Part Two – Betrayed

“Loyalty should never be promised lightly but when pledged it should be for all eternity.”

Chapter Sixteen: It's not just you

The night crawled by like a dying soldier trying to get home.

The woman looked out of her bedroom window at the full moon. Out of reach. Drifting in the same patterns month in and month out. Blocked from her sight only by the clouds between them.

Her phone rang and she answered it at once. The voice on the other end was not the one she needed to hear.

“You're up late,” said the stranger.

“What do you want?” She closed her curtains and turned her back on the window.

“Tomorrow is the big day,” he replied. “I just wanted to make sure you haven't forgotten the plan.”

“I haven't forgotten anything,” she said through her teeth. “I hope you won't forget your promise either.”

“We'll both have our answers tomorrow then.” The smile in his voice trickled like acid into her ear. “Sleep well.”

She hung up and sat on the edge of her bed.

I won't forget any of it. She dropped her head into her hands. For the rest of my life.

<><><><><>

Satara woke up screaming for the first time since her days at the hospital. The voice was hers but it also belonged the boy in her dream. To Sinastar, whose memories had somehow found their way into her mind.

Sin … Her eyes opened but the threat of Saytarnia's clawed hand lingered despite her return to consciousness. She rolled onto all fours and clutched her throat as if to pry the non existent fingers from her skin. Her forehead crashed into the hard ground beneath her tent but the blow wasn't enough to knock away the mingled memories of both her family and her clan's massacres. I have to get to Sin.

His previous invitation anchored her like a welcome hand entangled with her own. Like a promise sealed in blood.

“If any of your memories become too heavy, you can always come to me. No matter what time it is or where we are. Okay?”

A lightning bolt of pain from deep within her head shot down her spine and set the scar on her neck alight. She cried out against the back of her fist and squeezed the rim of her sleeping bag. The whimper in her bones turned into a full blooded roar as if her body personally blamed her for all the pain it had ever endured. What the heck is happening? Is it because I used zai?

Another agonising flare almost knocked her onto her side. The zip of her sleeping bag parted with a sharp hiss, forced open by her abrupt writhing, and she grabbed her head with both hands. Her skull seemed like it was about to splinter in the same way. It was the worst headache she had ever had. Tears collected at the corners of her eyes and spilled down her cheeks in sync with her uncontrollable sobs. She crawled towards the tent entrance but the sleeping bag bound her legs and crippled her.

She couldn't move fast enough. She couldn't escape the tent or the pain before the third spasm hit and black claws burst from her nail beds. She froze despite everything as nightmares and reality blended like paint. Denial took the sight of her warped hands and tore it to shreds in front her, waving frantically before the drops of saliva falling from her open mouth could embarrass her. Something sharp grazed her bottom lip, then her top one, and her saliva was suddenly tinged. Her toes scraped the floor of the tent and twisted painfully in the fabric.

What is this? All of her muscles went on strike simultaneously and she was sure she'd never be able to drink enough water to appease them ever again. Questions and memories crushed her bones and she couldn't move beneath their weight. The scar on her neck burned as if it were intent on turning her to ash. Why won't it stop? Why won't it stop? Why?!

The zai that had moved beneath her skin previously now raced out as if set free and encircled her weakened body like a pack of wolves. Only she didn't know if they would devour her or keep her company in the midst of the chaos.

“Sin!” she choked against the floor. They're too heavy now. What time is it? Where are you?

White Lightning flashed across her vision like a full blown storm trapped in the confines of the tent and Black Fire pushed out against its walls. It reflected the pressure building up between her tightening muscles and shaking bones. Between every cell in her body, each of her teeth, every strand of hair, until she was sure she would explode.

He isn't going to come.

“No – No.” She moaned and clutched at her head, at the scar on her neck, rolling onto her side. “I can't –”

The entrance of the tent was too far. The agony twisted into the shape of fury in a heart beat and suddenly she was on her feet. The roof of the tent strained against the crown of her head and her thoughts turned on her just like her body had.

This isn't going to end.

“No!” she howled and a particularly violent pulse of zai burned through the fabric overhead before she tore it all aside.

The full moon glared down at her and drew attention to the shadow it had thrown behind her. Her own.

No. That's not mine. Again.

The shadow was almost twice as wide as her and her hair stood on end as if static electricity filled the night air. Though she couldn't see them in her silhouette, her claws and fangs were pressed too close to her lips and skull to be ignored.

Saytarnia wasn't the only inhuman one.

The rods of the ruined tent poked at her from all sides like angry farmers with pitchforks. She tore herself free of them, from the material snagged by her claws as it tried to drag her down. Lurching forward, she landed on all fours in the ashy remains of the fire they had used intermittently for the last two days. The Black Fire in her veins scorched her from the inside out. The evergreen trees towered all around like the rules she strove to live by – Don't hurt. Don't destroy. Don't kill – both illuminated and broken into shards by each flash of her White Lighting.

Her zai filled the space within the circle of greenery, blazing high above her head, and she barely avoided Sinastar's tent as she stumbled towards the gap in the trees. Towards the pointlessly noisy cars and the clueless humans who drove them, who tempted her from beyond the boundary of her sight but not her senses. I have get out of here. I have to go – Sinastar's motorbike, parked across the opening, barred her escape. She raised her hand, now a huge black paw tinged with Red Lightning, to knock it over.

A shape moved in the darkness ahead of her and a body collided recklessly with hers before her paw could land. It was strong enough to throw her back onto the wreckage of her tent and pin her to the ground. She snarled and lashed out even as her heart skipped several beats and her fur lifted in alarm. The stranger dodged back but her claws ripped the front of their clothes and a faint warmth slid to meet the rough pads of her fingertips. Hands pulled her upright, by her wrist and then her elbow, before they locked around her torso.

What the – Who the hell –? Seconds before his distorted scent reached her, a familiar voice cut through the hellish tornado in her head.

“Satara! Satara, it's me.”

Sin? Her non-human ears twitched in response to the urgency in his low voice. Shock stilled her joints before the chill of his touch crept through her clothes. He's too cold. What if it's not really him? She struggled against his hold again and his grip tightened, pressing her upper arms to either side of her body with his own.

“It's okay. It'll be over soon.” His cheek brushed against her ear and she jerked her head away as if he had been asleep in a freezer.

“G-get off me,” she growled.

His weight over her knees kept her from kicking him off. The space between them was narrow so she couldn't headbutt him and her hands were out of action thanks to his hold.

“I can't. Not until it's safe.”

Safe for who? She didn't ask her question out loud. As soon as her mouth opened, it moved on its own and closed over the nearest part of his body it could reach. Sinastar grunted as her teeth sank into his right shoulder and his grip loosened a little. Only long enough for her to rear back and look at his face.

“You –” Her heart shrivelled beneath the weight of his frosted blue stare.

One of his eyes was half closed in discomfort. The rich golden hue of his skin was gone, replaced by a lifeless chalkiness. White marble beneath jet black strands of hair. Who the hell are you?

“Don't be scared,” he murmured. He lifted a hand and cradled the back of her head, rubbing her scalp as though he were palpating it for tumours. As if he could feel the warped shape of her rapid thoughts. “It's not just you. I'm here too. I promise.”

“What are you talking abou-?” He pressed her face into the curve of his neck, fearless despite the strong scent of blood on his shirt, and muffled her frantic anger with his skin. She opened her mouth to bite him once more but paused as he spoke again, her fangs pressed lightly against his exposed flesh.

“You can hear the cars on the road, can't you?” he said softly, his tone at odds with his merciless grip. “They sound so much louder now, don't they? Almost like the noise is coming from inside your head. And it's hard to see through your zai, isn't it? It's hard to think properly when it feels like it's burning through you.”

Her claws pierced the side of his trousers but the texture nor the smell of spilt blood didn't distract her this time. She blinked and tried not to struggle. Although it no longer filled her vision, the Lightning and Fire continued to course through her veins. She writhed against the unbearable heat and each movement released some of the unbearable energy, easing a bit more of the pressure each time. It's not enough. It's not enough, Sin –

“Remember what I told you about zai, Satara? Do you remember?” His hold strengthened and a cold layer of zai swarmed across his skin. She turned her face aside as the deep red energy chilled the tips of her teeth and swirled around them with a disturbing steadiness until she couldn't see anything but him. “It's made up of mental and physical energy. To control it, you just have to calm your mind again. Can you do that?”

She tried to but his zai took on the shape of blood stained ghosts wearing the faces of the Cunningham family. Her heart rate reacted accordingly and she turned her head in the opposite direction, her eyes squeezed shut as she tried to remember how to breath.

“Do you remember the sound of Brother An's flute? In the afternoon when the sun was highest.” He stroked the back of her head rhythmically, as if in time to the tune from his memories, and continued to talk over the violent twitch of her muscles. “Or the smell of the magnolia trees in your garden, early in morning right before dawn?”

She shook her head. I wish I could. The moonlight that had been piercing her like acupuncture needles vanished as if a large cloud had passed between her and the moon.

“Jason's in that tent over there. If I let you go, he might get hurt.” He paused as if he knew just how hard his words would hit her. “You don't want to hurt him too, do you?”

He winced as her claws pierced the waistband of his trousers but not his skin, warded off by the red barrier that covered it. A warning. A show of restraint. I don't want to hurt him. Or you. I don't want to hurt anyone. Her chest heaved, pulling the tainted but now familiar softness of his scent into her consciousness. But my body – this thing I've become – it doesn't care what I want. It doesn't care about you. Or Jayce. Or anyone else. My body doesn't belongs to me any more but to this monster that's eating its way out of me. If I don't hurt someone … it's going to keep hurting me.

Surrender crept out from her mouth in the form of a single whimper. Guilt dragged the rest back into her lungs and constricted her throat so they couldn't escape again. Her shoulders curled inwards and she pressed her forehead to her cousin's neck, making herself – and the roaring threat within her – smaller. Sinastar started to rock her back and forth as though she were a wailing infant instead of a blood thirsty beast, and muted surprise overrode her pride as she allowed him to hold her.

Only you. You're the only other person I'm going to hurt tonight. I promise.

She wasn't sure how long they sat in the wreckage of her tent but at some point the prickle in her veins faded and her gums stopped feeling stretched and sore. The light that broke through the darkness wasn't as harsh on her skin as the moonlight had been and the pain that made her limbs and torso swell now left her body like air from a punctured balloon.

She deflated in Sinastar's arms and grabbed onto the back of his shirt to keep herself upright, though his hands had already steadied her. She couldn't lift her head from his shoulder and was glad. The warmth rolling down her jaw and dripping from her chin consisted of more teardrops than blood. She cringed seconds before he finally spoke into the silence.

“Do you feel any better now?” She nodded and ducked her head, moving with him as he relaxed back onto his heels with a slow exhale. “That's good.”

Do you? His body still felt cool against hers and she had never been more conflicted about being touched by someone. Modesty suggested she move away from the young man she had only known for a couple of days but her inner child didn't want to let him go without knowing when it would be allowed to share such an intimate moment with him again.

His arms slackened and her fingers almost tightened in his shirt. She released a handful of the fabric and rubbed the back of her arm against her face. He waited until her movements slowed before patting her hair.

“You did well, Satara,” he said, his tone as soft as a kiss pressed to her temple. “You won tonight.”

“Only because I – I didn't – fight it by myself.” She gritted her teeth around the unsteady words.

“We were both fighting on our own.” He smiled as she lowered her arm. “Today we just happened to share a battlefield.”

She inhaled sharply as the colour returned to his pale irises and skin. Like sunlight seeping into snow and making it glitter. Like authentic life being returned to the deserving dead.

“Sin.” Her voice broke across his name. “Sin –”

His hand slid from the base of her head to its crown but the chance to speak was stolen from him.

“Oi! What the heck are you doing?” Jason's bewildered shout split the moment cleanly down the middle and pushed them apart as if it were a palmful of White Air hurled between them.

Despite his tousled hair and his face, still doughy with sleep, Jason was awake enough to send a million unspoken words their way. Satara lifted a hand in front of her face again. The shirt she slept in had stretched too far to accommodate the sudden restructuring of her body. The seam along one of her sleeves had split and cool morning air brushed against her ribs on the opposite side. Where else is it ripped? She pulled her hand back from Sinastar and secured her clothes in case they suddenly decided to fall away biblically. I can only imagine what this looks like to him but I know it doesn't look like anything good.

Jason confirmed her belief by stomping across the clearing towards them but she couldn't look at him. Not with the evidence of her weakness trickling down her cheeks and highlighting her eyelids with an exhausted red.

“Oi! I said what are you doing?” he demanded.

She turned behind the veil of her arm to reassure him, distracted by Sinastar who rose to his feet. He touched her shoulder briefly and then his side. His hand came away smeared with blood.

“You're –” She reached out towards his wounds but didn't dare touch him again. “I didn't –”

“I know.” He wiped his hand on the front of his shirt and he held the other out to her. “I should've warned you. This is all my fault.”

“Did – did you know this was going to happen?” Her hand hovered over his but she hesitated to make contact.

“I wasn't sure. But that doesn't excuse the fact I left you completely in dark about its possibility.” He looked worn out but he didn't withdraw his hand until she took it, pulling her up to her feet. “I'm sorry. I have a lot more to explain to you.”

“Wow. If you wanted me to leave you guys alone, you could've just said so.” Jason's bitter laugh dragged her gaze towards him and he managed to hold her gaze, though his face reddened.

“I have more to explain to both of you.” Sinastar let go of her hand and turned to face Jason's odd irritation. “Including what happened tonight –”

“What're you talking about, Jayce?” She blotted the tears from her eyes with one arm and blinked until her vision cleared. I don't have time to deal with other people's anger. Not when I can't evn control my own without hurting someone else.

“It just – It looks like you guys have been up for a while and –” His gaze dropped to her sleeves.

“Really?” She threw her free arm out to encompass the blood on Sinastar's clothes and her tent lying in ruins beneath them. “Is that all it looks like? Really?”

“You look – you look tired, Tara.” Jason held his hands out and tried to placate her with a weak smile as if his eyes hadn't been blazing with self righteous anger seconds ago. “You been through a lot recently so you're not –”

“Not what?”

“Not okay. Not your normal self. So I'm just w – I just don't want you to do things you wouldn't normally do.” He glanced at Sinastar, half suspicious, half crying for aid. “It'd be too easy for someone to – to make you do something like that right now.”

“When has anyone ever made me do something I don't want to do?” Besides stay alive.

“That's what I'm saying! Normally I wouldn't worry about anything like that but these days you –” He swallowed. “Your sister tried to kill you. Again. No one would be okay after that. I don't blame you for needing – for needing help. But you've gotta be careful. You don't want to ask the wrong person for help –”

“Did I ask for help?” Satara grabbed the front of his pyjama shirt and yanked him towards her. Giving him no space to mistake her next words. “And even if I did, do you think you can help me? Because you know how to use zai? Because you're my friend?”

“Satara.” Sinastar laid his non-bloodied hand on her extended arm. “Let's clean up. It's been a long night.”

“It has,” she rumbled without looking at him. “And I don't need to listen to anyone pretending to know what that's like or care when they didn't spend it with me.”

Jason froze in the middle of prying her hand from his clothes. Confused green eyes lifted to hers before they switched to Sinastar's for confirmation. The latter looked away but his fingertips pressed into her skin.

“Wait, what? I didn't –” Jason shook his head. “I never –”

Don't look at me with those watery eyes or talk to me with that shaky voice. You weren't supposed to know about any of this, let alone become a part of it. Satara let go of him and pulled her arm away from Sinastar's hand. I kept you out of all this for a reason but you're only here now because I –

She clenched her teeth as if the words could escape the cage of her thoughts and the heat that billowed up from her centre had nothing to do with zai. She walked past him, away from them both.

“Satara – ” Sinastar's call was cut off by Jason's raised voice.

“I never pretended to care about you. Not like your psycho sister or the rest of your family!” He spun round as she turned back to him, his face pale instead of the infuriated red she expected. As if each of his words were a knife that bled them both out simultaneously. “You wouldn't catch me beating the crap out of my sister when she didn't even do anything wrong. Or murdering our whole family, no matter what they did. That stuff messes you up.”

He's not wrong. I know he's not but –

“You're right. I am messed up,” she said slowly. Poisonously. “Me and my family. Both of them were a mess and both of them died because of it, and it's only going to get worse from here. So if you're looking for a pretty life, if you can't handle how it is right now, you might as well get lost now while you still can.”

Sinastar's gaze shifted sharply from her face to Jason's but she had already seen his muted dismay. The disappointment that settled like frost upon his features. She ran before she could talk herself out of behaving so recklessly, so out of character, and vaulted over the motorcycle as if she had jumped fences her whole life.

She didn't hear Sinastar call out after and knew she had moved too late to avoid his displeasure.

Breathing hard through her nose, she left the clearing and ran in the opposite direction of the motorway.

And kept running.

<><><><><>

Sinastar's first impulse was to race after Satara and intervene before she hurt herself. Or someone else.

But he couldn't ignore the devastation on Jason's face in the wake of his best friend's dismissal. Especially since his presence and actions had directly contributed to it. He reached out to pat the younger one on the back but didn't touch him. It's too soon for that. Even talking is risky right now but I need to know –

“Jason,” he murmured and the sixteen year old flinched as if he'd forgotten he wasn't alone, his semi-clenched hands loosening further. “I don't think Satara said that to be cruel.”

“I know.” Jason looked at the ground and rubbed his palms on his pyjama trousers. His head and shoulders were bowed like those of a whipped dog.

“And I care for my cousin. Maybe just as much as you.” He carried on as Jason gave no sign of acknowledging his second statement. “But perhaps not in the same way.”

“Then bring her back.” The red haired youth pressed a hand to the new creases in the fabric over his heart, each word rigid as he spoke them aloud. “She's right. I don't know where she's gone and I can't find her. I can't help her. But you can.”

“I can.” Sinastar rested his hand in between Jason's taut shoulder blades and breathed in deep. “But not in the same way you can.”

“What're you talking about? You heard her.” Jason laughed but his back tensed further as if he were trying not to throw up. “I'm not even supposed to be here, let alone help her out with anything.”

“Is that what it sounded like to you?”

“What did it sound like to you?” Jason finally dragged his gaze up from the ground, red rimmed eyes a landscape of dull despair and glittering humanity.

“A suggestion. Or maybe a question.” Sinastar smiled. The absence of horror on the other's face confirmed the disappearance of his other form. “It definitely didn't sound like an order to me.”

“A question?”

“Instead of telling you to go, maybe she wants to know if you'll stay?” He gave Jason several seconds to process the idea, watching it brew in his thoughts and deepen the colour of his stare. “The Satara you know. Would she say something like that without having a good reason for it?”

“That's the thing,” said Jason, shaking his head. His eyes wavered as if tempted to return to the ground. “These days, it's like she's not the same person I know.”

“There's a reason for that. I promise.” Sinastar steadied him with a hand to his shoulder. The seconds between his cousin's departure and the present ticked in time with the loudening pulse in his ears. “I'll explain it to you both. Will you be ok – Do you mind tidying up the tent while I find her?”

“Yeah, sure,” mumbled Jason, clearing his throat.

Sinastar patted his arm and hurried from the clearing. Though not before he heard the other speak again, his tone brittle and high enough to crack.

“What the heck happened to her tent?!”

So he didn't see anything …