Page 39 of Nyx
My cheeks heat as I stand there, panting, but eventually my rage is replaced by shame. She spots the shift in my demeanor and releases me, and my back thuds against the wall. I sink to the ground, my hands scrubbing over my face. “I just need to get to him.” The words are muffled against my palms, too embarrassed to meet her eyes.
Taryn’s presence towers over me, but then she drops to sit beside me and rests a hand on my knee. “Believe it ornot, Reyes, I understand what you’re going through right now. When Lillith and I were marked, I was a prisoner, and she was a guard. She tried to do everything right… notified her superior officers and even got permission to release me from my cell for visits. They asked her to keep it quiet, and she did. We followed every single rule before we realized there was a secret playbook running the game.”
“She’s a good one,” I mutter as my hands fall into my lap, and we both stare at the giant red woman beside the truck. Her brows are pinched thoughtfully as she explores underneath the hood, muttering to herself and tracing something with her finger.
“The best,” she agrees. “They kept us apart at Ljómur, and it felt like my insides were trying to escape to reach her. There were times I believed I would tear myself into pieces to make it through those bars, consequences be damned. I was willing to break myself apart just to get to her, even if it meant I’d never be whole again.”
“How would you get to her if you weren’t whole?” I ask, and she squeezes my knee as I realize what she’s done. I heave another sigh as I finally glance up at her piercing green eyes. “That was the point of telling me that, wasn’t it? Some self-actualization bullshit?”
“It was,” she agrees with a twitch of her lips.
“Didn’t know you were a prophet,” I mutter as I thunk the back of my head against the wall.
“Didn’t know you were so easily defeated,” she retorts, but there’s no heat in her tone, and my anger has faded as I scoff. “Now, while she’s working, you and I need to prepare the greenhouse to load. That way, when the truck is ready, you will be, too.” We stand togetherand dust ourselves off, and I cast one last hopeful glance towards Lillith. She peers over and subtly shakes her head.
“It’ll run,” she promises with an apologetic smile. “It might just take a few hours.”
It doesn’t take a few hours.
It takes fifteen.
Fifteen fucking hours.
Fifteen hours of frustration that grows with every passing minute. No sleep and ever-shorter tempers, and snippy retorts that morph into arguments. Despite my earlier calm, my anger has returned, and I feel like I’m going to explode right out of my skin with it.
Taryn’s sick of my shit, and I’m sick of her reassurances. I’m tired of fuckingwaiting, and if the keys to the van weren’t tucked securely into Lillith’s pocket, I might’ve already run off with it and left them here to fend for themselves.
It’s an awful thing to admit, but it’s the truth.
I amdesperateto get to him.
The greenhouse is disassembled and sitting outside the garage, ready to be loaded, and the van is filled to the brim with every useful item we could find. The remaining dry stores from the camp take up the back and middle rows. Bags of rice, beans, wheat, and flour are packed in as tight as we could get them. Medical kits and towels,blankets and spare clothing fill the gaps, until the doors barely close.
A maintenance closet in one of the better-hidden rooms held tools and building materials. Most of the stuff is foreign to me, and I’m not even sure what a lot of it does, but it was stored securely, so it’s important.
The remaining space in the van’s trunk was filled with rolls of wire, gears and mechanical pieces that looked useful, and a few toolboxes. When I showed the room to Lillith, she added a few things to my stack to transport before she loaded her arms with parts and jogged back to the truck.
And that was hours ago.
Now there’s nothing left to do butwait, and after a lifetime of waiting, I’m desperate to move. My temper flares hot again, and my jaw tenses, but before I can find something to unleash my anger on, an engine revs to life. Lillith’s whoop can be heard from inside the cab, and she rolls forward through the path we’ve cleared.
She’s barely parked the truck before I’m grabbing pieces of the greenhouse to put in the bed, and Taryn rushes over to help me. Lillith climbs out, leaving the engine running as we load. “It’ll make it back?” I demand, and she nods.
“It should. We need to stay together just in case.” Her crimson eyes dart over my agitated frame, pausing for a moment on my marked hand. “Are you okay to drive, Reyes?”
“Yes,” I snap, but my short fuse doesn’t convince her of anything. “Please,” I add, and her assessment turns intocontemplation. “I’ll follow behind you guys, and I swear I’m alert. Not tired at all. But can wepleaseget going?”
Taryn and Lillith share a glance before Taryn nods. “Yeah, let’s go then.”
The sun has started its descent, and I know they’re both exhausted. We drove through the night and worked through the day, and now we’re running on two days of no sleep. I might be the only one who’s found rest, and that was only a few hours’ nap in the van during the drive here.
Sleep is the furthest thing from my mind, though. Adrenaline crashes through my veins, and worry clenches my stomach. I’m wide awake, desperate to return to Nyx. To find him and make sure he’s alright.
In mere minutes, we’re pulling through the gates that surround this place that used to be my refuge, and instinct cinches my waist and tugs me forward.
Even without the road, the mark guides me home.
Reyes
