13 #2
“How are you feeling?” I ask as I unlock my muscles and continue to head over, finding my place on the edge of the bed.
Cooper follows, eyes fixed on Ezla’s abnormally tranquil face as he pauses beside Tate, folding his arms across his chest. “Any wooziness? Do you feel funny like last time, Tiger?”
“No, I’m fine.” His choked reply is muffled in our Bonded as he stays firmly in place, and Alby gives a nod of agreement that I can only just make out.
“Are you sure?” Concern laces my tone.
“Promise, Scotty,” Tiger whispers shakily. “I just need Ezzy.”
As I take in Alby and his silence, I know he feels the same.
Tate hasn’t even spared a glance for either of them despite them being all over her, and I’m sure that’s because of his emotional absence right now, but we all saw what happened with Cooper and him in the Game last night, so I hope that when he’s back, things might have changed a bit there.
Ezla’s mismatched eyes snap open.
Cooper sucks in a sharp breath. “Vengeance.”
Back online, Tate’s head lifts in a flash. His grip tightens on her hand as his intense stare bores into her face. “Havoc.”
“Ezzy! Oh my god, Ez!” Tiger sniffles, his thick golden waves all that are visible beside her chin with his face buried in the crook of her neck. “Y-you’re okay. I was so, s-so worried. You f-fell so fast.”
“Love? Are you okay? No pain?” I ask, trying hard to keep the anxiousness from my voice so I can soothe any panic around me.
Alby whispers her name unsteadily, head lifted to see her awake and alive, before choking out, “W-what h-happened?”
“You tried to leave me,” Ezla seethes. “That is what happened. You cannot leave me—” Her voice gets caught in her throat, and her humiliation trickles into the bond I’m not she realises is open.
But she shows none of that as she shifts, Tate reluctantly letting her hand go but, in a miracle, not arguing as she wraps an arm around Tiger and the other around Alby. Ezla crushes them to her.
The air audibly stills in their lungs, and they press closer at once, Alby moving further up now that Tate’s arm isn’t in the way.
“You all hit the concrete,” Cooper explains lowly, eyes sliding closed like saying it out loud is too much, the memories too fresh, too raw. “We couldn’t get to you in time.”
Guilt overwhelms me at yet another failure from me—
“Scotty,” Ezla barks, and I jolt. “You are well overdue a punishment. Do not make it worse. The only thing you are failing at is being logical lately.”
“I know, right? Fucking annoying,” Cooper mutters under his breath, though his eyes are still glued to Ezla as searingly as Tate’s, and I’m pretty sure that was his attempt at reducing all the doom and gloom in the room.
“H-how—how are we alive? Avri?” Alby whispers.
“Evidently,” Ezla replies, and his ebony lashes flutter closed when her hand strokes over his head. Her other finds its way to Tiger’s in the next moment, and he lets out a happy sound, some of the heaviness starting to lift as he takes in the fact that she’s really okay, just as they are.
He’s doing much better than me—it took me a while to come to terms with the fact that their motionless figures were unconscious rather than dead, to remind myself that Avri is exceptional when used correctly, and that the energy has truly healed them all fully.
Ezla says next, “It is not too surprising as Avri has treated me in this exact way before. However, my fall was wildly embarrassing—”
“Pause,” Cooper interrupts, and her mismatched eyes narrow. I can tell he’s trying to stay calm and not be demanding after all the traumatic events and the fact she’s only just woken up, but he stills presses, “Do you mean to say you’ve fallen from something that high before?”
“Hm.” Ezla’s dismissive response tells me she’s building her walls back up.
“No, Vengeance. Please.” Cooper steps forwards, features twisting as if he’s in physical torment. “Please, HC. Give me something here. You said before . . . You felt before, I mean . . .”
Huffing, Ezla pulls Tiger closer, then closes her eyes and brings her nose to his hair, inhaling subtly. He brightens more than ever before, and something in me melts at the sight of her actions, too.
Until she raises her voice. “Everyone, out! My Bonded and I need some alone time.”
The nurses scattered about all pause.
Ezla glares viciously.
They burst into action.
Speeding from the room, they’re gone within seconds.
Absently, Ezla caresses Alby’s head again, and he shivers. Then turns to stone along with the rest of us when she says tonelessly, “I threw myself off the Techtis Council building a couple of years ago.”
“What?” Tate hisses while my heart sinks like a lead weight.
“It did not do much good, only earned me more punishments when the Avri healed me,” she continues without inflection.
“The only reason I survived to even make it to treatment from such a height was because I second-guessed myself. I do not make irrational decisions, and yet I realised halfway down that I had not thought things out too well, leaving me to half-heartedly attempt to catch myself on my Avri platforms. It was wildly irritating to not be able to decide if I would like to keep falling or not mid-air, you understand.” She appears oblivious to our incredulous horror as she watches her fingers run through Alby’s hair in what can only be described as fascination.
Tiger’s cerulean eyes are glossy, but that doesn’t stop him from subtly nudging his head into Ezla’s hand for more attention on his own strands. Maybe the pain even encourages it as a result of a need for comfort.
I’m half tempted to stick my own head into the pile.
“H-how did it get that bad?” Alby rasps, chin resting on her chest.
Ezla shrugs, seemingly unaffected by all of this. “Nothing in particular.”
Cooper’s eyes narrow. “Are you lying?”
Unimpressed, she replies blandly, “No. It was simply build-up. I . . .” She hesitates, and I straighten, giving in to the urge to move closer.
Kneeling at her side by her head, not wanting her to have to look up at me, especially not when she’s in such a vulnerable position, I encourage soothingly, “You can tell us anything, Love.” I reach out slowly, waiting for any sign of protest before tenderly placing my hand on her head and stroking her hair, which I freed from its tight braids while she’d been unconscious so that she’d be comfortable when she woke.
Tate, Cooper, and I were also the ones to clean the dirt and blood from her, sure she’d prefer less people touching her.
Though I’ll admit, it wasn’t entirely unselfish with the need to comfort myself by caring for her so strong in me.
“Hm.”
Sighing and scrubbing a hand over his stubbled jaw, Cooper takes a seat on the edge of the bed. “Fuck, Vengeance. How much more horrors are you hiding, huh?”
“Quite a few.” Her admission is as unbothered as ever.
He groans. “And will you tell us all of them?”
“There would not be time.”
His jaw clenches. “Even if it took all the time in the world, I’d want to know any minor detail, Vengeance, just so I can carry some of the burden.”
“Awwwww, how romantic,” Tiger coos. “And I agree, Ezzy.”
Lips twitching as if she could almost smile, she flattens them out again before revealing quieter than her previous words, and somewhat haltingly, “Sometimes, I have found it . . . too much. Over the years, I have been . . . I have provoked my father on purpose, searching for the magic button that would . . . end it all.”
Tate lets out a dangerous growl like he’s attempting to scare her demons away. “You’ve been attempting to take your life—my life—away? Because of him?” He doesn’t wait for a response before spitting, “When the fuck can we kill this vile, disgusting, pathetic, motherfucki—”
“Calm, Tate.”
He pauses at once with Ezla’s hand on his thickly muscled arm, pupils blowing out as he lasers in on the action.
She continues, “I had always planned to make it through the Games and never return. But thirteen years is a long time. It should come as no surprise that I began to spend time searching for a faster way out of my situation.”
It’s silent for a few beats after that, no one knowing what to say.
Alby breaks that silence with red-rimmed eyes and a whispered, “I . . . I wish we’d found you sooner.”
A beat. Then, “So do I.”
Breaths hitch and eyes widen all around.