Halfblood Heritage

by Rheaume, Laura

  Keyrin nodded, secure in his victory and suddenly magnanimous, “All manner of doors will open for you. You’ve already impressed a certain organization with your resourcefulness. I can’t tell you how that amused me! Your celebrity from your previous adventures has already earned you popularity and a certain amount of political influence. What else do you need?”

  Scythe walked to the chair, sat and put out his arm. “I would like to talk to the governor, to start,” he said, disrupting Keyrin’s triumphant mood.

  Jenna stepped forward, expertly drawing two tubes of blood from Scythe’s arm, swabbing it and giving him a pad to hold against it. She took her tray over to the lab area.

  “What do you need to speak to my father about?” Keyrin asked pointedly.

  “Nothing about this, if that’s what you are worried about. I have some concerns about my Human friends’ security in the city and I want to see if I can exercise some of the political influence you mentioned to get them some extra protection.”

  “I can do that.”

  “No, thanks. I don’t want to owe any of your people a favor.”

  Keyrin nodded his understanding, “You will be limited in what you can tell him, and you will be accompanied at all times.”

  “That is fine,” Scythe said, looking up. “Does he know about all of this?”

  “This is my project. We have never discussed it.”

  Scythe stared at him, recognizing the truth in the statement, as well as the lie that cowered in its shadow. He didn’t know if his father knew or not, but by not conferring with him about it, he was free to act as he liked. Either way, the governor was free from involvement.

  This was one of the strategies that the Kin used to avoid lying. Scythe didn’t think it was any better than lying outright; in fact, he thought it was worse, because it resembled the Human practice of self delusion. However, he had learned that the Kin prohibition on lying was not the firm rule he had always believed it was. He had always, foolishly it seemed, believed that the Kin truly hated lies. That was something he had been raised to believe; it was something he tried to live by. Now that he was learning more about the world, he could see that it was a belt that wasn’t worn as tightly as he thought by everyone. For Keyrin, it was buckled so loosely that it was going to fall off of him at any moment.

  Well, sidestepping was one thing, but outright lying was another. Scythe doubted that even Keyrin was that far gone, so he said, “I would like to know one thing, cousin.”

  Keyrin smiled, “Like old times again? What?”

  “Were you involved in the abduction of the Kin the year I was kidnapped and taken to the Menelaus?”

  A dark cloud immediately covered Keyrin’s face, “No. I did not have anything to do with it.”

  Scythe tilted his head, registering something, “But, you knew of it.”

  Keyrin’s teeth ground together, “No, not until the five escaped last year.”

  “So this Scere wasn’t involved?”

  “Of course not, the Kin…”

  Scythe wasn’t interested in empty sayings. “Someone here, several people probably, had to have been involved, Keyrin. The operation went too smoothly, and the cover up was too complete for it to be only an outside job.” Scythe narrowed his eyes, picking up on the man’s agitation. “Think about it: a simple, last minute raid by a border patrol unit could not possibly covertly snatch thirty-five people, could not completely dominate all our defenses that easily.”

  “We were not as well regimented in those days…There hadn’t been any attacks here in decades...”

  “You know, Keyrin,” Scythe pressed. “You know something was not right about it, but you’re turning your back on it. Why?”

  “I don’t know anything about it,” he argued stubbornly, “and I don’t owe you any explanations.”

  “What about our deal? You said we could be straight with each other, right, cousin?”

  “You don’t know enough to be making accusations,” he said firmly. His patience was running out. “The Scere wasn’t involved, to my knowledge, but there are many people, other groups who are always scheming against us or against the Humans for their own benefit…”

  “They want war with the Humans?”

  “Which they? There are definitely those who want war. We have been battling them since my father was a child. Even before that. As for whether or not there were Kin behind the kidnappings, well, it looks like that, but I don’t know. We’ll see. Maybe, we’ll see. It is more likely that they are long gone.”

  “I can’t believe, after all you said to me about the sanctity of The Blood, that you did nothing when you suspected...”

  Keyrin closed his eyes and regret was written across his face when he admitted, “I wasn’t sure, and I did not have any leads in any case. It was not easy to have the constant reminder of my own cousin’s suffering, but I did what I could when you brought me a chance to find them. The secrecy of your mission allowed us to avoid being detected by whoever was behind it.

  “Our actions...your actions...allowed our people to be recovered earlier than anticipated, I think. I believe they planned on having the hospital discovered after most of the Kin were dead; that way they could have the social ramifications without the hassle of live Kin to deal with.” He sighed, adding, “I am and will always be truly grateful for your part in bringing back our Kin to us.”

  “I wouldn’t have been able to do it without my Human friends.”

  “That is true,” Keyrin admitted.

  “But that didn’t stop you from experimenting on Lena, who made it possible.”

  “No, that is also true.”

  “So you work for the Scere?”

  “No, but they are assisting us in our project. They contacted me, helped us in the early stages to identify expendable Humans with gifts, they brought us your friend, and a few others, to help in the research. In return, they have access to all the data.”

  “So the project was your idea?”

  “Well, not initially. It’s not really a common topic, is it? No, the idea was brought to my attention a short while ago.”

  Disappointment made Scythe’s stomach turn over.

  “You are just another stooge, Keyrin,” Scythe said scornfully. He looked at his childhood hero, his cousin’s husband, and said, “I thought we were better than them. When I lay in that hospital and saw what their ignorance and fear had led them to, I began to believe what you had been saying my whole life: that we were better. I never would have thought...not to save my own life would I have admitted that the Kin would be capable of the very same thing.”

  “It is not the same at all,” Keyrin smoothly countered. “Theirs was an act of terrorism. This is science; our research will benefit the Kin.”

  Benefit the Kin. Save the Human race.

  Could no one hear his spirit screaming? It was so loud that he could barely hear anything else. He wanted to...do something, but he didn’t know what. He never knew what to do, and he was beginning to suspect...it scared the hell out of him when he thought about it...He suspected that nothing he ever did would make even the tiniest difference. If that were true, if he was powerless, then why was he the one who had to be witness to all the terrible secrets? It made no sense. He was sick of being forced to sit by and watch all the bodies float by. Kin bodies. Human bodies. When would the halfblood body…

  Halfblood.

  “You said you were on a new path, because of my data. What…” Please be wrong. “...did you mean by that?”

  “We are in the early stages. It is all just a theory at this point. No use wasting your time right now. When we have more, we’ll…”

  “What. Did. You. Mean?” There was a sinking feeling, a dragging at the center of his chest that was pulling him down.

  Keyrin met his challenging gaze with one of his own. “I said I would do anything, to protect our people’s independence.”

  Scythe brought one hand up and rubbed his forehead, his palm covering on
e eye and his thumb rubbing circles over his temple, trying to get at the pain. “‘Our people,’ Keyrin? Please tell me that ‘our people’ includes the children of Kin.”

  “Of course it does.”

  “Tell me, cousin, that you aren’t using halfblood babies in your research. Tell me that I didn’t bring them here to be experimented on.”

  “The only Kin currently on record that has power is a halfblood. It has to be followed up on. We have to know if you are a singularity, or if it is the mixture of Kin and Human that makes it possible.”

  “Their families will not allow it.” Grasping. Gasping.

  “You would be surprised at how unwelcome they are.”

  No, he wouldn’t.

  “Just answer me this one question, Keyrin.” He didn’t wait for an acknowledgement. “Am I Kin?”

  “You are.”

  “So, all of this,” he waved his hand at the room and then held out his arm, pulling off the small bandage. “It’s all for me, too, right?”

  “It is for us all.”

  “If it’s for me. If it’s for your own cousin Rend’s adopted son, for Flame’s daughter, for all of them, then, how can you justify harming them? How can you hurt the blood you are trying to save?”

  “They will not be harmed. We are just studying them.”

  “Studying them how?” Scythe asked skeptically. He was rubbing circles again, running in circles.

  “Blood, mostly, some scans. Nothing invasive.”

  “And later?” he pressed.

  Shrug. “We’ll have to see. It will be a long while, though, until any powers should manifest. Maybe, like you, a good thirteen years.”

  Scythe shook his head, “And if or when they get their powers, then what? A special unit for the Blades...or what? When they choose to be a doctor or an information specialist or whatever at age ten and they train for that…”

  “Scythe, calm down. That is far away.”

  “It is not that far. I’m asking you if you are choosing their path, like you did mine. Were they destined to be Blades, or whatever you’ll call your ‘powered’ unit, when they arrived here? What are your plans for them, Keyrin?”

  “You have overstepped yourself. You are not a parent, or a leader of the Kin. You are a soldier and you don’t have a say.”

  “You’re wrong,” Scythe argued, but he knew it was a lie.

  He didn’t have a say. He couldn’t do a thing about it.

  Suddenly weary of their pointless conversation, Scythe asked, “Can I go now?”

  Keyrin examined Scythe for a moment. “So,” he said skeptically, “you are fine with the Humans here, then?”

  “No, I’m not fine with it,” Scythe resisted snapping. “It’s an atrocity, what you’ve done here, but, there’s no way you are releasing them, right?”

  “No, and their government wouldn’t take them back anyway, as I’m sure you’ve already figured out.”

  “So I’ve been told,” Scythe acknowledged. “I wish I could send them back to their families, but, I can’t can I?”

  “No.”

  “So I’m just going to have to live with it,” Scythe rose, looking out over the large room, counting what few Humans were still alive: seven. Seven people that he was turning his back on, for the fulfillment of his own desires. Two looked out at him from behind the bars, their eyes empty of hope; the rest didn’t have the strength or interest to do even that.

  He remembered a pledge that he had made what seemed like a lifetime ago: I couldn’t ever kill helpless children, no matter what I see tomorrow, I just couldn’t. In a moment of hard realization, Scythe understood something about himself: For my friends, for myself, for those who were violated, and to protect those who would be violated, I can allow these people to suffer and die. I can and...I will. I am no less a monster than any of them. The voice at the back of his head whispered smugly, That has always been true.

  Scythe swallowed, and turned his back on the unresponsive Humans to see Keyrin staring at him, his face perplexed. “What?”

  “I just can’t get a handle on you, Scythe, no matter how hard I try. I really don’t know you at all.”

  “That’s funny, because every time I learn something about you, I want to scrub my brain clean.” Scythe walked past him, letting himself out into the cold corridor.

  Chapter 30

  A blue uniform, laundered and pressed, lay on the dresser in the dark. Even with his eyes closed, even in the darkness of the shaded lights, even when he turned on his side and faced the wall, it was all he could see.

  The deep blue was almost black, and the cut was stark, simple, made to be used, not paraded around. The only ornamentation was a small insignia at the base of the neck on the left side; embroidered with black thread, even a Kin had to be looking to notice it: three blades formed a triangle, the center of which was filled in with red when it appeared anywhere else. Blades to protect the Blood.

  When he was eight, he went with his cousin to the park, and there he drew the attention of a governor’s young son. It wasn’t long until he had embraced an ambition to wear that uniform. And, ambition had chosen him, too.

  He couldn’t believe his luck when he had been accepted as a trainee upon his return to Poinsea: something he had always wanted was something that wanted him. It had been an even greater thrill to find that he was good at it. Gifted, they said. So he had worked harder than he had thought possible, and filled every empty minute, and every empty corner.

  What now?

  The thought of putting it on burned him, and froze him, and hurt him, and scared him. Mostly it scared him because he didn’t know if he was strong enough. He didn’t know if he was brave enough to acknowledge the rage and the disgust and the betrayal, and leave it where it lied, and walk away from the only family he had left.

  Pulling it on meant bowing his head, looking the other way…

  He ground his teeth.

  “We named you ‘Scythe’ for a reason, my son. Remember that.”

  Putting it on meant spitting on his father’s grave.

  No, he had to be strong enough.

  He rolled onto his back. His arm flew out and punched the bed.

  What, then, was there for him without the Blades?

  Before that day in the park, when he was just a small child, his life was family, and his family was his parents. Theirs was unusually small for a Kin household, but it was perfect for them. Separation and alienation set them apart from the Kin, but tied the three of them together with bonds closer even than those of the lauded 'good families.’ He had always felt a strong sense of belonging in the home that warmed him when he was there and held him up when he went out. As he grew up among the Kin, being teased or hated for his ugly face, ugly mother, ugly race, was something he had just gotten used to; it was tolerable because his parents were always there, sheltering him, supporting him, loving him unconditionally.

  His parents, without doubt, worried about what paths were hospitable, or even available, to their halfblood son, but he didn’t. If he gave any thought to his future, it entailed vague ideas of being like his father. But his father’s path, like almost every other, was barred to him, and had been since before he was born.

  There wasn’t much.

  There wasn’t much for a halfblood.

  Because of that, when he and his mother were brought to live with the Humans, he had harbored a terrible guilt. Although his abduction had been a nightmare, he had still been secretly thrilled to see what his mother’s people were like. He had secretly hoped...for something he couldn’t name. The excitement quickly faded, however, and then abandoned him completely. His mother’s condition had left him achingly lonely. Despite the wonders of the city, the many luxuries of his apartment, and the exotic Human culture, life there was empty. When he realized how unwelcome he was, how he would spend his life caged like a queer beast, how vacant his apartment had become after his mother had died, he yearned to return home.

  Home.

>   He hadn’t realized, even then, that home wasn’t a place.

  He had seen homes. His parents’ home was a house with a large garden, where he dug up weeds with his mother and sat at the table after dinner to play tiles with his father; home was where your friends came to eat and play. Humans filled their houses with a million things designed to please and comfort, to remind themselves that they were happy. Human homes weren’t enough for them, so they made hundreds of lesser homes throughout the city to meet with each other. They shared their lives in a very public way, which, while perverse to the Kin, seemed to work for them.

  In the bordertowns, Scythe had witnessed people standing together in their living rooms, consoling one another when their lives were shattered; their compassion and their strong sense of community in the aftermath of loss was impressive and even enviable to the orphan.

  In Poinsea, homes had modest sleeping areas but large living areas that were almost always filled with family.

  “I am home,” he insisted to his empty room. “I made it back.”

  The small room where he slept kept quiet. Even his words rushed under the door and fled down the hall, not wanting to hover awkwardly in a place like that. Quiet. And cold. He pulled his blanket up over his head.