Note: So this is my first note to the readers. I don't really know what to say, but I guess, I hope the story's going well enough for you to read. Oh, and if you're confused with the storyline, you can always ask in the comments. Thank you :)
________________________________________________________________
I could only register a single thought: we're doomed.
Yule could barely hear anything; we're surrounded by war-bringers now, all of their firearms pointed at us. And we were forced to raise our hands in the universal sign of surrender. Of all of the ways I would be defeated, I wasn't expecting this. The coward's way out.
"DROP YOUR WEAPONS," a man bellowed, "OR WE'RE SPILLING BLOOD!"
I let go of the grenade launcher which landed on the snow with a soft thud. I met Yule's eyes. The doe-brown irises were scared.
Several war-bringers cuffed our hands behind our backs and we were led out of the cart. I stared up at the sky, half-hoping Shiv would appear. A part of me dreaded she was defeated by the enemy falcon, or even killed by the explosion which I have caused. I scoffed. That's unlikely. Shiv's tougher than steel. She made it through a wildfire. She made it through a rain of bullets. Surely a little bird fight or explosion won't kill her.
"Alert the commander," a war-bringer told a woman beside him. "Tell him we found them."
The woman nodded, before positioning a device over her lips. "Shogun, we found them."
Shogun. The word sounded impossibly familiar to me, like I've heard it screamed or whispered a thousand times in my childhood.
"Stop twitching," a war-bringer growled at me.
I scowled at the man just as another man appeared. I heard Yule gasp beside me, and wondered if the guy who came looks like a tractor. But when I met the man's eyes, I almost felt all blood drain out of me.
Short brown hair. Pale skin. The steely gaze. The man and I...we were reflections of each other. Except that this man is in the war-bringers' side, had green eyes and had wrinkles instead of scars. Written on the man's name plate is-"
"Philip?" I croaked.
My brother stared at me like I am a stranger, another person he's captured. But a second passed, and he smiled that cheeky smile of his.
Shogun. It suddenly made sense. This man...Philip...he's my brother. And Shogun...it's the name I used to call him when we pretend to be superheroes. It's like his superhero name or something. Mine was...Philip used to call me "Doghead". Made a lot of sense now, I guess.
"Nice to see you, again, Doghead," Philip grinned. "Yo." He indicated a war-bringer behind me, and somehow, the war-bringer managed to stand even straighter. "Free my brother."
"Yes, Shogun..." there was a click, and I am free. Philip grinned, and I didn't know what to do. Should I gave him a brotherly hug? Joke with him? Or run off and escape...?
"Under some deep thought again, Lyall?" Philip laughed. I noticed his voice seemed deeper than the last time I've heard him talk.
I turned slightly and noticed the hand cuffs a war-bringer is clutching. I turned back to my brother. "Why'd you capture us?" I noticed my voice still seemed hostile. "Why are you hunting us down?" His moves were confusing. A day ago, his troops were hunting us, trying to kill us, and now he's all friendly and Doghead-y.
"I'll explain it later," said Philip.
"I don't know how to wait," I replied coldly. I began to sense then. He may be my brother, but his troops still tried to kill us. Nothing changes that, not even if he throws me back to the woods or rebuilds the village and revives the dead. Nothing changes the fact he tried to kill me.
"Calm. Down," said Philip. "Look, I just needed to talk to you. And hunting you down, making you think you're in danger, is the only way I know."
"What do you want to talk about?" I asked.
"I'll tell you when we get back to camp," said Philip. "Look, if we release your friends, oh, hi Uncle Emile, will you start trusting me?"
"That and keep me armed," I replied. "Fork over a gun and I'll listen."
Philip clicked his tongue. "Fine. Hand the shank a rifle."
A woman passed me a rifle, sleek and metallic. It looked so different from the hunting rifles my father uses. Two war-bringers removed Yule and Emile’s cuffs. Emile muttered "thanks" but Yule looked confused. Ah, she can't hear anything. I made a mental note to explain everything to her later.
There was a screech, and I saw two falcons appear. One is Shiv and the other is the larger falcon. I grinned at my raptor friend. I knew she'd make it. Shiv screeched before arrowing down in a rather wobbly way and landing on my shoulder, her talons squeezing my shoulder rather painfully. I noticed her eye seemed bloody and she was missing a few tail feathers. That explains her wobbly flight.
The other falcon landed on Philip's shoulder. Philip smirked at me. "Still see you kept Shiv around. Got myself a falcon too. Named her 'Skelta'." The falcon shrieked in affirmation, and I noticed it looked just as bloody and bruised as Shiv is.
"Shiv put up a good fight, I got to admit," Philip said. "War-bringers, escort the targ-" I glared at him "-I mean, my brother and his allies to the camp."
We were loaded into separate military jeeps. I was put on the one in the lead, Philip beside me; Shiv perched on my shoulder, Skelta flying steadily above us. Philip was silent the whole ride, though if I could read him right, he looked...happy to see me. I always thought he's crazy, but now, I think he's more than crazy. He's a maniac. What kind of guy tries to kill his own brother and then welcomes him like the other was just back from a hunt?
The journey to the peak of the mountain is long and dangerous. The rocks are too sharp, the paths too steep. The whole time, I glared at everything, making sure to give my brother the worst death-glare my face could muster. Philip didn't look bothered by the way I was treating him, and even looked amused, which made me even angrier. Is he treating me like some kind of joke? Maybe 5 or 6 good shots would erase that grin from his face.
After what was probably a surprisingly short time of travel, about 15 minutes, we arrived at a sort of cliff. Standing near the edge is a huge tent, and surrounding it are a cluster of several tents. Around the tents were war-bringers.
War-bringers. Whenever I'd here that name, I'd easily see an image of a horde of fearless men and women, wearing soldiers’ garbs and blasting away with cannons. But the war-bringers I see now...they bear almost no difference to the people back at the village. A man with gray hair and a missing leg sat crookedly beside the fire, tears silently cascading down his cheeks as another war-bringer, a disturbingly skinny woman, poured alcohol on a joint that was once his leg. A man huddled beside his tent, smoking a cigarette with a younger man who looks just like him. Probably his son. The son was drinking vodka straight from the bottle, and when we locked eyes, he didn't even glare. He had that hopeless, empty look the needy people have, the kind which seems to give up on life.
We were pulled out from the jeeps and led through the skinny alley of tents. We passed more war-bringers, and each one made me feel sympathy. A young woman, only a year or two older than me, held a crying baby to her chest as she stirred a pot of what was probably soup. Beside her were two other children, two boys about 5 or 6 in age, wearing thin tunics and sucking on boiled chicken bones. A few tents away from them is a wizened old man, leaning on a boulder, two dogs licking his numerous wounds. Beside the old man is a middle-aged woman, her face buried in a plastic bag filled with some kind of chalky powder. When her face emerged, she was smiling crookedly, before plunging her face in the bag again.
They all looked pitiful, every one of them. Behind me was Yule looking sad and guilty. Behind Yule is Uncle Emile, wearing the same sad face as Yule. If I were truly honest, I think right now, the war-bringers bear no difference to us. Right now, they barely look like war-bringers. They don't look like predators right now. They're prey. We're all prey.
We were led to the largest tent. Skelta flew away, and screeched back at Shiv, as though telling her to follow. Shiv pulled my hair affectionately, as though saying good-bye for now, before following her. I watched the two birds. It's surprising, really. Barely an hour ago, they were clawing each other's eyes out. Now they're flying there like sisters. I glanced at Philip. Even if we turn to birds, I'd never fly beside him like that without trying to tear his wing off.
We were forced to enter the huge tent, the kind which could've been a room made of cloth. As we were pushed to sit on a weathered couch, almost all of the war-bringers left, leaving only my brother and two others, who were on opposite ends of the couch.
Philip smiled wistfully. "I believe you've seen me fellows." He stared at me. "Now seeing their pitiful conditions, do you trust me now?"
"So you're trying to win over by giving us a show of needy corpses?" I spat.
Yule blinked.
Emile bit his lip.
The war-bringers stared weirdly at me.
Philip frowned then his expression turned steely cold. "Don't you have a shred of sympathy in your heart, doghead?"
"Only for those who deserve it," I replied coldly.
"Look, Lyall, either you're blind or you're just stupid," said Philip. "What I'm trying to prove is we're all on the same boat now. See the people outside? Aside from the uniforms, they bear no difference to the people back at home."
"Who you've killed," I replied simply.
"I did it for the best," said Philip. "I need to make a scene to push you into the forest."
"Well, you should have at least spared the others!" I shot back. "You destroyed everything, Shogun," I pronounced the last word coldly. "You destroyed what was left of what's important to me."
"You're lying," Philip sneered. "You've never been the selfless one. You only live for yourself and for an animal. It's surprising, really, that you decided to save her." He glared at Yule before turning back to me. "What made you go back to save her? Shiv?"
I steeled my eyes, not wanting him to see how true his words really are. If it weren't for Shiv, I would've never gone back to hell that was the village.
Philip turned to Yule, and looked confused when he turned back to me. "She's confused."
I turned to Yule, and she yelled at the top opf her lungs, "WHAT IN MERLIN'S NAME ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? I CAN'T HEAR YOU!"
I winced, and Philip clicked his tongue. "Bring the girl to the hospital tent. Her hearing's broken."
One of the war-bringers began to pull her out. Yule screamed, confused, and tried to hold on to the couch.
"NO I AIN'T GOIN' ANYWHERE!" she yelled. Her eyes watered. "NO, I CAN'T LEAVE! I...I..." she turned helplessly to me, as though asking me to grab her hand and hold on. But somehow, a force kept me from grabbing her outstretched hand and she was pulled out of the tent, screaming and kicking and yelling curses at me.
When she was gone, bringing a few shreds of the couch cloth with her, Philip clicked his tongue again, and the remaining war-bringer grabbed Uncle Emile.
"Wait, no! NO!" Emile tried to fight off, and a gun clicked. But Emile didn't look ready to give up. He continued to fight, yelling and telling me to help him. But I can't. I don't know what to do, and the rifle they gave me isn't enough to bring down an entire army.
More war-bringers poured in, and tried to restraint the man. Emile yelled something, and kicked a man in the forehead and punched a man's face. Obviously, he was too much to handle and wouldn't cooperate, and Philip walked over to him, pulled out a pistol, and aimed at it at Emile's forehead. He pressed the trigger.
Uncle Emile fell on the ground, dead.
I stared wide-eyed at the corpse of my uncle, and I turned to my brother in utter shock, not believing that Uncle Emile's favorite nephew had killed him.
Philip looked remorseless, but somehow, I could see the guilt watering at the corner of his eyes. His voice was stone-cold when he said, "take the body out and burn it."
Two war-bringers began to pull out the corpse, as though it was a sack of trash instead of a human being. Soon, Uncle Emile was gone too. Philip turned to me.
"I had to do it," he said, putting the pistol back on the holster on his leg. "Now back to the topic. Do you trust me now?"
"What're you, an idiot?" I shot back. "You killed Uncle Emile right in front of me and took away Yule and now you expect me to trust you."
"I had to do it," Philip repeated. "Listen, doghead. For once, trust me and don't be selfish. I know about the contract. About General Ross. And about your mission with Yule, her twin and Thom Grant. And I want to help."
"What's your proof you wanted to help?' I glared. "And why are you acting like a shucking angel all of a sudden?!"
"Because there's more to the contract than you know," said Philip. "General Ross has to sign it. Now. Because if he doesn't, we're all gonna die."
"What do you mean?" my voice had less venom, but still had a scowl at the edge.
"The country outside Werravvinn, Thereus, is sick of all the war. It wants to stop it. A week from now...it's going to rain missiles on Werravinn, missiles too strong to counter."
"What's up with a few missiles?" I snapped.
"The missiles are strong enough to sink the country alive," said Philip. "They're going to kill us all."