What Blood Leaves Behind (The Poison Rose)

by Beaumont, Delany

  Then William’s movements start to slacken, his face begins to relax. Soon he has subsided into a sporadic jerking, like a bad case of the hiccups. As I gaze into his face, I realize he is dying. He begins to gasp, takes a few erratic breaths and ceases to move at all.

  I place my hand on his chest but feel nothing—no beating heart, no rising and falling of his narrow, fragile ribcage. I get back up and take the rifle in my hands.

  Three

  Moira. I will kill Moira.

  My mind seethes with the image of a single bullet boring into the soft milky-white of Moira’s forehead, right between those corkscrew curls.

  I shake my head violently. This isn’t me. I can’t be one who has such murderous thoughts, can’t murder in cold—

  Blood.

  But is that what flows through the veins of these nocturnal apparitions? Can I even call them human? Do their hearts pump out the same red blood cells, the same white blood cells that flow through me, that flowed through William?

  I look down at William, at his crumpled, defenseless face and know that he could be any one of us. Next time, it might be me lying there—or Emily or Carson or Stace or Finch. We’re pawns—under the thumb of madness.

  Voices rise around me. Words aren’t clear but there’s some movement, some agitation. It’s harder to see—torches are pulled from sconces, their flares dancing wildly in all directions. The bonfire is burning lower, collapsing in on itself.

  I know there are only seconds remaining in which I can act.

  Moira. I try to get a fix on Moira. A torch remains stationary near Gideon’s body and she stands beside it, still visible, her hand on his chest as she looks dazedly from side to side. She must be confused, trying to come up with words that will regain control of the situation, maybe seeking guidance from her sleeping lover.

  Keep steady on Moira—stop hesitating. Moira is not human. Imagine her lying lifeless like a queen in state—stretched out alongside Gideon on that slab.

  But my finger wavers on the trigger. I keep arguing with myself as the seconds pass.

  Better not to open fire. Aisa will simply take Moira’s place—nothing will be changed by this.

  Keep hold of the rifle and run.

  Jendra is on the steps between Moira and me, pacing through the flickering light in a slow circle. She seems unaware that I’m only a few feet from her. She still has her gashed wrist half-raised, stares at it blankly. What is going through her head?

  I try to aim past her, aim at that quiver of torchlight so close to Moira’s waxen face. My finger touches the trigger as I stare at the shadows of her dark eyes, the smear of blood at the corner of her mouth and squeeze—

  But I flinch—just at the crucial split second. At the moment I pull the trigger, a car-sized chunk of the bonfire caves in on itself like a detonated building. At the crack of my shot, the fire gives out a rumble and a thundering crash, followed by an enormous hiss as it settles like a thousand snakes have been tossed on the flames.

  And ringing out over all this is a piercing cry that stings my ears. Moira is still standing at Gideon’s side, her hand now entwined with his.

  I hit no one—the shot went wild. But then I see—

  Jendra.

  She staggers to one side, clutching her arm. She looks at me, dazed and appalled, wide eyes blinking slowly as if unable to comprehend what has just occurred. Without warning, Moira springs to her side, grabs Jendra by her uninjured arm and drags her back up the steps.

  Pandemonium breaks loose. It’s harder than ever to see—unsteady gleams of torchlight, the bonfire lowering and spitting embers—impossible to get a fix on any of the shapes flashing about faster and faster.

  The Elders have dropped back to the far end of the square and the Riders are phantoms once more, inky wraiths crisscrossing the space around me. Their cries blur into an indecipherable babble. One knocks into me hard enough to spin me around. It takes a moment for me to realize that the rifle is gone, plucked right out of my hands.

  I grope for it, cast about for it as if I’ve dropped it but then the realization sinks in—

  It’s over. My chance is gone. My one advantage—gone.

  I want to shrink back into the dark myself. I want to sprint away from the fire’s glow, far from the perimeter of the square. I’m much too exposed where I am, unprepared for this—like an actor finding herself alone on stage and unable to remember her lines.

  But William.

  It’s hard to pull myself away from William. A powerful urge to protect him remains—as if I should scoop him up in my arms and run—and I tell myself, He’s dead—it’s over. Nothing you can do.

  But I feel I did nothing. Did nothing to protect the poor little fool.

  Repeat it until you believe it—there was nothing you could do. He wanted to go through with this—wanted to take the risk.

  I look up and Doon is now beside Moira with the rifle. Moira keeps looking from the rifle to Jendra. Jendra has sunk down to the base of the fragment of column that holds Gideon’s body. She looks like I did when I was in the cage, knees up to her chin, grasping her injured arm, a dark oily patch of blood leaking like slow-pouring syrup from a spot close to her shoulder.

  Moira snatches the rifle from Doon. She lifts it to her shoulder, squints down the site. She aims straight at me and I remain motionless. I can’t hear the click but I picture her finger pulling back uselessly on the trigger. She ends up cursing, holding the rifle away from her, staring at it like it’s defective.

  “I think you need to make sure it’s loaded first, Moira.”

  There’s high, mocking laughter from over my shoulder, sharp enough to fill the space around me, cut through the cacophony. The frenzied movement and clamor of the Riders subsides a little like there’s a growing awareness that here is something worth listening to.

  I glance back and it’s Aisa, only a few steps behind me.

  “Nice ceremony,” she says. “Too bad about your friend—Blondie there.”

  Her smell affects me more than what I can see of her—hair more darkly crimson than ever in the glow of the dying bonfire, face ash-white and indistinct. But that sweet, sickly smell with its harsh metallic undercurrent. It makes me stop up my nose, turn away so I can try to find some untainted air.

  “And this one.”

  Aisa comes right up beside me and toes at William’s motionless body with her boot. Like William’s nothing more than a dead squirrel she’s come across while walking in a park.

  I choke back the urge to drive her away, screaming at her to leave him alone. I want to drag his body to a place where these vultures can’t pick at it. The carcass of the deer—will they do that to William? But as enraged as I am, a part of my mind is already analyzing this confrontation, wondering how I can turn it to my advantage.

  Moira grins. She’s let the butt of the rifle drop to the ground beside her, holds it lightly by the top of the barrel. She’s poised, composed again. “What was the boy worth anyway?” she says casually. “He was a weakling, the runt of the Elders. And he would have become our runt, a sorry excuse for one of us.”

  Runt. The word bites. That’s how I thought of William.

  With Aisa beside me, Milo and Bodie must be right behind. I can feel their presence, the smell grown so intense I can hardly breathe—that reek of decay and singed wires all around me, a stench of graves and burned-out houses. I catch myself grinding my teeth.

  “Are we going to go through all of this again?” Moira calls to Aisa teasingly. “This little upset about wanting to be all independent?” She laughs like Aisa’s a silly child. “No one knew what was going to happen. Needle said the boy’s chances were fifty-fifty.”

  “Needle said, Needle said,” Aisa mimics. “What does Needle know? Is Needle in control now?” Aisa swings round to the larger group of Riders. “Does anyone really want Needle in control?”

  There is grumbling, murmurs of dissent. As if on cue, Needle pushes himself from the edge of his cushio
ned perch and onto his feet. Compared to the other Riders, he is gaunt and geeky. I can imagine how he must have been teased and bullied in school.

  “Needle knows enough,” Moira says. But it’s a weak response.

  There’s a lot of griping now, more commotion among the Riders, torches shifting around the square. I feel chill breath hovering at the back of my neck—Bodie and Milo. I hear them start to pant with anticipation.

  “Let Needle speak,” Moira proclaims, her voice rising. “Let him have his say. He knows what Gideon—”

  “Does he?” Milo growls from over my shoulder.

  “Respect. You must show respect.” Her voice spikes into a shriek. She takes up the rifle, brandishes it over her head, waves it back and forth. Doon stands close, arms folded tight across his chest, shaded eyes impenetrable. He looks like an enormous chess piece, a knight or a king ready to rain down holy terror on all who oppose him.

  Needle advances to the edge of the top step. He’s near Moira but not right beside her, keeping a little distance as if wanting to maintain an air of independence. He straightens the fur coat across his thin shoulders and raises his right arm, points straight up with a long white finger like a teacher waiting for his class to come to order.

  By degrees the Riders take notice of him. He waits until it quiets down, until heads are turned in his direction.

  But he doesn’t speak. Needle turns back to Gideon, bends low over his body. He glides his hands over Gideon’s face, over his entire frame like a faith healer—from Gideon’s forehead to his toes and back again.

  Watching him makes me wonder if the dormant body has decomposed at all or if it remains intact like a waxwork figure. I’m not close enough to see any discoloration, can only glimpse Gideon’s pale profile as Needle’s fingers flutter over it like the feelers of a moth.

  Then Needle whirls around, holds both arms out high in triumph. “We must maintain discipline. We must listen to Moira,” he says. “Gideon wills it.” His tone is emotionless, flat and monotone. Sepulchral as always, like it’s coming from far underground. He’s not the actor Moira and Aisa are but his voice has an otherworldly quality that compels attention.

  “How do you know what Gideon wills? We’re supposed to believe he spoke to you through your fingers?” Aisa hollers.

  There is widespread shushing among the Riders. Needle and his connection to Gideon still commands some respect.

  “You’re just trying to lick the hand that feeds you, Needle,” Aisa continues. “For some insane reason, you favor Moira over me.”

  “For a very understandable reason,” Moira says.

  There is some laughter.

  “This is bullshit. All of you know this is bullshit.” Aisa nudges Bodie and Milo. “All of you—all of you—can come with me and no one will have to listen to the screeching of this selfish, stuck-up bitch anymore.”

  There’s more laughter. A few Riders start shouting encouragement to Aisa. Some begin calling for a physical fight, a showdown between the two. “Let’s have a new kind of ceremony,” someone yells.

  And just like that, Aisa shatters whatever authority Needle possessed. His decree has done nothing to sway the crowd. He begins waving his hands frantically like someone flagging a taxi in a downpour. In seconds, he’s no longer the high priest officiating but a mere nobody desperate to be noticed by the crowd. “Can you—Can you all—” he stutters.

  No one pays any attention to him. But none of the Riders beyond Milo and Bodie step forward to join Aisa, to make a declaration that they’re on her side.

  The babble of the Riders rises. The wraith-like figures remain indistinct, marked only by the spluttering light of the torches. But I feel something—their agitation, their excitement as it accelerates charging the atmosphere, making the air electric. My skin starts tingling like a storm is about the break.

  Needle keeps flapping his hands, ridiculous in his pompous fur coat, standing in front of the cushioned throne he created for himself. Moira scrutinizes him—what’s become of him—and shakes her head sadly. With a flick of her hand, she waves him away.

  She maintains her composure. She lifts up the rifle again, this time above her head, gazes around the square with a cryptic smile on her face, waiting for her unruly audience to settle down.

  “Am I screeching, Aisa? Au contraire. I’m speaking in a most serene tone of voice. As one tends to do—when they know they’re in the driver’s seat.” She looks up at the rifle. “Everyone see this? This is what’s going to settle the score, Aisa dear, once and for all. This very rifle you took it upon yourself to return to the girl.”

  She’s recaptured the crowd again, their murmuring, their constant shift from place to place subsides.

  “I didn’t give her the rifle,” Aisa says. “You did.”

  Moira laughs breezily. “No need to lie, my dear. What good will that do you?”

  “I’m not lying.”

  “But why would I give it back to her? It makes no sense.”

  They fall silent. All noise dies down to just the crackle of the flames, so much softer than it was before. But there’s still an incredible amount of tension in the air. “Doon?” Moira asks, looking over at him. He shakes his head. I see Aisa turn and glance at Bodie and Milo. They shrug. “A mystery, then,” Moira says. “No matter.”

  She moves closer to Gideon’s body, looks from it to the Riders scattered throughout the square. As soon as she comes near him, Needle shrinks back until he’s obscured completely by darkness. His role in this performance is over. Moira raises a hand halfway—a small, theatrical gesture—certain now that she has the crowd’s rapt attention.

  “Listen, all of you. This is about power. The power that girl has with this gun. What she’s done with it so far. What she might do. It’s about the power that Aisa wants and the power that I have.”

  “Think you have, Moira,” Aisa says.

  Moira ignores her. “Somehow the gun was returned to the girl. And the girl would gladly have killed any one of us if she could. But listen to this—we can’t die. Gillian Rose—or any Elder if they were so inclined—can’t kill us. Hasn’t Gideon proved this?”

  Her voice grows shrill, has a hysterical edge that makes my ears ring.

  “But you doubt,” she says. “You fools continue to doubt Gideon, disrespect his power. Therefore—”

  She pauses dramatically for effect, the rifle now cradled in her arms.

  “Therefore, I will prove that power to you. The only source of power you need pay attention to. I will prove that I—that all of us—are stronger than death. Gillian Rose thought she was hunting us. I will let her hunt me. I will let her kill me if she can. Or I will get her first.”

  Aisa turns to me, her head cocked at an angle like she’s weighing my worth. “You’ll give her the rifle and let her hunt you?” she says.

  “Yes.”

  “Give her a clear shot at you? See if you survive?”

  “I will give her a clear shot at me.”

  “And you have bullets left?” Aisa says to me. I don’t know what else to do but nod my head.

  I can feel other Riders pressing closer, murmuring, torchlight flickering past me. That unsettling odor, the electricity in the atmosphere, it all keeps growing more and more intense.

  “Let this happen, Aisa,” Moira says in a softer tone. “Let me play my game. If I don’t survive, if I’m wrong, you’re rid of me forever. And you don’t have to lift a finger. I know you’ve never liked me. But if I survive—”

  “You let us break away,” Aisa says. “Let us do what we want.”

  Moira shakes her head, that cryptic smile back on her face.

  “We share power. The two tribes are united. You and me, equals. Joint rulers of…everything.” She sweeps an arm holding the rifle across the square. “What do you think?”

  “I think you’re crazy,” Aisa says. “We won’t let you kill her. I want her for my tribe.”

  “But it’s such a small thing. Look at that g
irl.” Moira levels a finger at me. “Would she really be such a loss? Look at the trouble she’s caused us. She was fun to toy with but she doesn’t know when to quit. And how did she get ahold of this?”

  The rifle.

  “If none of us gave it back to her—”

  “Go on,” someone shouts. I sense the majority of Riders are being persuaded. Or at least want to see what’s about to happen. This is prime entertainment for them.

  “The girl has bad blood. Infecting the entire city with whatever sickness she carries.”

  Sickness. How can they know what I carry in my blood?

  There is jeering, dizzy laughter. Moira’s speechifying now, has found her groove.

  “Gillian Rose,” she says, her finger again leveled straight at me. “A poison rose.”

  Poison. To them, I’m the one with poison in my veins. Are they able to tell that I’m different somehow? Inoculated. Immunized.

  They start howling, hooting. Pushing and shoving. The square’s becoming more like the shambles of a stage show than ever with an audience about to riot.

  “It’s a fair trade, don’t you think? You and me as equals for the life of this sad little creature. And, if by some miracle, she comes out of this victorious, then it’s even better for you. You’ll have her and no me.”

  “All right,” Aisa says. “Give her the rifle. Let’s see what happens.”

  The Riders start stomping, slapping each other on the back. Chanting, Rifle, Rifle.

  “Come here, Gillian,” Moira barks at me.

  Someone jabs me hard in the shoulder and I nearly stumble to my knees. I edge past William’s body, to the base of the steps, right at Moira’s feet. “Here,” she says and throws down the rifle.

  She doesn’t toss it far enough and I wince as it clatters on the steps. I’ve tried never to drop it, damage it, never let it out of my sight for long. But that’s not true anymore—you threw it in the snow. I reach for it and when I look up, Moira’s gone.

  It takes only an instant and the air clears. Everything is suddenly quiet. There’s the smell of burning wood, the sound of a crackling fire and that is all.