Rhian

It’d been about two days since Strauss made a huge mistake in taking his vows. Two days which might have been two weeks, come to think. It was tricky keeping time when every day felt the same. Around that time, I was still landlocked on account of some questionable choices. Made some choices. They were questioned. My real punishment? Teaching would-be Chasers to shoot bows. Look, that might have been all right for some. Palisade instructors had a cushy life as far as it went. But for a lass like me? Might as well have been trapped underwater in a cage full of them fishes with teeth.

But never mind.

On a day like every other day, I was lounging around the breakfast table with Gus—short for Feargus in case you’d forgotten. There were about a thousand of us Partisans in the mess hall. Tall, short, fast, strong, blah, blah, blah. I couldn’t be arsed with nine hundred and ninety-eight of them. We might have all had something in common, but I reckon you could find something in common with just about anybody.

Nobody said you had to like them.

Well, maybe somebody had. But not me.

Take the Delphi for instance. Sitting around their tables, all prim and proper in their boring grey uniforms and stupid bloody hats looking like tiny rowboats. Their eyes were just like mine, but they saw something I didn’t. They were all so goddess-be-damned eager playing their parts, happy going down for the cause as if they’ll be the ones remembered for it. ‘Course, there were exceptions. There always are, and I’ll get to that later.

At some point while I watched everybody else eat their poisoned breakfasts, I elbowed Gus in the ribs. “Catch word of any jobs only we can do?”

Feargus probably shrugged. He was a lot better at being lazy, so he wasn’t too bothered by all the puttering around. Also, we’d had that conversation about a hundred times.

“They can’t keep us here forever,” is what he usually said.

“Reckon they can do whatever they want,” is what I usually said.

But that morning was different. That morning we were being watched by a pair of Strachan lasses across the table. Twins and about sixteen. They were staring and it was annoying. I put on my best grumpy face.

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“What?” I asked.

"Nothing,” they replied.

“What. Is. Your. Problem?”

“It’s only…” said one.

“…it’s only nothing,” said the other.

“You're both plucking at my last nerve.”

“We’ve heard things about a Ghost Hunt,” said the one who dared to be daring. “We’ve got three weeks’ allowance on Councilwoman Kelly sending the pair of you.”

“It’s a bloody shame the Assembly put the ax to those about five hundred years ago.”

“Five years ago,” Gus said.

“Whatever.” I shrugged. “Councilwoman Kelly would never send us.”

The twins seemed to be considering. “But we thought you were the best?”

I might have laughed a little. Gus definitely laughed a lot.

We were good at what we did. Probably the best for a wee blip in time.

But that wasn’t the point.

Rumour had it, the Ghost defected from Palisade around the same time I was born. Some believed he’d died all on his own. Or maybe he'd already been caught, and was locked up in the asylum somewhere. Others said he’d been put on trial, exiled, and hunted down by Strachan trained for the Chase—the thing that happened to naughty Partisans who’d been booted from Palisade. Some say he was a hero. The Ghost had become such a goddess-be-damned legend, most couldn’t be bothered learning his name.

Rhydian Sinclair—nuttiest tree in the garden.

Councilwoman Kelly would never send us after the Ghost on account of the man was my father, but it wasn’t a matter of scruples. Coming face-to-face with a man like him—with knowledge and connections like he had—might have made too much sense to me.

The Assembly wasn’t ready to deal with a family nut-tree.

Either way, my time was coming to an end. Reckoned the Assembly had been trying to kill me for a while. The landlock? They were just biding their time, sorting out how best to do it while keeping their noses clean.

They expected me to defect, so I didn’t. Most of the time, I was curious to see what they’d try next. Sometimes, I wanted them to do me a favour. Point is, the Assembly wanted me dead or alive on their terms. Reuniting me with the man who’d evaded them for two decades was a bad idea.

Look, that’s all I’ve got to say about that. And if you’re itching to know what happened next: we stood up, walked away, waved to Michael, and then we left.

I had class.