Chapter 12
Esme
There was a nonzero chance I was having a heart attack.
I wasn’t breathing well, and the Bond wasn’t making it much easier for me.
Its excitement, its hunger, its greed was taking up every ounce of oxygen in my body, punishing me for not giving it what it so desperately craved.
My legs were barely working, feeling as weak as they would after nerves went numb. I wobbled like a newborn fawn all the way through the crowd, blindly finding a moment of peace in the narrow stretch of hallway between the main hall and the training facilities and collapsing into a seat.
Raking in breaths hurt, like each molecule of air was a tiny razor blade.
The Bond smiled in return, loving the pain. It would protect me if I was truly in danger, but it had long abandoned any sort of reaction to my suffering—especially if it was a result of me forcing distance with Ford.
My head hit the wall behind me, that snap of pain across my skull nothing but a distant ache. I didn’t even try to stop the tear that built in the corner of my eye and trickled down my cheek.
Three more droplets had fallen from my jaw, pooling in my collarbone by the time I felt a presence next to me, warm like most pleasant days on Muli.
“There sure are a lot of people here,” Freya mused, pulling her knees to her chest. I knew that by sound and years of friendship alone. I hadn’t yet gained the courage to open my eyes.
“Half of them work for the Empire. You know who they work for, so they aren’t really strangers.”
Freya’s hum was the only indication she heard me. I knew that she was feeling off kilter, unused to being around so many new people. Years later, and I still hadn’t quite discovered whether she was genuinely scared of strangers, or whether she was on guard for someone who might show up.
Several minutes later, much of which was spent trying to steady my breathing, Freya asked, “Are you okay? I know the answer, but I need to ask anyway.”
I blinked my eyes open, finding her looking at me with a gaze crinkled with worry. I nodded, my neck still stiff with restrained tears. “Nothing I haven’t experienced before.”
Freya’s eyebrows creased, one sharp pull that meant she was unsatisfied with that answer. “I don’t really know all that much about what you experienced. You don’t talk about it. All I saw was that night.”
Though I wanted so badly to push this conversation away and fall into that ever-tempting well of defensiveness, I resisted, if not to prevent Freya any harm on a day already so unsettling. “I never thanked you. For helping. Nor have I apologized for what you may have seen.”
It was a handful of breaths before Freya responded. “I sat by your bedside for most of it. I knew you would wake up—eventually. Ford was alive, so I assumed you’d stay that way. But that still wasn’t easy for me to see. Even less so when I realized how much you’d hid.”
“I know.” I did, really. “I think I felt like if I shared any of what I was going through, I’d have to finally confront it. I didn’t think I could hold out for long if you knew. And then Ford would and he wouldn’t be able to return it.”
That was quite a bit more exposing than I intended, but Freya was a safe space.
“I understand.” Freya was careful with her words, not speaking just to do so. A trait learned from years of being forced into a mold that fit other people’s expectations. “I don’t think that last part is accurate anymore, though.”
I had to laugh at that, a quick little bark. “You really see everything, don’t you?”
Freya lifted one shoulder and considered for a moment. “Everything isn’t technically accurate, but most things, yes.”
"I don’t know what to do.” Both our eyes went slightly wide at that confession.
Freya recovered quicker than I did, waiting patiently until I continued.
“I’m…I think I’m scared. If the Bond exists, then it should be easy to just give into it, right?
But all I’ve ever known was a Bond that made me feel crazy, one that didn’t care what was right or acceptable or possible, just what it wanted.
I don’t know how to…” I trailed off, unable to find the words.
“Accept a world where what it wants is also what’s right?” Freya supplied, loosening something in my chest with the words.
I nodded, throat tight again. I just needed to give myself a few minutes to wallow, and then I’d be okay. I had to be okay.
There was too much at stake to fall into a well of despair.
Freya placed a hand on my leg and I almost jolted from the shock of it. I wasn’t the most comfortable with physical affection—not from lack of craving it, from lack of practice. You didn’t go from isolated orphan to rejected paranima without that little side effect.
Where I was largely uncomfortable with it, Freya outright rejected it. For her to offer up touch was…well, it made me feel a little less crazy for feeling as horrible about all this as I did.
Some small part of me was saying that I should be happy about this, thankful the Bond finally woke up, but it didn’t feel that easy.
Unsure whether resting my hand on top of Freya’s would be too far, I moved slowly, meeting her eyes as I did. When she didn’t move away, I settled my hand down on top of hers and squeezed lightly in thanks.
Freya’s cheeks tightened then released, not quite a flinch. More like she was bracing herself, then realized there was no need to.
“The Empire is not happy. First an attack on Bellamy, then the camp. They want retribution,” Freya said, moving right into business.
“Where’d you hear that?” I asked, grateful for a moment of distraction, even if it was for this.
Freya shrugged in a forced show of humility. “Overheard Dulik chatting with General Iroko.”
And by overheard, she likely meant actively spying, but she got the information all the same. I breathed in deeply, my body already preparing for this next mission. “The Prince, I assume.”
Freya nodded. “Likely. He’s the heir, but I think they just want to hit the Royal family in some way. They outnumber us there, and it’s too difficult to defend on this side. The Empire wants to force their hand.”
It was true. If our estimations were correct, Muli outnumbered us two to one in population, let alone the fact that their people were, on average, stronger than ours.
While their side of the Bridge was in the middle of rich forest, able to support a sprawling war camp miles deep if needed, ours was in the middle of the desert.
The type of infrastructure it would take to support an entire defensive army…
That was why we Crossed—it was far easier to prevent people from entering the Bridge than trying to take down every Muli soldier that managed to Cross into Vir.
Still, simply winning this war was never the Empire’s goal. “The Emperor wants leverage, but for what?” I asked Freya, though I had ideas of my own.
Freya’s eyes flashed with something, turning the brilliant green slightly silver.
If I wasn’t mistaken, I’d think it was fear, though it was different than the rare flashes of the emotion I’d seen from her before.
“Power. Based on what Bellamy has said…I think he wants to force a treaty—but one that makes sure Vir has access to Muli’s resources. ”
I scoffed with indignation. This was really all too predictable. “And funneling straight through him.”
Freya’s answering laugh was full of ire—well as much as she was able to conjure up.
Most people thought she was naturally sweet.
I’d learned over the years that she was just good at hiding the depth of what she felt, particularly the uglier emotions.
“Hard to take someone out of power when they are the only person stopping you from going to war.”
I shook my head, mind racing with potential next steps. As much as I didn’t want to disrupt what Bellamy and Soren had found, it was really a shame that the Prince had rescinded his offer of marriage. That would have been the Emperor’s perfect solution.
Unless— “Do you think he’s going after the Princess? Another arranged marriage?”
“Ambrose is not the political savant the Emperor would need,” Freya snapped back lightning quick.
It took me a beat to long to realize that she was talking about the heir to the Greene family.
The next Royal family to pick up the mantle to lead the Empire after the current Emperor passed it along after his seven year rule, the way his predecessor and theirs before them had. If he did so at all.
I’d just only known him as the Greene heir or in my snotty moments, that green Greene kid. I was surprised Freya remembered his first name, though I guessed there had been much more discussion of Royals with Bellamy and Soren around, swapping stories of their childhood in the Royal court.
My mind diverted to the other Royals, who could be another match for the Prince or Princess, someone to use as political leverage.
I never got the chance to dive too far into that rabbit hole, because a younger, pale-faced solider poked his head right into my hiding spot and said, “Excuse me, Esme, but Ford is asking for you.”
My jaw clenched. He didn’t get to order me around like I was some dog, sending a young soldier to do his dirty work. Who did he think he—
“I think he wants you to see his family,” Freya whispered, the voice of reason I needed.
Right.
“Thank you,” I muttered as kindly as I could, bracing myself to confront the family I’d wished for so many years could have been mine.
?
By the time the families said their tearful goodbyes, complete with a propaganda-filled speech so ridiculous it threatened to make my ears bleed, I was exhausted.
Physically, from the Cross. That trampled-by-horses feeling didn’t go away for a day or so.
Mentally, from the pain of seeing Ford smiling and happy. Of feeling the comfort of Sophie’s friendship, somehow deep and real despite so few interactions. Of hearing Adam and Annie call me Auntie Esme, like I was their blood relative.