Mayhap that made me weak—the guards at the Barrier would have said so.Or mayhap that meant I had more feelings than I’d admit or allow to show.Right now, I wished my nerves were as hard as I pretended because my heart was pounding so loudly I could barely hear my own thoughts.
And then, just as I reached the last rung of the ladder, I heard it—I heardhim, the boy.It hissed at me, and the sound was inhumane enough to make my entire body shudder.I drew in a quick breath and jumped to the floor, swinging around to face it with my skullcrusher raised.
It took ten or so beats of my heart—rapid staccato beats—for my eyes to adjust to the gloom in the safe room.I took short, quick breaths, legs apart and braced for an attack that didn’t come.The scent of death and rot wasn’t as bad down here.There weren’t any dead bodies—yet—and the loamy smell of earth masked the scent from above.But there was the aroma of blood and sickness and the faintest whiff of Hollow.
The scent of a Hollow is a smell unlike any other, and one that no one who experienced it ever forgot.It was chilling, akin to the scent of putrefying flesh mixed with that of the sickly sweetness of a rotting garbage pile on the edge of the village.
The sound of a Hollow was almost as bad.We usually heard them long before we smelled them.From a distance, their noises sounded almost human.But this close, the grunts seemed otherworldly, almost eerily resonant.Even the hisses did not remind me of those of the occasional snake we encountered.Theirs were wet, gurgling hisses that made me want to vomit.The moans and hisses down here grew louder and more desperate as the moments ticked on and as I stared blindly at a spot just a few feet away.Gradually the shadows morphed into discernable shapes, and I realized what I was looking at.
The shelf had toppled over, like Finnrey said.I could make out the frame of the structure and see some of the items that had fallen free when it tumbled.Potatoes and sacks of grain littered the floor between the shelf and me.
And then I saw the child.
He really was a child, too.I had imagined a boy of ten or eleven.Still a child but big enough to be a threat.But this boy could not have been older than four.He was so small, lying under that shelf, his pudgy arms reaching through the wooden slats to try and get to me.
To kill me.
Eat me.
My breath hitched as I took him in.His round face was marred by dark streaks, clearly identifiable as red vein virus.I looked back at his grasping arms and saw the protruding veins there too.It was too dark for me to see how mottled the skin might be, but I imagined he was very close to turning.He might even turn while I stood here, gawking at him.Clearly, he was already in the throes of the desire to bite, to kill, to feed on my flesh.
I hefted my skullcrusher higher and moved toward him.I’d do it now, before the change could become complete.I’d do it fast so he wouldn’t suffer any longer.One well-placed strike and he’d be gone.This would be over.I stood above him, just out of reach of his short little arms and chubby, baby fingers, and looked down.His head was between two slats.I had a good shot at his temple.I’d drive the sharp point of my weapon into it, watch his body go limp, and Finnrey and I could go.
I took a breath, raised the weapon for the killing blow, and all the air in my lungs whooshed out of me.The child suddenly went quiet, and his eyes met mine.Just for an instant, I saw something human in them.And the human part of him, what little was left, was frightened and crying out for help.No matter that in the next instant he began thrashing and opening and closing his stubby fingers, trying desperately to claw at me.There was still something of the little boy in him.How was I supposed to drive my skullcrusher into a little boy?
I could imagine his parents thrusting him into the safe room as they fought off the Hollows.He would have had to listen while his parents and his sibling were eaten.He would have been frightened to death at the sounds of the monsters above.The Hollows might have lingered and fed for hours.
And then when all had gone quiet...had he called for his mama and papa?Had he cried in the silence?Did he know one of the Hollows bit him or scratched him and his fate was sealed?Had he known what was happening to him when he began to feel feverish, when the illness came upon him?
“Mara?”Finnrey called.“Everything alright?”
I closed my eyes and swallowed.“Yes.Almost done.”
“Are you sure you can—”
“Yes!”My voice was curt and harsh.I swallowed and softened it.“I’ll be up in a moment.”
I looked down at the little face one last time.He bared his baby teeth at me.
“May the gods forgive me,” I whispered.Because I never would.
And then I slammed the skullcrusher down.
***
“YOU DID WHAT?”GAZall but yelled an hour later when we met with him and Nize at the twisted tree.We were late, and Gaz had been halfway through his lecture about being on time when Finnrey told him I’d killed a Hollow.
I guess she didn’t want to hear him go on with his lecture any longer.Neither did I, but I would have preferred that to the way he was yelling now.
“That’s not the protocol!”Gaz said, stepping closer to me.Normally, I didn’t mind Gaz moving closer to me.I was tall, and Gaz was one of the few people the same height as me.He was muscular as well and had lovely dark brown eyes unmarred by flecks or other impurities, like my brown-gold eyes.Gaz had a straight nose and a high forehead, and he wore his dark hair cropped and his beard neatly trimmed, which only served to emphasize his full lips.
But I wasn’t fantasizing about kissing those lips now.Not when he was using them to scold me.“It was one of them, a boy, who hadn’t fully turned,” I said.“Finnrey had already immobilized him.I really wasn’t in any danger.”My voice sounded so calm, so aloof.I sounded as though I was talking about what I ate for supper last night or the temperature of the stew.I didn’t want Finnrey—or anyone—to know that inside my head a voice screamed,you killed him.You killed that baby!
“If he was immobilized then there was no reason you couldn’t have met Nize and me here and we all could have gone back.”
“Don’t be a dusthead, Gaz,” I said, wincing inwardly at the way his eyes widened in anger.“What was I supposed to do?Wait until he turned and became even stronger?We had to act when we did.”
“Fine.Then you can explain it to Morll.You’d better hope he doesn’t decide to punish you by sending you to the Barrier.”This was a common threat.Even though Earsleh prided itself on treating everyone with honor and equality, in reality, royalty and courtiers were rarely sent to the Barrier.We protected the kingdom by patrolling the farms and small settlements in the outerlands.We didn’t have to face the daily threat of death on the border.“Morll will be furious with you.Bothof you,” Gaz added.
