by Lan Chan
“Dammit, Gage! Can’t you be more accurate?”
The arrow fire alerts the Reapers to our presence. One of them raises his arm and makes a closed fist. Two things happen at once. Firstly, the blood furies begin to dive at Gage and me, forcing us to flatten ourselves on the ground or risk being clawed to death. Secondly, a number of thick ropes fall from the empty sky. I finally connect the pieces together. There’s a cloaked aircraft of some sort up there!
The Reaper in charge, the one who signalled for the ropes, grabs Micah by the waist. I’m on my feet again instantly and running towards them. A blood fury swoops for me. I run in a zigzag pattern, hoping to throw it off its game. Razor-sharp talons dig into my shoulder, but that’s as far as the animal will go because it risks smashing into the ground.
The blood fury makes a gargling sound in its throat, and I duck again, knowing it can’t be a good sign. A second later, a spray of sizzling yellow venom squirts from the pouches on either side of its fangs. So that’s the acid the Reapers use to dissolve their victims!
Cora roars as her arm and torso are covered in the acidic spray. It hits the Reapers too, but their suits seem to be designed against the poison. Having spent its store of venom, the blood fury takes off again.
“Rory!” Micah yells. The Reaper secures the clamp on the rope to his belt with one arm and dangles Micah like a cloth with the other. The Reapers who have holds on Cora and Leura throw the girls aside roughly and secure themselves too.
Micah’s abductor tugs on his rope and it slowly retracts into the invisible aircraft. “No!” I scream. I run into a wall of compressed air that pushes me backwards. I have to throw up my arms as a barrier against the debris being whipped around by the wind.
Through the gaps in my fingers, I see Micah’s mouth open and close. I know he’s screaming my name. He claws at the iron grip of his captor to no avail, and then his desperate outstretched arms beg me to help him. Then suddenly he’s sucked into the energy field of the cloaked ship and disappears entirely.
I’ve lost him.
My body won’t accept this fact. I’m running and I don’t even know why or where. Just as long as I keep going in the direction I can see the blood fury flying away. Somebody is calling out to me. I ignore them.
I make it to the edge of the forest when something catches on my belt. All of a sudden, a muscular arm reaches around my waist and I’m being drawn into an embrace.
“Get off me!” I yell at Gage. I rear back to kick him, but he mashes me against his chest so I don’t have enough momentum. “Get off! Get off! Get off!”
“Rory,” Leura says in my ear. “He’s gone. You’ll only get yourself hurt if you go after him.” I feel her hug me from behind, and I buck against them both. Cold fury travels through me like a crack in ice. The last thing I want right now is comfort in accepting that my brother is gone.
Neither of them releases their hold, and I consider biting into the bicep Gage has rested on my cheek. His sizeable palm keeps my head stuck to his chest, and I growl out my frustration. Every second I’m stuck here in this hug I don’t want, Micah is getting farther and farther away.
I struggle again and Leura’s arms grow tighter. The back of my neck is wet where her head rests on me. It takes me a moment to realise she’s crying. It should be me that’s upset. It should be me crying. If Gage would let me move, I’d shake her. Why am I not crying? I’m not going to cry. I can’t cry.
Instead, I ball up all of my fear and anguish and shove it in the deepest recesses of my mind. It can keep the pain of my mother’s death and the betrayal of Aiden’s abandonment company. Right now, all I can deal with is the anger that tears through me like an inferno on a dry pasture.
“Let go of me. Now!” I say through clenched teeth. Maybe it’s the simmering violence I promise in my voice that does it, because suddenly I’m free. The first thing I see is Leura’s smudged cheeks and eyes glistening with tears.
“Please don’t go,”’ she says before Gage folds her in his arms. I throw my last three knives at the nearest tree in succession. I have to use my left hand because my right one is still bandaged up. On a good day, I’m almost as accurate with my left arm as my right. Today my aim is way off. The knives either clatter to the ground after only nicking the bark or they miss the mark completely.
I cast around for a broken branch and find the perfect one amongst a patch of nightshade. Blue berries burst over my skin like ink on a clean sheet of paper as I carelessly drag out the branch. With two hands gripping the wood, I attack the tree with everything I’ve got, yelling and cursing with each smack.
I think I hear Cora speaking behind me, but I’m too caught up in my rage. Sully whines like she does when she doesn’t understand why I’m angry, and I feel her bewilderment, but I can’t stop myself. I smash the trunk for Micah’s abduction, for my mother’s death, for Leura who I’ve grown to like but who I blame for stopping me from going after my brother, and most of all, I bash the tree because I am useless. Because when things actually happen, all I’m good at is running away.
With each attack, the branch snaps a little more, until all I’m left with is a shattered twig. My breath heaves and burns as it enters my lungs. I slide to the floor and rest my forehead on the scratched-up trunk.
I hear someone crying. Big, ragged sobs that originate in the pit of their stomach. That can’t be Leura because her tears have been silent so far. I turn my head so I can just make out the scene from the corner of my eye.
The others are gathered around Cora. I can’t see what they’re doing because Gage’s back is in the way. “You have to take it off,” he says. There’s the sound of running water and then more sobs. Leura raids the medical supply bag.
“There’s only aspirin and some herbs,” she says. I see their details through a haze, but slowly the puzzle pieces slot together. I see myself drawing the attention of the blood fury and the animal unleashing a spray of its venom all over Cora.
I get to my feet and the world spins. Gingerly, I make my way over to the group. They split to let me through, no doubt wary of my temper tantrum. I take the tub of cooling balm laced with Micah’s Rose serum from my backpack and kneel down beside Cora.
The venom has eaten away at the fabric of her blue shirt, leaving it in tatters. Where the venom touches her skin, it has begun to bubble and weep a sickening yellow pus. The smell makes me dry retch, but I manage to hold it down because I’m not the one whose skin is being eaten away. At least in its pure form, the venom is slower acting than the concoction the Reapers use to melt holes in their victims.
“This might sting,” I say, though I doubt she’ll feel anything beyond her current torture. She doesn’t even flinch as I apply a copious amount of the balm to her arms and the left side of her torso.
“Oh,” she says each time I apply a little more. I smile automatically, and it’s so bittersweet to see Micah’s Rose is working exactly like I anticipated without being able to share it with Micah himself. I bite my lip to hold my unshed tears at bay.
Now that the sores are covered with balm, Leura and I are able to carefully remove the remnants of Cora’s shirt without her passing out. Leura dresses Cora’s venom burns with the store of bandages, and Sully and I guard her while she sleeps. As hard as I try to stay alert, I can feel drowsiness overtaking my senses.
When Gage and Leura come back from making sure all the Reapers are gone, they have to shake me to rouse me. It’s stupid to stay in this spot now that the Reapers know exactly where we are, but Cora isn’t fit to move so we don’t have much choice. Besides, if the Reapers didn’t take us before, why would they bother coming back for us?
Leura and Gage finish off cooking the wolf meat. When the smell gets too bad, I want to leave, but that idea is met with a resounding no. So I just sit there with Sully’s head in my lap, going over all the things I could have done to keep Micah safe. All the many precautions I could have taken but didn’t. I should have made him go back to the Landing. I shou
ldn’t have agreed to team up with the group. I should have gone after him. I should have done more to keep him safe. There’s a rational part of me that knows I haven’t had much of a choice, but that part has been tied up and gagged by the guilt that rages all over my emotions.
Saving the Landing, creating viable seeds, and destroying the Seeders. These all seem like such grandiose and detached ideas. What’s the use if I can’t even protect the people I care about?
A snippet of Gage and Leura’s conversation drifts over. I haven’t been paying attention until I hear the word Reaper.
“You’ve seen me shoot,” Gage says. “I’m okay, but I’m not that accurate.”
“Maybe it was a lucky shot,” Leura suggests. Gage shakes his head. He seems oddly comfortable admitting his shortcomings as a bowman. So different from the preening rooster that used to strut around the Landing.
“At the time, I thought so too,” Gage says. “But the more I think about it, the more convinced I am that it wasn’t me who shot that guy. I was aiming for the boy and somehow, miraculously, the big guy choking Rory went down.”
The fire flares for a second, forcing them to back away and halt conversation. I prop up on the floor, hanging on to every word. When the fire dies back again, Leura makes a series of clicking noises with her tongue, indicating she’s mulling it over.
“I don’t like where this is going,” she says. I don’t like it either. “How long do you think the Reapers have been watching us?”
It’s not until she says it that I realise it’s the same thing I’ve been tossing around.
“I don’t know,” Gage says. “But they knew exactly who they wanted and how to get him.”
I turn away then, unable to stand the direction of the conversation. How long have the Reapers known about Micah? How long indeed have they been watching him? I’d be stupid not to assume they’re interested in his talents as an inventor of all things that go boom. Is that enough to keep him alive? I don’t dare let hope dwell in my heart, but as I lie down and close my eyes, hope sneaks in anyway. As if somehow I’ll get to the Citadel, find Thomas Dempsey, and convince him to save Papa and find out where Micah is as well.
These are the thoughts that plague me for the next three days as our small group trudges through the forest once more. The burns on Cora’s body are almost healed and though she doesn’t say anything of it, possibly because I’ve been as talkative as a circus mime, I often catch her watching me when she doesn’t think I know.
I am consumed with running through every scenario possible in my head, planning for another reaper attack. These thoughts turn into insomnia despite how physically exhausted I am by all this walking. If I do make it to the Citadel, I’ll be in the perfect weight class for the circus. I see the ravages of this lifestyle on the gaunt faces of the others as well. Leura especially, since she had so little to lose in the first place.
Despite this, Leura tries the hardest to keep my spirits up or keep me distracted. “Have you ever heard the story of Weebil and the Red Rock?” she says much too enthusiastically.
I have heard it. My mother used to tell it to me whenever the kids at school picked on me for being small. When I don’t respond either way, Gage and Leura exchange a glance and then she starts to tell the story anyway.
“My mother’s people say that once upon a time, well before humans inhabited the earth, a family of birds lived on a red plane surrounded by waterfalls and lush forest. Weebil was the youngest and smallest of the family, and her older brothers and sisters Magpie, Crow, and Hawk would tease her mercilessly because her small wings couldn’t keep up with their mighty ones. Back then, the earth was plentiful, and the Bird family’s favourite place to gather food was a valley at the base of the Red Rock. The road there was treacherous because of the shroud of mist that covered the land, but the Bird family was blessed with keen sight and they were able to navigate the terrain.
“Magpie, Crow, and Hawk would fly there every day and bring back great big bunches of food, but little Weebil could only ever carry the smallest grains and seeds. Then one day, the Great Frog woke with an unquenchable thirst and he drank all the water in the world. When the other animals succeeded in making the Great Frog laugh, all the water he was holding gushed out and caused flooding all over the world. When the water finally receded, most of the Red Rock had been crushed to a fine dust that clung to the mist. The valley had turned into a gorge with boulders blocking its entrance.
“The Bird family cried and cried because they no longer had access to their food source. Soon the Bird family and all the other animals became sick from hunger. But little Weebil didn’t give up. She flew to the valley, and because she was so small, she was able to find a way through the tiny cracks between the boulders. She spent all night going back and forth and by morning had brought back enough seeds and grains to feed everyone. The animals rejoiced, and never again was Weebil teased for being small. The seeds that they didn’t eat the animals planted, and these grew into the forests that the humans inherited.”
Normally when I hear this story, it shakes me into realising that giving up is never a good option. But today I can’t pull myself out of the abyss. By the fourth day, I’m running on pure adrenaline. One minute I’m walking, and then all of a sudden the forest turns upside down. Somebody catches me, but I’m not really sure who. In the span of a moment, there are six faces looking down at me. It occurs to me I might be seeing double.
The twin Coras offer me water, which I gratefully accept. The water is warm and has a strange bitter taste, but I can’t be a chooser when water is so precious at the moment. We’re down to our last two bladders.
“Looks like we’ll be making camp here,” Gage says.
I’m so tired I can’t do much but curl up into a ball and drift off into blissful oblivion.
Sixteen
I’m woken by the sound of pattering rain and the trickle of water on my face. Damp, everything is so damp. My immediate surroundings are dark, though in the near distance, the sky is a muted grey laced with light yellow signalling the first signs of dawn.
Water begins to pool on the ground where I lie, but when I go to push myself up, I realise that my hands have been tied together in front of me with a coarse length of rope. My eyes are still heavy and I’m thinking through a drowsy fog, but as far as I can tell, I’m in a small cave.
My legs cramp from prolonged stillness, and I’m about to try to stand up when a figure appears and blocks out what little light filters into the cave. All the energy I’ve regained from a night’s rest drains from me.
It’s Cora.
She braces her arms on the roof of the cave like she’s about to use the rock ledge as a swing. The low light rims her sinewy body and obscures her features but somehow make them more pronounced. It’s not lost on me that she’s got my utility belt around her waist. Micah made that belt for me on my fifteenth birthday. I can’t help but be drawn to the two handguns tucked into the belt. I stupidly gave one to her, but where has she gotten the other? Has she had it with her the whole time?
I am chilled to the bone in the cave, but I bite down until my jaw hurts just so Cora can’t hear me shivering.
“Where am I?” I say. I don’t expect an answer, but merely speak to prove that I can. To show that I’m not terrified even though I half expect to pee myself. Getting the words out is like pushing sawdust through my throat. Residual bitterness lingers on my tongue and my teeth feel porous like they do after I’ve just thrown up. The water Cora gave me must have been laced with a sedative.
She ignores my question. “Get up,” she says. “We’re moving.”
I crawl outside the cave and hiss when the thin grey light hits me. My legs wobble, but an arm comes out to steady me. My gaze flows up the arm and onto Cora’s vivid blue eyes.
“Don’t touch me,” I say, cutting her apart with my stare. She flinches, but I am stone, and so she turns and her features set into a scowl.
Cora sets an unreasonable pac
e, which I have difficulty keeping up with while still drugged. She walks in front, holding a leash tied to the rope around my wrists. The rain has pattered out to a light mist, but we’re damp in almost no time. Cora swings my pack carelessly on her arm with the rest of my weapons around her waist. I can still feel the dull blade in my boot because it’s rubbing the ball of my ankle raw, but in a way, it’s also comforting.
My brain is sluggish and every so often I slip in the mud the mist has made of the forest floor. Cora doesn’t stop walking, but just drags me along until I can heave myself upright again. I tell myself I’m biding time, but after the fourth slip, I have to admit I’m just plain exhausted. I’ve given up hope that Gage and Leura are coming to rescue me if they haven’t already done so by now.
From what I can tell we’re still heading in the direction of the Citadel, though I’m not sure what Cora is trying to achieve with this stunt. Whatever it is she wants, I don’t intend to make it easy for her. If only I could think of a distraction.
We don’t stop to eat or drink until night falls and the path is too treacherous to navigate. My tongue is like sandpaper and I can’t remember the last time I ate something. When I see the small portion of jerky and even smaller cup of water Cora hands over, I feel like weeping. At first I think about refusing to eat or drink, but it’s clear I’m only doing myself a disservice, so I take small sips of the water and chew on the beef jerky for as long as I can. Even after it’s lost all flavour, I still don’t swallow so I have the illusion of eating. My only solace is Cora’s rations don’t appear to be much bigger than mine.
This tells me my abduction was hastily planned or at least hastily executed. I can barely look at Cora without wanting to leap up and slit her throat. How long had she been planning this? Was it from the start? It makes me sick knowing all that time she was probably trying to figure out a way to snatch me away.
