by A. W. Cross
I had stayed up all night, listening to Fiona’s screams until they suddenly stopped. The night seemed eerily silent then, and I knew that, even if she was still alive, Fiona was beyond saving.
“The Lottery will choose me,” Clarice said. “I will be the sacrifice.”
“No. I won’t let you. I’ll be the sacrifice.” It was only fair, considering what I had done to her, to our Mother. I should be the one to die, not Clarice, sweet, innocent, Clarice.
“You can’t.” Clarice looked down at my mechanical arm. “First of all, I wouldn’t let you, but secondly, they won’t allow it. A sacrifice can’t be Tainted.”
I had never hated my stone heart and my makeshift arm as much as I did in this very moment. Why could I not be normal? Then, I could’ve done this for my sister; I could’ve taken her place.
The gates creaked open and Gallant stepped outside. Seconds later, he reappeared, holding an object in his hand that I could barely discern in the shadows of the early evening.
Clarice grabbed my hand, and I was too shocked to protest. Today felt like a nightmare I just couldn’t wake up from, a terrible, horrendous nightmare.
Gallant stepped out of the shadows, his face a mask of grief. The last rays of sunlight fell on the object in his hand.
The rose, fresh blood still dripping from it.
As the Master Hunter walked forward, he looked straight at us. “First, Duncan gets maimed by those monsters, now this…” Gallant held out the rose so my sister and I, and the Hunters could look at it.
“The Beast demands a sacrifice. We must hold the Lottery,” Gallant said.
I stared at the rose, dumbfounded, and then at my sister. If her premonition was correct, if she would be the one chosen as the next sacrifice…
I glanced past Gallant, at the road behind him, at the slightly opened gate and the Wall separating us from the monsters outside.
Then, they would bring Clarice out there alone, to die.
There was no way in Hell I would let her go out there on her own. Over my dead body. Maybe literally.
12
The entire town had gathered on the town square, ready for the Lottery. I couldn’t remember the first or second time I was forced to witness the Lottery, back when I was too young for my name to be added to the list. Of the three of us, Amélie was the only one still young enough to escape this fate.
The only time I remembered clearly was when Fiona was chosen. I remembered the devastation of her family, the hysterical sobs wrecking through her mother’s body as she collapsed to the ground. Still, no one saved her. Tradition, my Father said when I asked him why. And then I asked him if he would save me, and he didn’t say anything in response for a long while until he said, “The sacrifices are chosen by destiny. The sacrifice is who the Beast wants; we can’t give him anyone else.”
Which basically meant he wouldn’t save me either. Like Fiona’s mother, he’d watched his daughter being taken away and sacrificed to a force none of us really understood.
Fiona’s mother had died from grief only one year after her daughter was sacrificed.
The town square was covered in grief-filled silence. As the oldest person in town, the task befell on Francois to pull a name from the enclosed, wooden box, where all the names of the town members of eligible age had been deposited in. As he climbed on the stage, which was usually used for plays or for important town messages to be spread, he seemed to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders.
“The Beast demands a sacrifice,” he said, and the people around us repeated the mantra, but Clarice and I stayed quiet.
Screw that Beast. Screw his damned sacrifices. He was not getting my sister. My mechanical arm wrapped closer around the crossbow in my hand, anger fueling through me. I felt the wood splintering in my grip, and if I had continued to press, the crossbow would’ve shattered.
The one good thing about having a mechanical arm rather than a real one, was that it gave me strength beyond that of any regular person. Maybe enough to kill a Beast.
Francois took a deep breath, closed his eyes and lowered his hand into the wooden box.
I held my breath; no air entered my lungs. I’d felt it, an hour or an eternity ago, when I’d pulled George’s heart from his chest, turned it into stone, and gave it to Duncan so he could live. I’d felt that what had happened in that moment, had changed destiny, altered its course, somehow.
For reasons I couldn’t explain, maybe because of the same strange power that had given Clarice her premonitions, I knew that my choice in that moment was what had brought us here. If I hadn’t performed that spell, then the Beast wouldn’t have demanded a sacrifice.
The certainty with which I knew that was terrifying. I was as certain of it as that I knew the sun would set in the west and reach its highest point at noon. But what did it mean, that this was connected, if it even was?
My thoughts were interrupted when Francois lifted his hand from the box, holding a paper with a name written on it. Despite Clarice’s conviction, despite having no reason to doubt her, I hoped, prayed against all odds that the name he read would not be hers.
Francois’ hands trembled as he opened the paper, and then his breath stuck in his throat and he looked right at me, and I knew.
The old man swallowed, tears prickling in his eyes. “Clarice.” The way he said her name so softly made it sound like a gust of wind, like a faraway dream rather than a nightmare.
Amélie, who was standing on the other side of me, screamed. Father wrapped his arms around her, his face gaunt and hollow.
Clarice’s hand squeezed mine so hard I feared my bones would break.
The world was silent, all sound blocked out, except for a strange ringing in my ears. I couldn’t see the rest of the town’s people; all I felt was Clarice’s hand in mine. All the world was encompassed in this small bubble of just the two of us.
And then, the noise returned, hitting me with such strength I stumbled backward. All of it was back, the gasps of the other villagers, their worried looks, their relief that the person chosen wasn’t their own sister or daughter.
The Hunters, our supposed protectors, now came for us like prison guards hunting down their prisoners. They’d make sure Clarice didn’t run.
Gerard and Richard, their faces cast down, approached us from the sides. An hour ago, they’d been at my house, begging me to save their friend, and now they were willing to take my sister away from me.
Charles, who was supposed to be Clarice’s lover, her fiancé, moved in front of us. He looked sorrowful, but even he wouldn’t try to stop what was happening. “I’m sorry,” he said to Clarice, his voice breaking. “I’m sorry.”
Behind him stood Philippe, an ashen pale ghost.
None of them could meet my gaze.
“Charles…” I felt Clarice tremble when she said his name. “I love you.”
Maybe she hoped he’d say it back. Maybe she hoped that, despite tradition, despite the possible risk to our town, he’d save her, or at least attempted to save her.
All he could do was shake his head.
“No.” The word escaped from my lips before I could stop myself. Letting go of Clarice’s hand, I moved in front of her, positioning my body between hers and the others. “No,” I repeated, stronger this time. “You’re not taking her.”
“Belle, we don’t have a choice,” Philippe explained, trying to calm me down. He held out his hands soothingly, and I recognized a shimmer of what had been there before, back when he’d confessed his love for me in the garden. Had it really only been this afternoon? So much had happened since then, that it might as well have been centuries ago.
“No.” I kept looking straight at him until he was forced to face me. The hurt in his eyes was reflected in my own. Just like the others, Philippe considered Clarice a friend. But she was much more to me than that: she was my sister, my blood.
“Belle, don’t do this,” Father said, trying to stop me while he was still holding a crying
Amélie. “You’ll only make matters worse.”
“It’s not worth it.” Clarice put a hand on my shoulder. “I know you want to stop this, but you can’t. The Beast demands a sacrifice.”
I stood my ground, refusing to back down. The crossbow in my hand started to weigh like lead, and I wondered if they’d call my bluff if I lifted it toward them, or if they really thought I could hurt them. “I don’t care what that stupid Beast wants. I’ll kill the Beast before it ever puts its claws on you.”
“You can’t.” Clarice’s voice sounded pained. “The Beast can’t be killed.”
“Belle, move aside,” Philippe pleaded with me. “Or we’ll have to be forceful and…”
“You said you loved me,” I interrupted him. “What does that mean? If it were me instead of my sister, would you stop this madness?”
“I…” Philippe blinked, surprised at my question. “I don’t… I don’t know.”
His answer hit me harder than I expected. Part of me had thought he would say ‘yes’. Wasn’t that what love meant? Protecting someone, no matter the cost?
Like Mother had protected me. I raised my hand to my chest, to my stone heart, and felt it beating steadily.
And then, while still looking at him, at the boy I had helped when he struggled with mathematics, at the boy who had taught me how to dance when it turned out I had two left feet, at the boy who I had always considered my best friend and who had confessed his love to me just hours ago, I lifted up the crossbow and aimed it at him.
“Belle, no…”
It hurt to hear the pain in his voice, but I had no choice. When the choice was between my sister and him, I would always choose Clarice.
My sister yanked her hand out of mine. “Don’t hurt her!” she yelled, although I wasn’t sure who the ‘her’ was she was referring to, and then she stumbled toward them, toward the enemy, nearly bumping into Charles.
“No!” I shouted at her. “Why? I could’ve protected you…”
Now Charles had her in his greedy claws, and he was willing to turn her over; he wouldn’t fight for her.
“I’m not letting you kill yourself just to protect me. There’s a dozen of them! You can’t shoot them all,” Clarice told me while the tears streamed down her face. “It’s my destiny, Belle.”
I aimed at Charles, but Clarice was in front of him, and releasing the arrow now could mean hitting her too.
“Belle, please calm down,” Philippe said, still trying to be reasonable while there was no reason to this madness.
I tried to summon the power I had wielded an hour ago, tried to tap into those dark passages of my soul, but I couldn’t get in sync—the noises around me were too overwhelming, the pressure too high, and maybe I was still exhausted, or Clarice and Amélie were still exhausted, and I couldn’t access their power. Whatever the reason, I was no powerful Sorceress capable of wielding doom and mayhem on those threatening to steal my sister. All I had was my crossbow and unfortunately, Clarice was right, I couldn’t shoot all of them.
I couldn’t even shoot one of them. I didn’t want to hurt them, not even Charles, even if he was a traitor who deserved all the pain in the world.
“I don’t want to lose you too,” Amélie said in a weak voice. “If you hurt them, you’ll be banished.”
I hadn’t realized how close she was, so close I could almost touch her. The initial devastation on her face over Clarice’ name being called had made place for a deep, forlorn sorrow. “Please.”
It took me all my strength, but I lowered the crossbow. Not for them. Not for me. For Amélie.
As the Hunters grabbed Clarice, pulling her along, I heard the echoes of Fiona’s screams all those years ago, now mixed in with my sister’s cries, and if my heart wasn’t made of stone, it would’ve broken in my chest.
13
My Father was a coward. I realized that as I gathered all weapons I could find from inside the house. Maybe his logic was somewhat right: someone needed to be there for Amélie. And maybe destiny was unavoidable; maybe no matter what I did, Clarice would die anyway.
After Mother died, Father had become a shell of his old self. He’d always been the weakest of the two of them. If Mother was furious, she could make literally anyone tremble with fear. If she wanted something, she would move heaven and earth to get it.
Father was soft-spoken, kind, caring, but he wasn’t the hero from the fairytales. Mother’s death had made him terrified of living.
The whole town was filled with cowards, I decided while I loaded a back-up crossbow on my back, along with three extra arrow quivers. I grabbed a short sword from Clarice’s collection and attached it to my belt.
I’d been a coward too. For years, hiding behind legends, myths and tradition. Allowing people to be sacrificed to some mythical Beast simply because one of the Tainted showed up dead, with a bloody rose attached to them. I had allowed myself to be afraid of the Tainted, of the creatures that had ripped my arm off and had tried to poison me with the disease they carried, the Blight.
Afraid of myself, of the arm that wasn’t my own, of the heart that wasn’t my own. Maybe even afraid of the power that wasn’t my own.
I took two of Clarice’s daggers and pushed them in the garters around my stockings, one on each side. The time for fear was over.
In so many ways, I was my father’s daughter. A thinker; a dreamer; an inventor.
But I was also my mother’s daughter. Headstrong. Stubborn. Fearless.
The Tainted had taken so much from me. This stupid town had taken so much from me. My mother. My innocence. My heart. I wasn’t about to let them take my sister too.
Once outside our house, I headed for the Wall. This time, no voices lingering inside my sleeping mind needed to lure me to it; this time I was fully awake, fully willing to face those voices, face those monsters.
I climbed to the top of the Wall and spotted the Hunters about thirty meters away, tying Clarice to a tree. Clarice looked so small, so breakable.
She wouldn’t be the next Fiona.
Even if I had stopped before attacking the Hunters, even if I had lowered my weapon, I wasn’t about to let her die on her own.
A noise from behind me startled me, but I ignored it once I realized it was Father, who was climbing the stairs to the upper part of the Wall, toward me. I was mad at him after he had done nothing to save Clarice, even though my efforts, in the end, had been futile as well.
“She knew this was going to happen,” Father said once he stood next to me, as if that would somehow make this all right. “She told me about her premonition. About…” He paused, running a hand through his greying hair. I’d never realized how quiet he was, how non-talkative until now.
“Did she tell you what her premonition was about?” He asked me.
“I’m not sure if she told me all of it.” I sounded like a sulking child, but I couldn’t help it. “She told me she knew she was going to be sacrificed. She knew about the bloody rose, but she also saw a dark carriage and a castle in the forest.
“She saw more than that,” Father said. “She saw an army of the Tainted, as far as the eye could reach.”
I froze, the blood freezing in my veins. “What?”
“The ruined castle, then an army of the Tainted, and then our Wall, with a girl with a green ribbon in her hair. You. But that part she’s been seeing for a while, she just could never place it.”
I gasped as realization hit me. “Your new invention.”
“I was hoping this could help keep the army of the Tainted at bay. But neither of us were sure her premonitions were real or if they were just nightmares… Not until today.”
“If there’s an army of Tainted coming, then there’s no use having her out there.” I turned toward Father, grabbing his tunic. “You have to tell them.” I pointed at the town square below, at the handful of people still gathered there. “Tell them that the Tainted will come, regardless of what we do!”
“We can’t change destiny, Belle,�
�� Father whispered sadly. “This is what is meant to happen. I… She thought we still stood a chance. If you were there. If you would protect us. The girl with the green ribbon.”
“That’s stupid,” I fired back, throwing my hands in the air. “We have to save her! This just proves how stupid it is that we even try to appease a monster we don’t understand by sacrificing one of our own, or that we cower away for the Tainted when maybe we can defeat them. It doesn’t end here. It doesn’t need to.” I tried to talk sense into him, tried to convince him that this was even more proof we could stand up to the Beast, stand up to the Blight.
“But it will end,” Father said. “Here, or in whatever place the Beast will take her, it doesn’t matter. You can’t save her, Belle, none of us can.”
“Why are you such a coward?” I barked at him. “Why are all of the people here such cowards?” I rushed past him, bumping into him. He stumbled forward, barely catching himself before falling, but I didn’t care. The anger inside me was too enormous to care about anything right now, anything but saving Clarice.
“We’re just trying to survive,” Father said with raw sadness in his voice that somehow angered me even more. “You can’t stop what Clarice saw in her premonition. She saw her death, Belle. You can’t save her!”
“You come up with the most complicated inventions to protect our town, while the simplest way to do so would be to just find your courage and stand up for us for once!” I was screaming now, balling my fists. “We don’t need a crazy professor locked up in his workshop, we need a Father who is willing to take a risk for us!” I stretched my arm to the left, gesturing at the spot where Clarice was tied up to a pole, waiting for her death.
“You have run away from everything since Mother passed away. Do you think Mother would’ve condoned this?” I shook my head so violently my hair bounced from left to right. “Mother would’ve done everything she possibly could to stop them.”