Page 14 of This Cruel Fate

Atlas’s frustrated hmph confirmed her guess.

“I’m not going to run any surveillance for you,” Xolia said.

“Of course not. We’re just blowing off steam. That’s what I said at the gala isn’t it?”

“Fine. What else do I need to know?”

Atlas smiled like he always did right before he was about to go in for the kill. For whatever reason he was so desperate to have Xolia join him, he had succeeded.

“This Friday at six, meet me at the old meat-packing plant?—”

“The one?—”

Atlas nodded. If a variant was talking about a meat-packing plant, there was only one they were referring to. The historic one that lay smack dab in the middle of the pocket of devastation of the rebellion. It was a fixture of Atalia, one of the first major businesses, which had provided beef to nearly half of Ris. The smell of rotting cow carcasses when it had been blown apart on that fateful day was seared into Xolia’s memory.

“Meet me there. Wear a mask, and don’t bring your phone or anything that could connect your identity back to you. Unless you want to spend a year in rehab and be on suppressants the rest of your life.”

Xolia nodded. Standard rules for illicit activities. “Any other rules?”

“Just yours.”

Xolia glared at him. He sounded so much like Silas. Those were the exact words that Silas used to say to her too. It was a punch to the gut. There was one thing Silas resented about her. One thing he forbade her to do. And rather than ever voicing it out loud, rather than calling attention to it, he just called it ‘her rule.’ Just one thing that she needed to follow that no one else ever did. “You don’t have to tell me that.”

“I thought this whole thing was for old times’ sake.” Atlas shrugged. “If that’s all, let me escort you out.”

He led her to the front door, leaving her to pick her way across the grounds and through the front gate. By the time she reached her apartment, a small smile tugged at her lips as she thought about hashing out her feelings in a good old-fashioned spar.

Chapter Seven

Thoughts of sparring and finally loosening her restraint on her powers became all-encompassing for Xolia. She woke up to lingering dreams about the exertion of fighting. The dance of two bodies locked onto the same goal. She sat in her cubicle, still painfully aware of Rowan’s absence, dreaming about defensive blocks and maneuvers she hadn’t tried in seven years. At home, Marshall would detail his days of separating volatile children from one another, and she imagined standing triumphant for all to see.

By Thursday, she had formed a steady routine of leaving work early for extra training time before Marshall would get home. She unlocked the front door to her apartment, dropped her coat and bag unceremoniously on the floor of the foyer, and ran to change out of her semi-formal wear.

After slipping into a more comfortable change of clothes, Xolia made her way to the bathroom and turned on the bath faucet. She filled the tub halfway before turning the water off. Drawing in a deep breath, she closed her eyes and cast out her awareness to the water, holding out open palms. Years of suppressants had eroded the mastery she used to have with her powers. What once had been second nature now only peeked its head out during times of emotional distress.

The still water in the tub connected to her, the water gently swaying in her mind. She called to it, and when she opened her eyes, the water was siphoning itself into a contained stream around her. Holding the water was imperative, at the slightest break in control the water would splash to the ground, and there was no way she could dry the floor without using all the towels and alerting Marshall to her actions.

She pushed the water back into the tub where it sloshed around, a few drops falling over the side. Holding onto a smaller amount, she tightened that metaphysical grasp with a small twist of her wrist and reached out to touch the shapeless form with her hand. At the touch of her fingertips, the water solidified into a wickedly sharp knife, solid as steel in her hand. After learning to establish contact with their elements, all variant children had been taught how to form weapons in the barracks. It’s what had made them such efficient killers and bodyguards.

Leaving the rest of the water in the tub, she left the bathroom for the living room, which had more open space to work through old forms. She slashed and parried imagined enemies, holding onto the knife with a vise grip. Terror gripped her in a way it never had before. If she failed at this, the one thing that had vaulted her above her peers in her youth, it would irrevocably change the way she saw herself. Choosing not to use her powers and being unable to do so made the difference between knowing she could do better and fearing she’d already done the best she ever could.

She moved with the push and pull of this newfound anxiety, pushing herself harder than she had all week. Her body was drenched with sweat by the time the click of the key turning in the lock reached her.

Shit. What time was it? Xolia whipped around to find the time on the clock above the stove, and she broke her concentration, sending a large splash of water to the linoleum flooring. Fuck.

Marshall opened the door, the small smile on his face dropping when he looked at her, shiny with sweat and hair plastered to her face. “What are you doing?”

Xolia stared back with wide eyes. He wasn’t supposed to be home yet. The water pooled around her, and she hoped that the couch blocked his view of the floor. “You’re home early.”

“Right, because we have to leave in an hour,” he said slowly.

What’s today? Xolia wracked her brain, trying to remember what she had clearly forgotten while she kept a neutral expression so that Marshall wouldn’t grow suspicious of her.

“I was just getting ready to shower,” she said. “I’ll be ready in time.”

“For what?” he asked.

An anxious chill made her shiver. How was she supposed to know for what? “What do you mean, ‘for what?’” Shame heated her face; this was pathetic of her.

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