Faces of Betrayal

by Daniele Cella

  The Mother wore a deep red robe, as rich and vibrant as if it were made from freshly spilled blood. There was no mistaking her white-and-gray-streaked hair, or the hooked nose on her sweet face.

  Hadjia relaxed. If Mother Sigunta was at the top of the room, she hadn’t yet been seen. A good sign.

  She didn’t recognize the person near Mother Sigunta who was wearing a crimson robe and a mask as red as a sunset from which a long nose protruded.

  Hadjia’s toes curled at the sight of the grotesque face and twisted sneer on the mask. The low, rumbling tones coming from the mask’s mouth made Hadjia think a man was wearing it.

  From the left hand of the masked man hung a golden pendant with an oddly familiar oval-like shape. A flicker of green light came from it as it swayed on his wrist.

  Hadjia pressed as close to the smokescreen as she dared, straining to hear. Surely they were having some sort of meeting together before the ceremony. That’s all it was, Hadjia told herself. A simple meeting.

  Their voices drifted down the room toward her.

  “All this traveling must tire you,” Mother Sigunta said. “Your journey here is long.”

  “You fear for me unnecessarily. The world here is like a book, and only through traveling can I read its pages. As you know, I have always been a great reader.”

  “They say that someone coming back from a long journey isn’t the same person as the one who left. That kind of thing changes a person. Is it the same for you?”

  “Between us, you are the one who never changes, Mother Sigunta. There is no age in your veins. No further wrinkling of your skin. But you need not fear: I continue to have the same ambitions. The ones you have always known me for.”

  “Ah. Very good to hear. What reason has brought you back?”

  “The prophecies of the Sun and Moon will soon be in motion. It’s time for you to pack and be ready.”

  “I’m always ready. I have been for a long time.”

  The slightest pause preceded his reply. “It doesn’t look like it. You have been ordering the slaughter of innocent people. That has nothing to do with our plans, and you know it.”

  “So you’ve come to judge me,” she snapped. “My children are growing up in a very productive house. It’s not your place to give an unsolicited opinion about the work that I do here. I do it well. Better than anyone else.”

  Something cold broke open inside Hadjia, permeating her belly and spreading all the way into her bones. Innocent people? Our plans? What could this mean?

  “Rumors spread fast,” said the unknown man. “The myths and legends live on everyone’s lips in this part of the country. These sudden, unexpected deaths are attracting the wrong kind of attention.”

  “These so-called ‘innocent’ victims are the test that allow my children to elevate their skills and their status amongst the other assassins. It’s a rite of passage that cannot be underestimated. Have my Shirais ever disappointed you?”

  “Let me give you some advice, Mother,” he said, dismissing her question entirely. “The swamps are too silent. In such a permeating stillness, even a breath can make noise. Now, more than ever, we must avoid making any kind of problem. Keep your head down.”

  Mother Sigunta released a sharp breath before she said, “I understand. We only have one more.”

  From her spot, Hadjia couldn’t tell if it was resignation or annoyance that was coloring her tone.

  “Mother – ”

  “I insist. It’s for my special girl. Once she finishes her test, I will cease the innocent killings and focus more on our mission. You have my word.”

  “Good. Because it deserves to be said that we cannot risk – ”

  “Stop repeating yourself,” she snapped again. “I understand. Aren’t you in a hurry to read your book? Go. I have an important ceremony to conduct.”

  Hadjia brought her eye even with the slit in the smokescreen just in time to see the masked man slip out of the hall through a side door so thin he almost couldn’t get through it. Mother Sigunta remained at the altar, staring at it as if it would open and swallow her up in one great maw.

  Hadjia leaned back, blinking.

  Mother Sigunta had said the words herself: The people who had died were ‘innocent.’

  Hadjia’s mind spun back to the previous day.

  The weeping child in the back. The look of horror in the dead eyes of the little girl’s parents whom Renji had extinguished in cold blood. They hadn’t been evil people after all. No, they were the evil ones.

  Hadjia forced her breathing to slow, lest she give herself away. Mother Sigunta never lowered her guard; she could detect everything, even the minutest sound.

  Hadjia forced her spinning thoughts to calm and focused on where she was. Although her instincts told her to run, she must stay. Now, more than ever, she had to witness the ceremony. She had to know the machinations behind all the lies she’d been told.

  Feeling more in control, Hadjia turned her concentration to the Ceremony Hall. So quiet and calm. It gave space for her thoughts while she mulled over the masked man, his strange words, the familiar way he spoke with Mother Sigunta.

  The sound of Mother Sigunta’s sing-song voice jerked Hadjia out of her thoughts.

  “I hear you, my little mouse.”

  Hadjia’s heart spun like a top in her chest. Mother Sigunta couldn’t have heard her! She’d hardly moved at all.

  “Come out, my darling. Don’t hide over there. It’s rude to listen to other people’s conversations, you know?”

  Hadjia braced herself. The Mother would find her and kill her, maybe. At the very least, a massive punishment would be in store. She wouldn’t be trusted anymore, not for a long while. But wouldn’t staying hidden would only make it worse?

  Just as Hadjia moved to stand up, a shuffling sound near the back corner caught her attention.

  Kim!

  The little boy peeked out from around the pillar where he’d been hiding.

  “Come, come,” Mother Sigunta beckoned. “I see you over there.”

  Kim shuffled forward. Thankfully, his eyes were trained on Mother Sigunta and didn’t stray over to reveal Hadjia’s presence.

  While he advanced slowly into the room, Hadjia quietly shifted so she could see through the slit.

  “M-mother,” Kim whispered. “I-I didn’t mean . . . I . . . I am . . . s-sorry. So sorry.”

  Mother Sigunta smiled wide, her crooked bottom teeth gleaming in the early morning sunlight. In the distance, the sounds of the stirring house shifted around, beckoning the dawn of a new day. Any minute now the other children would arrive, packing the room with their tight young bodies.

  “My dear boy,” Mother Sigunta drawled. “Come here.”

  She spread her arms, inviting him to her embrace with a warm smile.

  No! Hadjia wanted to scream. Don’t go! How could he be so foolish? How couldn’t he see the gleam in Mother Sigunta’s eyes? He must have just heard Mother Sigunta admit to killing innocent people. She’d been lying to them! Everything was wrong.

  But Kim continued, propelled by his own feet right into Mother Sigunta’s arms. Hadjia forced herself to watch even though she wanted to turn away in horror.

  “It’s not very nice to eavesdrop, did you know that?”

  Her embrace muffled Kim’s reply. Hadjia swallowed, her body coiled like a spring.

  “Silly boy,” Mother Sigunta murmured. “Silly, stupid boy.”

  A choking sound came from Kim. His body bucked, quaked, and made strange, strangled noises.

  Hadjia closed her eyes, screwing them shut. No. No. No. No. It was one thing to hear Mother Sigunta admit the truth of murder out loud, but to see it? To watch her kill this young boy?

  Hot acid rose in Hadjia’s throat, burning through her tongue. She wanted to vomit but swallowed it back.

  The sound of a thud made her wince.

  Unable to stop herself, Hadjia peered out through the rip one more time.

  Kim’s body
lay on the ground, his face pale and slack in death. She knew the look well. Fear streaked through her. She curled her fingers into fists, fighting the urge to run. One squeak. One misplaced breath or sound, and Mother Sigunta would hear her. She’d kill her as well, and all of this would just . . . end.

  But Mother Sigunta didn’t see her.

  The old lady bent over and picked up Kim’s body as if he were no more than a feather, slinging it over her shoulder as if she were a woman fifty years younger. With a quick glance toward the entrance to the Ceremony Hall, Mother Sigunta shuffled toward the back of the room, exiting through the same side door that the strange man had taken.

  The moment Mother Sigunta disappeared with the closing of the door, Hadjia leapt to her feet and dashed out of the Ceremony Hall into the hallway. Seconds before she turned to go up the stairs, she collided with another body.

  A hand shot out, catching her before she fell.

  “Hadjia?”

  Kaneko’s calm eyes stared down at her, thick with concern. The words tumbled out of Hadjia’s mouth all at once.

  “The Mother . . . Kim . . . dead. She . . . a man and . . .”

  “Mother Sigunta is dead?”

  “No! Sh-she killed . . . She – “

  With a sharp jerk, Kaneko pulled Hadjia by the wrist out of the hallway and into the back of the building, near a small closet filled with dusty old brooms and mop buckets. Hadjia stumbled along blindly, still reeling from shock.

  Kaneko shut them into the closet. Only a sliver of light leaked in from around the loose-fitting door, illuminating just enough of Kaneko’s face that Hadjia could see the shock and concern mingling there.

  “Quietly explain yourself,” Kaneko whispered, glancing to the door.

  The story stumbled out of Hadjia in spurts, rolling like heavy stones. By the time she finished, she felt like she might hyperventilate.

  Kaneko reached out, putting a hand on Hadjia’s shoulder. “Calm down.”

  The words, a sharp command, worked. Slowly, one breath at a time, Hadjia sucked in lungfuls of air.

  “I . . . I’m calm,” she said finally.

  In the low light of the closet, Kaneko studied Hadjia intently. “Whatever you heard, forget it.”

  “Forget it?” Hadjia echoed.

  “The Mother loves this school. She loves us. If she’s done something like that, there’s a reason for it.”

  “But killing a student?”

  “You don’t know anything about Kim,” Kaneko hissed. “Maybe he was in trouble anyway. Maybe he put the school in jeopardy before. The Mother knows all. We must trust her. She would never kill a student who was true. He must have been a spy.”

  A vision of Kim’s frightened face, along with his wide, curious eyes, ran through Hadjia’s mind. He couldn’t have been a spy. Too innocent. Too shy.

  “The best you can do is keep your mouth shut,” Kaneko whispered. “If she’s killed Kim for listening in and finds out you were there too, she might kill you as well. Whatever secrets you have, keep them safe.”

  Hadjia’s shoulders slumped. “Yes.”

  At this, Kaneko seemed to relax a little. “There’s no reason to alarm the other students anyway. Kim broke the rules. As long as we do what they’re supposed to, we’ll be safe. I’m here to help protect you, Hadjia, but we must please The Mother or I cannot do that. Just focus on your test. It’s coming up soon.”

  Hadjia felt weak all the way to her bones.

  She wanted to rest. To close her eyes and forget Renji’s test, the bloody children in her dreams, and Kim’s wide, curious eyes. She wanted to forget that she couldn’t trust The Mother at all.

  “Can you do that?” Kaneko asked, nudging Hadjia out of her thoughts. “Can you please Mother Sigunta and spare yourself – possibly others – from the horrible fate of those who disappoint her?”

  Hadjia swallowed, looked up, and met Kaneko’s gaze.

  She had no choice. The test would come when it would come. She had no control over that. She’d have to press on. And hope that the innocent killings would end. That she could find . . . something.

  Gathering her strength, Hadjia nodded. “Yes, Kaneko. I can.”

  Celty

  The sound of distant laughter and the pungent smell of horse manure greeted Celty when she slipped out of a deep, deep sleep.

  She surfaced through the layers of her unconsciousness slowly, as if she was paddling gently up and through the water in a lake. Her thoughts rippled around her, as if entities separate from her mind. For a moment, she thought she could reach out and touch them.

  Every time she tried, they rippled away.

  Celty’s nose had a tickle. Was a blade of grass tickling it? Where might she might be…?

  For a long stretch of time, she hovered in a strange in-between. Her body moved, but it too felt separate from her.

  A sound, maybe from someone stumbling, penetrated her mind. She cocked her head, listening.

  Loud, raucous laughter drifted over to her on the wind and touched on her sensitive ears.

  Every word that followed was said with a bit of a lilt.

  Drunk, she thought, her thoughts clearing slightly.

  Another round of laughter.

  Men. More than one. All of them, definitely drunk.

  One of the voices grew louder, increasing in volume. A thud thud thud of footsteps joined in with the laughter. A door groaned open, then must have slammed shut.

  Seconds later, a whizzing sound….

  The pungent scent of urine drifted through the air, and Celty wrinkled her nose.

  Disgusting brute.

  A man chanted a rowdy song under his breath, alternately singing and belching. Based on the odorous smell of his body – and his urine – not to mention the song he continued to sing, he would be within eyesight.

  Celty froze every part of her body, not wanting to even breathe with such a foul person so close.

  "Ho. What's this?" Someone spoke in a soft voice with words that were slightly slurred. She tensed.

  "Oy! Lads! Come see what present the gods have bestowed on us today."

  "You find your lucky star?" called another voice.

  "If that's what you call this."

  Celty's nostrils flared as she heard two more sets of feet join the first. She knew they were looming over her, and forced herself to exhale slowly, almost imperceptibly. With any luck, they'd think her drunk – or dead – and move on.

  But Celty didn't think that would actually happen.

  No. She'd always made her own luck in life.

  Her eyelashes fluttered of their own accord, although she hadn't opened her eyes yet. One of them laughed, kicking her in the ribs with a pointed shoe.

  "Oy there, whore. Get up. It's time for you to get to work."

  "Lazy women."

  "You're going to work for your keep tonight."

  "I like 'em tied up."

  "Less work for me, that way."

  They chortled together as Celty's blood turned cold.

  "My turn, lads. Here. Hold my belt. You know what to do with it if she gets frisky, like that one girl last year."

  "Not you! Lemme have her. You had first dibs last time."

  The men broke into a brief argument, shoving each other back and. The scuffle of their feet sounded not far from Celty's head, and she kept from flinching away by sheer willpower.

  Don't move, she thought. Don't give them a single clue that you’re present and awake.

  "Lads, stop. We'll all have her at the same time."

  Like drunken idiots, they guffawed, chortling with renewed energy.

  The first one stumbled over his feet, crashing into a wall. A bucket full of grains fell, spilling across the floor. Another crouched down near Celty. She smelled the foul yeast on his breath as he lowered close to her.

  "Think she tastes like candy?"

  "She's a whore. She'll taste like disease before anything else."

  "Let's have a try."


  Pain tore through Celty's head and neck when one of the men grabbed her hair and jerked her head back.

  "Well, well," he murmured. "What a dirty, naughty little slut you must have been."

  Celty snapped forward, closing her teeth firmly around the first thing she found. Flesh tore beneath her canines when the man howled and flung himself back and away, shrieking like a bewitched thing.

  Blood dripped down her lips as Celty spat a chunk of nose onto the floor.

  She opened her eyes; her vision was blurry, but clear enough to spy a waterfall of red pouring down a man’s face. He had stringy black hair and thin lips…and was squealing like a stuck pig.

  "She bit me! The whore bit me. Kill her. KILL HER!"

  The other two men stared at him in shock, their faces slack.

  Celty dug her heels into the dirt floor and attempted to push herself back and away, but the heavy ropes weighed her hands down behind her back.

  One of the others, a man with short blond hair that looked as if he'd hacked away at it without a mirror in the middle of the night, straightened suddenly. His rheumy, yellowed eyes stared right at her.

  "Time to teach this whore a lesson," he snarled.

  Celty tensed, preparing for an onslaught as the two men advanced toward her.

  Yet mere seconds later, someone tackled the blond from behind, taking him to the hard packed floor.

  Jin!

  The man’s head slammed into the ground. He groaned, passing out, as the third grabbed Jin from behind. This man slapped Jin across the face, sending him flying against the wall.

  Celty bucked against her manacles just as the blond started to rouse, moaning as if he were about to die. The other man advanced on Jin, swinging a leg back to kick him as hard as he could.

  "No!"

  The word tore out of Celty's throat. The man stopped, turning back to glare at her over his shoulder. Through the haze of dirt coating both his hair and face, Celty thought she saw umber hair and cool green eyes.

  At his side, the first man still was blubbering, blood flowing in between his fingers as he clutched at the wound on his face.

  "You gonna tell me what to do, you cannibal whore?" the umber-haired man sneered.

  She growled, struggling against the rope. The metal manacles rubbed against her ankle, tearing open a spot.