Page 28 of Tyton: The Spider and the Dragonfly (Tyton #1)

S

esi waited for her in the boxing ring. Her shorts looked unfairly good on her and Callie had to stop her brain from short circuiting. That wasn’t why she was here.

“You’re early.” Sesi’s feet dangled off the edges of the mat. “You wanted to talk about yesterday?”

“Lemme guess, Sparx?”

Sesi shook her head. “No, for once he didn’t say anything. He’s always kept you pretty close to his chest.”

Callie breathed a sigh of relief. Given how tired she felt after last night’s horrible sleep, she was glad Sparx cherished their friendship so much.If only he didn’t constantly blab to her mother.

“No,” Sesi continued, “It’s all over your face.”

Callie felt a sinking sensation, but she tried to smooth out her expression.

Sesi held out her hand as Callie approached. “It happens to everyone. For a species that has an aversion to killing each other, we’re still pretty good at it.”

“How do you feel?” Callie took Sesi’s hand. She was grateful for it because she was about to bite her fingernails again.

“About killing? I would rather not.

“It doesn’t feel good?”

Sesi narrowed her eyes. Then her expression relaxed. “That’s what this is about.”

Callie lowered her gaze.

“I might be reaching here,” Sesi started, “because I know exercise isn’t really a thing people do anymore since the widespread adoption of strength amplifiers, but have you ever run?”

Callie frowned. “Of course I’ve run. It’s not like we don’t do anything ”

“Okay, sorry, I still feel like an outsider sometimes,” Sesi laughed, chastised. “Have you ever run so hard that even though your body is in pain, your brain suddenly starts to feel good ?”

“Are you trying to tell me that murder is the same as a runner’s high? ” Callie frowned, indignant.

“No. I mean, yes, but I swear, I’m not trying to tell you murder is on the same level as running.” Sesi raised her hand defensively but she could tell Callie was still sceptical. “The chemicals are the same, no matter what you’re doing. They keep you focused. Alive,” Sesi emphasised.

“But I don’t want to feel good about murder!” Callie started hyperventilating, panic setting in.

Sesi took Callie’s bicep and placed the other hand on her chest. “Okay.”

Callie didn’t understand the gesture, where it was going, but feeling the warmth of Sesi’s hand against her breathing, her grip anchoring her, took some of the edge off.

“You don’t want to murder.”

“No!” Her breathing picked up again. How did Sesi not understand this?

“It’s okay, I’m not going to try to convince you of anything, I just want to make sure I understand, okay?” Sesi’s deep brown eyes never left Callie’s. For a colour so dark, they were surprisingly rich and warm.

Callie nodded, her heartbeat still pounding.

“You don’t want to, but you did it anyway. Something took over.”

Callie nodded vigorously, but didn’t break eye contact.

“And that something gave you a rush.”

She nodded again.

“And that rush felt good.” Sesi felt her pulse quicken, so she added “but you don’t want that. It makes you feel guilty.”

“Yes.” Callie felt calm enough to enunciate that much at least without yelling.

“Okay.”

“That’s it?” Callie’s face contorted painfully. Why would Sesi waste her time like this?

“No. I have a solution.” The way Sesi said it was almost nonchalant and it was causing Callie to ire. “But you’ll need to tell Talia.”

Callie’s face dropped. Callie wasn’t sure why she didn’t want to tell Talia how she felt. Maybe it was because Talia didn’t feel guilt. Talia had her revenge kick against the Natalists and seemed to believe that corporate security was subhuman.

“I figured.” There was a twitch at the corner of Sesi’s lip. She turned to pick up a roll of cloth and began wrapping her hands.

Callie knew Sesi was keeping something back. Worse, she knew that Sesi knew she was keeping something back. And Sesi was waiting for her to ask.

“Go ahead, tell me,” she said with a hint of acid.

Sesi continued rolling the cloth through her fingers. “Penance.”

“Penance?” Callie rolled the word around in her mouth. “Like, give to the homeless?”

Sesi shook her head. “Before corporations set up shop here, it was the Catholics.”

“Like Santa Muerte?”

“Kind of. They did a lot of questionable things to us back then. Even they knew it was horrific.” Sesi pointed at the punch pads with her chin and Callie picked them up. Sesi threw a few warm up punches. “But nobody is better at dealing with guilt than the Catholics.”

“And so, they did penance?”

Sesi jabbed twice, hard. “They dealt with their guilt in a couple ways. One,” She jabbed again, “they told themselves that we were savages who needed to be saved. Two,” Sesi made to weave as if Callie was any sort of threat, “they did penance. Sometimes it was a Hail Mary or a prayer, but I don’t think that’s what you had in mind. ”

Callie couldn’t imagine herself praying. Lighting a candle to Santa Muerte was as close as she got. “What do you have in mind?” she asked tentatively.

“Flagellation.”

Callie stayed silent, absorbing Sesi’s punches as she thought it through.

“It came from an even older idea. The flesh is impure and must be repressed so that the pure spirit can reign.”

“And you do that through flagellation?”

“It’s certainly one way to repress someone” Sesi smirked.

“Do you believe that?” Callie caught a few more punches.

“About the spirit? No. They probably just put themselves in subspace.” Sesi danced around, forcing Callie to circle so she stayed facing her. “But,” she continued, “we both know the body will carry guilt. Fixing the body will fix the mind. I know that you practice similar forms of therapy.”

“Did Talia tell you that?” her voice raised an octave.

Sesi laughed. “No. I own the club.”

“Were you watching?!” The mix of shame and titillation was becoming an uncomfortably common experience lately.

Sesi dropped her guard, her eyes boring into Callie. “I promise you, I wasn’t watching.” She bounced on her heels and punched her gloves together. “But it’s not like you rent those rooms for tea.”

Callie wanted to bite her fingernails again, but her hands were occupied with the punch pads. “I thought you said it was a bad idea.”

“It is.”

“Then why did you suggest it?”

“Because sometimes bad ideas are the only ideas left.”

Callie couldn’t really argue with that.

“What about Talia?”

“What about Talia?” Sesi threw her entire weight behind the next punch. It knocked Callie back a step.

“You know I don’t want to hurt her.”

“You also don’t want to murder people.”

Callie seethed silently, trying to come up with a solution. She threw down the pads and Sesi stopped, standing up straight. Sweat formed a triangle over her shirt.

Sesi walked to the edge of the mat and drank. Callie dropped her hands, but didn’t move. “Talia told me about you.”

“Did she.” Sesi poured some water into her hand and used it to slick her hair back.

“She said that it could have been forever, but you were both Dommes.”

Sesi huffed a laugh and bit at the inside of her cheek, thinking. “It’s true.”

Callie waited. There was obviously more to it than that. “Did she also tell you that she asked me not to pursue you?” Sesi bounced on her feet, nervous energy refusing to leave her body.

Callie couldn’t imagine Talia asking for anything. She must have stayed silent for too long because Sesi continued.

“I asked you before why you brought this to me and not Talia. You didn’t give me an answer. I thought I might know, but now I think that you probably don’t know her that well. Your reason and mine probably don’t match up.”

“She wouldn’t understand because she doesn’t feel guilty about murdering people.” Callie answered bluntly.

Sesi nodded slowly and then transitioned to shaking her head. “Talia feels more guilt than you can imagine.”

“Then why does she kill?” Callie asked, confusion in her voice.

“Talia has a lot to atone for. The victims are her offerings. The guilt is her penance. At least that’s how she sees it.”

Callie’s mind raced, searching for an answer to what could possibly be horrible enough that murder would be an atonement. “What does she have to atone for?”

Sesi stared at the mat. “Leaving her sister. She’s still in there. Though,” Sesi bobbed her head, “they weren’t close, from what she’s told me, but she still feels...”

“What?” A fresh wave of horror crashed over Callie. “She never told me!”

Sesi scoffed. “Of course she didn’t. In case you hadn’t noticed, Talia hates being pitied.”

“But I wouldn’t…” Callie started.

“It doesn’t matter. Unless you know revenge, what it does to you, she’s not going to trust that.” Sesi grew still.

“So, you’re saying it will never work out?”

Sesi shook her head. “Hang around with us long enough and you’ll find a reason for revenge. That’s probably what pushed you to ice those two guards. Pre-emptive revenge , let’s call it.”

Callie bit her lip. That made some sense. She would have to think on it before she could accept it, though. “She said you wouldn’t let her go after them. Your plan wasn’t good enough.”

Sesi bobbed her head. “Sort of. The plan isn’t good enough because we don’t know where they are. They move often. Any mission would be exploratory and if they got caught, they’d know we were after them.”

“She said she wanted our other mission to fail because she wanted to be in on stealing this tech. She had a grudge against the CEO.” Callie tried to bite her nail, but the punch pad was in the way.

The corner of Sesi’s lip lifted, but she didn’t say anything.

“Did you plan this?” Callie asked.

Sesi removed her gloves. “I’ll see you later.”