The Harvest, page 25
“Mind your tongue,” Belinda snapped. “You’re making me regret your transposition.”
“It always comes down to power,” Madeline seethed, clenching her fists. She continued to remind herself—it may be a simulation, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t die. There were no guarantees. “You love feeling superior, don’t you?”
“We all lost someone,” Belinda said, her face softening. “We cannot become what we are meant to be without loss. Without adversity.”
“And who decided that? The Ostara?”
“I don’t follow,” Belinda frowned. “What are the Ostara?”
“You’ll never know,” Madeline said. She raised her head just enough to see Belinda’s knees and then she stretched her free hand outwards, maintaining a laser focused gaze on the right leg. She felt a lurching feeling surge from her belly, as if she were throwing up, but the bile would be expelled from her hand. Madeline closed her hand tightly, to the point her nails dug into the flesh of her palm.
Suddenly, Belinda shrieked and fell over onto her back.
Her right leg had been cleanly ripped in half.
Cassius rose to his feet in alarm, forgetting all about Leandra, and Madeline reached out towards his neck. Instinctively, she mimicked the movements she had gleaned from her grandmother’s book, stretching her index finger straight up, and forcing her middle finger to hang down, her ring finger to point straight ahead, and her pinky finger shooting straight up. A bright red henna tattoo appeared around his neck, the lines cycling from the front to the back while the dots pulsed brightly and then dimmed. He clawed at the hex, but it was as if it he had been branded. It could not be removed—certainly not by him.
“KILL HER!” Belinda screamed, still clutching her leg.
The roar of footsteps echoed throughout the tunnel behind the curtain as it was thrust upwards violently. Madeline narrowed her gaze at the dozen men and women rushing her, and she decided to allow herself to feel the full witch experience.
Chapter 23 – Witch
When Madeline first learned that Trisha Chase was adept at hexes, she was shocked. First, it was an uncommon specialty, and not because of its uselessness, but rather its defensive properties. Most kids chose their specialties early, often leaning towards the flashier ones that would impress their friends and gain immediate attention. Hexes were boring in that regard, and yet, that was still not what surprised Madeline about her grandmother’s choice of specialty.
It was the cruelty of their design.
Hexes weren’t curses. Not at all. Curses were like wishing bad luck upon someone. Hexes were direct...personal...immediate. Though many witches that had mastered hexes opted to use them to bind others, there was a myriad of uses, and none of them were kind. They were designed to paralyze, cripple, dismember, maim, and kill.
Hexes were graphic and raw—Madeline was not prepared for its intensity, but once she started, there was no turning back.
“CAN SOMEONE STOP HER?!” a man shrilled. The left side of his body suddenly folded into itself, as if an invisible child had squeezed him like a squeaky toy. Cassius had long gone unconscious. He was on the floor on his back, with the hex still activated around his neck—he would be dead soon. Belinda had crawled into a corner, and she was watching with vengeance on her mind. Madeline ignored her for now.
The others were attacking her with their full might, focusing solely upon her, but she kept her shield up—a bubble made of symbols and henna images that spiraled around her like ribbon hula hoops. The whip around her left arm had been cut in half upon activation, and nothing else had the pleasure of standing beyond the border of her protection with her. They banged on the invisible shield with their fists and swords and half-whip. They shouted and screamed and activated their magic—nuclear weapons in the hands of babies. If only they knew how to compose the bomb, they could clear a nation, but for now, only fragile, harmless materials shifted in their hands, various gears cranking around their wrists as they tried to force their way to Madeline.
Madeline watched with authority, processing what she witnessed like a computer being loaded with thousands of zettabytes of data. When she got bored, she would remove a section of her safe zone long enough to try a new recipe from her grandmother’s cookbook.
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” Belinda shouted. “KILL HER SISTER!”
Madeline’s eyes went wide as the mob slowly turned towards Leandra, hungry for satiation. What they failed to realize was that Madeline was essentially no novice—not like them. They were babes, born at the birth of the Great War. They were quick to impress and pass their magic on to others. For them, it was like joining a new club.
But for Madeline—she had been prepping for war most of her life. She did not have the magic to use the specialty, but she knew everything about it. It was as if she had built a space shuttle, but she hadn’t yet loaded it with fuel. As much as one could be without harnessing magic itself, she was a master at Hexes.
She willed the shield to come down completely, and she sprang into action. She reached out towards the closest man to her and put a hand on the back of his head. With a thought and an utterance, she closed off the oxygen to his brain. She shoved him behind her and climbed further into the mob, reaching out to place the same hex that plagued Cassius on another’s neck.
“SHE’S ATTACKING YOU!” Belinda shouted, and the mob shifted like water sloshing back and forth in a bathtub. They turned around and she couldn’t get the shield up fast enough. A fist reached out with a ring of rocks spiraling around its wrist and punched her in the face. It felt like being hit with a hammer. It felt like her cheekbone had caved in, but she fought through the throbbing and uttered: “Petulans”
The man found himself being thrown to the right as a bright purple triangle with pulsing red dots appeared on the back of his rock-hardened hand. Another purple-dotted triangle waited for him on the far wall of the room and his hand crashed into it, sending his body flying into the ensuing avalanche of rubble from above the impact site.
Madeline took a deep breath as she blocked a woman’s fist heading towards her face, and she silently thanked Dinah for their secret sparring matches. Then she activated half of her shield, cutting off the woman’s arm at the shoulder. Madeline crouched down so that she was somewhat protected by their blows, and then she forced the shield to vanish. She rolled into their legs, reaching out to hex them with a touch. As soon as she wrapped a hand around a leg or a dangling arm, she muttered the words, “Sever.” The recipients would begin whining in agony as they clutched their limbs, agonizing over the sudden cluster of pinched nerves and tightened muscles from inside. When she reached the other end of the mob, she stood up and scanned them with her eyes quickly. None were dead, though some wish they were.
“Exspirare,” she said as she stretched her fingers out towards Cassius. The hex disappeared. She then repeated the words over anyone already unconscious. There were still a few hanging on as the pain overtook them. Leandra walked over to Madeline’s side and patted her on the shoulder.
“That was sick,” Leandra said. “Forgive me if I tell everyone.”
“Please don’t,” Madeline said, still examining the bodies to make sure she didn’t kill someone by accident. “I don’t want the attention.”
“That’s the exact opposite we should be going for during the Harvest.”
“I have my ways,” Madeline said.
“We’re still in the simulation. Imani might have recorded this.”
“Then it is what it is.”
“You okay?” Leandra asked. “I thought you’d be excited. You saw what you did too, right?”
“I saw,” Madeline swallowed hard.
“Humans,” Belinda laughed suddenly from the corner, demanding their attention. “I love humans. They’re so...moral.”
“Is that a bad thing?” Madeline said. Now that the fight was over, her body was beginning to settle, and the withdraw of adrenaline was unsettling, as if she were donating blood too quickly.
“Yes,” Belinda laughed. “Of course, it is.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You’re scared, aren’t you?” Belinda asked. “Terrified, huh? You felt it—the magic—that raw flammable energy.”
Madeline said nothing, but knew what Belinda was referring to. Using the magic was like injecting an ultimate steroid. The more she tapped into it, the faster her mind worked, the stronger she felt, and the more potent her magic became. She wanted another taste, but she feared the repercussions.
She looked down at her hands. They were trembling—it was slight, but noticeable.
“Hey,” Leandra said in concern. “You okay?” Her eyes shifted towards Madeline’s shaking hands. “When was the last time you used your hex magic?”
“It’s addicting,” Madeline swallowed. “I...I scared myself.”
“You scared all of us,” Leandra said, “but that’s a good thing. Think of how powerful you could become. Think of how powerful the Ostara already are!”
The Ostara...how did they stay collected and stable? With using their magic all the time, it seemed like it would destroy them...or was that the point? Like Annalise said, weren’t they moths embracing the flame? Was the whole point to be consumed and see if you came out alive? But how many moths ever did?
“You should use your Hex magic more,” Leandra said. “It gets easier to deal with over time.” Madeline looked into Leandra’s eyes in fear, and she found herself grasping the sides of her friend’s head. Leandra chuckled nervously. “What are you doing, Maddie?”
Madeline brought her face closer and continued to stare. Was this why Leandra had gotten colder over the years? Because she bathed in the pool of magic within her? How often? For how long? Did she force it to rise to the surface until she drowned? Did she drink from its heat so often that she had become numb to its effects? It was as if she had burned away her nerves and ability to touch, to feel, to care—was this why Leandra was placed in the top five?
Madeline broke off the grip on Leandra and looked down at the men and women at her feet...was this why she was had been placed in the top fifteen? Her ruthlessness during battle? The slaying of her enemies?
Don’t you care about us? Dinah’s words came back to her.
You can’t destroy them and think you’ll persuade them to follow you. Grant’s words echoed.
“I don’t want this,” Madeline cried suddenly, shaking her hands like a dog drenched in water. “I want this out of me.” She began forming a hex shield around herself.
“What are you talking about?” Leandra asked.
“I want the magic out of me!” Madeline cried, crouching down and holding her stomach.
“But it’s always been in you,” Leandra scowled, watching Madeline closely.
Madeline grit her teeth. She had lost herself for a second. “I—I think it’s Belinda. The magic she gave me in this simulation. Something’s wrong with it. It’s tainted. Maybe...it’s because we’re at the beginning of the war. It might be more potent or something.”
“The magic is the same,” Leandra said in a flat, serious tone. The kind she used when she was suspicious. “It never changed.”
“The simulation then,” Madeline said. She had to calm down. Now.
“You can’t take it out of you,” Belinda called out to her. “Unless you die.”
“Die,” Madeline whispered under her breath. Yes...if she died. If the simulation ended, then the magic would be gone. Was she completely sure?
“This is why humans can’t win,” Belinda muttered, looking up at the ceiling. “They want to hold onto the illusion that they’re still better than everyone. They think that they are of a higher standard, and so they can’t debase themselves with ingesting a strange substance. It’s like someone who puffs their chest out because they never had liquor or swore before. Good for you. Congratulations. No one cares. There is no reward. You get to kiss your own ass and be proud for no damn reason. Pride doesn’t exist. Emotions don’t exist.”
Madeline composed herself and stood back up. She could still feel that strange presence within her, but it had settled back to sleep, like a raging newborn baby after a feeding. “Emotions make us...” Madeline stopped herself, but Belinda guffawed so loud that it hurt their ears.
“Exactly,” Belinda laughed. “It makes you human. And that’s it! You’ll never be more. This magic isn’t some alien being. It’s not a parasite—this is an energy source. A new element to be used. Magic is the new plutonium, but it’s up to you if you want to use it to create or destroy.”
“And witches destroy,” Madeline said.
“Are you dense? The humans destroy.”
“What?” Madeline said in disbelief.
“Magic has finally brought us all together. Visions of a new world, of peace and harmony.”
“Of rule,” Madeline retorted.
“You mean structure.”
“Of executions.”
“You mean pruning.”
“Of the loss of free will.”
“You mean a granting of purpose,” Belinda scoffed. “What’s so great about the world before magic? Honestly. What was it? The wars? The genocide? The greed? What part? Oh, I know, the luxury, right? Were you happy? Did any of your grandparents say they were happy? Or did they talk about how they worked every day simply to work the next? Respite was fleeting, and regret was in rampant supply.”
“Then what’s the answer?” Madeline asked, noticing that Leandra was watching her very carefully from the side. “To kill you? To embrace my selfishness?”
“If that’s what you choose. Magic doesn’t change you, it just enhances what was already inside. If you want to kill me, then that’s what you actually WANT to do.”
“Why are you telling me all this?” Madeline asked. “What do you care about me? I’m a filthy human.”
“Not anymore,” Belinda said softly. “You’re like me now. We’re in this together, if you want. We can work towards a higher purpose.”
“Why not let humans live their lives?”
“Because they can’t,” Belinda said. “You know it’s true. I was one once. So were you a little while ago. Once we’ve latched onto an ideal, not only can we not let it consume our lives, but everyone around us must hear the great news. It doesn’t matter if you’re religious or you fell in love with avocados, the gospel must be shared. The heathens must be converted. We’re just jumping ahead a few steps and skipping the debates and pockets of violence, going right to the genocide. If all those who desire to stay human are gone, then those who truly want harmony remain.”
“You could try talking to them,” Madeline said, trying not to cry. She knew the conversation was futile, but she had to try. She had to believe that Grant knew what he was talking about when he spoke of persuading them to think differently. “You could compromise. When you defeat the—if you defeat the humans and win the war, can’t you come to a treaty?”
Belinda stared at her with a straight face. “Best to rip weeds out by the roots.”
“Fine,” Madeline accepted. “Then you can’t blame a human for trying to wipe out the witches.”
“They would be stupid not to,” Belinda said darkly. “They should have started rounding us up the moment magic became a part of our world, but again...that morality. They believe in survival of the fittest, but they hold onto morality simultaneously. What a mind-numbing paradox.”
“Alright, we’re done.”
“But I said we could work together.”
“No,” Madeline sighed. “I noticed your left arm hiding behind the bookcase. I can’t see what’s happening, but I noticed the twitching of your arm while we talked. Whatever your specialty is, you know it can’t stop me, so you’re trying to summon a new one.”
Belinda sat still, dumbfounded.
“Survival of the fittest, right?” Madeline said. “Being observant and knowing when to spot danger is a pretty big part of living.” She willed a section of her shield to vanish and then she stretched her hand out and whispered the incantation to place a hex around Belinda’s throat. Belinda choked and clawed at her neck as Madeline waited for her to black out.
“Let it kill her,” Leandra whispered in Madeline’s ear. “There’s no reason to let her live, even if this is a simulation.”
“No,” Madeline said adamantly.
“Afraid you’ll enjoy it?”
“Afraid I’ll get used to it. There are other ways to stop your enemies.”
“Sure,” Leandra said, crossing her arms. “Like what you did to Mr. Tate.”
The jab caught Madeline off guard, and a tear fell down her cheek. Since it was on the side not facing Leandra, she left it, not wanting to draw attention by wiping it away. “That’s why I’m not going to kill her,” Madeline said.
“Then you’ll never become an Ostara,” Leandra said. Madeline sighed heavily. She was hearing that a lot lately.
“And why must killing be a prerequisite?” Madeline asked.
“You heard Belinda. People can’t let go of their beliefs, even when better opportunities or explanations are standing before them. We get it, but the humans can’t. As witches, we have decided to let magic be our guide. We allow society to decide our fate because we trust in the powers that be. Humans trust only in their selves, their gods, their imaginations, their truths...it is unstable and chaotic, and that is why it is best to kill the idea where it originated from—right above their necks.”
“That’s what you think.”
“What exactly is your plan on surviving the Harvest then?”
“Not killing,” Madeline said.
“Hmph. I would love to hear your plan in detail then. As your friend, I can—” A booming sound flooded the room, and Leandra’s body was thrust in front of Madeline. Madeline lowered her shield and caught her instinctively as another bullet fired into Leandra’s side.
