Chapter Nine:

Little Demon

The thudding of Jim's body as it fell to its knees was all that was heard as everyone was silent. Harry moved forward and slid his knife out of Jim's forehead wiping the blood onto his already dirty t-shirt before sliding the throwing knife back into its sheath. The dead man was locked on his knees in front of Harry and Harry reached out laying the man out on his back before closing his eyelids with his little fingers. Goodbye Jim, Death guides you now. Harry stood straighter and walked silently away from the eyes that were watching him to sit by the fire once more.

He sat staring into the dying flames and red hot coals thinking of his family and of Death. It was not nearly as philosophical as it sounded, more of homesickness. He sat for a long time not moving. He debated with himself. He was getting too close to these people. He hadn't really known them long but he already wanted to stay even as he knew he should leave. It wasn't healthy knowing that no matter what they will eventually leave him, they would die and he would live for Death had already claimed him.

The sun had moved up much closer to the middle of the sky when a light touch on his shoulder brought him out of his reverie. It hadn't been the first time he had killed someone in mercy let alone the first time he had killed, he had a long list of names, but this was the first time that to Harry's knowledge the person was innocent.

Harry looked up at Rick's face. He searched it for a moment looking for judgement or disappointment but found nothing. Rick crouched down beside where Harry sat and opened his arms. Harry moved into them eyes wet as Rick held him. When Rick let Harry go and stood once more he kept a hand on his back and led him towards where everyone was gathered around a few of the graves that had been dug for their people. Jim was in one he assumed and looking around he saw that Ed, and a few others were also missing. Shane was glaring at him and Dale seemed to be looking at him with something akin to pity or disappointment but the other seemed to be fine with him. Carl stood beside Harry and Rick reached around Harry to ruffle his hair as he moved to stand behind them both.

A quick service was said over the bodies before the dirt was pushed back into the holes to cover them. Harry followed the rest of the woman as they brought clothes down to the quarry lake to clean them. He kept himself apart from them as he slowly removed all his weapons and pulled off his already dirty t-shirt to clean them before removing the rest of his clothing.

The scars from his previous life had carried over to his new body and he heard a woman's gasp as he entered the water bringing his dirty clothes with him to wash. Discretely he cleaned them further with spells before putting them on a rock to dry in the sun and swimming out a little further to wash himself. He washed the blood and body matter from his short silky black locks scrubbing roughly to ensure it was all gone before turning his attention to his small lithe body. Once he was sure he was completely clean he took half an hour to just swim in the cold water before coming back to shore and grabbing one of his knives and a stick that was his body length, firm and he could hold in his hand easily. Methodically he sharpened the stick to a point before putting his knife back and holding the newly made spear lengthwise against his body and diving back into the deeper waters.

An hour or two and fourteen speared fish later Harry was climbing once more out of the water. He sluiced as much of the water as he could off his body with his hands before redressing and strapping on his weapons. He strung the fish on a piece of twine from his pocket and walked back up towards camp. The women had already left, finished the days laundry so he walked alone, although he could see Dale on the RV roof watching his progress to make sure he was safe. He wasn't sure how he should feel about it but he thought perhaps the warmth he felt was happiness.

The camp was busy when he arrived but many of the people stopped and watched his progress. He could see the main group being spoken to by the women and became suddenly apprehensive. The women had seen his scars but he hadn't been purposely hiding them, he hadn't even thought of it. It had been a long time that he had even had to think about hiding his scars. Death had punished all those who were responsible, in both painful and graphic ways already and it was something he had thought behind him. Now there was the possibility that the women were bringing it up and he certainly didn't want to go through it all again and be treated like a small child.

He continued towards the group who had gathered around the fire but skirted the edges towards where Daryl was sitting skinning squirrels. It was close enough to the group that Daryl had most likely heard the conversation but Harry doubted that Daryl would speak about it and for that Harry was glad.

Harry sat beside the man and using one of his throwing knives began removing the scales and guts from the fish, adding them to the pile Daryl was already making with the squirrel guts. Harry was right Daryl didn't do more than a small grunt of greeting as Harry sat, although there was times when Harry felt his eyes join the groups in looking at him.

When Harry was finished he poured a little of the water they had brought up to the camp onto his hands to get rid of the worst of the guts before disappearing into the trees to look for some plants. It only took him a little bit to gather a large amount of prickly pear and elderberries. He had also managed to find a few wild mint plants and brought them back with him as well removing his shirt and using it as a sort of basket. He didn't particularly want to walk back into camp with his scars showing but figured they already knew and if he showed that maybe he didn't care about them they would leave him alone about it.

When he got back Carol and Jacqui were frying up the fish and squirrel and Lori was making a pot of plain oatmeal. He smiled at the women and separated his plants giving the mint to Carol for the squirrel and the elderberries to Lori for the oatmeal before moving to peel the outer skins from the prickly pears.

"Are you sure these are safe?" Lori asked. Harry looked up and nodded. Lori pursed her lips slightly.

"How do you know? I don't want to be eating these and suddenly fall dead 'cause of poison," she said. Daryl answered from behind Harry as he sat and took some of the prickly pears from Harry's shirt and began peeling them as well.

"They're safe. They're wild elderberries. Ferment 'em and you get that fancy wine," said Daryl gruffly. Soon enough the food was ready and Harry had put his shirt back on. As everybody sat to eat Harry could feel eyes on him. He wasn't sure exactly what those eyes wanted. They could be from his actions earlier today or from the scars or even if they should bring him with them when they left in the morning. He had known that Shane and Rick had a fight about where to go in the first place and was sure that no matter what they ended up choosing Shane didn't want him there even if he was in the guise of an eleven year old child.

Dinner was finished and the children began drifting a little ways away to play with dolls and sticks but Harry stayed by the fire and pulled out his sketch book and began to draw. He drew a sketch of Jim sitting under the shade of a tree with desperate eyes and a pain filled face. He was just finishing the last of the shading under the tree when Shane spoke up in a voice that was rather gentle for whom he was speaking.

"Harry? Who gave you the scars on your back?" Vibrant green eyes looked up into the dark brown eyes of the man who spoke, firelight catching and playing in the pools of green as though hell fire, and for but a moment the man thought he had seen the demons of hell in the memories that seemed to flash by in an instant.