“It slipped,” Naya repeated with enough disbelief to slap him.
Cringing at her tone, he shook his head. Only a few days ago, he’d awakened to find this girl assigned to help him recover from his death.
The more time he spent with her, the more he pitied her. No one should have to spend time saddled with a mess of a kid like him as their problem.
“I wanted to cut up my apple,” he said, not looking at her. “They said I can go into the kitchen and do things like that.”
Naya worried at a dot of blood on his sleeve with the stained towel. “You know how to handle a knife, Algie.”
He wrestled over whether to correct his name or not. Here, they called him that because some file indicated it was his name. They didn’t mean to imply he was only a child.
Besides, he probably deserved it. No matter how hard he’d worked to earn Grandma Katona’s respect, dying had certainly proven him incompetent.
“Yes, I do,” he said. “It just slipped.”
“And slashed your palm open.”
“Yes!” He clamped down frustration he didn’t mean to flail at her. Not here, not with all this magic in the air. “I wasn’t trying to hurt myself on purpose.”
Naya let go of him and folded the towel as if she needed something to do with her hands. “Then tell me what happened.”
She didn’t believe him.
He didn’t blame her.
“I’m sorry,” he said, swiping his hands down his face as if that could fling away everything in his head.
Everything in his head flung away.
A thick carpet of bright, welcoming blue eels swarmed over the walls.
Father held a fistful of Algernon’s hair as he dragged a knife across Algernon’s throat. “We should’ve given Miru the damned ring,” he grumbled. He breathed dark, brooding smoke into Algernon’s ears.
“No,” Algernon whimpered. “Not again. Please.”
His shoulder flared with agony, instead of his throat. Numb, aching emptiness enveloped his heart.
He screamed.
Hot, sticky blood spilled into the kitchen floor of a home he no longer had. The growing pool spread, reaching for a wriggling clump of glowing blue eels.
Begging never worked. The devouring hunger offered no mercy. No matter what he did or didn’t do, it rippled toward him, relentless and unyielding.
A man lay in the blue pool with his back to Algernon. Another eel poked from the man’s neck and slipped to join the rest.
Father sat with Algernon, sobbing and cradling his son’s head in his lap. “Your mother wouldn’t let me do it.”
His father’s anguish pulled tears from Algernon. He gripped Father’s arm and wished he could make everything right. He’d never wanted to hurt anyone.
Besides, Miru couldn’t take the ring anymore.
“Miru is dead,” Algernon said.
His voice rasped and scratched in a raw throat.
He couldn't admit how he knew as a drape of black hair slapped the eels aside and swept away the smoke. Lemon with a touch of mint chased away the emptiness and the consuming hunger.
“Who is Miru?” Eldrack asked.
He didn’t know anyone named Eldrack.
Yes, he did. The clerk had introduced himself a few moments before. And Naya. She’d called him “Administrator.” Of what, he had no idea.
Naya helped Algernon lie on the soft bed again.
Algernon struggled to gulp down air. Her magic swaddled him. The roughness in his throat faded.
His shoulder ached with fierce, throbbing angst.
“Miru killed me,” Algernon said.
No, Braylen had killed him.
Sort of.
No one had truly killed him. Not in the conventional sense.
Miru had inflicted the wound that had led to his death.
Braylen had hired him to do it. That man had held the power to prevent Algernon’s subsequent death and he hadn’t used it. He’d let Father watch his only child die.
For what?
Algernon hated him with a bright, burning passion.
Braylen had started it all. Algernon didn’t understand why and he didn’t care. The satiuz had hired people to take Algernon’s parents from him. His actions had destroyed Algernon’s home and murdered a member of his family.
Everything stemmed from Braylen.
A man who lived while Algernon had died.
“You’re aware you died?” Eldrack asked. Worry creased his brow.
Algernon nodded and closed his eyes rather than watch someone fret over him. “Nothing else explains what I remember.” And what he forgot.
“That’s unusual.”
A pen scraped on paper.
“You’re fine,” Naya said. “There’s nothing wrong. He doesn’t mean you’re bad or wrong. Try this drink instead?”
He opened his eyes. She held a different cup.
Algernon rolled to his side and took her help to sip.
Red wine.
Not his favorite kind, but it didn’t touch the dead place in his chest.
He took another sip.
Thin, watery blood sloshed into his mouth, filling him with dark, brooding smoke. Bright, welcoming blue rushed over his body, blotting out the candlelight.
He thrashed his arms as he sank in a pool of blood, trying to find the surface.
Crystalline tendrils of blue wrapped around his legs, chewing into his flesh.
Vibrant hands of brown and lemon laced their fingers with his.
They pulled. In both directions at once. Tearing him apart.
Algernon opened his mouth to scream. Dark, brooding smoke rushed inside until he burst.
“What were you thinking?” Penny and her pine magic slammed Algernon against a tree in the dark. A palm-sized globe of blue light cast shadows from above her head.
The impact stunned him. Algernon whimpered and sagged in her grip.
“Algie,” she barked. Penny slapped him.
His head snapped to the side.
He didn’t know anyone named Penny.
This strange woman hit him for no reason. Eldrack and Naya should have kept him safe from this. They hadn’t torn him from death’s grip to suffer a stranger’s wrath.
Had they?
Penny let him fall to the ground and crouched beside him. “Don’t you dare wander off inside your head,” she snapped. “Not now.”
Algernon watched himself roll to his hands and knees on a carpet of dead leaves. Twigs and other forest debris stuck to his hair. He wore bland, beige and brown clothes.
Both Algernons shook their heads, trying to clear them.
They looked up and met each other’s gaze.
The absurdity made both of them want to giggle, but they didn’t. Not with Penny so angry at the other him.
Not with the empty ache gnawing in his chest.
Penny. The name meant...pine. His mentor. She cared about him. He’d done something stupid. This woman who’d worked so hard to save him from himself had lost all patience with him.
He deserved that slap and fifteen more.
Algernon blinked hard and shook his head again. Was the bloody smear on his hand and sleeve real or imagined?
“I’m sorry,” he whispered as he stayed on his hands and knees, trying to hold back tears. “I didn’t think.”
Penny growled at him. “You panicked, you idiot. Why?”
Everything in his world begged him to trust her. This one person could and would help him. She believed in him. He knew that.
“I don’t know,” his stupid mouth blurted.
She narrowed her eyes and pressed her mouth into a thin line.
He gulped.
Penny knew a lie when she heard one. Especially one that pathetic and stupid.
“Satiuz Braylen.” Saying his name dragged a sob out of Algernon. Tears rolled down his cheeks.
“What about him?” Did her tone soften or did he only want it to?
“He—” Algernon
lifted a hand. Bits of leaf and dirt stuck to his palm. He swiped the back over his face. “He killed me.”
Penny said nothing for several long moments. She stood. Then she paced with slow, deliberate steps between two trees.
“Does Eldrack know this?”
Unable to stop the tears, Algernon shook his head. “I told him…” He sniffled and sat up so he could hug his knees. “Miru stabbed me. I told him Miru killed me. I died because Braylen—”
He wanted to destroy Braylen. Rage burbled free, demanding he rip and tear that vile man until nothing remained. His tears flowed, swift and torrential.
“Braylen was behind everything! He deserves a fate worse than death for what he did to me and my family.”
Algernon had certainly suffered enough for his crimes. Why didn’t Braylen?
Penny sighed and rubbed her temple. “Why didn’t you tell Eldrack? If you’d told him all this, he would never have sent you on this mission.”
“I don’t know,” Algernon hiccuped.
She shook her head. “Because you’re just a kid,” she murmured.
Just a kid. Not good enough.
He broke.
His body flopped to the ground, crashing through a plate of glass. Blue shards of smoke slashed a thousand cuts in his flesh.
Lying on his belly, he smelled pine and lemon with mint at the same time. His tears dripped into his mouth. They burned his tongue, filling him with dark, brooding smoke.
Smoke and lemon and pine waged war in his head.
“Algie, it’s okay,” Naya said. “Let it out.”
The lemon smothered everything. Tiny motes of mint danced with it.
“I’m so pathetic,” Algernon sobbed into his hands.
“No, you’re not.” Naya held him close. “This is hard. You’re not a failure because it takes you a long time to adjust. I promise. There’s no timetable for recovery. Some people are fast and some are slow.”
“Six weeks!” he bawled. “I can barely sleep. I can barely think through the pain. Why does my shoulder keep hurting? When will it stop? Why did you do this to me?”
“It’ll pass, Algie.” Naya rubbed circles on his back. “Eventually, it’ll pass.”
“What if it doesn’t?”
What if his father murdered him every night for the rest of his life? What if his mother damned him every day for the rest of his life?
What if he never remembered Grandma Katona’s face?
“It will.” She offered him a handkerchief.
“I don’t believe you.” He took the cloth square and wiped his face even as more tears slid down his cheeks.
“I promise it’ll get better.”
He sniffled and raised his head to meet her gaze. “You can’t promise that.”
She smiled and kissed his forehead. “Yes, I can. I promise you’ll adjust. It may take a while, but things will get better, Algie. You’ll sleep more and more until it’s a full night.”
Despite everything, Algernon liked how she said his nickname.
He sat with her, his mind drifting on tiny puffs of nothing.
No, not nothing.
Someone had done this to him. And he didn’t mean Naya or Eldrack.
That someone deserved pain and despair.
“Algie.” Naya nudged him. “I think you should get some exercise. Besides the stairs, I mean. Something more substantial. Maybe you can find a sparring partner?”
“How?” He rubbed his eyes, wishing they’d stop itching.
“Ask.”
Algernon sniffled and fussed with the handkerchief. “Would you spar with me?”
She giggled. The light, simple sound made him smile.
“Ask someone who knows how to fight, silly goose.” Naya gave him a playful shove. “Go looking for people with lots of muscles or that make you think of active predators. Or sit on a step and ask every Fallen agent who passes you if they’re interested in sparring. Knock on your neighbor’s door and ask them.”
He flopped on the couch. “You want me to go talk to people.”
“I’m so mean.”
“You are!”
Naya giggled again and tugged his arm to get him to move.
He heaved a melodramatic sigh and rolled to the edge of the couch.
“Are you awake?” Penny shook his shoulder.
“Not really,” Algernon croaked.
Pine-flavored magic plowed into his senses, shocking him alert.
Had he slept for once? With a pleasant dream?
“Why did you wake me?” he grumbled.
“Don’t be sour, son. Eat.” She handed him a sausage wrapped in a warm biscuit studded with dried fruit. “Before it gets cold.”
Right. Wagon. Other people. He had a part to play.
“Sorry, Mother.” Algernon took the biscuit and stared at it. His stomach gurgled and burbled. “I can’t eat yet.”
He couldn't eat this sausage at all. The meat would make him sick.
“Then get out and walk. That’ll perk up your appetite.” Penny jutted her chin like she wanted him to do something specific.
Listen, he figured. Watch. Pay attention. Learn.
Anything that might help them steal the amulet.
Outside the wagon, Algernon breathed in the fresh air of the road trundling past a meadow on one side and errant clumps of trees on the other. He settled into a brisk walk, glad for the sunshine and notable lack of magery. And dust. A rain shower had swept through sometime earlier, leaving everything with a bare hint of dampness. Including the horses.
After two days of traveling with this caravan, he’d determined the familiar scent in the front wagon came from a balm they put in the water for tea. It soothed the kinds of mild aches and pains people accrued while traveling.
Grandma Katona had used it. All the time.
He’d never realized she lived with so much pain.
No wonder she’d offered to stay behind and clean up the mess while he escaped the murderous thieves in their home. She must have seen it as a release in the service of her family.
Saving her then had kept his heart whole. Looking back, he wondered if he’d proven as guilty of clinging to Grandma Katona as his mother.
For all the good it did him.
“Hey, kid,” the lead rider said. His horse slipped into a slow walk alongside Algernon.
“Yessir?”
Algernon had determined he found the man familiar because he looked like all the people from his home region. Brown, sturdy, and common. His mother had that look. Father had come from more northern parts, diluting it for Algernon.
“We’re meeting another group ahead,” the rider said. “We could use an extra hand transferring cargo. You’d earn extra helpings at dinner tonight for it.”
Had they noticed his stomach complaining about the meals? He doubted they considered him a great choice for this sort of work.
Regardless, he knew Penny would approve. This job would allow him a chance to inspect the cargo. He could single out anything with a whiff of magic.
“I’d be happy to, sir.”
“Good. When we stop, move up to the front. Someone will tell you where to go and what to do. Don’t talk to anyone in the other group, though, unless you need directions or something. They’ve got a satiuz with them. You’re not to disturb him.”
Algernon blinked at him. A satiuz?
“Yessir.” He sounded breathless and stupid.
The rider chuckled. “He’s a man to treat with respect, kid, but not a direct line to the Creator who needs his boots licked.”
“Yessir. Do you...” Could he ask? Did he dare?
“Do I what?”
Algernon gulped, sure the rider would see through him. “Do you know which one?”
“Which satiuz? I only know his name, not his sect. It’s Braylen. Have you heard of him?”
“No,” Algernon said, trying not to sound too hurried. Or eager. He needed to sound like a regular kid who’d hoped for a puppy as he graciously
accepted a goat. The opposite had come true.
“I just wondered,” he said. Anyone would wonder that. Right? “My father—”
He stopped and shook his head, cursing himself for letting his hate control his tongue. Penny had told him not to lie or reveal too much. Little details made a story more believable. Big details and long stories derailed it. Hints without details at all made lies easier to keep.
“Sorry,” he said, scrambling for a reason to leave the topic. Had Penny said anything about her fictional husband? He couldn't remember.
“It’s hard to lose your dad young,” the rider said with a sympathetic nod. “If you want to talk, you come over at dinner and I’ll listen.”
Algernon watched the ground, uncertain why a stranger would extend such a kind offer. He didn’t know how to react.
Grandma Katona would’ve known.
He gulped and kept it simple. “Thank you, sir.”
The horse picked up speed and carried the rider from him.
Satiuz Braylen would meet the caravan. The one person in the whole world Algernon hated more than anything had dropped into his lap. Like a gift.
Fate took with one hand while giving with the other.
He picked pieces of biscuit off the sausage and plotted what to do when the caravan stopped.
Under no circumstances would he tell Penny that one critical detail. He expected she’d stop him. One didn’t walk up and kill a satiuz with no repercussions.
Algernon had a sword, a penchant for killing people, and a terrible load of guilt. Two of those things would help. The other promised only hindrance.
If he wanted justice, he needed to sort that hindrance beforehand.
Satiuz Braylen, leader of a sect of the Order of Spilled Blood, preached that killing any sort of animal or sentient being was the greatest sin. Algernon’s parents believed the same thing.
All his life, Algernon had heard this over and over.
He failed to see how Braylen hiring other people to do his dirty work counted as anything other than hypocrisy.
How did he reconcile people doing terrible things with his beliefs?
If killing was wrong, what did people who killed deserve as punishment? What if someone attacked him?
Hadn’t he killed those people in self-defense? How did that make him a sinner?
Miru’s death had been an accident. Algernon hadn’t even realized he could do that.
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