Chapter Ten
Yun
I couldn’t get the way Shear had acted out of my head.
Saying he was strange didn’t mean anything.
Anyone who had ever met him would know that much.
It started with those eyes of his, too bright for anything natural, the blue reminding me of a creature staring from the darkness, like his eyes had their own light source.
Add to that a stare that was somehow both knowing and vacant, like he knew everything but understood little of it.
He’d been strange from the first time I’d met him, but somehow it had gotten worse since what had happened with the corrupted. It felt as though he was always staring at me, always tense.
It meant that when it ended up just the two of us, I had no idea how to interact. We sat outside, the walls of the trailer having grown too close over the days we’d spent here. Even with the new place, so much larger than the old one, I couldn’t stand staying in there for too long.
Not that Shear looked happy about babysitting duty.
Of course, he never looks happy about anything.
“I’m not unhappy.”
The way he spoke so casually, responding to something I’d thought but hadn’t said, reminded me to keep my guard up around him.
“Don’t do that.”
“Don’t think so loudly, then.”
“I have no idea what thinking quietly means.” I stretched my legs out on the picnic table we sat at, an outdoor workout area just before us. A few people had been using it when we’d arrived, but they’d scurried off the moment we’d settled ourselves here.
I had a feeling that had at least something to do with Shear rather than me.
It seemed that the story about what I’d done had traveled more slowly than most rumors, suggesting those at the top wanted to keep that close to their chests.
I’d never gotten good at games like that, always too busy trying to keep myself alive to worry about why people in power did the things they did.
“When you think about me, it draws my attention,” Shear said. Hearing him say so much always threw me, since he remained quiet for the most part. Him speaking also suggested he was trying for my benefit.
“So you hear it more then?”
He nodded, his gaze on the empty equipment rather than on me.
I’d noticed that, though. He didn’t seem to look directly at the person he spoke to, as though he preferred to keep it separate.
“I ignore thoughts as best I can, but it takes effort. The more in tune I am with a person, or if their thoughts are something relevant to me, the harder it is to filter it out. So when you think about me, it becomes nearly impossible not to be aware.”
I caught myself before apologizing. I hadn’t done anything wrong, after all, and spending time with espers caused certain social expectations to fall aside.
When dealing with things like increased hearing, sense of smell or other talents, normal politeness between people changed. There were fewer secrets, so people just had to learn how to get along without killing each other. “So why do you look unhappy if you’re not?”
“I don’t really feel happy or unhappy. I never have.” He paused, frowning as though he’d just recalled something he couldn’t quite understand, then shook his head. “So I’m not unhappy with you in any way—this is just who I am.”
“You weren’t like this before.”
He tilted his head but kept his gaze straight out before him. He leaned forward, placing his forearms on his knees, the position hunching him forward. “You’re more observant than I’d prefer.”
“Would you rather I was dumb?”
“Perhaps. It makes it easier when people are, because I don’t have to consider my reactions.”
I scuffed the toe of my shoe against the dirt that covered the ground.
There hadn’t been much time to set up the place, so sidewalks had gone by the wayside.
They’d used heavy machinery to pack the sand and called that good enough.
“Is it because of what I did? I know Carter said it was fine, but maybe you don’t feel the same.
Are you afraid of letting me guide you now?
If you want to use a different guide, I understand.
” The words I could quit lingered on my tongue, but for the first time, I couldn’t get them out.
All the squads I’d joined before had been easy to walk away from, never feeling like a true home. This one, though? It would hurt, and I couldn’t make the offer myself.
If they kicked me out, well, there was nothing I could do about that, but I didn’t want to be the one to suggest it.
“Stop.” The word in my mind was like a break in my spiral, ending it before it could really get going.
I took a deep, shuddering breath, not realizing how fast my mouth had been moving, the way I’d rambled.
Shear spoke again. “That isn’t it, and you should know better than to think that. Unlike Kenyon, I am smart enough to identify something dangerous, and I knew you had that potential from the start.”
“Yeah, but I nearly killed a corrupted—”
“And in doing so, saved our lives as well as your own. You risked yourself when you could have stayed back. So, no, I’m not afraid of you, and I don’t intend to let you go, either.”
Let you go. Those words rang through my head, terrifying in a different way. I thought back to then, back to him, to the way he still spoke through my dreams.
But Shear wasn’t like that, at least I told myself that. I said he was different, that the words didn’t hold that same obsession.
“That’s what has changed. Before you lost consciousness, your mind was wide open, and I saw things you probably didn’t want me to witness.”
Oh…
I froze, the truth something I had amazingly not considered. I’d thought he’d wanted to cast me aside because of what I’d done, because of my powers, but I hadn’t thought it would be because of what had happened before.
And, damn it, that almost hurt worse. Did he see me as filthy now? Had he seen what I’d done to survive and now saw me as damaged goods?
My eyes burned, but I refused to let that show.
“Right. Well, I guess it all makes sense now. Who would want some used, broken guide?”
“Yun—”
I kept going, not hearing him above the rushing of my own thoughts through my mind, the ones that spilled from my lips. “Of course you wouldn’t want to touch me, not after knowing the truth. Guess I should have said that from the start.” I got off the bench, needing distance.
I was not going to cry. He said my name again, but I barely heard him, trying to escape before I made a bigger fool of myself out here, in front of everyone.
Except a sharp spark of pain rushed through my temples, and everything went dark around me.
The next thing, I wasn’t there in the sunlight anymore. Instead, shadows surrounded me, faded and moving like the world had no shape. It twisted, dark and yet somehow familiar. Spiny trees took form, and a glance up showed the purple streaks of a dungeon.
My heart sped impossibly faster, until I worried I’d pass out right then. Had a dungeon opened? Had I gotten pulled into one without realizing it?
Could this be The Pitt opening early?
“We’re in your mind.” Before me, that voice took form, becoming Shear. He somehow looked even more formidable here, as though finally at full power. “I didn’t think this was a conversation you wanted to have in public, and you were spiraling.”
I let out a soft laugh, too relieved by the truth to be angry about him being in my head. Even my own mind was better than The Pitt. “So this isn’t your first time here, huh?”
“No. I’ve slipped into your mind a few times.
At first, I didn’t understand what I was seeing, had to simply observe your thoughts, try to gain understanding without context.
I am sorry that I had to so suddenly. It must have hurt.
” He reached out as though to touch my head, the place at my temples where that sharp pain had seared through me.
I flinched away from him, something I hadn’t done in a while.
He froze, then lowered his hand.
“Sorry,” I whispered, my throat dry. Even if I knew this was my own mind, that it didn’t exist in the same way as an actual dungeon, my body didn’t seem to understand that fully. Instead, it reacted as though I were really out there.
“It’s fine.” His tone implied it truly was, but whether that was because he understood my reaction or just didn’t care, that I didn’t know. “Now, have you calmed enough for us to have an actual conversation?”
The way he spoke annoyed me, as though he were above those sorts of outbursts. Then I recalled his anger the time I’d calmed him—he might pretend to have no emotions, but clearly that wasn’t true.
His eyes narrowed, suggesting he’d caught the stray thought, but he said nothing about it before moving on.
“I wasn’t judging you for what happened inside that dungeon.
I wasn’t avoiding you because I thought you were somehow sullied or damaged—though judging from this”—he waved around at the state of my mind—“you clearly were damaged by it. Instead, I was thinking about how it might have happened. I would look at you and see that, and wonder how you could have survived it. What made you different? How could you have escaped it and survived?”
“So you’re just curious? Like what I went through is just something for you to figure out?” I twisted as though to walk away from him, even if there wasn’t anywhere to go.
When I did, he appeared before me again, suggesting he was far more adept at moving around in a person’s mind than I was.
“Normally, yes, I would say it was nothing but curiosity. That is how I’ve always been.
Nothing matters to me, not really, but you’re different.
I don’t know why, but when I think about that…
” He paused, and a line appeared between his eyebrows.
Seeing him uncertain was strange, but it didn’t cool my temper. “I’m not your little puzzle! Stop trying to figure me out for fun.”
“It’s not that.” His gaze wasn’t on me, instead on the ground, darting back and forth in quick jerks. “I don’t understand how you could go through that and still be you.”
That did give me pause, the words unexpected and honestly confusing. “What?”
“Your mind is fractured, your abilities changed by the trauma, yet you are still you. You still try to connect with others, still risk yourself, and I don’t understand how.”
“Again with the understanding. Why do you care?”
His next words escaped him in an unexpected and angry shout. “Because you did it and I never could!”