Daybreak (18 page)

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Authors: Ellen Connor

Tags: #Romance, #General, #Paranormal, #Fiction

BOOK: Daybreak
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The young man named Koss, no older than twenty and thin as a willow branch, spoke with quiet enthusiasm about his animal self. “I’m a marmot. Sorta like a . . . well, like a big squirrel.” He grinned with boyish sweetness that belied his place among Arturi’s top people. “But little mammals get out of big trouble.”
After the formalities, Pen relaxed. Just a little. She could do this. She could be one of these people without the need for the pretense of the Orchid. No one had mentioned that name, not here. Perhaps with Arturi leading the way, she could learn what it was like just to be Pen—helping him make this world a better place.
And maybe that would ease the deep ache in her heart. The ache Tru’s leaving had caused.
“We gather here because there’s work to be done,” Arturi said, meeting each person’s eyes in turn.
Pen hid a shiver as their gazes locked. It was like seeing an imaginary friend and an old flame made real, all in one man whose face remained unfamiliar. Absolutely disconcerting. Yet as always, something about Arturi made her pay attention. His calmness and his control over even the simplest situations screamed magic. But there was none. Just the strange charisma some human beings could wield.
“And,” he continued, “because it’s best to make plans in plain sight. Even those who trust us implicitly would begin to suspect our motives if we met behind closed doors, allowing access to only a select few.” He gestured to their position on the docks. Workers moved here and there, attending to daily business. But any could stop and listen. The circle was that exposed. “We govern by their consent. What right do I have to bar them from listening, from adding their input? In this way, we build trust.”
Zhara nodded, her head bent to the work in her lap. Quick fingers knitted at a hole in the fishing net until it was no more. But then she lifted her eyes, skewering Pen with a meaningful look.
I say that someone on this island intends to betray him. Betray all of us.
The woman’s warning echoed in Pen’s mind with a clear certainty. She’d do everything in her power to expose the traitor. No way had she traveled across the wrecked, blasted country, intent on defeating O’Malley and working toward a better way of life—only to lose to a turncoat.
“So,” Arturi said. He waited until all attention had returned to him. The smile he offered Pen was gentle, almost apologetic. “Once again, the time has come for some of you to return to the mainland. Penny, if you want me to make war, you will help me do so by taking the lead.”
EIGHTEEN
 
Tru had been at the Children’s Mission for a week and a half. He knew all the children by name, and he kept waiting for his customary sense of entrapment to kick in. But this was different from most settlements. The residents didn’t rely on him for anything. Sure, they seemed glad for his help, but it was patient acceptance rather than need. His flight instinct never activated.
He’d spent time in the tannery, making a few necessary items, and a couple of things that doubtless would never see the light of day. Yet there had been no controlling the impulse, and he tucked the finished product in his gear, shaking his head at his own foolishness. He wasn’t a man given to romantic impulses.
Not anymore.
Life coalesced into a regular routine. Mary Agnes never raised her voice. Never whipped her charges. At first he’d wondered how one woman could manage the place, but in the Changed world, most kids had experienced trauma that stripped a portion of their innocence. It wasn’t unusual to find a twelve-year-old organizing tasks for younger ones, which meant Mary Agnes maintained a capable cadre of assistants.
He’d hammered nails and sweated in the hot sun while trying to figure out why he wasn’t already on his way west. The lion wanted to know the same thing.
What are we doing here? This isn’t our place.
After nearly four years, they were still looking.
Mentally, Tru separated his life into sections, like a novel. Part One
: Before the Change
. Part Two:
In Jenna and Mason’s Care
. Part Three:
Looking for Home
. Part Four:
Home
.
And Part Five . . . was everything that came after Part Four. That was simple. It would be called
This Sucks
.
Only, the last few weeks hadn’t. He knew why he’d bailed. Guilt, plain and simple. Because he didn’t deserve to be happy, and he couldn’t stick around where he might be. He couldn’t let those empty spaces be filled. Pleasure led to peace, and peace meant he ran the risk of forgetting—and in a different way than he did when he went lion. As an animal, the past stayed with him but blurred and distant. Sharp, painful memories belonged only to his human half, of which the lion didn’t always approve.
Usually,
the big cat corrected.
He smiled a little and wondered if other skinwalkers had such talkative beasts inside their heads.
The smile turned into a quiet chuckle, which drew the eye of the girl working next to him. No surprise. He had been a surly bastard for ten days, and that afternoon he’d behaved no better during the mindless digging. The mission intended to enclose some farm animals once they finished the fence.
And if that’s not the saddest thing I ever heard,
the lion growled.
I know. You want to hunt. We’ll go soon.
You said that a week ago.
With a faint sigh, he turned another shovel of earth. The girl beside him, Clary, was about thirteen, thin as a reed, but tough. Her eyes were watchful, and she never tolerated any nonsense from her younger charges. He’d seen raiders receive less obedience than this half-grown woman.
“Why do you keep looking at me?”
He smirked. “Because you’re looking at me.”
“You’re sighing and making faces, like you’re talking to folks in your head.”
“Maybe I am.”
“Does that mean you’re crazy?”
Tru laughed. “Maybe. Probably. But I’m harmless.”
“Mary Agnes says that’s what all men claim,” she said darkly.
“Some men are liars,” he answered, more thoughtfully than her statement demanded. “But not all. It’s up to you to winnow out the bad seeds.”
“You must be all right. Nobody ever stuck around this long to help us without trying something with one of the girls before.”
His blood chilled. “What happened?”
“We stabbed ’em.” She touched the small knife strapped to her thigh.
Tru approved of her matter-of-fact tone. Mary Agnes didn’t let any child out of her sight without self-defense training. He remembered being taught about stranger danger—to run and scream and find a trusted adult. In the Changed world, children were taught to stab anything that tried to do them harm. Not a bad policy.
“What if they have guns?”
Clary snorted. “They don’t keep them if they do. And them on the island know better than to send hooligans our way.”
Another couple of hours passed in silent, backbreaking work, but as they finished the last hole, a runner arrived. This kid was named Ben, gap-toothed, towheaded, and not more than six. He panted out his message in between gulping breaths:
“There’s . . . a test . . . ’bout . . . to start!”
Clary perked up. “I’ll be right there.”
She grabbed her shovel and took off running. Rather than be left standing, he did the same. The lion growled in his head and showed a mouthful of teeth, but this time the big cat felt as curious as Tru did.
At the mission, Mary Agnes stood with a small team assembled. He guessed these were the scouts she’d mentioned in passing—all girls, all around Clary’s age. The woman couldn’t mean to send them to spy on O’Malley’s thugs? But he’d been around enough to know that you didn’t make friends by passing judgment on people’s business, particularly when that business remained unclear. So he stood quietly and listened.
“Arturi is sending a small team,” Mary Agnes said. “They’re targeting a slave shipment bound for the Big Smoke.”
Toronto, he recalled. He didn’t remember why it was called that before. With the fires and riots after the Change, it made perfect sense. The girls listened to the briefing with perfect attention, ready to play their role. Whatever that was.
“You’ll watch and report back. Intervene only if it looks like our side is going to lose.”
Intervene?
He wondered what Mary Agnes thought her six girls could do against O’Malley’s guards. Still, he didn’t speak up. The woman had to know what she was doing or these kids wouldn’t have survived.
“Understood,” the tallest girl said. Bethany.
Mary Agnes went on: “I don’t expect any problems, however. Arturi’s newest recruit is reputed to be phenomenal. An inspiration to the western resistance for years.”
Tru growled. Pen
would
be involved in this run the girls were meant to observe. That description couldn’t apply to anyone else.
“I’d like to go with them,” he heard himself say.
Finally,
the lion snarled.
A hunt worthy of us and not more digging in the dirt like some mongrel.
Mary Agnes shook her head. “I’m sorry. There’s no way you can be as quiet as my girls. I won’t risk them for your curiosity.”
“I’ll shift. In lion form, with sufficient cover, nobody will spot me unless I mean them to.”
“You’ll listen to Bethany?”
Though he was amused at the idea of taking orders from a teenage girl, he remembered that there had been adults who treated him like a leader when he wasn’t much older. So Tru schooled his expression and nodded. The lead scout studied him as if taking his measure and deciding whether he could be trusted.
“I don’t believe he’ll endanger the mission,” she finally pronounced.
“I won’t.”
Bethany turned to the other girls. “We leave shortly. Get your things.”
“What would those be?” he asked Mary Agnes, once the kids dispersed.
“I forgot you don’t know. Our girls use blowguns and poison darts. They once killed twice their number in O’Malley thugs, all without ever being seen.” Her tone reflected pure motherly pride.
“Holy shit.”
“Language. I don’t know if you remember this much history, but in many wars, there was a children’s crusade. This is the same.”
“You taught them?”
“Of course I did.”
“And you don’t feel it’s better to let them be innocent for as long as they can be?”
She shook her head, eyes fierce. “When they came to me, they were frightened, at the mercy of anybody stronger. Not anymore.”
That much was true. Mary Agnes’s children were confident and capable, ready to take on a team of O’Malley thugs with an eager glint in their eyes. They would become formidable men and women. So maybe it was best to let even this part of childhood change. Kids had borne more responsibility in other ages, and the human race kept plugging along.
We adapt and we hide and we abide.
“Thank you for letting me go with them. I have . . . a personal stake in this.” He had no idea why he’d told her, except that her calm gray eyes invited confidence.
“I could see it in your eyes. You know the Orchid, do you?”
Biblically
.
“As children, yes. Met up again recently.”
Mary Agnes cocked her head. “Then why aren’t you with her? Clearly fate’s involved. It’s a big world.”
Ordinarily, a word like “fate” wound him up in knots, because if he was destined to meet up with Pen, then maybe everything that had happened in Part Four—
Home
—was also inevitable. That didn’t set well with him. Not at all. For good or ill, he clung to free will because it meant he wasn’t fucked no matter what he did. The choices he made in life made a difference.
“I respectfully disagree.”
“You would,” she said with a chuckle.
He puffed out a breath and walked away from the conversation before it could turn into an argument. Quickly, he shifted. He’d done it enough that there was no pain involved, though in the beginning it had hurt like being run over by a truck. Now it was smooth and practiced, magic easing the transition. He padded up to Bethany. His human aspect watched while the lion sat down on its haunches and sniffed the air.
Interesting smells. Sweat. Salt. Cooking meat. Sweet grass. Big, fat rabbit. He almost went after it, and received a nudge. Task. Hunting, at least. He waited patiently.
When the other humans assembled, the scouting crew had dressed in green. None of the girls twitched at seeing the lion. Brave females. He liked them all. He decided licking could wait. They all carried slender reeds. Sleepy, the lion lay down while Tru listened.
“A couple of things.” Bethany held up a hand. “Like Aggie said, we’re backup. We step in only if there’s trouble.” When the other girls acknowledged this, she went on, “Once they complete the run, we’ll take charge of any kids on the truck and bring them back to the mission. The island’s already crowded enough.”

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