Page 95 of A Monarch's Fall

“They take loyalty seriously within The New Foundation,” she answered.

“Seriously enough to execute people who try to leave?” I asked, truly shocked.

“Yes, Percy. It’s a military,” she said and huffed with exertion, “The only good thing is that I’m already beginning to warm up,” she continued in frustration.

“Ana,” I said, frustrated at her frustration with me.

“What, Percy?” she asked, her hands angrily flaring at her sides.

“What’s your problem?” I asked.

“You, obviously,” she replied.

“I didn’t ask to be here,” I told her.

“No, but we are because of you. I was always going to end up in this situation, no matter what I did,” she complained.

“That doesn’t make any sense. You joined The New Foundation, not me,” I told her.

“I know! It was stupid. I should have turned around and gone home the moment they wanted to cut my hair. But I didn’t. And it wouldn’t have made a difference. You were always going to be taken, and one way or another, I was going to be dragged into everything. She’d have come for me, demanded I find you. I’d have still ended up here in this forest,” she ranted.

“You’d have been better off never meeting me then,” I told her angrily.

We walked in silence until the sun fell below the treetops behind us, and we sat down heavily against a large tree to protect us from a chill wind.

“I’m sorry,” she said as darkness fully descended.

“You’re just cold and want to steal my body heat,” I said, jokingly, trying to lighten the mood. I hated fighting with Ana.

“Are you warm?” she asked.

I lifted my arm, and she shuffled into the side of me.

“Are you still angry with me?” I asked.

“No,” she sighed, “I’m sorry. I’m scared. I don’t want to die,” she continued in a voice so low I struggled to hear her over the sound of the wind.

“You’re not going to die,” I told her.

“I don’t think Kat thought she was going to die when she got out of bed this morning,” she said.

We were silent again.

“Did you know her well?” she asked me.

“Only for the past week. I liked her,” I answered.

“I only met her today, when she came looking for you,” Ana told me. “Do you think she knew? I mean, it happened so fast, do you think she was aware that she was dying?” she asked softly.

“I think that we all know, in some way, when our light is dimming. I think it’s fast for us, the living, but for the dead, they know, and they wait for Hermes, and they hope they are given the rites for Charon,” I told her.

“I wish I believed in the Gods,” Ana whispered.

“What do you believe instead?” I asked.

Ana shrugged.

“I don’t know. I think we made up the Gods to help us understand things we don’t understand. I think there might be nothing at all.”