“Have you ever met any others like you?Or like me?Lirai?”She handled the word tolerably well.
“Yeah, back in Europe.”He sank into the chair across from her, painfully slow.“There’s lots of us, though.We’re just soldiers.Potentials—you know, people with the ability to becomelirai—are much more rare.”All the statistics he’d heard were in the neighborhood of one in around fifty thousand civilians, and plenty didn’t survive adolescence.The only thing the shadowbeasts liked better than snacking on defenseless potentials was getting close to full-blown Dreamers.But the latter had the Sons, not to mention the Flame’s, protection.She didn’t need to know what kinds of odds she’d bucked at the moment, though, so he searched for something else to say.“We’re frontliners, didn’t get sent stateside until training was finished.We took this satellite territory to keep the fringes clear.Closest active temple is… oh, probably Stanfeld.”Ignatius would know.
True to form, she seized on that little piece of intel.“And where are we right now?”
You’re pumping me for information, beautiful.That’s okay.He couldn’t blame her, and it made no difference anyway.“A little north of Longpoint.”
“Good neighborhood.”She touched her plate with a fingertip.Fragrant steam lifted as the heat-bubble folded aside, sensing the end of its usefulness.“I’m sure the schools are nice.”
Easy access to prime hunting grounds.Ignatius was always talking about how they should have some backup,anybackup, occasionally even muttering about how Control expected miracles without parting with any funding to provide them.
“I wouldn’t know.”Erik sat just as straight and tense as their potential, waiting for her to change her mind.
“So, Erik.”She poured with a facility that showed a bit of food service in her past but gave him the wineglassandthe wine, confining herself to water.“Do you have a last name?”
“No ma’am.”Not any I’m willing to claim.He’d even have to think and count on his fingers a bit to figure out exactly how old he was; he was fairly sure any kin he had was plowed under by war or poverty by now.
“Family?”she persisted.
He could answer that easily enough, chapter and verse.“The Sons are my family, ma’am.”
“It’s notma’am.”A mild flare of irritation, but at least she was regarding the plate as if it contained something remotely edible instead of offal.Progress was being made.“It’s Liv.”
“Not Livvie?”Button your mouth, Erik.
“You can tryMs.Stellack.” She picked up her heavy silver fork, and her shy glance was more mischievous than he might have thought her capable of.“But notMisslike the old guy says.Where did you find that fossil?”
He found me.Erik could still remember standing at the end of his dorm bed, his hair freshly cropped and the mark burning on his wrist, while Ignatius paused, eyeing him.Liraihad first pick of new Sons, of course, but Fathers going out to the front lines came right after, and it was good to be found acceptable for once.“Somewhere in a sediment bed, I guess.How’s the rice?”
“All right.”Did she look, of all things, hopeful?“You want some?”
“Not very hungry.”He took a slice of the bread, telling himself it was just to remind her he was mostly human and not as big a threat as the unclean.It wasn’t bad, for mass-produced baked goods masquerading as restaurant quality.In an active temple instead of a fringe one, there would be a chef or three in kitchens kept humming at every hour to provide anything aliraimight take it into their head to consume.“Thank you.”
That seemed to soothe a little of her anxiety, and Erik might have congratulated himself on finally handling her the right way if several tiny nails hadn’t scraped featherlight over his skin, tightening the sleeve that kept muscle, bone, and blood neatly packed.
A man was just a sausage, when all was said and done.
“Excuse me,” he said, politely enough, and left her with her fork in midair, closing theliraim’s door as softly as possible.
* * *
It was aleng-spider, a crafty hunter.Still, it obviously didn’t expect a Son to fall upon its unprotected back as it worked at breaking the eastern curtain of defenses.The thing was easily dispatched, and with the wet and cold sluiced away by sorcery, Erik returned to find the barely touched tray still on the table, food rapidly cooling since the heat-shell had been broken.Theliraihad hidden in the bathroom the entire time, her pulse entirely too high, thudding in his own ears.
He wanted to knock on the door and ask if she was all right, but what purpose would that serve?So he just took the tray and retreated, trying not to hear that frantic heart-pounding and wishing he knew what to say—if anything—to make her a little less afraid.
All Right Ever Again
The bed was soft,at least, and the sheets smelled of that same expensive fabric softener as the clothes.The blankets and comforter weren’t heavy enough, but the suite was relentlessly warm so it wasn’t a problem.Might even have been pleasant, she admitted, to be curled up in comfort while a thin freezing rain needled the windows.
If she hadn’t been kidnapped by funky monster hunters, she could have enjoyed herself immensely.As it was, the only control she had in this situation was making lists of things for them to fetch; as a coping mechanism, it kind of sucked.
As soon as she had a handle on one aspect of this bullshit, something else came along and she lost her grip.The latest jolt was dinner—oh, the rice was all right, she supposed, but the bottom dropping out of her stomach just before Erik’s expression changed and he excused himself hadn’t been optimal for further consumption of foodstuffs.
What was even worse was how she could literallyfeelhim retreating through the house, and the sudden sense of being almost alone as she rattled at the locked door had turned everything inside her to quaking mush.Not only that, but her head hurt, swift lancing pains retreating all at once a few minutes before he came back.
It didn’t take much in the brain department to figure out he’d probably driven off another… well, another monster.That same strange instinct, like the fine hairs rising all over her body when the barometric pressure changed, showed up when Jake and Ignatius returned at almost three in the morning.
At least, she thought it was what had happened.Which was why she was tossing and turning despite the exhaustion.
