فصل 15

There are times I long for a relationship with the Thunderhead. I suppose we always want what we can’t have. Others can call on the Thunderhead for advice, ask it to resolve disputes. Some rely on it as a confidant, for it’s known to have a compassionate, impartial ear, and never gossips. The Thunderhead is the world’s best listener.

But not for scythes. For us, the Thunderhead is eternally silent.

We have full access to its wealth of knowledge, of course. The Scythedom uses the Thunderhead for countless tasks—but to us, it’s simply a database. A tool, nothing more. As an entity—as a mind—the Thunderhead does not exist for us.

And yet it does, and we know it.

Estrangement from the collective consciousness of humanity’s wisdom is just one more thing that sets scythes apart from others.

The Thunderhead must see us. It must be aware of the Scythedom’s petty bickering, and growing corruption, even though it has pledged noninterference. Does it despise us scythes, but abides us because it has to? Or does it simply choose not to think of us at all? And which is worse—to be despised, or to be ignored?

—From the gleaning journal of H.S. Curie

15

The Space Between

The night was bleak and rain streaked the windows of the train, distorting the lights beyond, until the lights were gone. Rowan knew they were slicing through the countryside now, but the darkness could have been the airless expanse of space.

“I won’t do it,” Citra finally said, breaking the silence that had engulfed them since leaving conclave. “They can’t make me do it.” Faraday didn’t say a word—didn’t even look at her—so Rowan took it upon himself to answer.

“Yes, they can.”

Finally Faraday looked to them. “Rowan is right,” he said. “They will find whatever button will make you dance, and dance you will, no matter how hideous the tune.” Citra kicked the empty seat in front of her. “How could they be so awful, and why do they hate us so much?” “It’s not all of them,” Rowan said, “and I don’t think it’s really about us. . . .” Clearly, Faraday was a respected scythe—and although he didn’t come out against Goddard today, his feelings about the man were clear. Goddard must see Faraday as a threat; attacking Rowan and Citra was a warning shot.

“What if we both fail?” Citra suggested. “If we’re lousy apprentices, then they can’t choose either of us.” “And yet they will,” Faraday told her with an authority and finality that left little room for doubt. “No matter how poorly you perform, they will still choose one of you, for the spectacle alone.”  Then he scowled in disgust. “And to set the precedent.” “I’ll bet Goddard has enough friends to make sure it happens,” said Rowan. “I think he has the High Blade on his side, too.” “Indeed,” Faraday said with a world-weary sigh. “Never before have there been so many wheels within wheels in the Scythedom.” Rowan closed his eyes, wishing he could close his mind as well and hide from his own thoughts. In eight months I will be killed by Citra, he thought. Or I will kill her. And calling it “gleaning” didn’t change the fact of what it was. He cared for Citra, but enough to surrender his life and let her win? Citra certainly wouldn’t back down to let him earn the ring.

When he opened his eyes, he caught her staring at him. She didn’t look away.

“Rowan,” she said, “whatever happens, I want you to know—”

“Don’t,” Rowan told her. “Just don’t.”

And the rest of the ride was silence.

• • •

Citra, who was not the heaviest sleeper, found herself awake all night after they arrived home. Images of the scythes she saw at conclave filled even the hint of dreams, jarring her back to unwanted wakefulness. The wise ones, the schemers, the compassionate, and those who did not seem to care. Such a delicate charge as pruning the human race should not be subject to the quirks of personality. Scythes were supposed to be above the petty, just as they were above the law. Faraday certainly was. If she became a scythe, she would follow his lead. And if she didn’t become one, it wouldn’t matter because she’d be dead.

Perhaps there was some sort of twisted wisdom in the decision to have one of them gleaned by the other. Whoever wins will begin their life as a scythe in abject sorrow, never to forget the cost of that ring.

Morning came with no great fanfare. It was just an ordinary day, like any other. The rain had passed, and the sun peeked from behind shifting clouds. It was Rowan’s turn to make breakfast. Eggs and hash browns. He never cooked the potatoes long enough. “Hash pales” Citra always called them. Faraday never complained when the meals they made were subpar. He ate what they served, and didn’t tolerate complaints from either of them. The punishment for making something barely edible was having to eat it yourself.

Citra ate, even though she didn’t have an appetite. Even though the whole world had slid off its axis. Breakfast was breakfast. How dare it be?

When Faraday broke the silence, it felt like a brick flying through the window.

“I will go out alone today. The two of you will attend to your studies.” “Yes, Scythe Faraday,” Citra said, with Rowan saying the same in a half-second echo.

“For you nothing has changed.”

Citra looked down into her cereal. It was Rowan who dared to state the obvious.

“Everything has changed, sir.”

And then Faraday said something enigmatic that would only resonate with them much later.

“Perhaps everything will change again.”

Then he left them.

• • •

The space between Rowan and Citra had quickly become a minefield. A dangerous no-man’s-land that promised nothing but misery. It was hard enough to negotiate with Scythe Faraday there, but his absence left the two of them with no one to mediate the space between.

Rowan stayed in his room, studying there rather than going into the weapons room, which would feel painfully wrong without Citra sitting with him. Still, he kept his door cracked on the faint hope that she’d want to bridge the distance. He heard her leave, probably for a run, and she was gone for a good long time. Her way of dealing with the dark discomfort of their new situation was to remove herself from it even more completely than Rowan had.

After she returned, Rowan knew there would be no peace between them, or within himself, unless he took the first step into that minefield.

He stood outside her closed door for at least a full minute before he worked up the nerve to knock.

“What do you want?” she asked, her voice muffled by the closed door.

“Can I come in?”

“It’s not locked.”

He turned the knob and slowly opened the door. She was in the middle of the room with a hunting knife, practicing bladecraft against the empty air, as if battling ghosts.

“Nice technique,” Rowan said, then added, “if you’re planning on gleaning a pack of angry wolves.” “Skill is skill, whether you use it or not.” She sheathed the blade, tossed it on her desk, and put her hands on her hips. “So what do you want?” “I just wanted to say I’m sorry for shutting you down before. On the train, I mean.” Citra shrugged. “I was babbling. You were right to shut me up.”

The moment began to get awkward, so Rowan just went for it. “Should we talk about this?” She turned away from him and sat on her bed, picking up a book on anatomy and opening it as if she was about to start studying. She hadn’t yet realized she was holding it upside down. “What’s to talk about? I kill you, or you kill me. Either way, I don’t want to think about it until I have to.” She glanced at the open book, turned it right side up, and then gave up the charade completely, closing it and tossing it to the floor. “I just want to be left alone, okay?” Even so, Rowan sat on the edge of her bed. And when she didn’t tell him to go, he shifted a little bit closer. She watched him, but said nothing.

He wanted to reach for her, maybe touch her cheek. But thinking about that made him think of the saleswoman who was gleaned by a touch. What a perverse poison that was. Rowan wanted to kiss her. There was no denying that anymore. He had suppressed the urge for weeks because he knew it would not be tolerated by the scythe. But Faraday wasn’t here, and the turmoil they had both been hurled into had washed all bets off the table.

Then, to his surprise, she suddenly lurched forward and kissed him, catching him completely off guard.

“There,” she said. “We’ve done it. Now it’s out of the way and you can leave.” “What if I don’t want to?”

And she hesitated. Long enough to make it clear that staying was a distinct possibility. But in the end she said, “What good would it do, really? For either of us.” She moved farther away on the bed, bringing her knees to her chest. “I haven’t fallen in love with you, Rowan. And now I want to keep it that way.” Rowan got up and moved to the safety of the threshold before turning back to her. “It’s all right, Citra,” he told her. “I haven’t fallen in love with you, either.”