Ben holt's Arc

Chapter 1 of 4

Ben Holt spread the folder open on the counter of his market stall and weighed each scrap down with a jar. He was fourteen, tall for it, and his blue shirt was torn at the cuff from the last town he had walked out of. Inside the folder he kept the proof: receipts, sketches of bootprints, an apple core sealed in wax paper, a list of towns that fit his father's pattern. On top sat the worst one, a crumpled receipt with the name Barren Holt printed across it in heavy black letters. His father had bought groceries here, in this lot, before Ben ever arrived. Ben smoothed the paper flat and tried to keep his hands from shaking. Seven towns now. He was getting closer, and he knew what closer meant. If he found his father before he was ready, he would be the next name on a list like this one. He was sorting the receipts by date when the noise outside changed. A crowd had formed near the edge of the lot, tight and loud, the way crowds got before something bad happened. Ben stood on his crate to see over the awning. In the middle of the press was a girl his age, brown hair in a ponytail, a short sword on her hip. Behind her, lifted high and bright as stained glass, were two orange and black wings. The crowd pushed in. Someone shouted a price. Ben saw a man at the back peel a paper off a post and check the face on it against hers. A hunting poster. He thought of the old man on the cliff, the one who had grabbed his wrist when he was four and held on without a word until he stopped shaking. Ben shoved the folder into his mail bag and jumped the counter. He drove his shoulder through the ring of bodies. Hands grabbed at his shirt and tore it further. He got an arm around the girl's waist and pulled. "Move," he said. She moved. They broke out the back of the crowd and he ran her low along the row of stalls, ducked under his awning, and dropped the wooden shutter behind them. Outside, the shouting spread the wrong direction. Inside, it was suddenly quiet enough to hear her breathing. She folded her wings tight against her back and put her hand on the sword. Her eyes went to the open folder on the counter, to the receipt on top, to the name. She read it once. Her face did not change. "Aria," she said. "Aria Nightwing." Then she pointed at the receipt. "Barren Holt. That's the man who killed my parents." Ben set his hand on the counter to keep it steady. He had been looking for his father alone for ten years. He was not alone anymore.