Scythe

That night Goddard holds a feast. Rowan notices that while Rand and Chomsky enjoy the killing, they do it for sport alone; they do not share Goddard’s lofty visions. Volta is different. He eats little at the feast and has spent the day contacting the families of the bereaved. Rowan leaves to play cards with Esme. She tells him that sometimes she plays cards with the sons of the pool man. Rowan asks her if Goddard ever talks to her and if she knows why she is important. She ignores his question and says that she hasn’t been granted immunity, which makes her feel even more special.

As Rowan passes Volta’s room on his way to bed, he hears him sobbing and sees him through the slightly open door. Volta is angry and threatens to hurt Rowan if he tells anyone he saw him crying. Rowan tells him that he knows Volta is not like the others. Volta says that Goddard sees Rowan as a challenge: He wants to turn one of Faraday’s disciples to his own way of thinking. He tells Rowan that he hopes Rowan will eventually lose his conscience and be like Goddard: “It would make your life so much easier. So much more rewarding” (270).

Citra studies the scythes of the past: “It was usually laziness, prejudice, or lack of foresight that made a bad scythe” (272), yet the bad scythes are now called “innovative” and “forward-thinking.” Citra has seen the video of the attack on Magnetic Propulsion Laboratories and has seen Rowan in the middle of it. Curie tells her that it is best to remain undefined in the public imagination. As a scythe, celebrity is not fleeting. People do not forget the infamous acts surrounding death and gleanings. Citra dreads seeing Rowan. She is worried about what the months with Goddard have done to him.

On the first day of the Harvest Conclave, Goddard arrives in a limousine. He is mobbed by onlookers as he walks into the building. Rowan goes mostly unnoticed at the back of the entourage. Citra and Curie arrive on foot. A few people recognize Curie, and one tries to touch her ring, but they avoid most of the crowd. When they are almost to the top of the steps, someone shouts, “I love you!” (277), to Curie. She turns and asks why. There is no answer. Citra then asks why Curie is tense. She explains that it is because Citra will be tested, reiterating that Scythe Cervantes usually administers very physical tests.

Inside, Goddard seems more popular than ever. Curie says he has been attracting followers and more scythes share his viewpoints every day. She tells Citra that if the killers ever gain too much power, every honorable scythe will have to fight against them, adding, “I look forward to the day you join in that fight” (279). Citra sees Rowan laughing with some other scythes and feels bad that he did not look for her.

Rowan is looking for her but keeps getting interrupted by admirers who know that Goddard allowed him to grant immunity with his ring. Citra pushes forward and stands in front of him. Rowan says hello to her, but it sounds forced and is too loud. When she mentions that he has made a lot of friends, he says “not really.” She leaves him standing there and walks away. He follows her and apologizes. He says that it’s good to see her but also that it hurts. They agree to stay in the present and not talk about the competition until Winter Conclave.

Citra shows Rowan a series of holograms of Faraday’s house. She is able to track Faraday’s movements until five minutes before he goes up the stairs in the train station. The camera that could have followed him had been vandalized, and the footage stops. She shows Rowan five of the witnesses and tells him that she has learned that three of them were granted immunity the day Faraday died. Rowan says she doesn’t have enough facts to accuse Goddard, but he shares her suspicions. He tells her that she needs to leave it alone for now and continue the investigation after she is ordained, once she has full access to the Thunderhead.

After the initial conclave business, Goddard is anonymously accused of granting immunity too freely. Xenocrates jokingly sentences him to be quiet for five minutes. Curie tells Citra that Goddard is becoming untouchable. At lunch, Curie introduces Citra to some of history’s most famous scythes: Meir, Mandela, and Hideyoshi.

After lunch, Scythe Cervantes announces that the test of the apprentices will be a Bokator competition. Candidates will be in pairs and judged on their performance. Citra is paired with Rowan. Rowan knows that he needs to look as if he is doing his best but still let Citra win. After their first entanglement, he realizes that Citra is going to try to make him look good no matter what. She is daring him to fight her with all of his skill.

From the first kick, Citra is annoyed with Rowan’s obvious strategy. She is annoyed that he thinks her only chance of winning is if he sabotages the match in her favor: “Didn’t Rowan realize that by sacrificing himself, he’d be dooming her as well? She would sooner glean herself as her first act as a scythe than accept his sacrifice” (289). Rowan realizes that she is going to make sure that he wins, and he sees what he needs to do. With 10 seconds left, Citra has fought in such a way that Rowan will be the obvious winner. He springs on her, puts her in a headlock, and breaks her neck. Cervantes intervenes and shouts that Rowan is disqualified for his illegal move.

As Rowan watches guards carry Citra’s body away, he thinks, “You’ll be fine, Citra. You’ll be back with Scythe Curie in no time—but you won’t forget what happened today. And I hope you never forgive me” (292).

Curie writes of an event called the purge, which was a gleaning of everyone who had been born mortal before 2042, when death was defeated. She fought against it, but it happened anyway, cutting off what Curie considered the most valuable links to the past: the people who had seen it. She wonders if the Thunderhead would grieve for humans if there were a mass gleaning that killed every soul.

Citra is revived with her neck in a brace. A nurse tells her she has been unconscious for two days during the revival. Curie arrives and tells Citra that she and Rowan were both ranked as losing the Bokator match. Citra remembers the look on Rowan’s face right before he grabbed her neck. She worries that he enjoyed what he did to her but knows that the disqualification might have been his plan. Curie says that Rowan was impassive afterward and is no longer who Citra thought he was.

Goddard tells Rowan that he has more nerve than he would have guessed and that he impressed many powerful people. The largest party Rowan has seen yet begins shortly afterward. Volta tells Rowan that he cannot lose the scythehood to Citra on purpose: “Submitting yourself to her blade because of raging hormones is just plain stupid” (299). Rowan thinks that Volta might be right. If he wins, he can self-glean instead of gleaning Citra.

Goddard introduces Rowan to many powerful and influential people, and the teen feels valued and respected. Rowan enjoys the party, but he cannot stop wondering if Goddard killed Faraday. When he thinks about Goddard’s actions, however, he cannot find one that is in actual violation of scythe law: “There was nothing in Goddard’s repertoire of malfeasance that would suggest he would murder Faraday” (301).

On the third day of the party, Rowan sees Xenocrates there, which surprises him. Then he sees Tyger, which surprises him more. Tyger tells him that he is a “licensed partier” with a company called Guests Unlimited. Rowan tells him that it’s a bad idea and that he might be required to do things he does not like. Tyger says that his parents have given him up after he jumped too many times and that he is now a ward of the Thunderhead. Tyger says that there is a rumor that Rowan has been training with live subjects and that it pays well. He asks if Rowan can get him a job being one of his training subjects.

Volta sees that Xenocrates is reluctant to be there. He stands near Xenocrates and Goddard, hoping to overhear their conversation. Volta is surprised to hear Xenocrates say that choosing Goddard as an apprentice was the greatest mistake he ever made. Then he tells Goddard that “[t]he girl will cease to be a problem within a week” (305). Goddard calls Esme over to meet Xenocrates, and Volta notices terror on Xenocrates’s face. Goddard reaches behind him, and Volta gives him a small blade, understanding what he wants. Goddard places the blade near Esme’s neck, without her noticing, and tells Xenocrates to get in the pool and swim. He moves the blade closer to her, and Xenocrates jumps into the pool in his heavy, gold-laden robe.

Rowan and Tyger dive in and save him, bringing him back to the surface. Rowan realizes that the only reason Xenocrates would have gotten into the pool was because Goddard ordered it. However, he does not know what leverage Goddard has over him. Xenocrates leaves the party.

The party ends, and Goddard asks Rowan what he is thinking about: “People are saying that Scythe Faraday was killed by another scythe” (312). Goddard asks if Rowan thinks that he was involved and tells him that he would not risk the luxury they are enjoying to simply get rid of one old scythe. Goddard tells him that the following day Rowan will train with pistols against moving targets. If Rowan fails to kill any of them with a single bullet, Goddard will glean Tyger. Before leaving, he says that he would never be foolish enough to tell Rowan if he had been involved in Faraday’s death.

Volta plays pool with Rowan and tells him that Goddard is just playing tricks with his mind and that he thinks Citra is doing the same thing. Esme enters, and Volta tells Rowan that her weight is genetic. Suddenly Rowan realizes that she must be Xenocrates’s daughter. A High Blade with an illegitimate child would be severely punished. Volta says it would be even worse if “the daughter that no one knew about got herself gleaned” (315).

Rowan writes that he is apprenticed to a monster and believes he is becoming a monster as well. Then he tears the page out of his journal and throws it into the fireplace in his bedroom. He hopes that one day he will be skilled enough to give Goddard “what he deserves in return for all he’s done for [him]” (317).

Over dinner, Citra tells Curie she has been researching Faraday’s death. She tells her everything she has done and learned. When Curie learns that she has told Rowan, she says that is why he broke her neck and that he has probably told Goddard by now. Citra senses that Curie is keeping something from her but does not ask more questions.

The next day, two officers of the BladeGuard come to the house while Citra is alone. She tries to fight them when they order her to come with them, but one of them knocks her out with a stun baton. She wakes in a car with them, handcuffed. They tell her she has been accused of murdering Scythe Faraday. They take her to Xenocrates’s home, where the High Blade and Scythe Mandela are waiting for her. Mandela shows her a handwritten page from Faraday’s journal. In it, Faraday writes that he is scared that he has made a mistake in choosing Citra and that she comes into his room at night to watch him. He writes that if he dies, it will not be self-gleaning and will most likely occur by Citra’s hand. They tell her that the witnesses have been bribed and that whoever killed Faraday took the security measures off of his ring and used it to grant the witnesses immunity.

Xenocrates tells her that he has been studying an ancient concept called “torture” but will not subject her to it except as a last resort. He shows her another piece of paper: a confession for her to sign. If she signs it, she will be incarcerated until Winter Conclave. She hits Xenocrates with her cuffed hands and escapes to the rooftop, chased by a guard. She leaps off of the top and falls “until her life ended for the second time in a week” (327).

When Xenocrates reaches the ground, something unusual is happening. Citra is surrounded by a dozen people called Nimbus agents who won’t let him or his guards near the body. Xenocrates tells them that the Thunderhead has no jurisdiction over her body or revival. They take her away, and there is nothing Xenocrates can do. He screams over and over.