فصل 34

The longer we live, the quicker the days seem to pass. How troublesome that is when we live forever. A year seems to pass in a matter of weeks. Decades fly with no milestones to mark them. We become settled in the inconsequential drudgery of our lives, until suddenly we look at ourselves in the mirror and see a face we barely recognize begging us to turn a corner and be young again.

But are we truly young when we turn the corner?

We hold the same memories, the same habits, the same unrealized dreams. Our bodies may be spry and limber, but toward what end? No end. Never an end.

I do believe mortals strived more heartily toward their goals, because they knew that time was of the essence. But us? We can put things off far more effectively than those doomed to die, because death has become the exception instead of the rule.

The stagnation that I so fervently glean on a daily basis seems an epidemic that only grows. There are times I feel I am fighting a losing battle against an old-fashioned apocalypse of the living dead.

—From the gleaning journal of H.S. Curie

34

The Second Most Painful Thing You’ll Ever Have to Do

Winter sped relentlessly closer. At first Rowan kept a tally of the lives he temporarily ended, but as the days passed, he found he couldn’t keep up. A dozen a day, week to week, month to month. They all blended together. For the eight months he trained under Scythe Goddard, he had made over two thousand kills, mostly the same people over and over again. Did those people despise him, he wondered, or did they truly see this as just a job? There were times when the training called for them to run, or even fight back. Most were inept at it, but some had clearly been trained in combat. There were even sessions where his targets had their own weapons. He had been cut and stabbed and shot—but never so severely that he had to be revived. He had grown into an exceptionally skilled killer.

“You have excelled beyond my wildest expectations,” Goddard told him. “I suspected you had a spark in you, but never dreamed it would be such an inferno!” And yes, he had come to enjoy it, just as Scythe Goddard said he would. And just like Scythe Volta, he despised himself for it.

“I’m looking forward to your ordainment,” Volta told him one day during their afternoon studies together. “Maybe you and I can split off from Goddard. Glean at our own speed, in our own way.” But Rowan knew Volta would never find the momentum to escape Goddard’s gravity.

“You’re assuming that I’ll be chosen over Citra,” Rowan pointed out.

“Citra’s gone,” Volta reminded him. “She’s been off-grid for months. If she shows her face at conclave, the bejeweling committee won’t look too kindly on her for being AWOL all this time. All you have to do is pass the final test, and without question you’ll win.” Which is what Rowan was afraid of.

The news of Citra’s disappearance had trickled down to Rowan unofficially. He didn’t know the whole story. She had been accused of something by Xenocrates. There was an emergency meeting of the disciplinary committee, and Scythe Curie showed up on her behalf, clearing her of any wrongdoing. The accusation must have been orchestrated by Goddard, because he was furious at the committee’s decision to drop the charges—and by the fact that Citra had completely vanished. Not even Scythe Curie seemed to know where she was.

The day after that, Goddard took his junior scythes and Rowan on a gleaning rampage, fueled by his fury. He released his rage at a crowded harvest festival—and this time Rowan couldn’t save anyone, because Goddard kept him by his side as his weapons caddy. Scythe Chomsky used his flamethrower to set a corn maze ablaze, smoking people out to be picked off one by one by the other scythes.

Scythe Volta was now in the doghouse, though, because he had lobbed a container of poison gas into the burning maze. Highly effective, but it stole kills from Goddard and the others.

“I did it to be humane,” Volta confided in Rowan. “Better they die by gas than by fire.” Then he added, “or by getting blown away just as they thought they were escaping the maze.” Perhaps Rowan was wrong about Volta. Maybe he would escape from Goddard—but he certainly wouldn’t do it without Rowan. It was one more argument for Rowan to earn the ring.

They had all reached their gleaning quota by the end of that awful evening, and Goddard still didn’t seem to have satisfied his bloodlust. He raged against the system, if only to his own disciples, calling for a day when scythes would have no limits on gleaning.

• • •

Citra returned to Scythe Curie at Falling Water many weeks before Winter Conclave, when the Month of Lights had just begun, and gifts were being passed between friends and loved ones to celebrate ancient miracles that no one quite remembered.

Unlike her frantic journey to Amazonia’s northern shore, Citra flew home in comfort, and with peace of mind. She didn’t have to look over her shoulder every five minutes because no one was chasing her anymore. As Scythe Curie had promised, Citra had been cleared of any wrongdoing. And while Scythe Mandela sent a heartfelt note of apology for Scythe Curie to give to Citra, High Blade Xenocrates made no such gesture.

“He will pretend like it never happened,” Scythe Curie told her as the two of them drove home from the airport. “That’s the closest the man will ever come to an apology.” “But it did happen,” Citra said. “I had to hurl myself from a building to escape from it.” “And I had to blow up two perfectly good cars,” Scythe Curie said wryly.

“I won’t forget what he did.”

“And you shouldn’t. You have every right to judge Xenocrates harshly—but not too harshly. I suspect there are more variables in play than we know.” “That’s what Scythe Faraday said.”

Scythe Curie smiled at the mention of his name. “And how is our good friend Gerald?” she asked with a wink.

“Reports of his death have been greatly exaggerated,” said Citra. “Mostly, he gardens and takes long walks on the beach.” The fact that he was still alive was a secret they both planned to keep. Even Scythe Mandela believed that Citra was staying with a relative of Scythe Curie in Amazonia, and he had no reason to suspect it wasn’t true.

“Perhaps I’ll join him on his beach in a hundred years or so,” said Scythe Curie. “But for now there’s too much to do in the Scythedom. Too many crucial battles to fight.” Citra could see her gripping the steering wheel tighter as she thought of it. “The future of everything we believe as scythes is at stake, Citra. There is even talk of abolishing the quota. Which is why you must win the ring. I know the scythe you’ll be, and it’s exactly what we need.” Citra looked away. Without daily gleaning, her training with Scythe Faraday over the past few months had been about honing her mind and body—but more importantly, contemplating the moral and ethical high ground that a traditional scythe must always take. There was nothing “old guard” about it. It was simply right. She knew such high ideals were absent from Rowan’s training, but it didn’t mean he didn’t hold onto them in his heart, despite his bloodthirsty mentor.

“Rowan could be a good scythe as well,” Citra offered.

Scythe Curie sighed. “He can’t be trusted anymore. Look what he did to you at Harvest Conclave. You can make all the excuses in the world for him, but the fact is, he’s an unknown quantity now. Training under Goddard is bound to twist him in ways that no one can predict.” “Even if that’s true,” said Citra, finally getting to the point they both knew she’d been dancing around, “I don’t know how I could glean him.” “It will be the second most painful thing you’ll ever do,” admitted Scythe Curie. “But you’ll find a way to accomplish it, Citra. I have faith in you.” If gleaning Rowan would be the second most painful thing she’d ever do, Citra wondered what the most painful thing would be. But she was afraid to ask, because she really didn’t want to know.