The expression on the Commander’s face turns the dread coursing through me into stone. Oliver can’t defuse him. Rachel can’t either, not that she’d try. That leaves me. Standing between the leader who’s hated me for most of my life and the girl who thinks she hates me too.
“To argue against the law of Baalboden is to argue against me.” The Commander chops each word into a sharp-edged weapon. “Are you absolutely sure you wish to take me on, girl?”
Stepping away from his chair, he marches toward us with slow deliberation. The torches paint grotesque shadows on his face as he passes them, and I brace myself.
Best Case Scenario: All he intends is to give Rachel a lecture, and I can wait until it’s over before quietly insisting, as her Protector, that we take her home.
Worst Case Scenario: He intends to punish her physically for having the gall to argue with him, and I’ll have to step in. Promise to do the job myself when I get her home. Transfer his attention from her to me. It’s what a true Protector would do.
I no longer harbor false hope that I can somehow delegate the job to Oliver. The Commander won’t allow it, not after this. Jared trusted me with the person he loved most. Not Oliver, her surrogate grandfather. Not Roderigo Angeles, her best friend’s father. Me. The orphaned apprentice she once said she loved. I don’t understand why Jared felt this was best for her, but I don’t have to. He offered an outcast street rat a place at his table. Not just as an employee, but as a friend. I owe it to him to do my best for Rachel.
And because I understand how it feels to have the foundation you built your life on get ripped away from you, I owe it to Rachel, too.
The Commander now stands behind Rachel’s chair, gripping its back with bloodless fingers. He’s beginning to look close to his seventy-odd years. His skin is worn and thin, and wrinkles score the backs of his hands. Still, his frame is muscular, and he moves with the steady grace of an experienced fighter. Only a fool would underestimate him.
“If not for me, the survivors of the Cursed One’s first attacks fifty years ago would be scattered across the ruins of their cities. Leaderless. Hopeless. Or do you forget that while the monster might lay waste to others, it never comes within Baalboden’s Wall?”
The Commander leans closer, the torchlight flickering across his skin to gild Rachel’s hair with flame. His words are brittle slaps against the air.
“If not for me, the Cursed One would have burned this city to the ground decades ago.” His voice is rising, his fingers clenched against the back of her chair like he means to snap it in two.
“I will not tolerate dissension. I will not tolerate disobedience.”
He grabs a handful of her hair and twists her around to face him. I clench my fists and prepare to defend her if he takes it any further. She hisses a quick gasp of pain, but meets his eyes without flinching.
“And I will not tolerate a mere girl speaking to me as if she was my equal. You live because I allow it. Never forget that.”
Deliberately unclenching my fists, I open my mouth to offer the Commander whatever assurances it takes to get him to calm down, but Rachel beats me to it.
“I won’t forget it.”
She sounds appropriately frightened and humbled, though knowing her it’s possible she’s simply figured out how to show him what he expects to see. He uncurls his fingers from her hair, wipes his hand against his pant leg as if he’s touched something filthy, and abruptly turns to me.
“Let that be a lesson to you in how to control your ward. It appears Jared was somewhat remiss in her education.”
He has no idea just how remiss Jared’s been about instilling in Rachel the docile, meek obedience expected from a woman in Baalboden. I manage a single nod, as if grateful for the tutelage.
“I should take her home now,” I say, making every effort to sound as if I feel nothing about the entire proceeding.
“Indeed,” Oliver says, reaching out to engulf Rachel’s hand in his. His voice is just as unruffled as mine. We both know better than to show emotion to the Commander. “We’ll need to pack her belongings. Or are you planning to move into Jared’s house?”
It’s going to be hard enough to adjust to living under the same roof as Rachel. I don’t think I can bear it if I also have to adjust to leaving the solitude of my little cottage behind as well.
“She’ll move to my house.”
Rachel jerks as if I’ve slapped her. It suddenly occurs to me that maybe she can’t bear the thought of leaving her home either, but it’s too late to take it back. To show indecisiveness in front of the Commander is foolish in the extreme. Regret over my words mixes with anger at being forced into a position where my only choices are to give up everything or expect Rachel to instead. There’s no right answer, no easy solution that will somehow make this bearable for either of us. The weight of my new responsibility feels heavy enough to crush me.
“May we leave?” Oliver asks the Commander.
His dark eyes gleaming, the Commander says, “You may.” But as we push our chairs away from the table and get to our feet, he steps closer to Rachel and glances at me, malice glittering in his eyes. “Tell me, girl, why do you despise your new Protector so much? And don’t bother trying to lie.” His eyes slide off of me and onto her. “I’d only have to punish you.” He doesn’t sound sorry about this.
Rachel throws me one quick look, her blue eyes pleading. It’s the same look I saw two years ago, the morning of her fifteenth birthday, when everything changed between us. I’d just won the apprenticeship to Jared, and he was out on a courier mission to Brooksworth, a city-state far to the north of us. Oliver was staying at the house as he always did when Jared was away, and he was busy in the kitchen baking Rachel’s favorite lemon cake for her birthday treat. I’d joined Rachel on the back porch at her request. I thought she simply wanted to talk about missing Jared, or missing her mother, something we both had in common.
Instead, she sat beside me, her cheeks flushing, her eyes refusing to meet mine, and told me she was in love with me. I heard the vibrant hope in her words, heard the way her breath caught in her throat when I took too long to answer, and felt clumsy and foolish.
She looked at me as I sat, baking in the early summer sunshine, scrambling for something to say that wouldn’t hurt her but wouldn’t encourage the impossible. I tried to explain. To tell her I couldn’t think about romance when I had so much to prove. To make her see how fast Jared would terminate my apprenticeship if he thought there was anything improper between us. To assure her she was young, and there would be others.
The words were awkward and stilted, and I couldn’t figure out what to do with my hands as the hope in her eyes slowly turned to pleading and finally subsided behind a cold wall of anger. I reached out, bridging the distance between us like I could somehow erase the damage, but she jumped to her feet and left me sitting there with nothing but the echo of my promise that she’d get over me.
She’s spent every second since proving me right. I haven’t had a glimpse of anything beneath the fierce independence she wears like a second skin until now. Now, with the Commander demanding to be privy to details that I know humiliated her, she turns to me. I don’t intend to let her down.
“I’m afraid I’ve behaved rather poorly toward Miss Adams in the past,” I say, stepping slightly in front of Rachel so the Commander has to either deal with me or be the first to step back. “I can’t blame her for hoping a good man like Oliver would be her father’s choice.”
He studies me with a smirk. “Either Jared didn’t care about this poor behavior of yours, or he never knew about it.”
I nod toward the Commander with the barest pretense of respect before turning to face Rachel. “Shall we go get your things packed?”
Her face is dead white. Even the torchlight refuses to lend her any color. Straightening her spine, she slides her shield of fierce independence back in place and says, “Fine. But only until Dad returns.” Then she walks out of the room.
I move to follow her, but the Commander’s hand snakes out and digs into my shoulder. “And when is Jared planning to return?” he asks.
“I beg your pardon?”
His tone is vicious. “She said ‘until he returns.’ When do you expect his return?” His other hand rests on the hilt of his sword, and his fingers bite into my cloak like he wishes he could draw blood.
“We don’t expect his return,” I say calmly, though my mind is racing. If the Commander really thinks Jared simply died while traveling the Wasteland, why the sharp interest in Rachel’s belief Jared will return? “Rachel only wishes things were different.”
“If you know something more about Jared’s recent failure to return, tell me now.”
“I don’t know anything.”
“Don’t even think about lying to me,” the Commander says, malice dripping from every word.
The silence between us is thick with tension, and my thoughts race. The Commander doesn’t think Jared ran into trouble on his last mission. And he certainly doesn’t think Jared’s dead. I’m not sure what’s going on, but I know with terrible certainty that Jared is in more danger from his leader than he could ever be from the Wasteland.
“I’m not lying,” I say.
The Commander leans forward, chopping off his words like he’d spit them in my face if he could. “If I find out otherwise, I’ll punish the girl first. You, of all people, should understand that.”
The sudden memory of my mother’s broken body lying lifeless at the Commander’s feet makes it nearly impossible to say, “I understand.”
He releases my shoulder slowly, and I turn to leave the room, keeping my head held high. My back straight. My face schooled into an expressionless mask as if the twin fuels of panic and anger haven’t been ignited deep where the Commander never thinks to look.
Jared’s in trouble. I have to come up with a solution—something I can use to track him down before the Commander does. And I have to do it before the Commander decides we know more than we’re telling. As I stride out of the compound, following Oliver and Rachel toward the waiting wagons, I begin to plan.
CHAPTER THREE
RACHEL
Oliver and I take a wagon to my house while Logan decides to walk the considerable distance from the compound to his little cottage in the southwest corner of town. I imagine he wants time to assess the problem of being my Protector and come up with a plan for how to handle it.
Except there is no plan that will make living under the same roof as Logan easy to bear. And there is no plan that will make me accept having Dad declared dead. This isn’t one of Logan’s precious piles of wire and gears. He can’t fix this.
We enter my house, greeted by the lingering aroma of the sticky buns Oliver made for breakfast. I guess he’ll move back to his own house now, and this little yellow rectangle with its creaking floors and generous back porch will be home to no one at all.
I stand in the front room, wishing desperately I could overturn Logan’s edict and stay right here.
“Rachel-girl, it’s full-on dark. If we don’t leave soon, we won’t make it out to Logan’s tonight.”
“Then we’ll stay here.”
“We can’t.” Oliver brushes a hand against my arm and nods toward the front window. I look and find two guards standing on our front lawn, waiting at the edges of the street torch’s flickering light. “I guess the Commander had some doubts about you fulfilling your father’s will.”
I turn away from the window—and the proof that I have no power to change my situation—and say, “Let me take a minute to say good-bye.”
“I’ll put your clothes into a trunk while you do.”
I wander through the house, touching pieces of my childhood and letting the memories swallow me whole.
The doorway where Dad gouged out a notch and carved in the date every year on my birthday to track my growth.
The sparring room with its racks of weapons where Dad taught me how to defend myself.
The kitchen table where Dad and I joked about his terrible cooking. I run my fingers across the heavy slab of wood. This is also the table where Logan first became a part of our lives, back when he was a skinny, dirty boy with hungry eyes hiding behind Oliver’s cloak. I’d watched him as the years passed. Watched him soak up knowledge and skill like a dry blanket left out in a rain storm until eventually he turned himself into the kind of man who could command Dad’s respect. And I’d foolishly thought myself in love with him.
The memory burns within me, a bed of live coals I swear I’ll stop walking across. I don’t want to think about Logan, about feeling soft and hopeful toward him once upon a time. Not when I’m saying good-bye because Logan couldn’t be bothered to understand how hard it would be for me to lose both my dad and my home on the same night.
Grief rises, thick and hot, trying to suffocate me. My eyes sting, and I dig my nails into the tabletop as a single sob escapes me.
I will not break down.
I will not.
I refuse to walk into Logan’s home with tear-stained eyes and trembling lips. Stifling the next sob that shakes me, I blink away the tears and clench my hands into fists. Dad would’ve returned by now if he could. I can’t hold on to false hope any longer. He isn’t coming home. Not without help.
My eyes slide toward the still-open door of the sparring room as an idea—a ridiculous, bold, almost impossible idea—takes root. Dad can’t come home without help, and the Commander shows no inclination to send a search party. But Dad doesn’t need a sanctioned search party. Not when he’s spent years training me how to handle myself in the Wasteland, smuggling me out of Baalboden so I could go with him on his shorter missions and making sure I could defend myself against any threat.
And not when Logan knows how to track.
The memory of Logan’s belief in Dad’s survival skills is a tiny sliver of comfort I grab onto with desperate strength. It pains me to admit it, but Logan is better at planning than I am. If anyone can help me—if anyone in Baalboden would want to help me—it’s Logan.
The grief subsides, sinking beneath cold, hard purpose. I walk into the sparring room, strap a leather sheath around my waist, and slide my knife into place.
I’m going to find a way over the Wall and bring Dad home. Logan can either help me, or get out of my way.
CHAPTER FOUR
LOGAN
She’s been under my roof for twelve hours. One hour was spent trying to cook and eat a meal without accidentally brushing up against each other and without engaging in conversation. Mostly because she looked shocked and lost, and I had no words that would make it better.
Two-point-five hours were spent listening to her move around the tiny loft above me while I worked on a design for a tracking device and told myself no one should have that much power over my ability to concentrate.
The other eight-point-five hours, we slept. Or she did. I hope she did. I lay awake for more hours than I care to recall listening for a telltale catch in her breathing that would tell me how deeply she must be hurting. She remained silent, and I remained mostly sleepless.
Now the morning light feels harsh against my eyes, and my brain feels incapable of even the most rudimentary exercise in logic. Twelve hours into my role as her Protector and I’m sure of one thing: Moving Rachel into my little brick-and-mortar cottage wasn’t one of my better ideas.
The small stipend I receive as Jared’s apprentice is enough to pay for a house of my own with a bit left over for tech supplies and food. I have no idea how I’m going to make it stretch to cover Rachel’s needs as well. However, considering the current state of our relationship, money is the least of my current difficulties.
I’m sitting on my patched leather couch when she climbs down from the loft, sunlight tangling in the red strands of her hair and shimmering like fire. Her face is pale and composed, at odds with the fierce glint in her eyes as she looks at everything but me.
I should say something.
r /> Anything.
No, not just anything. She had a rough day yesterday. She probably needs words of comfort and compassion.
I should’ve invited Oliver to breakfast.
She wanders through the living room, bypassing stacks of books and running her finger along my mantel, leaving a flurry of dust in her wake.
Did I ever realize there was dust on the mantel?
The silence between us feels unwieldy. I clear my throat and try to think of the most conciliatory greeting I can compose. How are you? Did you enjoy sleeping in my tiny loft instead of the comfortable bed you’ve always known? It’s somewhat cold outside. Did you bring your heavy cloak when you packed up all your belongings to move here because I didn’t think fast enough on my feet to realize I should let you keep your home?
If those sound half as stupid coming out of my mouth as they do in my head, I can’t say them. Maybe I should just offer her some breakfast.
Her shoulders are tense as she moves away from my mantel and toward the slab of pine I use as my kitchen table. Its surface is covered with papers, inkwells, wires, and bits of copper. In the center, beside a stack of carefully drawn designs, lie the beginnings of the invention I’m hoping will solve this entire situation.
Her lips are pressed tight, dipping down in the corners.
I can say I’m sorry. She’ll hear the sincerity in my voice. I’ll say I’m sorry and then—
She reaches her hand toward the delicately spliced wires of my new invention. I leap to my feet, scattering books across the floor, and say, “Don’t touch that!”
She freezes and looks at me for the first time.
“I mean … it’s still a work in progress and it needs … Did you sleep okay? Of course not. You have your cloak, right? Because the weather is … I’m just going to make you some breakfast.”
I sound like an idiot. Being solely responsible for a girl—no, being solely responsible for Rachel—has apparently short-circuited my ability to form coherent speech. Partially because the only girl I’ve ever really talked to is Rachel, and we stopped talking two years ago. And partially because ever since she said she loved me, I’ve felt unbearably self-conscious around her.