Myrikal Read online

  Myri backed up then knelt beside Branch. “Where are you hurt?”

  “Everywhere.” He groaned and laid back down. “What are you doing here?”

  She reached for his river creature-bitten arm. “I’ve been worrying about your arm all night. I wanted to come check on you.” She dropped the backpack to the ground. “I brought some supplies.”

  Branch grasped her arm. “Don’t get them out until the others leave,” he whispered. “They’ll try to take them.”

  “O…kay.” She glanced at the crowd. The compounders were forcing the uninjured and less-injured thugs to carry the two unconscious ones. “Where are they taking them?”

  “We have a place inside. Like a jail, I guess. They’ll keep them locked up for a couple of days, try to scare them so they’ll leave us alone and go after easier targets. Then let them go.”

  The group started filing into the building. “Want me to send Brenda out to check on you, Branch?” a man yelled.

  “No. I’m fine.”

  The man raised an eyebrow and nodded before stepping through the door and closing it behind him.

  “Let me see that arm.” Myri held her hand out.

  Branch stretched his arm toward her. Myri pushed his long sleeve up above his elbow and sucked in a breath at what she saw. His arm was swollen and red a couple of inches above the bite, all the way down to his fingertips. Pus and blood oozed from the puncture wounds. Myri lay her fingers on the red skin and frowned. “It’s hot as the sun.”

  “Yeah,” Branch said. “It’s infected. I’m pretty sure I’m gonna’ die.”

  Myri’s frown deepened. “No. You aren’t. I won’t let that happen.” She unzipped her backpack and pulled out the water and clean cloths. “This might hurt.” She poured the alcohol-water mixture on the puncture marks.

  “Ow!” Branch tried to pull away, but she had a hold of his arm.

  “I told you it might hurt.”

  “How do you know it hurts?” He scowled at her. “Nothing hurts you.”

  She dipped her head lower. He was right. She didn’t know what pain felt like. Physical pain at least. “I’ve cleaned a lot of wounds for my dad. He always swears at me and stuff.”

  “I’m sorry, Myri. I didn’t mean to snap at you. I promise not to swear at you.”

  She nodded without looking at him. She wiped the wounds with a clean cloth then repeated the procedure until the bottle was empty. Satisfied that it was as clean as it was going to get, she wrapped the gauze around it and secured it with tape. “I have a week’s worth of penicillin here. You need to take one now and another one before you go to bed tonight. Then twice a day until they’re gone.”

  His mouth fell open. He looked from the bottle she held and back to her face. “Where did you get penicillin? That stuff’s like gold.”

  “It’s one of the ways people pay my dad for… jobs he does. We have a ton of it.”

  “Don’t go around telling people that. I’ve heard of people killing for this stuff.”

  Myri snort-laughed. The irony.

  “Why is that funny?” Branch asked.

  “It isn’t.” She picked up the other clean cloth she’d brought. “Now let me see what they did to your face.”

  “Dang it!” he said. “I just realized something. You saved my life again. Probably twice with the penicillin. I owe ya’ another one. I’m seriously never going to catch up at this rate. Myri-6, Branch-1.”

  The wounds on Branch’s arm turned a corner after he’d taken the antibiotics for a couple of days. Myrikal impressed upon him the importance of finishing the course she’d given him. She put the fear into him when she told him his arm would have to be amputated if the infection came back.

  It had been a few days since she’d last seen Branch. Russ kept her glued to his side more than usual, and she itched to get away and see her friend.

  “What are we doing today?” she asked.

  Russ rubbed his eyes then ran his hands through his messy hair. “I need to go meet with Roman about a job. Then we need to go pick up some supplies. We’re running low on food. I’d like to find some of the fresh fruit and vegetables I’ve been hearing about.”

  Alarmed that he’d somehow found out about Branch’s clan and their successful gardening, she asked, “Where did you hear that?”

  “At the bar, where else?” He took a swig out of his flask and screwed the lid back on.

  “Where are people getting it from?”

  “I don’t know. Some of the clans are apparently growing it. Go get ready We’re leaving in five minutes.”

  He rarely took Myrikal with him when he met with Roman—the one and only liaison between prospective clients and Manhattan’s best assassin. She figured he wanted to take her today so she could carry the supplies. Russ was in great shape for a man in his mid-forties, but more and more often, he made her do the heavy carrying. Why not? If you had access to a pack mule, you used it. It was the smart thing to do.

  Myri sighed and trudged to her train car to grab her goggles and pull her hair back into a ponytail. Or a mule tail. She rolled her eyes at herself. Dumb joke.

  The kitten swatted at the feather Myrikal dangled in front of it. Myri smiled at its antics. Russ had been inside the “diner” for a while. Roman stumbled inside shortly after her dad. She leaned back against the brick wall and stared up at the cloudy sky. She smiled again when the kitten crawled into her lap and curled up into a purring ball of fur, worn out from its vicious attacks on the feather.

  “Come on, let’s go,” Russ said.

  She jerked, startling the kitten off her lap. It scurried into a pile of trash and disappeared.

  “We’re going to take a little detour before we go to Central Park. I have some recon to do for the next job.” He headed off down the sidewalk.

  Myri pushed to her feet and followed him. He’d never included her in “recon” before, and it scared her. She knew he’d been grooming her to join the “family business” her whole life, but she wasn’t ready to participate. He’d told her he wouldn’t give her her first job until she was fifteen. Hopefully he stuck to that. That gave her at least two more years to… to what? She wasn’t sure. To conform to his heartlessness? To find a way out?

  Lost in her thoughts, she almost bumped into Russ when he stopped walking. Her heart stuttered when she looked up. They’d stopped across the street from Branch’s compound. Her father stood, examining it with intensity. Her fluttering heart nearly stopped when Branch came around the corner. He looked up and saw her and started to smile, raising a hand in her direction. She shook her head violently, whipping her ponytail back and forth like the winds of a hurricane. His smile dropped to a frown. He glanced at her father, then made an awkward pivot as if he’d meant to walk the other way the whole time.

  “Russ.” She swallowed. “What are we doing here?”

  He stared down at her, eyes steely, then turned his head and watched Branch walk down the street. “You know that kid?”

  Shoot. “No. I mean… I might have seen him around once or twice.” She licked her suddenly dry lips. “He’s not the… the target is he? I mean, he’s just a kid…”

  He focused his heartless gaze on her again. “Kids can be targets, too, Myrikal. They die just the same as adults.” He narrowed his eyes. “Most of the time.”

  Instead of shrinking away from him as she usually did, she narrowed her eyes—imitating his look. She straightened her back and raised her chin. “Yeah. Some kids won’t die, will they?”

  His eyes widened almost imperceptibly. Was that a flicker of fear she saw there? He looked away from her abnormally unwavering stare. “C’mon. Let’s go get some supplies.”

  She would not let her father kill Branch. No way.

  Minutes dragged on to hours. Myrikal lay awake but feigning sleep in her train car. She lay still, listening for Russ. The quiet swoosh of his well-oiled door sliding open carried to her hypersensitive ears. She threw the thin blanket off and hurried to dress i
n the clothes Branch had given her. She’d cut the other sleeve off the hoodie to match the one she’d torn off to use for Branch’s wound care, her scrawny arms hung bare. She counted to twenty slowly, hoping that was enough time for him to have turned the corner leading to the stairs. Shoving her hair into the hood, she cinched it down around her face and tied it under her chin. She didn’t need to follow him. She knew where he was going and she knew she could get there before him. What she didn’t know was how to get inside. Or how to find Branch once she figured it out.

  Myri peered around the wall at the top of the stairwell. Her dad, long black trench coat flapping behind him, rounded the corner down the block. She took off running the other direction, turning down another block parallel to the one her dad strode down.

  A single light waved in an upper window of the former high school turned compound. Myri pulled herself over the wall into the gardens and honed in on that window. That had to be him. Branch often stayed up late reading his comic books, and she’d just recently given him a candle and some matches. She’d been fast in getting there, but her dad couldn’t be more than a few minutes behind her. Thankful for her slight frame, she climbed up the thick ivy vines growing up the brick face of the building.

  Myri reached the third story window and peered inside. A candle flickered in the sectioned-off area of the former classroom. Branch’s head tilted down, the top visible to Myri as he flipped through a comic book. She tapped on the cracked glass of the window. Branch jumped and his head flew up. He stared in the direction of the window. Myri realized he couldn’t see her, hidden in the shadows.

  Moving in slow motion, Branch laid the comic books aside and rolled off the side off the mattress. He crouched on the floor.

  “Branch,” Myri voiced in a loud whisper. “It’s me, Myri.”

  Wary, he scooted over to the window, leaving the candle burning behind him. “What are you doing here? Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine. You’re not. You need to get out of here.”

  “Why? What’s going on?” He struggled to open the window, pushing against the rotted wood of the sill.

  Myri held to the vines with one hand and slid the window open with her other hand. She climbed through the open window and shielded her eyes from the flame of the candle. “I think you might be in danger. I’m positive someone here is in danger.”

  “What kind of danger? Should we wake everyone up?”

  This was the only secret she’d kept from her friend. He’d asked multiple times what her father did, what he was training her to do. She’d always deflected his questions or just flat out refused to answer. She didn’t want to tell him now. She drew in a deep breath and held it for several seconds before blowing it out through pursed lips. “Have you heard of Assassinator Anon…”

  “The Assassinator? Of course I have. Everyone has. He’s deadly.”

  Myri grabbed Branch’s shoulders and stared into his eyes. “He is my dad.” She let that sink in before continuing. “From what I can tell, someone contracted with him to take care of someone here. He’s on his way.”

  Branch closed his gaping mouth and shook his head.

  “Branch,” Myri tightened her grip. “I think it might be you.”

  “Me? But… I’m just a kid. Why would someone…”

  “You wouldn’t be his first kid target.”

  “But why? What makes you think it’s me?” His frown deepened.

  “I don’t know. I’m not even sure it’s you. I just know it’s someone here and we need to leave now!”

  “And what? Just let him kill someone else in the clan? Myri—” He shrugged out of her grip and balled his hands into fists. “Can’t you just stop him?”

  Could she? Of course she could. The true question was would she? Would she be able to defy her father? Would the years of training and brainwashing and overlord-ship prevent her from doing the right thing? What was the right thing?

  She heard his voice in her head, repeating his mantra he’d drilled into her her whole life.

  People are evil.

  We need to be the wolves.

  We are the wolves.

  Images flashed in her mind of all the horrible things he’d made her watch other people do. She slid to the floor and put her face in her hands. Did people deserve to die? Branch didn’t deserve to die. Branch was good. He was her friend.

  More mantras echoed in her head.

  It’s just a job.

  Is the wolf bad who kills the baby deer for food?

  People are evil.

  Her dad’s voice crashed off the inside of her skull like a boulder falling down a mine shaft.

  “Myrikal,” Branch pulled at her hands. “You can stop him. You have to stop him.”

  The terror-filled quiver in his voice bulldozed over the sound of her dad in her head. She wouldn’t hurt Russ, but she would stop him. She grasped Branch’s hands and lifted her head. “Okay.”

  She tensed the muscles in her legs and started to stand, only to be knocked to her butt by a blast that roared through the entire side of the building. Myrikal reached out, blindly searching for Branch, the brightness of the flames rendering her vision useless. “Branch?”

  Cries of surprise, fear, and pain filled her ears from all corners of the large building. A second explosion detonated nearby. Myri cussed herself for not bringing her goggles as she groped around on the floor for her friend. Her hand collided with his bare foot. She felt her way up to his face and leaned in close with her ear next to his mouth. His breath brushed against her cheek and she released a frantic sob she’d been holding in.

  “Branch?” Myri shook him gently. He didn’t respond. The flames tore at the makeshift walls separating Branch’s “room” from others. She lifted his much bigger body and flung him over her shoulder. The only way out now was through the window. Myri slid her free hand along the outside brick, feeling for the vines. Some had burned away and what remained wouldn’t hold her weight alone, much less both of theirs.

  She tried to shut out the screams as she squeezed through the window with her friend. She held tight to his flaccid body as she leaped to the ground three stories below. She let her knees absorb most of the jolt, trying to cushion the landing for Branch. She laid him on the ground and checked his breathing again. It seemed stronger and he moaned and moved his head away from the heat of the roaring fire.

  “Branch?”

  Still no coherent answer. Myri paused and listened. Worse than the screams and cries for help, now she heard only the sound of the crackling fire and crumbling building. A tear evaporated in the heat as soon as it spilled over. She lifted Branch back to her shoulder and ran. Her mind churned, a turmoil of scrambled thoughts, and she paid no attention to where she ran. The familiar form of the subway cars beneath the city loomed before her. Her feet had taken her home.

  Branch stirred, moaning. Myri laid him on the small mattress she used as a bed. He opened his eyes and blinked several times. “Myri?”

  She poured water on a cloth and dabbed at the red and partially blistered skin of his face. “Yes.”

  “What happened? Where am I?”

  Myri clicked on a flashlight she’d set next to the bed so Branch could see. “You’re at my place. Please don’t talk for a minute. I need to go see if my dad’s here. Understand?”

  He nodded. Sudden realization lit up his eyes. “Your dad… he…”

  “Shh!” Myri hissed, putting her finger to her lips. “I’ll be right back.”

  Branch tried to push up to his elbows, but moaned and collapsed back down to the bed.

  Myrikal snuck through to her dad’s car. He wasn’t there. He hadn’t returned from his stupid “job” yet. She made her way back to her room and knelt beside Branch. “He isn’t back yet. He probably stopped at the bar to celebrate another job well done.” She wiped a tear from her cheek.

  “I don’t remember exactly what happened.” He looked up at her.

  “Where are you hurt?” She picked up the
wet cloth and returned to dabbing at his face and arms. A small cut oozed blood into his hair.

  “Myrikal.” He stopped her hand with his. “What happened?”

  She set the cloth in her lap and looked down at her hands. “He blew it up. Burned it down. I got you out.”

  “What about the others?” He grunted as he pushed up to his elbows. “Myri. What happened to the others?”

  All she could do was shake her head as the tears fell to her lap.

  “Myri?” his voice rose, hysteria creeping in.

  “Myrikal!” Russ’s voice burst into the room a half-second before his body did.

  She jumped to her feet and spun with her back to Branch. She spread her arms out in an inane attempt to hide him from her raging father. Not knowing what to say, she stayed silent.

  “Who’s that?” Russ’s words slurred against his drunken tongue. He peered around Myrikal. “Is that the kid from that compound? The one you said you didn’t know the other day?”

  “He’s hurt,” she said. “I… I’m just cleaning his wounds for him.” She side-stepped to block her father from getting closer to her friend.

  “And what’s he gonna’ do for us?” He leaned toward her, the stench of his breath nearly knocking her off her feet. “We don’t do things for free.”

  “He… he already paid. He gave me these clothes.” She gestured to the hoodie and jeans she wore.

  “The clothes I provide for you aren’t good enough?” Anger flashed in his eyes and he stepped toward her.

  She held her hands up. “They’re great.”

  “Myrikal. Move.” Russ tried to step around her, his narrowed eyes looking at Branch. “I need to finish the job I just got paid for doing.”

  Branch sat and pushed himself up against the wall.

  “No.” Myrikal raised her chin and kept her body between her dad and her friend.

  Russ’s eyes widened and his body wavered as he took a half-step back. “Are you going to stop me?”

  “If I have to.”

  “Fine.” He turned as if to go toward the door. Quicker than his drunkenness should have allowed, he grabbed the gun he always kept tucked into the back of his pants and brought it up, aimed at Branch’s head.