Shattered Stars

by Theresa Kay

  Yes, there are ways of shutting it out, says Lir. Rym is not forced to listen to him.

  I look to him, brows raised. How did he…?

  Sometimes your thoughts are written on your face and I can feel your emotions. The side of his mouth curls upward. And I know how you think.

  “I’m going to borrow your bondmate for a bit, cuz,” says Rym. He links his arm with mine and pulls me away from the others. Leaning to the side, he mutters into my ear, “I need some distance from my father before I throttle him, and I thought you might do better without an audience.”

  Lir watches us go. Do not worry for me. I can handle my uncle for a bit. He crosses his arms over his chest before saying something I can’t hear, quickly drawing Vitrad into a conversation about who knows what.

  When Rym and I are far enough away that the others are barely visible through the trees, he puts his hands on my shoulders and stares directly into my eyes. “You can do this… just please don’t kill me.” He gives me an exaggerated wince, then smirks.

  “Sometimes…” I shake my head, smiling.

  “Admit it. I’m your favorite E’rikon. Well, except for my cousin I imagine.” It’s clear he’s trying to put me at ease, and it’s working. He does that eyebrow wiggle again. “Must have been nice to have your own room last night. I know I enjoyed not having to watch you two smooching every two minutes.”

  Heat gathers behind my cheeks. I’m not ashamed about Lir and me, but it’s a little awkward to think about other people knowing something so intimate. But Rym doesn’t know… How would he? I glance up and meet his eyes. Well, he clearly knows now. I can practically see the realization dawning on his features. And he’s speechless.

  Not in a bad way, though. His expression softens, but his smile stays in place, big, open, and all the way up to his eyes. He’s happy for me. For us. He’s glad Lir has found someone, and he’s glad it’s me. Sure, he knew we were bondmates, but that doesn’t always mean a pairing like ours. Welcome to the family.

  “Thanks.”

  A pause. He raises his brows, silent.

  Wait. He didn’t say anything. Not out loud.

  He grins as my mouth forms an ‘O’ shape. It wasn’t just the words that came through, either. Some of those things I couldn’t have known on my own. So not only did I hear him, I felt his emotions through the emotional link—the dhama. Not like I can feel Lir’s through the bond, but I got the general gist.

  I concentrate on the golden eyes in front of me. Say something else.

  Something else.

  It’s my turn to grin. It worked. Maybe the missing piece was trust, or friendship, neither of which I’ve ever felt toward Vitrad or Jastren. Was it a fluke, or can I actually link with Rym?

  Now what?

  He shrugs, and a devilish glint appears in his eyes. Want to freak everyone out?

  No. Not really.

  Oh, come on. You’re no fun. We—

  His eyes roll back, and his hands fly up to the sides of his head. He falls to his knees, his face twisted into a grimace.

  “Not. Funny.”

  He shakes his head vigorously, his mouth opening and closing without sound. A stuttered gasping noise makes its way from his throat, and his hands move from his head to his neck as if he’s trying to loosen something.

  “Seriously. This isn’t funny. Stop it.”

  Another shake of his head. He forces his eyes open, and my stomach drops. There’s no faking the pain reflected in them. Something’s attacking him. And it’s not me.

  Could Jastren be here? I scan our surroundings as I kneel beside Rym and grab his arm to try to pull him to his feet. But he can’t stand, and whatever mental attack he’s under seems to be getting worse. Finally he slumps to the ground, out cold. At least he doesn’t look like he’s in pain anymore.

  Lir!

  As the sound of running footsteps approaches, something tickles at the back of my mind. A familiar something. I spin around, squinting into the woods. My jaw drops open. It can’t be. But it is.

  It’s Jace.

  JACE’S GAZE DARTS FROM ME to Rym to Lir, who’s stopped several feet behind me, and back to me again. Confusion, anger, pain, and fear cycle across his features. His hazel eyes are unfocused, and he has a fresh wound on his arm—a deep one from which rivulets of blood are trailing. He looks worse than he did earlier, and I can’t understand how he’s even standing, much less using any of his mental abilities.

  Lir’s barely holding himself in place. His terror, and his desire to run to my side, scream across the bond. Jax—

  I lift a hand and subtly shake my head, keeping all my attention on my brother while keeping my other hand on Rym. Wait.

  Anger flares from Lir, overpowering his worry. Look what he did to Rym. I will not—

  I said wait! I force myself to relax and release a short, quiet breath before speaking again. Rym is okay, just unconscious. Jace isn’t… he isn’t currently hurting him. By the twinge of annoyance, I can tell Lir’s not fond of that wording, but before he can try arguing with me I continue. If you come over here, it might set him off. Right now, he’s confused, but calm. He won’t hurt me.

  You do not—

  I do know that. I risk a glance over my shoulder, sending him a tight-lipped glare that softens into a pleading look. Please. Trust me on this.

  Fine. I can feel him behind me, still furious and tensed as if ready to jump in the second something goes wrong.

  I turn my attention back to my brother and suck in an involuntary breath as Jace takes three jerky, uneven steps in my direction. His lips are moving, but it’s not until he’s closer than I can make out what he’s saying. My name. He’s muttering it over and over. The quiet chant continues as he crosses the distance between us, drops to the ground in front of me, wraps his arms around my shoulders, and bursts into tears.

  The tension flowing from Lir slows to a trickle as he forcibly pulls it back.

  Slowly, I move one arm around Jace’s waist and gently run my hand over his back. I gather up every ounce of calm I can find inside me and reach for the connection to my brother. Drip by drip, I let that calm flow into him, soothing away the rigidity in his body and the agitation in his mind.

  His sobs peter out, and he starts babbling under his breath. “I didn’t want to. She. Her eyes. It hurt. It hurts. She was there. I tried. Had to go. Nowhere…”

  I have no idea what he’s talking about, but it sounds like it has something to do with why he’s out here and not locked up anymore. And maybe with someone he may have hurt in his escape. It’s taking all my effort to keep my alarm—and Lir’s, thanks to the bond—out of what I’m sending to Jace.

  There’s no point in worrying about what else Jace may have done at this second. Deep breath in. Once he’s calmed down and can talk about it, I can handle it then. Deep breath out.

  It seems to be working. Jace’s stream of nonsense slows along with his breathing, and my hold on the rest of my emotions stays strong. One second at a time. One breath at a time. Until my twin’s heartbeat echoes my own and I can feel most of the cloud of panic and confusion lift from his mind.

  “Jax?” His voice comes out in a hopeful croak, as if he’s scared I’m not really here. His fingers dig into my skin as he pulls me closer to his chest.

  “I’m here.”

  Those three words make this conversation a mirror image of the one we had over a year ago, when I was the broken one holding desperately onto my twin, as he reassured me of his existence in reality. I close my burning eyes, and tears trail down my cheeks. Jace was my rock, a steady, solid presence that kept me from drowning in the aftermath of what happened to me. I never expected our roles to be reversed like this.

  I’ve been angry with him, furious even, for what I thought was weakness—giving in to Jastren without a fight. But intentional or not, that was another one of Jastren’s ploys, a mind game meant to drive us apart. Jace’s new scars, his haunted eyes, his emaciated body and ruined mind… they
show just how much he fought.

  And even without Jastren whispering in my ear, I’ve been oh so disappointed in my brother. Because I expected him to be the rock I remembered. Because I never thought he could be broken. Who knew the brother who was everything to me could shatter too?

  Or that I’d be the one who has to put him back together?

  One minute. Two. Ten… I don’t know. I hold my brother in silence, tears running down my face, his breath in my ear. And for those minutes it’s just us and it’s just now. This isn’t like when he found me at the cabin, and it’s not like when I found him in the E’rikon city either, because there was… hope in those reunions, a chance for a brighter future. But not with this one. I know that as soon as we step out of this moment, the world will want Jace to answer for the things he’s done.

  And no matter how much I love him, that’s not something I can help him with.

  Jace lets out a shuddering breath. “God… Jax…”

  On the ground beside me, Rym releases a quiet groan.

  My brother goes rigid, and his fingers dig almost painfully into my shoulders. I try to reach out for our connection, but it slams shut. He turns his head to the side, jaw tense and eyes tightly closed. “Please. Don’t. I have to… I have to…”

  He takes slow breaths in and out through his nose until his body relaxes again. When he finally releases my shoulders, runs a hand over his face, and leans back to look at me, his eyes are clear. “I can control it. Kind of. But it takes time.”

  I nod, my words stuck somewhere in my throat. The quick switch between raving and… mostly coherent Jace is making my head spin a little.

  “They… she… an E’rikon was in the cell. She tried to kill me. I… I had to leave the cell or I would’ve killed her instead.” He rubs his eyes. “I got lost. In my head. It happens sometimes. I…”

  One of his hands has started to pull at his hair. I place my hand over it, steadying it. “I understand.”

  Red hair hangs over his face as he looks up at me. “You do. And I do too. Now. I’m sorry.”

  Another noise from Rym. He’s waking, rolling to his side, his eyelids fluttering.

  Jace jolts, jerking his body backward. Nervous. Fearful. Like a skittish animal. “I didn’t mean to…” He waves a hand in Rym’s direction. “The hair. I thought… but he’s not. That one. He’s too young.”

  A hand lands gently on my shoulder from behind. Lir. Jace’s gaze darts between us in a series of split-second twitches before he closes his eyes again and breathes slowly in and out through his nose.

  He is dangerous, says Lir in my head. Very.

  I know.

  Do you?

  I peer up at him. His lips are pressed tightly together, and his eyes are hard. He’s holding emotions back from the bond, but they’re plain as day on his face, and they’re emotions I don’t often see from him. Rage. Disgust. Hatred. All directed at Jace.

  My eyes go back to my brother’s slumped shoulders. I try—I really do—to see him with Lir’s eyes. Jace killed the friend who was like a brother to Lir. And that was before Jastren got ahold of him, before his mind was shattered.

  But he’s still my brother, my twin. Guilt and shame twist together in my stomach. I can’t hate him, no matter what he’s done.

  I lower my chin to my chest.

  Lir drops down beside me and lifts my chin so I’m looking at him. I am not, and I would not, ask you to hate him. There is no ultimatum here. You do not have to choose between us, and I would never ask you to do so. He rubs his thumb over my cheek. I worry for your safety with him. And I will probably never trust him. But I respect that he is your brother, and I know he is important to you. I will do my best to… understand.

  “Thank you,” I whisper, holding his gaze.

  He gives me a soft smile and presses a kiss to my forehead.

  “What in the blazes happened?” Rym sits up, palms pressed to his eyes. He pulls his hands away and blinks at me. “I suppose I only asked you not to kill me. Next time I’ll be more specific, like, ‘Please don’t leave me feeling like somebody stabbed me in the brain.’”

  “Sorry,” says Jace from behind him.

  Rym whirls around at the sound of my brother’s voice. His head swings back and forth between Jace and me a couple of times. Then, eyes wide, he scrambles away from my brother. “You… you’re…” He sends a narrow-eyed look at me. “That’s your brother.”

  “Yeah.” I avert my eyes.

  “Umm… Okay then… What is he doing here?” A nervous glance toward my brother. “I thought he was safely locked away somewhere.”

  I open my mouth to respond, but Jace beats me to it. “There was a girl. One of you. She came to my cell and pointed something at me, held a knife to my throat, tried to kill me.” He’s looking up from under his hair again, his sad eyes boring into me. “I would have let her,” he whispers.

  “One of us? An E’rikon?” Lir asks.

  “Yes. All golden yellow.”

  Rym and Lir both go still, and my stomach drops. Is he talking about Trel?

  Jace shakes his head as if to clear it. “No. Just yellow, not like you.” He gestures at Rym. “I would have let her. But she threatened Jax and… and… and I couldn’t. I had to fight.”

  The two E’rikon are still frozen in place, tense and worried. But there’s a tiny splash of hope in my chest—because as much as Jace’s ramblings have been all over the place, he did say he would have killed her, not that he did. Still, my heart’s in my throat when I ask the question everyone wants the answer to.

  “What do you mean you had to fight? What happened to the girl?”

  Jace tilts his head to the side and squeezes his eyes closed. “I hurt her. But I stopped. I hurt myself instead, and it made it go away. And then I ran.”

  The tension in Lir and Rym drains away on a quiet and simultaneous sigh of relief. My muscles relax too, but not completely. I’m pretty sure I know who that E’rikon in his cell was: Miri. And I doubt she was acting on her own. So who sent her to kill my brother?

  Where’s your uncle? I ask Lir silently.

  As soon as I realized who was here, I told Vitrad to leave.

  I let out a small sigh of relief. The last thing we need right now is for Jace to catch sight of him, especially after the way he reacted to Rym. And frankly I don’t want to see Vitrad either, not until I figure out whether Miri was on a mission from Vitrad… or from Trel.

  I need to get Jace somewhere quiet and private, away from everyone else for a while, so he can calm down and maybe get himself fully under control. And so I can figure out what the hell is going on.

  “Jace? Why don’t we find a first aid kit or something? Get you cleaned up. And maybe get you to a bed.”

  My brother deflates, curling in on himself and dropping his chin and shoulders. “I want to go home,” he says in a quiet, almost childlike voice.

  Rym and Lir share a look, but don’t say anything.

  I scoot closer to Jace with my hand out. “I can find you somewhere safe to rest, get you some food.”

  He doesn’t look up. “Will you stay with me?”

  I hesitate for a moment before answering. “Of course I will.” I stand slowly and extend my hand down to Jace. “Come on. I’ll help you up.”

  Dirty fingers with ragged nails wrap around my hand, and my brother allows me to pull him to his feet. When he falters, his legs threatening to give out, I throw his arm around my shoulders and wrap one of mine around his waist. His knees wobble and he tilts to the side, but I grit my teeth and struggle to right him again.

  Lir steps around me, grasps Jace’s other arm, and holds him up from the other side. His green-gold eyes slide to me, sad and pensive, and he shoots me a soft smile as he pulls my brother’s arm around his shoulders and takes the brunt of Jace’s weight. I know how much it costs him to do this. Now, more than ever, it’s clear Lir would do anything for me.

  And I would do the same for him.

  THE C
UT IN JACE’S ARM takes nearly fifty stitches to close, but I get the wound sewn shut and bandaged. He devours the food I bring him—two cans of soup, it was all I could find—and sprawls out across the bed. Should I try to get him in the shower or something? He’s definitely filthy and smelly, but as I debate, his eyes slide shut and his breathing evens out. Asleep. Relaxed. At peace.

  Well, he has clean clothes at least. Bathing can wait.

  I step out of the bedroom and shut the door quietly behind me. “He’s sleeping.”

  Lir lifts his head from the back of the couch. “That is… good,” he says hesitantly as he drags a hand through his hair. “What are you—are we going to do with him now?”

  “Do with him?” My brows rise.

  “Yes. I am certain General Carter would not be pleased to learn your brother is not in a cell somewhere. Probably your friend Gavin as well.” He motions for me to come sit with him, so I do, curling up under his arm and resting my head on his chest. “You yourself said it was safer for everyone if he was drugged and restrained. He—”

  “That was before someone tried to kill him,” I say sharply. I pull away to glare at him.

  “Then we ask them to put better guards in place and make sure they know not to let anyone in. He is unstable, and that makes him dangerous. You cannot stay with him every second, and it is not your responsibility to fix him.”

  Anger flares in my stomach, and I shoot to my feet. “It wasn’t his responsibility to ‘fix’ me either. But he did. He was there when I needed him.”

  “That was different.” Lir stands as well. His hands wrap gently around my arms, and he turns me to face him. “You… you weren’t a killer.”

  “Really?” I tug out of his hold. “Tell that to Stu. Tell that to… them.”

  He grabs my arms again and waits for me to meet his eyes. “You weren’t like him. You were never under Jastren’s control. You never used your enhancements enough to cause damage to yourself.” He sighs and releases my arms. “I told you about the danger behind the shikiza enhancement—and Jastren may have made further adjustments when he reversed the emhasin. Regardless, the way he used it on Jace, that complete and utter control… it would be unhealthy for Jastren himself, let alone Jace. And then there are the repercussions of Jastren using Jace’s enhancement through Jace. I don’t know precisely how that would have affected him, but your brother’s mental state suggests that there are repercussions, and they are severe. He may never go back to being the brother you remember.”