Page 26 of I Married Kayog
Isobel sighed and caressed my forearm in a soothing fashion.
“I can see why. In her place, I might have reacted the same if I didn’t know the truth about you. But you said she’s your soulmate.”
“She is,” I said in a tone that brooked no argument.
“Then talk to her!” Isobel exclaimed as if she wanted to smack me for being irrationally stubborn. “The Maker didn’t pair you for nothing. Linsea entered your life because you are meant to work out somehow. Fate intended for you to meet now when things are reaching their critical point. Together, I have no doubt you will find the solution I failed to provide for you.”
“You didn’t fail,” I countered passionately, guilt twisting my insides that I might have made her feel inadequate or like I wasn’t grateful for all that she had done. “Your friendship and support are what gave me hope and kept me going this whole time.”
“Then let me continue to support you through this by heeding my advice. Talk. To. Her. You deserve to be happy, Kayog. You are the kindest soul I know.”
I snorted with self-derision. “Yeah, well this all might be a moot point. I will likely get expelled after my stunt.”
Isobel shook her head with a conviction that took me aback. “You won’t. Celeste—the Nazhral female you rescued—vouched to the fact that you were saving her. All the witnesses concurredwith her statement. Sure, you might get slapped on the wrist for excessive force, but it was three against one.”
“They’re still likely the children of very influential parents,” I countered. “They don’t just let anyone into Acadia. Surely their parents are going to demand some form of justice.”
“Nope,” she said with an unusual smugness laced with a hard glint in her eyes. “Those three boys have been problematic from the beginning. Yes, their parents are influential and the only reason they actually got in. In truth, you did the school a favor by giving them the excuse they needed to potentially expel them. But you’re going to be fine. I confirmed it before coming here.”
Despite my current predicament, a wave of relief washed over me. I didn’t know how to move forward from here. But I liked that the choice hadn’t been taken out of my hands as would have been the case had I been expelled.
“For the record, Director Colin snooped around and meddled quite a bit after the incident,” Isobel said pensively. “I think he may have put his thumb on the scale in your favor.”
“Really?” I asked, stunned. “What did he tell them?”
“No clue,” she replied in an apologetic tone. “But he’s extremely curious about you. When he questioned the other students about the incident, he also drilled them about you as a person.”
“Fuck,” I muttered. “Now he’s going to be even more on my ass. He thinks I’m the Good Samaritan.”
“Are you?” Isobel asked, her face unreadable as she held my gaze unwaveringly.
Any other person staring at her would have had no clue as to what thoughts crossed her mind. With my empathic abilities, I could read clearly that she believed I was. Although she didn’t approve of vigilantism or violence in general, she also didn’t condemn me for whatever measures I might have used to protect the innocent.
I didn’t answer but didn’t avert my eyes.
She snorted. “Figures. I suspected as much from the first time I heard of a timely rescue.”
“I fly around a lot at night when I can’t sleep,” I said in a non-committal fashion.
“And your emphatic abilities conveniently lead you to stumble on the damsels in distress?” Isobel asked in a teasing tone.
I smiled. “Actually, it’s more like ‘dudes’ in distress, as humans like to say. But who’s keeping count?”
She chuckled and shook her head affectionately at me.
“For what it’s worth, I cannot take credit for every instance of timely rescues. There are others out there who aren’t okay with innocents getting harmed.”
She tilted her head to the side and gave me an assessing look. “Enforcers are extremely resourceful and spare no expense for the welfare of their troops. Have you considered joining them?”
I shook my head with conviction. “The minute they find out more about me, they’ll probably have me committed or turn me into some sort of lab rat. I’ve had it with institutions.”
She pinched her lips into a disappointed but resigned expression. “Yeah… I get it.”
By the look she gave me, Isobel appeared to want to say something else but thought better of it. Reaching for my face, she peered into each of my eyes, likely assessing just how badly they had to be bloodshot right now. My friend then pushed back up onto her feet and ran the scanner from her armband over my head. The way her brow creased as she examined the result on the interface told me everything I needed to know.
“There’s still a great deal of swelling. Take another pill and then we can meditate together,” Isobel said in a commanding tone.
I nodded, lobbed another pill into my mouth, and assumed the Lotus position as my friend did the same. It wouldn’t fix me, but it would help bring some peace into the endless chaos of my mind.
