Page 6 of The Last One
Copperhair shouts, “Olivia!”
Olivia shrieks as she flies across the square and lands with a bang against a crate of rolled rugs. She groans and writhes in pain with her eyes squeezed into slits.
In two steps, I reach her, straddle her on the dirt, and wrap my hands around her neck.
Her jaundiced blue eyes sparkle, bright with fear and surprise. She coughs, and her life-beat thumps wildly against my palms as her pulse slows.
“Hello,” I say, “it’s me again.”
Words!I finally have words. Gripping my hands around her neck has somehow loosened the strangled cords in my throat, and now, words slip between my lips like honey and smoke.
Copperhair has words, too, loud words, and she screams, “Help! Someone, stop her!” as she pounds my back.
Iignore the redhead and continue to squeeze her friend’s neck. I may not know who I am or how I got here, but Idoknow that I will be made whole once my boots are back on my feet and my pendant is hanging again around my neck.
But as I squeeze, something, maybe a memory, flitters in my mind. Someone, somewhere told me that I am too quick to act, too quick to judge, too impatient to make the best decisions, that I need to consider the consequences more carefully.
Okay. Fine. I’ll work on my personal growthafterI handle this fucking thief.
Because at this very moment? I’m living my dream. “How does it feel, huh?” I sneer at the bandit, all my senses shaken and stirred. “How does it feel to wake up with a stranger’s hands wrapped aroundyourneck? How does it feel to be—?”
“Stop!” a man shouts.
“Never,” I snap, my eyes still on my prize.
“You will cease this immediately,” he demands, his voice raspy and gruff.
“No, I won’t,” I say, my teeth gritted even as Olivia tries to smack away my arms.
“Stop,” the gruff-voiced man repeats, “or I’ll—”
“Or you’ll what?” I challenge, still grinning, though, at the criminal now caught between some rocks and my hard hands.
What’s the worst this stranger can do to me?
Something cold and hard presses against my cheek.
Ah.
That.
I don’t know who I am or how I got here, but Idoremember weapons of war.
They’re sharp. They’re pointy. They’re dangerous.
And I don’t have one.
Yet.
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And thenanothersharp, pointy, dangerous thing pokes my other cheek.
This isn’t good.
Villagers crowd around us, everyone glowing amber.
Life isn’t going so well for them, either.
