Page 4 of A Cruel Kindness

Lingering longer than normal, then dropping to the floor when they realized I’d clocked them.

I was used to the stares, and normally wrote them off unless they belonged to a marginally interesting person, but this time they were grating. Good thing I’d developed quite the reputation for someone who was not to be fucked with, especially since my first few years here, I had to overcompensate to get over the Royal prick comments.

Those had ended the day some too-proud fighter challenged me to the mat and got cocky and went for my nose ring, ripping it out. I simply used the silver ring to carefully, surgically ensure that his left cornea was no longer functional.

Besides, I’d gotten a lot better in the six years since. No one challenged me anymore, let alone got that close to my face.

“What the fuck?” I barked at Peter, when one person ran into a table full of dismantled guns because they were too busy staring at me.

“I think you should just get to the Main Hall,” Peter said, nodding politely at the thin man who was clearly trying to restrain a wince from the force of his collision.

“Why? She already here?” I needed about seven million more hours of preparation before I could even think about confronting the woman who drew the shit lot of being my Soul Mate.

Shit, I hoped she was competent. I didn’t need to be worrying about her tripping and impaling herself on a loose branch jutting out of the rough terrain of Muliterra. I saw that happen once, I didn’t need to see that shit again.

Especially because you’d probably try to kill the branch for hurting her.

Fuck, the insanity was already starting.

Peter looked down to check his watch. “She should be here soon, actually,” he said, like time had gotten away from him.

“Why do you sound nervous?” I asked, twisting the towel around my waist even tighter.

Peter barked a laugh. “I was slightly concerned you’d bite my head off after the news.”

“I haven’t filed my teeth that sharp yet. Still time, though,” I said, snapping my teeth for effect. I cared about the way I looked, and didn’t find sharp teeth to be that pleasing to look at, but the only thing I cared about more was survival. I had some people to prove wrong.

Peter tried and failed to smother a smile, unable to admit that I was funny twice in the same conversation.

We turned down the next hallway, the final to traverse until we got to the pain hall, full of long, utilitarian dining tables and lined with televisions. It also happened to house an open space used for any number of fighting or training purposes.

Dinner and a show, really.

When we rounded the corner, the sound exploded, full of voices carrying at a louder level than normal. There were several pleading hushes that split through the noise.

There must have been something on the news to garner that reaction.

Good, they’d probably be too distracted to pay me any mind while I cut through to my quarters. That fact was confirmed when my eyes adjusted to the bright light coming from the center and I saw that everyone’s eyes were turned toward the television screens, their attention cemented on the news playing.

“We’re back with more information on the most recent Draft,” the newscaster said, their voice drawing out in the enunciated lilt that most journalists had.

I stopped dead in my tracks, dread pooling in my stomach. I just knew that this would have something to do with my paranima. Regardless of my feelings about the situation, I couldn’t help but stop and watch, looking for more information about her.

Once I stopped, my instincts, honed and sharpened over years of needing to rely on careful observation to avoid a painful death, I noticed that the newscaster didn’t look as prim and proper as they normally came. Her eyes were bloodshot, her skin pale, and if I wasn’t mistaken, it looked like there were tears building in her eyes.

“It is—” she cut off, her voice breaking off in her throat. For God’s sake, what happened? I felt Peter stiffen beside me, but paid him no mind. “It is with a heavy heart that I have to inform you all that—”

I didn’t hear the rest of what she said, because the gasps and screams that rang through the room were so unbelievably loud they cut off the sound of the massive speakers hanging through the room.

The newscaster’s pause to regain control of her voice had delayed her words so that the graphics popped up on the screen a second before she could announce what she’d intended to.

While the photos that appeared on the screen made the rest of the room erupt in panicked cries, asking God, the Goddess, and the Emperor in one combined prayer how they could let this happen, I had an entirely different reaction. My heart fell into my stomach, dread pushing through my veins.

On one side was the photo Peter had given me in the file, the picture of my paranima’s back, filled with the twin Mark to my own.

On the other was a photo of a woman. Of my Soul Mate’s face, apparently.

One well-known and well-loved far past what was reasonable for any one person, with dark, midnight black hair that hung around her sculpted features, and if it was the same as the last time I saw her, went right down to her waist.