Page 14

The flight took all day, and by the time we arrived back in the North, the sun had already set. I watched as the city belowtwinkled with lights, and marveled at how different the world was outside of Telvia. I hadn’t been here long…two months, maybe?

When the world burned down back in May, the few survivors of the camp had been whisked off to a hospital in the northwest, on the border of where Telvia ended and the North began. And that’s where I woke up, discovering that I had been in a coma for weeks, fluttering in and out of the world of the living and hanging out with the dead.

Once they released me, I was sent to live with Edith to finish recovering. Her family lived out in the boonies, apparently far away from the bustling cities of the North. And I stayed there for two weeks…bored. I had little to no contact with anyone except for Edith and her family. Her parents weren’t the military type. They preferred the quiet solitude of the plains, tending to livestock.

Likerealcows and goats, horses, and one mean bull.

It was the nuttiest thing to me. I had never in my life seen real farm animals before. We had no need for livestock in Telvia since we never ate actual food, just nourishment pills all the time. But they were cute.Smelly, but cute. And they were always so excited to see you once they figured out who you were...except for the bull. Turns out, he wanted to impale you with his horns. Apparently, that was a thing.

Go figure.

So I spent the month learning to care for animals, just Edith and me and her bazillion siblings. I asked her about Chelsea and learned she was at the Mental Health Institute in the city, being looked at and heavily medicated. No one understood what was wrong with her.

I asked about Wes. She shared she hadn’t heard from him. Since being released from the hospital, he’d been sent home andwas MIA. And then, I asked about Matias. The look she gave me said a thousand words and then nothing at all.

He was “dealing with stuff,” according to her. They moved him to one of the military barracks, but being the closest thing Chelsea had to family, he was her main emergency contact and considered the only “living relation.” He spent most of his time divided between training and living at the Institute trying to help with her recovery. The whole thing was messed up, and it all felt so crazy and foreign to me. I just tried to stay focused on the cows.

That’s when I was summoned. Once the doctor cleared me to resume training, I received notice telling me to report back to the city. That was over a month ago, and that’s when things got really weird.

Fort Warren was a military base that belonged to the North just on the outskirts of the capital, to the far north. That’s where I went to meet Sasha. I was assigned my new mini-tab, which was a HUGE relief since the lack of technology and communication with anyone while at the farm was driving me a little cuckoo. Like, I was talking to the animals. I had given them all names. I was seconds away from having a tea party with them, which I was given a prompt education on by Edith’s five little siblings. At any rate, I was assigned a barrack, a bunk, and orders to begin training the next day.

I was even given new dog tags.

This time, however, I wasn’t being trained privately like before. I was added to a squad of twelve other faces, none of whom I recognized, and none of whom had any interest in knowing me. In fact, I was pretty sure they knew exactly who I was, and they were biding their time before they planned to lynch me in the middle of the night.

Needless to say, it really wasn’t going that well.

But then, everything shifted, and I was called in to meet with Sasha after being at the barracks for nearly a month. The meeting was comprised of her and a few other individuals, namely Gary Fisher—who I recognized as the First in Command of the North from my Review a few months prior—Sergeant Major Anthony Giza, and Wes.

My heart just about stopped when I saw him. It had been almost two months. His hair had grown longer, neatly kept in a short, low ponytail. He was clean shaven, and he smelled so damn good. I didn’t even know how to describe it, but it was sweet and deep and…masculine.

I had no idea why he had been included in the meeting. It seemed weird, and no one really explained it to me, but I slowly put it together. Since Chase died, Wes had now inherited the responsibilities of the First Son of the North. Apparently, that involved being present in these meetings.

It was then that she brought up our agreement—she would help me rescue Jacob from Telvia if I helped her secure a rebel force and encourage the people of Telvia to dissent and rise against the Telvian government. Everyone heard it. Everyone knew what I had agreed to. There was going to be no backing down. I would agree to whatever crazy plans Sasha came up with to build up the rebel forces, and then she would do everything in her power to get Jacob back.

Done.

Locked in.

Bought and paid for.

And then it all changed after that…again. Sasha agreed to the mission Wes and I had just barely survived, and I was reassigned to train with Wes to prepare for it. When Edith found out, she volunteered to help too, and she would pop in and train with us from time to time. Everyone thought we were crazy, risking everything for the general of the REG, but I didn’t care. Jacobrisked everything to save me—twice—and I was hellbent on returning the gesture.

“Hey, you ready?”

My attention snapped back to the present, my head whipping around to see Wes leaning toward me, his eyes clouded from his meds. “What?” I asked.

He lifted a brow and then tipped his head toward the door behind me. “We’re here.”

I looked around and realized that we had landed. “Oh.” I had been completely lost in thought, thinking about the insanity and complete lack of familiarity of the last few months. It was truly wild to reflect on how much my life had changed in less than a year.

“Are you planning on living here, or are you going to get out?”

I gave him a quick glare and then turned away from him, crouching in the helicopter to get out. Stepping into the night, I breathed in the balmy air, feeling the humidity stick to my skin, making me feel as though I had just been wrapped up in a blanket of my own sweat. I ran the back of my hand across my forehead, feeling the perspiration gathering there.

Wes walked past me, stepping away from the slowing blades of the chopper toward a group of decorated military officers. I followed.

“Mr. Calvernon, sir. How was your flight?” The officer asked. Two silver stars decorated his lapel, letting me know he had to be a major general or something like that. I still hadn’t quite learned all the ranks and the fancy little buttons and symbols that went with each one. But I was learning… slowly.