Chapter 20 #4
The image of the patchy field of overgrown grass clumps littered with the eerie scattering of bones stays fixed in my mind even after we get back to Draven and debrief. I see it while I shower and change clothes, when I stop to grab something to eat, and even after I go for a drive to get some air.
The white, cracked remains of Gifted murdered and left behind like trash stays hanging over my head until I arrive at my Bond’s door without ever really intending to seek her out. I’m far more likely to get into an argument with her than be comforted, but I knock, regardless.
Seeing her face is enough.
Except my Bond doesn’t open the door. I don’t have to pry into her head to know that she doesn’t even move from her bed. I’m sure she knows it’s one of her Bonds, but she’s probably just too tired to want to deal with another argument.
I can’t help myself.
“Open the door, Oli.”
The Bond who opens the door is a very different one than the snarling and furious girl I’d first laid eyes on. There are dark circles under her eyes, and the corners of her lips are turned down like she’s trying not to outright scowl at me.
She’s exhausted.
The longer I stare at her, my own face carefully blank as I make my assessment, the more skittish she gets.
It starts with her cheeks turning pink, then she fidgets with the pen still in her hands until her face is almost glowing with embarrassment.
Still, I can’t look away. She never reacts so easily.
I’ve seen her enraged, ashamed, and even sacred, but there’s always a build up, some sort of catalyst to tip her over the edge.
All I’m doing is looking at her.
I step forward on instinct, my body drawn to her and ready to comfort her, but she stumbles away from me as she lets me into the tiny dorm room where North has her tucked away. The hallway was already empty, but having a closed door behind us both is still a relief to my bond.
It’s practically seething with discontent even before I lock the door and find it the most worthless excuse of security I’ve ever seen. Anyone could break it down, and the fact that whoever North tasked with finding suitable housing for my Bond has endangered her like this is unconscionable.
I can’t decide if I want to kill the petty excuse of a Gifted myself or watch as the Dravens’ nightmares consume them.
Both are as tempting as the other, but I already know it’ll come down to North and whether he can see past his own bruised ego to admit that he wants to deal with this slight against his Bond himself.
Never one to care about the opinions of others, he’s taken her rejection harder than most realize.
He’s a classic case of only caring about the opinions of those he loves and cares for…
and his Bond’s opinion mattered most of all.
It doesn’t excuse this lapse in the least, but I can see clearly how we’ve gotten to this low point.
When it’s clear my Bond isn’t going to break the silence, I do. “The Healer did a decent job. I thought for sure you’d be bedridden from the pond bitch’s bite.”
It’s an attempt at neutrality, and she pulls a face as she sits down on her bed, the springs squeaking in an offensive way. “She wasn’t that bad.”
Bravado.
From any other Gifted, I wouldn’t even need my Gift to know that’s all that statement is and yet—truth.
Will I ever manage to know this Bond of mine fully? Will she ever stop revealing new layers of complicated and unexpected reactions to things that throw me off center? Giftless, or at least pretending to be, and yet she didn’t find the horror of the maze ‘that bad’?
I lean back against the door, feigning nonchalance as if I’m not desperate for her answers.
“She feeds on fear. Most Gifted go up against her absolutely shitting themselves because she becomes the worst nightmare they’ve ever had to live through.
You gave her nothing, even after she spooked you. That’s not a normal response.”
Her face hardens instantly, as though a tonne of bricks suddenly stack together into a wall between us.“I never claimed I was normal.”
That wall and defense makes me reckless, my frustration at this stalemate boiling over.
The image of that pit of bones is still lingering in my mind and the idea of who, or what, could’ve caused mass deaths at that scale without leaving a trace isn’t just an obscure fear I’m fixating on because of my protective Bond instincts.
The Central Bond of the feared and monstrous Draven Bond Group is always going to be a target.
How many Gifted want this headstrong, determined, beautiful, perfect Bond of mine to lie dead in a pit just like that one until there’s no memories left of her as well?
How big is the target on her back going to grow while we’re too busy arguing over the actions of her past?
How long will it be before she slips through my fingers again?
My voice practically trembles out of me. “I think you made a mistake, and instead of owning up to it and making amends, you’ve doubled down on it. You should have trusted us… whatever happened in that hospital room that made you run away, you should have run to us instead.”
My Gift of the Truth has always relied on conscious, verbal interactions.
I can look into the minds of others to dig for information, to sift through memories and find out whatever I need to know that way, but that is my primary Gift being put to work.
I know this for sure, because while that takes some work and deduction on my part, my incidental Gift is a sensory response.
The taste of ash on my tongue for a lie.
The euphoria of unadulterated, intentional truth.
I’ve never felt the bone-chilling surety of fear before. I didn’t even know that counted as a truth, but there’s no question of which Gift is picking up on my Bond’s terror right now.
She hasn’t spoken a word.
It’s been more than a decade since I figured out the limits of my Gift and my world seems to tilt on its axis.
The moment our eyes meet, the fight leaves her in a rush, the permanent mask fixed over her features shattering instantly.
If I’d thought she looked exhausted when I arrived, it has nothing on the aching weariness that clings desperately to her.
Again, my bond ripples in my chest as if it’s replying.
I’ve never known it to be so responsive, even to her, but there’s an undeniable fury brewing at the state she’s in now.
Her eyes fill with tears but her voice is determined, brimming with her truth that pours into me like a drug.
“Those opinions of yours tell me I did the right thing, and I’m not pissed about it.
You can hate me all you like because at least you’re fucking breathing, Gryphon.
Please leave, I’m still exhausted from the Healing and I can’t do this right now. ”
With a curt nod, I do as she says and leave even as my bond thrums with vindication.
It’s not a good thing to find out that someone is threatening my Bond…
or that something spooked her. But it’s the first time she’s confirmed, even slightly, that she’s worried about her Bonds.
Her fears of our safety is what’s driving her away from us all, I’d bet my life on it.
If I find out what happened, I’ll know how to fix this broken Bond Group of ours.
I wait until I hear that pathetic excuse for a lock clicking behind me before I dig out my phone to organize a guard to stand at the door until I can get a better lock on it only to find a dozen missed calls from North and a text from Vivian.
The Resistance have retaliated.
More Gifted are gone.