Brooke (3 page)

3

W
hen my mother returns, I help her tuck Clara in. Then I tell her I’m going out on night watch.

She understands. She doesn’t ask questions like my father would if he were here. Father would insist on coming with me. He was a great warrior once, but now he’s older, and I’m faster and sharper without him. I grab my bow and quiver, kiss Clara and Mom good-bye, and jog out to the main cavern before he arrives.

Most everyone has gone to the tents to sleep. Only a few lamps still burn around the perimeter of the platform, illuminating a dozen stray people. I spot a tall figure holding a bow, and my heartbeat stutters. Then he rises to his feet, and I see that it’s just Hyde.

He joins me, flicking the blond fringe out of his eyes. “You’re with me tonight. The others headed out ten minutes ago.”

Hyde is the middle brother of the Seers. I rarely see him without Hayden or Straggler. “You were left behind by Straggler?” I ask.

Hyde smiles. “It happens.” He shifts the bow and quiver on his shoulder. “Ready?”

“Yes, Hyde. I
am
ready.”

Since I made my decision about Perry, I’m feeling much more optimistic. I am finished with grief and rejection. Tonight I’m not just driving away intruders from Tide territory. I’m driving away unwelcome, unhealthy, unhappy thoughts. I’m reclaiming the territory of my mind and heart.

We leave the cave, trading the smell of sage and standing water for the outside smells: burning forest mixed with fresh ocean scent, and that peculiar prickle of the Aether, which isn’t a scent so much as a creeping, crawling sensation over your skin.

It’s much brighter outside, thanks to the Aether churning in glowing blue eddies above us. That sight used to send us running for the shelter of our homes. Now we are accustomed to it. Now we live in a cave.

“Fierce,” Hyde says, his eyes on the sky.

“I’ll protect you.”

“I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t believe that.”

His tone is light, but I know he means it. I might not be six and a half feet tall or weigh two hundred pounds, but I fight as well as any of the Six.

We cross the small strip of sand to the switchback path that climbs to the bluff above.

Hyde’s bow bounces gently on his wide back as he walks. It’s a beautiful bow, fashioned from a slender, straw-colored piece of yew. It matches Hyde. His build and his hair. An expert bow for an expert archer.

Hyde is
one of the best
, like me. I smile to myself.

My plan is working. Already Perry’s words don’t hurt as much.

We crest the bluff and head due east, following the route Reef described to Hyde earlier. Then we walk an hour and a half until we reach the top of the gentle slope, which affords a clear view of the easternmost border of Tide land.

This area is one of the few places in our territory that hasn’t succumbed to fires from Aether storms, and the oak trees along this ridge are majestic and ancient. Hyde and I settle on a fallen branch that’s as large as an ordinary tree.

We can see miles away—toward our eastern border. If there are intruders crossing into Tide land, we’ll spot them from here. Now there’s nothing left to do except that all-important job of being a sentry—waiting.

Before us, the valley slopes down to a grass clearing woven through by a line of trees that follow a dry creek bed.

My eyes wander to the largest tree.

The first time with Perry was there.

That night comes back to me with perfect clarity, and my face warms as I remember how he looked and how I felt. How we were both trembling and trying not to laugh in our fumbling, breathless eagerness.

Then my memories sink deeper, and I am with Liv earlier that night. She’d pulled me behind the cookhouse after supper.

“I love him,” she said. “I’m ready. Roar and I are ready.”

That was the moment I decided Perry and I were ready too.

“Brooke,
you
two don’t have to just because
we
are,” Liv said.

“I love him too,” I told her.

Liv just stared at me, and I remember thinking,
She knows.
She knows Perry doesn’t love me.
She would scent it, as a Scire. Know it, as his sister.

It was the kind of thought that flew like a sparrow through my mind. There and gone. I didn’t want to trap it and examine it then. Perry and I were happy. We had fun together. And I wanted to believe that fun would lead to better things. Deeper feelings between us.

So I hoped.

It’s strange now to think the four of us lost our virginity on the same night. It’s the sort of thing that would reinforce the Dwellers’ view of us as savages, if they knew. But I wouldn’t have had the courage any other way. I knew Perry would never hurt me. Even if he didn’t love me the way I loved him, he cared for me.

And I wanted to keep us all together, our paths heading in the same direction. My world was perfect when I was with Roar, Liv, and Perry. All I ever wanted was for us to stay the way we were.

“I’m sorry about what happened.”

Hyde’s voice pulls me from my memories, thankfully. I’m doing a rotten job at moving forward.

“With Liv,” he elaborates. He turns toward me slightly. His legs seem so much longer than mine. Like they go on forever. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

I guess I was wrong about no one caring how I feel about Liv. “Thanks . . . It feels like I lost her a long time ago, though.”

“When she left for Rim?”

“Yeah.” In a way, I’ve been grieving for Liv since she left to marry Sable, the northern Blood Lord she was betrothed to. The day she walked out of the Tide compound, I knew I’d probably never see her again. The difference is that now I’m sure of it.

A lump rises in my throat. I shouldn’t say anything more. But the way Hyde is watching me, like he really wants to know, to listen to me, makes me feel safe.

“We did everything together. Me and Perry and Roar and Liv. The cave? We used to sneak out of the compound and go there, the four of us. Just to get away from the tribe and be alone.”

“I heard that,” Hyde says.

I stare at him, questions flitting through my mind. What exactly did he hear? From who?

“Reef mentioned something about it once,” he rushes to say.

It’s a poor cover-up. Reef is the last person in the world who would discuss something so trivial. Hyde just doesn’t want me to feel gossiped about, but I don’t really care. People gossip. I’m guilty of it too. But unlike Hyde, I never pass up a good teasing opportunity when I see one.

“Reef was telling stories about the adventures Liv, Perry, Roar, and I had in the cave?”

“Maybe it was Gren or Hayden.”

“Or Twig or Straggler?”

“Er . . . yeah.” Hyde grins sheepishly, knowing I’ve caught him. “One of those.”

He has a softer-looking face than Perry, I notice. His nose and jaw are more sweeping than starkly cut. Kindness rests easily in his eyes.

“It was a long time ago,” I say lightly. Only six months, actually, but I don’t want to look like I’m stuck in the past. “We used to think it was the greatest place. Well, Roar, Liv, and I did. Perry never liked it much. But Liv and I . . . we felt like it was a whole new world that we’d discovered. We used to see it as someplace magical.” I laugh a little, picturing the dark hovel we just left behind. “I can’t believe we used to think that.”

Hyde scratches the scruff on his chin. “I can.”

“You
can
believe it?”

He lifts his shoulders. “Sure.”

“No, you can’t.”

Hyde laughs. “I really can. Isn’t that what magic is? Something you see when you shouldn’t?”

“If that’s your definition of magic, then it’s everywhere.” I wave at the sky, which shouldn’t be the way it is either. “Even up there.”

Hyde looks up, his expression turning pensive as he considers the Aether.

“You’re kidding, right?” I say, watching him. “You can’t really think there’s
magic
in the Aether?” I just see destruction.

“What if it’s not
what
you see, but
how
you see it? What if the magic is in your perspective?” He gestures to the plateau that spreads in front of us. “What if real magic is about having the right outlook? The right view on life?”

I feel like he’s just become someone different before my eyes. Someone poetic. Someone intriguing. All I can do is stare at him.

After a moment, he looks away.

“Why did you do that?” I ask.

“Do what?”

“Turn away from me.”

“I was regretting what I said.”

“Why?” What he just said was beautiful. I can’t believe he regrets it. “What do you have to lose if you say what you want to say?”

Hyde is suddenly fascinated with pulling a bit of leather from the frame of his quiver.

“Hyde?” I prompt.

“I don’t know how to act around you sometimes,” he says, winding the leather around his finger.

“Sometimes?”

“Alone,” he says. “When we’re alone.”

“I intimidate you?”

He lifts his head. “Completely.” His eyes hold steady on my face. “I don’t want to ruin my chance to know you, Brooke. That’s why. I don’t want to ruin it by saying the wrong things.”

My stomach does a somersault.

Up until this second everything felt normal. We were just two sentries, passing the time with conversation. But now he is no longer
just Hyde
. He is Hyde, who says he wants to
know
me, which feels so much more profound than to
get to know
me. Hyde, who asks me how I’m doing without Liv and talks about magic like it’s in your eyes, not in the world.

I search for it now. I search for magic in his blue eyes.

I don’t see it, but what I do see is just as surprising.

There is
hope
in Hyde’s eyes, and it’s real and honest and so different from the physical hunger I’m accustomed to seeing in the gazes of men.

I lick my lips, choosing my next words with care. “You do know me, Hyde.”

I am blatantly fishing for more.

No. I’m not fishing. He is on the line, and I’m reeling him in.

“True.” Hyde blinks, his smile wobbling. “I meant know you
better
.”

It’s the exact answer I expected. Exactly what I wanted to hear.

“You haven’t lost your chance.” I lean closer to him. “How can you lose a chance if you haven’t even taken it?”

He holds perfectly still for a long moment. Then he inclines his head a little to the side, bringing his face closer to mine. His blue eyes drop to my mouth. We’re close enough that I can see every fine hair on his jaw. This is my chance to retreat, but I don’t.

A delicious spell has fallen over me. I want this. And I’m moving on. This is what it means to move on.

I feel Hyde’s hand cradle the back of my head, but I need no encouragement to draw closer.

Our lips meet and hold, both of us stiff with awkwardness for an instant. Then Hyde’s lips part and his tongue slides, velvet soft, against mine.

Desire seeps through my limbs like warm honey as we find our way, shifting closer.

He is patient and gentle at first, but then he becomes playful. He nibbles at my bottom lip, and I can tell he’s smiling. He’s a happy kisser.
A girl could fall in love with that,
I think.

Heat curls in my veins, and I reach for him, wanting more.

His shoulders feel different, not quite rounded enough with muscle, but I ignore that.

His hand is on my back, the pressure too light. I ignore that too.

I focus on the movement of his mouth over mine, which is full of affection and care. He kisses like a poet. Like he’s writing poems on my lips.

But it lacks something. A confidence. A ferocity I’m familiar with.

Ignore, Brooke.

Ignore. Ignore. Ignore.

It’s too late. I realize I’m getting in my head too much, because I hear the leaves rustle with a breeze. Hyde senses my hesitation, and his hand stills on my cheek. I feel the softest tremble of his fingers on my skin. I don’t want it to tremble. I am past
tremble
.

Perry knew I liked him to take control. He knew what I wanted. By now he would have—

I suck in a breath, feeling like an arrow has sliced right through my heart.

I jerk back. Hyde’s eyes fly open. We both freeze for an endless instant. Then I jump to my feet.

My legs shake beneath me as shame and lust play tug-of-war in my body. How could I think about Perry just then? What is wrong with me?

Hyde scrubs a hand over his face. “I’m sorry, Brooke. Was that too much?”

I’m so confused. I don’t know what just happened. No. I
do
know. Kissing Hyde wasn’t too much. It wasn’t too little, either. It just wasn’t kissing
Perry
.

“No. It was great.” My voice comes out scratchy, like I’m going to cry.

Hyde rises to his feet. For a moment I think he’s going to leave, but he doesn’t. He steps closer. “The last thing I want to do is hurt you. I really like you. I know about you and Perry, and maybe this was too soon. Maybe it’s not the right time, with all that’s happening. But I don’t care. I’ll wait for you.”

“I like you too, Hyde.” It’s the truth. He is thoughtful and romantic, and I should appreciate him for who he is, instead of just seeing him as
not like Perry
. “It’s just that . . .” I bite my lip, not wanting to explain to him that
he
is amazing but
I
am the one who is a mess. “You shouldn’t wait for me.”

I don’t know how I’m supposed to move on, but I do know that having him wait for me isn’t going to help.

Hyde’s gaze darts past me suddenly. He lets out a curse, his posture tensing. In an instant he is all warrior again. A sentry who has just spotted danger.

Our waiting is over.

4

I
n the midst of a scrubby stand of birches roughly a mile away, I see what has alarmed him.

Three people. Too far for me to see their faces. Close enough that I can tell they are all men. We watch them for a few moments, taking in the practiced stealth of their movements. How their progress is careful and furtive, and runs parallel to the well-trod trail instead of on it. There is no doubt in my mind—they are attempting to stay concealed. The men in the distance aren’t weary travelers seeking asylum. They are hostile.

Hyde comes to the same conclusion. “That’s trouble.”

“Let’s run them off.”

Hyde pulls his bow and quiver over his shoulder. His eyes blaze with intensity, and his muscles are coiled and rigid, like he’s ready to spring forward. There’s not a trace of kindness or playfulness in him anymore.

He gives a tight nod, and we jog down the hill toward the trespassers.

With a hundred yards still to go, Hyde and I slow to a quiet prowl. We could shout at them to leave from here. We could engage them with our bows. Hyde is a brilliant archer, as accurate as I am. But I have a clear view of the three men now. They have stopped walking, and I can see their faces.

And I know them.

I freeze. Hyde reacts immediately, stopping with me.

“Is it Roar?” he murmurs, sensing the shock that’s swept over me.

I shake my head. Roar’s return would be a great thing. This is not.

Anger ignites inside me, and I surge forward. My strides are fast and long, fueled by an endless flow of rage.

Hyde is next to me as we break through the tree line and come into the open. The three men stand on a rise above us, and Hyde and I have no cover. I have put us in the worst position possible, but I don’t care.

“Wylan!” I slow to a jog and reach back, grabbing an arrow from my quiver and nocking it. “Don’t move!”

His head whips to me. His eyes flare with surprise; then his expression transforms into something venomous and hateful as he recognizes me.

I approach the rest of the way slowly so I can keep my aim steady, my arrow ready to fly if necessary. Hyde holds pace beside me, his bow also drawn and nocked. As I have Wylan in my sights, Hyde swings his arrow between the other two traitors, Gray and Norris.

Hyde was there the night Gray poisoned Aria. He was also there the morning Wylan took a third of the tribe and left, renouncing his loyalty to Perry and to us—the Tides. He knows as well as I do that these three were forbidden ever to come back.

I stop when we are forty paces away. Wylan stands with his hands raised in surrender, looking from me to Hyde.

The strength of my vision allows me to see him as clearly as most people see at five paces. Weeks in the borderlands have not been good to him. His brow is heavier and lower. His pointy jaw juts out farther. His grimy skin sags like a plant that has wilted in the midday sun. Clothes that are no more than rags drape on his bony, stooping form. He has always had a pinched face, like he’s just swallowed ash. In the time since he left us, he only appears to have become more bitter.

“What are you doing here?” I ask. There is a soullessness to his black eyes that chills me.

“I came to talk to Peregrine.”

“Perry would kill you.”

“Then I’m lucky to have come by you first.”

“I may kill you myself.”

Wylan’s nostrils flare, and his chin rises slightly in suppressed anger. He has never liked me. “I mean no harm, Brooke. I’ve come to ask forgiveness.” He glances at the two men at his sides. “We have.”

“You’re seeking
forgiveness
?” It seems impossible. It’s a word I’d never expect to hear from his mouth. But he nods.

“Yes. I want to come home.”

There is something in the way he lingers over the word
home
. Does he know we’ve abandoned the compound?

“Please, Brooke. We’re tired. We want to be back with our tribe. Take us home with you.”

“No chance,” Hyde growls. He stands motionless at my side, his legs firmly set, his form perfect. The picture of an archer at his most lethal position.

“Tell Peregrine, then,” Wylan says. “I beg you, Brooke. Take the message for me. Tell him I want to speak to him. He’ll forgive me. At least give me a chance.”

Hyde says, “I’ve heard enough.”

I have too.

I drop my aim and let my arrow fly. It sinks deep into the earth between Wylan’s feet.

He lets out a yelp and lurches back, but Hyde’s arrow flies an instant later, also landing inches from Wylan’s foot.

“Idiots!” Wylan yells, retreating frantically. “You’re insane!”

“Get out of here,” I tell him. “Come back to this land again and it’ll be your death.”

After we run them off, Hyde and I hold our post until the morning watch relieves us. We talk about Wylan. I am surprised by the fisherman’s return—Wylan has always been so proud, so stubborn—but Hyde is not.

“You don’t know the borderlands,” he says to me. He is right. I don’t know them, nor do I want to. “Pride is the first thing you lose out there,” he continues. “And the most painless. The trick is to hold on to your honor. There are no laws. No rules beyond the ones you choose to live by.” He gives me a faint smile. “If you break those, you make an enemy of yourself, and that’ll destroy you faster than anything else.”

I stare at him, marveling at how everything he says intrigues me. Questions pop into my head, but I hardly know where to start. I just want him to keep talking.

Hyde raises his eyebrows questioningly.

“We were good together,” I blurt, just to say something, and I could kick myself. What I meant is how we handled Wylan. How it felt like we were perfectly in tune through the entire encounter. I don’t want him to think I meant anything more.

I don’t want to hurt Hyde. The hope I saw in his eyes earlier is a precious thing; I’m afraid I’ll destroy that part of him. And if I do that, I could lose this—my connection with this warrior who is fierce and perfect at my side. This poet, whose words twinkle like stars before my eyes.

A smile spreads over Hyde’s lips. It’s affectionate and understanding and gentle. “Incredible,” he says. “It was an encounter to remember.”

I still don’t know if we’re talking about our kiss or our stand against Wylan, but it doesn’t matter. I don’t fear anymore. I know, whatever happens between us, Hyde and I will be fine.

“It was,” I agree. “It sure was.”

When the morning patrollers arrive, we fill them in and then return to the cave, where we assemble in the Battle Room, a small cavern Perry uses to discuss important matters.

There is a table here. A long wooden trestle brought from the compound, and benches and chairs. I drop into one of them. I never expected that sitting in a chair would feel like such a luxury.

Hyde sits on my left. Across the table are Reef, Marron, and Perry. They remain silent and serious as Hyde and I take turns describing what happened.

“Bold of them to show up,” Reef mutters gruffly. “They know they aren’t welcome here.”

Bold
is putting it mildly. I still can’t get over Wylan’s gall.

I look at Perry, anticipating his reaction. I hate Wylan for betraying my tribe, but it’s personal for Perry. Wylan insulted him in front of the Tides. And then there’s Gray, who tried to poison Aria. But Perry seems calm. Thoughtful. Nowhere near as furious as I expected.

“He didn’t come to make amends,” he says.

I say, “He said he wanted forgiveness.”

Perry shakes his head. “That’s an excuse. A story he came up with to explain why he was here. Wylan knows I’d never forgive him. He wouldn’t have risked coming back unless he needed something.”

I press my lips together. I didn’t consider that Wylan might have trespassed onto our land with another motive in mind.

“Maybe he was trying to get to the compound,” Reef says. “There are still supplies there, and it’s unguarded. We left plenty behind that could be valuable. They could fetch a man some bartering power in the borderlands.”

It’s true. We couldn’t bring all our belongings with us into the cave. Tools. Furniture. Clothing. We had to leave most of our things behind.

Marron shakes his head. “A plausible theory, but unlikely. There were only three men on foot. Carrying away goods would be impractical and difficult. I don’t know that the effort would justify the reward.” He looks at Perry. “You don’t believe he’s motivated by revenge?”

Another long pause as Perry thinks it over. I imagine Perry has a whole host of memories with Wylan. He’s a Seer, like me, so his recollections would be strongly visual. But he’s a Scire as well. Perry would have scent memories—all the tempers he’s scented from Wylan. They would form a pattern, a reliable way to predict behavior. And, by working backward, the root of behavior: motivation.

Finally, he responds. “Wylan loves himself more than he hates me.”

Marron nods, like this statement makes all manner of sense. “Self-preservation, then. He’s driven by visceral, life-sustaining needs.”

“Shelter,” Reef says.

“The cave and the food stores we have here,” Marron says, nodding. “That’s what he’s after.”

I remember the way Wylan’s voice pulled at the word
home
. He’d made it sound syrupy, and now I recognize that tone as falseness.
Home
implies an emotional attachment, but that’s not what he wanted. What Wylan wanted was a roof over his head.

“But they were only three,” Hyde says.

“You told me that when they dispersed, they took a third of the tribe,” Marron says to Perry.

“A quarter. Almost a hundred people.”

I can’t help but remember Aria’s Marking ceremony, when Gray slipped hemlock into Aria’s tattoo ink. She almost died. Perry beat Gray to a pulp in front of everyone when he learned what Gray had done.

That attempt to poison Aria fractured my tribe. Some people sided with Perry and his right to defend Aria. Others, led by Wylan, saw it as a betrayal. They viewed Aria as a Mole, an interloper who shouldn’t have been there to begin with.

I was one of them. I didn’t want her there. But I didn’t want to see her killed, either. I stayed with the Tides that day, but dozens of people left. Their faith in Perry as a Blood Lord was shattered. They broke oath and followed Wylan out of the Tide compound. That morning I lost friends I had never spent a single day without. It was like losing Liv, but worse. Liv didn’t
choose
to go.

“You think the others are still with them?” I ask. “Hiding in the borderlands somewhere?”

Marron turns a ring around his finger as he replies. “Wylan was their leader when they left. He still could be. His entry into the territory could have been a scouting pass. The tip of the spear, probing for weakness.”

“You think he’s coming back with a larger attack,” Perry says.

It is more a statement than a question—he has already accepted it—but Marron replies anyway.

“Yes. We have to be prepared for it.”