Chapter Three Kion #2
“Maybe.” Kion sniffs, shrugs, and leans back in his chair. “But do you like it more than carriwitchet?” He watches as Taissa picks her spoon back up in a clenched fist, like she’s considering gouging out his eyes with it.
“Oh, I liked carriwitchet,” she snarls. “No—I loved it. The game. My team. San…Sansa.” Her throat works, she looks away for a long moment. Kion stiffens in his seat, clenching his jaw.
“Do you know what it feels like?” Taissa asks quietly, looking back at him. “When they tear your Bonding glyph off you? Do you have any idea what that feels like?”
Almost in answer, the glyph on his chest burns, nervously. Sweat beads on his forehead; itchy shivers roll down his spine. “That’s not the point, Cho.” Thinking about it is one million times worse than the idea of getting his bollocks chopped off.
She looks back at him for a long, long moment, her face still and steady save for the burning expression which Kion knows means that she despises him and wishes he would die immediately of the fatal illness of being a “numpty.”
Enough of this.
“Let’s not pretend you haven’t already made up your mind,” snaps Kion, shoving his chair back and standing up, suddenly deeply uncomfortable.
“So we’ll go on and cut this short, yeah?
You say you’ll be coming to play with us, thank you; I say you’re welcome, I bought you a train ticket to Pinion, you start packing—”
To his ire, Taissa hasn’t moved an inch. Instead, she stares down at her tea, stirring it with a carefully blank expression She speaks down into the chipped mug, her voice now steady. “Maybe the more pressing question: Why do you want me to come play for your shite team?”
Kion falters. Is she really going to make him say it?
“The Stymphs used to be Rank Three in the NCL Major League,” Taissa continues with a foul look toward him.
If he were a lesser man, that look would probably have killed him.
“Just below the Dragons. Sometimes you’d even move up to Rank Two.
How in Morgana’s chubby arse did you drop all the way to Rank Six in the Minor League?
I’ve watched the games, you know. I always knew you were shite, Locke, especially compared to me, but wow.
You’ve truly outdone yourself. I’m amazed.
It’s fumble after fumble. I almost feel sorry for you, but then again, I don’t. ”
His throat works, his fists curl at his sides.
Yeah. Fine. It’s true.
His team has gotten—bad. Incredibly fucking bad.
Impossibly, depressingly, humiliatingly, devastatingly bad.
Not long after that disastrous Wyverns match, their losses piled up. In each game for the past two seasons, they were knocked down a spot until they became the bottom-feeders they are now. Coach Royd quit the moment they lost to the Cockatrices.
Once, they’d been an unstoppable force, a tight-knit team. A family, as much as Kion originally hated to acknowledge the warm, absurdly fluffy feelings he gets from simply being with his teammates.
But then they got a case of the Blunduns. The most basic skills of their sport became impossible to them. Worse than rookies. Nothing has been able to shake them out of it.
So now, they’re just pathetic, shoddy excuses for players, constantly at one another’s throats. The constant arguing isn’t helping their performance, either, but aside from duct-taping everybody’s fat gobs shut, Kion doesn’t know how to stop it.
He hates it, the arguing.
He hates how his family is falling apart.
Metal scrapes against porcelain. Will Taissa ever stop stirring that godsdamn tea?
“I hear that your other Robber, Samara what’s-her-name, has a bun in the oven.
She can’t play, not without risking the baby.
So you’re desperate for someone to replace her,” says Taissa nastily, “and you know that I’m the best there is.
Probably other players already turned you down.
So you need me, because—let me guess—you’re about to be tossed out with the rubbish.
Dissolution. Your club owner, Dodds, isn’t happy.
Probably wants to start fresh with a new team. ”
She sets down her teacup and stands, arching a brow.
“Maybe,” he mutters.
“But you were right earlier.” She takes a step closer to where he still sits.
“Yes, Locke. I want to play carriwitchet again. I want to be on the pitch. I want it—badly. I would kill for it. I would die for it. But ‘need’ and ‘want’ are two very different things. The Stymphs need me. I don’t need them.
I don’t need you. You ruined my life. Why should I save yours? ”
Her voice is shaking again. Kion resists the urge to scoot his chair back, instead folding his arms trying to ignore how violently his left eye is twitching. “What are you saying?” Trust Cho to speak in ridiculous circles.
“I’m saying that you should show me how much you need me,” she says sweetly. “And then, maybe, I’ll consider joining your sorry excuse for a team. Until then, I won’t waste a precious fucking minute of my time on you.”
She hurls the words at him like a javelin. Kion is startled by the vehemency in her voice. Like there’s a deeper meaning to the words she’s saying. Something, a memory, prods at the back of his mind, but he can’t grasp it. It slips through his fingers like water.
“You’d be paid,” he grits out, but she shakes her head. “What, Cho? Just tell me. What do you want?”