Chapter 13 #3
I run my fingers over a few spots of smudged ink, mementos of my failure to align what I wanted with what I knew I had to do. I refold the paper and return it to the drawer. I’m sure when Aeson finds it, he’ll tear it to pieces and pretend it never existed.
I transfer items from my trove into my bag.
My fingers graze a familiar floral pattern embossed in metal, and I grab the palm-sized compact and open it.
The mirror my mother used to talk to my father reflects my soft gaze and slight head tilt.
The rest of my features are broken into the same shapes as the shards now housed within the compact.
The mirror didn’t survive our escape into The Scorch.
I don’t know when or how it broke, but the magic is long dead.
I study the fissure that runs through the small symbol etched into one of the shards and then close the compact and place it in my pack.
I reach back into the drawer for the discs that contain my mother’s logs, but when I get to the bottom of the drawer, they’re not there.
Confused, I peer inside, as though her recordings might be playing hide-and-seek in a corner or something, but they’re not there.
I pull everything out of my bag, making sure I didn’t already pack them, but I haven’t.
Confusion quickly evolves into alarm, and I pull out the rest of my drawers and then frantically tear apart every other hiding spot in my room.
“Ens?” I call out to my sister, abandoning my search when the case of data discs doesn’t miraculously turn up.
“Ens?” I call again, now halfway down the hall that connects our containers.
“Do you have Mom’s logs?” I ask, stepping into her room to find her filling her own pack with her favorite weapons.
“I did,” she answers absently, her gaze flitting back and forth between her long plasma rifle and the bag that’s clearly too small to fit it.
“What do you mean, did ?” I demand, my tone spiked with anger, and her attention jumps to me.
“I gave a lock box of Mom’s things to Imogen before she left with the others.
She promised to keep it safe.” Her eyebrows draw together as she studies my face.
“We couldn’t take them with us, Ev,” she hurries to say in an effort to combat the fury flooding my features.
“Anything we keep with us is going to be confiscated and picked apart by The Horde. I know the discs are coded, but if they can somehow circumvent the security measures, I didn’t want to give them access to our mother’s life, the breeding program, her relationship with our father.
None of that is anyone’s business but ours. ”
Her assessment penetrates my outrage, and I get ahold of myself. She’s right. I hadn’t even thought about the fact that our mother’s things wouldn’t be safe here anymore, or that we sure as shit couldn’t carry them around.
“I’m sorry, Ev,” she continues, easily picking up on my upset. “I would have said something, but you were dealing with what happened in the arena, and I wanted to give you some space.”
I nod and force a half smile that doesn’t quite make it to my eyes. “No, you’re right,” I assure her. “I was just wanting to look something up, that’s all. It’s not a big deal.”
“I might be able to help. What were you looking for?” she offers.
Shit.
I wasn’t planning on mentioning anything to her about my suspicions.
Especially when I’m not even sure it’s possible.
I don’t know much about bonds. It never made sense to worry about them when we thought bonding wasn’t possible without revealing.
So maybe the few odd things that have happened between me and Aeson are completely normal.
It could very well be my overactive imagination, or ignorance, telling me I’m seeing soul ties when really I’m looking at a run-of-the-mill bond.
Enslee’s gaze narrows when I don’t immediately answer. I need to come up with something, and it needs to be as close to the truth as possible. She can’t detect lies like a Thrasher, but she can read my microexpressions and decipher my tells better than anyone. She’ll know if I’m full of shit.
“I just wanted to see what she mentioned about bonding. I always skipped those parts before, but now?.?.?.” I wave a hand at myself and then up toward the sky.
Understanding alights in Enslee’s stare and then it shifts to contrition. “Shit,” she mutters. “I always skipped those parts too.”
I snort out a laugh and then throw my head back and exhale a deep breath. “We’re so fucked.”
“Totally,” Enslee agrees, but her smile is brazen. “That’s never stopped us before though.”
I laugh and wander back toward my room. “We better hurry or we’ll get stuck with the shittiest sandcycles,” I announce.
“Nah, we’re good on that front, but we will get stuck with the nastiest gear,” Enslee lobs back.
Crap. That’s even worse.
I hurry to finish packing, scanning my room one last time when I’m done. My attention snags on the bottom drawer of my dresser, the one that now only houses Aeson’s note. I stare at it for a second, and then I open the drawer, retrieve the folded paper, and tuck it safely into my pack.