chapter one part two!

For those who may be coming upon this post without having read the first portion of this chapter that was posted last week you'll want to go here and read before proceeding with this post.

As promised, this is part two of the first chapter of my current novel in progress. Half way through the week I was looking at this and wondering why the heck I had promised to have this ready for today when this half is pretty brand new material that needed all kinds of work on top of just getting written. But here we are, and here it is, and hey, I'm actually pretty happy with what came out. This chapter is by no means perfect but for the moment I am satisfied.  : )

Remember, comments, questions, criticisms, accusations, and random offers of publication are all welcome.

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Time began to slow down and then jump forward in spurts, leaving Mona a silent spectator as her world unraveled. She knew Gareth had left the room in the same vague way that she registered that her parents had both shifted away from her. As a Guardian, Gareth was even more duty bound than the rest of her family to report what she was. Her eyes were still focused on Lauren whose grip on her arm didn't slacken until the Guardians Gareth summoned arrived, but Mona couldn't feel it. The sudden shuffle of feet and sound of voices as uniformed figures entered the room came to Mona as if from some great distance, faint and distorted. Meaningless.

All at once she was outside, there was a brilliant flash of sunlight before the cool dim interior of a transport vehicle. It was the first time Mona had ever been inside one but she barely registered the stark, windowless interior. She wouldn't be able to help Auna and Meggie finish their group project for class. Another flash and then she was walking under the artificial lights of an Order Facility.

Mona had toured an Order Facility with her class last year. She remembered the pristine uniforms and tech-visored helmets the Guardians wore. These public service personnel who had been friendly and reassuring during the tour of students were now cold and condemning. Chatter filtered through the haze in Mona’s mind but it was all directed around her, not at her. She caught pieces of conversations about grocery lists, a health appointment to check out a rash, and several technical sounding terms that she didn't understand.

The unbroken grey floors of the Facility were cool under her bare feet. She watched her toes with each step as the walls of the main lobby, postered with public service reminders, were replaced in her periphery by their blank counterparts when they left the public area. Quiet rippled in her wake as she was guided and sometimes pushed down hallways.

Eventually, the Guardians slowed and ushered her into a room that was almost entirely taken up by a tall rectangular device with a door on one side. She was made to strip and step into the box, an analyst, meant to examine her for hidden items or other unreported marks while her clothing was inspected. The door was swung shut and darkness enveloped her. The air was stale and chill and Mona shivered, her still damp hair brushing against her bare back. The sound of her breath and pulse grew in her ears until it threatened to deafen her.

Without warning, beams of light began to flash from unseen recesses, crisscrossing her body in bursts that briefly illuminated her skin and the smooth walls around her. By the time the door opened again, Mona’s eyes were blurred with ghostly lines. The bundle of her clothing was pressed into her arms and she dressed by feel as her eyes adjusted to the light of the room.

In another room, a large hand, clad in a white glove, held her arm steady while her left wrist was scanned, cataloging the malmark in the Populace Database where every citizen’s marks were archived. She watched the red light of the scanner sweep back and forth across the mark and though there was nothing to feel, it burned. Once the mark had been recorded, “Malmark” overwrote her last name in bolded red letters on the tech interface. They were erasing her identity as part of a family.

Another transport vehicle, this time seated in the back with two Guardians stationed on either side of the door. Mona, in her distant thoughts, wondered if they actually believed the listless fourteen year old girl in front of them to be a threat. She didn't like looking at them but if she didn't, the lack of color and dim light that didn't seem to come from anywhere threatened to make her sick with vertigo.

The absence of bumps in the road only added to her sense of disembodiment. She knew from the tour and other school lectures where she was being taken now. The Threshold, one of many, was a gateway into and out of Orsandum, built into the great barrier wall that encompassed the nation. Taller than anything grown or erected within  its borders, the wall was meant to protect everyone inside from the dangers that lurked without. Mona’s house had been within sight of its eastern boundary and she’d always taken comfort in its enormous, ever present embrace. Now, it loomed, heavy and cast in shadow in the moment she paused outside the Threshold.

The halls and rooms inside were just like those at the Order Facility but on a larger scale. A maze whose twists and turns Mona would have no hope of remembering even if she’d been able to try. But the Guardians never hesitated and Mona was quickly swept through locking doors with a sign that read “Malmark Processing” above them. Another pair of visored Guardians, these with an added black band around their right upper arm that Mona didn't recognize, relieved those that had accompanied her in the transport. Their grips on her upper arms were even less friendly and held at such a height that Mona had to walk on tip-toe as they guided her down yet another hallway and through a heavy door.

A man stood inside the room which was empty aside from a table tall enough for him to use while standing. Mona barely glimpsed the surface of the table and the glow of a tech interface before the Guardians released their hold and her heels slammed to the unforgiving floor.

“Another.”

The man at the desk only nodded in acknowledgment, not looking up, and the Guardians left. The door closed behind them with a deep thud.

Mona stood, not breathing, and watched the man as he recorded something on the interface before turning his attention to her. He wore a different version of the Guardian uniform than she had ever seen before. Recognizable, less restrictive and yet more formal looking at the same time. He wore a small black cape, only long enough to cover his shoulders, that hung from a black cord attached at the shoulder seams. A hood, attached to the cape, covered his head in place of the visored helmet but it was not long enough to hide his face when he looked up.

His face was blank as his dark eyes appraised her for a moment before he straightened, taller than her father, and moved around the table to stand in front of her.

“Do not move. This will not hurt.” He hadn't spoken to her exactly, but to the room at large.

Mona’s muddled brain didn't have time to wonder what “this” was or why it might hurt before the man had raised his hands, gloveless, and placed them firmly on either side of her face. A soundless gasp opened her mouth as a tingling sensation filled her body, passing from her head to her chest and then each of her limbs.

Magic. It had to be. This man was an Analyst, one of the magic users that the devices in Order Facilities, created to imitate examinations performed with magic, were named after. Mona felt like she’d forgotten how to breath. Magic. The trait was unbelievably rare and she’d never encountered someone who held it before. She’d certainly never felt it and her mind didn't know how to process the sensation. It didn't hurt, but it wasn't comfortable either. This inspection made her feel much more exposed than stripping naked had, as if he were seeing every part of her, even her secrets.

And then the tingling was gone, leaving Mona more hollowed out than before.

The man’s face was still blank, but there was greater apathy in the lines around his eyes. He turned away without a word and moved back around the table. Chills began to ripple through Mona as his fingers flew across the interface with rapid strokes. The door opened into the room and the black-banded Guardians entered. Each reestablished their grasp on one of her arms and they led her, on tip-toe again, out of the room. The Analyst never looked up from the table.

The hallway they walked down now seemed miles long but Mona wished it was longer when she read the sign above the door at the end of it: Banishment Portal. An involuntary flinch shook her and she had a faint impression of gratitude for the hands pulling her along. Their pressure felt like the only thing holding her together.

They paused at the door as the Guardian to her right entered several codes into a small tech interface on the wall. Mona heard several loud clicks that echoed down the hallway and then they were pushing the door open and her through it. The chamber she stumbled into would only have admitted one more beside them and three suddenly felt like a very large crowd. The walls and floor were as bare as everywhere else she’d seen but there was another door, set in the opposite wall with a small window in it that gave a narrow view of a corridor one person wide that ended in another very solid looking door. There was no window in the door at the end of the passage.

Mona turned at the sound of the door closing behind her. In the confined space the clicks were even louder as the door locked itself again. The Guardians shifted and the one on her left released her arm then, in one fluid movement, tore off the left sleeve of her shirt, leaving her arm completely bare. He stepped away from her, turning to deposit the sleeve into a little metal chute that Mona had not noticed. Once a small glow had flared up, leaving behind the acrid scent of burned fabric, the Guardian nodded to his companion who turned to the portion of wall beside the windowed door. The wall lit up where he touched it. More codes, but on an interface that was not designed to be used by anyone who happened to stumble upon the room.

After a moment, the door swung open into the room, deathly silent, introducing air from the corridor that smelled musty and a bit like dirt. The ragged threads trailing from her shirt shifted in the small puff of air. Both Guardians gestured to her to enter the narrow hall.

Mona did not want to step through the doorway. Every fiber of her being screamed out against it. She took a step, and then another. Panic welled in her stomach, heavy and present for the first time since the leather strap had fallen to the table top just a few hours ago. How could that be? Another step and she was through the door, which was immediately shut on her heels. The tiny hall was silent, like the analyst, but there was enough light for her to watch, numb, as the door yet ahead of her began to open by some command she did not see or hear. First a crack of bright sunlight, the opening soon widened until the door gaped, an afternoon sun spilling into the space and making it impossible for Mona to see what lay beyond it. But she could hear wind, and the rustle of grass, or maybe leaves. The sound terrified her.

Maybe she wouldn't go. Maybe she would stay in the corridor. What would they do? Would they push her out themselves? Or would they leave her in this tight corner until night fell and some animal decided to investigate this new cave for a sleeping place?

The thought had her feet flying toward the doorway before she could register the fear. She exploded out of the passage and into a clearing spotted with clumps of short grass. The ground beneath her feet was dry and dusty; trees and bushes in the distance swayed in a breeze she couldn't feel. The glare of natural light after so long inside made her squint. No buildings, no roads, no people. The foreignness  of the wild landscape felt like an assault on her senses and she whirled around, searching through slitted eyes for the doorway to go back to the hall. But the only thing she saw was a large, unforgiving slab of metal that must be this side of the door. There was no handle, no edge for her fingers to grip but she ran to it anyway, banging on the surface until her hands we scraped and bruised. It wasn't until she slowed that she realized she was shouting, begging to be let back inside. It wasn't until she felt the burn of salt on her hands as she wiped her face that she realized she was sobbing.

“Please! Open the door!” She gasped. “Anyone? Don’t do this to me! Let me in! Gareth! Father! Please!”

Shadows had cast over the clearing by the time she stopped pleading with the door and slid, hiccuping with tears, to the ground and curled up into a ball. A slight, one-sleeved figure, completely alone for the first time in her life. As the shadows lengthened, fears whispered about the coming night but her world went dark long before the sun set.