Chapter 34 - Growth #2
Shooting me a glare over her shoulder, she finally turns. “Why do you all keep calling them they? With or without Roden’s involvement, Herionos attacked us in Libera. You’ve mentioned them. What’s the point of pretending they don’t exist?”
I know her words are meant to hurt me, but her voice is so cold she doesn’t sound like my July.
I drop my head, moving a few more tentative steps towards her. “It’s not that easy. Not all the Herionos are despicable like Roden likes to depict them.”
“Nothing is easy. It looks like nobody appreciates simplicity anymore…” She sighs, curling her fingers into fists at her side.
I’m expecting her to burst into anything: laughing, crying, shouting... For her to run away even. But she just stands by the oval window, staring at me as if my words never actually reached her.
“How much do you know about this man that Roden wants so desperately gone for good?” She asks, tilting her head.
At this point, I have no reason to pretend. I can only try to contain the damage.
I approach the window, and she doesn’t move away this time.
“It is—”
“He,” she retorts.
“He has a singular soul. One that Roden and the Chapter members loyal to him have tried many times to confine in its current existence, but a soul that always managed - one way or another - to remember its previous lives. The good and the bad parts, including the people he met. Those who tried to destroy him. Those who loved him.”
She leans against the window, hands braced on the sill, tapping one nervous finger on the white stone. “You forgot to mention that he is also closer than we thought. But you knew that already.” She purses her lips, her eyes piercing mine. “You know him…”
I flinch, lost for words because I’ve rarely seen her like this, restless, running her hands through her hair to keep them busy.
“You weren’t supposed to find out—” Wrong choice. Too late.
Her arms fall heavy at her side. “And I agreed to destroy his life. Even if I start to think that probably extinguishing his soul forever will be a blessing, given the alternative is to deliver him to Roden…”
I fear her whole body would crumple to the floor, deflated.
I know what she’s about to say, and I can’t stop it.
“And I said yes for us. For a chance at that freedom that I believe we were never destined to have. And probably never deserved.” She stabs her chest with her finger like a knife to carve out her guilt.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier. I couldn’t…” I glance at the window and then at July, asking for permission to get closer. Only when she nods do I take a step forward.
Our shoulders brush, and my heart jumps, but she doesn’t flinch or recoil.
“So, what side are you on?” she asks, folding one hand over the other.
The orchard is greener than the last time I was here. Mack must have found a way to purify the lake.
I let out a relaxed laugh, the first in days, leaving a faint purple halo on the window. “Tabs would have never let me in if I wasn’t on the right side—her side,” I admit, obtaining a puzzled, sideways look from July.
I mirror her stance, bracing my hands on the windowsill. “We’ll have an urgent, last-minute debrief later today. Tabitha would like you to attend so she can explain everything. And answer all your questions.” I nudge her with my left shoulder, “I know you may have one or two.”
I offer a tentative smile that she doesn’t echo. But she doesn’t run away or slap me either.
“Why can’t Roden just leave him be?” Her eyes roam around the room as if imprinting every detail on her mind.
Without waiting for my answer - I’m not even sure if she’s talking to me or herself - she steps away from the window, lost in thought, and approaches the table with the slice of cake, lifting a tiny piece to her mouth. A shadow crosses her face, but she quickly blinks it away.
When she remembers I’m here with her, she slowly turns to me, “Roden told me he stripped part of that man’s soul many times, trying to break him,” - she swallows what I’m sure is rage and tears she doesn’t want to see me - “But even Roden cannot do what I do to Rogues, and I’ve never seen this man before.
Then—who helped Roden and the Chapter before we joined the Harvesters? ”
Is there judgement in her tone?
Her attention shoots to the wall separating our rooms…
Oh, shit…
I shake my head. “I wish I knew. It must have been someone with your gift.”
“Someone horrible if they agreed to make that poor soul suffer repeatedly. I wonder if there is something Roden didn’t tell me.”
Her eyes flick to me, her hands balling into fists, the only movement confirming she hasn’t turned into a marble statue.
I need to get out of here before she asks the right question, and I give her the one answer she shouldn’t hear from me.
I turn to the window and freeze. Jyn is leaving HQ with Nikrah and Lily, followed by Kris, who snaps his head up and meets my eyes. I quickly shut the blinds, fearing they will come off their loops.
“Why is he so important? Why has Roden tried so hard to keep him alive but he’s now dropped the final decision on me? Why me?”
Even if I can’t see her, her voice is like a sword slowly piercing my back.
I search my brain for anything safe to reveal without her growing sceptical. Again.
“His soul is the only one that has the power to reject Roden’s orders. And that can only mean one thing.”
I master a regular breath - and find the courage - to face her again. Recognition blooms on her face. Her fingers relax. “He doesn’t belong to Roden, then. He’s nothing like us. And yet, he shares our talents?”
I nod. “Partially, yes.” I can’t blame myself if she digs up some truth on her own.
“How do we know he’s the only one?”
“We don’t.”
She dashes towards me in a rush of doubts but stops by the cot, using it like a barrier between us. “And all the lives he’s been through, every time Roden had someone like me harvesting a kernel of his soul—why can we not just let him be until his natural death? Why— ”
“July,” I push away from the window. “You’ve had a rough day—we all have. Let’s pause for a second and wait for Tabitha’s meeting.”
She hums in response, and I take it as an invitation to leave her room, give her some time to get ready, prepare her list of questions, and breathe.
I make for the door, but her voice calls me back.
“Galen?”
“Yes, Sof,” I smile, searching her face over my shoulder.
“Was there someone here with me while I was asleep?”
I don’t like the sound of this. “I checked on you once or twice. Mack, as well. I think you’ve carved a soft spot in his heart.”
She pinches her lower lip. “Hmm, no, that’s not it. I remember a face and a voice, but I can’t quite place them in my memories. It was pleasantly familiar, and it makes me sad at the same time.”
I swear I’m going to kill him myself this time.
“You probably had a dream. You’ve met so many new people lately…” I look away, conscious that my expression will betray me.
But she rushes to my side, her eyes reduced to two suspicious slits, like when we were children, and I told her she could grow fins if she stayed in the water long enough.
“Okay,” she grins, a smile too broad and too rigid, and dismisses me by waving her hands. “You’re right; shower and food before the big talk.”
I linger by the door while she rocks back and forth on the balls of her feet.
“As you wish,” I bow.
When I open the door, the floor seems quiet, except for high-pitched laughter and quick little steps coming up the stairs.
I turn back just one more time, “You sure you don’t need anything?”
“A million percent.”
“Great. Will you meet me downstairs when you’re ready?”
She clasps her hands behind her, “I don’t need a bodyguard. Please go.”
That sounds more like Leave me the fuck alone…but I’ll take it as an alternative to not speaking to me at all.
I step one foot out of the door when her voice strikes. “Who were you calling an idiot earlier in the other room?”
My knuckles turn white around the doorframe, and my arm becomes so rigid that it could snap like a twig.
“That was him. You brought me to the only place you shouldn’t have…”
“I didn’t know he was already here,” I drop my head.
“Does he know who I am?”
I nod slowly.
“What will happen to him if I decide to hold up my end of the bargain?” She approaches me slowly, steps as measured as the tone of her voice.
She brushes my back and gently turns me around. “I heard you before. It sounded like you two knew each other very well. How many times did you witness his suffering while pretending to be on the Chapter’s side?”
Her hand feels too warm when she slides it up my arm; my skin tingles when I lift mine to cover hers.
“It wasn’t easy.” I turn her hand in mine to place a kiss on her soft palm.
“Would you have kept the truth from me had our last night in Libera gone differently?”
I sigh into her hand, breathing in the light smell of cake lingering on her skin.
“I see,” she whispers, tilting my chin and cupping my cheek. “And I think I understand.”
When our eyes meet, the little girl Popplewish brought to Libera years ago is gone. July’s gaze is fierce.
Ready for the truth.