When I was there, he locked them on, and I braced myself. "Are you ready?" he asked.
I tilted my head, for the first time not letting anger control me—instead staying calm and focused. "What is the point of this? You ask me no questions, you tell me no information, and you don't kill me. Is there an end game here?"
He paused, fists elevated as he prepared to lay into me. "What do you know," he said in a similarly calm tone to what I'd used. "You might just be ready to talk now."
"You were breaking me down?" I asked, my fuzzy brain trying to piece it together. "But you never even asked me any questions. How did you know I wouldn't talk before now?"
He leaned in very close, voice a low whisper, breath foul as it washed over my face. "Your temper has always been your downfall, Violence. You will not survive this world unless you learn to ride the calming waves, the ebb and flow of the tides, the push and pull of the sword. Not everything requires a reaction. Sometimes it just is."
My gut dropped, and if I could have moved my hands, I would have clutched at the pain in my chest. I’d heard those words before...
"You know my sensei?"
The Red East leader smiled, his teeth the least white part of him. "He wants to see you," he said, and just like that, my chains were released. "But if you cannot attend this meeting with a calm heart, you will go right back into this cage, for it's when you have nothing and are broken down to your base nature that you will find—"
"Your true self."
My tone was bitter. My sensei was here, and I had no idea what to think about it. There was no one I’d respected more when I was growing up, and in my mind when I referred to him as “sensei,” it was in remembrance of the person who had guided and half-raised me.
But there was another side of him—the hard nature that made him a formidable fighter. He was as brutal as he was breathtaking, and I meant that in every sense. Not to mention the way he’d just up and left me when I was a naïve sixteen-year-old...
Rubbing at the red welts on my wrists, I wondered if the marks might be permanent after all of these weeks of trying to fight against the handcuffs. “Has all of this been under my sensei’s orders?” I asked, following the Red East leader out of the cage. He didn’t say a word, just continued leading me through the lower levels.
It was clear that most of the underground network here was for prisoners. I’d never seen anyone in a cell close to mine, but I’d heard plenty of screams in my weeks here. None of them had sounded like Rafe or Jordan—I doubted either of my guys would scream like that no matter what—but my heart still shattered every single time there was a shout.
Not knowing if my princes were dead or alive was legitimately going to give me a heart attack.
Nothing else was said as we continued on, and I finally got to leave the depressing pit of their underground rooms, emerging into fresh air and sunshine. Closing my eyes for a second, I breathed deeply and let the sun bathe my face.
"Come," Red East leader said. "You can enjoy your freedom soon enough. Once you've heard our proposition, you will understand everything much more clearly."
That proposition better include information about where my princes were, or this newfound calm they had been trying to beat into me would fade away in a whirl of fists and violence. My name, my nature after all.
The building I’d been locked in looked like a huge shopping mall, short and wide, with a lot of gray dreariness to the design. It even had a parking lot, which was where they ushered me into a nondescript white van.
"Not even going to offer me candy first," I muttered.
He side-eyed me, but I was pretty sure he didn't get the reference. Fuck, he'd clearly never been a kid fighting for his life on the streets, and it showed.
The car was silent and smooth, powering out of the mostly empty lot. We drove for what felt like an hour. Just me, Red East leader, and another armed, masked man. Finally, we left the urban landscape and entered a more natural setting until the car stopped in front of a gorgeous, ranch-style property.
"Of course," I murmured. No way would my sensei find himself living outside of his comfort zone—he hated concrete and people. Not in that order.
My door was opened by the driver, who left his gun inside the vehicle. Apparently they didn't fear me running from here. As much I wanted to remind them of who I was, there were more pressing things to worry about.
I needed answers about Rafe and Jordan before I did anything else.
Walking up the long, pebbled path, I headed for the grainy wood steps of the front porch. It took a lot of effort to move the last few feet to the door. I hadn't seen my sensei in a long time, almost two years to be exact, and things had not ended well between us. It was complicated and messy, our relationship, and in the time we’d been apart, I’d reached some dark conclusions about both of us. The respect I’d once held for this man was gone. But since he was the one standing between me and my princes, I had to suck up some courage and face my past.
The door swung open, and just like that, he took the option away from me.
Standing in the open space, wearing his trademark high-collared kung-fu outfit, was Uriel, my sensei. Many of the martial arts disciplines had lost their way after the Monarch War, disbanded so that commoners could no longer learn to fight. Uriel was of a secret, underground sect that still practiced in multiple disciplines. His training was second to none, and even I had never been able to come close to matching him during our sparring sessions.
"I’ve been expecting you," he said, voice deeper than I remembered.
I didn’t move, waiting for him to get out of the shadows so I could see his expression. His eyes actually. They were the only part of him that told me which Uriel I was facing today.
“Come in,” he said, stepping back.
