Half Bad

by Sally Green

  Celia also teaches me about Marcus.

  So it all seems to be heading in a certain direction. At first I said nothing, played dumb, but I can’t play along any more. I have to make some effort to fight back, and so the other day I tackled it head on.

  “I won’t kill my dad. You know that, don’t you?”

  She blanked me.

  But I know blank looks and I shook my head. “I won’t kill him.”

  She said, “I’ve been instructed to tell you these things. I tell you them. I don’t question why.”

  “You teach me to query everything.”

  “Yes, but some queries won’t get answered.”

  “I won’t kill him.”

  “Let’s suppose Marcus has threatened to kill a member of your family: Arran, say. The only way you can save Arran is by killing Marcus.”

  “Let’s suppose something more realistic. The Council threatens a member of my family: Arran, say. The only way I can stop them killing Arran is by killing Marcus.”

  “And?”

  “I won’t kill my father.”

  “All your family. Your grandmother, Deborah, and Arran are being tortured.”

  “I know the Council would kill them all. They are murderers. I’m not.”

  Celia raised her eyebrows at that one. “You would kill me to escape here.”

  I gave her a big smile.

  She shook her head. “And if they threatened you? Tortured you?”

  “They threaten me constantly. Torture me constantly.”

  We were silent.

  I shrugged. “Besides, I’m not good enough to do it.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “Do you think I’ll be good enough, one day?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “I’ll need my Gift.”

  “Probably.”

  “Will the Council give me three gifts?”

  Silence. And the blankest of looks. I’d tried that question before and not got anywhere.

  “What happens to Black Witches if they don’t get three gifts? Do they die?”

  “There was one girl I know of, a Black Whet, captured when she was sixteen. She was kept prisoner by the Council, not mistreated. Of course, she wasn’t given three gifts. She became ill with a disease of her lungs and also of her mind. She died just before her eighteenth birthday.”

  Would I be another experiment to see what happens? And what would happen to me?

  * * *

  The lessons about Marcus cover his attacks and his Gifts. There is a huge list of the witches he has killed, where, and when. By where I mean what country, town, or city, but also whether it was inside, outside, near water, mountains, streams, cities . . . By when I mean dates, but also times of day or night and phases of the moon, weather conditions . . . There are one hundred and ninety-three White Witches on the list and also twenty-seven Black Witches, though the list is probably incomplete for them. Marcus is forty-five years old now, and so in the twenty-eight years since he received his Gift that averages between seven and eight killings a year.

  The numbers are dropping off, though; he peaked when he was twenty-eight with thirty-two murders in that year. Perhaps he’s getting old, perhaps he’s mellowing, or perhaps he’s killed most of the ones he wants to.

  The Gifts for all these witches are on Celia’s list. He hasn’t eaten all their hearts, just the ones with Gifts that he wants.

  Marcus’s Gift, his own original one, is that he can transform into animals. He favors turning into cats, big cats. Most of the evidence is from tracks, a few distant sightings, and the bodies. There aren’t a lot of survivor accounts. In fact, there are just two: a young child who hid behind a bookshelf, and my mother. The child didn’t see anything but described hearing growling and screaming. My mother said she hid too, said she never saw Marcus, so that’s a lie, though the lie only became obvious after I was born, but she never said what really happened, not even to Gran.

  The majority of witches Marcus has killed didn’t have great Gifts, potion-making mostly, so he wasn’t killing those witches for their Gifts. Mostly they were Hunters who were trying to capture him, but there are others, Council members and other White Witches. I guess he had his reasons, but Celia doesn’t tell me what they are, even if she knows.

  As well as potion-making the Gifts he has stolen are:

  Breathing fire and sending fire from hands (Arran’s father, Council member)

  Invisibility (Kieran’s grandfather, Hunter)

  Moving objects by thought (Janice Jones, an esteemed old White Witch who sounds more like a crook to me)

  Seeing the future (Emerald, a Black Witch. I wonder if she saw that coming?)

  Disguising himself as any human being, male or female (Josie Bach, Hunter)

  Flying (Malcolm, a Black Witch from New York—this ability is questionable, though it seems he can make very big leaps)

  Making plants grow or die (Sara Adams, Council member—does he like gardening?)

  Sending electricity from his body (Felicity Lamb, Hunter)

  Healing others (Dorothy Moss, Secretary to the Council Leader)

  Bending and contorting metal objects (Suzanne Porter, Hunter)

  And weirdest of all:

  Slowing time (Kurt Kurtain, Black Witch)

  I ask about Marcus and his ancestors. Celia has told me the names of the male line. It’s an illustrious list of powerful Black Witches. They all had the same Gift, the turning- into-animals one. Still, I wonder about my Gift. Will being half White change things?

  And although Marcus is no longer a taboo subject that doesn’t mean I’m allowed to know everything about him. Most of my questions are answered by a simple “That’s not relevant.”

  I have asked about:

  The female line of Marcus’s ancestors. Not relevant.

  Where Marcus was born and brought up. Not relevant.

  How Marcus knew my mother. Slap.

  I know how Marcus knew my mother, though, and more, since after I returned from Mary’s, Gran told me what happened. And I wonder if Celia actually does know anything of the truth of that or any of my other questions.

  * * *

  One day Celia asks, “How do you think I control my Gift?”

  I’m not in the mood. I’ve had to kill, pluck, and gut a chicken today. I shrug.

  Next thing I’m on the kitchen floor clutching at my ears. She doesn’t often use her Gift on me; usually it’s just slaps.

  The noise stops abruptly and I get to my feet, using the range to pull myself up. I’ve got blood running out of my nose.

  “How do I control my Gift?”

  I wipe my nose on the back of my hand and say, “You think about it and—”

  And I’m on the floor again.

  The noise shuts off and I’m looking at the floorboards. The floorboards and I are old friends. I look to them for the answer. They are never much good at stuff like that, though.

  I get to my knees.

  “Well?”

  I shrug again. “You just do it.”

  “Yes.” She slaps me across the top of my head. “Like hitting. I know I want to do it, where and to whom, and it’s almost a reflex. I just do it. I don’t have to think about raising my arm and moving my hand.” She gives me another slap.

  I get to my feet, moving a step away as I do.

  “How does Marcus control all his Gifts? The ones he stole?” she asks.

  “Can he control them all?”

  Celia gives me a nod for that. “There is some evidence that he uses the lightning and moves objects, leaps . . .”

  “Some people can play lots of musical instruments. They just pick up the instrument and play. I guess they have to practice to become expert, though.”

  Celia says, “But there is
always one that they favor?”

  “I don’t even have my Gift, how would—”

  Those slaps really sting.

  * * *

  Celia is also teaching me about the history of witches. I don’t know how much to believe—I often wonder how much I should believe of anything she tells me. Anyway, according to Celia, hundreds and thousands of years ago, when the world was not split into countries but was inhabited by different tribes, each tribe had a healer: a shaman. Few of the healers had real power, but one called Geeta was special: powerful, good, and kind. She healed the sick and wounded in her tribe but also people from other tribes.

  This didn’t go down well with the tribe leader, Aster, who ruled that no one outside the tribe was to see Geeta without his permission. He kept her a virtual prisoner in the village. Geeta wanted to help everyone, so she escaped with the assistance of one of her patients, Callor, a wounded warrior from her tribe.

  Callor and Geeta lived in a remote cave. Geeta healed those who came to her. Callor hunted and protected Geeta. They were in love and had children: twins, two identical girls, Dawn and Eve. Geeta trained them both in witchcraft, gave them both three gifts and her blood on their seventeenth birthday. They would become great witches.

  The old leader from Geeta’s tribe, Aster, was ill and he sent a message requesting Geeta to return and heal him. Although Geeta wanted to help, as she helped everyone, Callor didn’t trust Aster and he persuaded Geeta to send their daughter Eve, the younger of the twins, rather than go herself. But instead of healing Aster, Eve, the hateful vicious twin, put a curse on him and fled. Aster died after a month of agony. Aster’s son, Ash, took revenge by killing Callor and capturing Geeta and Dawn.

  The story goes that Dawn, the compassionate twin, fell in love with Ash and they had a daughter. This daughter was the first of the White Witches.

  Eve roamed from tribe to tribe. She also had a daughter, who became the first of the Black Witches.

  I asked Celia, “Do you believe that story?”

  “It’s our history.”

  “History according to White Witches.”

  Today Blacks mock White Witches for living closely within fain communities, for pretending to be fains. They see White Witches as becoming weaker, more fainlike, needing guns to kill, using phones to communicate.

  And Whites hate Black Witches for their anarchy and lunacy. They don’t integrate within fain communities but don’t have a community of their own. Their marriages never last, often ending in abrupt violence. They usually live alone, hate fains and fain technology. Their Gifts are strong.

  * * *

  Celia won’t talk about the female line of my Black ancestors but she has told me the names of the male line. It’s an illustrious and yet depressing list. Each one was a powerful Black Witch and none of them died quietly in his sleep at a ripe old age. My great-grandfather Massimo committed suicide, so you could argue that he wasn’t killed by White Witches, but there is a clear trend in that direction:

  Axel Edge (Marcus’s father)—died in the cells of the Council under Retribution

  Massimo Edge (Axel’s father)—committed suicide in the cells of the Council

  Maximilian Edge (Massimo’s father)—died in the cells of the Council under Retribution

  Castor Edge (Maximilian’s father)—died in the cells of the Council under Retribution

  Leo Edge (Castor’s father)—died in the cells of the Council under Retribution

  Darius Edge (Leo’s father)—died in the cells of the Council under Retribution

  Celia says that the name of Darius’s father is less clear, as this was around the time the Council of White Witches became a formal organization, and records before this time are poor. But from stories a few more generations can be added with reasonable certainty, which are:

  Gaunt Edge (Darius’s father)—killed by Hunters in Wales

  Titus Edge (Gaunt’s father)—killed by Hunters in woodland somewhere in Britain

  Harrow Edge (Titus’s father)—killed by Hunters somewhere in Europe

  I asked Celia, “Did any of my ancestors live a long and happy life?”

  “Some of them lived to their fifties. I don’t know how happy they were.”

  So it’s no wonder my father is a little cautious. And I think of my ancestors and all their pain and suffering, and I still don’t understand why. I just don’t understand. I am kept in a cage, and none of it makes sense. I don’t want to live in a cage and I don’t want to die in a cell and I don’t want to be tortured and I don’t want to kill my father. I don’t want any of it, but it just goes on and on and on.

  I wonder, if I ever have a son what the future will hold for him. Maybe I’d do what Marcus has done, just leave him and hope that somehow he will have a better future without me. And yet here I am shackled up in a cage and I know it’s hopeless and hopeless and hopeless.

  But even with all that suffering and pain and cruelty I think that maybe my ancestors did find happiness, even for a brief time. I think I’m capable of that, and they must have been too. I hope so. I hope so. I hope so. ’Cause if I’m going to die in a cell I want to have something first. And I think of Arran and Annalise and being in Wales and running and every breath, every breath has to be precious and worth it and something important.

  Fantasies about

  My Father

  The routine keeps me busy and tired, but there are still times when I’m in the cage and I’m not in the mood for going into clouds or doing more pull-ups, so I just think.

  I still like to imagine my dad coming to rescue me on my seventeenth birthday. I’m lying here in the cage all shackled up and there’s this silence, and then a distant sound—not wind, not thunder but his anger and rage. He appears over the hills to the west and he’s flying, not on a broomstick or a horse but standing as if on a surfboard, though there’s no surfboard or it’s invisible, and he’s flying toward me, dressed in black. And the noise gets bigger, the cage just explodes apart, and my shackles fall off. He zooms around and slows down, and I jump onto my own invisible surfboard and I’m flying off with him. It’s the best feeling in the world to be with my dad and flying and leaving the broken cage behind forever.

  We go to the mountains where he lives and it’s lush and green, almost tropical. There, among the old trees and moss-covered stones, beside the clear stream, we sit and I am there with my father and he gives me three gifts—a knife, a ring, and a drawing—and I drink his blood warm from his hand and he whispers the secret words in my ear and we stay together forever, hunting and fishing and living in the woods.

  That one’s my main fantasy, I guess: the one I always go back to.

  I have other fantasies as well. Annalise features in most of them, and there’s lots of skin and sweat and kissing and tongues. Mostly I imagine I’m with her on the sandstone slab; she’s in her school uniform, Kieran has never found us, and I kiss her and undress her, sort of slow but nice, unbutton her blouse and her skirt and kiss her skin all over.

  My other fantasy is pretty similar: Annalise and I are on the sandstone slab and she undresses me, pulls my T-shirt off, unbuttons my jeans, and kisses my chest, my stomach, my skin all over.

  Then there are variations: she is undressing me on a hillside in Wales; she is undressing me on a beach; she is undressing me in the sunshine, in moonlight, in a rain shower, in mud and puddles.

  In those fantasies I don’t have any scars.

  The most recent variation is that I am in my cage and I blast it apart just by thinking about it, then Annalise appears and we kiss and I undress her and kiss her all over and she undresses me and kisses my chest and my stomach and my back. I have all my scars but she doesn’t mind and we make love on my sheepskins surrounded by the broken bits of cage.

  That’s a good one. I like it that she doesn’t mind my scars. I don’t think she’d like them reall
y, but maybe she wouldn’t mind them too much.

  And then there’s the fantasy that I don’t like to use too often, but I sometimes can’t help myself. In it I’m living in a cottage in a beautiful valley by a shallow, fast-flowing river that’s so clean and clear it sparkles even at night. The hills are covered with green trees that are almost humming with life, the forest is full of birds and animals. And my mum and dad are alive and living in the cottage and I live with them. Mostly I spend time with my dad, and we don’t sleep there in the cottage, we sleep in the forest and hunt and fish together. But we also spend time with Mum; she keeps chickens and grows vegetables. And summers are hot and sunny, and winters are cold and snowy, and we live together forever. My mum and dad grow old and are happy, and I stay with them and every day is beautiful forever.

  Thoughts about

  My Mother

  When I got back from Mary’s, Gran told me that Marcus and my mother were in love. But my mother knew it was wrong to love a Black Witch. She felt guilty about it. She married Dean and had his children and tried to be happy, but basically from the moment she met Marcus she was in love with him.

  I wonder if she still loved Marcus after he killed her husband, the father of her children.

  I guess when Dean found Marcus and my mother together there would have been a bit of a fight. Dean’s Gift was the ability to send flames from his hands and mouth, though it didn’t do him much good in the end, as Marcus must have fancied having that ability and he took Dean’s Gift.

  When did the flames stop? Did they curl out with his last breath?

  And where was my mother while all this was going on? Was she there? Watching my father eat the living heart of her husband?

  And was it easy to kill herself, knowing that she’d loved someone who could do that? She loved someone who killed men, women, and children, who killed the father of her children. She loved someone who ate people. And when she looked at me, her child—Marcus’s child—and saw I looked like him, did she wonder what I’d be capable of?