira. You better learn from her mistakes.
“Damn fool,” Kadira mumbled into the morning air like a prayer.
“Huh?” a voice from behind Kadira asked.
Kadira jumped and spun around, completely forgetting she had asked someone to meet her. When she realized who it was, she raised her hand to her chest and exhaled. Then she smiled and laughed to reveal her embarrassment.
“Sorry, Echo,” Kadira said. “I was just swimming with some old demons.”
Echo nodded and stood next to Kadira, silently surveying the city. The two women might have been mistaken for sisters if it weren’t for the fact that one of them was as pale as the moon and the other was as dark as the sky that surrounded it. They were of the same age, midthirties, and both tall and slender with long black hair pulled into a ponytail. Each woman was aloof but held a silent rage. They had the demeanor of a predator. They carried themselves as if everything that lived did so only because they allowed it. There were not a lot of people in the world Kadira respected. Echo was one of the few.
“It’s my fault,” Echo said evenly and then nodded down at her metallic leg. “I wore a second boot today. Didn’t feel like drawing attention.”
Kadira nodded. “I can understand that.”
“So you wanted to talk about a new mission?” Echo asked.
“I want to know what happened with Rainart the other night.” Kadira wasn’t one to mince words, and she got right to the point. She respected Echo, but no one was above her scrutiny. She never tolerated being denied access. Kadira looked at Echo with a gaze that warned the woman not to defy her.
Echo’s cold blue eyes met the dark, scalding eyes of her supervisor, and she instantly knew Kadira had heard the phone conversation between her and Rainart. However, she also knew that whatever Kadira might know, she didn’t know what happened inside Rainart’s garage. The man might be a drunk, but he was too paranoid to let anyone hide a bug in that room.
“He was drunk again,” Echo said, shrugging.
“No shit.” Kadira wasn’t going to let the conversation end at that.
“It was all a ploy,” Echo said. “He called me and acted as if there were a great emergency. He didn’t want me to contact you. He was cryptic, and I probably should have known why. He had me meet him in the garage, probably to help sell his ruse, and it was all so he could come on to me. As I said, he was drunk, and he was lonely. He was trying to seduce me. Rainart passed out shortly after I got there. I stayed to make sure he was all right.” Echo let a brief laugh escape her lips. “He didn’t even remember why I was there when he woke in the morning.”
Kadira looked away from Echo. She didn’t believe the story, but she didn’t have any evidence against it. Rainart Eil Dragaredd had been a thorn to her, someone she didn’t know inside and out. He was under deep cover when she first joined IONH, and had practically been a recluse since his return. He seemed to trust Echo, and she seemed to play him off as a harmless drunk. But Kadira’s instinct warned her there was more to the story.
“Was that phone call the only reason you wanted to meet?” Echo asked, her tone insinuating she would somehow feel inconvenienced if it had been.
Kadira flattened her palms against her gray coat and swallowed the fact that she would have to let the Eil Dragaredd issue go, at least for now. “No,” she said with hesitation. “The Jeseph Arcadia thing is gaining traction, and I’m worried the council is making a giant mistake. No one should have that much power and oversight.”
“Maybe you should bug his phone,” Echo said as an intended barb.
The point of the comment was not lost on Kadira, but she couldn’t have cared less whether Echo thought she was being a hypocrite. “I’ve already done that. Some of what I’ve been hearing is why I’m so concerned. Jeseph hasn’t said anything overt to show his hand, but when I connect the dots…” Kadira quickly realized she was giving Echo more detail than she wanted to, and decided to change tack. “I just think som
ething is brewing and we need to keep an eye on him. I want to put a team together, and I want you on lead.”
“How many agents?” Echo asked.
“You and two others for now,” Kadira said. “Just a small surveillance outfit. I might add later. I’m still hoping my gut is wrong about Jeseph Arcadia. Choose whomever you want to accompany you. I don’t care. Stay close to Arcadia, and report back, obviously.” Kadira turned away from the view, and from Echo.
“Do you want me to call you and let you know which agents I choose?” Echo asked as the head of IONH walked away from her.
“Not necessary,” Kadira said with a smile Echo would never know was there. “I’ll know.”
VII
After a day and a half on the North Road, Gildwyn was beginning to think he might be in over his head. He and Mayddox had not been prepared to travel through the frozen lands of Zehnder tribe. He had not been dressed for frigid temperatures, nor did he have adequate supplies for the trip. Gildwyn’s brown tunic and hooded green cape did little to stop the cutting wind. Though it could get cold in Whiteclaw tribe, the conditions in Zehnder tribe were a different story. Mayddox’s thick green coat helped the stag somewhat with the low temperatures, but the cold made it so he was able to travel far fewer hours without rest or shelter. Traveling by night in Zehnder tribe was tantamount to suicide, and out of the question.
The road had been harsh, and Gildwyn had stopped at every lodge he and Mayddox had come across along their trek. The gracious people of Zehnder tribe had given him what warmth and food they could spare, and Gildwyn was most grateful for it. However, he knew he couldn’t continue the journey all the way to Zehnder Palace this way. Given their current rate of travel, the trip would take at least a week. Gildwyn had to find a more time-efficient solution.
The sun was high in the sky now, but the wind was still cutting, and Gildwyn did what he could to keep his cape over his mouth and nose. As Mayddox strode into the village of Aarlsen, Gildwyn spied a large trading outpost and inn. He decided to stop for lunch, get rest for Mayddox, and possibly find help from the locals regarding a quicker way to the palace. The large wooden outpost stood three floors high and just off of the frigid road. Icicles hung from the pitched roof, and the sun made them sparkle brightly.
The Hands of Ruin: Book One Page 10
