She didn’t need to look. She knew exactly where her arrow would pierce the clay bird.
“What’s next?” she asked. “More birds?”
“Take a few more shots with the bow,” he replied. “But let’s see how you do with multiple targets.”
“Nice shot, Ms. Sasha,” Brother Raj said.
“Thank you.” She bowed respectfully to the monk. “Let’s go with three birds this time and give me about five seconds between each.”
“Two birds. Ten seconds,” Jayesh corrected. “We’re starting slow, Sasha. I know you can do much more with your gift. This isn’t about you showing off. It’s about me seeing your gift in action.”
“Did I complain?” She raised her brow but he didn’t acknowledge her question. “No, I didn’t complain because I get it, Jayesh. I’m not an idiot.” Sometimes the man made her want to break things with her fists. She could feel her pulse pounding in her veins.
You’re supposed to be Zen, Sasha. This is not good for my blood pressure … or my gift. Her gift came to her only when she was in a meditative state, and for it to work properly, she had to push everything else away.
It took her a moment, but she found her center and didn’t miss a single shot with the bow. When she moved on to the handguns and multiple targets, Jay asked her to hit one specific target of the three or four birds the monks pitched for her. It was elementary stuff, but she waited as patiently as she could.
“Give me something a little harder this time?” She set her handguns down and traded them for the repeating rifle.
“Hit all five this time,” he said, nodding to the monks to set her targets in motion.
Sasha took aim and sighted down the first clay bird, taking them each in rapid succession.
“Very good.”
Sasha was surprised to hear real praise coming from him.
“Good enough to test drive the big gun?” she asked.
“One shot.”
“Yes!” She watched eagerly as Jay rolled out a rubber mat and moved the enormous weapon to the ground, just at the cliff edge. She waited impatiently for him to sight down a target.
“Come, let me show you.” He gestured for her to lay beside him on the mat.
She listened carefully as Jayesh demonstrated how to use the high-powered lens to zero in on the steel plate target he’d set up more than two thousand yards away.
“I put a block of ballistics gel behind the plate so we can see how clean a shot you can get from here.
Sasha laughed as she switched places with him.
“What’s so funny?”
“This is so not how I thought I’d be spending my summer.”
“You’re a little bit of a weirdo, aren’t you? Most girls your age get excited about fancy shoes and boys, right?”
“Don’t get me wrong, Jay. I like shoes and boys, probably even more than most girls, but guns are my jam.” She smiled as she positioned herself behind the lens to get a feel for the weapon.
In that moment, as much as she wanted to succeed, she knew she needed to miss the shot. Jayesh needed to be reminded that she wasn’t infallible. That someone her age couldn’t be trusted behind a sniper rifle when the situation was real.
“Take a breath and focus,” Jayesh said, his hand at her back to steady her. “When you’re ready, pull the trigger and be prepared for the recoil. It’s going to kick like a bull.”
Sasha felt a flutter in her chest at his nearness.
He smells nice. The errant thought sent a spike of dread through her. Jay was certainly attractive, but she did not need to be crushing on her trainer. Especially not the arrogant jerk laying beside her. What’s wrong with me? Guilt sent her reeling. She owed Quinn more loyalty.
Sasha took a deep breath, letting her emotions take precedence over her gift. She aimed, waited for the subtle warning of her gift to pass and fired.
“You missed,” Jayesh said.
She wasn’t certain how he would react when she missed the first time, but the chill of his tone terrified her.
“Why did you miss?” he asked. “I was told you never miss.”
“I never miss the target when my gift is engaged. Sometimes my focus is off, and I don’t connect with the target. When that happens, I can miss.”
“Explain.” He stood with his arms behind his back, watching her like a predator waiting to pounce on its prey.
Sasha rose to face him. “Sometimes I just don’t feel it, Jay.” She shrugged. “There is no other explanation.”
“That isn’t good enough, Sasha. You must practice until there is no room for error.”
“Which is exactly what my training has been about in the two years since my Awakening. I had this ridiculous notion that I would have all this time to master this gift. I guess I’m expected to perform well beyond my years, then?”
“Yes, you are young.” He stood ramrod straight in front of her. “But you need to accept that the Senate will demand perfection. Explain.”
“When I’m in that moment, right before I take a shot, I need to be centered. I need to be calm and I need to feel it when my gift engages with the target. When that happens, I will not miss.”
“And if you’re in a situation where it is impossible to be calm and serene? I need to understand every aspect of your gift before I can ever trust you to join my team. You will tell me what it takes to make your gift work when it matters.”
“You need to trust me?” Sasha glared, her eyes simmering with rage. She’d had enough. “You. Trust. Me?” She leaned in to him. “What about me trusting you? You arrogant ass. Do you think for one moment that I’m stupid enough to trust you with the knowledge of every nuance of my gift when we live in a world that teaches us the exact opposite? You think my mother didn’t teach me to guard the secrets of my power with my life? You trained with her. You know her ways. Do you really think Naeemah El Sadawii would teach me to give in so easily just because someone older and stronger tells me I’m supposed to trust him when he hasn’t even earned it? This goes against every fiber of my being. And you want to be able to trust me? Trust is a two-way street, Jayesh. I’m not one of your soldiers. I’m not even out of high school yet. I know you need to trust my gift, but you need to back the hell off and show me you’re worth trusting.”
Jay took a step back, his face pale in the heat of the day. He clearly wasn’t accustomed to anyone standing up to him the way she continuously did.
“Of course. You’re right.” He nodded absently. “You are so young. I know this is difficult.” His voice sounded distant as if he hadn’t heard a single word she’d said. “You will continue to practice on your own here for the rest of the afternoon. I—I want you to feel at ease when you practice and clearly my presence is affecting you negatively. I will leave you to it.”
With that, Jayesh turned and walked away.
“What just happened?” Sasha asked.
“It appears the young man isn’t prepared to take on the role of teacher yet,” Brother Rabishan said, watching Jayesh disappear into the valley. “It’s a shame. We were having fun.”
“I don’t know what that was, but something spooked him and it wasn’t me going teen brat on him.”
“Perhaps you are simply more than he expected,” Rabishan said, shaking with laughter. “But you are absolutely right, young Sasha. He must earn your trust if he expects you to fully commit to becoming a Chola assassin. I’m afraid you two are going to have to find a way to become friends if you are ever to move forward.”
“I have enough friends, thanks,” Sasha muttered.
~~~
CHAPTER
FIFTEEN
Quinn: Fall
Atlanta, Georgia
“What is with you two?” Livia threw her hands up in disgust. “You have the chance to use each other to make your own situations better, but you’re so concerned about the other, you’re torturing yourselves for no reason. It's just prolonging the inevitable and making this harder than it needs to be.�
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“It’s called being a decent human being,” Santi said. “You must have missed that lesson growing up.”
“Well, being a decent human being never got me anywhere.” Livia shoved her hands into her boxing gloves, a sure sign she was annoyed. Quinn just hoped she’d vent her frustrations on the punching bag instead of his face. One hit and he would go down like a sack of rocks.
Quinn flexed his shoulders, trying to work out the ache in his back. He was so hungry and exhausted from Livia’s demented schedule he wasn’t sure how he was still on his feet. His reprieve had been short and sweet, and now he was caught up in Soma’s newest torture scheme.
Every morning for the last month, Livia delivered Quinn to the entrance of Soma’s version of the Yard. A ten-thousand-square-foot warehouse connected to Sterling Tower via an underground tunnel. The warehouse was the result of a myriad of gifts, much like the Yard was at home. When stepping into the warehouse for the first time, Quinn felt like he’d stepped through a portal to another realm. The forest was unlike anything he’d ever seen, dense and dark with menacing plant life that grew quickly and crept along the ground in an unnatural way. The whole place was unnatural. From the wildlife lurking in the darkness, right up to the sheer mountain peak hidden among dark, swirling clouds.
Each morning he was given the same task: run to the top of the mountain to retrieve a two-hundred-pound log waiting for him there. If he dropped it on the way down, he had to start over. The old Immortal who lived in the warehouse was responsible for the landscape, which changed constantly from one week to the next. The terrain grew more challenging each week and the log became heavier and more difficult to find. The expanse of wilderness inside the building defied the laws of physics, but the old Immortal’s ability was extraordinary. Quinn had five hours each day to complete the task. If he failed, Santi was sent to Michael for the night while Quinn was given a feast and a full night’s sleep. He rarely failed.
But failure was the whole point of the impossible exercise. They were supposed to fail, but neither of them could face what that failure meant for the other. So Quinn spent his days running up the mountain and back down as fast as he possibly could. Every day he dropped the log at Santi’s feet with barely a moment to spare, his clothes drenched in sweat and his heart racing in his chest. It was her job to return the log to the top of the mountain each afternoon. If she failed, Quinn was sent to Michael for the night while she got to feast and rest. She rarely failed, but when she did, Michael made sure it was the worst night of Quinn’s life.
After Quinn completed his daily task he trained with Livia in her private gym in the evenings. She spent hours pushing him further and further into his addiction, keeping him dancing on the cusp of going too far.
And on the nights when he’d failed his task, he had to see the fear in Santi’s eyes when Michael came to collect her. The food tasted like ash and he tossed and turned the whole night worrying about her. On the nights when they were both successful, Santi and Quinn spent a quiet night together on the wide balcony that ran the length of the penthouse. They weren’t allowed to eat or sleep, but they found solace in each other.
“Hold my bag, Quinn. I need to hit something.”
“Liv, what you need is a good, long talk with a therapist,” he muttered as he took his place behind the punching bag.
“Quinn's got jokes.” Livia laughed, landing her first strike, leaving him breathless.
His time at Soma had taught him one thing: Livia was merciless, but that wasn’t the real Livia. He suspected she had no idea who she really was.
Quinn let out a grunt when her foot connected with the bag. He stood, clinging to the punching bag so he didn’t fall over. An outsider might wonder what had her so furious, but he knew. She hated watching them struggle. She hated doing this to them. Deep down, she wanted them to take turns failing so at least one of them would get a good meal and some much-needed rest. Livia didn’t understand how they could care so much about each other in such a short time that they would be willing to kill themselves every day just to see that the other didn’t have to suffer at Michael’s hand.
“Tell me why you make this so difficult,” Livia said as she flew into a high kick.
That was the thing about Livia. When she got frustrated, she didn’t immediately lash out in anger like Michael did. She backed away and dropped the facade, carefully considering her next move, always trying to understand their point of view. Like now. In moments like this, he almost liked her. The Livia he first met was the type to do something extreme to get their attention. To remind them who was in charge. But as the weeks went by and they continued their “training,” she was becoming less of a monster and more of a person with a very demanding job. Her job just happened to be bringing them to heel, and neither Santi nor Quinn were making it easy on her.
Did I just feel bad for her?
Livia launched into a complicated sequence of kicks and strikes, taking her frustrations out on the bag.
“The momentary comfort of food and rest just isn’t worth putting him through that,” Santi said. “But that’s the point, isn’t it? We’re not supposed to enjoy those things. It’s a double-edged sword. I screw over my friend, I get food and sleep, but I don’t enjoy it because I screwed over my friend. Put yourself in my place, Liv.”
“I’m trying to.”
“Then put your mother in Quinn’s place and ask yourself if you wouldn’t race up and down that mountain even harder than we do if that was all it took to keep her away from Michael … or your father.”
“I see,” Livia said, her brow furrowed in concentration. “But she’s my mother. You two aren’t anything to each other.”
“Haven’t you ever had a friend you cared about?” Quinn asked.
“Sure, but I wouldn’t give up a good meal for them.” Livia landed another kick.
“Then you don’t understand people at all.” He winced at her punch. He cared more for Santi than he was ready to admit, even to himself, but there was no way he was going to be responsible for allowing Michael to lay one hand on her. Not as long as it was in his power to stop.
“Love?” Livia sneered. “Love only causes problems. Look what it’s doing to you two.”
“That’s not what’s happening here.” Quinn flushed. “And it’s none of your business.”
“I’d say we’re more in the heavy like phase at the moment, but it works the same for helping you understand, Liv.” Santi shot Quinn a wink. “When you care about someone, you don’t put your own needs before theirs.”
“Even if it’s pointless? You guys think you're holding out––that you'll manage to gain your freedom from this place. But it's a pipedream. It's time you both accept it and start looking out for your own interests. Soma is your life. My father will never let you leave."
"Your father. You talk about your father like that's supposed to scare us when it doesn’t mean anything. We don’t know anything about him.” Quinn was sick of her empty threats and punishments one moment and then in the next, she really seemed to be trying to understand them. Livia was an impossible woman.
“Quinn, you remember the night I took you from your family?” She jabbed a right hook, landing her punch and whirling a round house kick a little too close to his face for comfort.
“Uh, yeah, that kind of thing stays with you, Liv.”
“Then you remember how I told you if you proved to be loyal and useful, that life with the Coalition didn’t have to be the atrocity you’ve been raised to believe.”
“Well, this isn’t the Coalition, is it?” Quinn snorted in disgust.
“Isn’t it?” Livia cocked her head.
“What are you saying?” Santi asked. Her chain rattled across the floor as she reached for a bottle of water from the fridge. Not for herself or for Quinn, but for Livia, because it was her job to anticipate everything Livia ever needed before she needed it.
“Soma is the Coalition, my little darlings.” She waved the water awa
y, turning instead to throw another round of punches and kicks.
“It’s obvious you have some kind of deal with them. You have Coalition agents running in and out of this place,” Santi said. “But they still act independently. They couldn’t possibly be under complete Immortal control.”
“My father—my Immortal father—is Marcus Servius. Also known as the reigning mortal Marches, Marius Von Essen IV, among his many other aliases. Head of the Coalition. Leader of the Margrave council. The fools haven't realized they practically worship the very thing they profess to hate. They follow him like blind sheep––the same man who has led them for nearly three hundred years. Marcus infiltrated the Coalition in the fifteenth century. He established himself and our family as a Coalition dynasty, making himself his own heir generation after generation. Eventually he created the Margrave and turned the Coalition into what it is today. Without him, they would still be the same mindless, unorganized zealots they were when he found them." Livia kicked the bag, sending Quinn staggering across the room to land on his back.
"Immortals have controlled every aspect of the Coalition as you know it. When I said it doesn’t have to be the terrible thing you heard horror stories about growing up, I meant it. You are on the right side of things. You two are strong. You have useful abilities. I will break you if I must, but it would be so much easier if you’d join me as allies. Surrender your unconditional loyalty to me, to Soma and the Coalition, and I can protect you as part of my personal team and household. This exhausting game we’re playing, it could all end right now.” She turned to gauge their reactions.
Emerge: The Captive: (Book 3) Page 14
