“Ian!” he heard Lena shout.
“Pull him back here!” a woman’s sharp, high pitched voice yelled from behind him. Those that had pinned him by the legs and shoulders snatched him up and began to drag him away from the border patrol group and deeper into the throng.
He pulled in and then quickly lashed out with one leg, connecting hard with someone’s shoulder and bringing his now freed foot around to snap at the person holding his other leg. After a quick couple of kicks to the face, both legs were freed and he scrambled to get a purchase on the floor beneath him. Suddenly, he felt a change in the room, a sort of vibration that he could feel with his head, not his body. A few people turned toward the place where Lena and Ian stood. There, a soft blue light had begun to glow.
Something in Scythe’s body cringed and then flexed, or maybe it was shivering. He wasn’t sure. All he knew was that he had never felt anything like it before. Then he realized with a start that what he was looking at wasn’t blue and it didn’t glow. It wasn’t something that he could see at all. It just felt blue and felt like it was glowing. And it was right over there.
“Oh, crap,” the man holding his arms said. The light began to shine more brightly.
Scythe felt the same way he did.
“Make a way for me, Ian,” Lena’s voice reached him through the quieting mob.
Two glowing blue ribbons wove through the crowd in a more or less direct line between the strange blue not-light and Scythe. As they slid past, some townspeople shied away from them, a few rubbed themselves where they were touched, but most didn’t seem to be aware of them at all. These were the ones who were still yelling and trying to incite their neighbors.
Finally, the ends, waving in an unseen wind, reached Scythe’s location. He continued to struggle against the people who were dedicated to holding him. What they hadn’t noticed was that he was now trying to get free so that he could escape from the ribbons, not them. Scythe could feel the strange vibration stronger now that they were so close and it terrified him. When he had tried to back up, he found that there wasn’t anywhere to go.
One glowing ribbon surged forward, reaching toward his shoulder. Scythe instinctively twisted and yanked himself away from it. Somehow his body gave him the strength to break the holds on him and find a narrow gap in the crowd. He slipped through it, never taking his eyes off of the bizarre, ghostlike glow.
When new hands took a hold of his shirt, he gratefully let himself be pulled back by a pair of helpful strangers. Then the hands clamped painfully down on him and he realized his mistake. Two hands became four and then six and then he was forced onto his knees.
Trapped by a new group of angry borderlanders, he watched the ribbons until one and then the second landed on him.
He gasped when something…no someone invaded his mind.
It was Ian. Ian’s mind was lightly touching him, trying to calm him. His body jerked when the man’s presence formed into thoughts in a place where only his thoughts had ever resided.
Don’t worry, Ian’s voice soothed him through the undulating, glowing lines. The waves of light moved to both sides of him, cradling his shoulders.
Too many things were happening that didn’t happen, couldn’t happen. He felt himself slipping. Was he dreaming?
Ian’s voice shouted over the crowd, “Move out of the way, NOW!” The two ribbons thickened in Scythe’s head and then separated, pushing people to both sides of a pathway made of blue light at the end of which Scythe could see Ian. Each arm was pulsing with the power of one of the ribbons.
Then one of the hands on him let go, grabbed him tightly by his long, dark hair, and pulled his head back. The sharp pain brought with it a frightening realization: it wasn’t a dream at all. It was real. Scythe could hear his breath dragging itself in and out of his throat. He swallowed and tried to pull himself together.
Lena stood just behind Ian, looking down the row at the sight of Scythe with his body immobilized and his head pulled back. Her whole body was enveloped in dark blue, ghostly flames, and her face was a mask of controlled anger.
“Come to us, Scythe,” she commanded.
He didn’t even consider disobeying. Scythe tried to pull forward, fighting against the hands on him, but he paused when a knife was laid on his shoulder in just the right position so that an extremely sharp blade rested on his neck. The weight of the weapon leaning against him was enough to pierce his skin. When his sensitive Kin nose filled with the scent of his own blood, an uncontrollable shaking began deep inside him.
The sharp voice that had goaded the crowd moments before cut through the room from just behind his ear.
“No, this Kin is going to explain where my Sunny is, and then we’re going to string him up.”
The tension in the room skyrocketed, and the crowd that had been cowed by Lena’s presence looked back and forth from her to the woman at Scythe’s back. A few called out, encouraging the townswoman.
Scythe slowly leaned away from the knife.
“I explained this to you, Ronnie Carter. This boy, who is half Human, was in the city when the raid happened here. He wasn’t...”
His hair was released, and Scythe reflexively leaned forward. He reached up to grab the wrist connected to the knife.
“He knows, and he’s gonna tell us, eventually.” A second knife appeared on the other side of Scythe’s neck, just below his ear, causing him to freeze completely. She jeered at him, bringing her mouth down to whisper into his hair and unconsciously pressing the blades tighter against his skin. “I’m recommending you lower your hands, boy.”
When Scythe reluctantly did, she lifted her chin and scoffed at Lena, “What are you saying, citygirl? You saying he don’t have anything useful to offer?”
Scythe caught Lena’s whisper to Ian, “Can you get him?”
“I don’t think so, not with both blades like that,” was the grim response. “Give me a minute and I’ll try to shield him.”
The light touches on his shoulders began to spread out, thicken and move upward.
Lena called to Ronnie, “I’m saying he is an innocent. He’s here to help us find the kidnapped children. This is a poor way to repay him for risking himself. Furthermore, he is a member of our unit and by threatening the border patrol, you are endangering your town’s relations with Menelaus.” There was another uproar. Many people protested and others called out to the distraught Ronnie, urging her to let her captive go. Everyone knew that no bordertown could survive without the support of the city.
“He’s a Kin,” the woman shrieked, and her hands started to shake. “They killed my husband, my sister, took my sweet Sunny, who never hurt a creature in her life...Where is she?” Ronnie started to cry, which made her body shudder. The blades began to jump around and cut new slashes into Scythe’s skin.
Scythe could feel warm blood running down his neck on both sides and that, along with the overwhelming smell of it, touched off a deep seated, primitive fear as well as something else stronger that he couldn't name. Only Ian’s calming thoughts and the power moving up his arms and across his shoulders like a coat of warm, quivering paint kept him from panicking.
“But he didn’t. This thirteen-year-old boy didn’t do that. You’ve got to let him go, Ronnie.” Lena ducked under her brother’s arm and started to walk down the path made of light, her arms out. She pleaded, “He’s only thirteen. Look at him. He’s just a boy.”
“No. This is my only chance, and you know it, citygirl. You and your people aren’t finding a damn thing. Months go by and you’ve got nothing. No one is gonna pay for what happened here, no one.” Ronnie pulled herself upright, and her voice was struck with iron. Scythe felt her arms stiffen as she resolved herself to what she felt she had to do. “And that just ain’t right.”
Scythe’s eyes widened, and his world narrowed to himself and, approaching him but still too far away, Lena. Her eyes stayed on Ronnie, sharpening when the woman moved. Impossibly slow, too slow to make a difference, his h
ands reached for the blades. Ian’s power, now at the bottom of his neck, shot upward suddenly.
“No,” Lena said at the same time from only five feet away. The blue fire spilled from her outstretched arms, flying toward the woman and wrapping her up in a pillar of shimmering flame. Ronnie released her knives, which Scythe scrambled to hold onto before they fell on him. He caught one. The other slipped out of his fumbling hands and sunk an inch and a half into his leg. He plucked it out and pressed on the gash with the heel of his palm.
Ronnie began to shriek in agony, dropping to her knees behind him and grabbing her head. Scythe crawled forward and turned to stare at her, just like everyone else around him.
“Let some of it go, Ronnie, or it will burn you from the inside out,” Lena said, bringing her hand up to her temple. Sweat began to form on her brow and Scythe could hear her heartbeat pounding in her chest.
Scythe felt his body being pulled forward by Ian’s ribbons. Grab Lena, Scythe.
Scythe dropped the knives, stood and took a few shaky steps forward. No one stopped him. The ones that didn’t back away were frozen in place, staring back and forth from Ian’s terrible anger and a hunched over, suffering Ronnie. Scythe wrapped his arms around Lena, who had pinched her eyes shut and begun to moan under her breath. Ian’s ribbons filled with power and yanked. Scythe struggled to keep his feet moving under him and keep them both upright while Ian pulled them back within the circle of soldiers.
“Let’s go,” Ian said to their squad before raising his voice to address the stunned townsfolk. “The investigation in this town is closed. We will not risk our people again here. You have the right to petition another investigation from the city.”
New cries of protest went up throughout the room and several people rushed forward, desperate for their pleas to be heard. Ian guided Scythe and a stumbling Lena through the door and as a tight group they hurried to their trucks. While several guards kept the citizens back, they turned their vehicles around and left the town.
In the truck, Scythe had stared at the brother and sister sitting across from him, but they looked like they always had. No strange glow hovered around their bodies, and none of his sharp senses told him that they were anything but normal. To make the situation even more unreal, they acted as though nothing strange had happened: hovering over him while the medic treated his neck and leg and easily falling into their habit of lighthearted harassment.
It was a few days before he was able to sit comfortably with them, and he never underestimated them. Now he understood why they had the confidence to shrug off the rules and authority of people who considered themselves to be better and walk bravely into situations others would be wary of.
He understood something else, too. The world wasn’t what he thought it was. He had never heard of anything like what he had seen on that day in all his years with the Kin, outside of traditional myths and fairy tales. During his three years in Menelaus he had not seen even a glimpse of it either. However, there was no denying it: Human powers were real. He had felt them and could see them in a strange way. Something that he thought didn’t exist...did, and now that he knew it and had felt it right there in his head, he began to look around himself for more examples of it.
He could have saved himself the trouble because, except for feeling a few twinges every now and then in the back of his head, he didn’t encounter it again. When he had asked them about it, Ian had shrugged and said, “It’s not something people talk about, Scythe. It’s taboo here in the borderlands, for the most part. There is a history of witch hunts out here. It was a while ago, but people haven’t forgotten. We only use it ourselves in an emergency.”
Since Ian clearly didn’t want to discuss it further, Scythe had let it go. However, he was determined to begin researching it as soon as he returned to Menelaus.
After many days of heated debate as to whether or not Scythe should return to the city, Ian developed a strategy for keeping him safe. A small party of them visited each town first and prepared the townspeople before Scythe arrived. Then, they only met in very small, select groups. This plan, along with the stories that went ahead of them, proved to reduce the hostility toward him immensely.
Across Scythe’s neck, visible for anyone to see if they needed proof of the incident, stretched five jagged scars: two horizontal stripes on one side just below his ear and three on the other. The sight of five wounds, any one of which could have been a mortal injury, tended to make most people react strongly--mostly with caution, but sometimes with outright fear. Rumors spread of his invincibility due to some strange Kin power. Lena encouraged the increasingly outlandish stories and they hadn't had further problems.
Unfortunately, they had not uncovered any new information either in the three weeks they had been looking. Two more youths had been taken during that time from other bordertowns without a hint beforehand or a clue afterwards, and, when he had quiet moments to himself, Scythe had begun to wonder how that was possible.
While it was depressing to not be of any real help, Scythe didn’t mind the time he spent with the border patrol unit. The weeks with them were the best he had experienced in a long time. In some ways, he was even happier than his younger days when he was often an outcast among his father’s people. Lena and Ian accept him like a little brother, not reticent in the least when it came to teasing him mercilessly or even disciplining him. For the first time in three years, Scythe found that he thought of someone as a friend.
He only harbored two regrets. The first was that they couldn’t bring an end to the devastating sorrow that the kidnappings had brought to so many people. The second was the knowledge that their assignment would come to an end if they didn’t find something soon. That meant a return to his pristine life where he was constantly told that he lacked for nothing. With this in mind, Scythe’s thoughts wandered like untended horses to fields that previously had been off limits to him.
“Lena,” he said after a while, popping his head out into the brisk room. “Maybe I could talk to the Kin...”
Lena’s head jerked up from the pile of papers scattered over her blankets. Ian stopped writing and looked over at Scythe, only a little less surprised than she was.
Lena found her voice, “Talk to the Kin? Are you insane?”
“I mean, try to...”
“Scythe, did you sweep the room?” Ian interrupted.
“Um, yeah, there’s nothing here,” Scythe answered, checking again quickly for the high pitched, telltale signs of listening devices in their room. At least once a week, Scythe found little electronic bugs planted in their rooms and sometimes in their clothes. It had become a game for Scythe to see how fast he could find and disable them. Lena and Ian explained that this was common procedure for anyone working in intelligence, as they were on this mission; even so, they didn’t have a problem allowing him to find and destroy them. They enjoyed shaking things up with the monitoring operatives. While they were comfortable with the situation, Scythe found it to be just another example of the Humans’ distrustful nature and comfort with deception.
“You want to talk to the Kin? Sure!” she rolled her eyes derisively and pantomimed, “Heya! Hi guys, remember me? Yeah, I was just wondering...why are you killing Humans and kidnapping their children?” She stopped abruptly and gave him a no-nonsense stare. “No.” She picked up another paper and dismissed the idea entirely.
Scythe looked at Ian who was watching him thoughtfully. “It was just an idea.”
Ian explained, “I can see your logic, Scythe, but it is just too dangerous. The Kin in this area have broken off all communication with us; even diplomatic channels aren’t open. We aren’t at a point of open conflict, but it may be around the corner. We’ve been given strict orders to avoid contact.”
“I’m Kin, kinda, maybe I can...”
“No,” interrupted Lena without looking up. “Now go to bed.”
Scythe looked from Lena to Ian before murmuring to the wall, “It was just an idea.”
> Ian answered sympathetically, “People are dying, Scythe. We’re not about to risk you that way.”
“But, I know people there...”
“Bed,” Lena drew out the word, smashing her papers into a crinkled pile that she shoved under her pallet. She clicked off the lights and turned over, punching her pillow a few times before laying still.
“Lena, you’re kind of a witch sometimes,” commented Ian, putting his tablet away for the night and getting comfortable. The scant light shining in through the window illuminated his annoyance.
“Ian,” she hissed.
Scythe thought her voice was scarier at night.
“Yes, dear sister?”
“I will kill you.”
He laughed, “You’re welcome to try. Besides, who will pick up your nasty socks when I’m gone? Scythe won’t. The smell makes him dizzy.”
Relieved, Scythe laughed, too.
Lena snipped lightheartedly, “Watch it, zooboy.” Then, showing some remorse, she asked her brother, “You done with your letter?”
“I’ll finish in the morning. She wants one every day, now.”
“That’s because babies make us crazy.”
“You’re the craziest woman I know and you don’t even have kids.”
“That was weak.”
“Well, I’m tired. I can’t always be the comic genius.”
“‘Always?’ Even one time would be something,” she countered sarcastically and then added, “Besides, I don’t need kids. I’ve already got an adorable niece, Little Miss Treeclimber, and something droolie this way comes.”
“That’s my girl,” he said, his voice filled with pride. “And, who knows? Maybe a son.” Scythe smiled. The man obviously loved being a father. He reminded Scythe of the Kin that way.
Halfblood Heritage Page 5