Page 118 of Fallen Thorns
“Please.”
“I can’t. I can’t. I can’t,” she whispered into his curls, kissing his head.
A twinge rose up the back of my neck and my cheeks burned. I watched this tragedy unfold in front of me and I couldn’t take it. I could not let this happen.I can’t.
It’s nearly time.
I hoped Lucy knew what was coming.
* * *
I stand sheltered by a tree, some meters away from where she stands on her own, her back resting against the crumbling walls. A flurry of snow starts to fall, the sky an ashy coal. She moves in a shiver before lighting a cigarette in impatience.
I smarten my bracelets.
We waited for empty streets,before the world awoke. Some of us armed physically, but all of us fortified with our mental guards.
We may have looked like an army, but one filled with terrified soldiers sent into the jaws of death,wantingto fight but afraid, nonetheless.
Once we hit the woods, the snow dissipated under the shelter of the gnarling branches. Torches on, the weight of it all started to pull on my shoulders and Mars slipped by my side, throwing me an unreadable glance. No one spoke, the crunch underfoot created the only sound around us for seemingly miles. There was no true path, either, yet each of us had the sense to stick close together — all hyperaware of the slightest crack, or intake of breath.
Marianne led us, her Thorns, her step refusing to slow. I wish I could have understood how she was feeling in that moment, but her fast pace left no room for hesitation. I gulped down the lump in my throat at least six or seven times, as it returned with each step. I kept my hands in my trench pockets to hide them away and stop them from exposing how I really felt — utterly terrified. This woman hurt Ben.This woman killed me.
A further twenty minutes finally spat us out into the clearing, the church mere yards away from us. The surrounding trees formed a perfect amphitheatre for battle.
Marianne had prepared us to be ready for anything, her slowing steps and glancing back at us set our first plan into motion.Do not startle. She will not be alone.
From our vantage point, and the still dead sky, the abandoned building seemed entirely neglected. Nothing but the crawling ivy and window-piercing brambles hugged it. Our many searches of this land still give it a sense of familiarity in the faded light, but this time it was different. We had no scent, no sight, just sense. She had to have been there already.But where?
“Watch your backs,” Marianne called.
A boot clicked beside me and I looked over, realising I was standing almost eye level with Casper; red rage in his mourning eyes.
I lowered my head in acknowledgement, and he in turn, did the same. A silent understanding.
A twig crack startled us all to our left. Nothing but dead woods, blackening into an endless abyss. Something creaked from above and a large bird flew outwards in a frightened manner. Even the cold air now seemed to be whispering to us, but there was still no ground movement.
Seconds passed.
“We’re here,” Marianne broke the silence with a sturdy shout. “Just as you wished.”
A few Thorns behind me exchanged a frightened look with one another, as if silently asking whether our leader had a death wish. The rest of us knew we could wait no longer. In my pockets, my nails bit into my palms.
Nothing. Then, a laugh.Lucy.
And so, it begins.
From out of the shadows, her figure emerged. My fists made a tear into my skin, and blood welled in my palms. Casper was ready to lunge forward, yet Mars and two other Thorns held him back from all sides. He bared his canines in a hiss of discomfort.
The figure started to clap as it prowled forward through the knee-high blades of grass and shrivelled weeds.
She came in view fully, green hair flowing elegantly over both shoulders. I recognised her outfit. The same one she wore the last time my heart beat, the one that adorned her body as she gleefully lowered me to the ground and wished me sweet dreams. The clothes only I would recognise: a direct address to me.
Her claps slowed; she believed she had the upper hand.She does.
A toothy grin.
Marianne straightened her back, giving her but an inch of height on Dumont.
