Page 106 of Broken Ties
NOX
North wakes me only a few hours after the confrontation that was the result of my bond hijacking my body and almost binding me to that vile girl. The moment his voice bounced around my bare bedroom walls, I assumed his obsession for that girl won out over his loathing of his bond and he was dragging me out to face Shore’s skull spelunking.
I shouldn’t doubt the man.
“The Magnifier will be attempting to ambush Gryphon and the rest of Alpha Team this morning while they’re scheduled to assist in a relocation. The family is bait; they got through the vetting process because they’re genuine, but the Resistance has had them under surveillance for three years waiting for this moment. I don’t care how hungover you are, if you want to see this through, you need to be in the foyer in fifteen minutes.”
He should definitely care a little more if lives are on the line, but he’s shut the door behind himself without waiting for a reply, and I take all of a minute to decide that I’ve done far too much work on taking out this Gifted to have it all taken from me at the eleventh hour.
My head is pounding viciously, and it’s only as I brush my teeth that I catch a whiff of the girl again, some fraction ofmy clothes or my skin that I didn’t get clean in my drunken efforts, and I’m forced to step away from my toothbrush until the repulsion clears and I’m no longer violently sick. My shower is interrupted three more times by my vomiting, but I expel enough of that poison from my stomach to be sure I’ll survive the mission. After cleaning my teeth for a final time, I chew a fistful of antacids to get me through the Transporting and then call it good, stalking to the foyer like my head isn’t on the verge of exploding.
Gryphon is in the elevator, as though he was waiting for me there.
I almost let the damned thing go and take the stairs, or call it a day and go back to my books, but the look he gives me says I’ll either get into the elevator willingly or that he’ll make me. That moral line of his appears to have evaporated.
If only it weren’t all for the girl.
The missions we could go on if it were for the good of the community.
Too bad he’s as pathetic as my brother.
Halfway down to the ground floor, he hits the emergency stop button and turns on me. Even expecting it as I am, I can’t stop my bond from waking at the clear threat. I want to scream at it, to tell it that this is all its fault in the first place, but instead, I fix a bored look on my face and stare back at Gryph, unrepentant.
It’s honest, too.
Idid nothing wrong.
Despite being alone in this little metal box, he shoves his voice into my mind with the subtlety of a sledgehammer through a wall.
I’m not here for a fight, consider this a warning. North told me it was a bond response that you had no control over and barely remember. If I suspect for one second that you’re aboutto lose control again, I’ll intervene. If you have any sense in that genius brain of yours, Draven, you’ll steer clear of her altogether, because if it comes to that, I’ll put you down. In the choice between you or my Bond, she wins every time.
With a sneer, I shake my head at him. “Pathetic.”
His eyes narrow. “Draven?—”
I cut him off, getting into his face so he can see the steely resolve in my gaze even if he’s too stupid to hear it in my tone even with his most enviable Gift. “Stop your whining and listen to me, Shore. If that situation happens to me again, I’d rather you kill me. All of you are simpering after that bitch, so I’m sure it’s hard for you to believe, but use that fucking Gift instead of letting it go to waste like a fool; I’d ratherdiethan wake up to find her wet and panting at my feet again.”
The retching that I only half swallow back isn’t for show, but it certainly helps demonstrate the truth of my words, even if he’s ignoring his own fucking Gift telling him.
I hit the button to get us moving again, and the moment the doors open, I leave him behind. I have a lot of questions about where exactly North got the information on the Magnifier and very little patience left for the personnel already littering the foyer.
The shadows writhing unhappily underneath my skin need an outlet, and finding enough Resistance scum for them to rend limb from limb is my only priority for today.
The entire day is doomed,not just the mission.
We take out the Magnifier, sure, but within minutes of combat engagement, the calls begin to come through about theattack on Draven campus. Gryphon takes Black and disappears instantly, all but abandoning North and I for the girl.
Worse still, my brother doesn’t care.
No, he happily finishes off every last Resistance scum he can set his shadows onto in the tiny little town in the middle of bum-fuck nowhere that is flattened in minutes. The Magnifier is there and he centers that Gift of his onto my brother, only to find out it’s useless against him. Right before Azrael tears his throat out, he throws it at me as well, but I barely feel an itch. It’s frustrating, more so because it’s clear this was all a distraction.
They’re looking for something.
By the time Black returns for us, the campus is chaos. Students lay dead on the paths alongside the Resistance scum responsible for killing them. Entire blocks of buildings are still on fire while others are nothing but rubble. North is cursing viciously and sending out his shadows to cover the area, but when I move to do the same, my bond stops me.
Save it.
Holding back the full coverage of my shadows, I sent out a handful of the most vicious beasts instead. After a pause with nothing more pressing to show for it, I reply to it.Save it for what?