Chapter 22
Sicarius
I’m almost running as I drag Ketchup down the concrete stairs of Peak View Hospital. The orderlies dragging Oscar out of the room and down the hall when he wouldn’t stop screaming topped off an already disturbing experience. I wanted to ask him more, find out what my parents lied about, but there was no more talking to Oscar at that point. Admitting it hurts, but part of me was glad they drug him away. Do I really want to know what lies I’ve been told since birth?
When I reach Ketchup’s car, I finally find the strength to drop his hand. He doesn’t move, but I sag against the back of his car and hang my head. The silence of the parking lot is soothing after Oscar’s outburst. At least for a few minutes it is. Then my floundering brain nudges me, reminds me that Ketchup is still standing next to me, not speaking a word. I know I need to say something.
“Ketchup, I …” That’s as far as I get.
I work to find something, anything, but before I can, Ketchup’s hands are suddenly on my face, pulling me toward him. His lips press against mine fiercely, crushing me, and sending a rush every bit as strong as my hunger coursing through my body. The last hour evaporates from my mind. The last two years are forgotten entirely, and I’m suddenly back on my porch with Ketchup, a silly girl with unrealistic dreams. Except my dreams don’t seem so far away now. My hands slide around his neck and pull him closer. He deepens the kiss hungrily. I want more. I want nothing else in this world.
Ketchup shoves me away from him without warning. The angry glare on his face knocks me back. “You should have told me!” he snaps. “The hunger, the urges, the fact that your brother wants to kill me! You should have told me, Van. You shouldn’t have run away from me. You should have given me the chance to understand and help you. I wouldn’t have run. I wouldn’t have left you.”
“Will you now?” I ask, barely managing to make myself heard.
His anger holds for a few more seconds. In that brief moment, I fear my heart will explode. Then his shoulders slump and he pulls me against his chest. As his arms wrap around me, I know I will never feel safer than I do in his arms. He leans down next to my ear and says, “I’m not going anywhere, Van.”
For the first time in two years, I give in to him completely. I cinch my arms around him and bury my face in his chest. “Ketchup, I’m so sorry.”
“I know,” he says. “It’s okay.”
There’s so much more I want to say to him right now. I want to tell him how much I love him, how I’ve loved him this whole time. I want to tell him to kiss me again, but this time, in the way I always imagined our first kiss would be. My heart is begging me to tell him it will be like this forever.
Reality keeps my mouth shut tight. There’s still Zander. If he gets too close to Ketchup, there won’t be any forever. There will only be death. As he holds me, I can’t bear to say anything of the kind. So I don’t let myself speak at all. The wishes and the truth both stay buried until I can figure things out.
Ketchup is the first to break the silence. “Did you understand any of what Oscar told you today, because I didn’t. I’m not even sure we should believe him.”
“We should definitely believe him.” I may not have understood half of what he said, but this is one thing I’m sure of. Ketchup isn’t.
“Why? Just because Ivy’s last name is Guerra doesn’t mean she’s here to start a war. It sounded crazy, Van.”
Pulling away from Ketchup enough to look him in the eye, I say, “I know Oscar is nuts, but he isn’t a liar. You saw how upset he got when he talked about my parents lying to us. That’s always been a huge deal for him. He’s never once told a lie to anybody.”
“Still …”
“Ketchup, please. I know what I’m talking about.”
He shakes his head. “Fine, what are we going to do about Ivy?”
“We’re going to find out what’s in Ivy’s garage and why she spends her Sundays locked up in there,” I say.
“When?”
I take a deep breath, knowing this might be a huge mistake. “Now. Let’s go.”
***
Climbing over Ivy’s wooden fence proves easy enough. Making sure nobody was home before we could hop over the fence was the trickier part. When we first arrived, there weren’t any cars in the driveway, but neither of us knew for sure whether or not her mom worked during the day. We had to watch the house for a long time, eating lunch as we did, and wait for some sign that anyone was inside. Eventually, we decided it was safe enough to get started and made our move.
Ketchup and I stand at the door to the converted garage, my hand on the locked doorknob. I jiggle it again just for good measure. Not discouraged yet, I look around for other options. There aren’t any windows, which seems a little odd. I slip around each side. Nothing. My hope for a backdoor that isn’t locked is foiled too. There isn’t even a door. I head back to the front of the garage, but Ketchup stops me halfway. He points up. My eyes follow, and I groan.
“Seriously?”
He nods, “Sorry, but it looks like that’s our only way in.”
The skylight on the roof is one of several. “They look like they’re screwed down. How are we going to get them open? I don’t want to break anything or she’ll know someone was here.”
“How about we get up there, and then try using these,” Ketchup says, holding up a pair of screwdrivers.
“Where did those come from?” I ask.
He shrugs. “My car. I have a tool set in the trunk that my uncle gave me.”
Hmm. The longer I watch him, the guiltier he looks. Ketchup sucks at fixing cars. His uncle wouldn’t even think of letting him try to tighten a screw for fear of the whole car exploding. We’ll come back to this later.
“So, are you going to boost me up, or what?”
A few seconds later, we’re both on top of the roof twisting out screws as fast as we can. We’re much more exposed up here. Even still, as I’m unscrewing the second to last screw on my side, I look over at Ketchup and ask, “You’ve done this before, haven’t you?”
“Breaking into a garage? Can’t say that I have.” He pauses. “Well, I did have to break into our garage once when the garage door opener jammed.”
“Ketchup …”
“What?” He pretends for a moment longer, but then he sighs. “Okay, breaking into things isn’t exactly a new thing for me,” he admits, “but it’s not like I steal stuff. I just practice. It’s a useful skill to have.”
“Where do you practice?”
He shrugs. “Houses in my neighborhood mostly. Cars too.”
“Have you ever come to my house at night?”
The squeaky noise of his screw fighting to get loose is suddenly the only sound. I don’t push him, but I wait. Finally, he gets the screw loose and looks up at me. “It’s not what you’re thinking.”
“What am I thinking?”
“That I peek at you through your windows, or something,” he says. “I just get really worried sometimes, Van. After what Oscar did …well, sometimes I can’t sleep knowing you’re there with only Zander and your grandma. What’s your grandma gonna do? And Zander, with the way he’s looked at me since that day on the porch, I’m not always sure he’s going to protect you either.”
He looks back down at the remaining screws. I want to reach across the half-loosened skylight and kiss him. I don’t. I wonder if he’s trying not to do the same thing, because he doesn’t look at me when he speaks again. “I’ve never broken into your house, though.”
“Then why?”
“Just in case I ever need to.”
I know Zander would never hurt me. Regardless, a little dash of reassurance that Ketchup will be there if I ever need him lightens my mood. We finish our work quickly after that, and Ketchup lowers me down. I land badly because of the strangely uneven floor and stumble. Ketchup lands right behind me, and steadies me. My eyes linger on the warmth of his smile for just a moment before turning away and staring wide-eyed at the room around me.
Crimson drapes coat the walls in an alternating pattern of thick velvet fabric and bare, black walls. The floor is black, too, all but a thick band of white running down the center of the room that leads to the low platform I fell on. Inside the white band are symbols and words that have no meaning to me. I step back as I realize they continue up onto the raised platform. I still have no idea what they say, but my eyes follow the pattern to an even more incredible sight. There’s an…altar at the back of the platform. An ornately carved table of the blackest wood I’ve ever seen stands sentinel on the very center of the back wall. Here the drapes are farther apart, leaving a wide expanse of black wall. This wall isn’t bare. It’s filled with weapons.
And I’m not talking about guns. Swords, knives, things I’m not even sure what they are, all hold places of honor on the wall. They look old, too. Really old. The detailing on the handles is incredible, and some of them even have designs on the actual blades. They’re gorgeous, but very, very creepy. The book on the altar is freaking me out, too. It’s just a book, but the picture painted on the front makes both of us cringe.
A person—I can’t tell whether it’s supposed to be a man or woman, or something else entirely—is standing in a pool of blood. The creature’s mouth is open, caught mid-scream with a look of pure agony on its face. At first, it looks like the blood is pouring out of the creature. When I look closer, I see that the blood droplets are running up the person’s body toward its mouth. Like it’s eating it.
My own blood seems to run and hide in my core, my fingers and toes going icy cold. The similarity certainly isn’t lost on me. Kneeling in front of the blood-eater is a young woman. She’s the most disturbing of the pair. Dark, wavy hair frames a peaceful face. Her quiet smile in the face of what is standing behind her doesn’t make sense. The knife she’s holding to her own throat makes even less sense.
“What is this place?” Ketchup asks.
“I don’t know, but it’s beyond freaky.”
He nods. “If I had any doubts before, I don’t anymore. Something is definitely wrong with Ivy. I mean, what does she do in here? Swords, weird writing all over the floor, some bloody guy on a book. What is she messed up in?”
“What is Zander messed up in?” I ask.
We’re here in her dojo from Hell, and I still have no idea what’s going on. Reluctantly, my fingers stretch toward the book. I know the blood eater must be someone like me, someone who feeds on pain and anguish, but what could this book possibly say? Does it hold whatever answers Oscar found? Is the reason behind his murder of our parents hidden within its pages? My hand shakes as I flip open the cover.
Sei stato scelto. Solo coloro che hanno dimostrato …
“I have no idea what any of this means, do you?” I ask.
Ketchup scans the passage at the front of the book and shakes his head. “I’m sure we can find out, though. Give me a minute.”
He pulls his phone out of his pocket and has a translation app open a few seconds later. “Why do you have that on your phone?” I ask despite the serendipitous usefulness of it.
“I suck at Spanish.”
“You cheat on your Spanish homework?” I’m actually kind of shocked. Ketchup has the scoundrel act down pat because of the way everyone treats him, but I know he’s a pretty straight laced guy.
“Not all the time. The instructions on our homework are always written in Spanish. How am I supposed to do it if I don’t even know what I’m supposed to do?”
I roll my eyes. “I don’t think this is Spanish.”
“No problem. This translator can do a bunch of languages. It’ll even identify the language if you type in a few words.” His thumbs start tapping away like mad. He gets the first sentence down and the app immediately comes back with an answer of Italian. Kind of surprising, since with a last name like Guerra, I didn’t figure Ivy for having Italian ancestors. As Ketchup starts typing in the passage, I wonder whether Guerra is her real last name.
“Okay, I got it,” Ketchup says. “Here, take a look.”
You have been chosen. Only those who have shown courage and strength are chosen for our most sacred of missions. The trials of your choosing have proven your worth, but you must endure one last tribulation. You must sacrifice for your beliefs one final time. The rewards for your sacrifice will be the highest possible. Blessed eternity will be yours, but not without your final contribution. Your life is the price of this honor. Open the book and begin your journey to eternal happiness, your journey to vanquish the assassin.
Chills run a marathon down my spine. “Oscar was right,” I whisper.
“Looks like it. Ivy was chosen, by someone, to kill the assassin. Whatever that means. Who exactly are the assassins, anyway?”
“It must mean Zander…and me.” I can feel Ketchup press in closer to me after hearing my words. His concern is comforting, but Ivy’s sights are set on Zander right now.
“The assassin. That doesn’t really sound like Zander, though. Sure, your brother’s not the most compassionate guy in the world, or the most interesting, but he’s not an assassin. Unless you count the teams he plays against.”
I look down at the original passage in the book. I know what the words mean now, but I feel like we’re missing something. The clue appears in the last word. The Italian word for assassin is Sicarius. I recognize the code word my parents taught us from birth and suddenly feel sick. Oscar was right. If they taught us that word, they knew about all of this. Anger builds under my skin, but I force my attention back to the words.
The translation put no significance on the word when it spit it back out, but I notice that the word in the book is capitalized. Sicarius. “It’s not just a noun,” I say. “It’s a title. Look how it’s capitalized, Ketchup, like a team or a company name.”
“Like a terrorist group, an enemy.”
“But, that doesn’t make any sense. How could there be this whole group of wackos intent on killing me and my brothers? I know there have been others in our family, but how big of a threat can we really be?”
“Van,” Ketchup says slowly as he thumbs through the book, “I don’t think this is just about you and your brothers. This is way too much for a couple of messed up kids. Look how old all of this stuff is. Centuries. There’s more of you somewhere. There has to be. And whatever crazy group Ivy is a part of, they’ve been hunting these Sicarius people for centuries all over the world. If it was just one family, they would have killed them off a long time ago.”
“More?” I feel a little lightheaded all of a sudden. Was that the lie my parents told that broke Oscar?
Knowing there are more of us, that could mean help, knowledge, a real life maybe. The tiniest shake of my head makes me sway. My hands grip the table for support as Ketchup wraps his arm around my shoulders. More people like me. I don’t know whether to be relieved or terrified. Oscar killed our parents. Zander, he…he killed Lisa. What lives will I steal?
Visions of dozens, hundreds of people dying to feed an eternal hunger assail me without stopping. But amid the waves of death and carnage, there is a bubble of hope in my mind. If there are others, maybe they can help me learn how to control my hunger. Surely my family isn’t the first ones to try and abstain. Are we?
“Van, what are we going to do? It’s getting late. School will be out soon and Ivy will be meeting Zander after his practice.”
I was already scared that Ivy was going to do something bad by helping Zander. Like every other answer I’ve gotten today, this isn’t the one I wanted to hear. “Ketchup, we have to stop her.”
“How? I have a feeling there’s a lot more to Ivy Guerra than we thought.”
“It doesn’t matter. We have to stop her from killing Zander. I won’t lose another brother.”
My brain starts running at high speed. There has to be an answer somewhere. Spinning, I take in the room again. Nothing. Bare walls and velvet curtains. I drop my gaze to the writing on the floor. Reaching for Ketchup, I’m about to ask him to translate the writing. His own hand gripping my arm stops me.
“Van, she isn’t going to kill Zander.”
Those words should be good news, but I can hear the dread in his voice. “What?”
“The book said, ‘your life is the price of this honor.’ It said she’d vanquish the Sicarius, but not by killing them. She’s the one who has to die, not Zander.”
“But…that doesn’t make sense. Why would she kill herself …?” The rest of my thought trails off as realization slaps me. “No, no, no. Ketchup, she’s going to make Zander kill her! He must have told her enough that she knows how to trigger his hunger so he’ll lose control. She’ll sacrifice herself to expose him.”
“Why? What would that accomplish? It’s like you said before, everyone will forget after a while. She’ll be dead and gain nothing from it.”
I growl at the holes in my knowledge. I know I’m right about this. There’s a piece of the explanation missing. I’m sure it’s in the book, but we don’t have time to translate an entire book on a phone! There has to be something else. Something in this room. My eyes fall back to the writing on the floor.
“Ketchup, tell me what that says. Hurry!”
Maybe it’s nothing, but it was important enough to turn into a work of art on the floor of Ivy’s personal suicide temple.
“Okay,” he says after a minute, “here’s what it says. One life for the destruction of many. Expose the Sicarius to seal his family’s fate.”
The air seems to grow thick around me. It slides down my throat and chokes me. Somehow, I manage to force my voice through the cloying panic. “If Ivy makes Zander kill her, these psychos will know that my family are these Sicarius things. They’ll come, and they’ll kill the rest of us, just to make sure we don’t hurt anyone else.”
“Van, that is the stupidest plan I’ve ever heard,” Ketchup says. “Why go through the trouble of having one of their own people commit suicide? I mean, it sounds like Zander has already given Ivy plenty of reason to convince her that he’s one of these Sicarius people. So why not just come and kill him and his family? Why waste the life of one of their own?”
I shake my head, confused as well. “I don’t know. This group is old. These traditions seem to go back for hundreds of years.”
“Tradition can’t really be enough to give up your life when you don’t need to,” Ketchup argues. “Maybe we could convince Ivy.”
Judging by her temple, I seriously doubt that. My mind replays the translation again. One sentence sticks out, possibly giving me the answer. “Maybe it’s the reward,” I say.
“What?”
I grab his phone and go back to the first translation. “See. It said that if she gave up her life she would be given the highest reward possible. Ketchup, I don’t think this is just some group Ivy belongs to. It’s more like her religion. I think she believes that if she forces Zander to kill her, she’ll go to some kind of martyr’s paradise and have everything she ever wanted. Isn’t that why Muslim suicide bombers do what they do? The reward of forgiveness, paradise, and dark-eyed virgins?”
“If this is her religion,” Ketchups says, “then I don’t think we should waste any time trying to change her mind.”
I nod in agreement, but am sickened at the realization that there is only one way to stop her. I thought that all I had to do to save my brother’s life was stop one twisted girl. That’s not even the half of it. An army of ancient sword wielding fanatics is about to find out my family’s darkest secret, and we’re the only ones who know. It’s me and Ketchup against a centuries-old secret society of trained killers.