Page 25

Keahi

I think this is it.

The dirt bullets are shooting straight toward me with the kind of speed that makes dodging impossible, and I don’t know how to stop them.

I closed my eyes and shielded my face with my arms, bracing myself for the inevitable impact. Yet the pain never hits me.

I crack open an eye to see a solid wall of crystal blue water in front of me.

I grin in relief.

Malia, I recognize and turn to my right to look at her.

My relief vanishes as fast as it came, horror replacing it.

"Everyone, stop moving!" a masked stranger yells, holding Malia against him with his knife to her throat.

One by one, my classmates freeze while our opponents remain standing ready to fight.

I look at Kaz, hoping to get instructions about what to do, but he looks about as helpless as I feel.

Meanwhile, Malia meets my gaze with a weak smile as if she has accepted her faith and is now trying to assure me that it’s fine.

It’s the same smile she showed me when I accidentally hurt her in the corridor not so long ago.

My heart thuds painfully against my ribs.

It’s not reassuring at all, and nothing is fine.

She relaxes her hand and the wall that saved me turns into a puddle on the grass.

"What do you want?" Kaz demands, though his voice lacks its usual authority, giving away how outmatched he is.

How hopeless this situation is.

The stranger holding Malia throws his head back as he cackles, and the act causes his weapon to change angles just slightly. The movement is miniscule enough for no one else to notice, I’m sure, but I’m painfully aware of the deadly object against her delicate skin.

As his laughter tunes on, rage along with a dangerous bite of fear makes my hands tremble at my sides.

Nothing’s funny.

"There’s no need for violence," my trainer tries to reason.

Not that there’s any way that’ll work.

These people don’t know the way of peace. All they leave behind is destruction, pain, and death.

Even after all these years, I recognize these masked monsters.

They are the same that visit me every night in my nightmares.

They come out of the shadows to kill my family and leave me, a four-year-old, to die in the burning house.

They’re members of the Dark Fraction.

But what would they want here, so close to the academy?

"You’re right, as long as all of you stay where you are, no one will get hurt.

We have what we came for.

If one of you decides to play the hero, on the other hand, I’ll slit her throat and we will kill each and every last one of you." The stranger draws a drop of blood with the tip of his knife for demo, and Malia winces.

All the color of Kaz’ face drains away, some sort of understanding I can’t comprehend visibly dawning on him as the masked man starts yanking Malia toward the woods.

Kaz doesn’t react and Malia doesn’t fight as more and more feet of distance are put between us.

Kaz isn’t going after them.

He’s doing nothing. "No!" I scream and start running, refusing to just stand here while these sociopaths take Malia. Sweet, gentle, selfless Malia, who saved me. They can’t take her. The things they could do... My throat fills up with a handful of sand, my lungs immediately burning before I can take the second step towards her. The earth handler I’ve fought before manipulates the air I breathe, and I fall to my knees, choking.

"Stop!" I hear Malia cry out desperately and my head snaps up with an effort.

She is struggling against the man behind her, and I don’t have the voice to tell her to stop.

I shake my head instead, hoping she’s able to read the meaning behind my burning eyes. Don’t fight for me. Not when this is already my fault.

It’s only when her captor hisses something in her ear that she goes still, though.

My view goes fuzzy from the lack of air, and I choke and cough on the thick particles blocking my airways.

My fingers tingle as they dig into the dry ground, but I can do nothing other than watch helplessly as they pull her into the woods and away into the shadows.

Once they are out of sight, I can finally breathe again.

I gulp down greedy breaths of oxygen.

The rest of my group, including Kaz, is looking into the forest with identical expressions of shock.

I, on the other hand, get to my feet and run after them, burning lungs be damned.

"Keahi!" I hear Kaz call after me, but I don’t turn back.

I can’t.

Not when I’m the reason the enemy got Malia in the first place. If I had been able to protect myself, she would’ve focused on her own opponent and they never would have gotten their hands on her.

I ignore the sting in my sides and the burning of my lungs and keep sprinting over the uneven forest ground.

There’s no path for me to follow, no trail left behind, but it doesn’t stop me from heading into the general direction they vanished in like a madman.

"Malia!" I yell.

"Get back here and end this fight, Cowards!" My throat is burning, my eyes stinging but denial remains strong even when it becomes clear that there’s no person but me in these forsaken woods.

“Malia!” I scream one more time, yearning to hear her soft voice in reply.

As the deafening silence drags on and I scan my surroundings to no avail, I fall onto my knees, the fight leaving my system.

She can’t be gone.

"Keahi." My trainer’s voice makes me turn slowly.

He seems out of breath, though his voice remains calm.

It triggers me. How dare he! I push back to my feet.

"You let them take her!" I snap at him.

"You just stood there and watched as they dragged her away!" Kaz can’t meet my eyes and neither does he try to defend himself.

"How could you let them take her?" My voice cracks, and when he finally drags his eyes up to mine, they’re filled with an unveiled apology.

I barely remember following Kaz up to Adira’s office.

He briefs the headmistress about what happened, and by the time he’s finished, she’s resting her elbows on her desk and rubs her temples tiredly.

Throughout all of that, I pace the room. Kaz stands as still as a statue.

"What if they hurt her?" I raise my eyes from the ground to look between the headmistress and my trainer.

"They won’t hurt her." Adira sounds exhausted.

Utterly defeated.

"How can you say that? We all know what they are capable of! They’re using her as a sacrifice for some sick ritual right now for all we know!" I keep pacing the room, feeling sick to my stomach.

"They won’t hurt her."

"HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT?" I snap.

"They just wanted her back.

They don’t want to hurt her," she tries to reason, but my head is spinning too hard to soak up her words.

As if realizing I need to be grounded, Kaz places two firm hands on my shoulders.

"Back? What do you mean they want her back? Back where?" I try to make sense of this conversation, but I can’t focus.

Why are we here, talking when we should be out looking for Malia.

"It is complicated," Kaz adds, but my patience is wearing too thin for that kind of non-answer.

"Don’t tell me it’s fucking complicated! Tell me what on earth they want with Malia and how we get her back!"

"We can’t get her back.

She is with her family now, there is nothing we can do.

I’m sorry Keahi." That sentence seems to pull me back from my trance and I look up at the headmistress.

Slowly, I shake my head.

"No.

You said they wouldn’t hurt her!"

"They won’t.

Keahi,” she sighs, suddenly looking much older than I remember, “Her family is alive.

Her parents are Shadow Handlers. Malia would have been initiated on her tenth birthday, but we got her out her before she could arrive at the ceremony."

Time stops as I try to comprehend her words.

My mind descends into a new spiral.

"You took one of them here?" I ask softly after a moment of silence.

"You taught the enemy our ways so she could use it all against us when she finally went home?"

"No, Keahi, she didn’t know. We..."

"That’s enough, Kaz!" Adira snaps.

"No, it’s not.

You what?" I demand, trembling.

"Adira," Kaz warns before turning back to me.

"We altered Malia’s memories on her way to the academy.

She doesn’t know who her family is."

What

The actual

fuck

"How? And why? Why would you kidnap her? Surely there are other children of them, why Malia?"

"Because she is my niece."

I stare at the headmistress, blinking twice.

"Your niece? That would mean you..."

"I come from a family of Shadow Handlers, yes.

I ran away before my initiation, but yes, it’s what I was born into."

"And now you want to just leave her there? We can’t do that! Kaz tell her we can’t just leave her there!" Kaz doesn’t say anything.

I turn to look at him, but he just gives me an apologetic look as if to say “Sorry pal, my hands are tied”. Bullshit!

"No! She is your niece!" I tell Adira, grasping at straws and looking for an ally that doesn’t exist.

The earlier helplessness returns.

My trainer sighs heavily.

"That’s enough Keahi.

You should get some sleep before your classes start."

"Kaz, please! We don’t know what they’ll do to her." After all the previous changes, my voice settles on being quiet. Defeated.

"They are her family." He’s not even selling that.

I can see he’s as unconvinced of that argument as me.

"Not to her! They are strangers to her.

What if she tries to get away? Oh no..." My voice trails off and nausea hits me like a truck.

Images of Malia struggling against her captor cloud my mind.

She’s a fighter, she won’t accept being taken by the enemy silently.

Even worse, she’ll expect us to come. She must know I’d never let this story end this way.

I only snap back when Kaz pulls me up to my feet and we start walking.

When did I fall to my knees?

"Let me look for her.

You don’t have to come, just tell me where they are and I will get her," I beg when it’s just the two of us walking down the empty halls.

"I’m sorry, Keahi." Is all he says.

I wiggle out of his grip, not accepting it.

"I’m not going to just give up on her and leave her there! Now, don’t tell me they are her family because you know that is not true anymore.

She doesn’t even remember them.

You are her family. You and the rest of this Academy." My voice is shaking with frustration.

"Going to their camp is a suicide mission.

Besides, no one knows where they are.

They moved their camp after we got Malia out, so not even Adira knows anymore.” He must see my upcoming protests to his statement because he’s quick to bring out the big guns. “I’m not losing you too," he whispers barely loudly enough for me to hear, pain lacing his words.

I study the old man in front of me.

The man that raised me and stuck by my side for over a decade.

There are deep lines carved into his forehead as he watches me warily, and I realize he’s been aging without me even realizing it.

"Do you hear me, Keahi? You can’t do anything reckless.

It’s not what she would want.

Not after she did everything to save you." Both of his hands are on my shoulders as he pleads with me. I see the desperation and pain in his eyes, correlating so much with my own, and despite my tearing heart, I find myself nodding.