I Am the Reaper

Fall Through My Hands

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The girl is too close. So close the light from the fire and fading sky makes her hair glow, until it burns to look at her, like she is crowned in a brilliant slice of daylight. She keeps staring at me and I stare back, feeling a low growl start deep in my chest. 

"Bellamy?" she repeats that strange name, like a hope and a sentence rolled into one.

I lunge for her.

Almost before I've moved a step, a pain erupts in my back and I look sideways. I'm with a long wooden shaft, sticking from my shoulder. The girl is shouting and a force slams against me, tossing me into the dirt, I scramble up but a pressure on my hand stops me. There's a boot over my fingers and the heel of it stamps down, enough to make my joints scream and for my hold over my blade to loosen. The club is next.

The pain in my head is getting worse, right at either side of my temple, drilling through my cranium and pushing through the other side.

The men do not lower their weapons and I cast a glare around them, daring those gleaming points to puncture something. Start this war and give me a door to unleash this torrent of fury on. It builds beneath my skin until I'm clenching my hands in the dirt, so hard the knuckles crack.

That bow is still nocked, but the arrow does not fly. The girl makes sure of it, stretching a hand out to the others in warning, as if they're the threat. Insolent creature this sunshine girl is.

"You're not killing him!" she barks at a burly man swathed in furs, raising a blade despite her protest. But a moment later, the man lets out a ragged cry, his hand drops, and the blade clatters to the dirt. Another strike, and he is on one knee before me. Another girl stands behind him, miraculously dark haired. It's done in a complex braid and her clothing is like the other villagers, eyes the color of a red sky. There's a furious expression on her face as she pulls back the man's head by his own braid and glowers. "I'd listen to her if I were you."

Then this girl is looking at me too, with that same incredulous, horrified expression. Slant eyebrows pulled together. She releases the man with a shove and takes a step forward. "Bel?"

That growl finds its way through my lips and though the girl pauses, she doesn't stop. She moves forward, too close, but not close enough to snag on my blade. She toes an invisible border, just maddeningly out of my reach. She stretches out a hand and on instinct, I recoil. "What did they do to you?"

"I wouldn't get too close, Octavia," says the sunshine girl, her voice holding a warning. It doesn't waver anymore; it's strong again, which makes my fury grow. Stronger things are harder to break.

I think for a heartbeat that name sounds familiar. Octavia. A distant thought. A fading dream. A voice dying on the wind. But then it's snatched away, and it means nothing to me.

The girl doesn't look back but she pauses, staring at me with big eyes that remind me of a child's. "Bel, it's me." She scrutinizes my face, as if expecting some sign of recognition. But she gets none; I've never seen her before. There never was a before.

When she isn't satisfied, her face hardens and a flash of loathing that nearly matches my own crosses her eyes. "He's one of them," she murmurs. "A reaper." She heard the alarms. She already knows this, but acts as if she has to say it for it to be true.

Behind her, the sunshine girl does not even nod. "I know."

Without looking over her shoulder, this one named Octavia asks, "What do we do with him?"

"We"—

The girl twists on her heels so fast any chances of attacking her slip through my fingers. She whirls on the blonde girl. "We have to cure him. There has to be something."