FORGED: 4 Reforged short stories
Little Hawk
“Why are you hurrying home? No one there for you!”
“Mum’s working out late again, yeah? I got some work for her in my pants,” said another one of Sullis’ friends. The gap-toothed teen thrust his hips suggestively. “Her work comes cheap, don’t it? Could probably keep her busy all night for ten cen!”
“Fly off!” Logan shouted.
He hurled himself at the nearest boy, not one of those who had spoken, but all of Sullis’ gang were the same: bigger, meaner and stronger than scrawny ten-year-old Logan Centra. He bounced off the much larger boy and sprawled on the cracked pavement.
Sullis laughed. He was six or seven years older than Logan, but at least three times bigger, with broad shoulders and pocked skin. His gang tightened their circle around Logan. Sullis waggled his tongue insolently at the boy on the ground.
“Got something to say to your mum, Logan? Why don’t you tell me?” he taunted. “I’ll be seeing her later tonight. I’ll take real good care of her, don’t worry.”
Logan’s eyes burned with furious tears. He pulled his feet under him, but another one of Sullis’ boys — a wiry, ruddy-faced young man — kicked Logan in the chest and sent him tumbling back to the grease-stained roadside. Cars raced and rattled by, their drivers taking no notice of the boys fighting just outside. Logan wheezed and tried to jump at Sullis again, swinging a poorly-aimed punch at the gang’s leader. Sullis took a single step back, laughing again.
“You can’t fight worth a turd,” he said, then leered at Logan. “But then, what else you expect from the son of a whore? I bet you know how to ass about just fine. Gonna be a rental like your mum?”
“She’s not a whore!” Logan cried.
He cast about for a suitable insult. His heart was racing so fast in his chest that he couldn’t hear the individual beats anymore, just a thin hum like the pulse of a bird.
“But if she were, she would never work for you!” Logan shouted.
Logan could only see through one eye. The other was too swollen and he could only open it a crack. Even then, everything seemed muddy and red. Still, he knew the route home from school well enough that he could have made it with both eyes shut. Logan really hoped he wouldn’t have to test that.
The sun was setting behind the steep mountains surrounding Highwind like a crown of great stone blades. The stars would come out before long, but it would be some hours more before they would shine with light enough to pierce the thick miasma of smoke and other pollutants that filled the city air.
Highwind looked not unlike a pile of old boxes, discarded but not empty. Like most Prian cities, the houses were cheap, mass produced as flimsy, barely habitable temporary shelters. They were only designed to last for a decade or two before being replaced, but most of the thin-walled cubes and squat apartment blocks were fifty years old or more. They had been patched and repaired so many times that the walls seemed quilted in blotchy rust, water-stained aluminum and flaking paint.
The roads of Highwind were just as cracked and piebald as the houses. The cars and pedestrians that traveled them were no less worn. Logan tripped a few times on the uneven concrete, nearly stumbling into a chem dealer lounging on the street corner. She glared at Logan through lank brown hair and prodded the boy onward with a boot against his backside. He hurried past without looking back.
Logan climbed the creaking stairs that zig-zagged across the face of his building until he reached the faded green door of his mother’s apartment. For a panicked moment, he couldn’t find his keys. Had they fallen out of his pocket when Sullis kicked him? But no, Logan found them a moment later in his back pocket. The old locks took some effort, but he muscled the door open with a grunt.
The small apartment was empty, of course. That much of Sullis’ stupid taunt had been true — his mother was working late, as usual. Logan dropped his crack-screened school datadex on the couch and went to the kitchen for some ice. He broke a few cubes out of a tray in the freezer and wrapped them in a towel from beside the sink.
Back in the living room, Logan flopped down onto the threadbare couch. On the other end, his guitar twanged at the jostling as though gently admonishing its young owner. The boy considered playing, but his hands ached and his ribs hurt.
He closed his eyes, but he just couldn’t sleep. Logan sat up and pulled the guitar into his lap, curling his stiff fingers around the worn wooden neck, and began to play.
“Oh my God! What happened?”
Logan looked up with a start. He had lost all track of time and now Lynn Centra stood in the doorway with her hands pressed to her mouth. Her cheeks were bloodlessly pale and a bag of groceries lay forgotten at her feet. Logan sat up, wincing. He touched his face and felt the crumbly crackle of dried blood.
Lynn ran to her son’s side and snatched up the towel from the couch. The cloth was still damp from the melted ice and she caught Logan’s chin in gentle fingers, turning him to face her.
“Oh, sweetheart. What happened?”
“Sullis,” Logan mumbled. His lips felt stiffer and more swollen than before. The ice hadn’t done a very good job, Logan decided. “He said things about you…”
“Shhh, it doesn’t matter.” His mother wiped lightly at the blood on Logan’s split lip. “You shouldn’t be fighting. It doesn’t matter what the other boys say about me. They’re just children.”
“But they called you…” Logan couldn’t even bring himself to say the word. It made him so angry just to think it. “It’s not true!”
“No, sweetheart, it’s not, but it wouldn’t matter if it were,” Lynn said. “It’s just a job, you know, and not worth getting into fights over. If the older boys try to corner you, Logan, just run. It doesn’t do any good to fight.”
Her son muttered a noncommittal reply and didn’t meet Lynn’s eye. She sighed.
“Look at all this mess,” Lynn said. “Why don’t you go wash up while I get dinner ready?”
“Alright.”
Logan showered quickly and put on cleaner clothes, then came back into the living room. Lynn was in the kitchen, warming a small bowl of noodles and some red sauce. She smiled at the boy and nodded to the cupboard.
“Are you intact enough to set the table?” she asked.
“Sure,” Logan said.
“My brave little hawk.” Lynn smiled at her son.
He opened the cupboard, doors wobbling on their tarnished, crooked hinges, and stood up on his toes to reach the bowls on the top shelf. Lynn owned only one set of dishes, four glass plates and four bowls with matching teacups and saucers. Those dishes were her pride and joy — after Logan, of course. Her mother’s mother bought them many years ago from a Dailon who claimed they were antiques all the way from Axis. It probably wasn’t true, but the glass was beautiful and delicate, finished in a rich blue like the evening sky.
Logan carried the bowls very carefully to the little table under the apartment’s single window. Thick bars welded to the frame cut the view of the street outside into long slats like a paneled painting in one of the Union chapels. The sky was dark now, black like ink. There was only one moon out tonight, Unos. It hung in the darkness like a lopsided yellow grin, smirking down at the Prians scrabbling in the rocky dirt so far below.
Logan put out spoons and forks. He folded coarse paper towels under them and sat to wait for dinner. It was getting easier to open his left eye; the shower had helped. His mother stirred sauce into the pasta and carried it to the table. Logan scooped most of the noodles into his pretty blue bowl. He paused when the spoon scraped the bottom and flushed.
“Go ahead, eat up,” his mother said. “You’re a growing boy and you’ve got a lot of healing to do.”
Reluctantly, Logan left only a little dinner for his mother. His stomach rumbled. He hadn’t eaten since breakfast and that seemed an eternity ago. Lynn said a short grace over dinner and Logan dove into his food like a falcon on prey. His mother picked at her pasta, but ate very little. She was so thin, he thought, but still the strongest lady on Prianus. She looked worried and Logan hoped she wasn’t worrying about him.
Logan couldn’t avoid Sullis and his gang for long. They caught up with him a week later, after school. Logan was almost home and felt the first surge of relief at the sight of his building at the end of the street, but then he heard a voice behind him.
“Hey, whore-son!”
He turned just in time to see Sullis charging out from one of the drip-dens. The other people on the sidewalk parted, unwilling to get caught in yet another bout of gang violence. Sullis’ eyes were glassy and dilated, his rough cheeks brightly flushed as some chemical coursed through his blood and set his heart racing.
Logan balled his small hands into fists, but remembered his mother’s words — no shame and no fighting. As a dozen of Sullis’ boys followed their leader out of the murky den and into the crowded street, Logan turned on his heels and ran.
“Where you off to?” they called out, chasing Logan and shouting to one another. “Come on back! We just want to give our best to your mum.”
Logan reached the bottom of the stairs. His worn shoes rang on the rusted steel and he flung himself up the steps as quickly as his short legs would carry him. The staircase shuddered beneath him as Sullis and his cronies closed the gap. They were bigger than Logan and much faster. Would his head start be enough?
There was no time. Logan fell once, caught himself jarringly on his knees and jumped back to his feet, fumbling the keys from his pocket. One of the other boys was so close now that Logan could hear his labored breath sawing behind him. It wasn’t Sullis, but one of his rangier and less chem-addled friends.
On the third story, Logan bolted the last few steps and jammed his key into the front door. He twisted as hard as he could. Sweat streamed down the back of his neck, cold as icemelt. With a jerk, Logan unlocked the door and ran inside, flinging the door shut behind him. He spun, reaching for the deadbolt, but the door had already bounced off a large foot thrust through the gap. Logan’s pursuer bellowed in pain.
“You little bitch! I’m going to rip your skin off!”
The lanky boy lunged through the door and grabbed Logan. Sullis and the rest were close on his tail. They poured through the door and crowded into the small apartment. Someone slammed the door behind them. Sullis stepped forward, grinning at Logan. His lips seemed very thin and very dark.
“So this is where a rental lives.” Sullis’ words were slurred by drugs and he casually hooked Logan’s legs out from under him, then cackled when the boy crumpled to the floor. “Not much, is it? But then, that’s about what I expect from a cenmark whore.”
His mother said there was no shame in sex work, but before Logan could debate the point with Sullis, the bigger boy drove a boot into his crotch.
“Well boys, let’s make ourselves at home,” Sullis said. “His mum rents her body easy enough. I doubt she’ll mind sharing her place for a while. What’s nice around here, Logan?”
Lynn Centra had to work even later than usual. Some drunk had knocked over a toy display, sending bits of broken plastic flying like the shrapnel of a grenade. It had taken an extra hour to collect the shards, once parts of model dinosaurs that were a favorite among those young Prian children whose parents could afford them.
She fished out a few last pieces from under a shelf and swept them into a dustpan. The plastic was molded on one side with a feathered pattern and painted in mottled blues and reds. Lynn emptied the mess into a waste bin and wondered if any of it was salvageable. If she could put the pieces back together, the toy dinosaur might make a good present for Logan. It would be his birthday soon and she didn’t have any gifts. Lynn sighed and sealed off the garbage bag. Even if she could somehow piece together the broken model, Logan was already getting too old for such things. Children grew up so fast.
Finally finished, Lynn turned off the holographics and locked up the store. She ignored the listless catcalls from the whiskery old men lounging outside and hurried to her car. Highwind was no less filthy and dangerous by night, but at least the deep mountain shadow hid the worst of it away, out of sight.
A short Arcadian woman slouched outside the apartment block when Lynn arrived at home. She had pulled her dirty wings around her against the cold. Lynn felt a stab of pity, but then she caught the oily glint of a nanoblade in the alien’s hand. She shuddered and decided to park on the other side of the building.
It was almost midnight by the time Lynn wearily pushed open her door and stepped inside. She heard sobbing. Lynn dropped her purse and turned on the lights. Something… everything was wrong.
The apartment was in ruins. All of the pictures had been torn off the walls, shredded into pieces and scattered across the floor. Lynn’s clothes, too, were strewn across the tiny living room, some ripped or cut, some stained and soiled. The computer was gone from its corner desk and the sofa sliced open. The window was broken and shards of glass littered the worn carpet. Logan’s guitar was smashed and lay like a dead pet in the corner of the room.
“Logan?” Lynn cried.
He was in the kitchen. The cupboards stood open and empty of food. The boy was covered in drying blood. There was a long cut on his temple that seemed to be the source of most of the red, but his lips were puffy and there were dark, terrible-looking bruises on his thin arms. Logan stood at the kitchen counter, cradling shards of blue glass in his hands and weeping broken-heartedly over them as he tried to glue them back together. Logan looked up at his mother’s approach.
“They broke your plates,” he whispered.
“My God,” Lynn choked. She batted the broken glass out of his hands and held Logan close. “Oh my God! Are you alright? Did they hurt you?”
It was a stupid question. Of course they hurt him. Lynn scooped Logan into her arms and carried him out to the car. She needed to take him to the hospital. As she buckled him into the passenger seat, Logan began to cry again.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he sobbed. “I couldn’t stop them!”
“Logan, my little hawk, it doesn’t matter. We just need to make sure you’re alright.”
“They said… and took… I’m sorry.”
The rest was lost in tears.
“How’re you feeling?”
Logan avoided his mother’s gaze. He flexed his arm. It was stiff, but not too painful.
“Fine,” he said. “All better.”
“Good.”
Lynn patted his shoulder gently and steered him across the hospital lobby, but a man cleared his throat. “Miss Centra?”
She sighed. “Logan, why don’t you sit down for a minute?”
Lynn pointed to a row of white plastic chairs, each stamped with the words Property of Highwind Municipal Hospital. Logan nodded and padded across the scarred tile. He sat down beside a middle-aged woman who greeted him limply and then resumed her wet coughing.
Logan watched his mother. She spoke softly to the man, quietly so her son couldn’t hear. But he knew what they were talking about: money, of course. It was expensive to see doctors on Prianus. Logan heard stories at school about other Alliance planets, closer to the galactic core where there were lots of the silver-skinned Ixthians who all but gave away their medical expertise to anyone, even criminals and the poor. But that was far away. There weren’t many Ixthians on Prianus.
Logan kicked his legs. They didn’t quite reach the floor. The woman in the next chair smiled, charmed by the cute display. But Logan wasn’t trying to be cute. He was angry. His blood felt hot in his veins and seemed to burn behind his eyes. His legs were short and thin, knees still raw and red. He was weak, too weak to defend his mother’s home and honor. If Logan was going to beat Sullis, he would need help. A lot of help.
Lynn Centra finished speaking with the receptionist and had signed something on a datadex screen that Logan was too far away to read. She gestured him over and offered the sullen boy a tight smile.
“Let’s go home,” she said. “You need your rest.”
His mother had already gone to work by the time Logan woke the next morning. The broken cupboards were still empty, but she had left a candy bar and a small sleeve of crackers with a note: I love you, my hawk. Have a good day in school.
Logan stuffed the food into his mouth and left the little scrap of paper. He wasn’t going to school today. He had more important things to take care of.
The rising sun pierced the thick haze of Highwind sky in silver-gray needles, sharp rays like impossibly slender nanoknives. The streets were busy, as always, full of the thick, noisy bustle. Though not many Prians could afford null-inertia vehicles, even the air was alive with traffic. Hawks and falcons flew through the sky and shrieked at one another as their paths crossed or even collided.
It was summer in Highwind, but the thin air remained bitterly cold. Logan cinched his wool coat tightly around him and began his hunt. None of the adults took any notice of the young boy shouldering past.
That was fine — Logan ignored them right back.
He stopped at the mouth of every alleyway and at the door of every dark bar and smoky drip-den. Heavy-set bouncers turned Logan away from many of these, but most simply ignored him or demanded entry fees, none of which the boy could pay. When he exhausted every place within walking range of his apartment, Logan took a bus deeper into Highwind and continued his search.
He stopped to stare through the window of a worn-looking palaestrum. Inside was a wood-floored gymnasium where a stout, balding man was practicing the Prian martial forms. A pair of women in loose-cut clothes studied the short man intently and tried to mimic his movements. Logan caught a reflection in the mirror and turned. A boy about his own age vanished into the shadowed alley that separated the palaestrum from the shop next door. Logan followed him through the narrow passage and behind the building.
Logan finally found what he was looking for — when he came around the crumbling brick corner, he was suddenly face-to-chest with a tall teenage boy. Behind him, Logan could see the younger one he had followed and seven or eight other boys. A pair of girls, little more than children — much like the boys — lounged against a door and watched as they rubbed runny red noses.
The boy in front of Logan didn’t look anything like Sullis, but he didn’t have to. He held himself with the same defensive, suspicious hunch. His breath carried the same reek of cheap rollers. He was exactly the same as Sullis.
“What do you want, you little prick?” he asked Logan.
“I want in. I want to fly with you and your boys.”
“You’ve heard of Elson and my flock, eh? And you want a piece of the cuttings,” said the boy, who must have been Elson.
“Yes,” Logan answered simply.
Elson crossed his arms. His jacket had only one sleeve, showing off a sloppy falcon tattoo on the other bared bicep. Elson leaned in close to inspect Logan.
“You’re a bit of a starling, aren’t you? Got a piece? A knife or gun? No? Can’t say you’re impressing me much, little lark.”
Logan didn’t back away from the looming boy. “I’ve got even better. I live across town. There’s another gang there, run by a boy called Sullis. Do you know him?”
“No,” said Elson. “And why in the sooty hells should I care? This is my patch.”
“They hit a house not very long ago. They stole some things. Some antiques from Axis. They’re really expensive, worth a lot of colour.”
The lie sat uneasily in Logan’s stomach, as though he had swallowed a live snake. A poisonous one. Sullis had stolen some food and his mother’s computer, but had been too stupid to recognize the real prize. He and his boys had smashed all of the pretty dishes one by one as they ignored Logan’s pleas to stop. The memory of the shattered blue glass hardened his resolve.
Elson’s almost colorless blond brows shot up. The girls shrieked at something and called for Elson’s attention, but he just waved them off.
“You can show us where?” he asked.
“Yes. I know all their favorite places,” Logan said.
“And what do you want, little lark? Just a cut… or something else?” Elson asked. He was a little sharper than he looked. He must have guessed that Logan wanted more than a few cen in stolen goods. “Something personal?”
“They said some things,” Logan answered shortly. “They tried to shame my mother and they ruined her house. I don’t want them to ever do it again.”
“You want yourself some revenge?”
“Yes.”
Elson grinned lazily, like a self-satisfied cat. “And that’s why you want in. Alright, little lark. Even so, you can’t just ask your way into Elson’s flock, eh? You’ve got to prove yourself.”
Logan frowned. “Fine. What do you want me to do?”
Elson gestured to one of his boys. “You got some paint on you? Yeah? Give it here.”
The boy plucked a pressure-tube of lumapaint from his jacket pocket and tossed it to Elson, who held it out to Logan. He took the tube in his small hands, turning it over.
“What do you want me to do with it?” Logan asked.
“All this–” Elson swept his arms across the alleyway. “–is our nesting, isn’t it? How about leaving a little reminder for all the other little pricks who want a piece?”
The alleyway was layered in graffiti of all colors and sizes, from insults to lewd pictures to any number of gang tags. Elson wasn’t the only one to claim this area. Logan hefted the paint and flicked back the cap. He looked up at his new leader.
“My name,” Elson said. “Big as you can, lark.”
Behind Elson, the girls called out again as the rear door of the palaestrum banged open and a man stomped out into the alley. It was the same short, thick-bellied man Logan had seen inside. Elson turned to face him, forgetting Logan in an instant.
“What do you want, Vorus?” he snapped. “Tail it out of here, you wing-clipped sod.”
“You seem to have missed the front door again,” the old man answered almost pleasantly. “You can come in for classes any day, Elson. Why do you insist on vandalizing my back door instead?”
“Not interested,” Elson spat. “Go away, you old stump!”
He prodded Vorus in his wide chest. With a sad-sounding sigh, Vorus caught Elson’s wrist and twisted, driving the tall boy to his knees on the ground. Elson’s gang drew back like frightened deer.
“You must learn respect, boy,” Vorus said.
“Let go of me!” Elson shouted.
Vorus released the boy, who stumbled back a step. But instead of running, Elson pulled a snub-nosed laser pistol from his belt and waved it in the air.
“How dare you touch me, you mud-sucking old coot?” Elson shouted, leveling the gun at Vorus.
The old man lashed out with a surprisingly high, agile kick that cracked against Elson’s hand. Elson dropped his laser with a howl and cradled his broken fingers to his chest. He staggered and ran, scattering his own gang in his haste to escape. The other boys fled down the alleyway, shouting and shrieking. Logan turned to follow, but Vorus grabbed his thin arm.
“No, not you,” he said.
“I didn’t do anything!” Logan protested.
Vorus looked at the tube of paint in his hand. “You were about to, weren’t you?”
Logan dropped the lumapaint, but the old man didn’t let go of him. Vorus hauled Logan easily through the open door and into the palaestrum. They were in a back room, not the one Logan had seen through the front window. There was a square table and a few chairs. Vorus pushed the boy down into one of these. A brown and black falcon perched on a stand under the window and chewed contentedly on his braided leash.
“What do you want?” Logan asked petulantly.
“What did you think you were doing out there? Why aren’t you at school?”
Logan didn’t answer.
Vorus sighed and dropped heavily into a chair across the table. He leaned back and rested scarred hands on his belly. “What’s your name, little hawk?”
“Logan Centra.”
“I heard you talking out there,” Vorus said, “about your mother and another boy. Sullis? Is that his name?”
“Were you were spying on me?”
Logan bristled indignantly and jumped to his feet, but Vorus gave the table a sharp shove. Metal scraped loudly over the bare concrete floor and the table’s edge hit Logan hard in the stomach. He dropped back down into his chair, suddenly winded and a little nauseous.
“What did this Sullis kid say that made you come all the way across Highwind to join another gang?” Vorus asked.
“He… he called my mum a whore,” Logan panted. “And said I should be ashamed. Then he came to our house and… and broke her things…”
He trailed off and looked down at his lap, hoping that Vorus couldn’t see the angry tears that stung his eyes.
“He dishonored your mother and your home,” Vorus said. He actually sounded like he agreed. Logan looked up again and found the old man nodding. “Tell me, little hawk, why did you want to take Elson and his boys to fight Sullis’ gang? Was it out of revenge?”
“I… I just want Sullis to stop! I want him to leave me and my mother alone! He broke her favorite dishes and sent me to the hospital,” Logan said hotly. He had found his breath again. “It was expensive and now she has to pay for it. It’s not fair!”
“This boy, Sullis, is a criminal,” Vorus said. “What he did was wrong and against Prian law.”
“I know that!”
“Then what were you doing? If you defaced my palaestrum, if you joined Elson’s gang, then you would be a criminal, too.”
“But…” Logan protested.
Vorus furrowed his smooth, shiny brow.
“No. If you want to fight for honor, you must fight with honor, little hawk. Do you want to learn how?”
“I’m not very good at fighting,” Logan replied sullenly.
“No, I can see that,” Vorus said, eyes lingering on the boy’s many bruises. “But you can be, if you work hard, practice every day and come to all of my classes.”
“Your classes? Are you any good?”
Vorus laughed and slapped his hand on the table. “Me? Of course I’m good! I’m one of the best. I was a cop for most of my life. You don’t survive that unless you’re a good fighter. I still teach police and anyone else who wants to fight for the right reasons.”
“You think I could be any good?” Logan asked.
It was an intriguing idea.
“You need a lot of training. You’re small and more than a little skinny, but when Sullis dishonored your mother, you went in search of allies and convinced them to do your work for you,” said Vorus. He shook his finger at Logan. “It was a very bad idea, and an even worse one for a little boy.”
“I’m not a little boy!”
“Yes, you are, but I think we can remedy that,” Vorus said. “But I don’t teach criminals, little hawk. Do you understand? I train men of honor and integrity. Are you a good man, Logan?”
“Welcome to my palaestrum, Miss Centra. I’m Arctan Vorus,” he said, extending his hand. “I was hoping we could have a word about Logan.”
“You stay the hells away from my son!”
Lynn Centra’s face was pale. She was taller than Vorus, but still managed to look small and frightened. Her high heels clacked on the age-scarred wooden floor as she moved to leave.
“Please, Miss Centra…” Vorus put a gnarled hand on her shoulder. “Logan needs help.”
“No, not from you!” Lynn said. She gripped her purse tightly against her knotting stomach. “I don’t want you encouraging him, Master Vorus. Please, just leave him alone!”
“Logan’s a fighter, Miss Centra. He’s got fire in his heart and you should count yourself lucky that he’s got something to fight for.”
Lynn laughed shortly. The sound was sharp and unpleasant, full of bitter pain. “Whether you fight for something or nothing at all, you still end up dead.”
“He’s shown promise, Miss Centra. He’s small for his age, but he’ll get his growth. Logan’s fast and he’s clever. I think he has what it takes to be one of the best, maybe even good enough to join the force. Don’t you want the best for him?”
“I don’t want Logan to be a cop!”
Vorus frowned deeply. “The Prian police are a very thin, very fragile line between civilization and bloody anarchy here. Prianus needs good people.”
“No! I wanted better for Logan. His father was a cop, too, and died before he could even hold his son.” Lynn was still afraid, but her eyes took on the fierce, hard cast of a mother hawk defending her nest. “He left us alone. And for what? Honor?”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know. Logan never mentioned it.”
“He doesn’t know,” Lynn said. She couldn’t meet Vorus’ gaze. “I don’t want Logan to know. I don’t want to lose my son, too.”
“I found Logan in the alley out back, trying to join a gang. Is that any better? He wants to fight for you and he’ll find a way to do it.”
“He… he sings, you know,” Lynn answered quietly. “And plays the guitar. He’s amazing, really. I don’t know where Logan gets it. Neither his father or I ever played. I always hoped that maybe he would get away from Prianus.”
“And maybe he will. Or maybe he’ll stay and fight for all of the people who can’t or won’t fight for themselves. That’s not our decision. That’s between Logan and God. I just want to teach him. What he does with the knowledge is up to him.”
“What if he breaks his hand in your class?”
“Then he’ll learn to play his guitar with crooked fingers.”
Lynn sighed. “I can’t pay for classes, Master Vorus.”
“Then I won’t charge. He can wash the mirrors and sweep the floors. We’ll work it out.”
She shook her head, scattering the tears that had gathered in her lashes. Vorus was right, no matter how much she hated it.
Lynn went to the palaestrum door and pushed it open. Logan jumped up from where he had been sitting against the wall outside. She brushed the grit from the seat of his pants and took a steadying breath.
“Logan, you can study fighting with Master Vorus. Pay attention and be sure to behave yourself,” Lynn said. She smoothed her son’s hair and smiled. “I’ll see you tonight for dinner, my brave little hawk.”
Logan kissed his mother on the cheek and then looked up to see Vorus waiting just inside the palaestrum door.
“Are you ready to begin?” the old man asked.
“Yes,” Logan answered.
