by C A Ardron
He gave himself the distraction. He thought again how strange Karen was. There was nothing in her flat that told him anything about her. There were no films, no books, no ornaments. There was furniture, of course, but it was boring, nondescript. He got the feeling it had already been there when she moved in. She didn't seem attached to anything around them.
It was like she was stood apart, like she was real but everything around her was just a painting. Jay shuddered, shying away from such a line of thought. His eyes were once more drawn to a small pile of magazines stood neatly in one corner of the room on the floor. The one on top he recognised. It was the What's On TV guide. Not for the first time since seeing that title, he glanced around the room. Karen didn't own a TV. So strange.
Her gloves too, she hadn't taken them off once, or her jacket. This was her home, why hadn't she taken them off? Jay shook his head, not understanding this woman at all. Perhaps it was because she was Unician? He'd heard that Unicians sat on the floor instead of using chairs, not to mention eating poisonous insects. He'd heard lots of weird things about Unicians, but he didn't believe all of them. Some said they had the magic of unicorns inside their bodies and that they could raise the dead.
Jay forced himself to look at Karen again, she was looking outside her window. He couldn't imagine her eating scorpions and spiders. Maybe that one was just a tale too.
Karen moved a little, her gaze becoming more intense.
He realised with a start that her watching might be more than just idle curiosity. ‘Are...you looking out for Jackal?’
The Unician woman turned her head towards him. regarding him thoughtfully. He got the feeling she didn't really want to answer.
‘Yes.’
Jay swallowed at her abrupt truthfulness. She wasn't trying to hide how much danger they were in. He felt a sudden pang of guilt and looked at the arm of her jacket. It had become a little bloody from the knife cut she'd received.
Karen didn't know him. There was no real reason why she should've stepped out of the shadows to help. Now she was in as much trouble as he was. Jackal would kill her if he found them. She'd been hurt too. It was all his fault.
He sat back on the low sofa. At the very least he owed her an explanation. His muscles tensed and his throat went completely dry just thinking about it.
He found it a struggle to force any words out. ‘Jackal showed up at my house this afternoon.’
Jay thought she looked surprised but he wasn't sure, her eyes were sad though.
‘I see, Jackal attacked your family, then.’
Jay shook his head. ‘No.’
This time he was positive Karen was surprised.
‘Really? That's not like him.’
He paused his story, wondering what she meant by that. How would she know what Jackal was like?
‘My uncle...’ Jay's throat convulsed. He willed himself to stay strong; he didn't want to cry again. ‘Sold me.’
He looked up at Karen finding her features frozen in the oddest expression. Jay didn't think it was surprise, not this time. It seemed closer to alarm, or disbelief.
He waited while she processed what he'd just said. He couldn't believe it himself. His uncle had always been irritable that he'd had to look after him after his parents died. He hadn't thought his Uncle Max hated him that much.
Karen left the window and sat down across from him. He waited for the sad look in her eyes to appear, the sympathy, the exclamation of how horrible it was.
None of that came. A thoughtful expression crossed her face, as if there was something she didn't understand. Jay looked at her incredulously. Wasn't she going to say anything?
‘It's strange that he'd just show up like that,’ Karen mused. ‘Have you any idea why he came to your door?’
Jay's eyes bulged at her calm tone. ‘No! How should I know?’
Karen raised her hands in that appeasing gesture again, and he looked away. He couldn't believe how callous she was! He glanced at her again as she stood and turned away, going back to her survey of the street below.
Jay felt offended at how uncaring Karen seemed to be. He took a deep breath, admitting to himself that his anger had flared not because of her words but because she'd seen straight to the truth. He became a little uncertain of himself, a little uncomfortable in the Unician's presence.
She was right. Jackal coming to his door hadn't been a random event. His tongue remained still. Telling people his secret always landed him in even more trouble. He'd already endangered Karen, he couldn't say anything.
‘If the Sarpiens are after you,’ Karen spoke suddenly, cutting through his thoughts, ‘then the best thing you can probably do is go to the Predgarians.’
Jay looked at her sceptically. ‘The Predgarians? Aren't they, like, the City Guard?’
Karen looked amused and Jay felt his face going red. ‘I wouldn't make that comparison in front of a Predgarian if I were you,’ she advised him. ‘They take offence to things like that.’
‘Well, what's the difference then?’ He asked, trying to move on from his embarrassment.
‘The City Guard work for the Steiron Council and uphold the law. It may be true that the Predgarian's main cause is to protect the public, much the same as the Guard, however’ – Karen shot him a fierce grin – ‘the Predgarians have medallions.’
Jay felt a stab of surprise and couldn't help becoming a little excited. ‘You mean, like the same kind of medallion that Jackal has?’
Karen nodded. ‘That's right. The five Orders of Light all have medallions and are all capable of combating Sarpiens. Which is to be expected, of course, since the Orders were put in place to stem the tide of Sarpiens in the first place.’
‘There are five Orders of Light?’ He felt a little stupid for not knowing that. ‘I thought it was just the Predgarians and Dakkonin.’
Karen paused, looking very surprised. ‘I thought everybody knew about the Orders.’
Jay looked down, he could feel his cheeks reddening again. ‘Well, my parents never used to like talking about stuff like that, and Uncle Max gets mad when I ask.’
He glanced around the room, feeling uncomfortable. He'd always avoided talking about his family to anyone before now. He eventually gathered the courage to look at Karen again and tried to stop himself from jerking. She was staring right at him! She seemed thoughtful, though what about, Jay had no idea. She came back to the easy chair opposite him and picked up her cup of tea.
Jay hastily put his own cup to his lips and drank. He'd actually forgotten about it, even with it still in his hands.
‘The Dakkonin make themselves well known,’ Karen agreed. ‘They've put themselves on the frontline, killing the Sarpiens and their masters whenever they can.’
Jay swallowed his tea quickly. With Jackal wanting him so badly, he'd been trying his very hardest not to think about the monstrosity he knew the Sarpien must work for. Every Sarpien had a master, that's just the way it was.
He became nervous as he realised the intense Unician was studying him again.
‘You know what a sclithe is, then?’ she asked, though her tone implied it was more of an observation.
He gave an uneasy shrug. ‘Who doesn't? I mean, they're everywhere, right? Where there are Sarpiens, there's a sclithe, that's what they say.’
‘The sclithe aren't everywhere,’ Karen assured him. ‘That's an exaggeration, but the Sarpiens obey them. It's been that way ever since the sclithe arrived on this planet and subverted the first people they found, turning them into their servants.’
Jay shuddered. ‘And it's been going on ever since, right?’ He tried to think back but couldn't remember how long ago that had been.
Karen nodded. ‘That's right. That has been the case since the start of the alien invasion, almost nine hundred years ago.’
Jay let out a long breath. He'd thought it had just been a couple of hundred years. ‘You'd think we would've got rid of them by now,’ he muttered.
‘It's not as easy
as it sounds.’
Jay's shoulders hunched, she had that amused tone in her voice again. She must think he was an idiot. He jumped as Karen started speaking again.
‘After the five Orders were formed the sclithe realised they didn't have enough Sarpiens to win the war they'd started. They retreated and made homes underneath our towns and cities. They chose locations where large open battles would hurt us far more than them. Apparently it's a tactic which has served them well on other worlds.’
‘So there's no hope?’ Jay asked, he could feel himself getting angry at her matter-of-fact tone. ‘We just have to sit here and wait for them to kill us all?’
Karen chuckled. ‘Oh, they don't want to kill us...well, not all of us anyway.’
Jay stared. How could she be so casual about this?
‘The Orders haven't done a bad job keeping on top of things,’ Karen continued. ‘But we're getting off the point. We were talking about the Predgarians. Their primary focus is to keep the bloodshed down and protect the public in the on-going war.’
Jay frowned. ‘Wouldn't it be better to go to the the Dakkonin? They're the ones that fight Sarpiens, right?’
He tried to sink back further into the sofa as a scowl crossed Karen's face.
‘Yes,’ she conceded. ‘But they won't be interested in your problem. The Predgarians will be interested, it's their job to protect people like you from the Sarpiens.’
Jay looked down at the small amount of tea he had left. He knew what she was trying to tell him. He couldn't just sit here, hiding in her flat. He wanted desperately to go home, but couldn't. Uncle Max had sold him to Jackal, to a Sarpien. That house wasn't his home anymore. Nowhere was his home.
He felt close to tears again. This wasn't happening, it couldn't be. He glanced at Karen, trying not to make it obvious he was doing so. She had leaned back in her chair, drinking the last of her tea.
‘Did...did the Predgarians help you?’ He remembered that she'd told him she knew what it was like to be chased by the Sarpiens.
Karen swirled what was left of her tea in its cup. Other than this she hadn't moved at all, but her eyes were looking at him. Her expression was odd, her eyes lidded and her face calm. Jay couldn't even make a guess at what she was thinking.
Karen stood quite suddenly. ‘You know, I think I've got some soup in the kitchen somewhere. You must be hungry.’
Jay stared in surprise as she walked past him to the kitchen, her cup still in hand. Was she just going to ignore the question? He went cold as he realised something dreadful.
Karen may have saved his life, taken him in, given him clothes, even offered him food and drink, but he didn't know a thing about her. He'd been so caught up in his own emotions, thinking about nothing but how awful his life had become, that he'd completely ignored perhaps the most important thing. Just who was this woman?
‘Who are you?’
She glanced at him as she bent down and brought out a small saucepan from the cupboard beneath the kitchen counter. She gave a strange half-smile, one that didn't touch her eyes. ‘I'm Karen.’
Jay stood, leaving his cup on the small table in front of him, agitated. He didn't think there was a vaguer response she could have given him.
‘I hope you like chicken soup. It's all I've got.’
He paused in the act of opening his mouth to speak. ‘Yeah, I like chicken soup,’ he said instead. He watched her for a minute, wondering if she would answer any question. ‘You know Jackal, don't you?’
Karen didn't look at him at all this time. She busied herself with stirring the soup as it began to heat up on the electric hob.
‘You can sleep here tonight.’ Her voice was measured and unemotional. ‘You can use my bed, you deserve a good night's sleep after what you've been through today. I'll sleep on the sofa. Tomorrow you need to go to the Predgarians. When you're with them, you'll be safe.’
Karen was suddenly so distant, almost unfriendly. He felt sad and afraid too. He didn't really know anything about Predgarians. What if they refused to help him? Told him to go home?
‘Will you come with me tomorrow?’ Even though Karen wasn't willing to tell him anything about herself, he still couldn't help but cling to her. There was no one else he could turn to.
Karen's eyes flickered. She frowned and stirred the soup a little harder. She appeared to be fighting with herself in some way.
‘Of course I will, Jay.’
She smiled again, and Jay wondered what she was thinking. Karen's smile was sad, making him feel sure he'd just asked her to do something very hard, but he didn't understand why.
CHAPTER FIVE
Later that night, Karen tried to get comfortable on the small sofa. She'd been watchful for a while, more than a little worried that Jackal would appear on the street outside.
She needed to get at least a little sleep though, especially if she was to get Jay to the Predgarians tomorrow. She was quite tired, and even though the sofa was not the best thing ever to sleep on, she found herself dozing off.
There was the deafening sound of gallon upon gallon of water sweeping off the edge of the cliff. The waterfall was wide and rushed a long way down before hitting the surface below, Karen knew that. That's why she was so terrified as she fell. The wind whipped around her as she hurtled downwards, spinning end over end, hitting something hard on the way.
There was an odd clang of metal at the impact and not the painful thud of flesh hitting whatever she had bumped into. She saw suddenly, scarily close, the clear blue surface of furiously bubbling water. Darkness engulfed her as she went under, and then there was nothing.
Karen jerked awake, looking around wildly before realising where she was. Her hand went down instinctively to her stomach. She pulled up her leather vest a tiny bit and placed her hand under it, feeling the scarred flesh of the old injury which had almost taken her life.
It didn't hurt anymore, just ached sometimes in cold weather, but she was no longer in danger of dying from it.
She stretched her limbs and frowned at the soreness when her jacket scraped the cut on her arm. Karen stood and went to the bathroom, looking at her tired reflection in the mirror above the small washbasin, thinking to herself.
Jay didn't have any idea how much trouble he was in. He was paddling at the edge of a very deep pool, having no clue just how deep it was or what manner of monsters it hid.
Sarpiens and sclithe, Predgarians and Dakkonin, he didn't understand these things. They were just words to him. He hadn't had to live it like she had.
The corners of her mouth twisted into a cynical smile as she remembered the boy's words. Did the Predgarians help you?
Karen had never visited the Predgarians for help, and she never intended to. She continued to stare at herself in the mirror for a couple of seconds before removing her denim jacket and leather gloves, tossing them onto the tiled floor.
She untied the bloody cloth. The wound was caked with her own dried blood again. It had stopped bleeding though, so she left it as it was for now.
She sighed as she studied her right arm. It was just another scar to add to the collection. She had them all over but couldn't remember how she’d earned most of them.
Thinking about such things, of the past and of Jay, made her glance down. She didn't want to, but she did anyway. She made herself look at her worst fear, her nightmare, the thing she was most ashamed of.
Karen glared down at her left arm, staring balefully at the old enemy she didn’t know how to kill. It wound and spiralled all the way down. Faded now, the eyes were no longer alive and glowing, but it was still all too obvious.
The head of the purple-scaled snake was decorated with a semi-circular feathery crest. It rested on her wrist whilst the body and tail, ending in a simple point, journeyed all the way up to her shoulder, tiny spikes running down the entire length of its back.
She leaned forwards, putting her hands on either side of the washbasin, looking intently at her own eyes in the mirror. She had run
from what she used to be for three years, but no one could run forever. Karen was afraid that her short run of freedom might be coming to an end.
‘I’ll die before I go back,’ she swore in a fierce whisper.
Will you? a tiny voice asked in her head. Her hands trembled. Would Jackal allow her to die before another sclithe managed to take control, make her its slave?
She stood straight, releasing her tight grip on the washbasin. She inhaled sharply, trying to contain her terror. She would take Jay to the Predgarians tomorrow, then she would leave.
She had to get away, leave Steiron before Jackal found her. Karen picked up her jacket and gloves and left the small bathroom but she didn't attempt sleep again.
Karen concealed her secret once more as she shrugged on her jacket. There was a tiny bit of the snake's head that could still be seen on her wrist, but this was hidden when she pulled on her leather gloves.
She went back to the living room window, watching for possible danger. She wondered why she'd done this. After running from Jackal for the last three years she decided to just step out in front of him? She hadn't thought it through, it had been an impulse at the time.
By morning, Jackal would've alerted every Sarpien in the area to her presence. It would be a miracle if she could get Jay to the Predgarians without encountering any of them. She hadn't mentioned that to Jay. There was no point in scaring him more than he already was.
Karen felt a sick sensation in her stomach. She didn't think tomorrow was going to go well. Jackal held all the cards. He held the power, the resources, the back-up. Worse than all that, he had his medallion. She closed her eyes briefly, again trying to get a grip on her fear. If Jackal found her tomorrow, she couldn't stand up to him. Not like this, not as she was now. It would be pointless to try.
***
Jackal strode swiftly down yet another street, darkened shops on either side of him. His blood-red medallion swung as he walked; the etched jackal had a dangerous glint in its eye, a glint which matched the Sarpien's angry glare.
