Heart of Tartarus

by Lucy Smoke

  “I can’t sleep here,” I say. The truth is much worse. I can’t sleep alone. With the others around, I can wind myself up and watch me go. It’s all pretend, anyway. I’m just a windup toy. It’s why I’ve been spending so much time with the guys. The only time these dreams seem to haunt me is when I’m alone and vulnerable. If I’m not alone, though, they can’t hurt me. Maybe I’m just so broken that I can’t play by myself anymore.

  “Okay,” Haze says. “Come on. Why don’t I take you to my room?” He doesn’t wait for an answer before he lifts me into his arms and carries me out of the room. When I glance over Haze’s shoulder, I catch sight of Penny and she, too, watches us go with a sad look in her eyes.

  I hate this. This isn’t me. I’m not a wilting flower. I’m not weak. I’m not this broken, sad little girl. That’s not who Kida made. That’s not who Kida loved. Halfway back to Haze’s room, I struggle to be let down, wiggling about in his arms.

  “No,” I say finally, when he doesn’t seem to get the idea—or perhaps he’s ignoring my desire to be let down—I grunt and push at his chest. “Put me down.” He stops in the middle of the hallway and looks down at me, his eyes curious. He looks partially confused and partially irritated. I’ll take the confusion and irritation over pity any day. He sets me down.

  “What’s going on with you, Angel?” Haze asks.

  “I’m angry,” I say. More than angry, I’m pissed. There’s all this rage swelling deep inside me. I have to wonder if it’s normal for a human volcano to be walking around like there isn’t lava boiling in her veins.

  “You don’t seem angry,” he replies. “You seem sad. You’re not moving on—you’re stuck in the past and you keep yourself locked there.”

  “It’s hard!” I snap. “Would you be able to move on if Thayer and Noaz just up and died on you? Would you be able to do it if the rest of them did?” Chest heaving, I take a few steps away before turning on my heel to glare at him. “Don’t you think I want to get better?” I ask him.

  He shakes his head. “No, I don’t.” Haze steps closer until his chest brushes mine and I have to crane my head back to look up at him. Damn these men and their height. “I think,” his breath whispers across my face, “that you want to be stuck in the past because that’s the only place you know.”

  I shove at him. He doesn’t even move an inch, but dammit, I fucking tried. “What do you know?”

  “About pain?” he grabs my wrist and pulls me until I’m flush against him, pressed to him from my hips to my shoulders. “I know a lot about it, Angel. I know about loss and I know about sacrifice.” Haze bends down a little until his lips are so close to my face, I can practically make out the little creases in them as he puckers them and talks. “And you know what else I know?” he asks quietly. “I know that unless you let go of the past you’re trying so hard to hold onto, you’re going to keep having those nightmares of yours, and you’ll just be another dead girl walking.”

  He releases me so abruptly that I nearly fall on my ass. He sidesteps me and starts walking.

  “I’m not dead!” I scream at his back, eyes burning, chest aching. I’m not dead but… am I living? Haze doesn’t respond as he disappears around the corner. I don’t know how he can go from carrying me back to his room—all understanding and caring—to cold and indifferent as he walks away. A part of me wants that ability to detach, craves it even.

  I don’t recall how long I spend just standing there in the hallway, but when I finally start to move, I find myself heading directly for Thayer’s room. I’m so bone-deep weary that I just want some decent sleep and the only way to get it is if I’m in bed with someone else. He answers the door on the first knock.

  “Hey, Cass–”

  “Can I sleep with you?” The words are out of my mouth before I even realize what I’ve said. Is there really any need to ask? I’ve been doing it for days now. Hopping between beds. But this is the first time I’ve asked. Plus… Thayer is a heartbreaker—at least—that’s what I call him. With his pretty boy good looks. Asking to sleep with him is like asking–

  “Uh, sure?” he interrupts my internal monologue of rambling by holding the door open a little wider. I hesitate for just a moment before slipping through, and he closes it behind me. I stop and stare at the rumpled bed.

  “You okay, Firecracker?”

  No, I’m not. There’s something wrong with me. Just moments ago, I was angry—full of boiling fury—and now, as I stare at Thayer’s bed, and he puts a hand on my shoulder, I can feel tears pricking my eyelids. Why am I flip-flopping between emotions? Why am I ready to burn Tartarus down one moment and then crying into a pillow the next? Who am I? What is wrong with me?

  I don’t realize that I’ve asked the last question out loud until Thayer turns me around and crushes me to his warm chest. “There’s nothing wrong with you, Firecracker,” he says quietly. “It’s just the grief.”

  Grief. A selfish, monstrous, beast. He’s right. It’s got me held captive like a goddamn princess locked in a tower; like in the fairytale stories Kida used to read to me from her tablets. They’re so old that they come from before the sky cities even existed. Right now, I would give anything to have her hold me and read me stories again. Maybe it’s a childish desire, but I want to push my face into her neck like I am with Thayer right now. I want to smell her brand of soap like I can smell the motor oil and leather on Thayer.

  Hot tears leak out of my eyes and Thayer squeezes me tighter, until it’s hard to breathe. But that’s okay. In fact, I prefer it. I want him to hold me as tight as possible. Maybe if he squeezes me until I break, I won’t feel like I’m going to drift away—back into my nightmares.

  “You’re going to be okay, Cass,” he whispers, leading me to the bed. “I promise.”

  We crawl into his bed, and he wraps me up in his embrace. I relish in it. I melt into him, hoping and wishing that I could just disappear inside of him. Maybe then I wouldn’t feel so lost. I’d have someone to hold onto, something to connect to.

  “We’re going to take care of you. You’re with us.” Every sentence is punctuated with a long stroke against my head as he trails his fingers through my matted hair. “You’re not alone. You’re one of us.”

  I didn’t even know how much I needed to hear those words.

  Holding On

  “You need to hold on for a bit longer.”

  “I am holding on,” I snap through clenched teeth.

  Sweat drips down my forehead into my eyes. My arms are screaming from the strain, but I hold my lower half up higher. My muscles start to shake, and all of my promises of holding on are ruined as they collapse. I fall backwards between the pole railings that I had been clutching. My breath leaves me in a rush.

  Noaz scribbles something on a clipboard before shaking his head at me. “You’re not even close to being ready.”

  “I don’t see you training.” I scowl as I scramble back to my feet. My legs feel like limp, wet rags attached to my body and every step is agonizing. But I take a step and then another and another, until I’m standing nose to nose with Noaz, practically breathing fire. “You have been pushing me to go harder and longer–” if I was feeling up to it, I might have even inserted a sex joke, but Noaz doesn’t seem the type to appreciate that. “–and yet, I haven’t seen you do any of the exercises.”

  He lifts an immaculately arched eyebrow. “You want to see me run your obstacle course?” he asks, nodding to the ring of death—as I’ve been calling the indoor training area Vincent and the guys had set up. I glance away from where we are on the “exercise” portion of the course to the actual “training” portion.

  It’s a wide circular ring of various tasks: climbing walls, ropes hanging from the metal rafters, and even spikes jutting out from one side of an incredibly large pole. I haven’t even been allowed to go near the ring of death yet. But I’ve seen the guys do it. And they’ve all fallen… again and again. I squint back at Noaz. The only people I haven’t yet seen on it ar
e Vincent and Noaz.

  “Yeah,” I challenge, pointing toward the ring of death. “Why don’t you give it a try?”

  Noaz sets his clipboard aside. “Alright then.”

  I smile smugly, until I realize what he said. “Wait, what?” I didn’t expect him to agree so readily. But Noaz is already striding over to the beginning of the ring of death as Thayer and Aaron both amble over to me. Haze pauses mid-pushup and then lowers himself to the floor, propping his chin on his hands as he proceeds to watch. Even Levi seems surprised as Noaz approaches the ring of death. As he’s climbing one of the tall, slanted walls, he slips and grunts before swiftly sliding down and landing on his side. We all watch him expectantly now, curious.

  One second, Noaz is there and the next he’s gone. My mouth hangs open as I watch him quickly scale the ginormous wall of spikes, only to catapult himself over the other side, land on his feet and take off for the rope. He doesn’t stop at the rope but leaps halfway up with a powerful jump. Thayer laughs and cheers.

  I slowly turn to the others as Haze sighs. “Did you know he could do this?” I ask them.

  Aaron nods. “He’s showing off a bit, but it might also be because he wants to get his point across. Noaz has trained far longer and far harder than most of us. This course is nothing to him. He’s more of a technology genius, but because of his family, he was required to build up a certain image back in Arawn.”

  I blink. “His family?”

  Aaron stiffens and shakes his head. “Don’t worry about it,” he says, turning away.

  But now I have to wonder, who is Noaz? A tech genius like Aaron said, but what was that bit about his family? And how the hell can he move like a goddamn wraith?

  I watch as Noaz sprints around the course, climbing, pumping, jumping—and even when he does make a mistake, like on the last climbing wall, he uses his slip to adjust and slide completely down the other side of the wall even faster than if he were climbing it. It’s amazing. It’s mind-boggling. It’s… hot.

  Once that thought rams into my brain, I short circuit. No. I can’t think that. I have no right to think that. Kida was my one chance at love, and she’s dead. I don’t get another one, and I certainly don’t get to have sex. As Noaz breaks into the final obstacle, I turn around. I can’t watch anymore. My breathing is irregular, heart pumping in my chest as if I’m the one in the ring of death instead of him. The slow claps of the others let me know when Noaz is done.

  Instead of staying to see the impassive expression on his face as he orders me to do more exercises, I just do them. I get back on the railing, I lift my feet, and then I start to count to a thousand. When he approaches and picks up his clipboard, I close my eyes and ignore him. His speed and skill are not attractive, I tell myself.

  But even as I hold myself up—my muscles back to screaming—I have to beat back my other thoughts. The thoughts of not just Noaz, but Thayer, Aaron, Haze, and Levi. My lips burn, remembering my kiss with Levi—I sneak a glance at him, but he doesn’t return it. Maybe that’s for the best.

  I just need to hold on.

  A Little Bit of Relief

  Nighttime descends on Tartarus—but that doesn’t mean everyone closes up shop and goes to sleep. No, Tartarus isn’t like that. In fact, once the sun goes down even more people come out of the chrome work. I’ve decided that I can’t stay in the penthouse tonight. I need a break, a breather. I also need time away from that bedroom and that place that, for some reason, reminds me all too much of what I’ve lost, despite the fact that Kida and I never lived with Vincent.

  “Where are you going?” I turn around and spot Thayer and Aaron as they exit the elevator. I pause in front of the stairs.

  “I’m going out? Are you following me?”

  Thayer tilts his head to the side, his curly mass of shoulder-length hair sliding across one chiseled cheek. I glance down at their clothes. Dark synthetic cotton t-shirts and low-slung poly-leather pants. “We’re going out for a drink,” Thayer says. “Want to join us?”

  I glance at Aaron, but he remains silent, allowing me to make my own decision. I’ve come to know him well enough though, that even if I turn them down and strike off on my own, there will be someone following me within the hour. It’s not that he doesn’t trust me—at least, that’s not the case anymore. He feels protective and, truth be told, I’m a little protective of them now too. Because of what’s happened. Maybe that means I’m latching onto them. I just don’t want to see anyone else hurt right now. Especially not my guys—the guys, I remind myself. Not mine.

  I sigh and meet them in the middle of the lobby. “Why not?” I concede.

  Thayer smiles and holds the front doors open for me, though he knows he doesn’t need to. The doors will sense our movement and stay open on their own for as long as they need to. Still, it’s a nice gesture.

  Ferryman’s is a bar on the nicer side of Tartarus—not that Tartarus gets very nice, but at least in this place someone might actually warn you before they stab you through the eye. Thayer and Aaron shoulder their way through the crowd with me between them—Thayer with a ready and friendly smile on his face and Aaron, as usual, with his stoic ‘don’t-fuck-with-me’ expression. I’m still not quite sure how two men with such different personalities work so well together.

  “Three Cuffs!” Thayer calls across the bar. I almost expect the bartender to flip him off and yell ‘Fuck off’ like I’m used to, but within a handful of minutes a waitress in a tight black tank top and canvas shorts drops off a round of amber colored liquid in thick metal cups and is gone.

  “What’s Cuffs?” I ask as Thayer slides one of the heavy glasses over to me.

  “It’s like a brandy-ale. It’s not quite liquor, not quite brewed beer,” he explains.

  I blink down into my cup before raising it to my lips. The alcohol goes down without an issue. But either the Cuffs makes me thirsty or I was more dehydrated than I thought after all that exercise today because within a few minutes, I’ve downed at least half of my drink.

  “Whoa, slow your roll there, Firecracker—don’t want to see you shoot off.”

  “Huh?” I lift my head from my cup to find both Thayer and Aaron eyeing me.

  “He doesn’t want you to get drunk,” Aaron says.

  “I think she’ll be fine,” Thayer says, “but I just don’t – I mean what if something happens?”

  I shake my head. “Nothing’s gonna happen,” I say. Even if it does, it’s not like I’ll care much in the state I’m hoping to be in before we leave. They don’t need to know that though. I’m here to have a good time and just forget for a little while before I have to go back to the penthouse, and sleep in that bed, and dream of Kida. I suck back the rest of my drink and raise my hand for another. It’s quickly replaced, and my lips are back at the rim.

  Thayer and Aaron watch me as I down drink after drink. The Cuffs goes down so quickly I barely feel anything. I’m starting to wonder if it’s alcoholic at all. All the while, they both sip their first drinks until only a small lingering of foam around the bottom of their cups remains.

  “Uhh, Cass?”

  “Huh?” I sniff and lay my head on the table, a hiccup brewing in the back of my throat.

  “You okay?”

  “Yup.” I wave my free hand at him, as the hiccup breaks free. I stop and hold my breath, counting down before I continue speaking. “No worries, just fine.”

  “Watch her,” Aaron says suddenly, standing up and moving around the table. I drain the rest of my drink and look around for the waitress.

  “I think you’ve had enough,” Thayer says, sliding my glass away. I let him take it, there’s nothing in it anyway.

  “It’s fine,” I say, “just fine.” My feet are light as a fucking feather when I stand up, almost like I’m floating. Ha. Floating. Like the cities—though, they’re not really floating. No, they’ve got engines and fans and… all sorts of technical, science-y shit to keep us from plummeting to our deaths. For now, anyway.

>   “Where are you going?” Thayer asks, following me. There is music coming from somewhere in this place, invisible speakers somewhere. And a small collection of people are gathered in the center of the bar to dance. I turn, quickly snagging his hand. If he’s just going to follow, then he might as well be useful.

  “We’re going to dance.” My chest fills and decompresses, another hiccup bursting forth. Thayer blinks at me, but when no more erupt, he laughs.

  Shaking his head at me, he draws me closer as more people crush around us. I sigh and let my head hit his chest. I’m not here because a bar extols my sins, but because I need to escape them. I don’t even hear voices in the music, just the beat. Despite the rumbling rhythm like thunder in the middle of the bar, Thayer holds me close and we sway, his heart thumping under my cheek. My hands clutch his soft shirt and I rub my nose across it.

  “You’re not yourself tonight,” he says quietly. There’s no accusation in his tone, so I don’t feel pressured to respond, but I find myself lifting my cheek and leaning back to look up into his dark eyes.

  I remember once seeing a dog in the streets—the creatures are so rare, especially on Tartarus where most people eat pets rather than keep them; the hunger gets that strong for the less fortunate. The animal had these wide, burnt-brown eyes and Thayer’s remind me of the strength I had seen in them. An animal that could have been killed and eaten and yet had somehow managed to survive all alone on the streets crowded with the worst left of humanity. I wanted so badly to take him home with me—even though, at the time, I hadn’t yet met Kida nor had I been taken to the detention center, and home was nothing more than a hovel or wherever I could sneak in for the night. I was too scared to keep the animal—scared that one day I would get too hungry and I’d have to see the life drain from the poor creature’s eyes just so I could feed the gnawing hunger in my belly.

  Thayer scares me too, but for different reasons. His eyes promise protection and understanding. They are hardened by a life of difficulty, and yet softened because he is still able to maintain that upbeat personality of his. I wonder if it must be tiring sometimes to smile as much as he does.