Page 22 of Dissent (The Dissenter Saga #1)

I was at a complete loss for words. Tightness grew in the back of my throat as a lump formed. My nose prickled, and I knew that any moment, the tears were going to fall and there would be no stopping them. Because he was here. He was here, and he was alive!

I inhaled sharply, and then his name escaped my lips with my breath.

“Chase…” His eyes narrowed as a stern, bitter look came over his features.

His sharp, high cheekbones and angular face looked just as perfect as the day I watched him burned alive, as though they were chiseled out of stone.

“I thought you were dead.” A wet drop rolled down my cheek as an immense sense of relief swelled within me. He was really alive.

My eyes caught the glint of metal, and I shifted my gaze to the large hunting blade in his hand.

His features became distorted as he sneered, his jaw set and eyes cold.

My heart pounded in my chest. Something wasn’t right.

Something was terribly wrong. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end as a deep sense of foreboding filled me.

“He is dead,” his voice rippled out, slightly deeper than I remember it being, and on edge.

“What?”

“Wes!” another voice called out.

I jumped, almost losing my grip on my towel, but saving it at the last second. I turned to see Matias a few yards away from me. Wes? Who the hell is — It all clicked into place. I turned to look at Chase.

“Matias,” Wes acknowledged.

“Put the knife away, Wes,” Matias insisted firmly.

Even through his shirt, I could see the bulging tension of his biceps.

He wasn’t gripping his sidearm, but there was no mistaking that he was ready for a fight.

Wes must have registered the same thing because he rolled his shoulders back, visibly taking a deep breath as he placed the knife in a sheath hanging from his belt.

Matias looked at me. “Are you all right, Mara?” I just nodded, closing my mouth and rubbing my lips together as I took another deep breath to settle my nerves.

“She needs to leave,” Wes stated, jaw clenched.

Matias stood up straighter, rolling his own shoulders back as he shook his head. “It’s not her fault, brother. You know exactly how all of that went down and her leaving won’t change all that.”

Wes’s green eyes hardened, his lips set in a firm line as his gaze shifted back to me. “You need to leave.” The words slid out through gritted teeth.

“That’s not happening, Wes. She’s one of us now.”

He stiffened. “Yeah, we’ll see about that.” Then he took a few steps backward before finally turning and disappearing into the foliage.

I felt my breath escape me, the pounding in my chest settling. But I was still frozen in place, gripping the little fabric that covered my naked body. Matias closed the gap between us.

“Hey, are you really okay? Did he touch you?” I shook my head, unable to speak yet. I gripped the towel harder, trying to pull it up closer to my body, and before I could stop myself, I began crying.

I felt like such a fool, but I was so overwhelmed and I just didn’t want to do this anymore.

I wanted to stop the tears, but I just couldn’t, and they just kept coming.

Before my brain could register what was happening, I was being held, and I leaned into it, burying my face in Matias’s firm chest. All I did was cry, and all he did was embrace me silently, letting the tears fall.

After some time, I found the ability to control myself. My pride was trashed, but at least I felt a little better. Matias had been gentle and knew exactly when to give me space so I could dress. We were walking back to camp when I finally had the courage to speak again.

“You called him Wes . Is that his real name?”

“What do you mean?”

“Is his name Chase or Wes? I knew him as Chase Beckham back in Telvia.”

Recognition crossed his face, and he looked away from me quickly. “Yeah, his name is Wes.” I felt my throat sting, and the desire to cry surged within me, but my eyes were dry and itchy. I doubted I had any tears left in me. Raúl was right about Chase, after all. He was a Dissenter.

“Mara, who you saw today wasn’t Chase.”

“Excuse me?”

He swallowed hard as he tried to explain it to me. He took in a deep breath as he stopped walking, turning to face me. “Chase and Wes are the Calvernon brothers. They’re the heirs of the North.”

“But…but he looked just like him.”

“Yeah, it’s trippy, I know. They’re identical twins actually, but Chase liked to boast he was the oldest even though he was only born, like, a minute before, or some shit like that.”

Realization struck me like a ton of bricks. “That wasn’t Chase?” I realized then that I had been hoping it was. I would rather have Chase alive and hating my guts than dead because of me.

“No, Mara, that wasn’t Chase.”

I stared at the floor. Some part of me felt like going back to the river, to immerse myself in the water and never surface for air.

Another part of me was feeling something new.

Something tingled and spurred a sensation of heat deep within me.

But I squelched it. I felt lost. Matias must have sensed that I was struggling with something because he began trying to explain.

“Chase had been working with the rebels for a long time. He knew the risk he took when he accepted you as his mission. He went into Telvia as Chase Beckham and his Telvian parents were also some of ours. They weren’t his real mom and dad, though.

And Wes…well, he’s hurting. They were close, but he’ll come around. ”

There was a whole lot that just got dumped on me.

Chase was not Chase Beckham, but Chase Calvernon .

And the boy of my dreams also had an identical twin brother who obviously despised me and probably blamed me for Chase’s death.

I couldn’t blame him, though. It was my fault.

But there was something else. If I heard right, Chase accepted me as his mission ?

Now what on earth did that mean? “His what ?”

Matias suddenly looked confused. “They were brothers,” he tried again to explain. “And Wes’s kind of hotheaded and he’s hurting, so you need to give him a little space, okay?”

“No, not that. I’m talking about what you said about his mission . What did you mean by saying that he accepted me as his mission ?”

Something changed in Matias’s expression.

He cleared his throat, looking away from me as he shifted his weight from one foot to the other and then back again.

Clearly, he was feeling uncomfortable with the direction the conversation had taken.

“Look, Mara, you have to remember that this is a war we’re fighting.

And we all get asked to do things that sometimes may seem unfair.

But that doesn’t mean that what you had with him wasn’t real. ”

Heat rose within me again, and I could feel my cheeks flushing with it.

But this time, I had a better idea of the emotion seething inside of me.

I was angry. No, wait…I was pissed . “Are you telling me that Chase was my friend because it was a mission ? I was some sort of objective in your guys’ stupid little rebellion? ”

“Mara, calm down—”

“I will not calm down,” I interrupted him.

How could I have been so stupid to believe that someone actually cared about me?

“I liked him, Matias. And I thought he liked me too. And ever since he died, I have done nothing but blame myself for his death. And now I’m finding out that it was all some sort of ruse? That I was a mission ? Hell no!”

“Listen, it was nothing against you, and it wasn’t meant to hurt you—”

“Oh just shut up!” It was really burning within me now. The fire was growing inside, and I felt myself wanting to flee, to run away and never deal with any of this shit ever again. But where would I go? I had nothing. I had no one.

“Mara…”

“Just leave me alone,” I waved him off as I turned away, marching on. But he grasped my arm and pulled me back. Before I knew what I was doing, I slapped him. My hand hit his face hard, and the delicious smacking sound was incredibly satisfying. He let me go as his hand shot up to cup his cheek.

“You just don’t get it, do you?” I yelled at him.

“My whole life has been nothing but a giant disappointment for all the people in it! There were two people in my life, Matias, only two that made me feel like I was worth anything. Like I was worth something. Like I could be happy one day. And Chase was one of them. Then he died, at the hands of my father no less! How do you think that makes me feel? Huh? How do you think I feel right now learning that the person I felt so connected with, that the person I felt was the only thing worth living for, didn’t really like me at all!

I was just a pawn in this stupid, crazy chess game everyone’s playing.

And here’s the craziest part…everyone is playing it except for me.

I want nothing to do with it! And yet, here I am, still playing the damn game. ”

I felt the heat grow within me. My body was shaking, and it was taking everything within me to keep from shoving Matias, from hitting him again.

“I have nowhere to go! My father—my own dad— wants me DEAD. My stepmother wants me DEAD. And knowing my freaking luck, my brother will probably be the one to pull the damn trigger! I’m pretty sure that everyone in this stupid camp hates me!

And the worst part is, all I want to do is run away, to go as far away as I can.

And I can’t even do that because I don’t even know where here is!

I mean, look at this freaking place.” My arms flew open as I motioned around me.

“This is a crazy maze. There’s water out here!

There’s water in what I thought was nothing but a wasteland!

Don’t you get it? Everything I thought was true is a giant lie!

The only thing I thought was real, that I thought was firm and steady, that I thought would keep me safe , was Chase.

And now, that’s not even true anymore either, is it?

” The words fell out of me, and suddenly I felt tired.

The anger fizzled out as I sighed deeply, looking at the ground and feeling deflated.

Silence fell between us, and after a few seconds, I let out another defeated sigh.

“I don’t even know what the truth is anymore.

The only thing I know is I hate everything.

I hate all of it.” I rubbed my eyes, feeling the gentle pressure of my fingertips against them.

Taking a shaky breath, I mumbled, “I was better off in the fucking basement.”

He stood quietly for a few moments. Maybe he was processing what I said, or maybe he was giving me a moment in case I wasn’t finished, but he stayed quiet and just looked at me. There was tenderness in his eyes, not quite pity, but a softness that I couldn’t quite put my finger on.

The silence stretched for a few seconds before I couldn’t stand it anymore.

“So, where do we go from here?” I really didn’t know what I was asking him.

Maybe I wanted to know where to turn on the road to get back to camp.

Or perhaps I wanted to know what I should do next.

Whatever it was I meant, I wasn’t expecting the response he gave me.

His eyes remained soft as he rubbed his lips together.

“Well, for starters, you can start learning that we aren’t your enemy.

We’re not here to hurt you, Mara, and we don’t want you dead.

If that were the case, we would have done it by now, or we would have let Raúl do it.

But we’re not your enemy. Now, I don’t know what you mean by ‘the basement,’ but what I can tell you is that you’re safe with us.

And, I may not know a lot about what it was like to live in Telvia, but I know Sasha, and I know this camp, and I know what the Dissenters are all about.

You might not feel you’re worth anything, but you are .

Everyone here is valuable. Everyone here is worthy. And you’re no different.”

I pawed my foot on the ground, shuffling the dirt, letting his words sink in. “My brother told me something like that before. He said I had to believe in myself.”

He smirked, “I might not agree with your brother’s politics, but he doesn’t sound like a complete idiot at least.”

I didn’t want to, but a chuckle escaped me.

We stood quietly for a moment as I breathed deeply, trying to process everything I had learned.

It was a lot. But I had to get through this.

If not for me, for Jacob. Because what I did had a direct impact on him now, even if he didn’t know it.

I rubbed my eyes and sighed heavily. There was still one question burning within me. “Matias, why was I Chase’s mission?”

He searched my eyes, brows knitted together.

“I don’t know. All I know is you’re my mission now.

” His words lingered, hanging in the air for a moment, and then the smile returned to his lips.

A grin that I was ever so slowly growing to like.

He reached his hand out to me. “Ready to go back to camp?”

I stared at his outstretched hand and calculated what it meant to accept it. Did it mean I was accepting the offer to become a Dissenter? Was I renouncing my parentage, my dad and my brother, for these strangers? Where would taking this step lead me?

As if sensing my hesitation, Matias wiggled his fingers gently, encouraging me to accept his offer. “There’s nothing left for you back there, Mara. You’re a Dissenter now.”

His words struck me, and the look in his eyes drew me in. I reached out my hand and accepted his invitation.