Scythe (Arc of a Scythe #1) - Neal Shusterman Page 0,123
our mission face a trial that is not only instructive but transformative. Scythehood is humanity’s highest calling, and to achieve it should cut one’s soul to the very core, so that no scythe will ever forget the cost of the ring they bear.
Of course, to those on the outside, our rite of passage might seem unthinkably cruel. Which is why it must forever remain a secret sacrament.
—From the gleaning journal of H.S. Prometheus, the first World Supreme Blade
* * *
38
The Final Test
On January second, Year of the Capybara, the day before Winter Conclave, Scythe Curie took Citra on the long drive to the MidMerica Capitol Building.
“Your final test will be tonight, but you won’t know the results until tomorrow’s conclave,” she told Citra. But Citra already knew that. “It’s the same test, year to year, for every apprentice. And each apprentice must take the test alone.”
That was something Citra didn’t know. It only made sense that the final test would be some sort of standard that all candidates had to pass, but somehow the thought of having to face that test alone, and not in the company of the others, was troubling. Because now it wouldn’t be a competition with Rowan and the others. She’d be competing against no one but herself.
“You should tell me what the test is.”
“I can’t,” said Scythe Curie.
“You mean you won’t.”
Scythe Curie thought about that. “You’re right. I won’t.”
“If I may speak frankly, Your Honor . . .”
“When have you ever not spoken frankly, Citra?”
Citra cleared her throat and tried to be her most persuasive self. “You play too fair, and it puts me at a disadvantage. You wouldn’t want me to suffer just because you’re too honorable, would you?”
“In our line of work we must hold on to every bit of honor we have.”
“I’m sure other scythes tell their apprentices what the final test is.”
“Perhaps,” said Scythe Curie, “but then again, perhaps not. There are some traditions not even the unscrupulous among us would dare break.”
Citra crossed her arms and said nothing more. She knew she was pouting, she knew it was childish, but she didn’t care.
“You trust Scythe Faraday, do you not?” asked Scythe Curie.
“I do.”
“Have you come to trust me at least as much?”
“I have.”
“Then trust me now and let the question go. I have faith in your ability to shine in the final test without knowing what the test is.”
“Yes, Your Honor.”
• • •
They arrived at eight that evening, and were told that, by the luck of the draw, Citra was to be tested last. Rowan and the two other candidates for Scythedom were to go first. She and Scythe Curie were put in a room to wait, and wait, and wait some more.
“Was that a gunshot?” Citra said, perhaps an hour in. Citra didn’t know whether or not it had been her imagination.
“Shhhh,” was Scythe Curie’s only response.
Finally a guard came to get her. Scythe Curie did not wish her good luck—just gave her a serious nod. “I’ll be waiting for you when you’re done,” she said.
Citra was brought to a long room that seemed unpleasantly cold. There were five scythes seated in comfortable chairs at one end. She recognized two of them: Scythe Mandela and Scythe Meir. The other three she did not. The bejeweling committee, she realized.
Before her was a table covered with a clean white tablecloth. And on that tablecloth, evenly spaced, were weapons: a pistol, a shotgun, a scimitar, a bowie knife, and a vial with a poison pill.
“What are these for?” Citra asked. Then she realized it was a stupid question. She knew what they were for. So she rephrased it. “What is it, exactly, that you want me to do?”
“Look to the other end of the room,” Scythe Mandela told her, pointing. A spotlight came up on another chair at the far end of the long room that had been hidden in shadows; one not as comfortable as theirs. Someone sat in it, hands and legs bound, with a canvas hood covering his or her head.
“We want to see how you might glean,” Scythe Meir said. “For this purpose we’ve prepared a unique subject for you to demonstrate.”
“What do you mean, ‘unique?’”
“See for yourself,” said Scythe Mandela.
Citra approached the figure. She could hear faint snuffling from beneath the hood. She pulled it off.
Nothing could have prepared her for what she saw. Now she understood why Scythe Curie did not tell her.
Because bound to that chair, gagged, terrified, and tearful, was her brother, Ben.