“And the one your brother got for you?”
She really does know everything. “Yes.”
“Good.” Mother finishes tightening the belt around my waist. “Go and get them.”
I’m in a daze as I head back downstairs. Drew and I were so careful, so thoughtful. We tried to keep Mother out of this. And yet she knew. She was making her own preparations just as we were—also skirting the law for our family.
For me.
My chest tightens past the point of pain as I get the two sickles and slide them into the hooks on the belt. They’ve risked so much for me. My shoulders suddenly are pulled down by an invisible weight. Mother folds her arms, leaning against a support column in the main room. The sky has turned angry behind her, illuminating her black hair with streaks of gold, like fire in a hearth.
“You look like a proper hunter.”
“I don’t have a mask or collar.” I rub my throat. I mightlooklike a Hunter, but I’m not one. I will never be. I do not know if I could take my own life, not even with the vampire staring me down, not even knowing that it would be the best for Hunter’s Hamlet. That’s why Drew was destined for the guild, and I was made for the forge.
“Let’s hope you need none of it.” Mother sits at our table and folds her hands. She closes her eyes and I can see her lips move in a silent prayer. I hope her old gods are listening. I can’t pray to gods that have clearly forgotten about us.
I go to the window. The sky is turning purple. The sun is bleeding out. I watch as it disappears completely and we are plunged into a brief darkness before the moon rises from the ashes of its sibling. Angry and red.
The Blood Moon hangs above the earth, tinting everything crimson. It’s the largest moon I have ever seen, inflamed like a festering pustule. It creeps over the rooftops and charges the air with a restless energy. I place my hands in the sickles, adjusting my grip.
“You should come away from the window,” Mother says softly.
“I will go mad if I can’t see what’s happening.” I don’t know what I expect to see. But I do know that not knowing is far worse.
“Hopefully nothing happens.”
“Hopefully,” I echo.
For the first part of the evening, my heart is in my throat. I cannot tear my eyes away from the empty streets. Every shadow is haunted. Every corner hides a secret vampire that exists only in my mind.
My mind steps away from reality, back to that night…long ago…the night Father died.
I remember him leaving. He kissed us both goodbye and held us tightly as he always did. Unlike Drew’s embrace, it did not feel final. I wonder if things would’ve been easier if it had. If we had known that that was the last time we would see him and say goodbye, would it still have hurt so much? Could I have begun to form that yawning void within me in advance so my descent into it wasn’t so sudden?
He left and the next time we saw him…he didn’t have his sickle. His face had been stolen by a monster.
Screaming fills my ears.
But this screaming is not in my memory of the day Father left. Mother hears it too. She jumps up from her seat, sprinting to the window, ignoring her earlier warning.
“Do you see anything?” she whispers.
“No.” I try and shake the ghosts of the past.
“It sounded close…”
“It did.” I tighten my grip on the sickles. If the vampires are here, it means the vanguard fell. It means Drew is—I can’t even think it. Because something in me tells me he’s not dead.My brother lives. It’s foolish optimism, nothing more. And yet I’m so sure I would know deep within if he died. “Go upstairs.”
“Flor—”
“Mother, please,” I say, quiet and firm, locking my eyes with hers. I’ve never ordered her to do anything. Perhaps it’s Drew’s confidence in me—the one thing he asked of me, to protect her—that gives me the strength to be stern. “Go upstairs and hide.”
“If there is a vampire, they will find me even if I’m hiding.”
“That’s why we have the salt. And I will not let the monster come even that close.” I shake my head. “Isn’t this what you got this armor for? Isn’t that why you let Drew train me in secret? To protect you?”
Her hands fall on my shoulders, and she shakes me lightly. “To protectyourself.”
