Hauling myself out of the meditation pool, I splay out on the stone while I dry, taking in the world with new purpose. Sharp-edged resolve assumes physical shape as my aura blossoms across the water’s disturbed surface. Thinning to the point of imperceptibility, it sweeps out to soak the whole garden within my kinetic sense. Radiant light burns from my skin to set the water dazzling.

  Without even trying, I’m dangerously alight while I fetch my skinsuit from where I hung it on a bamboo shoot. Can’t help it. Hope and purpose reignited a fire in my heart that’s been dimming since I fled from the capital. Thunder rides in my veins. Every movement driven, eyes narrowed in resolution. Olympus is waiting.

  Around me, the garden rustles in anticipation, caught between the eddies of my aura and the seaside wind blowing across the fields. White clouds dot the pure blue sky. The skinsuit hugs my contours as I jog it up, worming my arms through the sleeves and wiggling my fingertips into the fingerless gloves at the end. Bundling up the rest of my sweat-soaked clothes, I stoop to take an apple with me from the pool.

  I’m quick on the uptake to notice when another light starts intruding on my kinetic sense, weirdly altered compared to the sparks of life in the garden’s other animals. Shining in my sixth sense like a hooded flame. It’s drawing near at a rapid pace. And colored by a flash of… worry?

  A raspy scrape of gravel interrupts the soundscape. My senses rush back. I turn to see Thane jogging into the cove, staff in hand. Small hunter faeries from the Tamer class wander in circles around him. He sweeps the clearing, sees me about to finish zipping up, and almost instantly turns his head away, leaving at a much more measured walk. I call out to his back.

  “Hey. Don’t leave.”

  He slows.

  “It’s fine,” I say. “We need to talk.”

  “Cal would mind.” The glimpse, he means.

  “That’s not your business,” I say as I finish sealing the suit. Gathering a harmless fingertip of ki, I flick it at one of the faerie lights circling him, knocking it into a looping downward spiral. “Why’d you rush out like that?”

  He keeps his eyes carefully fixed on the bamboo walling in the cove, feet only marginally shifting my way. “I felt you ignite. I was… worried.”

  “Worried.”

  “Yes. Worried.” His face smarts. I don’t push it.

  His eyes stray to the rest of the cove. Pain pools in his golden irises. When I don’t say anything after a moment, he meanders around the meditation pool with nostalgic slowness, stopping by the stony ledge where I left Ajax’s sword. Hesitantly taking in the garden, like I’ll lash out at him for intruding on a hallowed place.

  “I always told Cal she should have visited,” Thane says. “She would have loved this place.”

  “I told her I’d bring her here someday.” I run a hand through my hair, watching intently as he kicks the sword up into his hands in a smooth trick motion. “Wish the house was in better shape. Not much to see anymore.”

  “At least the tree is doing well.”

  “Figures. It’s the only metal thing here.”

  A shiver goes down my spine as I watch him spin the scabbard and slide the blade out an inch, checking the cutting edge. He’s so damn fluid. Reminds me again that even if I beat him, I did it with help when his back was against a wall; and he was fending off Valance and Aurix at the same time. On even ground… I’m not proud enough to wonder who would win between us. He’s always been the better fighter, and three years of elite training while I was struggling to survive have widened that gap to an almost insurmountable degree.

  In so many ways, I’m still so far behind.

  Resheathing the blade, Thane tosses it to me as I come around the pool. I catch it easily in my right hand.

  “I always said your father chose the worst materials for a house. And that thatch for the roof…” He grins wanly at the main house. “He always liked his authenticity. I’m more surprised it didn’t fall apart sooner.”

  “It would’ve without me. I was up on the roof fixing leaks since before you knew me.”

  “He had you do that?”

  “Jolie did. You know Dad. Couldn’t build a bridge if it were made out of friendship.”

  One of my aunt’s old adages. It gets a nosebreath from both of us.

  Even if it’s awkward, it’s something. I glance at Thane as I join him at the water’s edge. Travel hasn’t been kind to him. Dark scruff grows in a shadow along his jaw. His hair is longer and shaggy, grime under his nails. That same orphaned cast to his eyes as he looks around the garden. He was hoping to find something here too.

  For once, seeing him doesn’t stir up the full mountain of conflicted emotions it usually does. Some hesitancy, the same relief as when he helped drag me through my seizure, takes the edges off my temper. It was just one small, insignificant gesture in the face of the mountain of things he’s done to me. But it still means something.

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  I make a point of staring at Thane’s scruff till he grows self-conscious of both it and how close I’m standing. I send the apple his way with an underhand toss. “You need to shave. And bathe. Use the pool- I was done anyways.”

  “Didn’t you have something you wanted to tell me?”

  “It can wait till after. Just don’t take forever.”

  Jerking a thumb back at the water, I tuck Ajax’s sword under my arm and start padding my way back to the house.

  I cast one final look back as I near the edge of the cove. Thane’s still standing at the edge of the water, staring at the apple. He belatedly looks up when he finally notices I haven’t yet left. Holding my gaze for that awkward moment it takes me to untangle the impulse that tugged me to a stop.

  It’s a moment of weakness. I know. He deserves none of what I’m about to say. A different person would leave him to the silence, to his guilt, alone. And they would be right to. But I am not that person.

  “I shouldn’t have said all I did last night,” I say. “I was tired, and I was just trying to hurt you. It was wrong. I asked you to start over and come with me. It’s unfair if I hold the past against you now.”

  He shakes his head. “You shouldn’t apologize.”

  “It’s not an apology.” I watch him evenly. “Whatever is waiting for us on Olympus, I’d just rather we stay on talking terms when we face it.”

  “Olympus.” He arches an eyebrow.

  I tap the earring in my left earlobe. “Found this in Dad’s room. It’s some sort of holotech. Jolie sent a message to it in case I found a way to access it. She’s already on Olympus and starting to put down the groundwork for an alliance to beat Gami. So that’s where we’re going.”

  “Olympus is… a long way from Cal.”

  “I know.” I look down at my left hand, closing it in a fist. “I’m not giving up on Cal. If she’s still alive, she would want me to leave. And I can’t fight this fight alone. I need help.” My eyes return to his. “That includes you too.”

  Thane holds my gaze. “Are you sure that’s the right choice?”

  “Yeah. I am.”

  “Me being with you will burn more bridges than it builds.”

  “Then we’ll cross them when we get to them.” After another moment, I tip my head at the water. “Come find me when you make your choice. We’ve got train tickets to steal.”

  My bare feet have barely begun to slap against the stone path when Thane calls out to me.

  “…Can I ask you something, Tay?”

  The hesitancy in his voice drags me to a standstill. I turn to see him running a distraught hand through his hair, lips wrinkled, awkward and uncertain. An untailored part of him that the rest of the world will never know, because he’d never show it in front of a camera. Only me.

  “Anything,” I softly say.

  His lips work. Knowing what he wants to say, but suddenly finding it beyond himself to voice it. A small tilt of my head drags the question fully out.

  “How can you keep talking to me so carefreely?” he asks. “I’m the reason this place is a ruin. I’m the reason you can’t sleep at night. I destroyed your future. I betrayed you to side with Gami because I thought I…” His head shakes, golden eyes swimming with guilt. “…I was wrong. There is no excuse. I knew exactly what I was choosing when I became his apprentice. I betrayed you the day I went to hear his offer. I betrayed you every day after that when I pretended nothing was different. And then I-”

  “-Don’t.” I bite my lip so hard it draws blood. “Don’t, say it.”

  “Even if you don’t ask for one, you deserve an apology. What I did to you was evil, Tay. You have every right to hate me and still you choose not to, every single day. You’re telling me to come with you, but I don’t even know how to even begin. You shouldn’t trust me or take me with you. I’ve walked so far in the wrong direction that I don’t know where to go anymore; even if you ask me to. I’m not… I’m not the person you think I can be. Not anymore. I can’t just go back to being him, take your hand, and pretend we’re fine. I’m sorry won’t undo what I’ve done. I’m sorry won’t bring Mars back.”

  His bitter gaze lowers to the apple in his hand.

  “He was wrong about me. I am like my father.”

  Nails bite into the skin of my left palm. “I never thought I’d hear you say those words.”

  He scoffs bitterly at the apple, about to cast it away. “You said them yourself. They’re not wrong. Are they?”

  “Do you want them to be?”

  His hand wavers.

  “‘Cause I didn’t think you did,” I snap. “Since when did Thane Kyriaku start rolling over and letting people say he was no better than his deadbeat dad?”

  Thane’s golden eyes flash.

  “You’re not wrong. Nothing you can do will ever bring Dad back. But the choices that put you here aren’t all you have to be, either. We’ve all made mistakes, Thane. That doesn’t make you evil. It doesn’t make a monster. It makes you human.” My voice and my gaze soften as one. “I came back for you because I hoped you needed a chance, just one chance, to be more than those mistakes and start over. And if you want to apologize for the past, then just say it. The real words. The hard ones. Not the pretty ones.”

  The broken remnants of our childhood sway around us in the silence that follows. The emptiness of what is missing grieves even louder. When Thane’s voice rises against the breeze, his quiet voice is thick with guilt. Asking, begging me for forgiveness that I have already given.

  “I’m sorry,” he whispers. A wretched spasm wracks his soul in my kinetic sense. Wetness glistens unacknowledged in the corners of his eyes, catching in the light as the spring sun spills over us. He looks me straight in the eyes, unwavering. “I am sorry, Tay.”

  I swallow down the lump in my throat. “I know.”

  “I wanted to undo it all. I just… I don’t even know where to start.” He looks down at his callused hands. “I can’t even trust myself to make the right choice anymore.”

  “Stay with me. Help me kill Gami. That’s a start.”

  He nods. Probably the only person in the world who would agree so calmly when asked to help kill a Champion. Still, doubt lurks in his eyes. Like me, he came here hoping to find something more than a message. I hoped for a sign. He was hoping for absolution.

  I might not have found everything I needed here, but I can still give him something he does.

  “Dad believed in you, Thane. He still would, even now.” I wrap my hand over his and push the apple into his chest. “I still do.”