Silent Night

by Emma Couette

He holds his hands up in surrender. “All right, I was just checking. You don’t need to be so confrontational.”

  “Whatever, now are we going or what?”

  “Right, follow me.”

  …

  He leads me to the same training room we visited yesterday. The place is mostly empty, two agents duelling with single blade axes in one corner of the room. Ajax tells me to pick a mat and goes over to the weapon wall.

  The encounter with Bast is still chafing at me, but I can’t help but feel a little excited at the prospect of training. It always calms my mind. I wonder what he will trust me with this time.

  He returns with two wooden swords and my excitement fizzles out.

  “A wooden sword? Are you serious?”

  “Of course I’m serious. Were you expecting a real one?”

  “Well, no,” I reply. “Not really.”

  “Prove to me I can trust you with this and I’ll see what I can do tomorrow.”

  I sigh. “Fine, hand it over.”

  He throws the weapon at me. I catch the hilt easily in my left hand. He twirls his sword in his right. “All right, Silent, do your worst.”

  I grin despite myself. “That wasn’t smart of you to say.”

  “How so?”

  “You’ll see,” I reply and then I lunge.

  I dart to his right, throwing my weapon to my right hand as I step, but it was only a feint. He goes to block me, but I come at his left.

  Smack.

  The flat of my blade connects with his bicep. He hisses through his teeth and mutters a curse under his breath.

  I go on the offensive, but he fights back hard, wary now that he’s seen what I can do.

  We struggle against each other. We dodge, duck, twirl, lunge, parry, and block. Back and forth.

  I speed up then, switching my sword back to my left.

  The sword smacks against his lower leg as I duck the blow he aims at my head.

  “God,” he cries out, hand going to his leg automatically.

  I go in for the ‘kill,’ but then he does something unexpected; he grins.

  “What?”

  “Distraction!” he shouts and jabs his sword into my sternum as I straighten in surprise.

  My hand goes to my chest. “Ow,” I gasp. “What in the Guild?”

  “I won,” he says.

  I swear.

  How did he manage to beat me? How did I let myself get distracted? What is wrong with me?

  “Ugh,” I growl and chuck my weapon across the room. It hits the wall and snaps in half, wood pieces flying everywhere.

  “Whoa!” Ajax exclaims. “Chill. It’s okay.”

  “It is most certainly not okay,” I snap. “I lost.”

  “That’s going to happen sometimes. We’re only human. It’s not the end of the world.”

  “Yes, it is! If that sword had been real, I’d be dead. Dead! I’m supposed to do the killing and I was bested by you.” I jab a finger in his direction.

  He scowls. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Look,” I say, “I’m not trying to insult you. I just... I expected better from myself, I guess. If... If I lost like that at the Guild…” I scrape my foot against the floor. “I would’ve been knocked down no less than five spots and given a thorough beating....” My whole body tenses at the memory. I can feel the ache in my bones, the bruises blossoming beneath my skin, the fingers tightening around my wrists so I can’t fight back…

  I shudder.

  Ajax walks up to me and puts a hand on my arm.

  I resist the urge to flinch.

  “It’s okay,” Ajax says. “That’s over now. You don’t have to worry.”

  I shrug off his hand. “I don’t need your sympathy.”

  “Too bad,” he replies, “I want to give it. You’re an amazing fighter, despite what you’ve done to get this far. I’m going to have significant bruises tomorrow and, if you really think about it, you did win this fight. You connected two blows. If your sword had been real, either of the blows would’ve distracted me long enough for you to kill me.”

  “True,” I say, “but still.”

  “Look, Silent, don’t be so hard on yourself.”

  I cross my arms. “I have to be, because no one else is now. I don’t want to slack off just because my master isn’t breathing down my neck anymore. It could be a fatal mistake. I have to stay in top condition. That’s not me being hard on myself, that’s me being realistic.”

  “All right, I get it, but remember, he’s not your master anymore.”

  I nod. “Even still...”

  “You want to try again?”

  “Definitely,” I reply. “Come at me.”

  He smiles and replies, “That wasn’t smart of you to say.”

  …

  We spar back and forth for the duration of the morning, taking ten minute breaks every half hour. We start with wooden swords and then move on to wooden knives, axes, and finally he lets me shoot blunted arrows at the targets. He commends me for everything I do right and doesn’t criticize me for mistakes. It’s a new and strange experience.

  By lunchtime, we’re both exhausted and we sit at the table alone, nearly dozing into our grilled cheese sandwiches. Bast and Blake are still out on their respective missions. Ajax tells me they won’t be back until tonight.

  “What do you guys do on your missions?” I ask him. “The three of you are on a team you’ve said, but they’re out and you’re here. Would you be with them if I wasn’t in the picture?”

  Jax puts down his sandwich. “We’re a team because we’re from the same initiation class and we were all born in the same month,” he starts. “Some months have a lot of people, so they’re divided into multiple teams. Being a team means taking turns on each job and supporting one another out of the field. This week, Blake is on train patrol, Bast is on city watch, and I would normally be scouting for the Guild, but that job is kind of obsolete now since you’re here.”

  “But weren’t you one of the guards at the entrance when I arrived?”

  He nods. “When it’s my week for city watch, I guard the Warehouse instead.”

  “I see. Well, it all sounds interesting. A lot more variety than killing every day. A change in scenery and mission must be nice.”

  “It is, but I’m often wishing for a vacation.”

  I sigh. “Aren’t we all?”

  We pause our conversation to take a few more bites of our meal. Never has grilled cheese tasted so good.

  “So what are we doing after lunch?” I ask him after a moment. “Nothing too physical I hope?”

  “No, I’m done torturing you for the day. Jenson wants me to educate you on the way we operate.”

  My eyes light up. “We’re going on a mission?”

  “No,” he replies, “we’re going to an initiation lecture.”

  My mood plummets to my toes. “I thought you said you were done torturing me?”

  “Oh, come on, it’s not that terrible. Everyone has to do it. I’m sure they had something similar at the Guild.”

  “I wouldn’t know,” I reply.

  “How is that?” he asks, lifting his sandwich to his mouth for a bite.

  “I grew up there, had all the rules and regulations ingrained into me from a young age.”

  He sets his sandwich down. “You grew up there? What do you mean?”

  “I’m what they call a Guild Ward,” I reply. “I was orphaned as a child, many kids are these days, and the Guild takes them in, in order to manufacture a new generation of loyal assassins. If that’s all you know, you’ll never have a reason to leave.”

  “Makes sense,” he muses. “How... How old were you when...”

  “My mom died?” I finish for him.

  “Yeah.”

  “I was five. It seems young, but some lose everything before they can even speak up for themselves. They started with simple lessons first, teaching us how to read, write, and talk properly. Then they hit us with the weapon tr
aining. We began with knives and slowly worked our way up.

  “If you made a mistake, you were punished, and if you lived to tell the tale, you made sure you learned from it. I wasn’t the only Ward; I grew up surrounded by other orphans-turned-assassins. I was always one of the best though and always seemed to be favoured among the higher agents.”

  Until I took their place.

  I sigh. “I killed my first victim when I was ten, was christened Silent Night at age twelve, and, by the time I was fifteen, had secured a spot in the top ten rankings of the Guild. I thought I was amazing. I thought I was doing the right thing. Now... Now I don’t know what to think.” I poke at the crust scraps left on my plate.

  “I mean, it’s not exactly your fault?” he tries. “Like you said: if it’s all you know, it’s all you know. What matters now is learning what you didn’t know. I grew up in the Resistance; my mom was a top agent. This would be all I know, but the Resistance doesn’t keep us in the dark. We believe in being aware of any information we can possibly get our hands on. We never know what we might need to do our job.”

  “Your mom was a top agent? What happened?”

  He gives me a sad look. “She died. I was thirteen. Not as tragic as your loss, but...”

  “Every loss is tragic,” I interrupt him, “no matter your age. I may pretend I don’t have a heart, but I do understand the pain of loss.”

  He smiles. “Thanks.”

  We sit in silence then, finishing our sandwiches.

  Then he looks at me and says, “So, you ready for a lecture?”

  “Ready as I’ll ever be.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  We continue like that for the next two weeks, training hard in the mornings, eating lunch together, and going to lectures in the afternoon. Bast and Blake join us for dinner each night and I find myself getting comfortable.

  I have trouble building relationships with them at first. Ajax and I are on good terms, but it’s hardly a friendship. Bast is all right, though his excessive questions regularly get on my nerves and Blake... Well, I find her kind of cold and unresponsive, but then again, that’s probably how I come off as.

  I notice Natalie lurking about more often than one would deem normal, but only in crowded halls where she could write an encounter off as coincidence, though she never gets close. I wonder if her father is still begging Jenson to get rid of me. I wonder if she’ll ever have the guts to show her teeth.

  At the end of my second week at the Resistance, Ajax says he has a surprise for me, but that it’ll wait until the morning. I hope that I’m getting an audience with Jenson, but the real surprise is even better. When I wake to his knocking and go to the door, he looks at me with excited eyes and says, “We’re going on a mission.”

  “What?” My eyes grow wide with disbelief. “Are you serious? You’ll pay dearly for it if you’re joking.” I jab a finger into his sternum.

  He holds his hands up in surrender. “Relax, I’m telling the truth. Jenson approved it. He says it’s time you enter the field.”

  “It’s only been two weeks; he trusts me?”

  “He doesn’t, but I do.”

  Silence descends between us. I don’t know what to say to that. Something bubbles in the pit of my stomach. I push it down.

  “Why would you trust me if your superior doesn’t, and why would he trust your judgment?”

  “I consider myself a good judge of character and I’ve spent enough time with you to get a good read. Jenson trusts me because he trusted my mother. He knows I would never do anything to intentionally harm this organization. If what you say about taking down the Guild is true, you could save all of our lives. So for now, I choose to trust you. God help us all.”

  “Fair enough,” I reply. “I’ll get dressed then.”

  I go to turn away, but then he says, “You’ll need these.” He hands me a pile of clothes.

  “What’s this?”

  Then I see. It’s a new uniform, and it’s black.

  “Assassins below,” I breathe. A part of me wants to cry, but I hold it back. “Thank you,” I say.

  He shrugs. “It’s not my choice; we never wear grey in the field, too conspicuous. You can wear your cloak too, if you’d like.”

  “Would I?” I smile then, a big goofy smile. Funny, I don’t remember the last time I did so.

  I go back into my room, closing the door behind me. Hurriedly, I pull off the grey suit I’m wearing and slip into the new sleek black apparel. In reality, it’s no different from the grey uniform, but in my opinion, everything is three times nicer when it’s black.

  I notice the belt along the waist of the suit with several horizontal hoops. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say they were weapon holders.

  Do I dare to dream?

  I grab my cloak from its hanger in the closet and rejoin Ajax in the hall. I realize now that he too is wearing black. How did I miss that earlier? It looks good on him.

  Wait, what?

  I shake off my thoughts and say, “Do I get to have a weapon for the mission?”

  He raises an eyebrow at me. “What makes you ask that?”

  I pull at my belt. “I know what these loops are for. I haven’t lived under a rock my whole life.”

  “Yes,” he sighs, “I’ve decided to test your loyalty by giving you a weapon. I’ve decided to trust you that far. Don’t prove me wrong.”

  “I won’t disappoint you,” I assure him, though I can’t promise anything.

  “Better hope you don't,” he replies, “or I’ll have to skin you alive. It wouldn’t be pretty.” He smiles to let me know he’s joking.

  Still, I grimace as memories flash through my mind. I can feel the cold, can smell the iron. “No, it’s not,” I say.

  He shoots me a look. “How would you know?”

  “I’ve seen it done.”

  His eyebrows shoot up.

  “Are you really that surprised?” I ask him. “I mean, according to you, assassins are nothing but animals. What’s a little bit of torture?”

  “I didn’t think…” He rubs the back of his neck. “Well, I’ve been taught that you do, of course, but a lot of our lessons are based on speculation. In my head, you’re merciless killers, sure, but I thought maybe you drew the line somewhere.”

  I laugh. “The Guild has no lines. I was eight years old when they started training me and my fellow Wards in the art of performing and withstanding torture. Skinning someone alive... That was one of the lessons.”

  Ajax looks like he’s about to be sick. “That’s... That’s horrible,” he chokes out.

  “It was, but I suppose, after a while, you get used to the screams.”

  At least, that’s what you tell yourself. Sometimes, I still hear them in my nightmares, clear as if I never left my spot against the wall in that cell…

  I shiver. I have to move on to another topic before I take a long and terrible trip down memory lane.

  “Anyway,” I go on, “can I see the weapon then?”

  “In a minute. We have to retrieve it first.”

  …

  Ajax leads me to a part of the base he never showed me, to a door at the end of a dark hall. He types a code I don’t catch into a panel beside the door and it slides open with a hiss. Inside, it’s an assassin’s paradise. I do my best not to drool. I thought the weapon collection in the training room was extensive…

  The walls are covered and the room disappears into shadow, hiding its extent.

  “Assassins below,” I breathe.

  He shakes his head. “You wait out here. I’ll be back.” He slips inside, closing me off from the wonders.

  A few minutes later, he returns, holding something behind his back. He clicks the door back into place, locking the rest of the weapons away from my reach. I admire his effort, but his first mistake was showing me the location of the store. Now it’s only a matter of cracking the code, if I decide to turn on them.

  “Close your eyes,” he tells me.

  I
hesitate a second before complying. I hear his footsteps coming closer.

  “Hold out your hands.” His voice comes from in front of me.

  I do as he says and he places the weapon in my hand. My fingers curl around a familiar sword sheath.

  I gasp, opening my eyes. I’m holding my own sword. “Are you serious? Do I... Do I get to keep it?”

  He nods. “As long as there are no hiccups on this mission, it’s yours. You’ve earned it.”

  “How?”

  Is he insane?

  He sighs. “Silent, you’re one of the most notorious assassins in the history of Haven. You came to the base of your lifetime enemy and didn’t start any fights. No one has been injured or killed. You’ve exercised self-control I honestly didn’t think you possessed. In short, I’m impressed; I never would’ve been able to do the same.”

  “Thank you, I guess,” I say, feeling a slight heat in my cheeks.

  “I should be asking how you do it,” Ajax continues.

  “I don’t know,” I reply. “I just... Well, I haven’t gotten angry at anyone. Not enough to act on it anyway. You’re all so...nice. I’m in shock still. Also, it’s hard to commit mass murder when you took all my weapons.”

  He gives me a look. “We both know you don’t need a weapon to kill someone.”

  “Well...”

  He smiles. “Save it, let’s gear up and get going while there’s still daylight.”

  “Fine by me.” I slide my sword sheath into one of the belt loops on my uniform.

  Then I watch, envious as Ajax goes back into the armoury to retrieve weapons for himself, but I know better than to ask for another. Giving me even a sword is an enormous act of faith; I don’t want to test it.

  “What’s your favourite weapon?” I ask as we head away from the armoury.

  The question catches him off guard and he says, “Does it matter?”

  “No, I was just wondering. Trying to make small talk actually, but I don’t know much about it.”

  He shakes his head. “I’ll add that to your lessons,” he jokes. “I guess, if I had to choose, I’d say the gun. I like the range and the power.”

  “Huh,” I say.

  “What?”

  “It’s my favourite too, though knives are a close second.”