by Lola StVil
“Get the team ready to go,” she says.
Perry looks like he wants to say more, but he turns and jogs away. The moment between Atlas and me is gone, and with a sigh, I turn towards the loft. Atlas steps in front of me again, blocking my path.
“We can handle Loom. It’s only one guy, and there are six of us. You should stay here and figure out exactly what you want,” she says.
“Fine. But you know as well as I do that I’m not the only one who needs to figure that out,” I reply.
Why didn’t I tell her I know what I want: her?
“Really? Because I’m not the one who just ended things between us,” Atlas says.
“I…”
I decide to be honest with her.
“I said that because I think you deserve better than me, Atlas. You deserve to be with someone who is good,” I say.
Atlas’s face softens.
“How many times do I have to tell you that I love you and I am yours? I don’t care about the past. I care about now. I care about the future. And you’re good now, Kane,” she says. “What do I have to do to prove to you that I only want you?”
I did want to set her free. I did want her to be happy. But it’s not just that. Deep down, I can’t shake the feeling that she’s into Regal. And that’s what comes out now.
“Well, you could start by not kissing other guys,” I say.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake. I have to go and find Loom. I don’t have time to play another twenty rounds of how can I reassure Kane,” she says.
Have I become that needy? No. I haven’t. I can see what’s in front of me.
“Don’t you dare stand there and try to make it seem like I’m imagining this thing between you and Regal. There’s something between the two of you, and you know it. That’s why you didn’t reject him outright earlier,” I say, trying and failing to stay calm.
“That’s not true, and…screw it. I’m not doing this now. You need to work out whether or not you trust me. In the meantime, I’m going to go and find Loom, and figure how to get the Staff of Lost Souls. And once I’ve done that, I’m going to figure out a way to save Quinn and bring her back to us. And when all of that’s done, then maybe I can figure out what I have to become to be your version of an ideal girlfriend. How’s that?” she says.
“I never said you weren’t—wait, what did you just say about Quinn? Getting her back? Are you crazy? The Quinn you knew is gone,” I say.
Suddenly all the stuff with Regal seems trivial, kids’ stuff. If she’s going to go toe-to-toe with Quinn, she needs to go in willing to end her, not try and counsel her.
“Not necessarily. You were the Keysu once, but you snapped out of it,” she points out.
“It doesn’t work like that,” I say.
“Why not? It did for you,” she replies.
I need her to listen to me now and really hear me. I take her shoulders and look her deep in the eye.
“I was chosen as Keysu because I was all-around dark. You pulled me out of that darkness. That’s why I was able to walk away. It’s different with Quinn. She was chosen because she harbors an exceptional amount of hate. The type of hate that only grows with time. If you have a chance to take her out, don’t hesitate. Because I guarantee you if she has a chance to kill you, she’ll take it,” I say.
She shrugs my hands off her shoulders.
“You would say that. Because it excuses anything I do to her. And that’s not right. She’s lost, Kane, and if there’s a chance of bringing her back, I intend to take it. Because unlike you, I see things through. I don’t walk away because things get tough,” she snaps.
There’s no reasoning with Atlas once she makes her mind up about something, and her words sting. She thinks I was walking away from her because things got tough. Even after what I told her.
“Fine. Do whatever you want, Atlas, but don’t say I didn’t warn you,” I snap.
I storm away from her. She’s not going to listen to me, and I’m only going to end up saying something I’ll regret. Why does love have to be so complicated? So damn painful? At least hate is simple.
As I storm down the street, a door opens, and a waft of warm air spills out, enveloping me in the smell of hops. I turn back and push the door open and go into the bar.
I’ve been sitting at the bar for almost half an hour, drinking back-to-back shots from a bottle of tequila, when Pest walks in. The shots are just starting to numb the pain I feel. Pest slides into the booth opposite me.
“What are you doing here?” I ask.
“The bartender called me. He was worried you’d cause trouble,” Pest replies honestly.
I snort out a laugh.
“And you’re the cavalry?” I say.
“I’m the one who might be able to talk a bit of sense into you,” he says. “Kane, if you do anything stupid, she might walk away from you.”
It’s clear who he’s talking about. And it’s clear I’m not hiding the seething anger I feel very well. But it’s not aimed at her. Not really. It’s aimed at myself. Why do I always fuck everything up?
I pick up the bottle of tequila and down a large gulp. I offer it to Pest, who shakes his head. I shrug and have another gulp.
“It doesn’t matter what Atlas thinks,” I say.
Pest raises an eyebrow.
“Really. We’re over, Pest. It was a stupid idea, us being together. And now we’ve seen that, and we’re both moving on,” I say. “So, I won’t be going to Vulture Valley, and I don’t care one way or another if she makes it back out of there or not.”
“What happened?” Pest asks.
“I just told you,” I say.
“No, you just told me the lie you’re telling yourself. Now, what really happened?”
“You’re getting onto dangerous fucking ground here, Pest,” I warn him.
Pest knows as well as I do that whatever happens, I’m not letting Atlas face Vulture Valley alone, but I wish he’d just let me rant for a bit instead of being so fucking logical all the time.
“Okay. I’ll change the subject,” he says, holding his hands up in mock surrender. “Ummm, how’s Sadie?”
It’s obvious he’s been dying to ask me about her since he got here. He’s trying to make it sound casual, but it’s not working. Even after the amount of tequila I’ve had, I can still hear the excitement in his voice when he says her name and the way his eyes light up. He’s like a schoolboy with a crush on his teacher.
“She’s fine,” I say.
I don’t know what else to tell him. I mean it’s not like there’s going to be a repeat of what happened between them, but I don’t want to have to be the one to break his heart. Doing that to one person a day is enough.
“Right,” he says.
Thinking about Sadie reminds me she believed in me.
“You know, the team thought I was working with Quinn,” I say to Pest. “Except Saudia. She was the only one who believed it wasn’t me.”
“Atlas would never have believed that,” Pest says.
“That’s what I’d like to think too, but she did. Regal outright asked me if I’d poisoned him, and she paused before she told him I wouldn’t have done that.”
“She paused? Well, that’s it then. Bring on the hanging squad,” Pest says.
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” I snap.
I take another drink, eyeing Pest over the top of the bottle. He waits for me to swallow, then takes the bottle. I’m about to rage at him for trying to take it away, but he takes a drink himself and hands it back to me.
“Just that you always do shit like this. Whenever things are going well for you, you self-sabotage and do something stupid to screw it all up. Things are going well between you and Atlas, so you focus on some imagined slight as an excuse to blow it all up. Then you ended it.”
“It’s not like that,” I say.
“Well, what is it like then?” he pushes me.
“I wanted to let her go, Pest, before she sees what
I’m really like. Talon threatened to tell her about Silver Lake.”
“Oh,” Pest says simply.
I see the shudder run through him at the very mention of the place. That’s how bad things were there. He takes another mouthful of tequila, wincing at the burn as it goes down.
“Pest, could she…I mean, is there any way she could forgive me and still want to be with me after knowing what happened at Silver Lake?” I say quietly.
Pest opens his mouth and then closes it again. Words fail him. That’s all the answer I need. If even Pest, the eternal optimist, thinks there’s no coming back from that, then there isn’t.
“Yeah. That’s what I thought,” I say glumly.
“Hey, everyone,” the bartender yells, putting an end to the awkward silence that’s fallen over Pest and me, “the next round is on me.”
Whoops and cheers go up across the bar.
“Never thought I’d see the day Joe bought us a round,” one of the regulars shouts good-naturedly.
“I’ve just been paid for one hell of a big bar tab, so I thought I’d share the love,” Joe shouts back.
“The guy won the lottery or something? I need some of his luck,” the regular replies.
Joe laughs.
“You don’t want Loom’s luck. He’s got the worst luck in the world. Except for today apparently. Today, he has friends in high places.”
I’m on my feet as soon as he says Loom’s name. Joe sees me coming and turns towards the optics that hang behind him, thinking I’m there to take advantage of his offer to buy a round. I vault over the bar, spin him to face me, and bunch his shirt up in my fists.
“What did you just say?” I demand.
“I don’t want no trouble, Kane,” he says.
His face begins to change, his nose elongating, and thick black hair begins to sprout up on his face and arms. His hands begin to grow claws. He’s changing into a wolf.
“Neither do I,” I reply.
He’s still changing.
“Sure feels like you want some trouble,” he says, nodding down to where I still clutch his shirt in both fists.
I let go, and he stops changing.
“There won’t be any trouble,” I say again. “I just want to know who this new friend of Loom’s is. The person in a high place.”
“Is that it? Why didn’t you just ask? You know her actually. It’s Sadie’s daughter, Quinn.”
I feel the color drain from my face. They’re walking into a trap.
“Are you okay?” Joe asks.
I ignore him and run back to Pest.
“We gotta go,” I say.
“Go where?” Pest says, getting to his feet.
“They’re walking into a trap,” I say.
“I know. But where exactly are they?”
I spin back to Joe, who doesn’t even wait for me to ask, he just reels off the address of the warehouse of his long time customer.
I grab Pest by his arm.
“Hey, I hear Quinn’s your sister. Think you can get me a meeting?” Joe calls out as we whip out of the bar.
I’m so pissed off at myself. How could I have let my anger at Atlas and stupid fucking Regal cloud my judgment this way? How was I so stupid as to not even consider that Loom could be working with Quinn?
She’s proven she’s both cunning and resourceful, a dangerous mixture. I never should have let them go without me.
“Umm, Kane?” Pest says quietly.
I pull myself out of my own head and follow his gaze. Six demons stand guard on the warehouse doors. I try to convince myself that means the team couldn’t get in, so they gave up and went home.
I know that’s bullshit even before I see the smear of blood on the doorframe.
I grab Pest and attempt to teleport into the warehouse. I feel myself connect with some sort of force field, and we bounce backward, going sprawling on our backs.
“You really thought you’d get in there?” the largest of the demons laughs.
“I still fucking do,” I snap at him as I get back to my feet.
I turn quickly to Pest, who is also back on his feet.
“Move away. I’ll deal with this,” I say.
He doesn’t have a chance to answer me before I feel myself flying through the air. One of the demons has blasted me with a stunner laser. I ignore the shrieking pain in my head as best as I can and get to my feet.
Two of the demons are advancing on Pest. But I can’t help him because the other four are advancing on me.
In my mind, I see that smear of blood again, and I imagine Atlas wounded, bleeding. It’s all the motivation I need. With a roar, I throw myself at the demons.
I grab the heads of the nearest two, one in each hand, and smash them together hard. I wince at the cracking sound it makes: the sound you hear when you crack an egg. I don’t let it phase me for long. I let their prone bodies drop to the floor just in time to turn around and duck as a fist flies towards my face. A fist covered in razor-sharp spikes. I’ll have to watch out for that.
I swing my fist at him, but he is quick too, and he curves backward, so my punch misses him. I feel a hand on my shoulder, followed by a burning sensation. The other demon is singeing my flesh. The pain is intense; my vision swims momentarily, turning white around the edges.
With another roar of anger and pain, I reach over my shoulder and grab his wrist, trying to ignore the burning in my palm and the barbecue smell that fills the air as my shoulder cooks.
I bend at the waist and drag the demon forward, pulling him over my body and slamming him down on his back. I don’t give him a chance to recover. I raise my foot and bring it down, hard, on the center of his face. I feel the soft bones and cartilage there cave in on itself under my weight, and when I pull my foot back, I see the mess that was once the demon’s face.
I spin back around as Spikes gets a little too close for comfort. We circle each other, waiting for an opening, and I try to spot Pest. He’s not on the other half of the sidewalk where I expected him to be. If those bastards have hurt him, I swear I’ll make them pay.
I feel my eyebrow rise in shock as I spot him still with the two demons. One of them is down. What the hell happened? How did Pest, who spent our last battle together hiding behind a bed, do that?
I continue to watch, and my curiosity is soon satisfied.
Pest holds a pen. That’s his weapon of choice? Really?
As the demon stalks closer to him, he lifts the pen up, pointing it at the demon’s face. He clicks the end, and a spray of yellow gas bursts out, covering the demon’s face. The demon throws his hands up, clawing at his face and screeching before his knees buckle and he too goes down.
Well, shit.
“Kane. Look out,” Pest yells.
I turn back to the demon in front of me. I allowed myself to get distracted for too long, and the demon saw his chance. His hands reach for my throat, and I see the daylight glinting off the spikes that cover the palms of his hands as well as the backs of them. If he grips my throat, I’m dead.
It’s too late for me to jump back and avoid his groping hands, so instead, I step closer to him. His eyes light up with glee as his hand grazes my skin, pricking it. I feel warm blood start flowing down my neck as I put both palms on his chest and fire.
He explodes in a cloud of black ash so dense it makes me cough and splutter. Pest runs to my side.
“Are you alright?” he asks, banging his fist on my back as I double over, coughing.
I finish my coughing fit and straighten up.
“I’m fine. When did you learn to fight?” I say, still shocked.
He shrugs.
“After what happened back at my apartment, I got to thinking. What if you hadn’t been there when those warlocks attacked? They’d have hurt Sadie, and I wasn’t going to let that happen. So, I built myself a couple of weapons. I call this one the Pen of Torment. It contains a gas that makes the veins in your head pop.” He grins.
I shake my head, returning his
grin. Who would have thought it?
“I think calling it ‘Pen of Torment’ might be a little bit over the top,” I say.
“You wanna try it out before you decide?” Pest says.
“No, thanks, I’ll pass.” I laugh.
I take another look at the demons he took down. Blood has pooled beneath them, although there are no open wounds on their head. Pest sees me looking at them and explains how his Pen of Torment works.
“The veins pop and the blood runs out of their eyes, nose, and ears until they die from the blood loss,” Pest announces like a kid proud of his science project.
“Nice,” I say.
I know I’m putting off the inevitable. I’m dreading going into the warehouse and finding Atlas hurt or worse, but if she is hurt, we’re wasting precious time.
“Come on,” I say to Pest.
I lead the way to the warehouse and Pest follows me in. It looks like a slaughter house. The floor is an inch deep in blood, and it’s splattered up the walls. In the center of it all stands Quinn, a smug smile on her face.
“Where are they?” I demand.
Her smile widens.
“You’re too late, dear brother. They’re all dead.”
“It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles…”
— Buddha
I refuse to let Kane see how hurt I was, how broken, when he walked away from me, so I put on my game face, something I seem to be getting quite good at lately. But inside, I was spiraling out of control. I am so lost. First, he says he wants to break up because he is not good for me. Second, he brings up the kiss with Regal to try and guilt me into leaving him. ARGH!
He’s been so strong for me, always there supporting me. When we were trying to save Regal’s life, I was so sure we’d lose him, and that it would all be my fault. Only Kane told me it wasn’t my fault. It was Quinn’s. I think of the times we battled side by side, how his steely resistance pushed me to be a better fighter. How I feel safe beside him, even when we’re under attack.
And only Kane believed I could save him. I can’t help thinking of the times we made love, how he was so gentle and yet so passionate at the same time. How he held me, how his hands felt on my skin. How happy I felt.