Chapter 30 #2
Xavier makes the first move, striking fast. His movements are clean and controlled. Henley is more fluid. He’s deceptively lazy, looking like he’s not taking it seriously at all before unleashing a series of jabs that has Xavier kicking into defense mode.
Their muscles shift under their skin, gleaming with power. They’re evenly matched, both in skill and in the amount of shit talk that leaves their mouths.
Henley falls back and raises both forearms, taunting again. Almost like a dance.
“You gonna throw a punch, or you just gonna stand there and look pretty?” Xavier asks. His voice is laced with amusement.
Henley chuckles. “You wish you looked this pretty.”
He feints, then comes at Xavier with a left hook that snaps the other man’s head back.
“Dick.” Xavier huffs out a breath, but he’s clearly fighting a laugh.
They look like they’re enjoying themselves—so of course Evlynne chooses that exact moment to enter the gym. She’s in tight black shorts and a gray sports bra, her midriff flat and rippling with abs that make me a bit jealous.
Her step stutters when she realizes who’s sparring. “Are you fucking kidding me, Hen?”
The fight stops, Henley’s golden head swiveling in her direction. Nobody misses the anger flashing in her eyes.
“Don’t make it more than it is, Ev,” he calls back.
She looks from him to Mako, then Saint, who’s still pummeling his punching bag, unbothered by the escalating tension.
“He’s a Prime! And he’s in Silver Block,” she growls, staring at everyone in disbelief. “How are you forgetting that?”
“He stopped being in Silver Block when he deserted,” I remind her, but that only pisses her off further.
“Fuck off, Darlington. Don’t get me started on whether you belong here.” Her incensed gaze swings back to her friends. “How are you so calm about giving a Prime open access to our base?”
“Would you ease the fuck up for once in your life?” Henley retorts, startling me. “Not everything has to come down to Mod versus Prime.”
She gapes at him. “Yes, everything does come down to that. Nothing is more important than securing our rightful place on this Continent.” She jabs a finger toward Xavier. “He’s the reason for the Silverblood Purge.”
“Hey, Elaine?” Xavier says. “I wasn’t even fucking alive for the Purge.”
“I’m talking about people like you, and you know it.” To Henley, she says, “Whatever, Hen. You want to spar with Primes? Work with them? Go ahead. You’re the one who’s gonna get screwed in the end.”
With that, she turns on her heel and marches out of the gym.
Evlynne’s outburst puts a damper on the fun. The fight comes to an end. Xavier uses his shirt to mop up the sweat glistening on his chest. Mako joins Saint at the punching bags, while Henley saunters toward a rack against the wall and grabs a towel. Wiping his own chest, he strides back to Xavier.
He slants his blond head, though not quite in challenge. “You won’t win Evlynne over,” he says.
Xavier snickers. “Wasn’t trying to.”
“She hates Primes,” Henley continues. “She’s nice to the ones in the valley, but nobody’s na?ve enough to think she’d ever put their lives ahead of a Mod’s. Ev’s a Severnist to the core.”
For some reason, it didn’t even occur to me that there might be Severnists at the Dagger, but I suppose there must be.
The philosophy didn’t just die when President Severn did; I’m sure there are plenty of Mods who still subscribe to it, who still believe that Mods are a superior race and therefore deserving of a higher place in society.
“I’m sure she’s not the only one,” Xavier says, speaking my thoughts. He rolls his eyes at Henley. “Are you going to pretend you’re not?”
Henley’s voice loses its cavalier drawl as he displays a rare moment of sincerity. “I’m not. Both my parents are Primes. And trust me, neither of them is inferior to me. They don’t deserve to be treated as less than because they don’t have psychic powers. That’s absurd.”
Xavier sheds some of his own bravado. “Huh. All right.”
“Our issue with you isn’t that you’re a Prime. It’s that you served under General Redden. You were loyal to the Command. Men don’t switch loyalties overnight.”
“This man does,” I say, hooking my thumb at Xavier. “But that’s because he’s only ever been loyal to himself.”
Xavier smirks. “She’s right. I’m a proud member of Team Stay Alive.” He pauses. “Although I suppose nowadays, I’d like Darlington to stay alive, too.”
I beam at him. “Aww, thanks.”
“Anyway,” Henley says, shrugging. “Thanks for the sparring session, Lieutenant.”
As he joins his friends across the gym, I link my arm through Xavier’s and stand on my tiptoes to whisper in his ear.
“Oh my God. You almost made a friend!”
“You’re the fucking worst,” he grumbles, knocking my arm away.
We’re greeted by sunshine the next morning, but that doesn’t seem to cure the ennui going around the Dagger.
There haven’t been any major developments since the salt mine extraction.
No missions. No broadcasts. No big plans.
It appears both sides have retreated to reassess and strategize, and the Mods on the mountain are tired of being cooped up.
Me, especially. I’m so restless, I feel like I’m going to crawl out of my own skin.
“I hate lulls,” Karra declares at breakfast, speaking everyone’s thoughts.
“Lulllll,” Mako repeats, overenunciating the word. “I like that word a lot.”
Everyone stares at him.
“What?” He shrugs his enormous shoulders. “It’s a fun word to say. Lull.”
Henley leans back in his chair. “I don’t mind the downtime.”
“Of course you don’t. You spend it hopping from bed to bed,” Karra accuses.
“Right, because you and Gray aren’t screwing every chance you get,” he says.
“I wish,” she mutters under her breath.
I don’t think anyone else hears her, but she’s sitting beside me, so I do. Trouble in paradise? I never pry about Gray’s love life, but it didn’t seem like it was suffering. There was another party in the cave a few days ago, and his tongue was in Karra’s mouth the entire time.
I catch a flash of pink in my peripheral vision. A second later, Raven Persimmons walks past, holding her dinner tray.
“Raven, wait,” Mako calls after her.
Her dainty shoulders go rigid. Slowly, she turns toward our table. “What?”
“I think maybe it’s time we bury the hatchet, keen?”
His gracious tone brings a flicker of suspicion to her eyes. “Really.”
“Really.”
“What’s the catch?”
He folds his huge arms across his huge chest. “I’m a firm believer that every friendship begins with honesty. So if you’re the one who stole my gold chocolate—”
“Arghhhh!” With a high-pitched shriek of frustration, Raven stomps off, her pink hair swinging behind her.
“You need to let this go, brother,” drawls Henley.
“Never,” Mako vows.
Luisa and Evlynne join us at the table, setting down their breakfast trays.
Evlynne’s eyes flick in my direction, but for once, they’re not rife with hostility.
Maybe because Xavier isn’t sitting with us this morning.
He and Poppy are on their own, sipping their coffee and playing a new card game that Poppy taught him last night.
Fiona is nowhere in sight, otherwise she’d probably drag the teenager away from the evil lieutenant, kicking and screaming.
“You know what we should do?” Karra suggests, running a hand through her long black hair. “Sneak off the base and go to Heath’s End.”
I raise a brow. “Is that even possible?” Heath’s End is a small island in the southwest, not far from Ward V. Most citizens save up Lux credits for years and use their leisure passes just to go there. I’ve never been, but I heard it’s a tropical paradise.
“It is if we can convince one of our pilots to take us…” Karra bats her eyelashes at Evlynne.
“Absolutely not,” Evlynne says.
“Hen?” Karra pleads.
Henley grins. “Nope. I’m not risking Adrienne’s wrath.”
“That leaves you, Lu…” She waggles her eyebrows enticingly.
“Your man is a pilot,” Luisa says with a snort. “Go bother Gray.”
“He’s always in briefings,” Karra complains, which only makes his absence at breakfast more notable. I realize she’s right. He hasn’t been around much lately.
“I’d love to get off this base,” I admit, curling my fingers around my cup. “I’m going stir-crazy.”
“You grew up on a ranch, right?” Luisa says. “You’re probably used to being outdoors all the time.”
“Yeah, we were rarely inside. Only at night when it was time for bed. The rest of the time, we were out with the herd or riding horses, mending fences, mucking stalls.” I heave a sigh. “I miss it.”
Mako gawks at me. “Well, hellfuck, you really were a cowgirl.”
I grin at him. “What did you think people do on a ranch?”
“I don’t know, but for some reason it didn’t occur to me you’d be doing all that.”
The others and I laugh, but my good humor wavers when I notice Evlynne watching me. Without animosity.
I force my lips not to twist into a frown as I ask, “What is it?”
“Nothing. I was just thinking, if you’re that stir-crazy, there are some gorgeous places on the mountain you could check out. A lot of natural anomalies that cropped up after the Last War.”
“Like the daggerstone caves?”
She nods. “And the lagoon.”
“Oh, the lagoon is magnificent,” Karra chimes in. “You should definitely go see it.”
“There’s a lagoon on the mountain?” I can’t hide my skepticism. I wasn’t the best student in upper school, but I know basic geography, and you don’t typically find lagoons in the woods.
“Yes, and Karra’s right—it’s incredible.” Evlynne pauses, then begrudgingly continues. “I’ll fly you out there if you want.”
My suspicion levels are sky-high now. Why is she suddenly being nice to me?
“We could go today after lunch,” she offers.
“Yeah, maybe.” My tone is noncommittal.
I feel a poke in the back of my mind. Evlynne is trying to establish a link. We’ve never communicated telepathically before, but I know it’s her because her veins are rippling. Reluctantly, I let her in.
“Come find me in the hangar later if you want to go.”
I shouldn’t.