Game Of Survival •in editing•

1 Oath Of Death

The angle is perfect. The wind is a bit rough tonight but it's nothing new and nothing I wasn't already trained to handle. My auburn strands whip in front of my face, reminding me that before my twentieth birthday next week I'm in need of a dire cut. I raise my thumb to the target, an eye closed for the effect of a tunnel vision. I smirk, imagining Katherine climbing the old pine tree with one hand, the dummy made of cardboard, straw and old string in the other. I imagine her cursing and mumbling to herself like she was taking care of a newborn baby rather than training her soon-to-be assassin Goddaughter for the trial on her birthday. I grip the bow tightly with my left hand, notching the arrow and aiming at the target hidden well behind the leaves and branches of the pine. I adjust myself to the wind, and aim five paces to the right before releasing. The arrow swerves in the breeze, a pleasing woosh reaching my ears until it lands true, nestled in the middle of the targets fake skull. It falls around fifteen feet, hitting every branch on the way down and I'm careful not to dance on the spot for fear of falling as well.

I breathe in the early morning air around me, the scent of pine and wet sap, night blooming flowers, sweetened fruits that bloom in season and the dampness of dewey grass. Then drag my success back to the house.

"You've finished already?" Katherine squeals, eyeing my dead target with the arrow piecing straight through it's skull. "Oh poor guy. I spent more time making him than you took to find him and bring him back."

"How long did I take?" I saunter into the kitchen, Kat trailing behind me to put the fire on for tea and very early morning sandwiches.

"An hour. Record time. Even my record isn't that fast." She passes me the cheese, sliced ham and butter and I help myself with the bread. "I think mine was three."

I laugh subtly at the way her nose scrunches uncontrollably at my victory, knowing well she was proud regardless. "By this time next week, you'll be an expert with your bow."

Every fortnite since my sixteenth, I've been practicing with my bow and these little tests of Katherine's to amp me up to speed. I failed several times, being out in the damp, uncomfortable trees and open sky until dawn, sometimes until full sunrise before I gave up.
"I may be an expert with a bow, but will I be able to do it?" I slow my buttering of the bread, my appetite a canoe in a rapid.

Katherine looks at me, studies me rather, and sighs, pouring the boiling water into two tiny ceramic cups with peppermint leaves in them. "That's not for me to decide."

"Were you? You know, when they recruited you."

"I was actually a little older than you are. The young, healthy, glowing age of twenty four. To answer your question however, none of us are." She passes me my cup, taking away the long forgotten sandwich in progress. "None of us are the first time, most of us get second chances if Reaper allows it."

The name sends a chill down my spine. Reaper was a man of questionable intent and unknown background. Some say he is as young as I am, some say older than Katherine, bordering the age of forty five. Some say he is handsome and charming, others whisper of burn marks and scars littering the left half of his face. And the one rumour than threads all the stories of old is that he wears the biggest hats, his coat collar is always upturned and a skull cane guides the way of the your dreary future. One click sets your fate in motion.

Reaper was the King of the Creepers. The society of loyal assassins and mercenary that kill and maim for the safety of those who cannot protect themselves. Or so the saying goes. Some say the killing is worth it, that innocent lives are saved. But killing is a word used for self defense, when you've been cornered and forced to take a life in exchange for yours. The Creepers, by any sense of the word, do not simply kill.

"Do you think I'd be an exception?" I stare into the translucent water of my cup, seeing hollow hazel eyes staring back at me.

"There are rumours now that Reaper isn't who he used to be Sunshine." She lifts herself onto the counter with ease, the still toned muscles of her arms even after all these years shift under her weight. "Do you remember Mory?"

"Marie? The one with the dark skin and nice curls who gave me candy or the one who spoke to no soul?"

"No, Rainstorm, Mory. The one with the..." She points to her chest and circles them with her hands, emphasising the woman in question's figure. I don't know whether to laugh from her gesture or from the use of playing on the words of my name.

"Oh, you mean Big Breasted Barron."

I almost topple over in my chair from Kat's expression, the panic in her eyes like Mory could be watching us at the very second. "Shut your mouth young lady!" Her words seem to contrast the laugh that escapes her. "Yes, her. Well rumour has it that Reaper sent her on a suicide mission. She died last night."

And just like that, the laughing halted. Even the air seemed to still at the reality crushing statement. "I don't know why she wasn't able to kill her target." She continues, hands propped behind her. "I think the big man is cracking down on the ones that are left. He's either increased his standards for mercenary tactics and execution or he's decreasing the amount of people in his palm by sending them on impossible missions."

"Maybe he's trying to fish out a traitor." She raises a skeptical eyebrow at me, signaling to continue my theory. "I've read these books where the mafia boss always uses his own people to target the traitor in his group. Nine out of ten times the traitor is his love interest and he forgives her and then people are out to kill her because she lived when given the impossible mission but, you get the point."

She laughs incredulously, pointing at me like I've done something both smart and illegal, "We need to stop buying you those books."

"What if I can't do it? What if I fail..." I didn't want to think about what would happen if I fail.
Two years ago is when this dilemma started. Katherine probably hoped I'd stayed silent and didn't inherit my mother's observational skills but sadly that wasn't the case. I noticed the late morning returns when she'd enter the house on less than silent feet, her soaked shoes squishing against the wooden boards. Some nights I'd leave my door open and bitter, tangy scents intertwined with fresh rose water wafted through, an unimaginably confusing combination. When I finally found out what she'd been up to, it was too late to turn back. The Creepers' motto is; You cannot stand with us if you're looking at us. In simple terms it meant it's either you're with them, or against them. Nobody preferred the latter.

"You'll never know if you don't try. We always got second chances but the boss man is buckling down, I cannot say what will happen. I'll be honest with you, Sunshine," Katherine leans in, brushing her lips on my forehead, a gentle mother's touch, "Failure is not something you should aim for. I wouldn't wish you to fail."

I knew what she meant. Those who fail and are not deserving of second chances cannot leave the society alive. If you fail, you no longer stand with them.

I help Kat clean the kitchen before bed. It's almost two in the morning and I haven't the energy to shower. So I sit in the bathtub, letting the tipid water soak into my sap covered skin. I think about my official recruitment mission. The feeling of isolation and being trapped like a dog on a tight leash plagues me. I thought these feelings would be temporary when I first figured out what my godmother did for a living. Now, the voices howl in my ears, drumming against my rib cage, begging to meet the soft organ within. Can I kill someone the Reaper assigns me to? Am I capable of such a thing?

Yet I have no choice. If I want to live with Kat and not be sent away to a place the creepers are mere myths, stories told around a campfire, where the Reaper is a another name and not a warning of death, I need to be able to please them. To me, loneliness in a place with no familiar faces is equivalent to death itself.