Of Honey and Wildfires

by Sarah Chorn

“The company man?” Edward asks. He will remember Arlen. Edward remembers everyone he’s worked on.

  I think I nod. I try to.

  “Make sure they find each other, so she is not alone,” I say.

  I think of Cassandra. I will not go without her beside me.

  I sink into darkness.

  Our stories will never be told. No one outside of Shine Territory will ever know who my father was, or who Ianthe was. To the rest of the world, they are nothing but names.

  To me, they are the world.

  And so, I suppose, it is time for me to tell you how my world ended.

  Maybe you can answer one question for me, first.

  How long can a person live without a heart?

  I can tell you what happened today when I saw all those fancy men in suits laughing right in front of the hangman’s noose. I can tell you what happened when I saw the crowd gathered, all of them singing and dancing as they led my father out of the jail.

  I can tell you exactly what happened.

  I went cold.

  And I grabbed a knife.

  It happened so fast. The hours slid past, and the town became more and more full. Whores were doing a good trade at the saloon. He could hear someone playing the piano downstairs, and plenty of laughter. Outside was more merrymaking. Someone offered him some food at some point, but he didn’t respond and now a tray of cold porridge rested on his small table, flies perched atop it.

  When it was midday, his guards came to get him. “It’s time,” was all they said. They were not rough with him, but they weren’t gentle, either. They gripped his arms hard enough to bruise and led him downstairs. At the doorway from the saloon, Sterling waited. “I’ll take him from here,” the man said.

  “He just wants you safe,” Sterling shouted over the roar of the crowd. It was like a Longest Day festival. People, everywhere. Reporters were hanging around, too, jotting down notes in their notebooks. A few photographers with their huge cameras stood on the well-positioned second-story deck of the saloon, taking pictures of Grove. “He’s just worried,” Sterling said, leaning toward Arlen’s ear.

  Arlen didn’t bother answering him. Didn’t bother shouting over the press of people. Sterling’s touch made his skin crawl. This entire event turned his stomach. A man was going to die and people were celebrating that fact.

  What kind of people threw a party when someone died?

  “Make way!” Sterling shouted, pushing people out of the way, clearing a path for Arlen. All he wanted to do was run away. Be anywhere but here, with these people. He hurt. From his hair, to his bones, to his soul, he was in anguish. He was a scream wrapped in skin.

  People.

  People everywhere. And that hot sun overhead.

  “Make way!” Sterling called again.

  And then they were there, beside Matthew Esco, with his company men all around him. Arlen knew these people. He’d shaken their hands, held meetings with them, talked to their wives and children. He’d even been privately hired by a few of them, to organize their books and do their taxes. They were not strangers, but here and now, they might as well have been.

  “Ah,” Matthew said. “My son has arrived. I suppose it is time to bring the criminal out.” He nodded at Sterling, who disappeared through the crowd, likely heading toward the jail.

  There were mutters and grunts of agreement from the men around them.

  Arlen would witness this death. It would be horrible to see, and it would destroy him, but he would do it. He would carry the memory of his father, his real father, into tomorrow. Christopher Hobson would live on in him.

  He focused his thoughts on getting through this hour, and then the hour after, and hopefully, if it all went well, he’d still be standing at the end of the day. Tear soaked and worn ragged, but standing. He would survive. It is what he did.

  When Christopher appeared, the crowd went wild. Up the dais he went, up those hastily constructed wooden steps. Arlen thought he felt each one echo in the chasm of his soul. Their eyes met. Father, he mouthed. It was the only thing he had left to offer the man, and he watched as Christopher’s lips curled into a small, private smile.

  It was enough. It had to be. Arlen knew he’d just given the outlaw the only gift that truly mattered.

  On the dais, Sterling read out the charges leveled against Christopher Hobson. The list was long, and the crowd grew noisy. Chris stood throughout it, head hung low. Then, Sterling stepped aside, his job done.

  “Any last words?” The hangman asked in a booming voice. His features were hidden behind a thick leather mask, though his ruby skin was obvious enough.

  “I love you,” Christopher said. “I never stopped and I never will.” Arlen felt the words carve themselves in his heart. In his soul. In his muscle and bone.

  It happened so fast. The trapdoor opened, and his father dropped through, body jolting, jerking, then going still. Incredible how quickly a person can die. Shocking, the speed with which a story ends.

  “Arlen—" Matthew began, turning to face him.

  It was then that he saw the crowd moving, people being pushed aside, shouting. Yelling. Offended voices. A black head of hair appearing here, then there, coming closer, as a body tore through the press of people, panic spreading in her wake as people pushed to get away from her. And then she was there, his sister. Cassandra, an instant too late, but it didn’t seem to matter. She had eyes only for Matthew Esco, and the knife in her hands was long and sharp enough to cut the sun.

  She let out a scream of such shocking pain, it nearly brought him to his knees. Matthew shouted something. The company men moved, trying to block off Cassandra’s path, but she was already past them.

  Already past, and pushing that knife right into Matthew Esco’s heart.

  And then, everything stopped. The world seemed to hold its breath as Matthew slowly, deliberately pulled the knife out of his chest. “This will not harm me,” he said to Cassandra his voice cold and unruffled, as though he’d just started reading the newspaper, completely unperturbed by the fact that he had just been fatally stabbed. “Take her to the jail!”

  Lawmen grabbed her arms. She screamed and thrashed, her hair covering her face. She was wild and untamed. She was a mountain lion, and her claws were sharp. The men had a hard time holding on to her. Her screams were unlike anything Arlen had ever heard before. They weren’t the screams of a grieving woman, they were the unhinged wails of someone who had just lost it all, and had nothing left to hold on to.

  He would never forget that sound.

  He watched as she was dragged away, and then turned his attention to Matthew Esco, who held that knife, stared at it, with an almost bemused expression. The hint of a smile, a twinkle in his eyes. Arlen was aware of attention fixed on them, people muttering, wondering, on the verge of panic. Who got stabbed in the heart, and didn’t die? Matthew wasn’t even bleeding. What kind of creature was this? Suddenly, no one was celebrating, and no one seemed to know what to do.

  “She’ll be hung,” Matthew said. “Which is fitting.”

  He was so calm. So completely unruffled by all of this, by the event, or the attention fixed on him. Nothing could stop him, not even a knife in his heart.

  And wasn’t that a terrifying thought.

  She’ll be hung. Cassandra was his sister. The last person in the world who was his would be hung.

  And, suddenly, Arlen knew, and it stole the breath right from his lungs. He understood. He understood it all. He saw it as clearly as he saw the sun.

  It all clicked into place.

  Despite twenty years of Arlen living with him, Matthew Esco’s appearance had never changed. He never grew a day older.

  Arlen had never touched Matthew Esco. A lifetime of being kept an arm’s length away suddenly made perfect sense.

  Their conversation just hours earlier, all that talk of sacrifice, of feeding the Boundary. Now, they were going to the shine fields, and Arlen would inherit.

  Matthew had said that C
hristopher Hobson had seen him create the Boundary, and that made Christopher a weakness.

  “Matthew Esco is dead,” Arlen said.

  “What?” Matthew said. Around them, people whispered, mumbled, gave them space. No one wanted to be near Matthew. The atmosphere was no longer festive. Now, there was a hum in the air, a tension that hinted at chaos. All it would take was a spark to ignite.

  Arlen’s sister was about to hang. His father dangled at the end of a rope and Arlen knew that Matthew Esco died a long time ago.

  “Matthew Esco sacrificed himself to create the Boundary,” Arlen pressed. “That’s why I can’t touch you. You aren’t a man. Not anymore. Now you’re nothing but shine. I can’t touch shine, so I can’t touch you. That’s why you had all the mixed-blood babies killed. You didn’t know if it was just your line, or if it was all mixed-blood babies who had this effect on shine. You couldn’t risk it. And Christopher saw you sacrifice yourself, so he was your one, true weakness. You let Lila keep him for a while because you needed someone to inherit, but then she had some kids, you got your legacy, and Chris became a problem. He saw you create the Boundary, so he knew how to bring it all tumbling down. He is your one weakness, isn’t he? He knows about all the chinks in your armor. He had to be taken care of so you can keep all this. You spent years orchestrating his glorious downfall.” He threw his arms wide, gesturing at the space around him.

  “You don’t want to touch me, Arlen. It will undo everything I’ve set in place for you. I am giving you an empire.” Matthew said, his eyes were narrowed. If he was concerned, he showed none of it.

  “At what cost?”

  A beat of hesitation, just enough, and then, “It is quickly done, Arlen. You won’t even know it happened.”

  That’s why they were going to the shine fields. So Arlen could be thrown into a well. So his life could fuel the Boundary. An Arlen-thing would rise up until it was time for another generation to take his place. Sacrifice after sacrifice.

  What had Chris said at Rose’s house? It seemed like a lifetime ago, standing at that window, feeling like he was at a crossroads. This was his moment, his true decision. What are you going to do, Arlen? Make your choice, and make it fast. Belly up with Fate. This is when you get to choose what haunts you.

  Arlen barely knew the man and already he missed Christopher with a force that shocked him.

  “This is when I get to choose what haunts me,” Arlen whispered.

  “Arlen—“ Matthew said.

  If he turned left, his sister would hang, and he would inherit an empire. If he turned right, his sister would be free, and he would lose Matthew.

  Pick a road, he told himself. Pick the ghosts you can live with.

  “The Boundary doesn’t affect me,” he said slowly. “I wonder what would happen if I touched the source of it.”

  “You don’t want to do this,” Matthew said, the words edged with cold fear.

  “I really do.”

  And then, Arlen reached out and committed the act of touch. He brushed a finger against Matthew’s cheek and felt… nothing.

  Matthew Esco disappeared as though he’d never been. The sky exploded with rainbows of blinding light, as though the sun itself had burst. A headache roared to life within him. All he could see was white, so bright and pure it blinded him. He covered his eyes and screamed, was dimly aware of everyone else screaming around him. Panic. People were running, falling, shouting, crying.

  It was over.

  It was all over.

  Then, an orange hand grabbed his arm, grip firm. “Are you Arlen Esco?” a man asked, voice hurried. Arlen remembered him, vaguely. The healer who stitched his side. In all the chaos, he wanted to push the man away. He wanted to understand what happened. He wanted to be still for a moment and feel his grief.

  Instead, he says, “I am.”

  “Your sister needs you. Right now.”

  “I’d spent so long holding onto my anger, sharpening it, until I looked down and realized I held a knife. I plunged it into Matthew Esco’s heart, and then you arrested me.”

  How long have I been telling this story? It feels like an eternity. I feel like I’ve been bleeding for them forever. Just a little bit more, I keep saying to myself. Perhaps if they know how this world has shaped me, they will see my pain and understand that it needed somewhere to go.

  They stare at me, the two of them, Sterling and Elroy. They are wearing fine suits, though neither of them seems to be at ease. Sterling is wringing his hands together. Elroy looks sick. I stabbed Matthew Esco in the heart, and he survived. What kind of beast are they working for? I hope the thought is eating them alive.

  Sterling jots down some notes. Elroy studies his hands. He looks haunted. Hollow. A ghost of whoever he had been before he came out here. Before the land chewed him up and spit him out.

  Before.

  The West has a thousand different ways to kill a man, and Elroy looks like he’s dying as surely as I am. We are both suffering. We are, both of us, bleeding out.

  I saw the flash of light. It was blinding, even in here. Even in this windowless jail. As I sit here now, I can hear the chaos outside. I might not have killed Matthew Esco, but one way or another, my impulsive act of rage, the venting of my anger, ended an era, and I am not sorry for it. I do not know what happened. I am just glad I was part of it in some small way.

  My father is dead.

  My aunt, uncle, and cousins are dead.

  Imogen is dead.

  Ianthe is all I have left.

  “How much money have you made off of my family? How much money are six lives worth?” I pause. “They did not have to die. None of them had to die.”

  Silence greets my words, and somehow that makes me angrier.

  “You stole everything from me, and act as though I am a criminal,” I said. “I stuck a knife in his heart and he didn’t die. He didn’t even bleed, and I am the prisoner?” If I had any tears left in me, they would be spilling down my cheeks.

  I am dry as a creek in summer.

  I should be with Ianthe, not here, locked in this room with these two pompous men who look at me like I am something to study.

  Still, I sit and let them whisper to each other. I let them have their importance. I hope they hang themselves with it.

  Not even a day has gone by since it all happened. Not even a week since all that murder on the homestead. It feels like it happened an eternity ago. It feels like it happened a second ago.

  I have never felt so barren. I am lost. I just want this to be over. There is a chasm inside of me, opening wider and wider. Soon, it will swallow me up. Soon, I will be nothing but a memory.

  I am disappearing within myself.

  I wonder if they care.

  I wonder if this is how Ianthe feels.

  There is a knock on the door.

  Sterling grumbles something, and Elroy gets up. The door opens. Sunlight spills into the dark. Edward is there, his orange hair ruffled, his normally serene presence frantic. He is with someone. A man I have never met before, but I recognize him well enough. We share enough between us, from our dark hair to the curve of our jaws.

  I know the grief clinging to him.

  I remember my father telling me about Arlen Esco, his son and my brother, and all I can do is stare. Time slips away and it is just the two of us. Something deep inside shifts, and I feel the call of family and the echo of home.

  Sterling turns his attention on Arlen and starts asking him questions. Questions about his father, about his role in what happened, about the company. I block it out. All I can do is look at him. My brother.

  Then, Edward clears his throat. I take in his lined face and his tear-filled eyes and I know.

  This is the moment I have been waiting for. Dreading.

  I am not strong enough.

  I have to be strong enough.

  This is when I will break.

  “You can’t keep me here,” I say to my jailers. I stand up, let their irons clatter to
the floor. Even they cannot hold me. I don’t bother with their surprise. Fools. I have told them what I am.

  “Wait,” Sterling says, resting his hand on my arm, and I want to wash the feel of him off. “Just a few more questions,” he says. “Just a few more minutes.”

  Now, everything has changed. Now, he has no authority here. Now, Shine Territory is no-man’s land. Owned by no one. Overseen by no one. Lawless. The way the West was meant to be.

  “No,” I reply. “No more questions. I have bled for you enough.”

  I walk out the door and into the street, blinking away the afternoon sun. My brother, Arlen Esco, steps in beside me. At any other time, I would marvel at his presence, but I can’t. I have thoughts on only one thing. Edward falls in behind us, silent as the grave. I am walking toward my end. One more loss, and I do not know if I can survive it.

  Already, the world is draining of color.

  I know.

  How can I not?

  I enter the sanatorium. I go upstairs.

  She is laying on our bed, white and statuesque. Carved from stone. Barely breathing. I can see it happening. How is it fair that men like Matthew Esco have existed, undeserving, while bright lights like Ianthe are snuffed before they’ve even had a chance to shine? How can the world continue spinning without her?

  I always thought love was supposed to be warm, and comforting. Instead, it is cold as the grave and just as silent, and somehow, even that burns me.

  My beautiful Ianthe, dying right before my eyes.

  It takes her hours to die. Edward leaves me alone, but Arlen stays. He is a silent presence and I draw comfort from him. We do not know each other, but he is there, and right now, he is the closest thing I have to home. He rests a hand on my shoulder, reminding me that I am not alone.

  I perch on the side of the bed. I hold Ianthe’s hand. I press my lips to her cold, cold skin. I tell her stories, and I say, “I love you” a thousand times, as though the more I say it, the more I will carve it into her soul. Or perhaps I will fashion wings of it, to carry her to whatever comes next. It is not enough, and somehow, it has to be.