Tame The Caged Beast

Chapter 8: Check in and Acquaintances

Today was the day. The three weeks were gone and we were headed to the northern part of the district. That's where the training grounds and barracks were. Children said good bye to parents and some young parents said good bye to their children. There was mostly young people. Teenagers to be exact. Seventeen or eighteen at least. Others were late twenties or early thirties. Lines weren't as long as I thought they'd be.

All of the new recruits were set up in two lines. Males and females. Nicolai and Alden were separated from me but I assured them that I would fine. The guys' line was longer than the girls' so I was farther up the line than them. I was behind a tall girl with neck length red hair and dark green eyes who was talking to a girl with shorter red hair. Her hair was short like a boy's.

I was in front of a girl with black hair and menacing blue eyes. Her eyes, though light in color, were like Nicolai's. They could be calm and tender in an instant then murderous and evil in the next.

"What's your name?" the tall red haired girl asked me.

I turned around to see who she was talking to. I was only met by the ice cold eyes by the girl behind me.

"I'm Bracken," I said, "Bracken Avril. You?"

"Cedrica," she said, "Cedrica Steiner." She pointed to the shorter girl behind her. "This is Shira, my sister and my brother, Samuel, is somewhere out there. What about you? Are you here with anyone?"

I nervously twisted the beads on my mother's bracelet and buttoned and unbuttoned the leather clamp on my wrist. I looked back to where Nicolai and Alden were. They were talking and when the blonde boy saw me he freakishly waved. The identical leather clamp he had moved around his thin wrist. He definitely needed some meat on his bones.

"I'm here with my friends," I said pointing their way. "That blonde boy over there and the one behind him."

Both of the redheads looked over and studied them.

"Ooh, lucky," she said. "They're cute."

I turned away and let her drool over them. The line moved along nicely and Cedrica and Shira kept looking back at Nicolai and Alden. In no time we were up at the table.

You enter you name, age, address, existing family, blood type, and birth town.

I wrote down whatever I could fill out. It was easy.

Name: Bracken Avril

Age: 17

Address: Third District, Fourth Ward

Existing Family: Alden Kilburne and Nicolai Saintcrow

Blood Type: O Negative

Birth Town: Sirel

I wasn't sure if I should put this since it no longer existed. We moved then to the Third district in Maison after it was overrun. I wonder if Alden and Nicolai did the same. I mean that was where we were raised and grew up so it would make sense to put the truth whether it was still standing tall or rotting away in a field because no matter what it still had a small place in out heart.

I waited on the sideline until the two of them were done. Nicolai came back rubbing the back of his head.

"I had some trouble filling that out," he said blowing out a puff of air, "I don't really remember my blood type or if we should even put our real birth town."

I patted his shoulder. "I think you should have," I said, "Even if you didn't I'm sure it doesn't matter now. What's done is done, right?"

He bit his lower lip. "Yeah, I guess," Nicolai said.