Chapter 2-Touched

We left the hospital together, Vellum and the two other Facets in tow. The lot of us mounted our horses and trotted back to the outskirts. No urgency to get back home.

“I don't like this. We can't trust deserters” The younger Facet whispered behind me as if he wasn't within earshot.

I ignored him and hastened Copper to catch up to my twin. Creating space between us and our new cadre.

“Vellum has disorganized thoughts. It was a mess in there. His mind is running all over the place. It's like…” Grisham stopped himself.

“Mine?”

He nodded. “Like yours after the incursion.”

Grisham had helped me pull myself together after the attack as best he could. An impossible task.

“The way he described it-the cave, the people. It seemed real. Like something I've known. Did you feel it too?” I asked.

“I'd be lying if I said no. I just got this feeling that they needed our help. The people out there. I know we're doing this to stop The Watchers from invading Divern, and for the Indigo payout-but I think those people in the Wilds need our help just as much.”

I gripped my pipe tightly, finally removing it from my pocket. From the inner pocket of my greens, I pulled out a small bag with Indigo shards and dropped one into the pipe. I pulled my lighter from the same pocket and lit the shard. It burned like charcoal, releasing a dense smoke that I inhaled deeply before replacing the lighter in my pocket.

I let out a long exhale and looked up at the sky above me. We'd spent the entire day traveling to the center of the colony, “Pink, purple, orange. Two hours to sunset.”

I held the pipe to my brother who shook his head to refuse my offer.

As we walked back to our house, I caught sight of my clients. Wandering the streets of our neighborhood as they often did near dusk. Something about the evening air made them restless. I felt it too. As the sun retreated, my skin crawled with the urge to move. The itch of the fight we'd not face.

One of my clients approached. A gangly looking man who'd once been an abominable force before the incursion. His hair had thinned, and his eyes receded into his high cheekbones. He looked neither asleep nor awake as he staggered towards me. Sensing his need, I hopped down from Copper.

“Hey, Doc. Shipments late.” I spoke as he approached. “Should have more soon.”

“Rue. I just need a little of your stash. Today's been a real bad day. You know what it's like.” His voice was scratchy and distant.

“I know, Doc. I'm sorry. You'll be the first to know when it comes in.” The five of us in the middle of the street, halted by Doc standing before us. Copper began to sway on unsteady hooves, adding to my unrest. The afflicted ones watched from their homes or the darkened spaces between them. All of them waiting to hear if I had something to give them, something to take their suffering away.

“I would, Doc. You know I would. It's just-if I do it for you, it sets a precedent for everyone else. I don't have enough to share with everyone right now.” I felt them getting closer, creeping from their yards like curious kittens. Kittens who grew more ravenous the longer they went without their fix.

Doc had been a Facet in my unit. He was granted leave when he lost his right eye during the incursion. He wasn’t much of a sharp-shooter after the injury. His bow became foreign to him. Ailed by the memories of fighting them and infected by the sickness, Indigo was his lifeline now. The sorrow I extended to him was a thing I was unable to extend to myself. His suffering was my own in a profound way. I experienced his pain when my own evaded me. Denying him relief brought me no joy.

But I couldn't share.

I was just as haunted as the rest of them.

The Watchers killed us by cutting us down, breaking our necks, or bleeding us dry. But some of us didn't escape their grip that easily. We were infected when our blood mingled with theirs. Once infected, the only cure is the antidote. And the only antidote was created by the Cambria Colony. They gave the antidote to many, including Doc, in time, but something lingered in the infected long afterward. They hungered for Indigo, even as they withered away into nothingness. It was the need to escape, but it was more than that. It was the affliction.

The strongest of the Watchers, the Alphas we called them, could turn you. A fate worse than death, worse than affliction. The curse of becoming one of them. Being touched always ended the same.

With two exceptions.

“I thought you understood, Rue. You're one of us. You know what we've seen.” Doc’s hollowed grey eyes met mine. His hunched back made him smaller. He met me, eye to eye.

“Doc,” Grisham spoke from beside me, “do you want me to bring you some peace? We could sit together for a while. It could help while you wait for the next shipment.”

“No,” Doc spoke through muffled sobs, “It's not enough. It never lets me go. You can't stop it, Grisham.”

As Doc looked over shoulder, I realized the afflicted had poured from the shadows and out onto the street. Their sunken grey eyes catching the last drops of sunlight as the moon rose above us. My horse whinnied and tugged at the reins.

“The fuck is happening here?” The younger Facet spoke from behind me. Both the Facets and Vellum drew themselves closer to Grisham and I. Their horses as unsettled as my Copper.

Doc took a step closer to me, his eyes fixed on my pipe. “Just one hit, Rue.”

“Doc, please go back inside before this gets out of hand.” Grisham's voice was hushed and unhurried. It was a warning to Doc. I felt my brother's shoulder brush against mine. Feeling Copper tugging at me, I released her reins. She fled, leaving me to continue my plea. I could calm them down. I had to.

“I can't do it, Grisham. I need that pipe.” Doc's face tightened under the strain of his wanting.

I rested my hand on my brother's forearm. A warning of my own. All the afflicted who looked at us now, the ex-Facets, Surveyors, and Wayfarers, no more than haunted reflections of the fighters they once were. Still, we didn't want to fight them. They'd suffered enough.

“We’ll take from the walls, Rue.” Doc wiped the snot from his nose. “If we have to, we will.”

“Doc, come on now. You know it's too dangerous. The Watchers are waiting for us to slip up. Just hold on for a few days, I promise I’ll-” I uttered my last plea.

But it was too late.

Doc reached for me in a blind fury. Grabbing my wrist, he knocked my pipe to the ground. He ignored it as he grabbed a hold of my jacket to dig into my pockets, looking for any shards I had left. He pulled on my greens and tugged at my undershirt.

The scuffle ensued around us. Grisham and the other two Facets pushed away the afflicted. Instead of breaking their bones or cutting them down, they took mercy on them. Pushing them away and parting the growing crowd towards our house. I felt Doc's cold hands grabbing at me as he looked for my inner pocket. He was familiar enough with the greens to know where I'd hide something valuable.

“Doc, please stop!” My voice grew frantic, his grip stronger than I'd anticipated. “You know I'll take care of you. Just give me time!” I looked around for help, but Grisham had gotten separated from me in the crowd of the afflicted. I couldn't see the other Facets either.

“I can't wait another day, Rue. I need this!” Doc raised his voice in my ear.

Only then did I realize how frail I'd become. In the year since the incursion, I'd hardly been able to get myself out of bed. My days as a Facet were reduced to rotting in bed and the occasional trip to the Gate to collect shipments. My arms, once muscular and lean, were now scrawny and weak. My body refused to move the way it used to. Only when Doc and I tumbled to the ground did I realize my body was fading into affliction.

We grunted as we continued to struggle on the ground. I gripped my jacket as tightly as I could, holding desperately onto my shards. I felt his nails scratching at my skin, my undershirt torn. I curled my body to keep his hands from my pockets. I laid on the ground, helpless as he pawed at me.

“Someone,” I admitted at last, “I need help here!”

I felt the ground beneath me tremble as if a stampede raced towards us. From the corner of my eye, I saw a light growing in brightness above the crowd. The clamor around us grew muffled and distant.

Doc's hands froze, and his startled eyes looked into mine. His body went rigid and I felt the weight of him lift from me. After a moment, I inhaled deeply and sat up, unable to gather the strength to get to my feet. I squinted my eyes through the bright light. Wild black hair and blue eyes stared back at us. No longer in his hospital robes, I saw his strong masculine form. The blues he wore now carried remnants from his struggle at the Gate. The rips and stains evidence of the fight he'd faced.

“Vellum?” I coughed.

The light wrapped around Vellum. It gripped Doc as he hung a few inches from the ground. He was face to face with Vellum. My vision wobbled as if I were dreaming.

“Don't touch her.” Vellum's weak voice was a memory of what I heard now. The ferocity of it wrapped around my body like velvet, warming a small, forgotten spark deep within me.

“Remember my face,” Vellum continued, “because if you harm her, I'll be the one to find you. It'll be my face you see as your soul leaves your body ”

After a moment of silence between them, Vellum inhaled sharply, as if he'd been struck. All at once, the light disappeared and the both of them fell to the ground. Doc scurried off into the darkness like a cockroach and Vellum lay on the ground. His eyes closed, his face peaceful. The light gone aside from the static of his power still crackling in the air around us

“Rue, what happened?” Grisham rushed to my side. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I'm fine.” I crawled, pressing my hands to the ground. The darkness obscuring my view. I inched closer to Vellum, my arms and legs weakened from the struggle. I got close enough to Vellum to make out his face and paused. His hair has fallen away from his face to show the definition of his cheeks, the peak of his nose, his hard features relaxed now. The slight part of his lips as he drew breath in and out caught my eye for a moment.

My eyes jerked away as panic gripped my chest.

I continued feeling around as sighed with relief as I found my pipe. I placed it back in my pocket and sat back on my knees. I inhaled hungrily to catch my breath.

“He's like us, brother,” I turned to face Grisham, “He's been touched.”

Touched, but not turned. That makes three of us.