Witch Hunter Robin Fan Fiction ❯ Binah (Understanding) ❯ Ice ( Chapter 1 )

The message read: “I've gone to take care of him. I know it's foolish. I don't expect you to come after me.”

This meant, of course, that he was bound to do exactly that—he would chase her down, find her, not to Hunt her this time but to help. Amon grabbed the guns, the knife, his keys, and was out of the apartment in minutes. On the street, the BMW purred into life, and he angled it out of their narrow network of alleys and parked cars until it could hit the open road and eat up the asphalt. The radio came on; he silenced it with a single slap.

Amon reminded himself that Robin had always been this way—that for as much as she asked “Is this all right?” about the tiniest things, once she had made up her mind about something, it was nearly impossible to convince her otherwise. He'd know the moment he watched her look over those photographs (children, used in the most horrible of ways) that she would settle accounts her own way. She would have no mercy for the Earth Craft user who had used his powers of illusion to lure little ones to his home only to betray their trust and innocence; the man would be mere ash in moments. How quickly she had forgotten, he reflected, how the first Earth Craft user she'd met in combat had almost strangled her while she stood still, trapped in a sorcerer's illusion, unable to fight back. Or perhaps she remembered it all too clearly, and understood immediately what illusions those children had lost themselves in.

What Robin did not know, and what Amon could never forget, were those terrible moments that he, the Hunter, had watched in the darkness while Robin slowly allowed the breath to be choked from her. How tempted he was to reach for the gun and eliminate the threat, blow the other man to pieces and do the same to everything he'd ever learned about Witches, justice, right and wrong. The mingled pride, fear, and relief when she triumphed—when he watched her incinerate her attacker.

He had a good idea of where they could be found, and find them he did, in yet another secluded alley that he swore Witches created just for this very purpose. He equipped himself with the Witch killer bullets, and slid out of the car, edging along a wall. He couldn't see Robin but their prey was definitely there, standing and looking at a point that Amon himself couldn't see. The Hunter disturbed something and the hunted whirled, fixed his eyes on Amon. Training told Amon to move but suddenly he could not. He was frozen momentarily, and when he found his legs again he was running forward gun out, only to trip on something soft.

Robin lay on the ground, her hair blown every which way across a face livid with bruises and welts. Blood crusted around her nose and mouth. Amon crawled to her, confused. He bit the longest finger of his right hand and tore his glove off, seeking a pulse in her neck. There was none. Her skin was cold, clammy from the dirty moisture of the alley. Dirt and bits of trash stuck to her hair. He shook her. Her face flopped. He picked up a hand, looking for the pulse there; it dropped lifeless to her stomach when he let it go. “Robin,” he whispered. A nagging voice insisted that if Robin were truly dead he'd know it, feel it, as certainly as he'd ever known anything in his life, but this voice was drowned out by the sickening, maddening toolatetoolatetoolate singing through his mind. It came to a dissonant crescendo when he saw the Earth Craft user, their enemy, standing just a few feet away and laughing hysterically.

The knot that held Amon together was undone in a single stroke, and a terrible sound that began in his gut and boiled through his lungs and throat tore its way out of him. He lunged for the Craft user, still on his knees, reaching out to strangle and shred, only to feel something leave him. The something came with his voice, and he pumped his rage and horror and grief into it, as it was so much easier than feeling any of those things. He watched in wonder as the Craft user froze, suddenly planted in place, and his body crystallized over with ice, ice pouring from his mouth, eyes, nose, and ears, the blood that left them freezing in red icicles on its way out. But Amon wasn't finished—his hand was still out and he could feel the bitter, unearthly cold exploding from his hands, making the enemy a statue, until the enemy himself burst into shards of glittering ice. The world wavered, and rippled, and Amon fell to the ground, depleted. He could barely breathe. Instantly, shivers overtook him—his teeth couldn't stop moving, his hands wouldn't stop shaking and his body jerked helplessly. He was sapped, drained, everything ached, and his head screamed in protest and his mouth was sandpaper. The world went black.

…

Something warm and soft like suede was stroking over his face absently. He was warm; bathed in warmth. Before his eyes opened, he identified Robin's clean, herbal scent—lavender and mint, nothing tawdry, just her. We're dead, he realized. I could have sworn we would make it to Hell. He opened his eyes, and saw flame.

Amon startled only to have his head shriek vengefully; a hand gently pulled him down. He turned. Robin was sitting on the ground, her face the one he knew again, although her eyes were sad. It was the first time he'd had to look upward at her; she'd shifted his head into her lap. A ring of low-burning fire surrounded them. “You wouldn't stop shivering,” she said, by way of explanation.

He blinked. Realization dawned. He cursed himself a hundred times a fool. “I was deceived,” he murmured. Robin nodded.

“The Earth Craft,” she said.

Amon lowered his eyes, looked at nothing. “He showed you to me, dead.”

“Was that it?” Robin whispered.

“What?”

She gestured; he recognized the suede from earlier as the deep red gloves on her hands. Amon turned stiffly, to see through flames the space where the Craft user was no longer and the thick frost that covered the walls, fences, garbage bins, and trash where he'd shattered. The street itself still wore a coat of black ice. Amon's heart began to hammer painfully. He recoiled from the sight, wanting to make it not be true. “I did that?”

“Yes,” Robin answered. She covered his ungloved right hand, his gun hand, the one he'd reached for the enemy with, with her own. It was a light touch, but he could feel the heat easing up into his still-chilled skin. He noticed this in a detached way, far distant from it and yet inextricably linked to it. He waited for what he knew was following: “You're not a Seed any longer, Amon.”

***

Coming home was difficult. He wasn't sure how he managed it—his tendons creaked as he labored toward the car. Robin remained quietly at his side, pausing as he drew shaky breaths. He felt hung over and old, sweating just walking to the car. He sat down heavily in the familiar seat, enjoying momentarily how it cradled him, and then he did his best to get them home. It was a silent drive. The lights flashed across Robin's face; somehow she looked paler than usual.

They lived above a tiny restaurant. Amon considered it poetic justice, or perhaps the fates laughing wickedly at him once again, that when he first came back from Solomon Headquarters with orders to Hunt Robin, before he'd even seen her again, the friend who owed him a favor stashed him above an Italian restaurant. Each morning before dawn, he heard the grinding and roasting of beans; the worn-out high school girls who struggled each morning to serve trendy espressos and pay off their cram-school fees. Later the smells would radiate up to him through the floor; dark coffee above all, but later in the day, rich sauces, melting cheeses. And because most of his work then was done at night, he sat tucked away all day nosing these smells, wondering if they were what Robin remembered of her youth with the man who had ordered her death.

Water was thundering in the tub down the hall. He'd merely sat down in the kitchen at the little table, doing nothing. It still hurt to move. The porch light that hung under the eaves overlooking the stairs they took to reach the apartment was enough to light the kitchen dimly; he didn't feel like reaching for a switch. He was a creature of darkness, now, he reminded himself; not a Seed, not a carrier, not innocent. Not only did he possess the power, he'd used it, and used it to kill. He was a Witch, now, something to be hunted. No longer a human being. Prey.

Of course, he would have to leave Robin, now. He looked at her hastily-written note, still on the kitchen table where both of them had left it. You were right, something in him sneered. She does make you weak. And now she's made you into a Witch, just like your father and mother before you—totally out of control, a danger to everyone you know. It was why he'd refused to meet her upon his return, he remembered. One of the reasons, at least. He told himself it was to bide his time, find the gap between Luciano's letter and his command, see if she had indeed changed upon attaining the Arcanum, but it was something else. A memory. One he'd done everything to stifle. His mother-

“Amon?”

He jerked. Robin stood in the arch. Having shed only her overcoat, she merged with the shadows. The light from the bathroom cast her face into relief. “You were lying on the cold street for a long time. Would you like a bath, so that you don't catch a cold?”

It was so perfectly like her to ask him so tactfully if he wanted something after she'd already provided it, knowing he couldn't at all refuse. He nodded, stood with some effort. His knees popped. Whatever else the power had done to his soul, it had taken the lion's share of his strength. He muttered a “thank you” to Robin as he passed, and loped to the bathroom.

It was a small bathroom, but the tub was old, not built for utilitarian use but perhaps for long soaking, or bathing a number of children at once. The tub dominated the room, encroaching upon the toilet and sink menacingly as though it sought to swallow the entire apartment. In the glare of the bathroom light it looked mundane enough, but it was, after all, a bath drawn by a Witch. This, he told himself, was why the water that slid up to meet him eased his joints immediately. She'd put something in it—salts. He wasn't sure how salt was supposed to soothe him, but it was working.

Admittedly, their living together had been his idea. Quite naturally he'd brought her here after Factory's collapse. There was nowhere else for them to go. STN wasn't safe, regular police would do an investigation—they couldn't leave the country, and reinventing themselves was out of the question. Now that Amon thought about it (and he often did his best to do anything but think about it), he'd not invited Robin to stay, so much as watched while she persisted in staying. She had no family. His half-brother was the only one he had left, and if he were honest with himself, he'd admit that the idea of leaving Nagira for good was anathema to him. And by and large, while they pretended to be dead during the day, Robin was a good ghost. Quiet, unassuming—she did her own dishes and never left awkward pieces of lingerie in the bathroom. She did have a rather amazing ability to sleep in, he'd noticed. And even after months of living together, he still hadn't a clue as to how she did that…thing…with her hair.

Amon sighed, and relaxed further into the tub. He would call Nagira, later. Nagira, the older brother, the lawyer, the one with connections all over; he'd know what to do. With his easy smile and his ridiculous mutton chops and white fur coat, Amon had no doubt that he'd have an idea of some kind. Maybe there was a supplement he could take, Amon thought, something to stifle the power. Nagira made it his business to help Seeds and Witches—there must be something he knew about this kind of thing.

Amon slid further down to wet his hair, submerging himself, letting bubbles of air leave his mouth under the water. He listened to the way things sounded through the water and porcelain. Now that he was warm and in his own space, things didn't feel so different. Still his same face under the water, the same uneven layers of black hair, the same thick, rounded shoulders that liked to hunch a little, the same gut that usually knew what to do, the same legs that met feet too wide. He rose for air.

He'd become everything he hated most in this world, in the span of a single night. It should have felt different, and it didn't.

***

Nagira got the call in the wee hours of the morning. He reached blindly for the phone beside the bed. “Hello?”

“It's me.”

“How are you?” Nagira asked, careful to keep his voice jovial. He knew that if Amon were calling this late, it was for one of two reasons: something was very wrong, or his younger brother had approached an important decision of some kind.

“I'm…” Over the phone line, Amon paused. Nagira imagined him, sitting somewhere alone, his usual black clothes and morose expression, in such opposition to his own demeanor. “I'm a Witch, Nagira.”

Adrenaline jolted through Amon's older brother, but he merely swallowed, blinked, kept calm. “Is that so? How did that happen?”

There was silence on the other end. Nagira willed his brother to answer the question. He knew Amon. If he didn't confess the truth, it would eat him alive from within, until he was a walking void. “I don't know,” Amon said quietly. “I saw Robin dead, and then it-”

“Robin's dead?” Nagira sat up.

“No, she's not.” Amon's voice was hollow. “It was an Earth Craft user. He showed me an illusion. I thought she was dead, and—” He broke off abruptly. “I was deceived,” he said finally. “But I didn't realize this until after I'd killed him.”

“How did you do it?”

There was another silence. “Ice,” his younger brother answered. “He iced over. Then he shattered.”

“Did you say anything?”

“No. There was no spell.”

“Like your mother,” Nagira realized, instantly regretting what he'd said.

“Yes,” Amon said darkly. “And like her, I used the power to kill. I should be Hunted, Nagira. I should turn myself in.”

Nagira's mouth set in a line. “How selfish of you,” he criticized. “And how lazy, to look for the easy solution. Fine. Turn yourself in. Leave Robin to fend for herself.”

“She can do fine on her own.”

“The hell she can. She may be a Witch, and a strong one at that, but she's still a child, Amon.” Nagira warmed to his topic. “And all those months ago, you took her from me. You said she was out of my hands, that you would take responsibility for her. So, be responsible.”

“Then I'll give her back to you!”

“I don't believe that for a second.” Nagira sat up against the pillows. “Your moral quandary is all well and good, little brother, but it's damned inconvenient. In case you hadn't noticed, this is a war. And Robin's in the middle of it, which means that you're in the middle of it, too. This is a duty you volunteered for, Amon—you have to see it through to the end.”

Amon was silent, but Nagira could hear him breathing, mastering his temper. “Is there at least something I can do about the power?”

“Master it,” Nagira said.

“But-”

“If you don't, you'll hurt yourself, or the people closest to you.” Nagira let the truth sink in. “Learn to control it, or it will control you.”

Amon sighed begrudgingly into the phone. “How?” he asked.

“I don't know; I'm not a Witch. Ask Robin. She's had the power since she was small.” Nagira smiled. “You were the one who demanded that she learn to control it, Amon. Would you expect yourself to do anything less than what you asked of a fifteen-year-old girl?”

The words died between them. Nagira hoped that he'd made his point—he'd not made his career in litigation for being clumsy with his words. Amon thanked him, and they hung up. Nagira turned to the woman lying in bed next to him. He smiled.

“Amon's powers have awakened.”

“Ice?” Yurika Dojima asked, grinning. She seemed delighted with the idea, her eyes dancing merrily even in the dark.

“Yes, ice.” Nagira slid further under the covers, brought her into his arms. “And if that doesn't fit him, I don't know what does.”

She cuddled up closer. “It's very poetic,” she said airily. “Fire and ice.”

Nagira laughed out loud.

***

Amon awoke the next day in full daylight, instinctively knowing it was very late in the morning, but too distracted by the ravenous hunger in his belly to care. Robin was clattering in the kitchen—he must have slept very late indeed. Curiously, the pain from last night was gone. He stretched, tentatively, felt only the usual pull of tendons. In fact, he felt refreshed, more alert than he usually did upon waking up. And the smells coming from the kitchen were more than enough to pull him out of bed.

Upon touching the floor, however, he had a problem. With Robin asleep long into the afternoon most days, he had the apartment to himself in the morning. By now he'd grown accustomed to dressing leisurely, standing in the kitchen in his bathrobe. He simply knew she'd wake up long after he was dressed and clean and fed. But now, he was so hungry he didn't even want to bother with clothes. It had taken him a long time to stop wearing his STN-issue jacket in the apartment. And he'd already been so weak to her, last night—more intimacy was the last thing he wanted. Clothes were in order. So he hurried into them, and out of the room.

Robin merely gestured behind herself when he came into the arch. There was a plate on the little table, covered in eggs and rice and fish. He resisted digging into it right away. “You're up early,” he said.

Robin shook her head. Her nose was in a recipe book. “You woke up late.” As if remembering something, she turned around. “Are you feeling better today?”

There was such hope in her voice. Amon nodded. “Yes, much better.”

“But hungry, right?”

Again, he nodded. “How did you know?”

Robin looked at an indistinct point somewhere near the kitchen floor. “Using the Craft burns calories like any other activity. What you did last night was especially difficult. I thought you would need to replenish.”

Amon was silent, but sat down in front of the plate. Remembering his sins of the previous night, the food didn't look so appetizing any longer. “You have to tell me if I did that the wrong way,” Robin continued, gesturing at the plate. “All I know how to do is the dishes we made in the convent. But I thought Japanese food would be better.”

“Is Japanese food healthier?”

Robin shrugged. “I don't know. I just wasn't sure you'd like anything else.”

Amon turned to look at her, but her back was already to him. She was serving herself, slowly and carefully. He wasn't sure what to say, so he bit into the breakfast instead. It wasn't bad. Not the best he'd ever had, but not awful. “You did just fine,” he said, swallowing. The whole thing felt a little surreal. He never thought of how Witches spent their mornings, living together like anyone else, preparing the food they'd shopped for like anyone else—

“Wait.” Robin stiffened. He frowned. “We didn't have this kind of thing in the refrigerator.” Robin remained with her back turned to him. “Did you go out, to get this?” Still, she wouldn't move. “Look at me.”

Reluctantly, she turned. Her eyes were to the floor again. Slowly, she brought them up. He could read the guilt there clear as day.

“You aren't supposed to leave without me,” he intoned. “It's dangerous.”

Robin frowned. “After last night, STN-J will look for an Ice Craft user who can't control his power,” she said. “They will look for more incidents, a pattern. There may even have been witnesses from last night who saw the car at the location, or a camera that picked up your information. It is now more dangerous for you, than for me.”

He snarled. “If you hadn't left without me last night, none of this would have happened, Robin,” he hissed. “If you had showed an ounce of responsibility, actually thought before taking action, been an adult instead of putting us both in danger-”

“Amon!” Robin crossed the kitchen in two strides, placing her two hands over his single right one. He looked down at it, annoyed. Only then did he see the lump of ice that had grown under it, cancerous and distorted, spreading out like a fungus across the kitchen table. Revolted, he tried to move his hand away. Stinging pain shot up the hand.

“You've frozen yourself to it,” Robin said. She was careful not to look at him. “If you move now, you'll tear the skin. You have to let me melt it, a little.”

“What?” he asked, but he could already feel the seeping warmth radiating through her hands and into his as he watched her concentrate. At first it was gentle, like warm steam or even water, pouring into the hand and outward, but his hand remained stubbornly frozen to ice that felt like it was eating his skin alive, it was so cold. He tried to move his fingers.

“Please don't move,” she whispered. “If I'm distracted, I will burn you.” She brought her own hands away and merely looked at his, now. He found himself barely breathing. It was a simple proposition, he thought. Move and you catch fire. Don't move, and you're likely to get burned anyway. “This is going to hurt, but only for a little while. Do you trust me?”

“Get on with it,” he gritted out. Amon found anything easier than looking at that hand trapped by the ice, ice he had created, and instead he watched Robin's face as she bent down over the hand again. There were her green eyes, the sudden flicker of the Craft, and hotsearingstop and she'd brought the hand away, holding it carefully in her own. He looked down at where the ice had been; water dripped to the floor from the table.

“This is why it's dangerous for you,” she whispered. “I am sorry that I have made your life this way. I know you didn't want it. All I ever do is complicate your life. I will do my best to make things easier, to make up for my terrible mistake that has cost you so dearly.” And with that she placed the hand on the table again without looking at him, and left the room. Moments later, Amon heard the door to her room close.

Amon sighed deeply, slumped into the chair. The skin of his palm was a little pink, but otherwise unharmed. Robin's breakfast sat mostly untouched. And he felt awful, for a hundred different reasons. So he ate, numbly, everything that Robin had made for him, even after he wasn't hungry any longer, just to chew and swallow his own punishment. He cleaned the kitchen with great attention to detail, then sat down in the armchair that faced the hallway, and prepared to wait her out.

***

It was nightfall when his patience had exhausted itself. He'd forgotten what teenaged girls could be like when it came to sullen behavior. They were a completely different breed when it came to proving a point; able to go without food or bathroom privileges for hours, if necessary. Well, he wasn't having it. Robin was Robin, whatever Nagira said, and this spoiled child stuff was bullshit. He crossed down the hall and knocked purposefully on the door.

“What?” she asked.

“Are you going to let me in, or set me on fire?”

“Come in, and find out.” He opened the door, but not before noticing that the knob was surprisingly hot to the touch.

Candles filled the room. All were aflame. She sat on her bed, back to the wall, knees drawn up against her chest. There were books, and a lot of sketches on the walls. He frowned. “I didn't know you could draw.”

“I'm not very good,” she said. Amon stepped further into the room, examined the sketches. They were mostly views of Italy, or so they seemed to be. He recognized a few of the domed skylines and the bridges of Venice. But others intrigued him more; scenes that must have originated in the convent, long arcades that led into dark chambers, light playing on a stone floor.

“Your memory is certainly very good,” he said, turning to her.

“Things were simpler, then.” There was wistfulness to her voice that she was unable to hide. Amon heard it clearly, and sighed. He knotted his fingers behind his back.

“Your life was much easier, before STN-J.”

“Yes.” She stared at her knees.

“Even though you had the power from a young age?”

“Yes. I was trained by Craft-using Witch Hunters, like Sastre.” She shivered suddenly, at the memory of the man who had gone through so many other Witches before trying to kill her. Like so many others, he had ended up a pile of ashes, yet another piece of her childhood consigned to the flames.

“Men like Sastre and a young girl like you doesn't sound like a good combination.”

She faced him. Her voice was very small. “Is that why we have so many problems?”

Amon tried to ignore the wrenching feeling in his gut. The candle flame in the room suddenly seemed much warmer. He shrugged. “It's possible. But we can't go on this way.”

“I know,” Robin murmured. “I can leave tomorrow-”

“You're not going anywhere,” Amon cut her off. She blinked. He took one step closer. The floorboards creaked under him. “We're going to have to adapt. Be more careful. And Robin…”

“Yes?”

He swallowed his pride. “You must teach me how to control it.”

Her eyes were wide for a moment, but he knew by now that it wasn't from surprise. She was digesting the information. After a moment, she nodded slowly. “I want to help you.”

“You might find it difficult; they say you can't teach an old dog new tricks.”

Her first genuine smile of the day spread across her face. It wasn't even in the mouth that he noticed it, but in the eyes—a flicker of something like the Craft, only far more benign. “I'll just have to light a fire under you, then,” she said, and slid off the bed to stand up in front of him. She offered him her hand. “It's a deal.”

They shook on it.