Page 31 of The Tree of Spirits (Paragons #2)

TRUST

T he General was right about one thing: the truth hurt. I felt like I’d been punched in the stomach.

“You’re not a Knight at all,” I muttered. “At least not anymore.”

Conner’s gaze flickered to me, and he sighed. Then his gaze snapped back to the other Rebels.

“Why have you kidnapped Savannah Winters?” he demanded.

And when the others cringed, a second realization hit me hard, like a building had fallen on top of me. Conner wasn’t just any Rebel. He was their leader.

“The General had her in the Black Obelisk. He was questioning her,” replied Cedar. “So Angel and I went to extract her.”

“You mean kidnap her.”

Cedar pounded the wall with his fist. “We had to interrogate her, Conner. She could have compromised the whole Rebellion.”

“How?” Conner spread his arms. “She doesn’t know anything about the Rebellion or any of you.”

“Oh, really? Did you think we wouldn’t notice all the time you’ve been spending with her?” Cedar looked at Angel and the other Rebel, who both nodded. That encouraged Cedar to continue. “And in all that time, you didn’t share anything about us, our hideouts, or our plans?”

“No. I did not.” Conner’s voice dipped low. Dangerously low. “Because I didn’t even tell her I was a Rebel.” He pointedly turned his face away from me when he said that.

“Well…” Cedar didn’t seem to know what to say to that. Finally, he settled for, “Better safe than sorry, right? The General was asking her about us. And for all we knew, she knew at least some of our secrets. We had to extract her from the Black Obelisk.” He forced a laugh.

“But you didn’t have to set me on fire,” I chimed in.

All four of them looked at me.

“You set her on fire?” Conner’s jaw was tight. His whole body was stiff. He looked so unlike his usual relaxed, joking self.

Cedar must have seen it too. He retreated a step. “Technically, I only threatened to set her on fire. And lit a few sparks on her ropes.”

“Yeah, because that’s much better.” Conner cracked a smile that definitely wasn’t jovial.

“We are Rebels, guys, not barbarians. I didn’t give you those invisibility suits so you could sneak into the Black Obelisk and kidnap Apprentices,” Conner said in a voice so calm and level, it was scary. “Especially not that Apprentice.”

The mystery Rebel shot Conner an amused smirk. “You like her, don’t you?”

Conner opened his mouth to respond, but then his gaze found mine. And for once, he looked like he didn’t know what to say. “Leave us,” he told the Rebels with a wave of his hand.

“But—”

“You threatened to set Savannah on fire, Cedar,” Conner cut him off. “I’m not sure how I’m supposed to react to that, but I can tell you that I’m awfully tempted to freeze your fingers off.”

Cedar paled.

“So, please, get lost until I’ve talked myself out of it,” Conner said with a wolfish smile. “In fact, all of you should go. I need to speak to Savannah alone.”

Cedar and Angel left immediately, but the third Rebel remained for a moment, her smirk ever-persistent as her eyes darted between me and Conner. “Of course you do.”

“Not now, Vivi,” he sighed.

When she’d left, Conner crossed the room to me. Very, very slowly.

“You,” I hissed, meeting his beautiful, deceitful eyes with a glare.

“Very scary, Red,” he chuckled.

“Now I know what my mom meant when she warned me about wolves in sheep clothing,” I muttered.

“You should know.” His smile widened. “You hang out with wolves.”

“Wolf is not a wolf,” I replied. “She’s a husky.”

He leaned in closer and smiled. “Of course. My mistake.”

“Stop it.”

“Stop what?”

“Stop being all nice and charming and pretending that things are ok between us,” I snapped. “Because things are definitely not ok between us!”

His smile cracked, revealing something raw and vulnerable underneath. “I’m sorry, Red. I really am. I didn’t mean to hide who I am— what I am—but I…”

“Yes?”

“I didn’t want you to look at me the way you are right now.” He took a deep breath. “With such disappointment in your eyes.”

“I’m not disappointed that you’re a Rebel, Conner. I’m disappointed that you lied to me about it.”

“Technically, I didn’t lie. I just omitted. And I know that’s just as bad, and I really wanted to tell you. But we were getting along so well, and I really, really didn’t want to ruin that.”

The pitiful look in his eyes quelled some of my anger—but only some of it. “You told me to stay away from the Rebels. Is that because you were afraid I’d mess up your Rebellion’s grand plans?”

“Mess up my plans?” He expelled a short burst of air, like a balloon deflating. “No, Red, I didn’t ask you to stay away because I was afraid you’d ruin our plans. I told you to stay away because I knew the General was watching you, just waiting for a reason to arrest you.”

“But staying away from the Rebels,” I said quietly, “you realize that also means staying away from you.”

“Yeah.” His laugh was tired and a bit forced. “You’d probably be better off if you’d done that too. And I should have told you everything, Red. I should have told you to stay away from me.”

“If you had, I wouldn’t have listened, you know.”

He snorted. “Yeah, I guess you’re just as much of a rebel as I am. Maybe that’s why we get along so well.” He hit me with a charming, lopsided smile.

I frowned at him. “I’m still angry with you, you know.”

“I know,” he sighed.

“You’ve made some seriously stupid decisions, Conner. Like not trusting me with your secret. Because I would have kept it.”

“I know.” His hand reached toward me.

I scowled at it. “ And you also hang out with the people who kidnapped me, knocked me unconscious, and dragged me all the way across town to some super-shady hideout.”

He retracted his hand. “They…made an error in judgment.”

I huffed. “That might be the biggest understatement ever.”

“Just hold still and let me fix the mess they made.” Conner pulled out a knife.

I flinched.

He sighed. “You have serious trust issues.”

“You kidnapped me. Gee, I wonder why I might not trust you.”

“I didn’t kidnap you. My harebrained friends did. But they meant well. They’re good people, once you get to know them. You guys just got off to a rocky start.”

“A rocky start?” I repeated in disbelief. “Your friends grabbed me and threw a bag over my head. That’s more than just a rocky start. It’s a declaration of war!”

“You’re so melodramatic.” He lifted his knife to the ropes binding me to the pole.

I shot him a suspicious look. “What are you doing?”

“What’s it look like? I’m untying you.”

“But why?” A part of me was still feeling paranoid.

“Do you want to stay tied up?” he asked, amused.

“No,” I said quickly.

He cut through the ropes, freeing me.

“So.” I shook off the severed pieces. “Now what?”

“Now I’d really like it if you would forgive me.”

His smile was so genuine that I really wanted to. And, if I was being truly honest with myself, I’d have to admit that part of me already had.

“You’re pretty smart and good at magic,” I said. “And it seems like you want to do the right thing.”

His smile grew wider.

“So why did you leave the Knights?”

“I left the Knights last year for…well, for personal reasons.”

“Personal reasons?”

He shook his head. “You wouldn’t understand.”

There he was, holding back again.

“And Kato? Does Kato understand?” I asked him.

“Of course not.” Conner scowled at the ground. “Why do you think I’ve been avoiding him? We’re best friends. Practically brothers. He didn’t handle it well when I left.”

I stopped myself as I was about to give his shoulder a comforting pat. Conner was really good at getting people to empathize with him. I had to be careful. He’d already burned me once before, whether or not he’d meant to.

“Conner…” I sighed. “I trusted you. I even liked you.”

The frown faded instantly from his face. He flashed me a charming grin. “You really shouldn’t go around liking and trusting every good-looking guy that you meet.”

The flash of teeth I gave him in return was more of a snarl than a smile. “Why do you always do that?”

“Why do I always do what ?”

“Make jokes when you should be serious.”

“To take the pressure off? I don’t know. You tell me.” He brushed a few loose rope threads off my sleeve. “You do the same thing.”

“Not all of the time.”

He snorted. “Well, I guess you’re a lot tougher than I am. You can handle the pressure without the jokes.”

“I won’t argue with that.”

His lips buzzed with laughter. “That’s what I like about you, Red. You always speak your mind. So, with that in mind, can you do one thing for me?”

“That depends.”

His smile faded a little. “I guess that’s fair, all things considered.”

“So what is this one thing ?”

He leaned his back against the wall. “I was hoping you would at least try to forgive me.”

I cleared my throat. “I don’t know, Conner. But I think if you want me to trust you, then you also need to trust me.”

“I do,” he said immediately.

“Do you?” I folded my arms across my chest. “If that’s true—if you truly trust me—then you can tell me why you left the Knights.”

He stared at me for so long, and all the while, I was sure he wouldn’t agree. But he did.

“Ok,” he finally said. “Actually, I guess you need to know this anyway, if we’re going to work together to rescue the Apprentices.”

I frowned, confused. “What do those things have to do with one another?”

“Don’t worry. I’ll explain everything.” He grabbed my hand, pulling me over to the sofa. And when we were sitting there, side by side, looking at each other, he said, “First of all, I wanted to assure you of something, especially after what my friends did to you.”

“Ok?”

“The Rebels were not the people in those techno suits yesterday. We did not attack the conference center. And we did not kidnap the Apprentices.”

“Yeah, I kind of figured that out already.”

“And the General didn’t change your mind?” He waited, watching me for my response.

“Of course not. The General is just looking for a scapegoat. And while I did not particularly enjoy being kidnapped by your friends—and I definitely think that Cedar especially needs some serious personality lessons—I don’t believe that any of them are jewel thieves.”

“No, the Rebels have far greater aspirations than collecting bling.” His smile was short-lived. “And so do the Templars.”

“The Templars?”

“Yeah, apparently that’s what the guys who kidnapped the Apprentices are calling themselves. That’s what my friends found out when they crossed swords with them in the Park the other day.”

“So what do the Templars want?” I asked.

“This heist was never about the jewels, Red. In fact, the Templars left them behind in the store.”

“Then what was the heist ab—” I stopped myself. “The Apprentices. We were the Templars’ target, the treasure they did all of this to steal. But why? What do they want with us?”

Conner shook his head. “I don’t know, but this isn’t the first time something like this has happened. A couple Apprentices have gone missing each year, always under peculiar circumstances. No one has been able to figure out who is doing it or why.”

“Why haven’t I heard about this?”

“The General wrote off the missing Apprentices as fluke accidents in a dangerous world.”

I wasn’t surprised by that. At all.

“But some of the Knights just knew those Apprentices were still out there,” Conner continued. “Finally, last year, we found evidence that we were right: a note from one of the missing Apprentices. It was Vivi’s little sister, and she was begging us to come save them all.”

“What did the General say then?”

“He said someone was playing a prank on us,” Conner replied with a jaded smile. “It wasn’t a prank, Red. Those Apprentices are still out there. And the General refused to let us go look for them. He said he wasn’t going to waste valuable resources on a wild goose chase.”

I set my hand on his arm. “That’s why you left the Knights, isn’t it? That’s why you became Rebels.”

“Yes,” he rasped. “These kidnappings have been going on for years, and the Government refuses to entertain even the possibility that those Apprentices are still alive. So they do nothing. And they won’t let the Knights do anything either.

And when Vivi went looking for her sister anyway, they locked her up and told everyone that the loss of her sister had driven her insane. ”

I sucked in a shocked breath. “That’s awful.”

“They left us with no choice, Red. We had to leave. We had to do something. So we broke Vivi out of the Black Obelisk and launched our so-called Rebellion. And we’ve been searching for the missing Apprentices ever since.”

“Do you have any leads?” I asked.

“No. Whoever took them did a very good job of making them disappear. And if we don’t stop the Templars, this year’s four missing Apprentices will soon join them.”

“We are going to figure out why they are doing this and stop them,” I told him.

Conner’s smile returned. “Yeah, I think we will.”

“The Templars are the key,” I said. “If we find them, we find not only this year’s missing Apprentices, but maybe all the other missing Apprentices too.”