Chapter 3: In Which Rat Makes Funeral Arrangments

We dashed across the alley, for a very brief moment we were bathed in moonlight - the moon riding high and in full glory. There was suddenly a vacuum of time, reality sucked in a breath. Fizz's small toes caught against a loose cobblestone. She flew forward, her little hand slipping out of mine. I tried to save her from falling.

But I couldn't.

It was ice, a fist of ice that closed in on my mind. I was sent into vertigo, unable to tell the ground from the sky. The moonlight felt sharp, its silvery presence edged with knives, stabbing into my flesh. My breath caught in my throat as I gasped, my knees buckling, sweat breaking across my forehead.

The world was hollow and empty; a chill snaked itself up my spine, leaving a burning sensation in its wake. In the deserted alley, the sound of footsteps echoed - many sets of feet, all deliberate and intently marching toward us. "Fizz." I choked, crawling to where she lay, fighting the stone-hard ice in my brain.

"Rat," she moaned. That's my name - Rat. Useful name for a street kid - saves me at least one insult. "I can't..."

I reached out and took her hand, clenching my teeth. Stubborn, that's one thing you can say about me and that wouldn't be stretching the truth. I know our lives weren't really worthwhile. It was no feast, living as we did. But if you want to test the survival instinct of a human being, you just needed to look at us. The only thing we had was our lives and our names, and yet even when it was all over, I was too stubborn to let it go, too stubborn to give up.

I couldn't feel my feet as I shifted them beneath me, rising slowly. I couldn't feel my arms as I pulled Fizz up against me. I could feel the cold sweat trickling down my back; I could feel the lump of bile rising in my throat. I began running, dragging her stumbling behind me.

Before I managed to get more than a few paces, the fist of ice tightened itself inside my head, this time with a vengeance, the way one would stomp on a cockroach a second time after seeing its antennae still wriggling. I completely lost control of my limbs, crashing onto the ground chest first. I was an ant being squashed by a giant's thumb. Fizz, on her hands and knees, crawled toward me; she shook my shoulder, the steadily growing volume of marching feet nearly drowning out her frantic pleas. Fizz always had such a thin voice. "Rat. Rat. Don't die."

I wanted to tell her that she shouldn't worry about me; I wanted to promise her that I wasn't dying. But the ice spread from my mind to my throat. I could only struggle for breath and wonder if actually I was dying.

That's how my life as a street boy ended.

Harsh hands dragged us apart. The sight of her being hoisted away as if she was nothing but a rag doll brought back my voice and my desperation to protect her. The ice kept tightening, but my rage tore through it and I could not be bothered with heeding its painful bite. "No! No!" I screamed. Maybe the Gods, if they existed, would hear. At that moment, I was willing to believe in anything that could save her, even in them. "FIZZ!"

And my shout woke her from her own shock, "RAT!" she screamed.

At the sound of her voice, I became crazed. I fought against the arms holding me back. Kicking, scratching I briefly managed to slither out of their grip. But they caught me again quickly, this time more of them, clutching my wrists and elbows and chest. I kept on struggling aware only of her screams as she was dragged out of sight.

I couldn't get to her and I was going to die. I had nothing to do but to shout her name, over and over again. Fizz, my street sister, innocent yet experienced. Little Fizzegretta, with her curly hair so tangled it turned into chunky dreadlocks, with her pointed chin, her minx smile, her stubbornness that rivalled only by my own. She was taken away, down the alley, her thin voice bouncing off the walls of the buildings. No one woke, no one listened, there were no curious eyes peeking out of the windows overhead. Her screams pierced my bones and rent my heart, yet in the city the sounds she made were no more than the wailing of an abandoned kitten or the insistent call of a night bird.

"Fizz!" 

The screaming stopped abruptly.

The meaning of this punched me in the stomach with lightening force, shocking me into silence. I felt detached and numb, unable to breathe; unable to comprehend. My body turned into an empty shell, my limbs slackening against the hands holding me, I stared bleakly ahead. Somewhere in the shadows down that alley, my street sister's sweet, warm blood was pouring out onto the cobblestones.

And I was next.

I was released, falling to the ground in a heap. I lay there and did not attempt to move. No word was uttered, no gloating. There was only the calm and precise swish of a knife being pulled out from a leather sheath. Moonlight glinted off the silver blade that rose above me. I glared at it, overcome with rage, but too weak, too spent to show my anger. A hand yanked at the front of my shirt, I was pulled off the ground.

The blade came down.

"I told you, we won't be killing this one." It was a man's voice, controlled, cold and business-like, sending a chill down my spine. The knife stopped at my throat, the sharp tip breaking the skin, I felt the wetness of my own blood trickle down to my shirt. "You will have to kill him seven times in seven different ways for him to die properly. He's a Wielder, you ignorant fool."

I was dumped back onto the cobblestones as if the man holding me had just discovered that I was a leper. My almost-killer's boot connected with my ribs, knocking the air out of my lungs. As I gasped, he spit on me. "The only thing worse than vermin is stubborn vermin." He aimed another kick at me.

But before his boot reached my body, the great hulking mass of him was on the alley floor beside me, twitching and gurgling.

"Perhaps you did not hear me," said the voice again as the man walked out from the shadows and into my sight. From where I lay I only saw his robes and the medallion of a magician hanging around his neck. "He is a Wielder."

My would-be-killer was released from the magician's hold, he gasped for air. I remained still, I was alive, and not just alive, but a magician thought I was a Wielder.

Which was absurd, and most likely a lie.

I knew all about Wielders. Everyone knew about Wielders, and they certainly weren't anything like me. Who ever heard of a Wielder growing up on the streets of Auran City? Wielders were the blessed ones, those born with the ability to wield magic. Wielders, if they wanted, could become magicians, but if they didn't, if they chose to go about their lives in the ordinary sense, they always went farther, they always did everything better, and they were always lucky.

Therefore it is impossible for a Wielder, no matter how young, to find himself in my shoes.

I did not volunteer my opinion on the matter, I was alive to survive and if this low-class magician, whoever he was, wanted to spare me, I wasn't about to argue, as long as it ensured I continue to live.

"No Wielder, however unfortunate, is vermin." The magician spoke to the man still lying on the ground. "Get up. We will take him to market, making him someone else's problem is the best way to get rid of him."

The man rose and I was hoisted to my feet by someone else. My arms were pulled behind my back and heavy iron shackles were fastened to my wrists. The magician snorted, he must have known that the shackles were too big for my thin wrists and that I could squeeze my hands out of them. Now upright, I took the opportunity to examine him. He was short, and like most magicians, thin, with a long white moustache and shaggy eyebrows but no beard. There was something I immediately disliked about his face, an oily malice that took over his features, making him ugly regardless of how his face was shaped. I had met a few people with that sort of face, and I was never wrong about them. He smiled at my inspecting glare as if we were both in on some secret.

"I don't know how you got here, boy," he said off-handedly as we began moving off. I didn't know what he meant by taking me to market, but it couldn't be anything good, there was nothing friendly about his voice. "it's a good thing that you will be taken far from here and never become a magician. Wielders of your ability are nothing but trouble to the whole Wielder community."

I said nothing, choosing to look at the lumbering man shuffling next to me, every inch of how he felt about me showing on his face. If it weren't for the magician's interference, he would have killed me gladly. It was clear that I would not have been his first, and he obviously took pride and pleasure in his work. But he had cut my throat a little, and if the rumours about Wielders were true, and if I was a Wielder...

As if sensing what I was thinking, the magician laughed mirthlessly. "That's right, boy. One year is all he has left in this life." I saw the colour drain from the man's face as it dawned on him that by attempting to kill me - and failing - he had sealed his fate. They said that the Gods were very particular when it came to the circumstances of a Wielder's death. Wielders were the blessed ones, those touched with magic, capable of Wielding it. No one but the Gods could determine the manner of a Wielder's death.

I don't know if that's the reason people die if they try to kill a Wielder and fail, or maybe whoever made the rules just wanted to make sure that a person who undertook the task to kill a Wielder would be motivated enough to follow it to the end.

Either way, I couldn't help feeling glad that this man was going to die because of me. There are people that the world is better off without; my mouth formed the shape of a smirk inside my bruised face. I could never miss an opportunity to gloat. I knew things about life that no kid should know, but I was nevertheless just a kid. "Well," I said to him smugly, "at least one year gives you enough time to plan a great funeral."