Blood for Honor

It has been a very dry end to summer. Long, hot days and cool, brisk nights are devoid of moisture. Even the humidity has been scarce, a rarity for the Piney Woods that I have called home my entire twenty-four years of life.

The void left by the moisture is now filled with all-consuming flames.

A cacophony of screams coats the night air as thick as the smoke hovering over my wooded village. A faint orange glow illuminates the trees in the direction of the more densely populated area. Still, the extent of the damage hides from my secluded shanty cabin behind my father’s larger cottage.

My knees weaken under me as the shrieks and yells grow in volume. I attempt to slow my breathing to quell the anxiety building in my chest, but the smell of smoke sets my nerves on edge. Though deadened through a distance, I might as well be in the midst of hell with them.

The village garden is shrouded in darkness through the window over the sink, untouched by the violence this night holds. I can only pray to whoever might be listening that the fire does not reach it. Nearing the final harvest, we cannot afford to lose our crops. The deer have become sparse over the last few years, and we can no longer depend on their meat to feed us, cutting down our food supply significantly.

My husband is conspicuously absent, and my village is under attack. I have resigned myself to pacing the narrow patch of earth between the empty fire pit in the center of the cabin, and the water pump against the wall, chewing on my thumb anxiously. My leather-clad feet make no sound against the rabbit skin rug covering the sandy floor as I wear a path in the soft fur.

Unsure of what to do, my anxiety threatens to overtake me. I can do nothing except gnaw violently on the calloused skin of my thumb and continue pacing with intentionally deep breaths to try and calm myself.

My thoughts run rampant despite my efforts.

Tonight’s attack is entirely unprovoked. We have had a tense ceasefire with Charon for some time since the new Chief took power, but we have had no intentions of breaking it on either side—or so I thought. After decades of constant fighting, I thought we were finally making headway toward peace despite our differences.

I can fight, without a doubt. I could swing a sword before I could read, but the thought of missing my husband somewhere in the fray keeps me within the four walls of our home. Danny will come here to look for me first unless he needs my help.

Or he is dead.

We parted on a sour note this morning, and I cannot help but fear that negative words may be the last thing I ever said to him.

I should go look for him.

The thought evokes a strong sense of determination, forcing itself through the fog of anxiety clouding my mind. It makes it easier to process my thoughts, and I finally make my decision.

A raucous banging against the cabin’s doorpost sends my heart beating erratically in my chest, flooding my body with adrenaline. Danny would not knock, but neither would intruders.

“Iylara! You in there?” Damian’s voice bellows through the barrier in his deep, southern cadence. Impatience lurks at the edge of his tone.

My older brother’s familiar voice from the other side of the door calms my racing heart—to an extent.

The Damian Vance from my childhood would be much more welcome to hear. That Damian was more accepting of me. Now he harbors resentment against me because of who the man I married is—or rather is not, which is Blackthorn. My brother is not the only one who disagrees with my decision, but I can’t think about that right now.

I mentally shake myself, shoving the bitterness brought on by the thought aside to deal with later. I take the three steps between me and the door, inhaling a deep breath and releasing it before slinging the thick woven door open.

My six-foot-tall brother stands outside under the thatched awning with a worried look. The lines of his furrowed brow crease his forehead, uncovered by the long, black hair braided down his back. His tear-drop-shaped clan mark stands out stark against his skin in the light of the torch he carries. It curves over his chin and down his neck, the tip ending at the hollow of his throat, identical to my own.

“Danny here?” he asks, dark brown eyes searching for my husband over my shoulder. Crow’s feet are unmistakable at the corners of his eyes as he narrows them at Danny’s absence.

I shake my head, trying to keep the frantic fluttering in my chest at bay. I glance over my brother’s shoulder, but there is no movement in the courtyard behind him.

Where is Danny?

“I haven’t seen him since he left to help the blacksmith this morning. What is going on?” I ask, my anxiety clawing its way out of the cage in my chest more and more by the second.

“Charon,” Damian says shortly. “We need to go.”

My heart thuds vigorously against my ribs. “Not without Danny,” I say, shaking my head. “Of course, who else would it be? You know I mean, ’Why are they here?’”

Damian ignores my question. “Grab your bag, Iylara. Move," he orders, trying to coax me into action with the venom in his voice. He uses fear and malice to get what he wants, but it does not work on me. I do what I want, for the most part.

I do wish to hear my brother call me by my affectionately given nickname, Ray, one more time. It’s like a stab in the heart every time he calls me by my birth name. He was the first to call me Ray, after all. It may have been a joke at first, but it stuck, nonetheless. But now, his voice always has an undercurrent of disgust when he speaks my name.

I give Damian a shaky huff and turn on my heel, strutting for the antique armoire in the far corner of my home with more than a little attitude. I pull out a long hooded cowl from the wardrobe. It covers my olive green overdress with gentle ochre waves, hiding the two short swords hanging from my weapons belt on either hip. I procrastinate in joining my brother by adjusting my belt’s position languidly.

It only takes a moment before an impatient Damian finally yells at me from the door. “Hurry up, woman! We don’t have time for this! The fire is getting closer to the courtyard!”

Damian’s patience with me is running thin, but I am stalling on purpose. I can only hope the extra time will give Danny a chance to make his way home. Damian is only moments away from dragging me off to the safe house, per our doomsday plan in the event that something like this night ever came to pass. The fact that Danny does not know how to get there by himself does not escape me.

My father never entrusted the location to him, much to my chagrin, and I never went against my father’s orders to withhold it from him. It is on me if he is lost tonight because of that.

A deadly virus swept through three years ago, killing a third of our population, including my mother and older sister. Now, the ruling bloodline of Blackthorn has had to take some precautions to ensure the clan always has a leader. But it entails running away from a fight like cowards if you ask me. That opinion is frowned upon, so I keep my mouth shut if I can help it.

“I’m coming,” I say over my shoulder.

I pull the hood of my cowl over the dark, auburn red braid hanging halfway down my back, casting my sun-kissed face in shadow. My leather rucksack and quarter-staff wait for me beside the door, and I meet Damian outside after grabbing both.

I adjust the strap of my bag on my shoulder as I speak. “Are we holding Charon off at all?”

Worry gnaws away in my chest for our people like a starved beast, and I cannot help but feel less of myself as I prepare to run away from the inferno and battle to save my own life.

“So far, but Charon was more organized than ever before. If you can’t tell, they got through the South Gate,” Damian says, lowering his voice as we head for the smaller North Gate, near the Orchard.

Of course, they did. We wouldn’t be evacuating if they didn’t.

“Dad ordered me to fetch you and Danny—bring you to the safe house,” he says, cutting off my thoughts.

I glance back at the pine wood, scavenged metal, and animal skins pieced together in a haphazard yet functional design that is my home. “But Danny isn’t here. I should be looking for him, not coming with you. I can fight, you know,” I say bitterly, wishing I had gotten myself together and gone looking for my husband before Damian showed up.

“Dad won’t allow that,” Damian says, grabbing me roughly by the arm to stop me as I take one step in the opposite direction. He knows I am seconds from bolting off into the darkness after a man he hates, if not to help defend our people.

He tugs on my arm with a snarl, and I let him pull me along against my better judgment. It is quieter on this side of the village, and we make it to the North Gate without interference. The sounds of battle shrink away with the ever-increasing distance our feet carry us.

We slip through the North Gate, mainly used for exporting extra food from the gardens to the trading post. It is only wide enough for a small supply wagon to fit through. I am sure if Charon knew about it, they would have utilized it tonight, but it is nestled under cover of dense forest and overgrown trails, well hidden from anyone ignorant to its existence.

“Our father doesn’t allow much,” I mumble, trudging behind Damian with a bitter attitude. “I should be fighting, not running,” I add, righteous anger rising inside me.

I don’t know how much longer I can continue to do nothing. I helped train many of the people we are leaving behind to fight for their lives. I should be by their side, but being an heir to leadership, I am begrudgingly withheld from participating in the name of preserving Blackthorn’s ruling bloodline. I don’t understand why it matters so much. Surely others could lead just as well, but tradition runs deep in our clan.

“You should be thinking about the bigger picture,” Damian spits at me, poking at my anger while simultaneously acting as though he has heard my thoughts.

I should not poke back, but I don’t listen to rationalizations on the best of days when it comes to my brother. “You mean saving ourselves,” I throw back at him, unable to hold my tongue. “Our people are dying, and all we can think of are our own lives.”

Damian turns, towering over me. “You need to watch your tone, Iylara.” I do not cower from him like I know he wants.

Damian likes to throw his weight around from time to time. Since our older sister died, making him the next in line to be Chief, he has let the thought of power go to his head. If he had it his way, he would have talked our father into stepping down long ago, but extreme stubbornness runs in the family.

I came by mine honestly, that is for sure.

“Don’t even. You know good and well that I am right.” My words only make Damian angrier, as I knew they would, but I enjoy poking the bear from time to time.

Damian brings his hand up, striking me on the cheek with the back of his hand. I hiss, my hand automatically covering my stinging skin.

I glower at him as he points his finger in my face. “You forget who you are talking to,” he says with a growl, shoving me forward roughly. “Walk.”

I grit my teeth against the stinging his hand left behind and concede. Picking a fight with him right now might not be the best life choice, so I submit, falling into step beside him with a defeated sigh to avoid his wrath. Damian may very well beat me if I run off to search for Danny with the mood he is in now. He has only ever slapped me once before, on my wedding day, and it isn’t something I like to remember.

Damian does not act like this in front of our father. Surely Leeland Vance would find his son’s behavior distasteful, but he would never believe me if I told him about it. Being the only son, Damian has always been our father’s favorite.

“You aren’t as superior as you think,” I mutter. I shrug off his hand to walk ahead of him, determined to have the last word, as childish as it is.

Damian’s anger pulsates outwards from him like hot tendrils waiting to burn me, much like the heat of the flame smoldering at the end of his torch, but he does not answer. He grabs my arm once again to ensure I do not run off, and his long legged-strides surpass my shorter ones as he drags me closer to our destination through the wooded forest.

The family safe house is not much, but it has withstood the test of time for over a century. It is one of the best-kept secrets of our age, or so it seemed when my mother talked about it. She was very prideful, it being her great-grandfather who built it.

Inset underground in the rock of an old abandoned quarry, the hazardous pathway down into the pit deters most passersby, but our trained feet glide over the loose ground with ease.

I vault a new addition to the crumbling stone near the bottom with the help of my quarterstaff. I land on the hard stone floor of the quarry pit with a flourish and arrogant bow, trying to lighten the tension between my brother and me.

“Show-off,” Damian mumbles grumpily, but there is the faintest sound of amusement in his voice—a shadow of times past. It is the best I can hope for.

I grin meekly with satisfaction but say nothing, opting to turn my attention to the stone wall in front of me. I place a hand on the stone inside of a chest-high indention and hold it there. The surface remains cold even in the heat of late summer. At my touch, it burns hot for the briefest moment.

I wince as the stone pricks each of my fingertips all at once, soaking up the singular droplets of crimson instantly. The stone sighs and slowly slides away to reveal a tunnel entrance that opens the way to a hallway. Sucking on my fingertips, I step through the hole, and follow the path with the sharp taste of iron on my tongue.

The winding hallway opens up to a large cavern. The expanse in front of me is complete with a wellspring surrounded by dark-dwelling plants that glow dimly in the low light of the cavern. The foliage thrives on the minimal amount of light at noon that comes through the skylight positioned directly above the pool.

I glance around the rocky cavern, my eyes stalling on the light of the fireflies flickering amongst the flora surrounding the pool, but only for a second. Looking around the room, I frown at my husband’s absence. A part of me hoped that a member of my family had already found him and brought him to safety. It would have saved me from the worry rising in my throat that threatens to choke me now.

Keena, Damian’s wife, and their eleven-year-old daughter, Ysabel, sit by the fire pit in the center of the cavern, nestled under blankets on the overstuffed couch. They ignore our entrance, for the most part, their matching raven hair shining in the firelight.

I catch Ysabel’s glance, but she diverts her eyes before her mother notices. A look I cannot place envelopes her sharp features, but my father interrupts before I can ask what is wrong.

“Where is Danny?” he asks, knocking the cherry from his cigar as he stands up from his spot next to the water. He places the nub of tobacco between his teeth as he ambles over.

I make my way to the small fire pit, trying to ignore Keena’s derisive glare that has taken me captive with my father’s acknowledgment.

The cavern is chilly, much colder than the air outside, and goose flesh appears on my arms where my skin is not covered in fabric. I push my hood back. “I don’t know,” I answer with a slight shiver.

Familiar energy in the air puts me on edge, and I cannot ignore it. I begin to gnaw on my thumbnail nervously again, anxiously waiting for whatever is to come.

“Then he did do it!” Keena says with an accusing tone as she stands, her malice directed at me.

“What are you talking about?” I ask, glancing between her and my father in confusion.

“It isn’t Aunt Ray’s fault, mom,” Ysabel tells her mother in her songbird voice. It chimes around the room like music, but it does not do much to tame the chaos swirling in the atmosphere around her mother.

I look at Ysabel with questioning eyes. Keena looks down at her daughter and waivers. After a moment, Keena turns to me, eyes smoldering. She is dead set on blaming me for something, as always, and there is betrayal in the sharp look in her eyes at her daughter’s defense of me. Thankfully, she cannot bring herself to take her frustration out on the girl, but I am a different story.

“Of course it is,” Keena hisses at me. “Someone opened the gate and let Charon in. How else could they have gotten past the guards?” Keena says with a flourish of her hands. “And now your Charon-born husband is missing.”

Her accusation is as clear as day. Loyalty lies with your clan, and turncoats are one in a million. No one ever entirely leaves their clan—unless you are Danny Rekkon. But I am the only one who believes that.

But I trust my husband implicitly.

“Don’t even go there. He would never betray us,” I say.

How can she have the gall to pin this on Danny?

Keena was a forest rat, a clan-less outsider in her own right before Damian found her half-dead in the middle of nowhere. She was not born Blackthorn either, but we took her in as our own, all the same.

What a hypocrite.

“I don’t believe that,” Keena says, standing up straighter as she challenges me.

Standing as tall as she can, Keena is still several inches shorter than me. To make up for her stature, her chocolate eyes, made lighter by the mocha tone of her skin, shine bright with determined anger.

“Enough,” my father’s low voice rumbles through the cavern with authority. “We have enough problems without you two at each other’s throat.” His green eyes are stern as his gaze bores holes in the two of us.

“Yes, sir,” I say, bowing my head and submitting immediately to my father’s authority. The need to fight still radiates from Keena, but she manages to restrain herself after a moment.

“Let’s go get ready for bed,” Keena tells Ysabel stiffly, trying to divert her anger before she does something to enrage my father.

“I can’t go to bed. I need to talk to Aunt Ray,” Ysabel tells her mom, sounding more like a miniature adult than an eleven-year-old.

“No, you don’t. Come on,” Keena chastises, tugging gently on her daughter’s arm.

Ysabel looks at me, but rather than give her mother more reason to hate me, I side with Keena for once. “We can talk in the morning, alright?” I say as Keena steps between us.

Ysabel ignores her mother’s scathing glare as she takes her arm back. “It could be too late by then,” she says but gives into her mother’s threatening glare.

I want to stop Ysabel and find out what she means, but Keena does not offer the chance. She grabs her daughter roughly by the arm, pulling her along as they head off toward the arched hallway by the water where the bedrooms are. Ysabel gives me one more glance over her shoulder before her mother turns her back, and they disappear down the corridor.

I cannot quite make out the look my niece gives me. Something in her translucent brown eyes hovers between fear and anger that is not directed at me but somehow for me—like she knows something I do not.

With the duo out of earshot, my father walks over as Damian towers over me, pulling my attention away from his wife and daughter. “Do you always have to antagonize her?” he asks in his favorite domineering tone. “Especially with Ysabel around!”

“Antagonize her? Keena started it,” I say in disbelief. “How come you always blame me when she starts something?”

Encounters between Keena and I are usually tense, and she is eleven times out of ten the one who starts it. Somehow I still get blamed for disturbing the peace—every time.

Damian huffs as our father places a hand on his shoulder. “Lay off your sister,” he says, looking at me in concern.

“What are we supposed to do about Danny?” I ask. I need to search for my husband, but I know my father will never let me.

A dark look crosses my father’s lined face, but it is Damian who speaks. “Danny can take care of himself,” he snaps, seemingly coming to some conclusion since we arrived that I am still in the dark about.

“I have to go look for him,” I say, glancing between the two men with pleading eyes. My mother would understand if only she were here. Meredith Vance was the only person who ever understood me in this family.

My father takes a deep breath, hesitating to answer my question. “Iylara, there is a very good chance Danny is the one who let Charon in.”

I stare open-mouthed at his words. “No, there isn’t,” I argue. I will not stand by and let them pin this on Danny. They have wanted to get rid of him since day one and would have succeeded if my mother had not been the one with the final say in my marriage.

“He has been on the run from Charon for a long time. You think he couldn’t have finally given in and made a deal to save his own skin?” Damian asks.

Are they all in on this? My own family is attacking me.

“No!” I almost yell. “He would never do that. Charon would never take him back! You have to believe me. I know it is hard for you to put aside his past and trust him, but I will not stand around and listen to this!”

I make for the entryway, but Damian steps in front of me, stopping me in my tracks. “Get out of my way, Damian.”

My brother shakes his head as my father says, “No.”

I turn back to my father. “I am going to go look for him,” I say with finality.

“I cannot allow that,” my father says, shaking his head.

I clench my jaw in anger, withholding the retort that will get me reprimanded. I look up into my brother’s eyes. I see a challenge in them, but I am wise enough not to take the bait.

I stalk off toward the bedrooms as calmly as possible, but every part of me wants to scream. The dim light of the corridor embraces me, and I slink by the partially closed door to Keena and Ysabel’s room. They whisper, but I restrain the urge to stop and listen, continuing down the stone hallway. My path is lit only by large candles mounted on iron plates bolted into the walls every few feet.

Ignoring my room altogether, I make my way further down the corridor. There is no way I can go out the front, so I head for the back exit, knowing what I have to do. My father may think he is always right, but I cannot see how he could be anything but wrong now.

Crouching to pass through a low crevice, I inch my way out into the darkness. I shrug off my pack as it catches on the stones above me and abandon it behind me. I drop down from the outcropping of rock into the dense bushes below that conceal the exit from view.

No turning back now.

Looking both ways through the bushes, I find my path clear and make a beeline for the village.

Smoke permeates the air even this far out, like a roaring chimney. I can imagine that if it were daylight, I would be able to see the smoke billowing from the southwest side of the village like a fountain. The stars are nowhere to be seen, and the invisible haze blots out the light of the full moon above me. I should have brought a torch like Damian’s.

I spin around, sensing a shift in the atmosphere behind me. I bring my staff up in front of me in self-defense, squinting into the dark. I cannot see anything until Damian steps out of the densest shadow, that damned torch of his flaring to life. I do not lower my staff as I face him, and he frowns.

“Go back,” I tell him, committed to fighting him on this if he does not concede. I cannot go back to the safe house. Not without Danny. I have to prove my husband is not to blame for this mess we are in.

“I can’t do that, little sister. I’m sorry.”

As Damian speaks, a sharp sensation in my neck sends me staggering. I reach up, fingertips brushing against a small, feather-tipped cylinder. I shudder a breath, the effects of the dart protruding from my neck, kicking in instantly. Even with the support of my staff, I cannot stay upright as the world fades, and I sink to my knees as my legs give out.

Three figures appear out of the trees and diverge on Damian from all sides, swords raised, but he has not seen them.

My warning cry is lost to the darkness as I fall into oblivion.