by S McPherson
‘You fool,’ she hisses, and Milo spits at her tail. She looks like a demon carved of stone, a patchwork of body parts and limbs that are not her own. Her wings are now lopsided, coarse and too large for her body. Her ample chest could have been snatched from a new mother, her tail too stunning for her grey skin and her face is cracked, her eyes a shattered rainbow.
‘You do not own me,’ Milo snarls, his voice like a rusted blade and his eyes burning a brilliant blue. Pessa starts, edging away.
‘So, my kitten has claws,’ she smirks.
‘You do not own me,’ Milo roars, and his subconscious screams ‘You are not your father’ as he charges after Pessa who swoops away.
The hanging shells clank as they barrel through them and the vines and dreamcatchers sway as if caught in a storm. Milo’s teeth are clenched so tight his jaw aches. He feels his strength rise as he lifts his hand and yanks a vine from the ceiling.
Pessa continues to cackle, the sound hollow and unfeeling.
Milo pounces, twisting the vine around his hands before he coils it around her neck. Pulled backwards, she gags, her one hand grasping uselessly behind in hopes of clawing at him. Milo pulls harder, his muscles throbbing. He feels like an unchained beast.
You are not your father.
Pessas eyes bulge as the air is crushed out of her. Her wings thrash, and at last her hand makes contact, her talon-like nails slicing a gash in his cheek. Milo continues to squeeze. She won’t let him go after this. If he hopes to escape, this is his one and only chance. Pessa continues to fight, wriggling and croaking, but he notes how her strength is waning.
Finally, Milo draws the vine from her throat, letting her collapse to the ground, choking, wheezing and gasping. He thrusts out his foot, kicking her in the back of the head, then launches himself at the shield and strikes it with his fist. Blue light explodes, a force ravaging his hand, and he clings to a vine with his other. He punches the barrier, again and again, wincing at the wayward sparks. His knuckles split, his palm blisters and he feels the sensation of horns bursting through his skull.
He glances down at Pessa, still weak and groaning on the floor but slowly regaining consciousness. This time Milo doesn’t hold back. He silences his conscious self and invites the tang of bile rising in his throat. Sweat trickles down his forehead and beams lance from his eyes. He howls, a sound that shakes the walls and whips the laser emanating from his eyes across the shield.
‘NO,’ Pessa screams, swimming at him with the precision of a dart, teeth bared, but the shield erupts, its force raging and slamming her into a wall. She struggles against its onslaught, and Milo grits his teeth as he pushes his arm through its blaze. His skin shreds in strips as he reaches for the gethadrox and at last yanks it from the dreamcatcher. With no destination in mind except far away, he twists the device and hurtles himself at the darkest arrow the instant it appears, promptly carried on its current and thrown into another world.
Nearly instantly, Milo stumbles and crashes onto a mound of black sand that sparkles, as if infused with crystals. Drums pound belligerently along with the thrum of his pulse, and in the dark night, somewhere nearby, flames flicker from torches. Barely upright, Milo makes out a grunt behind him right before a musty sack is thrown over his head. He fights the gruff hands that hold it in place, but he’s no match for whatever has grabbed him, his arm still battered and torn from Pessa’s shield. There must be two of them, for one scoops up his legs and another restricts his arms. He tries to shake the bag loose from his face but it seems to be tied.
Milo listens, trying to make sense of where he might be and what they might have planned for him, but all he can hear is the roar of the drums and the shrieks and howls of unknown creatures. It’s cold; a churning gust of wind makes him shiver and the thick air is rancid, like pickled dung. He twists in the creature’s grip, their puny hands evidently stronger than they feel. For a fleeting moment, Milo considers teleporting, until he remembers they will only go with him as long as they touch. Snarling, he struggles as they haul him carelessly across the sodden and grainy earth, and then they snatch away his satchel.
At last, he feels himself slowing, then the sack’s torn away and a gate clangs shut. Milo turns to the sound, to find himself in a cage, a cage of solid bone and rock. Whatever gate he had come through, it now no longer exists. All the same, he pushes against the walls but nothing shifts, nor can he see a lock or handle that would mark where they’d brought him in, and so how he might get out.
Milo peers through the gaps, watching the backs of his captors—great hulking beasts with hairy backs, soiled skin and wiry tails, like those of an oversized rat—walking off between other cages before disappearing from sight. He looks about for his satchel and finds it’s gone.
‘Good one, Milo,’ he grumbles and taps into his power, pulling on that familiar surge of strength and truth, not caring where he ends up as long as it’s far from this cage. To somewhere he can devise a plan for getting his gethadrox back. But then the power cresting inside him stops, sputtering out like a damp flame. He frowns, calling on it again, but again his gift soars and plummets, as if struck by an arrow.
‘You’re a Coltis?’ a young voice asks.
Milo jerks. He hadn’t even bothered looking into the disarray of other cages around him, ones he now realises host creatures more hideous than anything he could imagine. What snatches his attention more than them, though, is the boy who’d just spoken, a lad of about fourteen years and seemingly human, though the backs of his hands are exceedingly hairy.
‘And you?’ Milo studies the boy. He has thick brown hair, wide violet eyes and deeply tanned skin.
The boy grimaces. ‘Not quite sure. My mother was impregnated by one of these monsters. They ate her not many years after I was off her tit.’
Milo tenses, a pang in his gut. Flesh-eating creatures and a cage of bone.
‘Yet you’re still here.’
The boy is filthy, his thin clothes in shreds, his lips dry and outlined with a ring of crust, but he’s clearly been fed from time to time, and a stack of tattered books made from leaves and straw surround him.
‘I’m…their pet, I suppose.’ The boy frowns. ‘They check me sometimes. I think they’re waiting for me to morph into one of them, but I’ll kill myself before I let that happen.’
Milo remembers how his father had appeared in Blade Upon Blade, not long before, to see what he had become. Not wanting to be your father is something to which he can certainly relate.
‘Why don’t my abilities work?’ he asks.
The boy shrugs. ‘The Sikunsaw have great strength,’ and he indicates the beasts crammed into the many cages. ‘The Denurib use a binding spell on the place to quell it. Perhaps it affects you too.’
Milo flops back, whacking his head against the bone bars but hardly caring. ‘The Denurib are those things that put me in here?’
The boy nods almost apologetically. ‘Every night they fight for their feast; a great battle between hunter and prey.’
‘And if the prey wins?’
The boy lifts his large haunted eyes to Milo’s. ‘The prey never wins.’
THE RECRUITS
It feels strange to be back in Swanson. Stranger still to be standing inside Celestial Pets, Michaela’s old pet store. Only now it’s been magically transformed into a self-serve café with an impressive countertop running the length of a wall, littered with baskets of nuts, crisps and biscuits. A large glass-doored refrigerator stands on the other side, crammed with fizzy pop, J20, water and sandwiches, and small round tables speckle the room. The windows are mirrored, leading those on the outside to see only their reflection. But from the inside I look out. My gaze skims the vacant park across the road and the houses lining the street beyond. Just a few months before, Jude and I had been here, when to outsiders it had seemed like nothing more than a pet shop run by a kind lady with a great smile and purple eyes. The Court were still desperately trying to build a gethadrox and Milo and I were
still trying to be heroes. Now, how things have changed.
Turning away from the window, I’m met with twenty-five unfamiliar faces, each staring back at me. Some are curious, some anxious, some I struggle to read. Twenty-five faces I didn’t know a fortnight before; some I didn’t even know until a few days ago. We call them ‘The recruits’.
Victoria Burns, the dancer from Bentford Sixth Form College, sits with her arms folded across her chest. Her freckled cheeks peek from under her pink-rimmed glasses and her red hair shudders around her like flames. When she sees me looking, she nods but doesn’t smile. I realise she has a small bag at her feet—many of them do—and I wonder if that means they’ve already decided they will be going into Coldivor tonight.
Then I look at Trevor Darcy. His pale blue eyes stare blindly back at me from behind the glasses he wears ironically. His brown hair falls into his face. His cane rests casually against his leg. We recruited him for the stunning way he seems to see without seeing, for the way he carries himself with such confidence and assuredness. We found him in a comedy club for under eighteens. He’d had the audience in stitches, me and Sakiya included, and not once did he use his handicap to achieve it.
I remember after we spoke to him, Sakiya had said it was a shame he couldn’t see himself, as she ogled the seventeen-year-old walking away. But I’d shrugged; it was like he knew he was good looking and didn’t need to see it to know it. Just like when we told him about Coldivor. He’d agreed without even speaking to his counterpart, just purely on belief, and that’s why we recruited him. His spirit is his greatest weapon. His spirit is that of a warrior.
The Dragons are huddled in a corner, snickering amongst themselves and passing a hand rolled cigarette around, though it doesn’t smell much like a cigarette, and Sakiya hovers just a little too close.
‘So, when do these new versions of us supposedly get here?’ demands a deep, accusatory voice, snapping me out of my musing. I turn, meeting Ibrahim’s icy glare. The boys recruited him just the other day. He’s a human canvas: wings, snakes and skulls are inked into his skin in reds, blacks and greens, decorating almost every visible inch of him, including his shaved head. Even his left cheek bears an anchor, his right, a teardrop.
‘As soon as the portal opens, they’ll teleport here,’ I say, addressing everyone. ‘Lexovia, my counterpart, says it should open any minute now.’
Ibrahim huffs, shaking his head. ‘Teleport? Portal? Do you listen to yourself?’ His painted friend beside him chuckles. ‘You’re a lunatic.’ He turns, addressing the others: ‘Do you honestly believe your twin from another realm is just going to pop up tonight and change everything?’
A few of the others shuffle and a girl with more piercings than I can count says, ‘Isn’t that why you’re here?’ I smile at her in gratitude.
‘I was curious,’ Ibrahim sneers, ‘but we’ve sat here now for over a bleeding hour and I think it’s pretty clear we’ve been had mate.’
‘They’re coming,’ I say, but the brute talks over me.
‘Think about it:’ he cries, ‘all of a sudden some world we’ve never even heard of needs our help?’
‘Why else would they call us here?’ asks the same girl.
‘For the world’s worst prank,’ Jude scoffs.
Ibrahim doesn’t back down. He stands firm. ‘I’d check your wallets if I was you. I smell a scam.’
Everyone’s hands fly to their pockets and handbags, and I see doubt taint their faces. I can practically smell it. Ibrahim has planted the seeds and they’re growing, instantaneously, watered by all the crap he’s spewed.
‘It is getting a bit late,’ someone says, and I clench my fists when Sharlie, a round faced girl with cocoa skin and hazel eyes, gets to her feet. ‘I think I might go.’
‘Smart move,’ Ibrahim enthuses. ‘I’m right behind you.’
‘Count me in,’ chortles his friend, pushing back his chair harder than necessary.
I watch, wide-eyed, as more and more people rise from their seats, convincing themselves that tonight is either a scam or a waste of time. My gaze darts to the Dragons. They haven’t moved but are eyeing me…sadly. I think perhaps they wanted to believe the most, but even they don’t seem too sure anymore.
‘They’re coming,’ Nathaniel calls as people carry on scooping up their bags, ‘and those of you who stay will do great things.’
Ibrahim laughs. ‘You’re both crazy,’ and he shakes his head. ‘I don’t know why I bothered to come. “Unlock your potential. Change the world”,’ he quotes back at us from the line on our business card, and I think I hear a hint of disappointment amidst his scorn.
His friend throws an arm around his shoulders. ‘This is what we get for listening to crazy people.’
‘You’re right,’ I yell over the sound of scraping chairs and shuffling feet. ‘You’re right. This is completely crazy. It’s mad. How can we, a bunch of teenagers, hope to change the world? To turn it completely on its head?’ I barely notice as the movement stops, as people turn to face me. My breath’s ragged as I pace back and forth, my thoughts tripping over themselves. ‘Answer? I have no idea. But someone once told me that, in order to change the world, you’ve first got to be crazy enough to believe you can. I want to change the world,’ I say as I thump a hand against my chest. ‘I see a world where people can live together, no matter how different they may be. Where people can be who they are and that’s okay. They aren’t ridiculed or shunned or beaten for it. They’re just accepted for who they are: Coltis or Corporeal, big or small, whatever race, whatever belief. Just…exactly as they are.’
I feel everyone’s eyes on me now, even Ibrahim’s. I look down and a rueful smile tugs at my lips. ‘I used to laugh a lot more than I do today. I used to tell the lamest jokes and laugh, with all my heart.’ Nathaniel snickers, as if remembering. ‘But after my parents died, I didn’t laugh so much. I forgot how to. Until one day, quite recently, I made some friends. Friends with people in places I never thought I’d go. I became friends with people I used to judge and call peculiar.’ My eyes settle on Jude. ‘I made friends and then I laughed again. I laughed, and once more I saw the world as changed. I want to see that difference in the world. And to see that difference, I have to be that difference. I see the possibility for such a world here, right now, and I’m crazy enough to believe in it. What about you?’ and I shrug, near breathless. ‘Do you want to be crazy with me?’
The silence is deafening, but there’s something in the air that thrums even louder: hope and determination.
‘Most people think I’m nuts anyway,’ Victoria drawls, slipping back into her seat, ‘but in my opinion, if people aren’t talking about you, you’re doing something wrong.’
‘My folks have been calling me a lost cause since day one,’ Trevor chuckles, and I grin wildly as slowly everyone returns to their seat, even Ibrahim.
He nods. ‘Your world doesn’t sound so bad,’ and he clasps the hand of his friend—his partner, I now realise—before he plants a kiss on his lips.
‘I think we should be called the Loon Squad,’ Swift offers, but before anyone can answer, a series of clashes and swirls of coloured light have everyone yelping and jumping back. The café fills up fast as the Coltis arrive and I sag in relief at the sight of Lexovia. I leap across the chairs and skid across a table to get to her, forcing her into a hug.
‘You all right?’ she asks when we pull apart.
‘I am now.’
Now there’s a river of faces, each one a ripple; so alike but strikingly different. I lean against a wall, mesmerised by them all. Though I expected this; worked and hoped and bled for this; now surrounded by it, I can hardly take it in. Victoria and her counterpart, Tessa, don’t waste time with formalities. Tessa hurls her arms around Victoria as if they’re long lost sisters and Victoria soon returns it. Beside them, Derek shakes hands with his equally strapping counterpart. They are both a towering height of six foot at least, but where Derek’s hair is dark, matching his
depthless eyes, his counterpart’s are cinnamon, his hair a golden-brown. They don’t drop hands immediately, but rather stare at each other, visible tears creeping in their eyes. I blink away my own, swallow a lump in my throat, and my chest heaves in and out. We did it. All around me, people embrace, laugh, tug on each other and demonstrate their own particular abilities. All of us different yet exactly the same where it truly counts.
The most exciting counterparts who’ve arrived are Ningul Margoom and Andrew Patell. Ningul is an Ochi, broad shouldered and with wavy blonde locks and green eyes that might as well be Jude’s. Andrew is a Spee’ad, his chocolate skin a shade darker than Nathaniel’s, and has blonde corkscrew twists in his hair. It’s his face, though, that strikes me the most. Though it’s leaner and with more prominent cheekbones, it’s undeniably the face of the only friend I had in the years following my parent’s death. It’s Nathaniel’s.
Jude practically somersaults at the sight of his counterpart, whereas Nathaniel stands stunned, awe stretching his features. Though I smile, a wave of sadness dampens it. Being the counterpart of the last Elentrice—the most important warrior and current leader of the Court—means I’m unable to go to Coldivor, unable to train. I’m to stay on my side and spend a fortnight without Nathaniel, Jude or Sakiya—who is using the opportunity to see her old home and help with training— which doesn’t sound too great.
Lexovia weaves between everyone, testing strength and no doubt assessing our selection. She waggles her brows at me and I take that to mean she’s pleased.
‘Right,’ she eventually says and swans over to where I’m propped, clasping her hands together, ‘shall we get started?’
‘Let’s.’ Though I would love to stand back and let discovery continue to deluge the café, it’s no secret that we’re pressed for time.