Page 49 of This Cruel Fate

He shrugged. “Maybe I was bad at my job. That’s why Peter offered it to you instead.”

That comment was enough to set her on edge. Her hand clenched around the vial. “I thought the news would’ve made you angrier.”

“I am angry,” he said.

Xolia stilled. If he had said anything else, she would’ve assumed he was lying. This couldn’t be anything other than the truth.

“Less angry now,” he continued. “Besides”—he leaned in close to Xolia, his mouth hovering near her ear—“with Peter on his deathbed, FAR is a sinking ship. The party is nothing without him.” He straightened. “So I should be thanking you.”

“You tried to—” Xolia cut herself off and lowered her voice so only Atlas could hear it. “You tried to kill me.”

Surprise overtook his features before they settled back into that infuriating neutral mask. “And it obviously didn’t work, so I fail to see the issue. Have you ever been drunk?”

She shook her head, surprising herself by answering his question when he had so calmly admitted to an attempt on her life.

“You should try it; it would make this conversation much less painful.” Atlas waved over the bartender, who so far had been content to let them wallow in their secluded corner.

Did she trust him? No. Did she want to understand the loss of inhibition that so enthralled humans? Yes. You’re in a public space, Atlas can’t hurt you.

Slipping the vial into her pocket, Xolia stood up. She’d made up her mind. If she hadn’t been allowed to be stupid in her teen years, then twenty-four was as good a time as any to let loose. To be free. She deserved it, after all. “Order me a drink,” she commanded before making her way to the dark doors of the restrooms.

Once she had the door closed behind her, she pulled the vial from her pocket. An illicit thrill ran through her. This was different from the fights. Lower stakes. Unknown. But it carried that same sense of freedom. The same sense of reckless abandon that made Xolia think of Adonis’s words about finding comfort in a loss of control. It both terrified and excited her. She unscrewed the top and nearly spilled half the drug onto the floor when she realized the lid extended down into the vial and curved to hold the powder.

Thoughts of Adonis ran through her mind when she moved the tray of powder up to her nose. She hesitated. Surely it shouldn’t be too difficult to breathe it in. She lowered her nose. Do it.

After four failed attempts and an embarrassing mishap where she bumped her nose into the tray, she was finally able to snort the entirety of its contents. It seared the inside of her nostril, her eyes widening as she shoved the empty container into her pocket, and she stumbled to the sink to wash it off her face. You fucking idiot.

After a painful minute the burning subsided and she chanced a look up at the mirror. Her skin was wan, with red splotches around her nose where she had scrubbed. Her eyes were bloodshot, thin tendrils of red streaking across the milky white. It wasn’t unlike the first time she had ever taken rimere suppressants, though that faded as soon as the drugs were regularly in her system.

Xolia turned the water back on, going within herself to find that ephemeral part of her that controlled water. It answered her call, and with minimal effort, small water moths danced around the room. She hadn’t been able to do that on rimere. Interesting.

Curiosity overwhelmed the initial fear, and she made her way back to Atlas, where a glass of amber liquid waited for her. Sweat had formed around the glass in her absence. Atlas didn’t say anything, he just raised his glass to hers in a wordless toast. Steeling her nerves for the uncomfortable burn of alcohol, she grabbed the glass and chugged.

Mind fuzzy, limbs unstable, and voice utterly slurred and sluggish, Xolia teetered dangerously on the edge of consciousness. Once that first cup had been emptied, Atlas was all too happy to keep a steady stream of alcohol flowing between them. Conversation had drifted in and out though Xolia was sure she had forgotten a few words spoken between them. She didn’t think they’d said anything important or worth remembering.

Drunkenness was a strange feeling. She understood why humans gravitated to it for leisure. She understood why Adonis relished a loss of control. It was weightless. She could run for miles without a care for what anyone would say. Her mind buzzed with endless possibilities, and she worked hard to keep her phone tucked away in her pocket when all she wanted to do was yell at Adonis for having stood her up and yell at Marshall for being a coward. Yelling sounded fun. Since Adonis and Marshall were out of the question, she focused her attention back on Atlas. The man who tried to kill her. The man who’d looked down on her at every opportunity. The man who’d won Silas’s affection from the moment they met, while she’d had to fight and constantly prove her worth.

Tears burned along the bottom of her eyes, but she would be damned before a single one fell in the presence of Atlas. This wasn’t fun anymore, and that weightlessness crashed into her. All of her fear and anxiety crushed her breastbone. Peter would be so disappointed in her if he found out she’d let herself get so drunk, and he would be more insistent than ever on her being constantly surveilled.

No one surrounded Atlas. Nothing bad ever happened to Atlas. It’s just not fair. “I want to go home now,” she said. Her words were mangled, and she half-worried that Atlas wouldn’t be able to understand her. Had he been talking? She couldn’t remember and decided she didn’t care.

“Let’s go,” Atlas said. While he settled the tab, Xolia stewed in her emotions. Why did everything come so easily to Atlas? Why hadn’t she tried harder to get what she wanted when the war ended? Belatedly, she realized she was angry. She was so angry at Atlas. Why should she continue to hide that from him? What was the point of sitting around and pretending at being friends when they both knew they hated each other?

Even with the drugs and alcohol impairing her judgement, she knew it would only turn out badly if she attacked him in the bar. She’d have to wait until they were outside, then. She nodded to herself, that was a good plan.

Atlas offered his arm to her, but she refused, instead choosing to walk on unsteady legs out of the bar. She could feel the eyes of multiple patrons on her, but she refused to look anywhere other than directly ahead of herself. One step. Then another.

Cold air hit her face, mildly sobering her up. There was a moment of clarity before the warm haze settled over her again. I don’t think I’ll drink again. “Did you bring a car?” she asked, suddenly aware of how far she was from home and how much she didn’t want to walk.

“I did,” Atlas said. “I’ll drive you home if you let me show you the Museum of Variant History first. Think of it as a tour before you announce your vice chancellorship.”

Sober Xolia would have struggled to piece together Atlas’s intentions, drunk Xolia didn’t consider them at all. Them being alone and hidden on the museum grounds would be perfect for her planned assault. She could punch him, hard enough to break his nose. Hard enough to prove that he wasn’t infallible. Hard enough to convince herself that she wasn’t just a second choice. Hard enough to be able to move on with her life. “Let’s go,” she said, her mouth stretching into an unnaturally wide smile, completely against her wishes.

A black, compact car pulled around the corner, and Atlas opened the back door. Xolia slid in and he followed her. Heat enveloped her, and she slipped further into an inebriated sense of peace. This night was turning out better with each passing minute.

The Museum of Variant History was being built inside an old building for a defunct newspaper. It was a block away from the Natural History Museum—which, in the years following the war, had taken down all their incorrect and outdated exhibits about variants. Now, less than a month from the grand opening, the building was shrouded in scaffolding and surrounded by large construction vehicles. The grounds were torn up. Xolia didn’t know how it was going to be fixed by the grand opening. She strained her eyes to see more in the dark, but with two broken street lamps, the block of the museum was ominously darker than its surroundings.

The hair on the back of Xolia’s neck stood up, some latent self-preservation despite her impaired state. This is the perfect opportunity for me. The thrill of getting even with Atlas was enough to make her overlook just how disadvantaged she really was. It hardly mattered.

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