“When you were born, Jena, I argued against apprenticing you as a soul-breaker.”
I stiffen but bite my tongue. Her admission shouldn’t surprise me. I’ve long known she dislikes me.
“There was something amiss with your grandmother, too.” She raises her head and tears glisten in the corners of her eyes. “She was my best friend. We were breakers together. But she never understood. And nor will you.”
I frown, swallowing down rage and holding it tight in my clenched fists. “What does that mean? What was she supposed to understand? What am I supposed to understand?”
Veloni scrubs a hand over her face. “Every generation there are a few children for whom the soul-taking does not work at birth. They remain unsouled. The Council makes them soul-breakers.”
The breath leaves my lungs and my knees give way. I sink onto the bed. A strange kind of relief warms my stomach. Perhaps this is why I have always felt so separate from my kith and kin. Perhaps this is why I am so sure the unsouled can be the salvation of humanity’s future.
“So, you…” I point at her, then back at myself. “…and I…?”
“Yes. You are an unsouled. As was I. But we don’t stay that way.” Veloni frowns as she watches me.
My heart stops, stutters, starts again, but faster—as though urging me to run from what she will say. I still don’t understand why she seems to think being unsouled is terrible, so I stay.
She hesitates then plunges on, speaking fast. “The reason that breakers absorb a small portion of each bringer’s soul is to gain, over time, what they were unable to take in one piece at birth.” She leans forward and grips my hand. “But the souls aren’t just giving life, Jena. They give knowledge.”
With a sigh, she glances at Freya. “What the bringer knows. What they’ve learned. The person they’ve become. What they carry from their soul-bringer. All that is passed on to the soul-taker. It means most children already know how to be kind and generous. How to treat others with respect. How to care for the land. How to construct a house. Everything. And each generation builds on that knowledge.” She gives a soft, sad laugh. “Oh, they still have to learn things, but it takes less time than it takes an unsouled child. Much less.”
I fling my arms wide. “So what? Why does it matter how long it takes them to learn?”
Her pitying gaze dwells on me until I squirm. For the first time, the awareness of things unknown and unlearned is a hollowness in my chest.
Veloni points south. “That city. That’s why. The unsouled who came before us almost destroyed the world in their arrogance and greed. Their lack of respect for others.” She rises, her stockinged feet silent as she paces the room. “Each generation made the same mistakes. Sought nothing but self-aggrandizement and power.” She jabs a finger at me. “Because, like you and your grandmother, they could not learn fast enough to prevent the mistakes made in their youth. And it snowballed. Generation upon generation caring only for their own comfort and wealth.”
She brings her hands together sharply. Thunder and lightning crash overhead and I jump.
Her hands fall, limp, to her sides.
“Until it was too late. We still don’t quite understand what killed them all at once.” Her shoulders slump. “Just that the survivors were mostly the souled ones. Then we discovered that even their children were often born without souls. But most can inherit one if it’s bound properly. And with it came knowledge. Such knowledge.”
She pauses and stares through me. “Our world consists of a hundred and twenty villages, Jena. All that is left of humanity. A little over a hundred and twenty thousand souled people with the knowledge and wisdom not to repeat past mistakes.”
“And?” I prompt when she stops again. My fury has died with the storm’s passing, leaving me cold and empty. I can no longer see my path quite so clearly. My way is muddied by fear now. Fear that I have strayed and cannot find the way home. That I have been naïve. That I lack… knowledge.
“And,” she repeats on a sigh, “to keep the expertise of old souls alive, we have to limit the population in number, to allow life only to those who can be soul-takers. Plus a few who will become breakers and finally masters. This is the Council’s true function.”
“But…” My voice is small, my throat so thick it chokes the words. “But I don’t understand. I’m a soul-breaker. Why can’t I be a master? What’s wrong with me?” I touch my ribs. Blood has oozed through the scar tissue and stained my tunic scarlet, the color of a soul-bringer’s shift.
Veloni grasps my hands so tightly the scissors she still carries press hard into my flesh. Her expression is earnest. Truthful. Pleading, almost.
“We breakers can’t take in an old soul. Instead…” She lifts a shoulder and her gaze slides from mine, “…we break off and steal a little of each soul we pass from bringer to taker. And, in doing so, most of us inherit all of that person’s knowledge.” She touches the spot on her chest above where the soul-holding organ sits. “When this is full, we become wise enough to govern.”
Her face sags again. “Yours will never be full, I’m afraid. Something in your body cannot absorb the soul shards. The weight of their wisdom is too much, perhaps. I’m sorry. You can never be a master.”
I pull free of her touch and rise from the bed. I am flawed? My stomach twists into sickness. How can that be? The answers seemed so clear before.
Outside the bedroom window, lightning still flashes in the distance, but the storm has passed overhead, leaving nothing but the sound of dripping water and the clean smell of wet earth. To the south, the broken city is silhouetted against a yawning, golden moon.
I glance across at Freya. Her eyes are half open but still tired and vacant. She writhes on the bed, moaning. Veloni turns her back on me and tends to Freya, encouraging her to push the babe into the world. Freya’s daughter child will come, soon, and I no longer have an easy solution. Even without the driving rain, there is no way to fetch a soul-bringer in time.
Veloni is bent over the bed, my blue-metal scissors in her hand, ready to cut the child’s throat. Or ready to take my sister’s soul and leave my little niece without a family. For there is no way the Council will let me live after this either.
I reach deep inside, searching for the rage and certainty that fueled me for so long.
But it has vanished like the storm.
Soon, all that will be left is the sound of blood dripping from the blades.
Unless…
I move to the clothes cupboard. Behind me, Freya groans and Veloni urges her to push hard. My sister cries out, triumphant, relieved. A baby’s wail follows, thin, petulant.
From the cupboard I draw a scarlet soul-bringer’s shift. Discarding my breaker’s clothing I pull on the shift and return to the bed. Veloni nods.
There, I curl up beside my little sister, clasping her cold hand in my warm one. The new babe lies swaddled and sleepy between us. Freya’s eyes flutter open and widen at the sight of my clothing.
She sucks a shuddering breath. “Are you sure, Jena? I’ll miss you so much.”
I swallow hard and nod. “This body is wrong for this world. But, with all of my soul-shards in her, baby Jena will make wiser decisions than I did.” I nod to my mentor, who inclines her head, her eyes dark, regretful.
With my blue-metal blades, Veloni slices through scarlet linen and pink scar tissue and draws forth the first piece of someone else’s soul. Bright and clean. Glittering in the half-light. Not a hint of darkness smudging it anywhere.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this diverse collection of short stories. If so, would you be kind enough to leave a review on Goodreads, and any book retail sites you happen to prefer? Reviews help other readers find authors they love. Then authors don’t die of starvation.