40. Jay
Jay
Irise to the front, shoving Dove deep within us and watching this monster. He does a double take and chuckles.
More than anything, I wish I could see his face, see who I am looking at. Take away the terror and intimidating visage that is affecting me more than I care to admit.
“Hmm, you are a calm one, aren’t you?”
I straighten my shoulders and lift my chin, staring straight ahead, ignoring the tears on my cheeks.
“Interesting. It’s really interesting the way you change who you are. I did some reading. Is it true that you don’t remember what the others are doing? Is there a personality in there that is a whore? One that likes to bathe in blood? Are you the monster I made you?”
With an inaudible hiss, I turn towards him and level an unimpressed look at him. I have no intention of telling him anything.
“I have wondered what’s wrong with you over the years. The strange way you seemed like two people. But you are always just exceeding expectations.”
“How did you find out?”
“Ah, well, I recorded you several times. I like to watch and see what you do when I torture you, and low and behold, you did me one better and split yourself into parts and pieces. It’s spectacular.”
I growl, and in my mind, I reach for the door. It’s a pale blue door with gold paint with elegant borders. It’s a beautiful door. The handle is gold and heavy, and cold in my hand. No one else can find it, only me. But when I open it, the truths rush out. The ones I want, and it’s time.
We are here, and now, we need to remember.
Raven ruffles her wings, and I can feel her tension through the chamber.
I shove the door open. Furious with this monster. Furious to be back here again.
I won’t die here.
He smooths the mask over my face and steps back, laughing. When I turn, I see a person exactly my size wearing a bird skull mask. Robin hasn’t made a sound in years now, but I would know her no matter what she wore.
“My Nightingales.”
The shock goes through the chamber. Dove sobs. Merle climbs up on her throne, staring with wide eyes. Kestrel stands up, legs spread, her mouth open. Raptor snarls and paces to stand with Kestrel. Robin and I were both Nightingales?
But…I thought I was the only one? If Robin was one…more memories slam into us of us working together…Robin and Merle, the songbirds. Killers. Prisoners. Nightingales.
I turn and look at the other five nightingales. Some are bigger, some are smaller. But we all wear the same thing.
“Now, my darling songbirds, go and kill for me. Remember everything I’ve taught you, and know that I’ll be here, watching. If you do anything wrong, it’s going to cost you.”
The memory blurs, and it’s later.
I kneel beside Robin.
“You didn’t kill him,” she snarls, her eyes furious, betrayed.
“I couldn’t!” Her wrist is so thin under my hand, and I think she’s not eating enough. “I couldn’t kill him. He was just like us. You should take him for-”
He hits me with a closed fist. “Stop thinking. Stop talking. You are a disgrace, and you’re going to learn about what happens when you ignore your Father.”
He beats Robin first until she’s screaming. Then, he ties her to the table so she can watch him whip me.
The first blow of the whip should hurt the most, but that’s not true; they all hurt, and the pain only gets worse and worse.
I scream until I can’t scream anymore.
He undoes the manacles, spins me around, and stands there, staring at me in a way that is more terrifying than the whip.
“You have failed me.”
“Father, no, wait. I’m sorry. Please!”
He turns and walks out.
***
Some things are hidden even from me, I think in despair. We’re all reeling as the memory reveals who that little boy was. As we see those green eyes and that red hair. We know that face.
Sage. We chose not to kill Sage.
I try to swallow the horror of what happened and what almost happened. Did we know he was our alpha? Is it possible to know that young?
Saving Sage cost us Robin.
No, that’s not right. There’s more.
Robin explodes out of the manacles when he unlocks hers and launches herself at Father.
She gets her thin arms around his neck and pulls, trying to twist. His mask comes off.
I see pale skin, an older man, he has ugly blue eyes, mean eyes.
He’s not ugly or handsome; he’s just a man.
She sinks her teeth into his neck. I hear his scream, and then, to my surprise, he bites her.
“LET GO!” I scream.
They are locked together in a hideous fight, neither will give up.
She doesn’t make a sound, just holds on, refusing to let go.
The smell of blood is thick in the air; their shadows dance like giants on the walls. The lantern light flickers and sways, and that smell of him makes me nauseous.
I try to scream, cheering her on, willing her to save us, but her strength gives out too soon, and the blood makes her arms slippery. She loses her grip, and he throws her back on the table, punching her over and over until she doesn’t move, not even to raise her head.
“Oh, that is going to cost you,” Father hisses. “After all I’ve done. After all I’ve sacrificed. You selfish little bitches. Fucking think you can bond me?”
Bond him? I stare at Robin in horror. She rolls her head and vomits blood.
My heart bangs in my chest. I want to beg him, stop him, plead, but I don’t. I stay silent, watching in sullen fear and panic over Robin’s strange stillness.
He grabs his jacket and turns and stalks out, banging doors and pulling them closed, leaving us in the near-dark and echoing emptiness of the building.
And for the first time, I think he might really leave us here to die.
Time twists and distorts, and she stops breathing. When I open my eyes, she’s gone.
I stand there, a late teen, completely and utterly obedient. Raven and Kestrel are co-fronting, though we don’t even know what we are doing, preventing us from reacting to his taunts. Beside me, a boy my age towers over me. He’s strong with broad shoulders, but I have never seen his face.
Korax. His name means Raven. Bringer of Death. He is Father’s pride and joy.
I am Merle. Blackbird, a common nothing bird. I am a disgrace; he hates me, though I don’t know why. Everything I do isn’t good enough, not enough violence, not enough drama, not enough.
I try so hard to please him. To earn that pat on the head or shoulder, to earn his approval and save myself a vicious beating, but I can never do what he wants me to do. Something in me rebels, and I’m broken into six pieces, and my pieces don’t want to do what makes him happy.
We want to see him scream. We hate him, more than we hate anything.
Why is this so hard? How am I going to survive if I can’t even do what he wants?
Maybe today will be the day I disappear forever.
Father pauses in front of me, looking me up and down. “You were sloppy. Do better next time.”
I lower my head. “Yes, Father.”
Down the line are children who have survived his training. More like me. Some come back, some never do. I feel a pang, but I don’t know why, I don’t know any of the Nightingales. We don’t interact except on occasions like this, and we never talk to each other.
I am just a soldier for this monster.
Just a soldier. If I had a life before, I don’t remember it. All that exists is Father.
I’m twenty-two years old, standing shoulder to shoulder with Korax. We don’t speak to each other, not even to acknowledge the other. We are perfectly trained. I am agile, fast, skilled in weapons, fighting, and survival. I am a killer. A blackbird who will rip your throat out.
The warehouse windows shine moonlight down into the dark and dancing dust motes whirl around like stars. I hate these cold metal shells. They have been the only home I’ve known. I can sleep on the stone, on the cement, on the metal tables. In my cage, locked in.
Korax shifts his weight, a mass of rage and death. He scares me because he’s so skilled at being dangerous. It comes naturally to him in a way that I need to work at. I saw his face once: black hair, tanned skin, dark eyes. Only for a second, but he is human. Much more human than I ever dreamed.
On the other side of me are the children. That is what tears me apart. He has continued his mission. Replacing the lost kids with younger and more trainable babies. When I saw the latest, something in me snapped, and I decided that enough was enough.
No one is coming to rescue me. Or them.
Korax.
Egret.
Wren.
Sparrow.
Pigeon.
He went and brought home a new child, a tiny baby, less than half my height. She’s all delicate bones and the sweetest voice. He named her pigeon. Pigeon. She’s just a baby. I can’t stop looking at her out of the corner of my eye.
No, he can’t do it again. I won’t let him. Do what again? My mind asks, and I slide away from that painful question.
“There’s an intruder, Father.” One of his guards pants as he braces himself against the wall.
I perk up, this is my moment.
“Back to your rooms!” he bellows.
Like I predicted, Father runs. He is a coward at heart. A coward who is terrified of his own death or a cage.
The ghost flies past, and I have a moment of curiosity before I shove it away. Focus.
I’m going to make sure Father ends up dead. But not today, not yet. I ignore the others as I follow, obediently going to my room to wait.
Except I don’t get that far.
I turn back, and Raven vanishes into the dark. There’s a policeman in front of us, one Dove recognises. He sees us, and his expression clears.
He lifts his gun and shoots.
I expect to die. When I open my eyes, I hear someone drop behind me.
He takes a step and screams when Father stabs a knife into him. He collapses.
Everything in me breaks. I am frozen, screaming as I watch him die. He is a scent match. That alpha is ours.
“Run!”
I shake my head.
“RUN!” he commands, giving me no choice.
We turn, forced to obey the alpha, and Raven comes back. She doesn’t know to look behind her. I don’t tell her.
Merle is screaming still, but we shove her into the dark.
I hold the others back and hold them in place. It takes it out of me, but I slam that door between us so no one can see, no one can remember.
Raven grabs the children's hands, gathering them up. The smallest on her hip.
“Fly, Korax. This is your chance,” she says coldly when she opens the door to his room. “Don’t let him catch you.”
He hesitates only for a second, and then he’s gone, disappearing into the dark that he knows so well.
Outside, the contacts Raven made are waiting in cars hidden on a disused road. We lead the children, stealing the masks and tossing them into the bushes to be forgotten by time. Each child is delivered into a car.
We wait in the dark, watching the red lights vanish, then I pull out a phone one of them handed me.
“Roseland?” she whispers. “Where are you?”
“Raven?” His voice is weak. I hear sirens. “Raven, wait! Where are you? I’ll come to you! Wait for me.”
“Why do you sound so weird?”
Raven’s forgetting the plan, forgetting everything. She’s going to go back.
I’m tempted for a moment because fate knows we love this alpha more than we love anything, but being with us is death. For him and for us.
“I’m fine. We didn’t get him. Go, we’ll meet up soon,” he says. “Just run, be safe.”
“I love you, Rose,” Raven and I whisper.
“What? What does that mean? Why do you sound strange?” Rose coughs weakly.
“Raven, wait!”
I end the call and rip Raven out of the seat, allowing Merle and her panic to drown us out.
The stolen children have disappeared, and there is only me in the dark. He will come back; he will search for us, for them, for me. I need to lead him away. He must not find them. I won’t let him hurt another child.
I walk up to the door, and I push it closed, locking it with the gold key that hangs around my neck, and then I whisper to Merle to run.
I stare at the house with the little girl who is laughing and smiling. She is bigger than she was, she’s put on weight, but she has gotten taller. She is laughing and smiling, a light of normalcy vibrating in her aura.
She looks beautiful. Like a happy child.
Raven is with me, and she purrs with pleasure. We have checked all the girls, and they are all doing well.
I turn and walk into the forest. Hours of stomping has me on edge.
It took me a long time to be easy in the sunlight, to sleep with the massive, open sky above my head.
Winter was hard. It’s been almost a year since we escaped, and while the kids are doing great, I am aware I am too thin, struggling to find food and money to eat.
Living in the forest has become the only sure way of evading Father.
But I don’t know how to hunt, and sometimes, I catch things and end up sick.
I think I might be dying. If I don’t find help soon, I will die.
Why is that thought not a sad one?
It’s almost comforting. While I’m walking, I lock the memories of those children up, hiding them from even me.
I stumble my way through the forest, ignoring the branches that grab at my tangled hair. My legs shake, and breathing is difficult.
Where am I?
I realise I’m lost and turn in a slow circle, but everything looks the same. It’s beautiful. If I died out here, I could be happy.
“Merle!” The adult male voice startles me.
I freeze, terror licking my insides. No. Please no. I don’t want to go back.
“Merle?”
Merle pushes to the surface, stealing control, and she does what she does best. She runs. We don’t see the car. Not until it’s too late.
Raven and I look through our eyes briefly and see Roseland. We look up into the face of the most beautiful omega we’ve ever seen. He’s not even looking at me.
“My name is Pix.”
“Why are you crying, little blackbird?”
I lift my eyes to his and sneer. This piece of shit. He’s not even worth a tenth of my alphas. He’s not even worth anything of my omega. Father is nothing.
“Show me your face.”
He laughs.
“Why, in all these years, have you never shown your face? Are you scarred? Are you frightened? Why?” I taunt him, pretending I don’t remember that day. He killed Robin because she bonded him. He’s a monster.
“Like you with your personalities, when I put this mask on, I become a god. I am something more, untouchable.”
I stare at him, at the craziness that is just pouring out of him.
But the memories have reminded me of something very, very basic.
We fought. Even when we lost everything, even when it cost us everything, we still fought this monster.
He’s not invincible. We fought him. Robin fought him.
I was trained by the best, and I know that he isn’t infallible.
My sister proved that when she was just a kid.
I’m going to win, for all of us.
So no child ever ends up here again.