Sun's Glory - Pt. 02

Stooped, with only a few white hairs on his head and sagging jowls, Joe Briarwood looked nothing like the strong, upright man I remembered. When he yanked open the door, annoyed, no doubt, by my persistent knocking, he looked like he'd seen a ghost. Perhaps my expression was the same.

For just a second he was frightened, but then the familiar brown eyes creased in delight and he pulled me into an awkward hug. "Lucjan! I thought I'd never see you again." Over his shoulder I looked for my foster mother, longing for her smile, her soft touch.

When he let me go, he wiped his eyes, still grinning. His teeth were yellow, with several missing. "You hungry? I have some food left over. What about tea? Found some last marketing day, that was something, let me tell you." He looked me over, then motioned toward the hallway. "Why don't you go clean up? There's water in the bathroom." Joe turned away before I could respond, before I could ask about Ruth.

Hefting my pack, I walked across the cracked linoleum down the hallway, memories filling my mind. I'd found comfort here, long ago. But something felt wrong. It hung heavy in the air and made my gut churn. A few more steps showed me empty bedrooms full of dust and dirt, bare mattresses and closed blinds. No one had slept there in years.

I washed the blood from my hands and changed my shirt, stared at my face in the flyspecked mirror. My gut told me I shouldn't have come here, but I had to know the truth. Joe was hiding something. The bone knife felt cool in my hand when I pulled it out of my pack. I held it in front of my face, eyeing the razor sharp blade. Then I gathered my things and returned to the kitchen.

My foster father had his back to me when I came in, and again I was struck by what the passage of time had done to him. Time passed oddly for me--while not immortal, I aged much slower than a human, yet the years went fast.

"Sit down, Lucjan," Joe said, turning back around. His smile seemed forced, his body language not quite as welcoming as before. In my pocket the knife burned.

Bemused, I pulled out one of the chairs, glancing around the familiar kitchen. Joe shuffled around, pulling out a pot and filling it with water from a nearby jug. He'd lit a kerosene lamp and set it on the table. I remembered it as one of Ruth's favorites.

The house smelled stale and dirty. Thick dust striped the white curtains Ruth had hung from the window, telling me that she had been gone a long time. And still Joe said nothing about her. I watched him bustle around the kitchen, chattering nonsensically, avoiding the coming confrontation for as long as he could. I said nothing, not even when he asked if I still liked honey in my tea.

"I have a little, it's crystalized, but I can melt it." Joe placed a chipped tea cup in front of me, along with a slice of bread and a small bit of cheese. "Let me just get that for you--"

"Joe. Sit down."

He blanched, but did as I ordered. He looked even more shrunken sitting across the scarred table. I didn't like the way his eyes kept skittering away. Nor did I like that he kept his hands in his lap. Sweat dripped down his face, fear rising off him in waves. He paled when I placed the bone white knife on the table.

"I know Ruth's dead, Joe. Tell me what happened. Don't try to lie to me," I warned.

My foster father finally met my gaze. I saw the pain in his rheumy eyes, the fear, the guilt. "I knew someday you'd return and I'd have to tell you what I did." His voice shook. "But I can't--I won't." Defiant, he brought up one hand, brandishing the thin blade he held. I wanted to laugh--was he threatening me? But no, he intended to slit his own throat.

I snatched the blade before he even got close to his neck and tossed it away. "It's not going to be that easy, Joe," I told him, and tears spilled down his wrinkled cheeks. "You should have killed yourself long ago." His distress left me unmoved.

"Speak, old man. Where is my mother?" His eyes darted to the bone knife and he licked his lips several times. I already knew I wasn't going to like what he was about to tell me.

"I--after you left, things got bad for us. Ruth...she wouldn't stand for it, you know how she was. She hated being told what to do, hated how you'd been driven away." Joe stopped, lips pressed together. I didn't prod him. Silence had a way of drawing out things. Outside a wolf howled. My foster father hunched his shoulders, reached out a shaking hand for his teacup.

"She just wouldn't stop complaining even when I told her to stop, that there was nothing we could do. Ruth didn't like that, you can be sure. Well, to make a long story short, she was banished."

The knife leapt into my hand, warm as the flesh that once enclosed it. Joe's eyes widened in alarm and he shoved back his chair. "Wh--What is that?"

"This?" I flourished it, the blade gleaming in the low light. "This is a bloodknife, my dearest and truest friend, and right now she's telling me that you're a liar and I should kill you." I raised an eyebrow. "I'm considering it."

"Lucjan--son--please...let me explain."

I gestured with the knife. "Speak, then, and I will judge you."

Joe swallowed hard and began talking.

"You were only a child, so you probably weren't aware of the politics behind things at that time. I would have been higher up in the government here if Ruth had been able to keep her opinions to herself, but she couldn't. And folks were okay with that until we took you in. Your...differences became more and more apparent and people got scared. Ruth, she tried to explain, tried to make people understand that you weren't a monster--" here he darted a glance at me "but it was no good. After the fight with that kid, I can't remember his name, no one wanted you here."

"And after I left?" I stroked the bloodknife with a finger, caressing the hilt as I knew she liked. Joe stared, trying to understand; he never would and not only because I was going to kill him.

"It got worse. Lucjan, try to understand. I was scared and when people are scared...sometimes they do stupid things." His begging fell on deaf ears; humans only begged when they knew they were going to die. The bloodknife quivered in anticipation. So did I.

"Tell me the rest, Joe. What happened to Ruth?"

"They--they threw her off the wall at sunset." Joe sucked in a shuddery breath. "There wasn't anything I could do, I swear."

I could fill in the rest of the details myself. She wouldn't have died from the fall, would have begged them to let her back in as the creatures of the night began to stir. It wasn't often they had food so easily, and she would have attracted many hungry things. It was a cruel death. Hate burned, and I gripped the bloodknife, heat rushing up my arm. My muscles twitched with the effort it took to keep from ripping his head off prematurely.

"You let her die a horrible death."

"I was scared, Lucjan! Try to understand what it would have been like!"

I slammed my fist on the table, shaking the lamp. He flinched.

"I understand plenty, Joe. I understand that you are a coward of the worst sort. You cannot even admit now, after all this time, that you should have died with your wife." I stopped, swallowed down the grief. "How...how could you have let her be tortured like that? I don't understand."

Words fell from his mouth, words he must have suppressed for years. "She got what she deserved! She never listened to me! She just did whatever the hell she wanted and damn the consequences! I always had to suffer right along with her, always, always! You want the truth, Lucjan?" Joe's eyes were wild, lips shining with spittle.

"The truth is, I opened the door to them myself. Does that surprise you? Well, no one was more surprised than Ruth when the mob appeared outside our door and hollered for her--not me. I'll never forget the expression on her face when she realized I wasn't going to fight them." He shrugged. "I'm a bad person, I know this. And the folks around here never let me forget what I did. And now here you are, decades later, stirring everything up."

I blinked. "You hated her," I said, marveling at this fact. I didn't remember any acrimony, but I'd been a child.

Joe looked uncomfortable. "Not always," he admitted. "When you were with us Ruth was happier, she complained less, and my life was easier, more peaceful. She'd always been a complainer, nothing made her happy, nothing I ever did." He paused. "Until I brought you home. Then she was happy and I had a peaceful life."

The revelation floored me; everything I'd believed about my time with my foster parents was a lie. I'd come here expecting the same love and care I'd had before, but Joe had destroyed it all. I felt nothing for this pathetic human before me, nothing but contempt. He wasn't even worth my hate. My fingers closed around my knife; it pulsed in excitement.

"When did this happen?"

"Oh, about six months after you left." Joe shrugged. "I'd had a bellyful already, you see?"

"I'm going to kill you," I hissed.

Belying his age, Joe lurched from the chair and dashed toward the door, hollering the entire way.

"Help! Help me! Murder! Help!"

It was so ludicrous I laughed in amazement. Where did this old man think he was going? No one was going to answer his cries, it was near midnight. Despite the safety of the wall, no one ventured outdoors at night. Not even the coward Joe Briarwood, I noted. He stopped with his hand on the doorknob, shoulders heaving.

He turned around, resigned. "Fine, Lucjan; just get it over with."

I smiled in amusement. "Do you really think it's going to be that easy, coward?" I ran my tongue over my teeth; while I did not need blood, I liked it, and it had been so very long since I'd tasted it. I raised the bloodknife to my lips and kissed the blade.

"Let us begin, my lovely," I whispered.

He didn't stop screaming until dawn.