Read a full summary of Scythe, the first book in the Arc of a Scythe series. This page is full of spoilers, so beware! If you are looking for a spoiler-free review, check our rapid review. If you need a refresher on what happened in Scythe, then you are in the right place!

Author
Neal Shusterman

Ratings
4.7 stars on Amazon
4.36 stars on Goodreads
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Arc of a Scythe
#1 Scythe (this page)
#2 Thunderhead (recap)
#3 The Toll (synopsis)

***** Everything below is a SPOILER *****

What happened in Scythe?

In a society that has abolished accidents, disease, and aging, the only way to keep the population in check is for scythes to glean randomly selected citizens. A scythe comes to Citra’s house. Her family’s concerned who’s about to die. He only eats dinner with them and later reveals he’s there to glean their neighbor, but she’s not home. He seems to recognize something in Citra’s personality that would make her a good scythe.

Rowan is at the hospital waiting for his friend Tyger to wake up from speed healing after yet another suicide attempt. Tyger knows he won’t die; he’s just doing it for shock factor.

When Rowan gets to school, the same scythe asks him to direct him to the main office. He’s going to glean the high school quarterback today. Rowan stays with him even though he doesn’t know the boy well. The scythe eventually explains that they try to keep the ‘age of death’ percentiles about the same as they used to be.

Rowan stays until the end with the boy. The reaper notes his compassion. Rowan’s fellow students ridicule him and even wonder whether he stayed with the quarterback to gain a one-year immunity. He didn’t, but they don’t believe him.

Citra and Rowan both receive an anonymous invitation to the opera. They’re taken to the same box for the show and try to figure out why they’re there. At intermission, Faraday, the scythe they’ve both met before, appears. He asks them to meet him an art museum the next morning. He takes them to displays from the Age of Mortality, when people were surrounded by disease and danger yet seemed to feel so much more deeply than people currently do.

At a diner later that morning, Faraday finally tells them his purpose. He wants them each to apprentice with him for a year. Then one of them will be selected as a scythe.

Rowan doesn’t want to be a killer but knows his empathy would make him better at it than most. His big family will barely miss him. Citra is more reluctant but knows it would buy her entire family immunity from death as long as she was a scythe.

Faraday soon comes to collect them both, granting immunity to each family member in their household before they leave. He takes them to his modest apartment and gives various instructions. No romantic notions are allowed between them. They receive all physical blessings based on the goodwill of others. They should never be wasteful. And they will study many things (history, philosophy, science, human nature, and all forms of killcraft) while also accompanying him on gleanings.

Faraday takes them grocery shopping, teaching them to get just the necessities. They’re always free, of course. Citra notices the three types of people’s reactions to a scythe’s presence. There are the deniers, the escape artists, and the scythe’s pets.

Faraday shows them their other purpose: to choose a victim from the parking lot because that’s where a small percentage of deaths used to occur. He chooses a 96 year old lady who looks in her 30’s. They go to her office that afternoon to give her the death pill.

Faraday allows her to write a letter to her family before the pill is administered. After her death, he tells Citra and Rowan they’ll give it to her family at the funeral. Not all scythes attend their victims’ funerals. Faraday always does to show human decency.

A group of unnamed scythes board an airplane to kill everyone aboard. A flight attendant runs away, so her whole family will be killed. They seem to enjoy gleaning, which goes against scythe code.

Their training begins, both mental and physical. Once Faraday mentioned something about what a ‘good scythe’ would do. This made Rowan and Citra realize that not all scythes are honorable like Faraday. This doesn’t sit well with them.

The gleanings never get easier. Faraday says this is good. If you didn’t often cry yourself to sleep, then you aren’t compassionate enough to be a scythe.

They’re also asked to keep a daily journal. Theirs are private as apprentices. Scythes’ journals are public record. Citra finds it easy. Rowan does not. He’s used to keeping his feelings to himself. Citra says it probably won’t matter because it will be lost in a gazillion pages of other scythes’ journals. But if Rowan is going to do something, he wants to do it properly.

They’re not allowed contact with their families, which suits Rowan fine. But Citra misses hers, so Faraday allows her to attend her aunt’s wedding. She’s given the cold shoulder. Even her immediate family isn’t sure how to act. She realizes this is why Faraday sent her: So she would realize her relationships won’t be the same as a reaper and not to yearn for them the whole year.

Faraday’s going to go alone to a gleaning today and gives each of them a task to do while he’s gone. Citra is to clean and polish all of the weapons. Rowan is to choose someone to glean tomorrow from the parameters Faraday gives him. He finds the choice difficult to make, which is exactly what Faraday hopes.

The next day, the three of them go to this man’s home to glean him. Citra puts his dogs to sleep, but Rowan must do the harder part. He must tell the man how he selected him and that he must die. Faraday says it will be by drowning. Citra’s amazed at Rowan’s composure. Right until he pukes. Faraday says it should never feel easy. He’s proud of them.

The same group of scythes, adorned in brightly colored and bejeweled robes, appear at a food court for a mass reaping. But they save one—Esme, a little girl who loves pizza. They have a plan for her instead.

Faraday’s doing a gleaning out of town and gives Rowan and Citra a day off. Rowan goes to shoot hoops with Tyger. He’s amazed and disgusted by how his friend lets him win and would bow to his any whim.

He lets Tyger see their house, which Tyger finds boring until they get to the weapons den. Tyger begins wielding the weapons. Rowan has to use one of his new moves to wrestle it away from him. He hears Citra arrive upstairs and sneaks Tyger out when she gets in the shower, telling his friend it’s Faraday instead. He suddenly realizes he doesn’t want his womanizing friend to meet Citra.

The scythe teaching them Bokator, their martial art, has them in a class of eight. They’re the only apprentices; the others are scythes early in their career. One day, the sparring match he calls for is between Citra and Rowan. They each have some advantages and disadvantages and are evenly matched. Citra’s angry at the end when Rowan gets to her as he has her pinned under him. She doesn’t want to be attracted to him.

On a gleaning with Faraday and Citra, a man fights back. They take him into a bedroom so his family doesn’t have to witness. He attacks them when they get in there. Faraday tells the wife his skirmish was with Citra instead of with her husband. Citra thinks this is such an important lesson. It shows Faraday’s compassion and how it’s okay to break the rules sometimes.

Citra’s supposed to bring Faraday warm milk before bed every night. One night he’s already asleep, so she tries on his reaper ring. It turns freezing cold on her finger, which ends up frostbitten. Faraday’s awake and says it was a lesson in curiosity. She made it much longer than he expected her to before she tried it on. He tells her Rowan will now bring him his milk. They’ll see how long it takes before he tries it on.

One of the three annual conclave meetings is coming up. Rowan and Citra will attend with Faraday. They’re also required to take some tests on things like poisons formulas and weapons history to check on their progress. They won’t be disqualified if they do poorly, but there’s a secret consequence Faraday won’t elaborate on.

One night when they’re up alone studying, Citra admits she’s worried about the tests. Rowan wants to take her hand to comfort her but knows it’s a bad idea. Citra admits she’s glad no one is disqualified on the basis of these tests because she’d miss Rowan if she’s gone. It’s the first time he realizes she doesn’t dislike him.

They arrive in Fulcrum City (formerly St. Louis) for the conclave. The usual rituals are carried out and discipline is handed out to a handful of scythes. An anonymous accuser lodges complaints about Scythe Goddard, the mass gleaner. Faraday thinks he made the complaint himself to take the wind out of any detractor’s sails.

Rowan notices the more interesting part of the meeting doesn’t happen in the assembly. It’s the tight knots of schemers who meet outside of the bronze doors. Faraday’s above it all.

After lunch, there’s a time for humans to come in and demonstrate new weapons they’d like to market to the scythes. A council governing immunity is then proposed. Citra’s pleased to see how much weight Faraday’s opinion carries the one time he speaks up.

The four apprentices up for scythedom appear. One failed the test last night and is gone. Only three rings lay on the pillow, so one more will not make it. It’s the hot-tempered boy they noticed yesterday.

Now it’s Rowan and Citra’s turn to come forward with the other apprentices. Each must answer a single question from Scythe Curie. Citra’s fourth to go and lies when asked the worst thing she’s ever done. Curie says this answer is unacceptable and says Faraday will punish her. Rowan goes next and purposely lies about his question and is dismissed to Faraday like Citra was. Citra’s furious he did this just so she wasn’t the only one being punished. Faraday tells him it wasn’t wise to intentionally get his question wrong.

The last few boring issues are being addressed before dismissal when one of Scythe Goddard’s lackeys stands up. She proposes that whoever prevails between Rowan and Citra be required to glean the loser. Faraday shouts his objections. The High Blade decides it’s a fine idea and then closes the meeting.

Things are awkward on the ride home and the following morning. Faraday’s going to be gone and leaves them to their studies, which they usually do together. Citra leaves, and Rowan goes to her room when she returns. He wants to kiss her. She kisses him first and says she’s glad that’s over with. She also says she hasn’t fallen in love with him yet and doesn’t plan on it. He says he hasn’t fallen in love with her either.

Scythe Goddard and three of his lackeys show up at a rich man’s house because they want to have his property. He tries to negotiate to no avail. He assumes he and his family get to leave. They kill his pool boy and say he will stay on as the new one.

Rowan and Citra hear a knock on the front door late at night and assume it’s Faraday because he never came home. It’s High Blade Xenocrates instead. He takes them to his home because Faraday has just gleaned himself. He assumes Faraday did so because apprentices are usually released from their apprenticeship if their mentor dies. Faraday sacrificed himself for them. But two scythes have stepped forward to take them on as apprentices. They both just want to go home since Faraday can’t be their mentor any longer. But Scythe Curie will now train Citra, and Scythe Goddard will train Rowan.

Curie takes Citra to her unique house in eastern MidMerica. It’s modern and full of windows, nestled in forest with a river running under the foundation culminating in a waterfall outside. It’s called Falling Water.

Curie takes Citra on a gleaning in a small town the next day. She looks for a victim tired of this life and kills him with a blade without warning. Citra questions her method. Curie yells for her to get on the ground and apologize. It was mostly for show, but Curie does have a reputation to maintain. Citra’s task is to discover if the victim had a family. If so, she’s to invite them to Falling Water for dinner to grant them immunity.

The wife and two young children come to dinner. Curie truly listens as they talk about their fallen loved one. She lays the blade on the table and says the wife can take her life if she’d like. Even though Curie promises her immunity is still good and she won’t be punished for killing a scythe, the wife declines the offer.

Citra asks why Curie chose to take her on. Goddard wanted both her and Rowan, but Curie couldn’t stand to think that he’d pit the two of them against each other.

Citra asks about the element of surprise in Curie’s gleaning method. Curie says it resembles the surprise of death in the Age of Mortality. She asks about Curie’s gleaning of the old president. Citra says she figured Curie would glean with greater purpose. Curie enigmatically says Citra is wrong.

Citra feels the need to confess the worst thing she’s ever done since she lied to Curie at the conclave. She didn’t push a girl down the stairs; she pushed her in front of a truck. Curie takes her to the girl’s house to apologize. Citra offers to let the girl push her in front of a truck as retribution. Rhonda seriously considers it but then declines.

Curie tells Citra that the Thunderhead knew what she did. It sees everything with its cameras. It just chooses which crimes are worth addressing and which aren’t.

Citra thinks about the soulless Thunderhead, who doesn’t abuse the information it collects like humans with imperfect motives used to. People waited for the machine to breach this theory. It never did. Citra knows the Thunderhead has a recording about how she pushed Rhonda all those years ago. And somewhere up there lurks the truth about Faraday’s death. Did he truly glean himself?

One of Goddard’s lackeys (Volta) drives Rowan to the mansion Goddard recently confiscated. A party Goddard is throwing in Rowan’s honor is in progress. Goddard tells Rowan Esme‘s the key to the future. He says these excesses are all donated or on loan. He’s doing away with the old-fashioned way of the scythes to welcome in something new, luxurious, and fun.

Rowan doesn’t want to participate in the party but knows he’s going to die in eight months. Goddard says the death match between Rowan and Citra will still take place. Rowan could never kill her. So if he’s going to die, he tells himself he might as well indulge in what Goddard is offering just a bit.

Goddard orders Rowan’s nanites turned off so he can feel pain and experience lack of healing and then has his lackeys gather around Rowan and beat him up. Rowan hurts more than he thought humanly possible. Volta takes care of Rowan as he recovers.

Esme visits him, too. He asks why she’s at the estate. She doesn’t seem to really know. She tells him she thinks he’ll be a better scythe than the others.

Goddard finally comes to visit him on the third day. He turns back on Rowan’s healing nanites but not his painkilling ones. He’ll begin his training again tomorrow with the aid of quick healing but feeling every bit of the pain.

Citra’s busy training with Curie, gleaning with her, and entertaining the families of the dead with her. She plans to defy the old death laws like Curie and never glean children should she become a scythe. Faraday did it because it fit the old statistics he clung rigorously to, but he often cried those evenings afterward at home.

Citra always goes to gather the families while Curie works on dinner. One call is different than the others. The only surviving relative of a gleaned woman is a monk in the Tone cult. Citra goes to the monastery to talk to him. She’s surprised how calm and resigned he is about his sister’s death. She gets angry at his apathy. He says she’s welcome to gong the bident, the large tuning fork-like structure to release her anger. She is surprised by the vibrations (which the Tone cult worships) and by the watery bowl of eradicated diseases they keep nearby.

Citra becomes obsessed with searching the Thunderhead’s backbrain to find any hints as to whether Faraday’s death was a suicide. She finds the search slow and maddening.

Citra brings up that there’s no law strictly forbidding her, as an apprentice, to visit her family. Curie thinks it over and eventually agrees. Citra wants to see her family but also has an ulterior motive. She says she wants to walk the city together but takes pictures near all cameras as they walk near Faraday’s old house and the train station. Citra might be able to use her private uploads to create a path to link to the camera data on the day Faraday died. She is narrowed her search from billions to millions. But she’s willing to search for as long as it takes to get answers.

Rowan’s becoming numb as he goes through the training all of Goddard’s disciples withstand. He remembers Faraday’s wisdom about never losing his humanity or else he’ll come a killing machine. He knows this greyness hanging over him is better than what’s around him: darkness masquerading as enlightenment.

Rowan hears Goddard’s words and philosophies in his head constantly now. He still internally vows to blow his initiation but also secretly wonders what type of scythe he might be after the two very different philosophies he’s studied under.

Little Esme seems to have a crush on Rowan. The rules are she must be kept happy, so when she invites him to play cards one night, he obliges her.

One day Goddard brings thirteen human subjects for Rowan to perform his training on instead of the customary dummies. Goddard assures him they’re being paid handsomely and will be revived as soon as it’s over. He must leave the last victim unharmed. He performs his task with quite a ferocity. It pleases Goddard but sickens Rowan. He does feel an excitement and satisfaction, though.

A magnetic propulsion engineer always wondered why his job was important since all modes of travel had been perfected. He knew his research was being recorded by the Thunderhead but knew there must be a reason why. Then one day scythes seize his research facility.

The scythes at the estate haven’t gleaned the entire time Rowan has been there, so their quota has racked up 250 gleanings they need to make. They board a helicopter and travel to a large office building.

While the four scythes glean, Rowan’s instructed to use a hatchet to destroy glass and anything else he can. He secretly helps humans escape the building, which ends up going down in flames at the scythes’ hands. Goddard gives Rowan his ring, which will work for someone other than the owner with permission, to grant everyone else at the scene immunity once the gleaning quota is reached.

Rowan can barely stomach the celebratory dinner that evening. Volta seems to be the only other one it bothers. Everyone else is reveling in the day’s gleaning stats and horrors. Rowan says he promised to play cards with Esme again. It’s a lie, but she happily obliges him. He wants to figure out why Goddard has her there as his prisoner but doesn’t get much out of her except that she hasn’t been granted immunity.

Rowan hears Volta crying when he walks past his room that night. Volta’s furious Rowan saw him this way. But he knows Rowan is likely a kindred spirit with a conscience. Volta wants to “get with the new” as the alluring Goddard swayed him with at first. But he just can’t do so with a pure heart. He hopes Rowan can so he doesn’t have to deal with this guilt and sorrow.

At first, Citra was excited to get to the Harvest Conclave to report to Rowan on what she’s discovered about Faraday’s death. But Curie’s warnings about not trusting Rowan any longer make Citra dread it more with each passing day. Curie’s infamous for her gleanings, especially those of the president and his cabinet. But she hates the fame. The way Goddard relishes it worries her. She tells Citra to win the ring at the Winter Conclave and glean Rowan as quickly as possible.

Curie and Citra quietly slip in a side door to enter the conclave, while Rowan must arrive with Goddard and the gang amidst fanfare. Citra tracks him down. She shows him what she’s found. She’s identified half of the people who might’ve been in the subway station when Faraday was hit by the train. And three of the nine were granted immunity that day.

Rowan thinks it’s suspicious but knows they can’t jump to conclusions without proof. He says when she’s ordained she can dig in deeper with her increased Thunderhead access to get more concrete proof. She wants to know why he says when she’s ordained. He brushes it off and is glad it’s time to move into the assembly room.

This time, an anonymous complaint is lodged that Goddard gives out immunity too freely. Curie would like a punishment and a curtailment of his immunity powers, but they proceed without doing so.

They learn the apprentice challenge is a Bokator ring challenge in which they’ll fight one-on-one. Rowan and Citra are paired for the last match. They both try to subtlely throw the match so the other can win. Then Rowan realizes what he has to do; he has to make her think he’s changed so she won’t care about him anymore. In the last ten seconds of the match, he snaps her neck. She’s sent to be revived and repaired. He figures this will make her despise him.

Citra hears a voice in her head saying her name just before she awakes in the rejuvenating hospital. She’s been there two days and will be as good as new in one more. Citra asks Curie about how Rowan acted after he snapped her neck. She can’t decide if his cold look beforehand was genuine. Curie tells her he’s not the same guy he used to be.

There’s no punishment for Rowan back at home for breaking the test rules. Goddard throws a huge party in his honor. Volta knows what Rowan really did. He asks him not to intentionally sacrifice himself because of raging hormones. Rowan secretly pledges to glean himself if he defeats Citra fair and square.

Rowan’s surprised by two party guests: Xenocrates and Tyger, who is now a professional partier. He asks Rowan if he can get him into the love subject scene to make even more money.

Goddard and Xenocrates first discuss how ‘she will cease to be an issue in a week.’ Volta thinks they’re talking about Citra and knows this would be the best for Rowan. Then Goddard insists Xenocrates jump in the pool fully clothed to draw a laugh since the man drew a laugh from the conclave at Goddard’s expense. He calls Esme over and subtly threatens to slice her throat if Xenocrates doesn’t jump. He complies.

Rowan realizes the large man can’t swim. He and Tyger dive in to rescue him. Xenocrates acts as if it was an accident. He hears Goddard quietly apologize to him and realizes for some reason Xenocrates followed an order given to him by Goddard. He can’t figure out why.

Rowan asks Goddard about it after the partygoers are gone. Goddard says he’d have to ask Xenocrates to know for sure but it’s probably not a good idea to bring up something embarrassing. Then Rowan says a rumor is going around that Faraday’s death was a murder instead of a suicide. Goddard asks what exactly Rowan is trying to say and threatens to hurt Tyger if Rowan makes false accusations again.

While playing a round of pool, Volta tries to tell Rowan that Citra might just be playing him with her information about Faraday. Esme pops her head in to say she’ll play the winner. Volta reveals that she’s the leverage Goddard has on Xenocrates. She’s his illegitimate daughter.

Citra confesses all about her secret research into Faraday’s death to Curie. She’s surprised but listens intently. She asks who Citra has told and then tells her to let Curie take it from here. She says Citra can continue to investigate when she’s a scythe.

Two BladeGuards come to Falling Water to arrest Citra for Faraday’s murder. Curie’s gone, and there’s nothing she can do to resist. They take her to Xenocrates’s house and lay out the accusations that someone has used to frame her. They even have a note in Faraday’s handwriting claiming he’s worried about her intentions. Citra fights her way out of the room and jumps off the building to die.

The Nimbus crew (Thunderhead’s own) are already down there to collect Citra’s remains when Xenocrates arrives. He’s furious that she’ll be in their jurisdiction instead of his for the few days it takes her to heal.

Citra hears a voice in her head as she’s coming back from the dead once again. She quickly figures out it’s the Thunderhead she’s speaking to. It found a loophole in scythe law. It can’t interfere with their laws but can talk to her now because she’s outside of their rule while dead.

The Thunderhead wants to talk to her because it’s concerned about the direction of the scythedom. It can’t interfere except to tell her she seems to be a part of many of the future algorithms it has run. In some she lives; in some she doesn’t. But she’s important in a large percentage of them.

Citra asks if he can tell her about Faraday’s death. He can’t interfere but finds one piece of information he can give her that she would’ve soon discovered on her own. The killer’s name is Gerald Van Der Gans.

Citra wakes up in a hospital in the Chilargentine region of MidMerica. The Thunderhead took her very far from home for her healing. She was off the grid until officially back to life. A friend of a friend of a friend told Curie where she was, so she’s there with Citra. She sneaks her away to a cabin in the mountains before any of the High Blade’s men can imprison her.

When she wakes up a second time (this time at the cabin), Citra tells Curie about the note they showed her in Faraday’s handwriting. But she says it can’t be true. She wasn’t trying to kill him, of course, and he’d never think so. Curie says the letter is real except Faraday wrote it about her, not Citra.

Curie was an apprentice of Faraday’s when she was seventeen, and he was twenty-two. She was in love with him and snuck into his room one night. He let her down gently and then ripped that page describing his concerns from his scythe journal. But he kept it. After they’d both turned a corner and reset to those young ages again, they were lovers. It went on for seven years until they were discovered.

It was a huge scandal because it went against scythe law. Their punishment was seven deaths and separation for seventy years. They’ve been friends since then. But Xenocrates knows all about this and likely knew that’s what the note is truly about.

Curie knows something else it at play. She’s going to go home and try to figure it out. She sends Citra away with a name and an address in a car with weapons borrowed from the Chilargentine scythe with whom they’re staying. They hear a knock on the front door of the cabin. Citra escapes. She only looks at the name when she drives out of the sight of the house. It’s Gerald Van Der Gans. Citra’s glad she has weapons with her for when she finds him.

Citra zigzags across the country, dodging the scythes looking for her. She’s relieved when she finally passes into Amazonia—which doesn’t cooperate with the scythes from other countries—on a hypertrain. They kick off all of the non-Amazonian scythes. Citra’s safe at lease for a while.

Citra soon switches trains and continues on the path Curie gave her. She finally makes it to the address, a house on the beach. She sees Gerald from afar off. He’s out on the porch. She can’t see him well but takes a shot at his knee and connects. She runs to him. It’s Faraday. He passes out. Blood pours from his leg.

Citra gets him inside and gets his leg set and ready to heal. She tells him everything that’s happened and can’t believe he’s totally off the grid and didn’t know. The only way to reach him is in person. That’s why Curie sent Citra to him.

He faked his death to save her and Rowan from having to kill each other. He never dreamed all of this would happen.

Rowan has been with Goddard for eight months now and has become a killing machine behind his mentor’s wildest dreams. Rowan has killed over 2,000 times, many of them the same people revived day after day to earn money.

He’s appalled by Goddard’s latest mass gleaning, an attack at a harvest festival. He can’t rescue anyone because he’s by Goddard’s side the whole time. Volta gets in trouble for the humane poison gas he uses on festivalgoers.

Rowan’s heard Citra’s off the grid after getting in trouble for something. He doesn’t know the details but knows Curie has vouched for her and cleared Citra of all charges.

Citra trains with Faraday with no interruptions for gleanings. Faraday says she’s just the type of scythe they need in this tumultuous age. She thinks Rowan is, too. After eight months with Goddard, Faraday says he can’t be trusted anymore. Citra doesn’t think she’ll be able to glean him. Faraday says it will be the second toughest thing she ever does. She’s afraid to ask what the toughest thing will be.

Goddard takes the gang to reap at a Tonist monastery. Rowan’s supposed to stand guard out front, but Goddard says he’ll have his first kill today even though it’s against the rules.

When Rowan wanders in, he finds a desperate Volta. He killed a classroom of children because they were supposed to annihilate everyone. It’s too much. He slits his own wrists. Before he dies, he makes Rowan promise to be a better scythe than him.

The whole monastery is on fire. Nearly all of the Tonists are dead. When Rowan finds Goddard, he has reserved the highest ranking Tonist for Rowan’s first kill. Rowan runs Goddard through with his blade instead and then decapitates him. He kills Chomsky and Rand next. He puts on Goddard’s robe to approach the emergency personnel outside. It scares him how well he can pull off this role. He tells them to protect the buildings around the monastery but to let it burn to the ground.

Rowan meets with Xenocrates to discuss what happened. Rowan acts as if it was all an accident and the others burned up in the fire. Xenocrates mentions the facts that don’t line up with this, but then Esme appears in the doorway. He knows Rowan had this timed perfectly. Xenocrates agrees to call off the investigation into what exactly happened and to let the dead be dead. Rowan vows to not tell anyone the secret about Esme. Xenocrates leaves to escort her to her mother.

How did Scythe end?

The day of the final test arrives. Citra begs Curie to tell her what it is. She refuses. When it’s Citra’s turn, she finds her brother tied up in a chair. She must kill him using a weapon she draws out of a hat. He’ll be revived as soon as it’s over. She finally does so. When she asks Curie how the other rounds went, she discovers Rowan pulled the gun on whoever was brought in for him before they were even done reading the instructions. Citra knows he must have changed immensely in their time apart to be so cold.

At the Winter Conclave, Citra is chosen as the new scythe. They give her a knife to glean Rowan, but she punches him in the face to start off. His blood hits her ring, granting him immunity for one year.

Citra whispers to him to grab some knives and to fight his way to the car waiting by the side door. Rowan’s speed, technique, and power amaze her. Rowan’s shocked to see Faraday is the driver. They speed off into the night.

The final journal entry is from the newest scythe, Citra (aka Scythe Anastasia). It sounds like Rowan is wreaking havoc around the world, gleaning all sinister scythes. He’s earned a name for himself in the process…Scythe Lucifer.

There you go! That’s what happened in Scythe, the first book in the Arc of a Scythe series!

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