“Any time.” She smiled at me in a very professional way. “That’s what I’m here for. I’m here to assist. Now please make yourself comfortable. I will notify the Neutral that you have arrived for your appointment.”
She turned to face Cyrus as we filtered in, moving toward the furthest set of alcoves. They all opened into the common area of Cyrus’s room, and there were only partial walls separating them, raising up as far as the backs of the couches.
“Your appointment has arrived,” I could hear Emmy telling Cyrus.
“I am going to have you sentenced to eternal damnation,” Cyrus growled back. “Make them go away!”
“Is that really a thing?” Emmy asked, and I turned to watch as she pulled out another sheaf of parchment, running her finger down a list that only she could see. “Nope, it’s not a thing. It’s right here on the list of things you assured me weren’t real, right along with gods who have sex with dwellers—as I recall, it was impossible because they find dwellers repulsive—oh wait,” she paused dramatically, and then started scribbling on the list, “we can cross that one out, can’t we?”
Cyrus was digging into the pockets of his robes. He pulled out a flask, took a deep pull, and then strode toward us.
“Willa, come with me,” he barked. “I have your first assignment.”
“I can’t right now,” I quickly replied, before one of the guys could start a fight about it. “I have lessons this sun-cycle. For the whole champion thing? Remember?”
“You don’t have lessons.” He shook his head, taking another frustrated swig. “You don’t have a teacher. There’s no Chaos Beta.”
“Yeah, well, I’m going to teach myself. I mean there’s no harm, right? Staviti said the strongest sol in each power group, he didn’t say the strongest sol in each power group, minus the Chaos sols.”
“How do you know you’re the strongest Chaos sol at all?” he countered, as I felt one of the guys step up behind me protectively, another at my side.
Cyrus was smiling, but it was humourless. He knew that I wasn’t a Chaos anything, and he was calling me on my bluff ... but why? So that I didn’t make his life complicated by insisting that I train at Champions Peak? Or ... understanding suddenly dawned on me. He was worried that word of a Chaos sol would get out to the gods, and then Rau would realise that he had been betrayed. That Cyrus had lied to him. I hadn’t ascended to Topia as a Chaos Beta, I had ascended as myself, but Rau didn’t know that. All he knew was that I hadn’t ascended as his Beta, and that I was supposed to be dead.
The most logical explanation for him to draw would be that Cyrus had lied to him, and that I hadn’t really died.
Would that mean Rau would start trying to kill me again?
Did I really care, if I couldn’t die?
Did I really trust that I couldn’t die?
“Let’s just focus on the important question for right now,” Siret whispered behind me. “Do you care if Rau finds out about you being here?”
“No,” I answered Siret loud enough that Cyrus thought I was talking to him.
His brows crinkled, his eyes glimmering. “No what?” he asked.
“No, I’m not going to let you take this opportunity away from me,” I told Cyrus. “This is what happens when gods try to plan everyone’s futures as though it’s their right. If there is a stronger Chaos sol out there, they’re welcome to come and take my place, but until then, you have a Chaos dweller, and I’m going to teach myself.”
“I supposed it would be an impossible task, keeping this hidden forever,” Cyrus muttered. I knew what he was talking about, but the sols in the room would possibly assume that he was talking about there being a dweller with Chaos powers. “Very well, Willa. You can have your place here, I just hope you’re ready for the kind of attention that will bring you. See me after you have finished teaching yourself. I will have your assignment ready.”
I nodded, turning my back on him as we all spread out through the alcoves. I noticed that the girls all took seats, while the Abcurses stood, lingering by the entrance to the alcove. I glanced around, trying to figure out what to do with myself. Rome dove into his teaching session without much of pause. I watched as he reached over and broke off the arm of one of the couches, tossing it at his student.
“Do that,” he told her.
She reached over and did the same thing on the other end.
Rome shrugged. “Can you crush someone in a hug?”
“Not yet,” she answered, brushing at the blunt line of her fringe. She was scuffing the toe of her boot against the ground, glancing from Rome to the other sols and back. “Should I be able to do that?”
“Yeah, probably.”
I turned away from them, mostly so that I wouldn’t start laughing. Rome was not the teacher type. He was definitely more the crush things into pieces while grunting incoherently type, and he was trying his best to utilise those exact skills in his task.
Beside Rome, Coen sighed very loudly. “I’m not going to teach you shit,” he told the small, dark-featured girl sitting before him.
“Why?” she shot back, colour rising to her cheeks. She shot to her feet, shifting her eyes over to me, and then back to him. “You have to. That’s your job.”
“I don’t need to,” he sneered. “You want to cause pain, but there’s nobody here you can experiment on. I don’t believe it’s a skill you should practise at all, unless you really need to, so fuck off. Find something else to do.”
She stalked away from him, shoving her shoulder into mine as she passed. Pain shot through me, from my arm to my centre, sharp and fiery. I bit down on my lip, turning to watch her so that the guys wouldn’t see the look of pain on my face. When I had myself under control, I tried to shake it off, turning back around again.
Coen was now sitting on the couch that the girl had vacated, his feet kicked up on the other couch, his muscled arms folded behind his head, his eyes closed in respite.
Beside him, Yael and Aros were huddled together, whispering. Their students were sitting beside each other on the couch opposite them, talking to each other in a very surface kind of way, as their attention was almost entirely still on the two brothers. I shook my head, turning to find Siret, except that he wasn’t there. I blinked, striding forward. Gone.
“Where’d he go?” I asked the sol he was supposed to be teaching.
She was sitting on the couch, still awaiting instruction. “He’s right in front of you.” Her voice was laced with irritation, her words spoken hurriedly. She quickly flicked her eyes back to a spot in front of her.
“Yeah, Rocks.” Yael was beside me now, a smirk on his face. “He’s right there, teaching and instructing like an obedient god. Why do you have to be so dismissive of him like that?”
My mouth was dropping open, but I was distracted by a thunderous, grating sound from the other side of the room. I peeked around Yael to discover that Rome had pulled a marble tree branch clear from the divider wall behind him, leaving a gaping hole that looked into another room beyond them. A sol boy appeared in the opening, staring through at us. He opened his mouth, seemingly forming words, but I couldn’t hear anything.
“An enchantment,” Yael answered my unasked question. “Each of the alcoves is sound-proof. You shouldn’t be able to see between the marble branches, either, but I think Strength just poked a hole in that enchantment.”
I shook my head as Rome tried to fit the branch back into place, before giving up and throwing that at his student, too. She managed to catch it in time, turning and placing it on the couch beside her. The seat cushions were flattened under its weight.
“Was that supposed to be a lesson?” I asked Yael beneath my breath.
“I can still hear you,” Rome answered in a raised voice, “you’re not that damn far away, Rocks.”
“Oh, right.” I shoved my thumbs up. “You’re doing a great job! Mind if we all just sit here and watch?”