“Because Haru is self-serving. Everything he says or does is for his own gain. He’d let you die if it gave him an edge. You didn’t really believe he was trying to help save Jiro during last night’s Soemono, do you?”
I didn’t answer. He wasn’t wrong about Haru, but that wasn’t what stuck with me. What stuck was Sora himself.
When I first met him down here, he looked like a lost cause, broken. Now he sounded confident and focused. Noticing things others hadn’t. And the way he fought during Soemono… That wasn’t luck. That was training.
He might be a chef, but he was definitely something else.
“When did you start paying so much attention?” I asked, narrowing my eyes at him.
“I think the better question is, Why did you assume I wasn’t?”
“Because when we first got here, all you did was keep to yourself, muttering nonsense like a?—”
“Fool?” He met my gaze, unblinking. “It’s okay. I’m not offended. The truth is, I was lost. I’d come to the conclusion this was the end… I guess you could say I’d given up.”
“What changed your mind?”
“You did. For someone with the odds stacked against them, you didn’t once seem to waver. It was as if you had no choice.”
“I didn’t.”
“You did. You just chose to fight.”
I studied him for a moment. “Last night in Soemono, you didn’t look like someone who’d just decided to fight for his life. You moved like you’d done it before.”
“I spent my youth training in martial arts. I even thought I wanted to be a professional fighter, but by my twenties I was disillusioned. So I turned to another passion—cooking. And look where it’s gotten me: a spot on the roster in the fighting pits of Nokoribi. Life’s cruel like that.”
“So you accept that all this violence is what—true nature?”
“No. There’s no honor in what’s happening here. It’s manufactured, nothing more than evil capitalism. A lot of money is being made up there, on our spilled blood. It’s greed. Pure and simple.”
I tilted my head, studying him. Was this the real Sora or another performance? He’d given plenty since his arrival—lost cause, warrior, and now philosophical sage.
Footsteps in the hall snapped our attention toward the door. Moments later, the Chopmen filed in. The last one through was different, shorter than the rest. He turned, and I saw it: that smile. That devious look.
Haru!
“Wake up!” he bellowed, swinging one of the spiked iron mallets. One by one, he slammed it against the bars of each cell.
“I said wake up!”
He stopped at Sora’s cell. “Don’t look so surprised. I’m a Chopman now… It’s what I chose.”
He spun, his eyes sweeping across the block. “The rest of you will have to choose your place in the Leftovers. To be Flames, like the ones who cooked for us back in Tokyo. Perhaps a Chopman, like me. Or maybe some of you dream of becoming a Blade.”
He stopped at Jiro’s cell. “I believe ‘slave’ has already been chosen for you.”
Haru let out a loud, maniacal laugh, waving his mallet as he strutted about in a suit far too big for him. “Of course, some of you might not even live to choose a place.”
He swaggered over to my cell. “Some of you are just too much trouble.”
Leaning in close to the bars, his grin stretched wider. “I bet you wish we had an alliance now, don’t you?”
Part IV
Flamebound
63
