Summer Ruins (5 page)

“I said I would take you to say good-bye. Anyway, we’ll go to my sinum; it’s unguarded. I’ll get the boys and bring them there, too.”

“Why are you doing this, Deshi? If you don’t care about us?” I’m not trying to be rude; it’s simply the question in the forefront of my mind.

He doesn’t answer for a while, and it makes me wonder if he even knows. Finally he meets my eyes and I do see uncertainty there this time before he frowns. “When you told me you care about them—that you love them—I believe you. Even if you don’t care about me, I know how it feels. And I’d want to say good-bye.”

Before I can ask who he cares about or what happened to them, he grabs my hand and pulls me into the hive. My head spins without anything to focus on, and Deshi does it all with his own power instead of borrowing some of mine. I’ve never entered the hive that way unless I’ve been asleep, and technically that doesn’t mean I was unwilling, only unconscious.

I didn’t know we could be forced, which was probably a good thing; it would have made every confrontation with the Others even scarier, and that’s not optimal while trying to convince myself we can beat them. It’s disconcerting being dragged along instead of going willingly, and my body feels jostled and sore.

We land in a strange sinum, the first one I’ve entered in weeks that’s unprotected by a barrier. Worry snakes into my stomach. If this is a trap, I’m a sitting duck. If Deshi can bring me here, can he
keep
me here?

“Wait here. I’ll be back.”

“Deshi how do you know they’re not going to find us? This isn’t safe, with no barrier.” I try to force a confrontational tone, but even I hear the terror rushing through my question.

“Althea, it’s fine. The Wardens are in a briefing about the Summer Celebration, followed by a training session for their assigned jobs. We have at least three hours.” He pauses. “And I don’t need a barrier. I’m not hiding anything from the Others. They’re my family.”

I only nod, unwilling to upset him and have him retract this opportunity to see my friends. He evaporates from his sinum briefly, leaving me alone less than five minutes before he reappears with a dazed-looking, filthy Pax.

That slow smile squeezes my heart with joy. Until my eyes roam downward and find the gaping wounds bleeding through the slashes in his thin t-shirt.

Chapter 6.

Deshi leaves, but I hardly notice. I throw myself into Pax’s arms, wrapping mine around the solid breadth of him to make sure he’s really here. The warm sunshine of his aura wraps around me; the comforting scent of apples and cinnamon piles into my nose until it diffuses through my blood.

He sets me gently away after a moment, wincing but trying to cover it up with a smile. “Wow, I never thought I’d enjoy seeing you more than I did the first time we met.”

I swat his arm, my cheeks heating at the memory. Pax will never let me forget that he’s seen me naked, probably not even if we live through this and see our hundredth birthdays. My embarrassment distracts me, but not for long. “What happened to you?”

“Me? What happened to you?” he asks, running a soft finger across the bridge of my nose.

I haven’t thought about it in days; my nose stopped hurting a while ago. It must still bear the scars of Deshi shoving me face-first into the wall. “Nothing. It’s nothing, and it happened a while ago. This is obviously still happening.”

He looks down when I point at the open cuts across his skin. There are too many of them for it to have been an accident, or a single torture. I can see in Pax’s face that he doesn’t want to tell me, and he’s saved when Deshi reappears.

The scent of pine trees and fresh snow spins me around. Lucas’s face—tired, pale skin streaked with dirt, still bearing the barely-healed gash along his jaw from Kendaja’s touch, but beautiful—rips a sob from my throat. Relief and joy, exactly what’s pumping through my veins, fill his eyes and we crash into each other with two steps.

Lucas’s cold arms wrap around my back, squeezing me so tight against his chest I can’t breathe. It’s okay. I don’t need to breathe. This is my air, what sustains me—this feeling of perfect belonging in his arms.

“You’re really here,” he breathes into my hair.

“Where you are, I am.” My voice breaks.

My tears are hot, even steaming a little in the frigid air coming off Lucas. Even though Deshi and Pax are there, Lucas presses my face between his hands and crushes his lips against mine. I want to sob into him, to never let go, and the kiss is too short.

We don’t say anything more. Words don’t matter.

Deshi clears his throat, and Lucas and I tear our eyes from each other. “I’ll leave you alone for ten minutes. I think that’s all we can afford. The Wardens are in a meeting, but not everyone is. If Zak or Kenda need me and can’t find me, they’ll look here first. So, ten minutes.”

It doesn’t escape me that Deshi is risking something here, even if he’s acting as though it’s no big deal. He won’t meet Pax’s eyes, but he can’t stop the curious glances sliding over Lucas and me, down to our linked hands.

When he raises his gaze to my face, I latch on. “Thank you, Deshi.”

He nods quickly, disappearing as the boys echo my sentiment.

Pax strides over to the opening, peering both directions down the corridors. When he turns and comes back to us, he slings an arm around Lucas’s neck. “No one’s out there. It’s good to see you guys.”

Lucas grins and goes to elbow Pax in the ribs. The weeping blood stops him. “What happened to you?”

Pax sighs. “It’s nothing I can’t handle.”

“Pax, come on. We only have ten minutes, don’t waste half of it making us force you to talk,” I prod.

Maybe he doesn’t want to share, and maybe there’s nothing we can do, but I still want to know who’s hurting him. If nothing else, so their name can go on my ever-growing list of people to retaliate against if I get out of here.

He clamps his teeth together. “Kendaja has taken a kind of liking to me, I guess.” He smirks the slow smile that used to steal the moisture from my mouth. “Who can blame her, right?”

It should make me smile, but instead it floods my head with anger so forceful it surprises me. Before, when I thought about Kendaja I felt a tiny bit of pity for her. She’s obviously mentally unsound, and her father and brother treat her like a toy or an animal kept on a chain. This, though? Hurting Pax when he’s trapped and defenseless? It pushes me so far toward hatred that I can’t find any compassion for her.

The intensity of my hatred startles me, and something inside me breaks off and floats away. Probably one of the last good pieces I had left. “She’s not going to get away with it, Pax.”

“Now, Summer, I know you think you can protect all of us all the time, but that’s not the case. She’s not going to kill me; she’s just playing. And these are just scratches.” He tugs on my ponytail. “So let’s talk about something else.”

The lump in my throat makes it impossible to do that, so Lucas squeezes my hand and comes to the rescue. “At least she left your face alone. That would be tragic, to ruin that thing.”

“True. I think she likes it. I mean, she’s insane, but she’s still a woman.”

Their banter brings a smile to my face in spite of everything, and even though it feels a little wobbly, it buoys my spirits. “Okay, enough. The Prime’s coming back tomorrow. What are we going to do?”

Neither of them answers, and I take the moment to survey the three of us. By my best estimation, we’ve been locked up here a couple of weeks, maybe three at the most. We’ve all lost weight—there’s no reason to think they’ve been fed any more than I have, and if Deshi’s only having mercy on me, then it’s fair to assume they’ve eaten even less—but other than that we’re all relatively intact. Filthy, reeking, but whole.

As bad as Pax looks, and as angry as his condition makes me, he’s not incapacitated.

“Do we try to fight?” I ask quietly.

They exchange a glance, then Lucas shrugs. “We’re not getting out of here like that. Maybe we could travel. Maybe. But the Spritans are gone for good. What if the bracelets don’t work?”

I concentrate on the threads ringing my wrist for a moment, and the soft hum of Spritan magic shifts through them. “The magic is still in them. But nothing’s changed. Leaving won’t convince Deshi to join us in our fight.”

“What fight? I mean, if we die in here, that destroys our chances.” Pax crosses his arms, looking between Lucas and me for agreement.

“He’s right, Althea. Deshi or no Deshi, we can’t just stand there and let them kill us. That definitely ends any chance we have.”

“I know, but I think I’m close to making him see things differently. I can feel it. He’s thinking about it.”

“Deshi’s been to see you?” Pax asks. A swift mixture of guilt and envy crosses his handsome olive complexion. “When?”

“A couple of times. He brought a salve for my burns and gave me water with the pink stuff mixed in—it healed me, at least from the burns, almost immediately. Anyway he lets me tell him things, about how it’s been out there.”

“And you think he’s listening?” Lucas muses.

“I don’t think he’s changed his mind yet, but yes. He’s listening.” I take a deep breath. “But you’re right. The Prime’s coming back tomorrow, so we’ll have to try traveling. Unless they take our bracelets, or put those gloves on us again—you remember, Pax. They block our powers.”

He nods. “I remember. All we can do is what we can do. If we don’t get out of here, at least Brittany’s working at the cabin. In a few weeks everyone else will be, too.”

“Forty kids against two hundred Others.” Lucas doesn’t clarify the statement, but it’s more sorrowful than disbelieving.

I know none of us are sure the kids we unveiled can’t find a way to win back Earth. We just aren’t sure they
can
, either.

Then again, maybe we’re not capable of such a feat, either.

“We shouldn’t talk about them in here. You never know who’s listening.” I cast a quick glance toward the ceiling, hoping they follow my drift.

Deshi might be necessary, and maybe I’m closer to getting him to rethink his position than I was yesterday, but we can’t trust him. Not yet. And he could be listening to every word.

As though we conjured him, Deshi appears in the corner. He looks a little nervous, and who can blame him? The risk he’s taking in letting the three of us say good-bye isn’t small.

“Time to go.”

Pax turns to me quickly, snatching me into a fierce hug. “See you tomorrow.”

To my surprise, he does the same to Lucas. The two of them give each other a couple of slaps on the back, then Pax strides toward Deshi. “Take me first.”

They disappear a second later, and I step into Lucas’s arms, not wanting to waste a moment of the privacy Pax just bought us. I pull his face to mine, taking more time with the kiss now that we’re alone. Lucas’s lips are dry and chapped; mine are, too. We smell terrible. None of that matters. He tastes like love and friendship, and his cold arms around my back send delightful shivers down my spine.

His grip tightens and he lifts me against him, backing up until we run into the wall. My fingers find his hair and tangle in the curls, and I lose myself in the smell of winter and the warm need spilling through my blood.

When he loosens his grip, letting me slide down the front of him until my feet touch the ground, it’s too soon. I don’t want to let go of him, not ever. But Deshi will be back any minute. Even so, I stand on my toes to reach his mouth again, taking and giving a little bit more. I can feel the knowledge between us, in the desperate desire to clutch these stolen moments, that this might be the last time we hold each other.

Lucas’s smile is sad, his dimples creasing the tiniest bit. His hands are heavy on my waist, and I know he doesn’t want to let me go, either. “I wish we had more time. And more privacy.”

The suggestion in his statement, and the idea of what might happen if Lucas and I had hours to explore each other, heats the blood in my heart. My mouth goes dry as the sensation spills downward into my stomach, then weakens my knees.

I want it so badly—time. We might never get the chance.

“I love you,” I say.

The words are ridiculously inadequate for the feelings racing through me. Instead of trying to say it differently, to articulate everything, I simply stare up into his eyes. Lucas and I have always excelled at nonverbal communication, and right now I see those millions of feelings all over his face, too.

His frigid hand brushes over the scar that runs from my hairline past my eye, down my neck, and finally slides around to thread into my hair. “I love you, too.”

We’re holding hands in silence when Deshi returns, our sides pressed against each other for support.

“Lucas next.”

Lucas squeezes my hand, then steps to Deshi’s side. He casts one last glance at me, then sticks out his hand for Deshi to shake. The surprise on our fourth’s face is almost comical, and my heart breaks for him. It’s a simple act of kindness from a thoughtful boy, a thank-you and an acknowledgment of the risks he’s taken today.

When Deshi reaches out, Lucas grasps his hand without hesitation. “Take care of her, Deshi. Okay?”