22. Aryn #3
His hand falls away, and I stop my tail from lashing out to keep him close. Allowing Cato to touch me is more reckless than coming out here to hunt alone, and I’m not helping either of us by encouraging it.
“Just don’t go looking for danger so you can come out on top,” I say.
He chuckles and winks again. “I can’t promise that.”
I try to hide my grin as we walk back toward the farmhouse. After a while, he breaks the silence. “My parents worked for the military, you know.”
I pause, glancing over at him. “That surprises me.”
“Yeah,” he agrees with a bitter laugh. “Surprises most people that know me. They were good parents, and good to others, as far as I can remember. Did contract work in weapon development.” He nods at the machete in his hand. “Dad was the best metalsmith in the world, or so he claimed.”
“You got his modesty, I see,” I tease, thrilled as another grin tugs at his lips. “Is that one of his blades?”
He nods, fingers tightening around the hilt. “Twenty years later, and it’s just as strong as the day it was forged.”
We pause at the quiver of a branch nearby, but it’s only snow sliding to the ground. “You lived in Atlanta?” I ask as we continue.
“We did. There was a community on the outskirts of the military sectors where a lot of the human contractors lived. It was gated and guarded to keep us safe, and backed up to a massive forge where Dad’s crew worked.
Mom managed the employees and the upkeep of the place.
Made it so Dad only had to focus on his work.
They spent a lot of hours there, so my brother Gideon and I had a caretaker who looked after us.
Irick was a Ramves male who had been with us as long as I can remember…
since we were kids. I trusted him. Considered him family. ”
Cato isn’t looking at me as he talks, but there seems to be a point behind his story, so I don’t interrupt.
“One day, my mother was working late in the office when some bigshots came by to discuss weapons shipments. They didn’t know she was there, and mentioned some top-secret mission.
She interrupted them as soon as she realized she wasn’t supposed to hear it. She did the right thing.”
Personal experience tells me the story doesn’t have a happy ending, and my stomach bottoms out as I wait for him to continue. “I’m not even sure she told my dad,” he says after a long stretch of silence.
“It probably wouldn’t have mattered if she did,” I offer gently.
He meets my eyes for a moment and gives me a fleeting smile.
“Yeah. Probably not. Twenty years. She’d been working for them for twenty fucking years without so much as a mark against her name, but that all disappeared the moment they realized she’d heard something she shouldn’t have. There was no loyalty.”
I hum my understanding. “There rarely is in life.”
“A few nights later, I woke up to the smell of smoke. There was a fire downstairs, but everyone was asleep. I couldn’t get them to wake up. Years later, I realized they were probably drugged, but I was only thirteen. I wasn’t thinking like that, you know?”
“That’s understandable,” I say softly.
“I decided I was going to carry them out. I wasn’t exactly small, even back then, but I was a kid.
Gideon’s room was the closest to the door, so I went for him first. I got him on my back and carried him outside, and I was running in for my parents when I saw Irick walking away.
I yelled at him, screamed at him to fucking help me when I realized he had a gas can and a blowtorch. ”
My stomach clenches with the betrayal he must’ve felt. “I’m sorry.”
“He turned and looked at me for a minute, but I couldn’t tell if he was sorry or just indifferent.
He said, ‘You don’t get to love things, Cato, and you don’t get to keep them.
Not in this life. You might as well learn that now.
’ Right then, I learned you can’t trust anyone.
He raised me, and all it took was a single command before he was willing to kill us all.
He could’ve helped us escape, or at the very least warned us.
There were a hundred different ways that night could’ve gone. ”
“Your parents?”
He shakes his head, tracing the scars on his cheek.
“I went back in, tried to get to them, but whatever Irick put in the house caused an explosion. A metal beam fell on me, and it was hot enough… well. To do this. I could barely even crawl out, then had to watch as the place went down in flames with our parents inside.”
“And Gideon?”
“He’s… fine.” When his jaw clenches, he catches my curious gaze and shakes his head. “He survived without so much as a scratch on his pretty face. He blamed me, though.”
“Blamed you?”
“Not for the fire. For getting him first. We fought about it a lot. Duked it out a few times, and let it settle in the past. Well. I did, in any case. I’m not sure he ever got over it.
Once he realized I didn’t need him to take care of me anymore, we went our separate ways.
Kept tabs on each other from a distance, met up a few times a year, but we were never close after that.
” He huffs again, a sad, abrupt thing. “Fire eventually took him from me, too.”
My hand wraps around his wrist, halting our steps and forcing him to look at me. “I’m sorry that happened to you.”
“Yeah,” he says with a sad smile. “Me too.”
Tentatively, I reach for his cheek where those scars peek out of his beard, but I hesitate at the conflicted look on his face. “You can touch,” he says, so softly it’s almost a whisper.
My fingertips brush the edges of those awful scars before trailing down his jawline. “The scars don’t take anything away from you, Cato. They only give you more fire.”
“They’re a reminder I couldn’t save them.”
“They’re a reminder that you tried,” I counter. “You didn’t leave them behind. You know that, right?”
He nods, then the tension between us breaks when he chuckles. I tilt my head curiously, and he glances down at where my tail has wrapped around his waist. “Gods,” I groan as I pull it back and tuck it under my coat.
There’s a sadness to his voice when he offers me a half-hearted smirk. “Told you it likes me.”
We’re near the treeline now, the farmhouse visible through the trunks. Sounds carry our way, evidence of the others working on their assigned chores.
“I hope you know he was wrong,” I say as we stand there on the edge of this pocket of privacy we’ve created.
“About what?” he asks, voice rough.
“Our losses don’t define our lives. You’re allowed to love things, Cato.”
He swallows roughly, staring ahead. “But I can’t keep them.”
“Maybe not,” I agree. “Life doesn’t offer us those sorts of guarantees.”
“Then what’s the point?”
I hesitate, forcing the words past my tight throat. “You have to decide if it’s worth it. If the happiness still matters, if it’s still important, if it’s taken away.”
“Was it worth it for you?” he asks.
“I’d do it all over again,” I answer honestly.
He’s quiet for a stretch, fidgeting with his weapon as he takes a few deep inhales. “Does it make me an awful person to say I don’t know if it was worth it for me?”
“No,” I say softly. “It doesn’t.”
“The thought of going through that again… of caring that much and just…” He trails off and swallows. “I don’t know if I’m that brave.”
“You are, Cato. And when you’re not, I’ve got your back.”
“What do we do?” he whispers.
“You don’t have to do anything,” I answer softly, reaching over to squeeze his forearm. “I’m here either way.”
He catches my hand when I try to pull away, then weaves our fingers together with a deep, shuddering breath. He doesn’t look at me, just stares into the distance before he squeezes my hand once and lets go.
“Alright,” he whispers.
“Alright,” I agree, and side by side, we leave the forest and rejoin the others.