Pursued (46 page)

Merrick couldn’t control his frustration. “But why, Mamam? You don’t know the things they say to me, the things they do. Why can’t I teach one of them a lesson, just once?”

“Because…” She’d hesitated, her green eyes troubled. “Because, Merrick, sometimes when someone like you—when a hybrid—starts fighting, they can’t stop. Do you understand?”

Slowly, Merrick had nodded. He didn’t think about it much, but he knew it was there—a deep, untapped well of violence that lived just under the surface of his soul.
If I fought them,
he told himself, thinking of the bullies at school, the ones that jeered at him and called him “half-breed scum” and “Kindred dog.”
If I let myself go, even once, I wouldn’t stop until they were all dead. Every last one of them.

It was a horrible thing to realize about himself. Horrible, but true. He could feel the cold curtain of hatred—the killing frost, as he thought of it to himself—wanting to come over him sometimes. It hung over him like a cloud, waiting to descend when he was having an especially bad day and the other students wouldn’t leave him alone, but somehow he always managed to stave it off. In the past, he’d done that by talking to Sylvan. But now that his friend was gone, he had no outlet. Lately Merrick had felt the rage growing inside him, getting deeper and hotter, like an angry flame licking at the edges of his soul, hungry to consume him. But if he let the fire burn too brightly, he knew the killing frost would not be far behind.

I must not give in,
he told himself as he walked through the public reflection area, looking at the snowdrop trees, which were in full bloom. Their delicate, lacy white blossoms looked like palm-sized snowflakes caught just before they melted.
Can’t let them get to me.

But it was getting harder and harder to control his rage, to put it away and not give in to the cold hatred that wanted to consume him. Especially when the others teased him about not being a true male. Merrick thought the shame of not letting his first blood yet would kill him sometimes.

I should go out on my own,
he thought as he walked past the quiet waters of the pond.
I know where Jonquil keeps his shale. I’ll kill a vranna and drag it back to the grotto on my own. That would shut the bastards up. They’d never dare to call me half-breed or a child again. I—

“Hey, half-breed!”

The unwelcome shout came from his left and Merrick turned, frowning. It was Rattis, the leader of the males who bullied him at the learning house, and he had his whole group of followers with him.

Merrick glared at them. “What do you want? It’s a nice enough day—we even got out of learning house early. Can’t you just leave me alone?”

“Now why would we do that?” Rattis swaggered over. He and the other males in his group all wore blood-red
tharps
and red fur boots
,
a symbol of their gang of pure-blooded Primes. “When it’s so much fun to teach you a lesson?”

“And what ‘lesson’ would that be, Rattis?” Merrick growled.

“The lesson that hybrids and half-breeds aren’t wanted here. Especially ones not even male enough to kill a
vranna
and let first blood.” Rattis came right up and stood toe to toe with him. He was a head shorter than Merrick and not half as muscular, but he acted with the assurance of someone who is confronting a coward, someone who won’t fight back no matter what is done to him.

I’m no coward,
Merrick thought, his hands curling into fists.
I could kill them—kill them all without even trying.
But if he did that—if he so much as laid a finger on them—Jonquil would cast him and his mother out. It would kill his mother if she had to live with her sister again and their only other option would be the frozen tundra above, where nothing warm-blooded could survive for long. Tranq Prime was a closed world—those without kin or someone willing to take them in died in its icy grip.

So Merrick took a deep breath and pushed the cold, killing rage that wanted to rise in him back down below the surface. “I have no quarrel with you, Rattis,” he said in the most neutral voice he could manage. “Leave me in peace and I’ll be on my way.”

“If we did that, then you’d never leave,
hybrid scum.”
Rattis spat on the ground at his feet. “You and your whore of a mother would stay here forever, polluting our grotto with your impure filth.”

“What
did you say?” Merrick took a step closer to the other male so that he was towering over Rattis. “
What
did you just call my mother?”

For the first time, Rattis looked uneasy. “I only spoke the truth.”

“He’s right,” Nadire, one of the other males in the gang sneered. “My older brother visited her yesterday.”

“So did mine.” Rattis laughed, apparently forgetting his unease. “He said she has a mouth sweeter than any female in the grotto. And her cunt—”

Merrick could feel the rage rising in him and this time there was no stopping it. It was one thing to put up with the insults and jeers about his own mixed parentage, but
no one
was going to speak ill of his mother. His arm shot out, and he gripped Rattis by the throat and hoisted him into the air. He shook the other male as though he weighed no more than a doll. “You dare!” he roared. “You dare to tell filthy lies about my mother? I’ll
kill
you!”

Rattis’ face turned as red as his
tharp
and he scrabbled at Merrick’s hand frantically. “True,” he wheezed. “Not lying. Ask…anyone.”

“Let him down!” Nadire shouted. “He
is
telling the truth—we all are.” He looked at the other pure blooded males. “Aren’t we?” They nodded their heads and murmured ascent.

The rage inside Merrick died down a little, giving way to confusion and disbelief. It couldn’t be, could it? Surely they were just trying to hurt him—saying the worst possible thing to wound him to the core. Then he remembered the strange males he’d sometimes seen leaving the domicile as he came in from his hours at the learning house. He’d assumed they were friends of Jonquil’s. Jonquil, who never did any work but somehow always managed to have plenty of money to spare. Jonquil, who looked at his mother with those pale, predatory eyes, as though he was calculating how much she was worth…

Stunned, he dropped Rattis to the ground. The other male lay there, choking and rubbing his bruised neck.

“You’re a liar,” Merrick told him but he wasn’t sure if he was trying to convince Rattis or himself.

“Am not.” Rattis scrambled to his feet, his face still purple with strain. “Why do you think Jonquil took the two of you in, in the first place? It wasn’t from the goodness of his heart—that’s for damn sure.”

Rage rose in Merrick again and he started forward. But something stopped him—the need to know. The need to refute this ugly, hateful rumor once and for all.

Rattis and the others took advantage of his indecision and scrambled away to what they obviously considered a safe distance. They put the body of the large, silvery lake between themselves and Merrick, but Rattis, as always, had to have the last word.

“Go see for yourself if you don’t believe me,” he shouted, his words echoing across the lake. “I heard the Bloodstart brothers talking about going to see her together this afternoon. She takes them two at a time—did you know that, you hybrid freak?”

“You fucking bastard,” Merrick growled. “You’ll pay for those lies, I promise.”

“You won’t be able to touch me once I show the house master these.” Rattis pointed to the collar of purple bruises, which were beginning to rise on his neck where Merrick had choked him. “You’ll be dismissed and kicked out of learning house and probably the entire grotto.”

“You—” Merrick started around the lake but the bully and his gang fled, laughing as they ran.

“Run along,
half-breed,”
Rattis called over his shoulder.
“
Run along and find out the truth about your whore of a mother.”

They fled into the snowdrop trees and disappeared from view, but Merrick wasn’t following them, anyway. He had to know now—had to know the truth, no matter how much it stung.

Turning, he set out at a run for his domicile.

* * * * *

Elise watched, her heart breaking, as a much younger and more innocent Merrick ran toward home. He looked so different here, in his vision of the past. His hair was longer, a glossy blue-black color she thought was beautiful. He was tall and big for his age, but it was clear he hadn’t nearly reached his full growth yet. How old was he, here in the past? Twelve? Thirteen? Elise couldn’t tell, but she thought he was somewhere in that age range. His eyes were the same—the lovely, mismatched blue and gold—but there were no scars on his face or body. Strange to see, since the older version of Merrick—the one she knew—had scars everywhere, both inside and out.

Her heart ached for this younger, more naive Merrick. He’d been hurt by the death of his father ,and by the cruel taunts of the other boys, but his innocence hadn’t been stripped from him—not yet. Yet Elise was terribly afraid that was about to happen. She hoped with all her might that the other boys had just been teasing him and telling lies about his mother—a woman the young Merrick obviously worshiped and adored, if Elise’s glimpse into his thoughts was accurate. Was she about to be knocked off her pedestal?

Elise didn’t have long to wonder. The young Merrick ran through the high, arching cavern of rainbow-colored rock and down a complex series of tunnels that got progressively smaller and narrower. At last, just when Elise was beginning to feel claustrophobic, even though she knew she wasn’t really there, he came to a simple stone door set in a brown stone wall. He produced some kind of key-like device from the folds of the black wrap he wore around his waist, and hastily opened the door.

Inside, the living area was depressingly dim and shabby. A thin channel of steaming purple water ran through the center of the room, which was lit only by some faint light fixtures attached to the low ceiling. It was clear someone had tried to pretty it up—there was a vase filled with fresh blossoms, like those from the grove of trees Merrick had been standing in when the vision began. But the furniture was threadbare and scuffed, and the floors had dirt grimed into them that no mop, however industrious, could ever completely eradicate.

Lounging in one of the broken-down chairs was a man who looked to Elise to be in his mid-forties. He had the lean, hungry look of a greyhound that has never caught a rabbit and the light blond hair and pale blue eyes that seemed to be the norm for people here.

“Merrick!” He sat up frowning when Merrick rushed through the door. “What in the seven hells are you doing home this time of day? Why aren’t you at learning house?”

“Let out early,” Merrick growled. “Where’s my mother?”

The older man shifted uncomfortably. “Why…at the market. She decided to do a little shopping—make something special for our last meal tonight.”

Merrick’s mismatched eyes narrowed. “Liar.” Turning, he ran through the living area and into a smaller kitchen and dining room area, which looked clean and neat but was every bit as shabby as the living room.

“Wait!” the older man shouted, leaping to his feet. He ran after Merrick and put a hand on his shoulder. Now that they were standing together, Elise could see that the older man was taller, but not by much.

“What?” Merrick glared at him. “Get your hand off me, Jonquil.”

The man’s pale blue eyes narrowed. “She’s taking a nap,” he snapped. “Let her be.”

“I thought she was at the market. Is she buying special ingredients for last meal or sleeping—which is it, Jonquil? Either way, I’m going in.” Merrick shrugged the man’s hand off his shoulder and turned to a small doorway that led off the kitchen area.

“No!’ Jonquil shouted but it was too late, Merrick had already swung the door wide and seen what was going on, on the other side.

From where she stood, silent and invisible, Elise could see it all. There was a bed—a thin mattress set on a stone platform—and on it a lovely, disheveled woman with blonde hair and green eyes. On the bed with her were two men whose nearly identical faces proclaimed them to be related—probably brothers. Both of them had their pants around their ankles and one was in the act of mounting the woman—the woman who had to be Merrick’s mother, Elise realized with a sinking heart.

The two men looked up at the interruption, the looks of surprise and fear on their faces almost comical. But there was nothing funny about the look on Merrick’s face. As Elise watched, his expression went from disbelief to horror to black rage.

“Merrick,” his mother cried, her pale skin flushing red. She scrambled to cover herself with the rumpled sheets. “What are you doing here?”

“I was going to ask you the same thing, Mother.” He looked at her coldly. “Are these two males attacking you?”

“Of course we’re not,” blustered one of the men.

“We paid our money fair and square,” the other one protested.

“Is that so? You
paid
for my mother?” Merrick spoke quietly, but the look on his face was hatred so pure and cold it was frightening to see, especially on one so young. Something in that look seemed to scare the two men.

“I…we…” began one, backing away as he reached for his pants.

“She…Jonquil said we could…” The other man was also fumbling for his trousers.

“Jonquil said that, did he?” Merrick’s voice was a soft, threatening growl and Elise could feel his rage rising through their bond. She could feel the cold bloodlust Merrick called “the killing frost” overtaking him and this time he wasn’t trying to push it away. This time he embraced it.

“Yes,
I
said it.” Merrik’s stepfather, in some ways as loathsome as Elise’s own, was suddenly standing in the narrow doorway. “So get out now, Merrick and let them finish their business.”

“Let them finish?
Let them finish?”
Merrick took a step toward his stepfather, his hands clenched into fists at his sides, his eyes blazing. Elise wasn’t sure but it looked to her as though his fangs had grown much longer and sharper than they had been at first.