by JA Huss
Yeah, I get it. "I agree."
"You will not see Tier this week, Junco. You will spend it with Ashur and the 039."
I scowl up at him. "Ashur is ignoring me, I've tried to call him a million times. He won't answer."
"I instructed him to stay away from you, but now you need to patch things up. He will be on the team for Earth. So you will spend this week with Ashur and the remaining 039."
"Well, I'm not sad about that." I smile up at him. "You're not going to get a fight out of me. I miss them."
He just points to my left hand. "Do you know why you can play with that disability and not hear the difference?"
I look down at my missing fingers. "Why?"
"Tier gifted you this when he healed you back on Earth. It's a special gift, Junco." He stops and sighs a little. "One I would have preferred he saved for something bigger, perhaps. But nonetheless, this is what he gave you."
"What did you give him?" I look at him as he raises his eyebrows, maybe deciding if he will tell me or push it off.
"Too many to list. But I am an Archer, so I have more to give away. Tier only had the one gift to give away and he gave it to you at that moment." He looks away for a second, then glances back at me. "It must have been some special moment."
I think back to the hot springs and smile up at Lucan. "It was life-changing for me, really. I don't know what he thought about it, obviously, but everything turned for me in the time leading up to the nightdog attack. My whole world just – changed. It went from being one thing to being something completely different. And he told me the story of Inanna and her trip down below. And how she had the power of making decisions so she decided not to be a victim. That was my interpretation of that sequence, anyway.
"Plus," I add, "he washed the blood out of my hair for me. It was unexpected and nice. And then when we were fighting the nightdogs, I jumped down from a cliff and killed the one that had hold of his arm with my little boot knife. So," I shrug, "I helped him out there."
"You say that like it's nothing."
"He saved my life after, so we were even anyway."
He changes the subject abruptly. "Why did your father really make you learn things the old way?"
I shake my head and huff out some air. "Look, I know what you want me to say, Lucan. But I'm not going to. Maybe he did love me in some sick, twisted way, but it doesn't matter anymore. He ruined everything."
I tap a few keys and wait to see if he answers but he doesn't. "I'm not saying I'm unhappy here, because I'm not." I look up into his blue eyes that remind me a lot of Kush. "But I would've been just as happy being Charlie's wife and raising his child. And given the chance to turn it all back and have that be my life, I'd take it."
He puts his arm around me. "If I could gift you that, Junco, I would. But I can't."
"Thanks. Things are going to turn out OK. The syrinx – I mean, Sera – said so. It's part of my payment for taking her to Earth. She promised me that I'd be 'if not happy, at the very least satisfied' when I meet my end and that's good enough for me."
We're quiet for a minute but then he grabs my elbow and I twitch a little at the sudden movement. He holds firm and stares down at me with a serious expression. "Junco, I would like you to consider the possibility that you don't understand what your father's intentions were when he did those inexcusable things to you."
I make a face at him. "Either they were inexcusable or they weren't, Lucan. Which do you think they were?"
He lifts a shoulder in a half shrug. "I have no idea, they were certainly not the best solutions, however I've never had the opportunity to meet your father, so I can't know. But let's move past the horrific way in which he handled the situation of your boyfriend. And then let's move past the barbaric abortion. And take a minute to ask why? Why would he do these things to a girl he raised with care for almost two decades?"
I look away as the chills climb up my arms. I hate that he mentions my baby. Hate it. "He wasn't that careful, Lucan. I think you've got him mixed up with someone else."
"He put a lot of effort into you. Not just as a soldier. But as a child. Why teach you that horse sport? Why teach you to play an instrument? Why give you a God? He took you to church? Every week?"
I swallow and nod as my face begins to feel hot.
"Men who want to kill their grandchildren don't do those things, Junco."
"I can't explain him, Lucan. He took me around the world to kill people, for fuck's sake."
Lucan nods. "Yes, and I've looked into every possible job. There was a pattern to it. They were all" – he stops to think – "necessary."
"I really don't want to talk about it, OK? I just want to forget it."
"Well, you will have to face your past when you go back to Earth, so it is better to be prepared. Consider the idea that your father had another motive. What kind of man was this Charlie? How long did you know him?"
I shrug. "Six months, I guess. He was a good guy, Lucan." I look up at him. "We had something nice."
"What if your father was worried about what the baby might turn out to be? Especially since he saw firsthand what was happening out at the Stag camp. You're not really human, Junco. Yes, you have parts that are biologically human, but who knows what would have happened to that baby. It might not even have survived."
I'm not really human. I say it in my mind, repeating it over and over. I'm not really human? There are no babies in my future, that's what he's hinting at. I swallow down the lump in my throat and look down at the piano keys, searching for a way to avoid this new revelation. "So I killed him for nothing?"
He shakes his head. "You can't change that, so just let it go. My point is not to make you feel guilty but to allow you to explore the idea that while he failed miserably by forcing you to submit to him, he might have had reasons for his actions."
I sit quietly for a second and begin to get angry. "The end justifies the means? Is that what you're telling me?"
"No. This is true for the avian. But that's not how it works on Earth. I learned my lesson with you, Junco. After the second fight when we came to get you for testimony. I had no idea you'd react that way – it's just the way it's done with us." He forces a smile and swallows.
I look away as he becomes uncomfortable.
"So, if that was his intention with you, justifying the means he used to achieve his desired result, he was wrong."
"So, why are we having this bullshit conversation then?"
"I would like to teach you a lesson in perspective, Junco."
"Really?" I laugh.
"You see, life is a challenge. It presents you with problems all the time. Big problems, little problems. In-between problems." He looks down at me to see if I'm listening.
I am.
"And you can deal with all problems in two ways. You can look at things objectively and make a decision based on logic and reason. Or you can look at things emotionally and base your decision on feelings. But no matter how you choose to deal with the it, the problem always stays the same, correct?"
I nod at him as my eyes watch his lips and his eyes.
"The problem doesn't change, only your reaction changes. So know that there are two perspectives to solving problems. And your success in dealing with problems depends on which perspective you choose to accept in the moment you make your decision."
"Which is better, logic or emotion?"
"Neither, they both have a place."
"So what's your point?"
"Why don't you burn wood infested with wheat beetles, Junco?"
I blow out some air as I remember our conversation outside of Fledge. The day he smacked me down to the ground for being unreasonable. I swallow. "Because it gives off poisonous fumes that will kill you."
"Why do some people burn the wood anyway?"
"They're freezing to death and they need to get warm."
"But they know they'll die if they stand there in front of the fire to get warm?"
"If they grew up in the R
R they do."
"So they have two possible outcomes. Die or die. Which do they choose?"
"If they're logical they turn away and keep going. And if they let the fear take over they stop and burn the wood."
He smiles.
"I don't see the smile in this, Lucan. So which is better?"
"Neither. Sometimes life just isn't fair, Junco. And you have to either move on or stay. Either way can lead you places you'd rather not go or they can lead you to success. Maybe you find better wood just over a hill and get warm or maybe you burn the wood and there's hardly any beetles in it and you don't die."
"I didn't really need you to tell me this. I already know life sucks and sometimes you gotta fight for it. And that last part is just luck anyway. In most cases you won't be lucky."
"True. Most cases, but not all. So when you're down on Earth, Junco, always look at both perspectives if you have the time."
I groan loudly and look away. "What if I don't have the time?"
"Choose your heart. It knows what to do."
He pauses and I look up and meet his eyes. They are kind and I lean my head into his shoulder.
"You will spend this week learning, Junco. You have a lot to learn." And then he taps me on my shoulder and we're standing in a restaurant. A fancy-looking guy smiles at us and motions to follow him towards a private room in the back where the other Archers are waiting. I recognize most of them, but they all stand and formally introduce themselves, taking me by the elbow and doing that weird squeeze greeting.
"Junco rewrote The Lamentation of Inanna for the piano today," Lucan beams. They oooh and ahh at me and my mood improves immediately. Poor guys, they really need to get a life.
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Acknowledgments
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
A BIG thanks to my family for not badgering me when I didn't cook or clean for weeks. (These weeks are in addition to the ones I mentioned in CLUTCH!)
To James Ledger, for creating the FLEDGE cover artwork – he was very (very) patient with me.
Special thanks my awesome editor, RJ Locksley for making all the Junco books so much better than they ever would've been without her help, insight, and suggestions. (And if there's a typo in this book, you can bet I put it there after she was done.)
This book contains a lot of fight scenes and I owe every single one to Metallica. I simply can't write a fight scene without some old-school Metallica blaring in the earbuds. I owe you dudes, bad.