When Stars Burn Out (Europa Book 1)

by Anna Vera

  “Where’s Lios?” I inquire casually, focusing on loading and reloading my gun unnecessarily. “He’ll fix up your lip. You three been sparring today?”

  I’m eighteen years old. Merope’s nineteen. We’re the closest in age in our league, with everybody else being years older. Not only is she my best friend—a sister, really—but she’s also gifted with the skillset ability of Empathy.

  Meaning I can’t hide anything from her. Ever.

  Well, nobody can, but I especially can’t.

  “I asked you about your Final Exam,” she reiterates with narrowed violet eyes. “You were in Onyx’s office for nearly two hours. What was taking so long?”

  Merope swipes sweat off her face and smears the charcoal face paint everywhere. She looks vaguely like a raccoon. A pretty, violet-eyed raccoon, whose glare is fraying my periphery with all its burning intensity.

  To hell with it. Spit it out, Eos.

  My tone is distinctly sardonic as I say, “Well, according to our mentor, I’m not physically or psychologically fit to fight as a soldier alongside you on the front line.”

  “Physically . . . or psychologically?” Merope probes. I keep my lips tight, eyes averted. “You . . . No, there’s no way,” she adds with a lighthearted scoff, as though I’m joking.

  “I failed,” I confirm.

  “What do you mean, you failed?”

  “I think that statement is self-explanatory.”

  “Eos,” she gasps, breathless. “Tell me this isn’t . . . You’re supposed to deploy with . . .” Her little fingers claw nervously at her braided hair, releasing it in tufts of frizz. “I need you by my side when we deploy!”

  “Merope,” I say in warning. “You’re making this worse.”

  “What’s your new Purpose, then?” she asks, still messing with her hair—so black, it’s almost blue. “How will you be serving our Purpose?”

  “I get to be a groundskeeper or kitchen aid.”

  “We’ve got to talk to Onyx.”

  “She has made it very clear that there’s nothing anybody can do to change this,” I argue hotly. This is all bad enough without making some kind of a scene.

  Merope sighs deeply. I take her hand in my own, lacing our fingers together. We exit the weapons room, spilling out into the muddy lawn of Marathon—into air that’s thin as a wisp, a balm to my fiery mood.

  Rays of sunlight fall in beams from a dark sky, filtered by the glass, which is UV protectant—like Earth’s atmosphere, but a little stronger, probably.

  Farther off, specimens practice sparring in a quagmire.

  The irrigation system must’ve just turned off. The lawn is muddier than it normally is, so much so there’s a deep puddle of water resting just beside the sparring specimens. Two are against each other, while the rest linger in a ring around them, watching through critical lenses.

  Jupiter, the Tertiary Counselor, gives a shouted commentary evaluating the fighters’ techniques.

  “No skillsets!” he bellows as Ares, a specimen whose skillset ability is manifesting fire, shoots sparks from his fingertips. “This is hand-to-hand combat only.”

  Ares’s opponent is a member of our league: Apollo, who’s got black hair and eyes, with fair skin. His muscles ripple under his skin-tight shirt. Nearby, a few girls openly swoon.

  I scoff as Apollo throws a punch at Ares, hitting his mark perfectly—right in the jaw.

  Merope shakes her head slowly. “He’s good looking, I’ll give him that,” she offers.

  “Not you too?” I say, rolling my eyes. Merope’s cheeks take on a pink blush. “He’s nothing but a smug bastard.”

  As though to emphasize my point, Apollo dips and dodges a left hook strike with ease. His combat skills are executed with an alacrity Ares simply isn’t used to facing—given his skillset, he hasn’t ever needed to be good at sparring.

  With that, Apollo tackles Ares, and after a few moments of hastened wrestling, he’s got him in a choke hold. Ares’s dark face swells, bloating. He taps.

  “Apollo wins,” Jupiter declares, apparently bored.

  “Any other takers?” Apollo asks. He winks at a girl standing nearby, igniting a chorus of excited tittering.

  The smuggest of all bastards.

  Before I know it, I’ve shot up a hand. “I’ll take you.”

  “No skillset—”

  “That won’t be an issue,” I say, interrupting Jupiter before he gets too carried away with himself.

  No skillset, no problem.

  This is my kind of fighting.

  I peel off my jacket and leave it heaped, alongside my gun, at Merope’s feet. She whispers, “Kick his ass.”

  “No problem,” I mutter as I approach Apollo. He looks as he always does: beautiful, but vaguely confused.

  Apollo glances at Jupiter. “But she’s a girl.”

  I scoff. “You don’t miss much, do you?”

  Jupiter waves a thin-fingered hand in the air, indicating we should bump fists—a gesture of good sportsmanship.

  Apollo’s fist bumps mine. “Don’t hold back.”

  “Oh, I will,” I say, steadying my pace, matching the rhythm of my footwork to his. “Or else I’ll kill you. You don’t want that.”

  “Kill me?” he echoes with a laugh—and throws a punch at my face, full-throttle. I dodge it by an inch. The ring of people around us gasps, then cheers.

  My small victory seems to aggravate Apollo. He dives a fist at my face again. I drop, rolling. Mud splatters under my weight as I fall, leaving my bare arms sleeved in brown-gray.

  Apollo leaps, aiming to tackle.

  I roll again.

  The mud is frigid and slick. I feel it seep through my clothes like icy fingers. Apollo misses but doesn’t fall. I take a handful of water and splash it in his face, leaving a spattering of mud flecked over the bridge of his nose like freckles.

  He hastily wipes the mud off his face. Furious.

  Seething, he says, “Fighting like a gir—”

  “Fighting to win,” I interject, capitalizing on his distraction by throwing a fist into his stomach. A moment of silence follows, filled only by his wheezing.

  Bent forward on his hands and knees, he gasps, trying to catch his breath. Life doesn’t spare a kick when you’re down. I won’t spare you either, Apollo.

  I pummel three additional jabs, bloodying his nose, leaving his thin, pale lips split. He yells, lunging for me. A second later, we’re rolling together, splashing in the mud, just as he and Ares had moments ago.

  The crowd around us is a stew of color as I roll and tumble, and roll again. Their voices are dulled by the loud rhythm of my breath as I keep it steady, controlled.

  I’m caked in mud. It drips from my hair, leaves a gritty residue in my mouth, drying patchily on my cheeks. I catch a glance at Apollo, and he’s just as dirty—his face alive, lit up like fire in all his poorly concealed rage.

  I roll onto my back and lift my legs, striking a heel into his thigh as hard as I can. He falls in the wrong direction, tipping forward, landing on me.

  “Get off,” I growl, shoving at him wildly. He regains control of himself, sitting perched on top of me the way Lios always does before tickling me to tears.

  He lies down, parallel to me, while wrapping his legs around me like he’d rather die than let go. Then, fast as that, he’s got an arm around my neck.

  Wrapped there, cinching tighter.

  Just as he’d done to Ares.

  Rolling backward, he drags me along. His hold on my neck tightens, but I refuse to tap out. Even Jupiter says, “Eos, it’s best to recognize your limitations—”

  I throw a jab into Apollo’s ribs.

  He cringes, tightening his grip. I feel my periphery quiver and fade, darkening. I’m shocked to also detect the distinctive sensation of a skillset abi
lity when it’s active: a strange buzzing.

  I try to say, No skillsets! but the words are blocked.

  Unlike the feel of Onyx’s skillset—a high-pitched ringing, a vibratory peal—Apollo’s feels like a song. It rolls out of his flesh with a rhythm, a steady beat akin to the thud of a heart.

  Weird. Very, very weird.

  I’ve never felt a skillset like this before.

  Apollo shifts nervously, his skillset’s feeling increasing like a whisper might to a yell, then to a scream.

  Again, his grip tightens, and I’m sure I’m going to blackout this time—but just then, I recall we’re fighting beside a pit of mud and stagnant water . . .

  I’ve lost enough today. I won’t be losing this too.

  Despite being league members, we’re basically strangers to one another. This is the most I’ve interacted with Apollo for at least two years—the last interaction being obligatory, and under the hawk-like supervision of Onyx. But during that obligatory lesson, Apollo showed me one thing about himself:

  He doesn’t like water.

  I throw every ounce of my strength into rolling us over to the side, to the left. Before Apollo realizes what I’m doing, we’re already slipping down the muddy slope, rolling over one another as we tumble.

  When we stop—by sheer luck—I’ve ended up on top of him.

  I lunge, pushing his head backward so it’s fully immersed in the foot-deep muddy water. Apollo bucks and thrashes under my hips, completely panicking over being submerged.

  “Eos wins,” Jupiter drawls lazily from beyond, and I lift my grip on Apollo’s face immediately. He thrusts himself out of the water, gasping. His face is a patchy kind of red and his black eyes stare daggers at mine.

  “What?” I snap, climbing out of the water.

  Apollo snorts. “You cheated.”

  “How?”

  “You know I’m phobic of water,” he snarls, grabbing me by the wrist—hard. A quick yank, and he’s dragged me within reach of his right fist, which punches unsuspectingly into my jaw.

  My head is whiplashed, lip split instantly.

  Everything is silent.

  I run my tongue over my lower lip, tasting blood. My eyes don’t yield from Apollo. I wouldn’t be surprised if he put a knife in my back later, once it was turned.

  “Coward,” I reel, stopped by Jupiter, who has thrust his arm between the pair of us. “You pathetic coward.”

  “Cheater,” Apollo parries back.

  “You used your skillset,” I decry, but Apollo isn’t listening to anything I’m saying. The patchy pink to his cheeks has faded to a dull, sickly pale—and a moment later, I see why.

  Pavo is approaching us.

  And beside him, a very angry Onyx.

  Her voice is like a cracked whip. “Apollo!” His posture straightens at once. “You’ve knowingly defied my orders!”

  “I . . . I was just . . .”

  “You’re coming with me.”

  “I’m sorry,” Apollo says in earnest, chancing a quick glance back at me as he follows—an odd, unreadable kind of expression masking his pale face.

  But I don’t have time to scrutinize it any further because less than ten seconds later, Pavo’s beside me. “Good work.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “Apollo’s reign has ended,” he jokes. “He’s been undefeated until today—until you.”

  “I wasn’t aware of that, sir.”

  “Don’t lie,” Pavo commands with a stale breath. “You knew, yet you challenged him regardless. You’re the kind of specimen who will serve well as a soldier.”

  After all the excitement of defeating Apollo, the reality of today floods back in, cold as ice.

  I gulp. “I . . . There’s . . .” I look up, seeing Merope stand off to the side of us, my jacket draped over her arm. Sticking out of the pocket is my termination order.

  “What is it, Eos?” Pavo asks.

  “Might I meet you in your office in a minute?”

  “Of course.” Pavo’s lips yield to a rare, congratulatory smile before he treads off toward the arena’s exit. I’m left squeezing the mud-water out of my hair, feeling a little woozy.

  A beat later and Merope’s at my side, looking sheepishly at my split-lip before pointing to her own. “We match.”

  “That we do,” I say irritably.

  “At least I got mine from a fair fight—not a suckerpunch.”

  “How did he become such a dick?” I hiss as Apollo exits the arena at last. “We were all raised by Onyx together, yet none of the rest of us suckerpunch people in the face.”

  The shuffling of footsteps heralds an approach.

  Merope and I both look up to see who it is and are relieved to see it’s Cyb and Lios—the last members to our league, both as spattered in sludge as Merope and I are.

  “We heard about the spar,” Cyb says, her pale brows arched in an atypical testimony of her approval. “Passed Apollo on our way back in the arena. Had his tail between his legs, didn’t he?”

  She looks up at Lios: a tall, godlike specimen. He’s always been the best looking of us all with his bronzed skin, red-brown hair and bright sapphire eyes.

  Lios laughs, draping an arm over her shoulders. Though I’ve always seen Lios as a brother, Cyb hasn’t—they’ve been linked romantically for years.

  I’ll never forget following Lios into Marathon one day in the hopes of him practicing sparring with me—only to discover him practicing something else entirely.

  I’d found him pinning Cyb against a rock wall, her pale legs wrapped around his bare, bronzed hips. I was younger. Not really aware of sex—well, aware of it, but not aware of it in relation to myself. Until that moment, I didn’t really think much about it.

  Being eighteen and still a virgin, though, I’ll admit I think about it a lot more now.

  I snap back to reality a moment too late. Lios is eyeing me strangely, with concern.

  “You’re being quiet,” he says. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.” I spit the lie instantaneously. Merope gives me an encouraging stare that says, Come on, Eos, just get it over with.

  I sigh, shaking my head. “Actually, no.”

  We’re alone in the arena now, with sparring lessons being over for the day. It’s just us, the chilly air, and the slurp of mud sucking enthusiastically at our shoe soles.

  Lios drops his arm from Cyb’s shoulders, passing his hand through my hair instead. “What’s up, kiddo?”

  I stare miserably back at my league, wondering . . .

  Wondering how I’ll tell them the truth without looking like the total, utter failure that I really am . . .

  “I didn’t pass my exam.”

  “No.” Lios’s sapphire eyes are edged. “How?”

  “Failed my Psych Eval,” I say, scowling at Cyb to gauge her pending reaction. “Apparently my ego’s too big . . .”

  “We’ll talk to Onyx,” Lios declares suddenly.

  “No,” I nearly yell in reply. Everybody stares. “No, there’s nothing we can do. I already told Merope—we aren’t going to try talking to Onyx.”

  “And why wouldn’t we?” Cyb asks.

  “Because I don’t—” I pause, swallowing. “I don’t know that after all this, after everything . . . I think it’s best if I stay, if I work where I can’t accidentally endanger anybody.”

  Could it be? Has Onyx actually gotten to me? Her speech about my being a danger, a liability. And after sparring today, the way Apollo looked at me. “Cheater,” he’d said . . .

  All because I thought not to tap out but to employ his worst fears against him. To fight dirty. To go there.

  Would I have, if I weren’t so bullheaded—so confident in my ability to beat him, to win?

  “Endanger?” Cyb barks, raking her butte
ry hair aside, fixing her silver-gray eyes on mine. The southern hemisphere of her skull is shaved nearly to her scalp, a swath of brunette under the peroxide blond. “Is that the horseshit Onyx has been feeding you all morning?”

  “We’re worse off without you, if anything,” Lios adds.

  “Can I just—” I stop, dabbing a finger to my split lip and brushing a hand down my mud-coated arms. I look desperately at my league. “Can I just forget about this for a while?”

  For a second, everybody is quiet. Then Lios steps closer, his thumb brushing my bottom lip, Healing it immediately. I give him a weak smile. Merope thrusts my revolver forward in a way that says, Yes, of course.

  “Let’s go shooting,” she suggests.

  “Shooting.” Cyb snorts, smiling slyly. “That has always been your favorite form of catharsis.”

  I try to smile, accepting my revolver. “Not today.”

  “Not today?” Merope echoes, looking disappointed to have failed at cheering me up. “Are you sure?”

  I pull out my termination order—now wrinkly, splattered with mud—and say, “I’ve got to turn this in.”

  “Now?” Merope asks.

  “I told him I’d be there in a minute.” I gesture to the arena’s exit in reference to Pavo. “But I’ll . . . I’ll see you afterward?”

  My league exchanges glances.

  Lios decides he’ll be spokesperson. “You want to go alone?”

  “We’ll go with you,” Merope says.

  “No, it’s fine.” I don’t know why, but I feel a crack snake its way through my steeled stoicism. I walk away before they can see it breaking me apart and say, as loud and strong and as brave as I can make myself sound, “It’ll be boring. I’ll do this alone.”

  3

  Pavo’s office is the largest in our branch of the Ora.

  As the Lead, he carries all the authority, including assigning and managing branch-related jobs. He probably thinks I’m here to discuss deploying with my league in a month’s time.

  How wrong he is.

  I look at the blank space at the bottom of the slip, which remains distinctly unfilled.

  When I arrive, I push the door open. “Sir?”