Though coming from an Urthman, his words shoot through my blood like shards of hot glass. I hold his gaze for a moment, all the while wondering why I see truth in their obsidian depths. “Is that right?” I grumble sarcastically then add, “I’m not Azlyn, by the way,” under my breath.
“Avery then if you prefer.” I’m shocked that anyone heard me, least of all him. “But I know who you are regardless of what name you call yourself. You’re the leader of the humans.” He pauses a moment and bows his head deferentially. “I’m Peter.” He thrusts his hand forward. I look at it curiously then back at his face. He retracts it with a nervous twitch.
“How do you know who I am?” I ask without attempting pleasantries.
Peter offers a small, almost embarrassed smile. “Everyone who lives—er, lived—here,” he catches and corrects himself, “knows who you are. We’ve watched you build your cities.”
I look at him quizzically.
“We’ve lived here, only thirty miles from you and Cassowary, only a few miles from Galway, or what was Galway.”
Shaking my head, I have trouble making sense of what he’s said. “What? How’s that possible?”
No sooner than the words are out of my mouth, Sully chimes in. “Why are you still living in Humanland? You aren’t supposed to be here.” Sully’s tone is firm but not nearly as threatening as I’ve heard it in the past.
Hesitating slightly at Sully’s obvious annoyance, Peter says meekly, “This has been my family’s home for two hundred years. We had every right to be here.” His voice is devoid of defiance of arrogance. He’s merely reporting facts as he understands them. “We’ve been living here, in this village, since you built Galway, and you never even knew it. We keep to ourselves, remain on our property and have done so for as long as I can remember.”
I weigh Peter’s words carefully. I’ve never heard an Urthman’s perspective before, not a sincere one at least. And while I still don’t trust him as far as I can throw him, thus far, Peter seems genuine, a point that perplexes me and annoys me at the same time.
Brom huffs. “Oh blah, blah, blah!” He bats the air in front of him in an aggressive act of dismissal. “You just haven’t attacked yet. Haven’t got the stones to yet.” He grabs his crotch unceremoniously then continues. “And why do you suppose that is?” His gaze flickers from me back to Peter. “Why haven’t you attacked yet, monster?” Once the words leave Brom, without warning, he thrusts both arms out in front of him and pushes Peter, heaving him into the wall so that he slams his head.
Peter winces, his hand flying to the back of his skull. He rubs it then examines the dots of crimson on his fingertips. His gaze lifts from the blood and settles on my face. “We want to live in peace. The last thing we want is bloodshed.”
The irony of his words isn’t lost on me. Before I can comment, Brom erupts again. “An Urthman not wanting bloodshed? That’s some joke!”
As obnoxious as Brom’s demeanor is, I have a hard time disagreeing with what he’s saying. What Peter proposes, the notion that an Urthman doesn’t seek to slice a human from neck to navel, seems absurd. Time and experience has taught me otherwise. It’s instilled in me the knowledge that it’s ingrained in who they are, that they are preprogrammed at birth with the need to hunt and kill human beings. I watched as they bludgeoned my pregnant mother, watched as she surrendered and begged for mercy. But mercy wasn’t a word they understood, wasn’t an emotion they were capable of feeling. They slaughtered her in cold blood. And to date, I’ve never known any to behave differently.
Remembering how my mother lost her life makes me tremble with rage. Even with the hot tendrils of fury snapping through my blood like a livewire, however, something about Peter’s words is compelling. There’s truth to them that I cannot deny, though I wish I could. Whether it’s his conviction, that he truly believes what he’s saying or that what he’s saying is true is a question I can’t answer as of now. Regardless, I bristle at the conflict I feel. The idea of an Urthman not wanting conflict with humans is improbable. It doesn’t make sense in my brain, yet I find myself believing what Peter says. Especially since, barring the bloodbath at Galway, none of our cities have come under attack in years.
“We desire peace, only peace.” Peter doesn’t look at Brom, but looks at me instead when he speaks. “The Urthman council declared the end of hostility toward human beings years ago.” The genuineness with which he speaks is truly gripping. I find myself entertaining the possibility that he’s telling the truth.
But when Oliver blurts, “Oh come on! Do you really expect us to believe that?” I realize I’m the only one among us who’s leaning in that direction.
After a quick scan of the faces around me and gauging the overall disbelief etched in them, I ask a question that I’m sure nags at their brains, for it nags at mine as well. “If this council you’re talking about met and declared peace, why weren’t we informed of it?” I fold my arms across my chest and lean forward slightly. “I mean, it doesn’t really make sense—peace without both parties knowing about it? Does that make sense to you? Because it certainly doesn’t make sense to me.”
Nods of approval ripple through our group and my thoughts, vacillating moments earlier, return to normal.
Peter shifts his weight from one leg to the next. Looking ill at ease, and perhaps ill in general, he says, “Well, perhaps I exaggerated by saying peace had been declared in the formal sense.”
I arch an eyebrow at him. “Exaggerated?” I say through my teeth. “You’re in no position to be exaggerating right now, are you?” My gaze darts from Brom then back to him. “So why don’t you tell us the unexaggerated truth?”
Peter’s gaze slides to Brom and a frown drags the corner of his mouth down. “Uh, yes, uh,” he clears his throat, “exaggerated may be too strong a word. The council simply decided to avoid you. That was our version of peace. You live your lives. We live ours. All without conflict. Hence the term peace.”
“Hence?” Brom growls. “Is this guy for real?” He stabs a finger toward Peter then turns to me and claps his hands together, holding them flush against each other. “Please, let me kill him now just for saying hence.”
“Oh dear,” Peter recoils, his eyes pleading with me.
While I agree that most people who use pompous words do so to cover the idiotic things they say, I still can’t bring myself to unleash Brom on Peter.
“Let’s hear him out,” I say to Brom. Then to Peter I say, “You do have more to add, right?”
“Uh, yes, of course. Uh, the Urthman council speaks for all the Urthmen tribes. One member from each tribe is elected and travels to a designated location to discuss issues that affect us all and it’s overseen by Armarius, the head of the council of Urthmen.”
Brom yawns melodramatically. “C’mon, is there a point to all this nonsense?”
I shoot him a stern look. Peter looks terrified but continues. “This form of peace has been in effect for a while now. The council has agreed for years. Why do you think there hasn’t been an attack on any of your cities in that long?”
Brom faces turns an unhealthy shade of red. “Because you keep losing every time you fight us, that’s why!” he explodes.
Peter turns his head and clinches his eyes shut as if bracing for the impact of a blow. When one doesn’t land immediately, he opens one eye, peeking, and then opens the other.
“Oh come on, Peter, enough already!” I say and suddenly feel like Brom. “That sounds ridiculous to me too. You guys gave up because you were losing every battle you fought against us, just as Brom said.”
Brom puffs out his chest, equally shocked as he is proud that I’m actually agreeing with him. Seeing him react as I do, knowing that he seeks to torment Peter, a being outnumbered and holding the favored opinion, causes me to feel a pang of guilt. Urthmen have long since been oppressors of the human species, tyrants who used violence and intimidation to keep humanity in check and their numbers dwindling, but now, as we are, I feel lik
e a tyrant, like a bully. Why that is, I have no idea.
“Please, Avery, I understand what you’re saying, but if we’d wanted to, we could’ve merged all the tribes, formed an army and attacked all of your cities at once,” he says almost apologetically. “There are still millions of Urthmen in the country. We still outnumber humans by far.”
I part my lips to retort, a hot spark of insult flashing through me so that I blush, but try as I may, I’m at a loss. I simply don’t know what is true and what isn’t at this point. Peter doesn’t bear the resemblance of a smug being. To the contrary, his demeanor is humble, obliging even. Swallowing hard, I’m grateful when Sully steers the conversation away from talks of Urthmen outnumbering us and avoidance as a form of peace and asks, “What happened here? Why would your own kind attack your village and kill everyone?”
Peter’s expression clouds. Pain becomes evident. Eyes cast to his feet, he replies, “The creatures that attacked here, they aren’t our kind, not anymore at least.”
His words are haunting wisps that trace the back of my neck like icy fingertips. “What are they?” I ask, though a part of me doesn’t want to hear the answer.
Peter lifts his gaze so that it meets mine. “They are the Uganna.”
“The Uganna?” The word trembles on my tongue.
“Yes, they are a species you created. They’re here because of you.”
My head rears slightly. “Excuse me?” I balk. “What the heck are you talking about? How did I create the Uganna?”
“You, specifically, didn’t create the Uganna, though you had the largest hand in it,” he says with the same even tone he’d report the weather. “You destroyed Kildare with that bomb, the same kind that was used during the War of 2062.”
I feel my brow dip, my mouth contort in confusion. “The bomb destroyed the entirety of Kildare, including the people there.”
“Yes, but the surrounding boroughs, the towns and villages that edged the city weren’t destroyed. They’d have been better off if they had been I suppose.” His gaze grows distant and his voice trails off. Several beats pass before he resumes speaking. “More than a million Urthmen lived just outside Kildare, they took the brunt of the fallout, the radiation, the sickness. The ones that survived suffered the same fate as my ancestors. They transformed, morphed into something else, something terrifying.” He swipes his brow with his hand. The memory of my father telling the story is crystal-clear in my mind. “I’m sure you’ve heard the stories about the original Urthmen, right?” We all nod somberly. “The Uganna are just like them. They were the original Uganna. They’re mindless savages, bloodthirsty monsters.” He sighs and rubs his temples with his fingertips. “It wasn’t until my ancestors started reproducing that Urthmen became rational, thinking creatures. We evolved to what we are today. But the Uganna, the return of the beasts, that’s something you brought on yourselves, on all of us, the day you detonated the bomb in Kildare.” A gaze as dark and shiny as onyx looks from face to face before landing on me. Feeling the weight of judgment shimmering within them, I avert my eyes, the possibility of truth too much to bear.
After a few moments of tense silence, I say, “King Leon was going to kill us. We didn’t have a choice.” It’s a feeble defense, I know, but I say it anyway and immediately feel the heat of shame burn my cheeks.
The corners of Peter’s mouth plummet, his frown deep. “I’m sure that was true, Avery, but you see in doing that, you’ve traded one problem for another.” He sweeps his hand toward the open door of the shed, to where countless bodies lay in varying states of cannibalistic mutilation. “And unlike the late King Leon and his army, these creatures will never stop. They crave only violence, death, the taste of flesh. They’re consumed by it, driven by it.”
Peter’s words cause the air around us to buzz and quiver with unseen energy so potent I half-expect to see tiny volts of lightning begin zigzagging through the atmosphere around us. But it doesn’t, and instead Arnost’s deep voice echoes. “Well then, if death and violence is what they want then death and violence is what they’ll get.”
Every fiber of my being screams in warning, in protest of what Arnost has said. These new creatures are an unfamiliar opponent, their habits unpredictable, unknown, which makes them all the more dangerous. Any strategy that’s worked with Urthmen, Lurkers or any other predator we’ve encountered, anything we think we know, is useless.
Peter shakes his head slowly. “That wouldn’t be wise, especially since we don’t even know how many of them there are out there.”
We saw more than could be counted, rushing toward us as we fled Galway. A terrifying multitude headed our way, the seemingly infinite number of them was enough to freeze the blood in my veins. The thought that there are more out there, more than what we witnessed, is utterly terrifying. The shed tips violently to one side before my head begins to swim in dizzying laps. I envision dens with packs too numerous to comprehend. I picture them uniting, storming each city, until both humans and Urthmen alike have been exterminated.
“Avery. Avery.” I’m vaguely aware of my name being called. Lost in a turbulent sea of worry and dread, the voices around me had become little more than a distant hum, but when I tune in, I realize Sully has called my name at least twice, and that his brow is puckered with concern.
“Yes,” I answer and am amazed at how much stronger my voice sounds when compared with how I feel.
“Are you okay?” he steps toward me and asks, his voice low and his tone intimate.
I assure him I’m okay then listen as June poses a question. “Why did they come here and kill your people?” she asks.
“As I said before, they seek blood, flesh. They sniff it out, violence and death motivating them constantly.”
“Oh my gosh,” June breathes.
Peter’s features soften when he addresses her. “Those things, they don’t see us as anything more than meat to feed on.”
June’s lower lip begins to quiver and her eyes fill with tears. I immediately go to her and wrap my arm around her shoulders, drawing her close. She turns toward me and buries her face in the crook of my neck. No matter how tall she grows or how many summers come and go, she will always be my sweet June bug, forever young, forever my baby sister.
She sniffles several times then straightens her posture, squaring her shoulders and tipping her chin in defiance of all that frightens her. As I watch her, a thought pops into my mind. I snap and point at Peter. “You must know these woods well, yes?” I say a bit louder than I intended.
“Yes,” he replies warily.
“Then you will get us out of here! You will get us to Cassowary.” My words are not a question and not even a statement really, but more of an order.
Peter hesitates a moment, searching my eyes. “You will kill me when we get there.” Now it is his words that echo not with a question but with resignation.
“No. I will not. No one will.” I issue a warning by leveling a harsh look at everyone in my group. “No one will. You have my word.”
“Oh this is great!” Brom doesn’t waste a second before he launches into a venomous tirade. “You’re going to trust a filthy Urthman? Have you lost your mind, girl?”
Narrowing my eyes to lethal slits, I hiss, “I’d mind my tongue if I were you, boy.” The heaviness of my blade at my back is a comfort. My fingers dance, readying to rip it from my scabbard and draw it on Brom.
When he lunges, I flinch but his hands reach not for me but for Peter. Throttling him, he lifts him off the ground and slams him to the ground in a swift, smooth move that betrays his lumbering heft. He yanks a hunting knife from a sheath at his hip. The finely honed blade glimmers with deadly intent as he brandished it. “I’m going to slice this monster open and gut him like a fish before I ever let him lead us to our deaths.”
Heart lurching to my throat and pounding there frantically, I scream, “Let him go!”
Brom ignores me in favor of pressing the pointed tip of his knife to Peter’s throat.
The skin there depresses and a pinprick of scarlet appears. “Oh I have no plan of doing that,” he snarls.
Sliding my sword from the scabbard at my back, the air whooshes as the razor-sharp edge slices the air. Within the space of a breath, it’s at Broms neck, just below his chin where a vital artery pumps lifeblood through his body. “You kill him, you die,” I promise.
I’d prefer not to kill Brom but at this point, but we need Peter more than we need him.
“You would kill me before you’d kill an Urthman?” His eyes widen and his tone is spiked with incredulity, with bitterness.
“I’d rather not,” I answer honestly. “But he can get us out of here before the Uganna find us. Can you?”
Brom laughs. It’s the high-pitched, staccato laughter of a crazed person. “No, I can’t say that I can.” He laughs a bit more then becomes eerily calm. “Hope he does a better job of leading us than he did of saving his own people.” His statement is a bomb that detonates against Peter’s spirit. He closes his eyes tightly, his anguish apparent.
“Let him go,” I say.
Brom retracts his knife and offers Peter a hand to help him up. Peter debates accepting it, eyeballing it as if it were a livewire. “C’mon, I won’t bite,” Brom grouses. “Not yet at least.” He chuckles heartily.
I replace my sword to its sheath. Once Peter is on his feet, I ask, “Why didn’t you leave? When you saw them coming, why didn’t all of you abandon this place?”
“This is our home, or it was our home,” he qualifies dejectedly. “We planned to defend it.” He shakes his head then rubs a hand over the smooth surface of his crown. “A human girl, no older than you,” he points to June, “passed through our village. She was on a horse. She told us what happened at Galway, and that the monsters were headed here following her.”
“A human girl on a horse?” Oliver springs forward, his face inches from Peter’s. He grabs him by the front of his shirt. “Did you kill her?” he demands and begins shaking him violently. When Peter doesn’t answer right away, Oliver screams, “Tell me!”
Planet Urth: The Fate of Urth (Book 5) Page 8
