Nevermor (13 page)

“After you saw
her the first time,
you
were the one who asked
us
what we thought
about it,” Nix continued to argue.  “You asked for our opinions, and we gave
them to you.  You said you weren’t going to bring her here, and now you’ve gone
and done it!”

“I was the one
who got to choose, and I chose her,” Rifter said calmly.

“And to hell
with the rest of us!”

That had done
it.  In the passing of that breath, Rifter drew his sword, and all of them
tensed to see that flash of metal as he lifted it toward Nix.

“I decided we
needed a girl; so I brought a girl.  If you’ve got anything more to say to me
about this, we’ll do it with weapons,” he warned sharply.

Nix didn’t seem
rattled.  He looked at the shining end of the sword and then back up at his
brother – his
leader
.

“One of these
days, I’m not going to just walk away,” he warned.  “But for now, it is once
again
as you wish
.”

Nix stooped a
little in a mocking bow and backed away, retreating deeper into the tunnels. 
There was a collective sigh as Rifter put his blade away again, and everything
finally came back to a calm.

“So, a
girl
!”
Finn said loudly to draw them back in.

“Is she pretty?”
Toss asked with great interest.  “I want to meet her.”

“Me too!” said
Mach and Mech at the same time, after which they gave one another a sharp
look.  They didn’t like it when they expressed the same thought – as if their
minds were the same mind.

Even Sly put his
book down, looking interested.  “What’s her name?” he asked.

“You’ll have to
ask her yourself,” Rifter scoffed, feigning annoyance.  “I can’t do everything
for you.”

“Well, where is
she then?” Toss wanted to know.  For such a large boy, his face had a genial
quality that made it impossible for his brothers to think of him as anything
other than an enormous child.

“Somewhere
outside.  Come to think of it, you’d probably better go make sure she’s still
alive out there,” Rifter said slyly.  “If not, I don’t suppose there was any
sense in having the argument.”

2

Wren waited in
the spot that Rifter had instructed her to wait, vowing that this time, she
would not be led astray.  The wisp – as Rifter had referred to it – had drifted
off again, but Wren could still hear the whispers as the fairy passed around
her, keeping a safe distance as she watched.  Rifter had been gone for several
moments, and Wren was beginning to wonder how long she would have to wait for
him.  She didn’t want things to take a turn like they had before.

Rifter has good
intentions, but
no one has ever taught him any manners at all,
she decided firmly.

To pass the
time, she studied her own shadow – this imp that had attached to her.  It
seemed as regular as a real shadow and she didn’t feel any different because of
it.  She was only bothered to know the truth about it.  The way the mimic had
come upon her hadn’t been very pleasant, but the imp seemed obedient enough for
now.

Perhaps it’s not
such a big deal
,
she told herself.  What would it be like without a shadow following her around,
after all?

She began to
hear a disturbance coming through the trees and she turned, expecting that
Rifter had come back for her, but instead, she saw a number of forms
approaching through the mist.

More pirates?
  She wondered
if she ought to run or at least duck down and hide, but she was sure that they
had already seen her.  The drifting orb shot out of the trees and settled in
the midst of them, and with her light, Wren could tell that she was looking at
a group of boys, all around her age.

There were five
of them – of varying sizes; some younger, some older – and they stopped in a
line several steps away from her.  They did not speak, and neither did she, but
not because she couldn’t think of anything to say.  She was simply too shocked
to do anything.

They were
ghastly.

They peered at
her past dirt, blood and ratty mops of hair.  Though they were filthy, there
was no mistaking their youth.  Their eyes were bright beneath the grime.

The arrangement
of their clothes seemed to be based on what they had managed to kill.  They
were decorated with furs and bones, feathers and hide.  They wore necklaces of
teeth.  She believed some of those pearls were human.  The group of them was
frightening – worse than the orphans running wild on the streets of London –
and if Wren had not felt that they were familiar with Rifter, she would have
fled from them.

They are just
boys
,
she told herself. 
You have two brothers, and there are other boys at the
orphanage.

I would much
rather deal with boys than men.

“Hello,” she
greeted them finally, putting on a warm smile.  She saw that Rifter had emerged
now, standing back behind the rest, observing as they reacted to her.  She felt
safer to see him there.  He wouldn’t let anything happen to her – she hoped.

The boys seemed
as wary of her as she was of them.  A tall, rotund boy nudged one of the others
with his elbow, urging him forward to be the braver one of the group.  This one
was pale with thick black curls, and after an annoyed glance at the other, he
did step toward her.

“Uhh, hello!” he
greeted her in return.  “I’m Finn, and these are my brothers.  Toss, Sly, the
um, the twins over there – Mach and Mech.  And there’s another one around here,
Nix, but he’s pissed off right now.”  He was sputtering, and finally he stopped
with a shrug.  “I’m sorry!  You’re – well –
pretty
.”

That melted her
fear away.  They had won her over.

“Thank you,” she
said with a smile, feeling flattered – though of course the admission of her
beauty gave her a sense of power over them, as it does with all lovely girls. 
She felt more comfortable in their midst.

Finn grew braver
at that, but not only him.  They all moved toward her, coming closer to get a
better look, and she was able to examine them a little better as well.  She
made mental notes about them to be able to distinguish one from another, but it
wasn’t so hard.  They were all very different.

The one called
Toss was larger than the rest, though perhaps not any taller than Nix.  She
would remember him easily by his round face.  When she tried to look him in the
eye, he blushed and directed his own gaze at the ground.  His brown hair was
cut unevenly like Rifter’s, longer in some places than others.  They had
certainly hacked away at it themselves without caring much.  The large coat he
wore was stitched together from many types of fur, as if no single animal would
be enough to clothe him.  Still, he was not so much fat as he was solid.  He
definitely appeared strong.

Sly was short
and thin, his clothes dark and snug.  The jacket he wore looked as though he
had ripped the skin off an animal and put it on himself, for the top came up in
a hood that still had the pointed ears from the creature’s own head.  His brown
hair was a bit long and stuck out more on one side than the other, but his face
was delicate and almost pretty for a boy.  His eyes were wide and alert,
observing everything.  There was a little curve to his mouth that seemed to
promise that he knew something she didn’t, though she couldn’t have known what
that was.

The twins were a
bit difficult to distinguish – not from the group, but from each other.  She
was not sure which had been introduced to her as Mech and which was Mach.  They
were dressed the same way in ponchos of brown fur, and their hair was shaved
down the sides but with a long portion down the middle which stood straight
up.  Wren got the impression that they kept themselves so similar purposefully,
as if it was a private joke so that they could swap themselves out as needed
and no one would know.

Finn had a very
welcoming face and a friendly smile – if not a little crooked.  He wore a heavy
fur jacket, and there was a satchel secured across his body.  He was at once
very amiable and always looked her in the eye.  Presently, he took her hand to
draw her attention.  His own were wrapped in dirty strips of cloth.

“Now you know
us,” Finn reminded her.  “But who are you?”

She felt
immediately foolish, wondering if she’d been staring at them for too long.

“Oh!  I’ve
forgotten to introduce myself!  I’m sorry; I’m Wren.”

“
Ren
!” 
Finn dropped her hand immediately and took a step back.  It was as if he had
just realized he was holding the tail of a cobra.  Toss had the same horrified
look in his eyes and crossed himself hurriedly.

Seems kind of
rude
,
she thought, mildly insulted.  They’d had an even more severe reaction than Rifter
when he’d first heard her name.

“It must be an
omen,” muttered one of the twins quietly as they both leaned in to whisper
together.

“We should
rename her,” Toss suggested.

“She can’t get a
new name until the Vow,” Sly reminded him.

Wren only stared
at them.  What was the issue?  She was intent to get to the bottom of it.

“What do you
mean?  What is wrong with my name?” she wanted to know.

“
The Ren
is the name we gave to a dangerous creature that roams the land,” Rifter
explained.  “We usually try to stay out of its way, because we haven’t quite
decided how to kill it yet.”

“Can’t you start
calling it something else?” she tried.  “Why Ren?”

“Because if it
catches you, it will
rend
you limb from limb,” came a voice from the
shadows.  A familiar figure stepped out from the trees and they all found that
Nix hadn’t gone too far after all.  He emerged now with a smirk on his mouth,
his long hair hanging in his face.  “It’s a terrible monster and we just can’t
seem to get rid of it.  How ironic.”

They are going
to stop insulting me like this
, she decided.  If it hadn’t been clear
before, it was obvious to Wren now – the boy Nix did not care for her at all.

“Are you saying
you’d like to get rid of me?” she asked him pointedly.

“I’m just saying
that the similarities are a little too close to ignore.”

Nix certainly
wasn’t keeping his feelings about her a secret and he didn’t care who knew it. 
She saw that Rifter was giving him a firm stare, but Nix was ignoring him –
until Rifter stepped up to confront him head-on.

“I told you not
to say another word,” Rifter threatened.

Nix looked back
at him levelly, and though he was trying not to appear intimidated, it was
evident that he was.  He didn’t respond, and eventually shifted his eyes away. 
Once Nix had been subdued, Rifter turned to the rest of them.

“For as long as
Wren is here, she is one of us,” he told them.  “You will give her the same
regard as you do each other.  But she is also a
lady
, so I want you to
treat her with respect as well, or else you deal with me.  Anything unclear?”

Wren felt proud
that he had stood up for her that way, but then Toss was raising his hand
tentatively.

“Yes?”  Rifter
was willing to entertain his question, but there was a warning in his voice.

“You said we
should treat her like one of us, so are we giving her the test?”

Nix perked up at
that.  He raised his head and his eyes flashed.  “That’s a damn good question.”

They all looked
toward Rifter expectantly, and he glanced at Wren in consideration, his mouth a
grim line.  She didn’t know what they were talking about, but she didn’t like
how it had affected him.

“You should know
the rules,” Nix said smugly.  “
You
made them.”

Rifter was
silent for another moment, mulling it over.  “I’m not so sure that she should
have the same test.  She is a girl, after all.  Girls were meant to be
protected.”

That would have
made her happy – if it wasn’t for what he said next.

“But there are
still a few hours before dawn,” Rifter agreed with a smile, after which all of
them looked at each other knowingly.

“Off to the
beach then!” Finn said, rallying the rest of them.  They all began to whoop
agreeably.  “Lead the way, Wisp!”

The glowing
fairy did oblige, and they all started after her, following the light that
threw shadows across the forest.

“But we just
came from there,” Wren said, confused.  To hear how Nix had seemed to promote
this made her feel uneasy about what it meant.

“
Now
we’re getting somewhere,” Nix said with a grin.  Whatever was going on now, he
was more pleased with it than her arrival.  Actually, most of them seemed to be
in high spirits.

“Let’s go,”
Rifter said to her, stepping to fall in behind them, but she gripped his arm,
her fingers catching in the leaves.