The Trial (The Tree House) (23 page)

“Well, you’re a little firecracker,” he spat, his sour breath permeating the mask and making me gag. The arm around my neck tightened quickly, causing a sound to escape my throat. The ravager cocked his cow skull head to the side and I could feel my stomach churn violently. With one quick motion, he pulled my hood off and ripped the cloth off my face. “What do we have here?” he asked excitedly watching my long hair swirl around my head in the wind. He caught a strand and pulled his mask off so he could swipe the hair under his nose. The ravager’s face was disfigured, scarred from the rain, surely. I winced in disgust as he brushed my hair against his face. “We haven’t seen a pigeon in a long time. Eh, Cook?”

“No we haven’t,” the one behind me breathed into my ear.

I tried tilting my head away from him but his grip around my neck tightened. The one in front of me stepped closer and ran a jagged fingernail down my cheek. “You’ll be very useful, little bird” he whispered scraping his nail down my neck and along the zipper of my coat.

I nudged his hand off me and spat hard, speckling his face with blood from my cut cheeks. The ravager behind me grabbed one of my arms and wrenched it hard behind my back and I clenched my teeth to keep from crying out. The man in front of me laughed as he wiped a speck of blood off his nose and licked his finger. “Let’s go,” he said and turned away from me.

The ravager holding me lifted me off the ground with the arm around my neck, giving me no leverage to resist. I tried wiggling and kicking my legs but he only wrenched my arm further up my back. When I heard it pop, I began thrashing harder. Everything around me started to fade as my lungs fought for air. My body went limp and something
exploded right in my ear. I didn’t even notice when the ravager loosened his grip on my neck and I went crashing to the ground.

Slowly, my surroundings came back into focus. My cheek rested on the wet pavement and the rain hitting my face felt like a million little pin pricks in my skin. A few gunshots cracked the air and I quickly lifted my hood, covering my face from the rain and my already sensitive ears from the noise. A loud laugh caused me to lift my head to see just what was going on.

My vision was still blurry but I could just make out the horns of one of the ravagers’ masks and a flash of blond hair under a dark hood. The ravager went down with one slam in the face from an elbow. I turned my head the other direction to find a darker blur, completely in black, ramming a booted foot into another ravager’s stomach causing him to double over. The butt of a shotgun came down hard on his back sending him sprawling to the ground.

Clickclick.
Bang.

A spray of blood erupted from the ravager’s head and he was still. I waited until only the celebratory laughs of the brothers filled the air and then I slowly got to my feet.

“You fired a gun? Are you trying to get us all killed?” I asked, my voice rising with anger as I approached them.

Ben smiled, his teeth gleaming. “Judging by the way you were handling yourself, you wanted to get killed. I taught you to fight better than that,” he replied pointing a smug finger at me.

I batted it away. “If you hadn’t noticed,” I sneered. “There were four of them and one of me.”

“Well, there was one of me and I still got the job done.”

“You cheated,” I muttered watching as Ben twirled his hand gun around his finger.

Jack nudged his brother hard causing him to almost
drop the gun. “Who got the last shot in?” he asked glaring at Ben. Then Jack turned to me before Ben could give him an answer. His gloved hands cupped my face. “Are you alright?” Jack asked me as concern filled his green eyes.

All I could do was nod before burying my face into his jacket.