The Glass Arrow(99)

He lowers the bow and in a flash picks up a stone off the ground and heaves it with all his might into a tree behind him. I can hear the air release from his lungs in one hard whoosh.

And then he spins back, lifts the bow, and fires.

I feel the pressure first, like a dull branch prodding my right shoulder. It shoves so hard against me that I’m knocked off my feet and land on my back beside the fire. When I turn my head I see the narrow rod rising from my skin. It’s in that moment, between the shock and the fear, that I think of Deer in my ma’s old story and wonder if this was the last thing he saw before Mother Hawk took his soul.

The pain comes a moment later, stabbing into my shoulder and sending bolts across my chest. It’s worse than the wire, worse than a Watcher beating. I can’t move. I’m pinned to the ground.

I can’t even remember how I got here.

I hear a crashing through the darkness above, beyond, surrounding me. Hooves striking the ground somewhere close. Someone’s here. Is it Kiran? Where is Kiran?

“Found her!” someone yells. The gritty sound echoes in my head.

“He won’t be happy,” groans another.

I close my eyes and see my ma. Her long, dark hair hanging in tight ringlets to her hips. The mark on her cheek that warps when she smiles.

“Aya.” She still sounds the same when she says my name, as though she’s never been gone. She sits on the ground beside me, cradles my head in her lap and sings my soul away. Her fingers are warm, skimming across my forehead. And Brax is here too. Licking my face. Snuggling into the crook in my arm. Here there is no blood, no fever, no grief. Here there is only peace.

I’ve fought well, just like my ma taught me. Just like I was supposed to do. It finally feels all right to let go, and when I do, I can breathe. It feels like the first time in years that I’ve really breathed. Everything is okay now. Everyone is safe. I am free.

I’ve got the glass arrow.

It protrudes from my shoulder, wavering the slightest bit, and shining in the firelight. The blood of my life seeps from it, blossoming on my Driver shirt, soaking into the ground.

My sacrifice will allow my family to live.

I am filled with joy.





CHAPTER 24

I COME BACK BIT by bit. One bright dot appears, growing larger, eating up the darkness.

At first, I’m only aware of the pieces—my frozen feet, my aching head, my arms crossed over my chest. There’s a pebble stuck under my hip. A rough wool pad under my head. My stomach is empty, and I’m starving.

I’m so tired. I go away for a while, but when I come back there’s a noise breaking through the crackling of the flames. A voice I recognize. He has a funny way of talking. Kiran, that’s his name. Kiran.

“… She always wanted to do whatever I did, and our mother stuck her with me, too. ‘Don’t you leave Kyna,’ she’d say. Every single time I left our house. I didn’t always mind. Well, maybe I did. But I was just a kid myself, you know.”

Kyna. Behind my closed lids I can see her in the buckskin dress with the boards on her legs. Her hair shimmers in the sun. It’s golden. Just like Kiran’s. They resemble each other, now that I think of it. The same nose. The same lanky build.

Kiran’s telling me stories. Like the stories I used to tell him in the city. In the Garden. I remember now. Long nights, when I talked and talked, thinking he didn’t know what I was saying. I remember.

“She was four and I was seven when I let her ride for the first time. My father wanted her to wait until she was bigger, but he was working in the city and my mother was cooking, so I took her out back and set her up on this old paint gelding we had. It seemed harmless enough. Kyna loved it. She was laughing.” He clears his throat. “Neither of us saw the snake on the ground until it was too late. It spooked the gelding, and she fell. He ran her over trying to get away.”

Kiran says nothing for a while. I wish he would talk again. I wish I could do something to make him feel better but my shoulder’s begun to throb. I can’t remember why it hurts, though I feel like I should.

“I carried her back to camp, to the doctor, but her legs were crushed. During the operation I thought of all the times I’d told her to stop following me and leave me alone, and I promised to take care of her from then on. I still try, though she doesn’t need me much these days. I wouldn’t have left home, but the city medicine helps her legs. I took that job at the rental barn in Glasscaster so I could get it.”

He sighs.

“I wish you’d wake up already, Aya.”

My name. Aiyana. Aya. I was supposed to die, but I didn’t. I was sold, but I escaped.

A moan whispers from my throat, but it takes too much work and grows quiet.

“Aya?”

A cool hand presses against my neck, searching for my pulse. It must take a long time for those fingers to find what they’re looking for because they linger through more than a dozen throbbing beats of my heart.

“If you can hear me, they’re gone, Aya. The mayor’s brother and his men. You were right. And that’s the last time I’m going to ever say you were right about that, because you’re not talking me into shooting you ever again.”

He moves the hair from my forehead, leaving a tingling sensation wherever his fingertips brush.

“You’re safe now. It’s been discussed by the elders. You and your family, even Strawberry. We’re taking you all in. The outcast—your father, I mean—they’re still not sold on him, but the rest of you, you’re going to live with us now. If you want, I mean.”