Her gaze met Blade’s and in the other girl’s grass green eyes was a rage that equaled her own. Bone swallowed again, desperate to quiet them all.
“That’s why we’re out here, though, Bullet. She used our names and we all got tasked,” Blade said.
Still Bone said nothing but the creatures had risen with the lightening sky and circling above was a hawk, preying on things revealed by the retreating fog. The hawk held a powerful position in the air, watching over everything below. It chose when it would strike and when it would rest.
She despised the hawk even as she envied its freedom.
Some insect or animal scurried over her foot but it didn’t matter. She had long ago learned not to fear the crawling things. The black-eyed man had tried desperately to find her weakness. Water, darkness, creepy crawlies, pain—he’d attempted them all. Ultimately, it was Minton who discovered it. Then he’d made her suffer in ways her young mind had been incapable of handling. He had found the thing she feared the most and cultivated it.
“Bayu-bay, all people should sleep at night,
Bayu-bay, tomorrow is a new day
We got very tired today,
Let’s say to everyone 'Good night’,
Go to sleep
Bayu-bay”
Ninka’s voice was pure and tinted with the colors of her homeland. There was a comfort to be found when Ninka spoke her native language—a cold beauty that drew Bone’s mind from her lust to kill. But the child’s ramblings this day might get them all killed. Bone shifted again and this time she embraced the pain, moved harder to scrape and tear her skin. As there was comfort in Ninka’s language, there was pleasure in the hurting.
“She’s dying, isn’t she?” Arrow asked and in her voice was the calm Bone needed. If only she could be like Arrow, controlling her fear and hate, settling the waters of her mind until she felt…nothing.
She could not. She wasn’t that strong. “Stop talking,” she spat. “Stop talking,” she demanded again. If they didn’t shut their mouths, Ninka would pay the ultimate price. Ninka with her yellow hair and soft skin, her fragile bones and weak mind.
Death was stalking, curling around them all with the rising wind. The hawk was a harbinger. They wouldn’t escape the black-eyed man. He knew everything.
“Gretchen, the sky is turning very blue,” Ninka whispered louder now.
Bone could see the blue. It was startling in this place of sorrow and loss. The lighter colors taunted the sky but the blue overrode them.
“Hold on, Ninka. This task is almost over,” Bullet croaked out.
“She’ll get herself killed and the rest of us punished. Shut up, Ninka, please,” Blade pleaded.
Oh, Blade was angry. Bitterness leaked into her tone and should the black-eyed man hear it, he would punish her—make her take another life and another and another until she screamed her throat raw. Blade had killed more than any of them since they’d arrived here. She lost control more than any of the rest of them, even Bone. It was always painful to watch, but stunning in its own way. Her blades made a lovely noise when they danced in the air…or across skin. For some reason when Blade was pushed close to the point of breaking it made Bone want to destroy the black-eyed man—punch through his chest, take his heart in her hands and squeeze it until he was dead, dead, dead.
One day she would be strong enough.
Her breath caught, the sound a loud click in the silence left by Blade’s plea. “Shut her up, Bullet. She’ll get us all back in the water pit,” Bone whispered.
“The sky is blue, blue, blue,” Ninka sing-songed.
Bone shuddered. The cold wrapped around her feet, moving up and coating her entire body, dispersing the warmth of her hate and locking its sharp teeth into her soul to shake and tear.
“They come,” Arrow said in her voice that spoke of ages long passed. Arrow had a voice like Bone’s ima…ancient.
“Kar li, ima” Bone said on a breath but the wind took her voice and flung it. I feel the cold, mother.
“Ninka, hush poupon, don’t say a word,” Bullet pleaded.
Ninka was beyond them all now. The Etz haChayim, Tree of Life, called and her voice would only be heard there after today.
“Bauy-bay, Bayu-bay, tomorrow is a new day,” Ninka trilled out, nearly yelling now. “Gretchen, my mama is calling me. Do you hear her?”
Panic threatened to choke Bone. Her young body was weak. Not as weak as Ninka’s but too tiny to break the binds that held her. She wanted to grab Ninka from the ground and run. Instead she closed her eyes.
“Yes, Mama, I am here…” Ninka cried softly.
The sun’s rays grabbed at the clearing where they were staked, heralding the entrance of the big, tall men coming to make sure they’d remained silent. Their boots thudded against the ground. After all, they had no need to be quiet.