38. Honey #2
“Why not?” Cass asked, his eyes wide.
“Because I think I’ve—I just had a strange feeling.” Her thumb pressed against her palm hard and rubbed in a small circle.
Cass took a breath. “Honey, I came back for you. She came with us to help…this place is going to hurt you. Chrysalis —”
“I don’t know what Chrysalis is and I’m not allowed to know, Cass. You know this.”
“Then trust me when I say you don’t want to find out. Please…come with us.”
The three words hung in the air, all of Cass’s pain and discomfort compressed into come with us.
“You want me to leave my home,” Honey said.
“I want you to be safe.”
”I am safe.”
“Honey—”
“You left.” It came out sharper than anything she’d said so far with an edge that felt filed down by months of waiting and just found its original shape.
“You went out there and you found something. Or someone, apparently, when you were supposed to be doing your mission. A whole different life. If you are happy, then I am happy for you, but I stayed here. This is what I have. These are the people I know. You’re asking me to leave everything, Cass. ”
“I’m asking you to come with me.”
“That’s the same thing.” She was looking at him with an expression that was equal parts love and hurt and the pain of someone whose best friend came back different and was now asking her to become different too, on a timeline that ended before breakfast. “I need time.”
“We don’t have—”
“Then I’ll think fast.” Her voice clipped the end off the sentence. “Give me today.”
“Okay.” Cass’s voice was small. He was trying to hide how much the no had cost him and failing at it the way he failed at hiding everything—transparently and with his whole face. “Today.”
The quiet after that was heavy. The meditation bell rang outside—second call or third, Riot had lost count.
He’d been still through most of this, letting them navigate their shared history without inserting himself into architecture he hadn’t built, but a loose thread pulled at him and he was going to see what unraveled.
“Honey,” he began. “Before his mission, Cass went through Chrysalis. You said you don’t know what it involves. But you saw him after. What was he like?”
Cass went rigid beside Honey in a full-body brace, his breath held as his hand drifted toward his temple.
Honey’s eyes moved between them. “He was sick,” she said slowly.
“For weeks. He couldn’t keep food down. He barely slept.
When he did, he woke up very upset…There were days he didn’t know where he was.
The Elders said it was a very intense spiritual process, that even Brother Matthias had to be called in because there was so much difficu—”
Cass’s hand went to his head and he winced.
The pressure hit Riot’s skull at the same instant like a chisel behind his forehead. His vision went flat and sharp in a way that wasn’t the gold but was something, a rattling deep in his skull.
What the—
“Drop it,” Riot snapped at Honey. He pulled it back to soften it. “We need to stop. Now.”
Honey’s mouth opened, clearly wanting more information.
“Please.”
She closed her mouth.
“Princess.” Riot said the word just above a whisper, just for Cass. “Come here. It’s okay.”
Cass’s body left the edge of the bed before Riot finished, like it wasn’t a decision or thought. He settled into Riot’s lap, his face buried in Riot’s neck and his good hand gripped Riot’s shoulder for dear life as he just breathed and shook.
The rattling behind Riot’s own eyes faded. The pressure drained. Whatever this thing was—this mirroring, this sympathy tremor that his body did when Cass was in distress —began to ease.
Things That Are Wrong With Me. Volume twelve. Now with a supplementary appendix.
Honey hadn’t moved. She stayed sitting on the edge of the bed, three feet away, watching Cass curl into Riot without the smallest hesitation to account for the fact that his best friend was right there.
She held her face still, her eyes shimmering like she was trying very hard not to feel something and felt the edges of it cut anyway.
“Find Sage,” Riot told her as Cass’s lips moved on his skin, repeating something over and over that neither of them could hear. “You’re her welcoming advisor. Bring her to the commissary at first seating.”
“All right. Just breakfast, and we will continue this discussion there.” She stood and smoothed her robes like a deliberate, practiced reset, the composure going back on like armor.
Then she stepped toward the bed, pushed Riot’s shoulder sideways with one hand like someone who did not find his size especially noteworthy, and struck the headboard with her fist.
A panel popped open and she pulled several small glass vials from it, all of them with broken wax seals around the top.
Cass lifted his head from Riot’s neck. “You—I looked for those. For months. I could smell something every time I stayed over and I could never find—”
“I know,” Honey said simply. She gathered the vials and tucked them into her robes, close to her chest, and moved back towards the door. “First seating, don’t be late.”