New World Ashes

by Jennifer Wilson

  My lips stuck together as I opened my mouth to speak, but he hushed me. Pressing a finger to his lips, he then pointed to the cot below us. Mouse’s soft breathing could just barely be heard. It was steady. She was still asleep.

  “Will you do me a favor?” He whispered.

  “What?” I whispered back, still not fully awake.

  Triven unfurled his palm revealing one of the white pills Ryker had given me. “Next time you take a sleeping pill, let me know. That way when I wake up and you’re not thrashing about, I won’t think you’ve died in your sleep.”

  I gave him a wistful smile. “I’d have thought you would have appreciated a peaceful night’s sleep.”

  “What I like is knowing you are safe by my side. It doesn’t matter to me if it’s a restful night or an exciting one.” He stretched, placing the pill on our little side table.

  “You have a sick sense of what’s an exciting night.” I rolled my eyes in irritation considering the last time we had an “exciting night” I nearly killed him. He chuckled, trying to make light of the situation. I fixed him in a fierce gaze to emphasize my point. “I took it in hopes of keeping you both safe while I slept.”

  “I think you are the least of our safety concerns right now.” He rolled quietly out of bed and started pulling on a long-sleeved shirt. “Besides, I think we can resolve some of those issues today.”

  I eyed him suspiciously. His returning lopsided grin did little to sway me.

  “Meet me in the training bunker after you eat breakfast.”

  My eyebrow rose.

  “Mouse knows where it is.” And with that he was out the door.

  BREAKFAST WAS AN uneventful meal. Inessa was the only one in the kitchen when we arrived and while her smile was warm, her eyes were slightly guarded. We didn’t speak. I couldn’t blame her after the things I said last night. You can’t really tell a room full of people to go to hell and expect a warm reception in the morning. When I yawned for the fourth time, however, she placed a steaming cup of something bitter smelling in front of me. The taste made my tongue pucker but amazingly the last of sleep’s clingy fingers fell away from my mind. Mouse finished her food while I struggled to stomach mine.

  Once we finished, I followed Mouse to what Triven had referred to as the training bunker. We left the familiar safety of Ryker’s underground blockhouse and moved carefully through two white power supply tunnels to find it. I felt overly exposed, but Mouse seemed confident in our safety.

  Apparently the use of the word “bunker” was a loose representation. This was more of a dead-end tunnel with training equipment in it. The room was big compared to most I had seen since my escape. Aside from it being a little narrower, it reminded me of the laundry room I had worked in with Triven back in the Subversive. The walls curved into the ceiling making the room feel like a tipped “C”. Small pipes ran across the ceiling, disappearing abruptly into the wall at the end of the corridor. The only exit was the twelve-inch-thick door we now stood outside of. Everything was white. Even with only a few sterile lights, the room seemed blinding. I recoiled a little, flashing back to the room with the bright lights and the swallowing darkness. I froze in the steel-girded doorway, unable to enter.

  Mouse bound ahead of me to the waiting Triven. She faked a few punches into his side. He bear-hugged her in response, tickling her until her mouth opened in silent laughter. I felt a small pang of jealousy at how close they had become in my absence. Mouse was like my little sister, but still I could not see myself playing with her like that. I wasn’t exactly the fun-loving big sister type. I was more of the kind that would kill you if you hurt her. Literally.

  I was watching them so intently that I jumped when a shadow stepped out from behind the door. Instinctively, I snarled as my fists curled into weapons.

  “If I didn’t know you so well, I might be offended.” Ryker’s deep voice crooned sarcastically. He eyed my stance with a critical look then turned casually away. He moved fluidly across the room to the training mat. My body relaxed a little as he moved away, but I still didn’t enter the room.

  “So do you want to tell her or should I?” Ryker asked over his shoulder. He was indifferently stretching his neck and arms.

  Triven cleared his throat awkwardly, and my attention shifted to his direction.

  “Tell me what?” My gaze shifted between the two men.

  “I asked you to trust me.” Triven said walking closer to where I stood.

  “And I do.” My words came out slow, suspicious. I think…

  Ryker picked up a training baton. I tried to ignore him, but while my eyes were on Triven, my mind was watching the weapon in Ryker’s hand. Mouse had picked up a baton as well and was now playfully sparring with Ryker.

  Triven spoke, and I made an effort to focus. “When I first saw you, there was this light inside of you. A fire. When we got you back, it was like it had gone out. As if The Minister had snuffed the life out of you.”

  I looked away from him as his words slapped my heart. I was dead inside, everyone knew it…

  Triven gently touched my chin pulling my eyes back up to his. “But The Minister is an imbecile if he thinks he beat you. You are the Phoenix. You rise from your ashes and become reborn—stronger and fiercer than ever before. I’ve seen it. There is a spark in your eyes. You just need a little push. You need to fight… as if your life depended on it.”

  His hazel eyes were steeled with determination.

  I glanced around the room. The Minister had used fighting to break me. He forced me to hate myself for what I had trained to be and now Triven wanted to give me that power back. Ryker had stopped moving. His back was still turned to us but he was listening now. It clicked.

  “You want me to fight… him.” I stared at the back of Ryker’s dark head. I could feel the stir of revenge in the pit of my stomach. He might be on our side, but I still held some residual hate for him.

  “Your instinct to survive is stronger than any other natural feeling you have. Love and passion come second to it,” Triven said. If this fact hurt him, he showed no sign of it. The only emotion gracing his expression was confidence. “I have seen the blaze that burns in your eyes during combat. The power and sense of life that emanates from you when your life is in danger is intoxicating to you. You thrive on it. You come alive.”

  My eyes shifted to Ryker. “Why him?”

  Triven’s eyes flinched slightly. “Because I have seen that spark when you look at him. Your anger flares and I see glimpses of the girl I first met. The girl quick to a fight, not because she was out of control but because she could master every situation.” He hesitated. “You also need someone who won’t hold back when it comes to a fight and I can’t do that. I can’t hurt you, even if it means helping you. I’m… I’m not my mother.”

  I reached for him, my fingertips brushing the back of his hand. I spoke quietly, “I couldn’t do that to you either. There is enough blood on my hands, I couldn’t live with myself if yours was there too.”

  We stared at our barely touching hands.

  I voiced the question we were both thinking. “What if this doesn’t work?”

  “It will work.” He grabbed my hand, squeezing it. “Trust me.”

  He released me suddenly and turned toward the other two. “Come on Mouse. How about we give these two some room?”

  He reached out for her. Mouse promptly dropped her training baton and ran past Triven’s outstretched hand to me. She collided with my waist and smiled up at me. She nodded at me with knowing eyes. I knew what she was trying to say without any signs. You can do this. I hugged her back and kissed the top of her head.

  “Maybe you two should stay. It might be a good idea for Mouse to see what we are really capable of.” Ryker was now watching us, his head tilted to the side thoughtfully as he spoke.

  Triven rounded on him with a paternal wrath that impressed even me. But I couldn’t muster that same resentment. A part of me hated Ryker for wanting to expose her to the ki
nd of violence we were both capable of. And yet another part of me felt he might be right. Mouse had never truly seen me fight. Would she feel the same way about me, if she knew that I had been raised—that I had trained—to be a weapon? As much as I never wanted her to see that part of me, chances were it was going to happen. Sooner than later. And she had the right to know what her so-called hero was made of. But I wasn’t ready, not now.

  “I agree,” I said evenly. Triven let out a huff of frustrated air next to me. “But today is not that day. Maybe we can educate her next time, that is if I don’t kill you today.”

  Mouse swatted my hand reproachfully, her tiny brow furrowed. Play nice. Trust him. She signed. I tried to smile reassuringly, but it was a little too stiff to be convincing.

  Triven squeezed the top of my shoulder before taking Mouse’s hand. Letting him touch me was becoming so easy. He winked at me and whispered in my ear. “Kick his ass.”

  I grinned in earnest this time as they left. Ryker strode past me, his posture stiff from years of ingrained military training. He shut the door with a heavy thud and spun the wheel, locking us in.

  “I never thought I’d see the day when Prea Mason went soft for a guy.” He leaned against the door tossing the baton idly in his hand.

  I bared my teeth at him. He smiled in return—his face was actually handsome when he did so. Looking less military and more human. I hardened my already icy glare. He was pushing buttons and enjoying it.

  “You know Triven is a good man—kind, caring. He’s a good fighter too. Actually bettered me in our first match together. But he’s weak.” He pushed off from the door and walked toward me. My heart began to pound as he dropped the baton and grabbed a real knife from the wall. “He may not be willing to hurt you, but I am.”

  Ryker’s expression barely changed in the next instant, but it was enough to give him away.

  I twisted and dropped to the ground as the knife sailed past my neck. Warmth spread down my collar, seeping into my clothes. I was rusty. He had missed a direct hit on his target, but still, it wasn’t simply a glancing blow. If I hadn’t moved, there would have been a knife embedded in my throat. Ryker was already positioned, prepared for my counterattack. He smiled—not in the warm way he had moments ago—but in the same cruel way I had seen so many times in my prison cell.

  Adrenaline pulsed through my veins like venom. I could feel my muscles tensing, my senses heightening. Ryker reached for the wall behind him and produced another glinting knife. My eyes took in the room around us. I was cornered. Behind me was the dead-end wall with nothing but foam covered batons on it and to my sides were only empty curved walls. All of the weapons of real use were now carefully stowed on the opposite end of the room. Behind Ryker. Before I could form a plan, he charged me. The hair on the back of my neck rose as years of experience whispered in my ear. Kill or be killed.

  Something inside of me cracked wide open and the world changed. Images of injured children fell away. All I could see was the man coming at me. Everything shifted from grey to black and white. Live or die. Fight or run…

  Fight.

  Just as Ryker bore down on me, my body came to life. I launched sideways with a burst of speed. Ryker’s knife slashed past my shoulder, missing me by inches. I forced the muscles in my legs to push forward as I ran headlong at the curved chamber wall. I could hear Ryker adjusting his aim, coming toward me again. My footing came naturally as I leapt onto the rounded surface. One. Two steps. Then on the third I twisted my body in the air, projecting myself back and upward. My arms shot out seeking the pipes suspended from the ceiling. Shock registered in Ryker’s eyes a moment too late. He skittered, trying to stop his forward velocity, but I was too fast. I swung headlong at Ryker, using both of our momentums against him. My feet landed squarely in the middle of his chest with a heavy thud. Air whooshed from his lungs as he hurled backward. My blood raced as he slammed into the wall of weapons behind him. The shelves exploded in a clattering rain of deathly artillery. The knife he was clutching clattered to the floor joining its brothers and sisters in an array of silver and white.

  I dropped from the pipes, a grin passing my lips. My fingers were tingling. As I gasped for air, my lungs seemed to fill for the first time in nearly a month. My temporary euphoria was short-lived however.

  Ryker was moving again. He rolled onto his side. I barely saw the crisp white of a gun’s muzzle before he fired. The sound was oddly muted in the convex room, but the searing bite in my arm was plenty real. I dove to the right, throwing myself at the nearest pile of weapons. Careful of where my body landed, I rolled twice, my fingers closing over two knife hilts as I moved. I could hear Ryker’s bullets spinning past me. The smell of singed hair burned my nostrils as one skimmed too close to my head. Ryker was getting to his feet as he continued to fire. I flung one knife as I flipped upright. He deflected it with the gun. Metal clanging against metal. But it was enough of a distraction to let me get to my feet. I hurled the second knife as I dodged sideways behind another rack of weapons and counted. One shot. Two more shots and…

  Click.

  He was out. I flung myself on top of the rack tipping it toward him. I clung to the falling partition until the trajectory was right and threw myself at Ryker with all of my force. We fell in a heap of punching fists and kicking legs. Something inside of me snapped and I let it go.

  Everything I had suppressed when fighting those kids, all of the hate I felt for The Minister, all of the rage and distrust I was harboring for Ryker came flying loose. Suddenly he was everyone and no one. A blur of faces flashed in place of Ryker’s as we fought—The Minister, Gage, Maddox, Arstid, Ravagers, every soldier I had seen, even my own hollowed face… I wanted to kill them all. To stop the pain they had caused.

  I fought blindly, striking to kill every one of them before they killed me. Our bodies collided over and over again. I could hear small bones cracking, see blood pooling but it couldn’t be stopped. My body was alive again. It was on fire and I relished in the power of it. Slowly the world seemed to be clearing and I could think again. I countered every move Ryker threw at me. Taking his blows in stride until I saw my opening.

  Ryker lunged, bringing up his knee for a final blow and I parried. Using his own knee as a launching point, I vaulted myself into the air. I grabbed a fist full of his raven hair and slammed my knee into his face. His body quaked with the force and he plummeted to the floor.

  I went in for the kill.

  With acrobatic grace, I flipped myself behind him and pulled his arm back at an impossible angle, stopping just before the bones reached their breaking point. Anger was coursing in my veins. I pressed my lips to his ear and whispered. “I take back what I said earlier,” I pulled, feeling the bones in his arm snap. “Now we’re even.”

  Impressively, Ryker didn’t scream but only slumped forward with a groan. I slipped my arm around his neck like an anaconda and squeezed as we slid to the floor. I could feel the racing pulse of his heart beneath my fingers and I pulled harder. His good hand clawed at my arm, but I held tight. Slowly his struggling eased. Finally, his bloody bruised hand stopped clawing and began to tap my arm.

  He was conceding. Tap, tap. I give up. Tap, tap.

  A wicked grin spread across my lips and I squeezed harder until his body went limp in my arms. My mind was alive again and my instincts were flaring, whispering to me.

  Kill or be killed…

  19. CHOICES

  I WAS STILL feeling smug when Ryker finally began to stir. Triven was right. Fighting, surviving, feeling in control was like a drug for me. My mind was racing again. My body was tingling with excitement. For nearly a month my physical skills and my brain were withering away day by day. But in this instant, I felt like myself again. It was as if my toxic blood had been purified by the adrenaline.

  Ryker coughed, rolling onto his side as he clutched his arm in pain. He glared at me. “Did you conveniently forget what conceding in a fight means?”

  I tossed an i
ce pack and a green syringe I found in a first aid kit to him and slid down the opposite wall, careful to keep a safe ten feet between us. “No. I just wanted to prove a point.”

  He sat up. With one hand, he strategically pressed the needle into his arm near the break, wincing. He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth as the serum worked its magic. His foot twitched with pain for a moment before calming. Once his breathing regulated he spoke. “And your point would be…?”

  “That I’m still better than you.” I dabbed my knuckles, blowing on the raw flesh when it stung. “I could feel the pulse on your neck the entire time. You were fine. But it was nice to see that smug smile wiped off your face for a change.”

  He gave a low chuckle before succumbing to a coughing fit. Tossing the needle aside, he flexed his fingers gingerly, testing his newly healed arm. Once satisfied, he picked up the compress and pressed it to his bruised neck. I watched him with a cautious eye. Ryker had so many faces, so many sides that I had already witnessed. The loyal soldier. The rebel. The lost best friend. The passionate leader. The ruthless fighter. As he looked at me now, I could see every one of those personalities and yet, none of them. I couldn’t read him and it bothered me.

  His piercing eyes were watching me carefully as I contemplated him. “You feel better, don’t you?”

  I swallowed before answering him. “Triven was right. He understands me.”

  Ryker’s face hardened infinitesimally, but I noticed.

  “You know I should have killed you for the way you came after me.” Even though I felt alive again thanks to Ryker’s advances, being attacked repeatedly hadn’t endeared him to me in any way. If anything, it made me warier. For the first time since we met, neither of us had held anything back. We were well matched and equally lethal. I may have won this round, but not by much.