Matt Archer: Blade's Edge (13 page)

I waved and stopped Aunt Julie mid-sentence. “Question for the wielders…any of you getting instructions from your blades?”

Jorge’s eyes found mine. “Something in the periphery, perhaps. Why?”

I crossed my arms. “Because my knife-spirit is telling me we have to go to Afghanistan. Now.”

Chapter Thirteen

“A
nother deployment,” Aunt Julie said
later that night. “Afghanistan is a dangerous place even without monsters. You up for it?”

“Have to be.” I leaned back on the leather sofa in the living room of their townhouse in McLean. They’d invited Jorge and I to crash there for the night. Even now that Uncle Mike was married, his place still looked like a bachelor pad with minimal clutter and only a few candles to add a homey touch. Maybe they hadn’t decorated because both of them traveled so much. Or maybe Aunt Julie didn’t go in for fussy stuff. Either was possible. “What I don’t understand is why they aren’t sending me with the others.”

Uncle Mike sighed. Probably because I’d protested eight times in the last four hours. “We need to get an idea of what we’re facing over there. Putting Ramirez and Parker on the ground to get set up makes more sense than launching you into the unknown. We’ll bring you out—we’ll have to, I’m sure of it—but you need to hang tight.”

The spirit growled in a frustrated way.
You are needed.

“Yeah, but I can’t go,” I said, forgetting for a second that I had an audience.

Jorge, camped out in the recliner, gave me one of his mysterious smiles. “The spirit would not allow him to sit by.” He leaned toward me. “Would it?”

The room felt cold all of a sudden. Could he hear my conversations with the knife? “What do you mean?”

“Your uncle and others on the team have discussed the growing attachment issues, especially during battle. Some have minimal trouble, like Brandt. Others are more entwined, like Ramirez and me,” Jorge said. “How much hold does your blade have over you?”

Mike and Julie, who sat on chairs they’d brought in from the kitchen, both looked really interested in that question. How on earth was I going to explain my “leash” situation with Ella while they were around?

Short answer? I wasn’t.

“It has opinions about stuff,” I said, waving my hand in a vague way. “And it does get a little excited when we fight.”

Mike stood. “Honey, let’s go make some coffee.”

A pretty transparent excuse, but Aunt Julie caught on right away and followed Uncle Mike into the kitchen.

Jorge tapped his lips with his finger, then pointed at me. “Care to change your answer?”

I never could lie to him. Out of fear, or respect? Both, probably. “It took me over during the last big op. I could feel it controlling my actions. We went into a total frenzy. And now…now it keeps me in line while I’m at home, too. It…” I paused. I might as well tell him everything. “
She
keeps spooling me up for a fight. I nearly clobbered my brother for being a jackass to my sister a month ago, not because I wanted to, but because the spirit thought it was a good idea.”

“A female…that makes sense,” Jorge said absently. “Hmm.”

So much in that “hmm,” it said volumes. “‘Hmm,’ what?”

“Well, you said ‘we’ for one thing. And ‘she’ for another,” Jorge said. “My spirit is male, by the way. I don’t think the others know exactly what theirs are, yet.”

I let out a little breath. “So I’m not the only one.”

“No. But it sounds like I need to give you some separation exercises.” Jorge reached out and put a hand on my arm. “We want to be connected with our spirits, but you must invite its control, rather than letting it assume power on its own. My knife and I work in symbiosis. You know this word, yes?”

I nodded. Biology class came in handy. “Two organisms living together, using each other to survive.”

“Correct,” he said. “In the right balance, neither takes precedence over the other. It’s good as long as the relationship stays mutually beneficial, so it’s critical you learn to draw boundaries with your knife.”

The blade vibrated in my backpack. I could feel the spirit’s indignation from across the room. “She doesn’t like that idea. The last time I tried to squash her control, she made me barf.”

“I doubt she does. Your spirit is the most powerful of the five, Matt. Naturally her hold will be the strongest.” Jorge stared into the distance. “I never told you, when I made them…your blade almost killed me.”

Another buzz from my backpack—pleased this time. I dug my fingers into my legs. What had Jorge unleashed on me? “How?”

He chuckled in a not-funny way. “Each blade was fused with its spirit—born if you will—with a tremendous jolt of energy. I was able to deflect the residual power into nature; the trees, the water, et cetera, to protect myself. This blade, though, threw off so much raw energy the trees bent around me. It was like standing in a whirlwind, except more electric. The surge rushed through my body….” Jorge closed his eyes. “I woke up several hours later, collapsed on the ground. My eyebrows and the hair on my arms had been singed off and everything smelled like soot for days because my nostrils were burned. The blade was driven into the ground next to me.”

“So that’s why you were surprised my blade didn’t stay with you, but went with Uncle Mike?” I asked. “Because she blasted back on you?”

“Yes, I thought only I could manage her power. She must have had her reasons for leaving, though.”

Yes,
the knife whispered to me.
I was looking for you. For blood that fit.

I jerked in surprise. “Uh, yeah. She said something about finding blood that fit.”

“So now we get back to the real crux of the matter,” Jorge said. “Why does your blood fit? Why were you chosen?”

I stared at my hands, unable to answer that question. Of all the people in the world the knife-spirit could’ve picked, she picked a scrawny freshman and turned him into a fighting machine. The hell of it was that I might never understand why my blood fit.

The spirit sure wasn’t telling me.

By the time I got home, winter had caught up with Montana. Seeing the snow falling in a solid sheet made me half wish I’d gone to Peru with Jorge. Making matters worse, not even the special exercises Jorge had given me lessened the knife-spirit’s hold. I tried everything he suggested for two weeks—meditation, doing some kind of weird chanting while facing north, taking a bath in salt water and mint leaves (Mom had raised her eyebrows, but brought the leaves home from the store without asking)—and nothing changed. Most of the time, the spirit was willing to give me space, but when she wanted to be in control, she had my total attention.

Mamie had demanded a full debrief of the summit, and after I told her about the kidnapped children, she went into super-librarian mode. All human suffering affected her, but kids were her kryptonite. The weekend before my sixteenth birthday, she came bursting into the game room, interrupting the Celtics/Lakers game. Tied, with forty-five seconds to go. Perfect timing.

Mamie stood in front of the TV. “Matt, I’ve got something to show you.”

“I never should’ve told you about those missing kids,” I said, trying to see around her. “You’ve been like a research tornado since I got back.”

She clicked off the TV before I could protest and plunked down on the beat up brown sofa Mom had designated as kid furniture. I got up from the bean bag chair to join her, knowing Mamie was just like the Borg—resistance was futile. She shoved a sheaf of papers in my hand and launched into her lecture.

“I’ve been studying pre-Persian mythology,” she said. “Fascinating stuff.”

I riffled through the printouts. A few were from Wikipedia, which apparently held the sum-total of all the world’s knowledge. Some were from more obscure sites, though, like colleges and research institutes—places only Mamie would search. “Okay…so?”

“I’ve found out—” Mamie stopped mid-sentence and sighed. “This is kind of bad. Are you up for this right now?”

Good question. Did I really want to know? If something horrible lurked out there somewhere, maybe ignorance was good. But a tingle in my blood said, yes, yes I did want to know. Telling me if I knew what this thing was, I could kill it. Sweat beaded on my forehead as the feeling became stronger. My heart raced, begging me to act now, rush, hurry….

“I know what you’re doing,” I mumbled, pushing back against the spirit. Last thing I needed was a surge of blood lust with no real outlet. We’d have plenty of enemies to take out during spring break without me looking for a fight at home. “You need to stop this crap.”

You’ll be tested soon. I must help you stay ready,
the spirit insisted. She sounded annoyed that I pushed back.

“Understood, but not now, okay?” I said, hoping I could reason with her. Luckily, she was in an agreeable mood and my pulse slowed. “Thanks.”

Mamie pursed her lips. “You’re talking to the knife, aren’t you?”

I nodded. “I’m good now. You were saying?”

“Okay, so you know how Jorge says the knives are fused with spirits of Light?”

I pointed at my forehead. “I have one living in here, remember?”

“Considering I just caught you talking to yourself, I sure hope so, because the alternative is that you’re nuts,” Mamie said. “Anyway, pre-Persian mythology has a lot to do with Light and Dark, too, just like Jorge believes. The ancient cultures in Afghanistan believed in a master spirit that ruled the darkness, an entity of perfect evil serving as a foil for their master spirit of Light. The Dark spirit had an army of lesser demons, and it was to blame for everything bad. It’s goal is pure and utter destruction.”

“So?” I said. “Every religion on earth has a version of the devil or something like it.”

“Listen to what I’m saying.” Mamie gripped my arm and gave me a shake. “This spirit’s main purpose is to destroy anything and everything it comes into contact with. Even the things
it
creates. Now how would a spirit like that maintain its power?”

It took me a minute, but I got there. “Life, right? It’d need to draw life-energy.”

“That’s my guess. It’d explain the zombies, at least. It even explains why so many children are being taken. Who has more energy than a little kid?” Mamie let me go and crossed her arms, huddling into the sofa. “I sent everything to Aunt Julie, thinking she could use the information. She wrote back to say they hadn’t considered this angle, but would look into it. I hope they do, because we need to figure out how to stop it before it drains everything—and everyone—dry.”

I stared into space. “Yeah, we do. I just wish the colonel would call me up.”

“I know,” Mamie said, patting my shoulder. “In the meantime, I’ll keep searching for information.”

As she drifted out of the room, the knife whispered,
The fight is coming. Soon.

Soon.

Chapter Fourteen

M
y birthday, February tenth, landed
on a Tuesday. Since my fifteenth had royally sucked, I hoped for better luck this year. It started out well, with the presentation of keys to a used Honda and the promise of skipping morning classes to go test for my driver’s license. Even better, I got the passcode to my government-issued savings account. The numbers before and after the comma in the balance made my jaw drop.

Maybe I could afford to splurge on that flat-screen TV after all. Or at least pay Mom back for my car. I daydreamed about hitting the mall all the way to the drivers’ testing station.

Mom patted my shoulder as I waited to be called. “Are you nervous?”

“Um, I’ve been driving a Humvee over rough terrain since last summer. Schmitz taught me when I was in Australia.” I whispered. Louder, I said, “I’ll be fine.”

Mom quirked an eyebrow. “Of course…you weren’t in Sydney last summer, were you? What
were
you doing?”

I hesitated, not sure Mom would want to hear that I was hunting monstrous Dingoes instead of touring the Sydney Opera house. Luckily, I got a reprieve as a balding guy with wire-rimmed glasses perched on his head came around the counter. He consulted a clipboard. “Archer, Matthew.”

I raised my hand. The man pointed to the front door, and I led him to my new-to-me Honda. The air was sharp; temperatures had dropped again. No snow, though. Good—I’d have an easier drive without sliding around on slush.

Ella told me they’d docked her for not checking her mirrors enough, so I made a big show of adjusting the mirrors before starting the car. The examiner made a note on his clipboard. Guess that worked.

Backing out slowly, I wondered if the guy had enough of a sense of humor for me to pull a J-turn when we parallel parked. Given his gray pants and maroon sweater with the collar of a white dress shirt peeking out, I doubted it. I stopped at the entrance to the parking lot, looked both ways, flipped on my blinker even though no one was coming, then turned right.

The examiner didn’t talk except to give me instructions: turn left here, merge with traffic, stop. Twenty minutes of perfect turns, observing the speed limit, and glancing in my mirrors like I was scared someone was following us, went by before we pulled into a neighborhood to practice parallel parking and parking on a hill. After lining the car up without bumping the curb, I put the Honda in park and turned my wheels, just like the textbook said. The examiner marked more notes. Then gave me more instructions: test the horn. Make sure I know where my hazard lights are. Turn on the windshield wipers. Pop the hood and point out the oil dipstick.