I’ve been afraid before, no doubt. Surprised and confused aren’t unfamiliar feelings either. But before this day, this moment, I don’t think I’d ever felt all three at once as intensely as now.
I just stand there. Frozen. Silent.
“Oh I’m sorry,” he says. His voice was too welcoming to be sincere. “You probably don’t remember me. Well, I personally knew your father.” I couldn’t be true.
“You’re lying.” I say softly.
“Oh, you don’t believe me? Garett Lenon Erickson. He had blue eyes and dark brown hair.” That was his name. And that was what he looked like. “Skilled with a spear too. It sure came in handy in the war.” War?
“What are you talking—” I start.
“That was when he killed my brother,” he says, fake smile wiped off his face.
“What war?” I ask more firmly.
“And I killed him,” he says, avoiding my question.
“What about my mother?” I ask.
“Oh, Linda? Blown up by one of our bombs,” he says as if that was the sort of thing everyone did. I get filled with emotion. Not sadness. Rage.
I feel something being shoved into my clenched fist. My bow rests in my hands as Dillon gives me my quiver with only seven arrows.
“What about my parents?” Dillon asks with an edge to his voice. "Did one of you kill them too?"
“Yes,” a man with muddy brown eyes and dirty blonde hair said. “Mariana and Terrance Hart.”
“Gwendolyn Tate,” a man at the far right grunted.
“Carter Tate,” the man at the opposite end said. They weren’t at all skeptical about telling us. That’s what bothered me. It’s as if they wanted us to know. And they probably did.
There was one last man. He had lifeless gray eyes and chestnut hair that swept across his forehead.
“Cameron McHenry,” he grunts. Rose’s father.
Simultaneously, they pull out knives. Bigger and sharper than I’d ever seen. I take a look to my right. Olivia stands wrapped in Marcus’s arms. I feel a pang of jealously that they each still have a piece of their family, but wave it off. I turn to my left. Dillon’s face is solid, but his eyes show fear. He mouths something that I can’t make out. I hold his gaze for a moment, then close my eyes and think about my mother, my father and Rose. I had a feeling that this was the last of the gang. There was a reason they sent our parents’ murderers last. They figured that this would be the end for us.
When I open my eyes, I find that the distance between us and the men had decreased. My bow is loaded, but I think better of it. I couldn’t afford to waste any arrows.
There are five men. There are four of us. We each would fight a man with the exception of one of us. I prayed they wouldn’t all go for one of us. But that was too much to ask.
Olivia was ripped from Marcus’s arms and pinned to the ground by the man who killed her mother. She was the youngest, and more importantly, smallest of us. The other four cut her struggling body as I shot arrows. I catch a glimpse of the pain in Marcus’s face as he rushes to help his sister as well. My three arrows bounced off of three of the men's armor and fall to the ground, useless. I grab my knife out of my backpack and sling it over my shoulder. I take my chances.
Blood was flowing from Olivia’s handful of cuts. Marcus was battling with one of the men, and Dillon with another. I swipe my knife across the man who pins Olivia, cutting his lower arm. His grip loosens and Olivia scrambles to her feet. I scoop up the three arrows, grab Olivia’s hand and run a fair distance away from them. I open up her backpack and hurriedly wrap a bandage around the two worst cuts on her forehead and lower leg, skipping the antiseptic. I couldn’t spare anymore time.
Three men reach us, but I realize it too late. One sends a knife slicing down my back. I try to ignore the sting and get to my feet. He stands a foot in front of me, too close to shoot. His amber eyes burn me. Those were the eyes of my father’s murderer. I turn on my heel to run, but his hand forms an iron grip on my wrist to the point of pain before I can get anywhere. He shoves me on the ground. I reach for my knife, but he knocks it out of my hand then kneels over me and locks my arms to my sides. The sun glares in my face. I turn to the side. For the first time, I realize that we’re on a large hill. And at the bottom of the hill lies the city.
“Any last words?” the man asks with a smirk. A knife is pressed against my neck, blade ready to jab into my jaw.
“Don’t say anything Skye,” Dillon says as he sends an arrow at the man’s hip, one of the spots not covered in armor. The man gives a grunt and stumbles, releasing me. I have just enough time to scurry to my feet. I open my mouth to speak, to say something about how bad I felt, but Marcus’s yelp and Olivia’s shriek fill the air. I hear a thud that had to be Marcus. I dart in his direction.
Sure enough, he’s flat on his face, blood stained shirt heaving up and down with his gasps for air. The man who killed his father sprints to him with a spear. I shoot him in the hip which merely acts as a distraction. I grab Marcus’s hand and force him up and run.
Dillon and Olivia run toward us. We’ve used our arrows, knives, and spears, and been wounded, but the five men are still standing.
“We don’t have a chance,” I proclaim. “We have to run!” They don’t ask where. They know. We fly down the hill. I begin to think why they wanted to kill us. Maybe they anticipated another war. But I still don’t have any answers about the first one.
We don’t look back to see if they’re following. I don’t need to look back to feel an arrow pierce the skin on my back, knocking me off my feet. Or to know who shot it. I tumble down the last of the hill. Arms flailing. Legs kicking. Head banging. I don’t know when I stopped. Or if I even ever did. I kept feeling myself rolling. I can’t see or think clearly. Shrieks of my name. Scuttling feet. Sirens. The air is filled with a flurry of sounds.
Then, nothing.
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