Thunderhead (Arc of a Scythe #2)(11)

“We are scythes every moment of our lives,” Marie had told her. “And we must never allow ourselves to forget that, no matter how much we might want to. Our garments are a testament to that commitment.”

On the day Citra was ordained, Scythe Curie told her that Citra Terranova no longer existed. “You are, and shall ever be, Scythe Anastasia, from this moment until you choose to leave this Earth.”

Anastasia was willing to live with that . . . except for the times she needed to be Citra Terranova.

She left the restroom with Scythe Anastasia rolled up under her arm. She was now Citra once more; proud and headstrong, but with no impressive social footprint. A girl not worthy of much notice. Except to the Thunderhead cameras that swiveled to follow her as she strode back to the car.

? ? ?

There was a great memorial in the heart of Pittsburgh, birthplace of Scythe Prometheus, the first World Supreme Blade. Spread out across a five-acre park were the intentionally broken pieces of a massive obsidian obelisk. Around those dark stone pieces were slightly larger-than-life statues of the founding scythes, in white marble that clashed with the black stone of the fallen obelisk.

It was the memorial to end all memorials.

It was the memorial to death.

Tourists and schoolchildren from all over the world would visit the Mortality Memorial, where death lay shattered before the scythes, and would marvel at the very concept that people used to die by natural means. Old age. Disease. Catastrophe. Over the years, the city had come to embrace its nature as a tourist attraction to commemorate the death of death. And so, in Pittsburgh, every day was Halloween.

There were costume parties and witching-hour clubs everywhere. After dark, every tower was a tower of terror. Every mansion was a haunted one.

Close to midnight, Citra made her way through Mortality Memorial Park, cursing herself for not having the foresight to pack a jacket. By mid-November, Pittsburgh was freezing at this time of night, and the wind just made it worse. She knew she could put her scythe robe on for warmth, but that would defeat the whole purpose of dressing down tonight. Her nanites were struggling to raise her body temperature, warming her from the inside out. It kept her from shivering, but didn’t take away the cold.

She felt vulnerable without her robe. Naked in a fundamental way. When she first began wearing it, it felt awkward and strange. She would constantly trip over its low, dragging hem. But in the ten months since being ordained, she had grown accustomed to it—to the point of feeling strange being out in public without it.

There were other people in the park; most were just moving through, laughing, hopping between parties and clubs. Everyone was in costume. There were ghouls and clowns, ballerinas and beasts. The only costumes that were forbidden were outfits with robes. No common citizen was allowed to even resemble a scythe. The costumed cliques eyed her as she passed. Did they recognize her? No. They were noticing her because she was the only one not wearing a costume. She was conspicuous in her lack of conspicuousness.

She hadn’t chosen this spot. It had been on the note she received.

Meet me at midnight at Mortality Memorial. She had laughed at the alliteration until she realized who it had come from. There was no signature. Just the letter L. The note gave the date of November 10th. Fortunately, her gleaning that night was close enough to Pittsburgh to make it possible.

Pittsburgh was the perfect place for a clandestine meeting. It was a city underserved by the scythedom. Scythes simply did not like gleaning here. The place was too macabre for them, what with people running around in shredded, bloody costumes, with plastic knives, celebrating all things gruesome. For scythes, who took death seriously, it was all in very poor taste.

Even though it was the closest big city to Fallingwater, Scythe Curie never gleaned there. “To glean in Pittsburgh is almost a redundancy,” she told Citra.

With that in mind, the chances of being seen by another scythe were slim. The only scythes who graced Mortality Memorial Park were the marble founders overseeing the broken black obelisk.

At precisely midnight a figure stepped out from behind a large piece of the memorial. At first she thought it was just another partier, but like her, he wasn’t in costume. He was silhouetted by one of the spotlights illuminating the memorial, but she recognized him right away from the way he walked.

“I thought you’d be in your robe,” Rowan said.

“I’m glad you’re not in yours,” she responded.

As he moved closer, the light caught his face. He looked pale, almost ghostly, as if he hadn’t seen the sun for months.

“You look good,” he said.

She nodded, and did not reciprocate the sentiment, because he didn’t. His eyes had a careworn coolness to them as if he had seen more than he should, and had stopped caring in order to save what was left of his soul. But then he smiled, and it was warm. Genuine. There you are, Rowan, she said to herself. You were hiding, but I found you.

She led him out of the light and they lingered in a shadowy corner of the memorial where no one could see them, except for the Thunderhead’s infrared cameras. But none were visible at the moment. Perhaps they had actually found a blind spot.

“It’s good to see you, Honorable Scythe Anastasia,” he said.

“Please don’t call me that,” she told him. “Call me Citra.”

Rowan smirked. “Wouldn’t that be a violation?”

“From what I hear, everything you do now is a violation.”