by Kit Rocha
It was amusing, in a twisted sort of way. No wonder the acolytes stared at her like she was some sort of puzzling, alien creature. “Everyone must have so many questions about how I wound up here.”
“Some do, but not as many as you might think.” Nita turned over her arm and showed Kora a thin scar marring her light brown skin. “You can put people back together without leaving a mark. That’s a lot more valuable than pottery or sewing or even the most beautiful lace in the world.”
Kora wasn’t sure she agreed. “I can save people’s lives,” she countered. “If they wind up with scars, that’s not a bad thing. It means we won.”
“You’re right.” Nita rubbed her thumb over her scar before turning her arm again to hide it, but not before Kora sensed her prickle of sadness. Nita hid it behind a smile. “Honestly, I never minded the scar. Or the clay beneath my fingernails, or the burns from my kiln. But my parents have ideas about what the eldest eligible daughter of the Reyes family should be, and it’s not muddy.”
Fury blazed through Kora, sudden and ferocious, prickling under her skin. “Well, fuck them.”
Nita blinked. Then she laughed, startled, but the sadness was gone. “Kora! I’ve never heard you swear before.”
She didn’t, not often, but she didn’t know what else to do with the anger welling inside of her. “They should be proud of you. Of who you are.”
“Maybe.” She caught Kora’s hand and squeezed it lightly. “It’s okay. I have it pretty good here. And I have family that loves me. Like Xiomara…” She nodded to a pretty brunette who was sitting at the card table. “She’s my cousin—well, my uncle’s cousin’s daughter. And the one braiding Ana’s hair? Katya? She’s a different uncle’s granddaughter.” Her brow furrowed. “I think she’s related to Hunter, too. Through the brother of one of his mothers, maybe? Hell, I can barely unravel it, and I’ve been learning royal genealogy all my life.”
“If it’s that difficult for you, I don’t stand a chance.” Kora hid a smile behind her cup of punch. “If I can match names with faces, I’ll be happy.”
“Well, that’s all you have to do. You’re not related to any of them.” Nita laughed. “That’s probably at least part of the reason why Ashwin’s so appealing, you know. He’s definitely not going to turn out to be anyone’s cousin.”
Unlike Nita’s parents and their attitudes, that was something she could fix. “Do you think it would help ease people’s minds if I offered to do DNA testing? It wouldn’t be hard to check for common ancestry.”
Nita laughed again. “You know what? Maybe you should be doing that. I mean, we’re only a few generations in here, but at the rate we’re going…” She trailed off and shook her head. “But no, I didn’t mean literally, so much as… It’s the mystery, you know? They’re not sure where he came from or what he’s done, so they can imagine all sorts of romantic things.”
For a moment, Kora tried to imagine how Ashwin would react, and all she could think of was anger, the low, simmering kind you could only sense behind his shuttered eyes. Not that they would wonder about his past, or even that they would romanticize it, but that it might not occur to them to be wary of him.
What would he say—what would he do—if they found out everything there was to know about him, and it changed nothing? Would it show him that a man’s past didn’t have to define him, or would he make the connection at all?
“Kora?” Nita touched her arm lightly. “I know it’s easy for me to joke because I’m not from the city. If it bothers you—or him—we can stop it. I know you must have grown up differently than I did.”
“What? No, I was just...thinking.” She swallowed hard. “You’re right. We do come from a very different place. I’m not sure Ashwin is accustomed to having people be curious about him, not personally. I know I always seemed to confuse him.”
“Really?” The word was gentle, almost teasing. “He never seems confused when he’s looking at you. Not to me, anyway.”
Kora blushed again. “It’s more complicated than it seems.”
“Most things are. But I heard Ashwin’s officially going to be a Rider soon. I guess you’ll have plenty of time to see if it gets uncomplicated.”
Unless it just twisted things up even more. The Makhai Project was more complex than its description on paper—they weren’t simply creating more efficient, effective soldiers through genetic manipulation and physical conditioning. A large part of it, maybe even the largest, was the mental conditioning. All the things the soldiers were taught—and the things they weren’t.
“I don’t know if I can explain it to you. It took me years to wrap my head around it, and I saw it every day.” Kora shifted on the couch, turning to face Nita. “The things your parents tell you—even when you know they’re wrong, after a while, part of you starts to believe them. You can’t help it.”
“No,” she agreed softly. “You can’t.”
“The Makhai soldiers are told all their lives that they don’t feel emotions, but they do. I’ve seen it. Felt it. The administrators of the project know it, too. They have a special term for it—destabilization. Any time a soldier feels something unrelated to a mission, that’s what they call it. Sadness, joy, fear. Love. It all means they’ve destabilized. It’s the only word they have.”
Nita’s brown eyes widened as understanding turned to horror. “But...why? What purpose could it possibly serve?”
“Control,” Kora whispered. “They’re given context for the emotions that make them more effective at carrying out orders. Anything else isn’t just superfluous, it’s counterproductive.”
“But...what about the rest of their lives? How do they…?” She trailed off, looking suddenly queasy. “Oh Saints, they don’t have lives, do they?”
“Like I said, it would be counterproductive.” Nita looked so appalled that Kora didn’t have the heart to go on, to tell her that the soldiers who destabilized were submitted to regimented torture in the name of conditioning. “There’s a very good reason I left. And only one very important reason I stayed as long as I did.”
“Because of him.” Nita worried at her lower lip. “No wonder he always seems so...confused by the parties. Don’t worry about the other acolytes, okay? I’ll make sure they give him some space.” Her sudden smile held more than a little mischief. “There are some advantages to being the eldest daughter of the Reyes family. If there isn’t a Rios around, I outrank just about everyone.”
“I’ll remember that.” Kora returned her smile. “Ignore me, though. I can’t help but feel protective.”
“Hey.” Nita caught her hand again and squeezed it. “Don’t ignore that. Embrace it. That’s power. If the Base doesn’t know how strong our sadness and our joy and our fear and especially our love make us, then that’s their loss. And their weakness.”
“A miracle worthy of the temple.” Maricela stood at the end of the couch, a basket hanging from one arm. “How did you get her here, Nita?”
“Ana brought me along.” The grin on Maricela’s face was so infectious that Kora barely felt the sting of her words.
“Ah, that makes sense. No one can say no to Ana. Even Deacon is clay in her hands.” She shook the basket. “I made food.”
“Made, hmm?” Nita shifted over and patted the couch between them. “Now you’re just showing off.”
“Doing my duty,” she corrected as she sank to the cushions with a sigh. “I have to set a good example for the acolytes.” Maricela’s squint turned into a giggle. “I sound like my mother.”
“Better yours than mine.” Nita gestured, and Xiomara leapt up and hurried to pour Maricela a mug of punch. She handed it over with a curtsy before retreating, and Nita smiled. “I was trying to explain the tangle of noble families to Kora. We may need to draw her a diagram.”
“I can’t think of anything less befitting a party,” Maricela declared. “Do you know what Gabe did today?”
Nita’s eyebrows climbed. “I thought they were all busy getting ready for A
shwin’s initiation.”
“Hardly. He spent the day over at the refugee houses with a lady from Sector Two. Her name is—”
“Malena,” Kora supplied. They both looked at her curiously, so she explained. “She and Jaden… They were fond of each other.”
Maricela groaned. “Oh, I’m an ass. I thought he had a secret crush. I didn’t realize.”
Kora took Maricela’s hand. “Not many people knew.”
Nita nodded to the basket Maricela had brought. “Maybe the acolytes should follow your good example. It’s been a while since we made anything for the refugee houses. I could talk to Del.”
“And we’ll figure out something for Jaden’s sister, too,” Maricela said decisively. “Something more like what they do when someone dies in Sector Seven.”
“I can help with that.” It wasn’t one of the roles Kora had envisioned for herself when she’d come to One—death counselor to the royal family—but it was one she would gladly take on. Because Gideon and Maricela didn’t expect people to leave behind their history just because they’d settled in a new place. They expected them to bring it with them, to keep it even as they folded in parts of their new home and culture.
That was a respect worth honoring, and it made her proud to be a part of the Rios family.
Chapter Fourteen
The tattoo machine hummed, a hypnotic backdrop to the burning pricks as Del inked in the final branch on Ashwin’s new tattoo. She had a light touch, far gentler than the man who’d done the Makhai tattoo that covered his back. They were almost soothing, those little stabs of pain. They reminded him of the way it had tingled and sparked the first few times Kora had touched him.
Thinking about Kora was not a good idea. His control over his body’s physical reactions was more fragile than ever where she was concerned, and the logo on his shoulder was almost finished. Ashwin wasn’t sure what humiliation felt like, but he still didn’t relish the idea of walking into the Riders’ sacred initiation ceremony with an impossible-to-hide erection.
Even he had some social survival instincts.
“There we go.” The priestess swiped a cloth over his arm and sat back, smiling at her work. “How does it look?”
“Beautiful, as always.” Deacon studied the tattoo with an upraised brow. “Leaves, huh?”
He said it as if there was a deeper meaning, and Del’s warm laughter confirmed it as she set down her tools. “All things come in seasons, Deacon. You know that better than anyone.”
“I bow to your superior insight.” And he did, literally. When he straightened, he gestured to Ashwin. “Come on. They’re waiting.”
Ashwin rose, gathering his jacket in one hand. His sleeveless cotton shirt bared his tattoo, and he was acutely aware of the play of air across his abraded skin. Everything felt like that now—too sensitive, as if Kora had shattered more than his pain associations. The careful walls he’d erected to dissociate himself from being distracted by unimportant physical stimuli had crumbled.
He felt...alive.
He felt raw.
Deacon led him through the heart of the temple, a dome-ceilinged circular room with rows of curved wooden benches facing a raised altar. Dozens of candles flickered on a wide offering rack. More burned around the edges of the room, thin columns of wax nestled into the sand-filled urns in front of each brightly colored mural.
Their saints. Ashwin recognized a few by sight now—the dark-eyed brunette who held a heart cradled between her upraised palms was Gideon’s aunt, Adriana. The ethereal woman with glowing bronze skin and a floating white dress was Juana, Gideon and Maricela’s mother. Bright red roses grew around her hips and curled up her arms, ending in a crown around her jet-black hair.
He’d seen both portraits repeated in tattoos worn proudly by everyone from crafters in the marketplace to the gardeners who worked in the Rios orchards. The Rios family’s history and legacy was public and inescapable, adorning every wall, every shrine, even their bodies.
Maybe that was what drew Kora to them so strongly.
She’d never known her parents, just like Ashwin had never known his. Oh, he’d met the woman who’d given birth to him, but Natalie Olsen hadn’t contributed any of his DNA. She’d simply made a strategic choice in the chaotic aftermath of the Flares—to earn a comfortable post overseeing one of the luxuries warehouses in exchange for carrying a child to term and handing him over without question or expectation. The few times he’d interacted with her, she’d given no indication that she knew who he was. Maybe she didn’t.
Family simply wasn’t a concept on the Base. Only shared purpose and commitment to a higher goal—even if most of the people sacrificing never knew exactly what that goal might be.
Deacon cleared his throat, and Ashwin realized he’d been staring at the mural of Gideon’s mother. He resumed walking, following Deacon behind the altar and through the doors leading to the Riders’ inner sanctum.
More candles burned inside, this time thick pillars that scented the air with spice. One burned in front of each portrait except for the newest, where Gideon stood waiting for him, the Riders gathered in a loose semicircle nearby.
Ashwin took note of each person out of habit, scanning for weapons and fixing their positions in memory. But most of his attention was drawn to the new black outline decorating the wall.
The likeness was precise. Ashwin studied his straight nose, the flat line of his mouth, the familiar curve of his jaw, and the stern arch of his brow. He recognized his own features, the same ones he saw in the mirror. But the sum of those features, when filtered through Del’s brush, were more than their parts.
She’d captured something about him, something unfamiliar and new. The tension in him that was coiled too tight. The rawness.
“There’s not much to this,” Gideon said, the very gentleness of the words somehow lending the moment a breathless sort of import. A vocal trick—lowering the voice to force the listeners to focus—but Ashwin couldn’t tell if it was deliberate or instinct.
Gideon bent and picked up a candle as he continued. “Just the vows. Are you ready?”
Del had walked him through the three vows before starting his tattoo. He’d committed them to memory the first time and recited them back obediently, earning a wide smile and a jealous murmur about envying his recall. But they were merely words, words he’d told himself he could echo emptily in pursuit of his mission.
Lie.
Ashwin had made vows before that he had no intention of keeping. When the Base had sent him to take over the Special Tasks team in Eden, the corrupt councilmen had demanded any number of sworn promises of obedience and allegiance. He’d spoken the oaths knowing that he intended to break them, and had felt no conflict.
He’d sworn allegiance to the generals at the Base, too. Those oaths weighed heavier on him, but he’d been quick enough to violate them when he realized Kora needed protection. He could wrap the decision up in justifications about how he wasn’t hurting the Base by hiding her from them, but the naked truth was that he’d choose her even if he was.
The only oaths he’d held inviolate were the ones he’d never actually sworn—the unspoken loyalty he shared with his fellow Makhai and the elite soldiers like Lorenzo Cruz. Men who could ask favors and be trusted to repay them, men who watched each other’s backs because the people in power couldn’t be trusted to prioritize the soldiers’ lives.
Ashwin shifted his weight slightly, bringing the circle of Riders into his peripheral vision. Wary Deacon. Cold Ivan. Serious Gabe. Brilliant Lucio. Irreverent Zeke. Determined Ana. Watchful Hunter. Ferocious Reyes. Merciless Bishop.
Soldiers, even if they weren’t of a kind he recognized. People who deserved better than empty vows he never intended to keep.
The weight of that knowledge made Ashwin’s voice hoarse. “I’m ready.”
Gideon nodded. “Do you promise to forsake family ties and pledge your loyalty to the Riders as your brothers and sisters?”
The easies
t of the three vows. Ashwin had no family to forsake, and he respected the Riders as fellow warriors. From what he’d witnessed inside Eden, respect was a far sight better than what most brothers and sisters could offer one another. “I do.”
“Do you promise to protect the people of Sector One by giving aid where aid is needed and spilling blood to keep their hands clean?”
Still not difficult. The Base might set their eyes on the people in power, but for the most part they wanted stability and productivity for the people who made Eden and the sectors their home. And blood on his hands had never bothered him. “I do.”
Gideon met his gaze squarely. “And do you swear to protect the Rios family?”
Ashwin waited for him to finish the sentence, but Gideon simply watched him, smiling and expectant, as Del’s voice echoed through his head.
Do you swear to protect the Rios family and obey Gideon Rios?
Gideon had removed himself from the oath.
The silence grew teeth. Ashwin flexed his fingers and turned the words over in his head. Protecting the Rios family might include Gideon by default, but dropping his name from the vow mattered. It was Gideon’s next move in their complicated game of chess.
And it was a vow he could make in good faith, because Kora was part of the Rios family. “I do.”
Gideon held out his hand. Deacon was ready with a lighter. It clicked softly in the silence as Gideon flipped it open and sparked a tiny flame. He lit the candle and turned to place it at the base of Ashwin’s portrait. “Ashwin Malhotra. Welcome to the Riders.”
Deacon stepped up first, one hand outstretched. When Ashwin took it, he drew him into an embrace. Ashwin tried not to stiffen, but no one but Kora had ever hugged him. The solid embrace and the slap on the back was over before he could relax.
Zeke caught his hand next, clasping his arm as he grinned widely. “Can you read my mind now?”