Transcendence, page 19
part #6 of The Beginning After The End Series
As she closed her eyes, a soothing wave radiated from her fingertip into my head and down the rest of my body. My eyes fell shut as a gentle blanket of darkness wrapped around me.
Chapter 23
Why Are You Crying?
GREY
“Where to next, Nico?” I asked, cheerfully swinging the plastic bags filled with school supplies by my side.
“We still have to pick up our uniforms, right?” Cecilia answered, cradling a textbook in her arms as if it were a baby.
“It hasn’t been two hours yet since we got ourselves measured. We’ll make that our last stop,” Nico replied. He looked down at his little notepad. “We need to buy backpacks and calculators.”
The three of us strolled casually down the city sidewalk. The streets were old and crooked, with paving stones that wobbled and shifted out of place from the weight of passing pedestrians. Dull buildings towered over us, blending in with the murky gray sky. A recent rain shower had replaced the usually grimy stench of the area with a fresh, earthy smell, while puddles had gathered in the dips and potholes of the neglected streets.
Arcastead was by no means a pleasant or appealing city. Yet, at this moment, everything around me was at least bearable. From the homeless people lurking behind the trash bins in back alleys to the scowling soldiers threatening to arrest any passerby who accidentally bumped into them, the usual sights—and everything about this place that I hated so much—somehow seemed charming.
The sun had fallen by the time we finished purchasing all the supplies we needed to start our new lives as students. As we headed toward the outskirts of Arcastead, both the patrolling soldiers and street lights became scarcer, keeping us on our toes. Nico and I knew the area well enough to outrun any potential thieves or kidnappers, but having Cecilia with us made the walk back to the orphanage all the more tense.
“Are you excited to go to school, Cecilia?” Nico asked quietly, hoping to fill in the tense silence.
Her brows furrowed in thought but she ultimately nodded, with a smile that had become more frequent as of late. “I’m nervous and scared, but yes.”
I was about to chime in when a faint rustle drew my attention. Pretending to be digging through the plastic bag of school supplies, I took a peek behind us and saw a shadow flit into an alleyway.
“—right, Grey?” Nico nudged my arm.
“Huh?” I looked up at him.
“Sheesh, don’t space out on us,” Nico admonished. “I know we’ve been through this area hundreds of times, but it’s still dangerous to be daydreaming like that.”
Scratching the back of my head, I smiled sheepishly. “My bad.”
“And I was just telling Cecilia that we’ll be there in case anything happens to her,” Nico said.
Walking on the other side of Nico, Cecilia giggled, and I heard another faint noise.
A shiver ran down my spine. I could feel my heart pound against my ribcage as if trying to break free. Suddenly, I was all too conscious of my breathing—the same shallow, ragged breathing I’d heard so many times in movies when the main character was scared.
I was afraid. I didn’t know of what, but my instincts were telling me to run—to get out of here.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw something move—fast, just a twinkle against the flickering street light—and once again, the world seemed to slow down around me.
I lunged sideways, knocking Nico and Cecilia into the grimy street.
“Run!” I roared as I heard the click of another projectile being loaded from the shadows.
Although startled and confused, Nico was able to gather his wits. Abandoning his bags, he pulled our disoriented friend into the nearby alleyway.
It felt as if someone else was taking control of my body as I instinctively dipped down and picked up Cecilia’s textbook. I raised the thick hardbound book up to my chest, just as the force of the projectile sent me staggering back.
I glanced down quickly and saw a syringe-like object embedded into the textbook. The dart contained a clear liquid that quickly oozed into the pages of the book.
It wasn’t a bullet. I knew that for sure. Then a memory of my trip to the zoo with Headmaster Wilbeck sprang to mind. It was one of those needles they shot at animals in order to make them fall asleep.
Yanking the needle out of the textbook, I followed Nico and Cecilia into the narrow alleyway.
A gruff voice barked out orders from behind me. “After them! I don’t care what you do with the boys, just keep the girl alive.”
“Keep running!” My voice echoed off the worn stone walls as I ran, ducking under the rusted fire escape ladders and vaulting over trash bins.
It didn’t take me long to catch up to my friends, which meant the crooks behind us would soon reach us.
Nico was fine, but there were trails of blood running down his legs and arms from scrapes and scratches he’d gotten while running. I knocked down metal trash cans and discarded boxes, throwing anything hard I could get my hands on at the pursuers in a desperate attempt to slow them down.
“They’re… going to… catch up,” Nico wheezed. He was running out of breath.
“Why are they after us?” Cecilia panted. She was exerting all her energy and focus into not tripping over anything.
I shook my head. Other than what the man had said, I had no idea. “Nico, do you still have that glove on you?”
“I should—wait, you’re not seriously—”
“Can you think of any other way?” I said, cutting him off, my voice laced with impatience.
At Nico’s signal, we veered left into a narrow alley. Our pursuers’ footfalls were growing louder as they gained on us.
Grudgingly, Nico dug through his jacket pockets. After finding the glove, he reached out to give it to me, but Cecilia snatched it out of his hand.
“Cecilia?” Nico exclaimed.
“I-I’ll do it,” Cecilia stammered, putting on the fuzzy black glove.
Dumbfounded by the girl’s sudden courage, I nearly tripped over a pile of discarded clothes. “It’s too dangerous. And you still can’t control your ki!”
“We heard what that man yelled earlier,” Cecilia huffed. “They aren’t allowed to kill me, right?”
I looked to Nico for assistance, but he couldn’t come up with an argument either.
Cursing under my breath, I tightened my grip around the syringe in my hand.
“Fine. Nico, got a plan?”
My friend’s eyes narrowed the way they always did when he was thinking. “We make a right over there,” he ordered softly.
I looked back over my shoulder; two pursuers dressed in black were less than twenty feet away from us.
We turned sharply into a wide back alley behind an old restaurant. I had expected that we would keep running, but Nico pulled me back by my sleeve.
“Cecilia, fall on your belly like you just tripped over something. Grey, with me,” Nico hissed, dragging me behind a cluster of metal trash cans.
My heart thrummed like a drum, so loud that I worried our pursuers might hear.
It only took a couple of seconds for the two men in black to skid to a stop around the corner.
The one on the right spoke into his wrist. “Sir, we have the girl in our sights.”
“The girl tripped and it looks like the boys have abandoned her. Permission to proceed?” the other man said.
Unlike the crooks who had tried to mug Nico and me a few months back, these two were obviously professionals. They cautiously moved toward Cecilia, but to our surprise, our timid and quiet friend began bawling.
“Guys! Don’t leave me,” she wailed as she began crawling away. “Please!”
The man on the right scoffed and shook his head. He walked forward and stepped on Cecilia’s leg.
I gnashed my teeth as Cecilia cried out in pain, but, for once, Nico looked even angrier than me. His eyes were fierce in a way that made even me fearful.
The man who had asked for permission to proceed remained a few feet away, while the other pursuer reached down and pulled Cecilia up by the back of her coat.
He raised his other wrist and spoke into the communication device. “We have her.”
Cecilia took full advantage of the opportunity. She lashed around and planted her gloved hand on the pursuer’s face.
A shrill scream tore from her throat. Like the other times she had gone out of control, a blast of ki erupted out of her. However, some of her rampant ki had flowed down her arm to her hand. A current of electricity flashed out of the black glove, lighting the dingy alleyway.
The pursuer who had grabbed hold of Cecilia wasn’t even able to scream. His body spasmed and a puddle formed on the ground between the man’s legs as Cecilia pried herself free from his grasp.
Nico squeezed my arm and we rushed into action. Nico dived for the uninjured pursuer’s legs while I went for his sternum.
I’d thought the flash of light would have disoriented him enough that we could end the fight quickly, but he had recovered in time to react to our attack.
Sidestepping out of Nico’s reach, he kicked my friend away while bringing his right arm swinging down at me. I backstepped away from the blow, then closed in to strike his exposed throat, only for him to dip his head. His left hand shot toward my neck at frightening speed.
I gagged as the man’s cold hand gripped my throat and lifted me off the ground.
“You have potential, kid,” he sneered, bringing me close to his face. “A waste you have to die here.”
At this distance—less than arm’s length—I was able to see the man’s face for the first time. His nose and mouth were covered by a mask, but it didn’t matter: His scarred left eye was brown, and the right eye green. I would have known him anywhere.
My vision was darkening and I could feel the strength leaving my body, but despite the situation, I didn’t panic.
Praying to any higher being that might help me, I drove the point of the syringe into the man’s neck.
“What—” he gasped, letting go of me as he fell to the ground.
With no time to waste, I hurriedly roused the unconscious Nico and helped Cecilia back to her feet.
“We did it,” Cecilia whispered as she leaned on me for support. Her legs were shaking—not from the cold, but in fear—and her cheeks were lined with tears.
“Good job, you two,” Nico muttered weakly, putting Cecilia’s other arm over his shoulder for support.
“Yeah, we did it.” I nodded. “Now, come on. We need to get out of here before any more of them show up.”
“You’d best kill us and run far away, brats.”
I spun around to see the guy with the brown and green eyes squirming on the ground.
“You have nowhere to go,” he mumbled, his voice slurring from the effects of the drug. “I made sure of that.”
“Let’s go, Grey,” Nico urged, tightening his arm around Cecilia to keep her steady.
None of us spoke as we made our way back to the orphanage. Even the streets were quiet, except for the sirens that screamed in the distance. It was as if we didn’t want to accept what had happened to us—that we had almost been killed for no reason. I wanted to look forward. I wanted to think, instead, about the fact that we were going to be attending a school in a new city soon. We would have to buy new supplies, but that was fine. Everything would be okay once we got to the orphanage and Headmaster Wilbeck got us out of Arcastead.
Cecilia was able to walk on her own after a few blocks—a vast improvement from her earlier ki outbursts, which used to knock her out cold for hours.
“Thanks for the help,” Cecilia muttered, breaking the silence as she shyly handed the black glove—or what was left of it—back to Nico. The shock glove my friend had made had been reduced to a clump of wool from the overload of Cecilia’s ki. “Sorry about your glove.”
“Don’t worry about it.” Nico stuffed the remains of the glove into his tattered jacket and looked at me with a grin. “At least I was able to see what it was capable of, thanks to you. Grey wasn’t useful at all.”
“Make fun of me all you want; I was the one that saved you guys today,” I gloated, sticking my tongue out at Nico.
To my surprise, Nico responded seriously. “You’re right. I wasn’t any help in that fight.”
“Hey, I was just kidding,” I said, a pang of guilt ringing in my chest.
“Nico, it was only thanks to your glove that we were able to escape them,” Cecilia consoled him.
“Yeah!” I quickly agreed, walking ahead of them. “And I bet you can learn to make a lot more, and better, tools and weapons after going to school!”
Nico’s sullen expression brightened at our words. Taking out the remains of the shock glove, he gripped it tightly, a newfound fervor in his eyes. “We’ll need to get new supplies first. Headmaster Wilbeck is going to blow a fuse!”
Cecilia’s face contorted into a fair imitation of the headmaster’s serious frown. “She might even make us go back tomorrow morning to find them!”
The two of them burst into a fit of laughter behind me, and I let them enjoy their moment. The summer nights were usually warm, but I thought the heat felt different tonight. The air was dry and there was a smell of smoke that was only getting stronger... Why?
I turned the corner onto the street our orphanage was on, and found my answer.
Behind me, Nico and Cecilia drew closer, but their footsteps seemed to echo and their voices were muffled, as if coming from a very long way away.
Suddenly, the words of the man with the brown and green eyes rang in my head: “You have nowhere to go.”
I stopped dead in my tracks, my gaze locked on the sight of the orphanage burning to the ground. Police cars, fire trucks, and ambulances were clustered in front of our home.
And then I saw her.
She was being carried on a stretcher. A paramedic had just put a tarp over her, covering her face, but I saw her. I saw Headmaster Wilbeck.
I ran, leaving Nico and Cecilia behind. I evaded the policemen securing the perimeter and pushed aside the paramedics.
People shouted around me but I couldn’t hear what they were saying. All I could hear was my blood pounding in my ears.
I tore off the tarp covering Headmaster Wilbeck.
Blood—too much of it.
Her eyes were closed. Why are they closed?
I shook her. She needed to wake up.
Nico, Cecilia, and I had been attacked by bad people, but we’d gotten away. Everything was supposed to be okay now.
I shook her too hard. Her arm fell limply off the edge of the stretcher. Her eyes were still closed.
Hands were grasping for me, words tumbling like fall leaves around me, but they were lost behind the man’s words, which burned like a hot iron rod against my skull.
“You have nowhere to go.”
ARTHUR LEYWIN
“Arthur!”
My eyes shot open; tears were streaming down my face.
Everything was still blurry, but I could tell I was in my room now, inside the castle. My breaths were still short and erratic, and my left hand gripped something soft and warm.
“Arthur,” the familiar, soothing voice called out to me again.
I turned my head, blinking away the tears still forming in my eyes.
Next to me, holding my hand, was Tessia. Her eyes were red and wet with tears as well.
“Tessia?” My voice came out dry and raspy. “Why are you crying?”
“Dummy.” She choked back a laugh, smiling as the tears rolled down her cheek. “I could ask you the same thing.”
Chapter 24
Intermission
My gaze lingered on Tess. She was smiling—laughing, even—with relief and embarrassment as she wiped away her tears.
This was the first time I had seen my childhood friend since the ceremony where I’d been given the title of a Lance, but it had been even longer since the last time we had spoken.
The elven princess had changed since then. There was a faint scar just along her hairline above her right ear; it might have gone unnoticed had she not tied up her hair. Battle scars were visible all over her arms, and a fresh bandage was wrapped around her left forearm.
“You’re hurt,” I noted, gently tracing the line of blood seeping through her bandage with my fingers.
Noticing my worried expression, she grabbed my scarred hand, taking it tenderly in both hands. “Oh, please. I have more injuries from attempting to cook than from actually fighting.”
I laughed, glad to have her there, speaking to me, holding on to me. Despite the calluses on her palms and fingers, her hand felt soft and warm compared to mine.
Shaking her head, Tessia said, “Do you have any idea how scared I was when I heard the news from my captain?”
“Your captain? Does that mean you got promoted to head?” I asked, staring at the princess’s stunned expression.
“You’re unbelievable. Your thoughts immediately go to whether I got promoted? You almost died, Arthur!”
“I’m just glad you’re doing well,” I replied.
Tess took a deep, resigned breath, and leaned her head on my arm. “I don’t even have the strength to argue with you.”
I felt her hands squeeze mine, and the gesture was so warm and comforting that I nearly burst into tears again. Time seemed to slow down for a brief moment, and we stayed there, silent and contemplative and together.
“You took such careful measures to make sure everyone would be safe that I never even thought about how dangerous this war would be for you.” Tess lifted her head, gazing up at me with her brilliant turquoise eyes. “Seeing you like this—in bed, full of injuries—it was a cold reminder that you’re only human and not some indestructible warrior mage.”
I snorted. “Is that how I look to you most of the time? Some indestructible figure?”
“With the emotional maturity of a toddler,” she finished with just a hint of a smile.
“Is that any way to talk to a general?” I scolded, trying to keep a serious face as she struggled to do the same.
