41. Vesper
VESPER
“No!” I scream, sitting up so fast, it makes my head swim.
I immediately plop back down as nausea slams into me so hard, it takes every ounce of willpower to keep my stomach bile down.
I press my hand to my head as a skull-splitting headache flares up at the light filtering in through windows.
It’s so bright I have to squint my eyes.
Sunshine. It’s sunshine, I realize.
I’m still not used to the lack of red glow that shined on Dross. The colors here are more vibrant, more real, but wherever I am right now, it’s anything but.
I’m in a bed I don’t remember climbing into. The sheets are soft and silky against my skin. The pillow is thick and smoosh-y. I look down at my clothing in a panic and see everything but my thick winter jacket and cloak in place.
Beside me, on a nearby table, Svetlana is asleep on a pile of cloth. She’s passed out as hard as I must have been, soft snores coming from the praying mantis. A bug shouldn’t be able to snore, but she is, her little arms tucked tight against her body as she dreams.
I wait for the nausea to calm for a few minutes before I risk sitting up again.
This time, I move slowly, careful not to jostle my body too hard.
I sit on the edge of the bed for another few minutes, gathering my bearings, before I risk rising to my feet.
I sway just a little, a reminder of the alcohol I’d drunk before filtering in through my mind.
I press my hand against my forehead again and try to remember what happened.
I remember drinking, then dancing, then . . . nothing. I remember nothing.
I do a mental check of my body, searching for any new aches and pains. Nothing. Not even the pain from the yeti fight. I frown.
“Hello?” I call.
I’m in a small room with very few furnishings, but there’s an open doorway before me that leads to, I assume, another part of the building.
No one answers my call, but I can hear the gentle sound of papers rustling.
I follow the sound out of the doorway and find an apartment larger than the one Dox and I had shared.
There’s a man in the main area, a man I’m starting to recognize.
He’s sitting at a table, a large paper with small font open in front of him, his back to me. He doesn’t look at me.
“It still surprises me that they put out a newspaper in this region,” he says in a gravelly voice.
I blink. I’ve never met this man before, but I certainly know who he is. How I ended up in what’s clearly his home though? I don’t have an answer for that.
“A . . . what?” I ask, wincing at the sheer amount of sunshine streaming in through the large bank of windows along the wall.
I can see we’re high up judging by the scene outside those windows, but that still doesn’t answer anything other than that I’m somewhere I very much don’t remember coming to.
Havoc turns finally and looks at me over his shoulder.
He holds up the paper in his hand. “They write stories about what’s happening in The Harrow.
New stories every week. Like the news updates in the safehouses.
I’ve seen you a few times in the last couple of weeks.
Making a name for yourself, it seems.” He folds it up and sets it down on the table so that he can turn and fully look at me.
“The propaganda from Dross makes it in, too.”
I stare at him and then look back down at my own body again. I’m wearing everything. All my fastenings are in their proper places. Everything is as it should be, but if I’m in his home . . .
“Nothing happened,” he grunts, looking away out the windows. “You passed out. I made sure you were safe.”
I narrow my eyes. “Why?”
“Why, what?” he asks. “Why would I help or why did you pass out?”
“Both.”
I move slowly into the room and weakly fall into the opposite chair from him. My head is still pounding, but I need to figure out what happened.
“The drinks here are a risk unless you know what you’re drinking,” he says, answering the second question first. “The one you were drinking is one of the stronger ones. They make it like vodka, but they add in some hallucinogenic potion that I have yet to find the name for. I’d suggest avoiding it in the future.
Knocks you out and gives you one hell of a hangover. ”
I wince, reminded of the pain I’m currently dealing with. “Noted.”
“You’re a player, a rather popular one at that. You should be smarter,” he chastises. “I don’t often interfere. Even considered leaving you to your lesson.”
“Why didn’t you?” I ask, watching him carefully.
He shrugs. “Your bug found me. Kind of like her.”
He still isn’t looking at me, his face turned toward the windows.
The sunshine dances across his face in a way that makes him even more devastatingly handsome than he looks on the posters.
I’ve seen Havoc many times in my life. The Luxe Guards love to use his image on the propaganda posters around Dross.
You, too, can be a legend.
Havoc, the Legend.
The Harrow makes legends.
I’ve seen it so many times, it makes me sick. And now here I am, sitting in front of the man they use to convince others to enter the Harrow. Here he is, just sitting here, reading a newspaper, completely relaxed.
Rumor has it he’s been in the Harrow for almost a decade.
He entered one day and just never left. It makes sense.
Even with all the dangers of the Harrow, it’s still far better than Dross.
At least you won’t starve here and you don’t catch any of the sicknesses we have to contend with back home.
And Havoc doesn’t seem the kind to be about the Golden City of Luxe anyway. He’s too rough for that. Too gravelly.
I study him closer, taking note of the small scars I can see on his arms here and there.
He’s dark-haired, the hair longer and messy around his ears.
His eyes are so dark, they almost don’t look human.
In Dross, men struggle to grow facial hair, mostly because of the poisonous air.
Apparently, it effects hair growth so when they try, it grows in spotty.
Beards are rare back on the ring. But Havoc has a thick, healthy beard, trimmed neat and nice on his face.
There’s a massive sword leaning against the table beside him that I flick my eyes to.
All around, he looks exactly like the posters, if a little more rough around the edges.
I want to ask him about that, about how he became The Legend, but there are more important things to worry about right now. I haven’t seen Locke.
“The man with me,” I say, looking around the room. “Where is he?”
He hadn’t been in the bed with me and he’s not in this room. Svetlana was there, sleeping, but no one else had been tossed in.
Havoc’s brows shoot up in surprise. “The Bone Breaker? I didn’t realize you two were . . . together.”
“We’re travelling together,” I clarify. Not that it’s any of his business, but it felt important to clarify just in case Locke wouldn’t like the implication. We’re friends and we’ve gone through a lot, but we haven’t exactly discussed anything deeper.
He frowns. “Why?”
I frown back at him. “Why not?”
“Bone Breakers are untrustworthy,” Havoc replies.
“This one isn’t,” I argue, staring at him hard.
He studies me, those dark eyes tracing my face. “Interesting.”
I try not to think about the strange feeling in my stomach at his perusal. Somehow, it feels like he sees deeper inside me than I’m letting him. Like he can read deeper into my words than I’d like.
“Where is he?” I ask again, starting to grow worried.
Havoc shrugs. “He was being carried off by—” He stops when I stand up suddenly. “Where are you going?”
“To go get him,” I answer, raising my brow. “I just hope Stevie is with him.”
“Stevie?” Havoc asks, frowning.
“The Ophanim that was with us,” I clarify. At his deadpan expression, I add, “The floating ball of rings and wings and creepy eyes.”
Havoc just stares at me. “You keep interesting company, player.”
“Who was carrying him off?” I ask as I adjust my clothing and try my hardest to push down the headache.
“The rats,” he replies. “But you can’t just go marching into the sewers. The rats don’t like that.”
“Well, I’m not leaving him there,” I argue, spinning to meet his eyes. “Will you help me?”
He grunts out a laugh. “I’ve done my part.”
“So that’s a no?”
He crosses his arms over his chest. “What do I look like to you? A handy helper?”
I don’t know what that is, but I assume it’s not great. Either way, I straighten and walk back over to him, stopping just in front of his chest. I’m in his space, and he tenses, but he doesn’t step back.
“I thought you were a legend,” I say, staring at him.
His brows pull in. “A legend that stays alive,” he counters. “I don’t go around taking unnecessary risks. A Bone Breaker is hardly worth all this trouble. Trust me.”
My face twists. Without looking away from him, I call, “Svetlana, wake up! We’ve gotta go.”
I hear her rise in the other room and groggily say something in another language I don’t understand.
“But I want to sleep,” she calls back, clearly agitated as she appears slowly from the doorway to the room.
She sees Havoc and immediately straightens, lifting taller on her legs.
“Oh, hello handsome,” she purrs despite the grogginess. “You have such a pretty head.”
Havoc just looks from the praying mantis to me and shakes his head, clearly done with us.
“So, you won’t help?” I clarify. He doesn’t answer, only stares at me. “Fine,” I grunt. “Never meet your heroes, huh?”
He takes a step back finally and tips up his chin. “There are no heroes here, player,” he replies. “Only survivors.”
I scoff. “Some fucking legend,” I spit, before I scoop up Svetlana and storm out the door.