The Reflective Dissent Read online

  Flat black eyes meet his own, and the Bloodling ever so slightly inclines his head. “Then you must call me Slade.”

  Jeb slowly nods, and a tense truce of sorts ensues. He turns back to the graveyard view, the exact spot where he and Beth had jumped before this whole new mess began.

  Sunlight appears to spill like blood over the green grass. “We have jumped to Three, the quadrant of America and the lesser quadrant of Kent, Washington.”

  “Why?” Slade asks, his voice raspy from vomiting.

  He turns partially. “I caught Beth's tailwind. She travels with Gunnar, Jacky, and Maddie. I can only presume she is leaving the Threes in their world of origin.”

  Slade slides his jaw back and forth, stating the obvious. “That's foolish. Maddie appears as a Reflective female.”

  Jeb turns fully, and they face off. “Not wholly.”

  “Do not”—Slade palms his chin—“split hairs, as the Threes call it. She does not look like the humanoids who reside here.”

  “And you've visited Three so often?” Jeb folds his arms.

  Slade gives a slight shake of his head. “No,” he says shortly, “but there are those who've hopped before, taking evidence. Proof of the differences among sectors.”

  Jeb did not know that others had jumped with enough precision to detail history, or survey anything, doing nothing other than maim and plunder. The very thing The Cause was erected to prevent. Disquiet coats his guts like sour milk. But Jeb does not voice his misgivings. Not with a Bloodling.

  “Let's follow their trail. We will meet up with them, ascertain Beth's well-being, and jump her to Papilio.”

  Slade shakes his head. His black hair is loose around his shoulders, and he's in dire need of a cleanser, as is Jeb. His wounds from the torture and beating he suffered heal excruciatingly slowly. Many of the surface injuries are faded, but the deep bruising and internal bleeding will take more time. Food and rest is needed. But his soul mate is away from him and unprotected.

  Slade tears a tie from the pocket of his tunic, once again slicking the inky strands of hair back and turning them tightly at his nape, where he secures everything into a neat hair club.

  Slade’s cool dark gaze finds Jeb, his nostrils flaring hard. “First, we discover what smells like chilling blood and rotting meat.”

  Jeb's eyebrows rise. All Reflectives have an acute sense of smell.

  Slade claps him on the back, and Jeb fights not to lurch forward at the abrupt contact.

  “Can't smell it, Merrick?” Slade is grinning now.

  Jeb would very much like to wipe that expression from the Bloodling's face. His eyes narrow on the large male.

  Slade tilts his head, indicating Jeb should follow. After a moment’s hesitation, he hikes after him. Trudging about a quarter kilometer deeper into the woods, they see something.

  There, at the base of a large and ancient tree trunk, a body lies. Head canted to the extreme left, it appears as though nearly torn from its thick neck.

  As Jeb draws nearer, he recognizes the corpse, and his lips draw away from his teeth in disgust. “What in Principle's name?” he mutters, sinking to his haunches. His eyes roam the wounds. Jeb frowns, recognizing the killing style.

  “Merrick?” Slade asks, his voice urgent.

  Jeb cranes his head, looking up at the giant Bloodling. “This is Maddie's sire,” he explains, slipping smoothly into the Sector One tongue.

  Slade tips his head back. “Ah.” His lips curl. “He does not look like he's much of anything now.”

  Jeb nods, standing. “He was not her.” Jeb struggles. Some of the words to describe difficult references do not come readily to him, and a pang of longing for Beth spears through him. “Biological father,” Jeb finishes finally.

  That seems only to confuse Slade more. “Who ended him?”

  Judging by the wound, it would be Gunnar, but Jeb frowns, gazing at the neck. That wound is ceramic kissed—he recognizes it.

  Not that Beth couldn't accomplish this fool's death—or want to. But the wound's depth of the near decapitation speaks to leverage gained by height and superior strength—not talent, skill, and expertise, all of which Beth possesses.

  The raw execution indicates speed and necessity were factors, which causes Jeb to search the deep pockets of the woods more thoroughly for the other scent he had identified.

  Ryan.

  Jeb's nostrils flare, and the scent of the other Reflective tingles his nostrils.

  He unsheathes his second ceramic dagger, giving a sideways glance to Slade.

  Slade goes from neutral to aggressive in a moment, dipping his chin. “I smell the hopper.”

  They exchange a full glance.

  When he finds a partial answer for why the Reflective's scent still lingers but he's not here, Jeb rubs a hand over his skull. Fine hairs bristle underneath the contact.

  “This is bad.”

  Jeb glares at Slade as their attention clings to a section of matted-down moss that nestles between the roots of the great tree. The moss is in the shape of a large male.

  Ryan was here.

  Slade moves to the area, and lowering himself to his knees, he closes his eyes, inhaling deeply. “He was bled.” Jeb presses his fingertips against the deeply furrowed tree.

  Their eyes meet.

  “Gunnar?” Jeb asks incredulously, resheathing his daggers.

  Slade gives a laugh like a bark. “That is my deduction.”

  Jeb's disquiet deepens. “Beth would not allow that.”

  Slade smirks. “I think our Beth is doing what she must to survive. And why would she protect that deplorable hopper?” Slade's eyes simmer with remembered hate. “A rapist and murderer of his own kind? Do you not recall the illegal fighting? How he intended to beat Beth to death? A female?”

  Our Beth.

  Jeb would never forget Ryan seeking to kill Beth. Just as he would not readily forget Slade's treachery to see him out of the picture.

  Jeb's chin kicks up. “He will be held accountable.”

  Slade grins suddenly. “By whom? The defunct Cause?” Slade makes a sound of harsh disbelief then coughs. “No. Your Commander Rachett has been given to the nightlopers of my world. They would have torn his limbs off by now and beaten him with the bloody stump.”

  Jeb hates his truths but can't deny the potential logic within.

  Slade stands, hitching up pants made of skinned animals, straightening his tunic, and puts his powerful hands on his hips. “I say we go after this Reflective”—he spits the word out like a foul taste in his mouth—“and kill him solely for the sake of rendering the collective sectors free of his stain. Then—we secure Beth.”

  The wheels of Jeb's mind turn. “How do you know Ryan was bled?”

  Slade's eyebrows jerk in surprise. “Too clean, Merrick.”

  Merrick's eyes scan the ground. Not one drop of red can be seen in the sea of green forest floor.

  “What would cause Gunnar to feed on a male?” Jeb knows that feeding by a male Bloodling is almost exclusively from a female.

  Slade shakes his head. “Need. Extreme need. Taking from a male outside of battle is...”—his lips lift off sharp, brilliant white teeth and short fangs—“distasteful.”

  Jeb does not suck blood as the Bloodlings do, of course, but he has no desire for male flesh in general. He understands the male Bloodlingsʼ disinterest from taking from their own gender.

  Suddenly Slade lifts his face, taking in the sun as it sets, partially revealed through the thick canopy of trees. “How many suns?”

  Jeb frowns then understands. “Sector Three has one powerful star.”

  Shrewd eyes address him. “Ah—but Gunnar would not necessarily know that or remember. He forgot himself and must have”—Slade looks outside the border of trees to the vast rolling steep hills beyond—“gone into the sun.”

  Jeb's sense of urgency reasserts itself. “It's not relevant. Let's go. Their trail cools.”

  Slade captures Jeb's arm,
and his eyes stare pointedly at the contact. “Gunnar will not take to you ordering Beth around or doing the same to Madeline. He's claimed her as kindred blood.”

  Jeb shakes off his large hand and begins walking where the beat of his soul mate pulses, some distance from their position.

  Ryan's as well.

  “I cannot help the needs of the bonded Reflective male. My very basest instincts will not be satisfied until I see her safe.”

  He spins to Jeb, and Slade’s dark eyes are slits of black within the deeply shadowed woods, as though they've disappeared. “Nor I, Merrick.”

  Merrick steps into his advance, gritting his teeth. “You have no claim on Beth.”

  “And her timepiece still ticks away. Ticktock.” Slade's voice clucks with soft precision.

  Jeb's arms straighten, his hands curling into fists. “She is unprotected while you argue with me about schematics and circumstance.”

  “Tiny Frog is a warrior, and her warrior father is with her. Ryan can try. And that is all that will happen. Between the two of them, she is well protected.”

  Jeb lets a disgusted breath slide out of him. “That is what separates us, Bloodling. You desire Beth for superficial reasons. I desire her forever.”

  Jeb turns away from the Bloodling again.

  He cannot count on the male as anything other than an in-the-moment protection of Beth.

  If she needs it.

  Beth Jasper is Reflective, and that is no small thing. Jeb wishes desperately that the one who followed her was not.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Beth

  Tears stream down Maddie's face, dripping unheeded from her chin. Her jewel-colored iolite gaze travels the disheveled mess surrounding them.

  The dwelling Madeline DeVere shared with her mother appears to have been completely ruined, as though a human tornado spun through.

  The front door hangs off its hinges like a decaying tooth, twitching in its jamb as they attempt to pry it forward. The bottom shrieks as it’s dragged across the floor.

  “Fucking Chuck,” Jacky spits, kicking a torn pillow. It flies across the main part of the dwelling, ironically falling on an upturned couch.

  Maddie moves forward, obviously intending to search the domicile.

  “Don't, Mad.” Jacky captures her arm.

  She whirls toward him, her finger raised. “Don't tell me what I can't see. I won't be protected anymore. Chuck is gone—this is my home.” More angry tears rush like train tracks down her face, and Beth sighs.

  “Shit,” Jacky mutters, grabbing his nape and casting his eyes down. When he raises that emerald stare, his attention moves to Gunnar.

  A look passes between them that's impossible not to interpret— Maddie's mother.

  Gunnar's eyes widen.

  Beth moves fast, faster than any of them, catching Maddie against her.

  “No!” Maddie wails.

  Beth tips her forehead against the taller girl's back, holding her fast about the waist. Though Maddie is taller, Beth's four times stronger than a Three female.

  “I know he's hurt her!” Maddie yells, kicking her legs up and squirming to get loose. Her wet anguish soaks through Beth's borrowed clothes.

  “Let me look for your kin,” Gunnar says at Beth's elbow, and he reaches out, cupping her wet face.

  Maddie stills. Blinks. Finally, after a brutally tense minute, she nods and relaxes against Beth's hold.

  Gunnar holds her eyes a heartbeat longer, then with a terse nod, he leaves them.

  They wait for Gunnar's investigation with their collective breaths held.

  Finally Gunnar returns, his lips set in a grim line.

  When Maddie sees Gunnar's expression, she crumples against Beth.

  Gunnar comes to her, pulling her into his huge arms. “There, there, blood of my blood,” he soothes, and she chokes back her cries, clearly willing herself to be brave.

  Maddie finally stops crying and pulls away, looking up into the Bloodling's face. “Is she...” Maddie bites her bottom lip as fresh tears well after the old.

  Gunnar is silent.

  “I have to see.”

  Gunnar doesn't say no, but every bit of his body tenses. “It is not—” He curses from low and deep in his throat, and Beth watches as his fangs descend. “This is not what I would want someone I care for so deeply to witness. And that a male did this to a female...” His fists clench, a low hiss escaping his lips.

  Gunnar gives Beth a glance that freezes her insides.

  Maddie's hands cover her face, and he grips her, pulling her in against his chest. “You can never forget evils that you consume with your eyes, Madeline. However, in this moment, you can choose what you must partake of. And this bit of violence, I would spare you if I could.”

  He drops his arms, and she steps away.

  Their eyes lock, and for a moment, Beth thinks Maddie might turn and walk out the front door.

  She doesn't.

  Instead, Maddie walks around where Gunnar stands, as though he's guarding her from herself, and steps over the debris of her home.

  Beth hears crunching glass and a clunking sound of wood being stumbled over.

  Gunnar's eyes shut as she passes, his shoulders slumping in defeat.

  Beth knows when Maddie finds her mother.

  The very air trembles with her grief.

  *

  They are silent as they make their way to Jacky's domicile, hardly a kilometer from where Madeline lives.

  Gunnar doesn't carry Maddie, but it is an emotional cost not to. Instead, he holds her hand, dragging her unresponsive body behind him. Her vacant eyes look with dispassionate interest around them. There isn't much of a view.

  Beth has kept to the wide ribbons of greenbelts, which hold thickly wooded forests between rows of what Beth knows they call “houses” here on Three. To Beth's Papilion eye, they appear cheap and without heart.

  She longs for her domicile on Papilio, with its stone construction and wooden beams. Her butterflies. Windows with a view of the grape vineyards growing out of the rolling hills in the distance.

  Gunnar obviously would look alien, and that is another viable reason to stick to the shadows. Beth shivers. The kind of notice they'd receive because of who she travels with would be unacceptable.

  Certainly without a locator, she'll have to manually jump them back to One or Papilio. And that is always a risky proposition. The single most critical thing drilled into the candidates, from the time they began reflecting at the tender age of five cycles, was to always jump with a locator.

  Always reflect with a partner.

  And here is Beth, partnerless and without a locator. To use a typical Three saying—shooting blind.

  I will not allow myself to think of Jeb. Of Slade.

  Yet they creep inside the fissures of her troubled psyche. Especially what Slade made her feel. Her body aches for his touch, and Beth understands deep down that lust and passion are not enough. He's awakened something inside her, true. And though he's proven not to hurt her, a nagging bit of herself doesn't wholly trust his motives. She feels there are things Slade keeps from her, and certainly there are things he keeps from Jeb. And Merrick, though having declared her, is still, foremost, her partner. Beth longs for friendships and knows that yearning weakens her. Blinds her to the others’ motivations that might not be pure.

  “Holy shit,” Jacky whispers.

  Beth halts, scanning his neighborhood and remembering the last time she was in that house. The day they jumped here had been some sort of strange holiday where Three younglings traipsed around in costume and begged for sugared treats.

  Beth did not like the tradition.

  The group slows, staring up the steep ravine and into the backyard of Jacky's domicile.

  Spirals of twisted gray smoke crawl upward—his house is standing in ruins, and a sense of foreboding sweeps Beth. Has Ryan guessed they would come here? Perhaps he was the one murdering Madeline's mother—burning down the house where Jacky's
parents had lived.

  She jumps to these conclusions like skipping stones across a lake. Reflectives are taught to look at coincidences as connections, not random circumstances.

  Beth turns to Gunnar, and his broad back swells with his measured breaths. “Gunnar.”

  He turns, revealing only his profile. “My daughter.”

  Beth smiles without meaning to. With all the tragedy, the separation from Merrick and her uncertain future, this one man has decided to own their tie. The connection feels more right than it should. Beth breathes through her growing feelings for Gunnar, reminding herself that she was essentially an orphan. Then reprimanding herself that Gunnar had never known of her existence.

  Beth forces herself to the present. “I believe Ryan might be behind”— she struggles, unwilling to remind Madeline about the fresh tragedy—“some of the recent happenings.”

  Jacky walks over, careful not to trip on the sloping ground, toward a drainage ditch that holds excess water runoff.

  He jabs a finger behind him, and their eyes travel over the charred wood that was once walls. “Why would Ryan burn our house? My parents are gone.” He shrugs, trying for a bravado Beth sees clearly he doesn't embrace.

  Jacky crosses his arms. “This Ryan dick? He's Reflective. And you guys—Kennet, Colin, and for sure uptight Merrick—you've made damn sure I know how expert and deliberate ya all are, right?”

  Beth doesn't like his tone, but she can't argue the facts. Reflectives are warriors. It's a simple precept.

  With a swift nod from her, he goes on.

  “And there's no way after Gunnar munched on him, he was feelinʼ all spry and shit. He wouldn't be able to get here before us, take the time to burn everything down then lie in wait? Nah,” he squints up through the tree trunks to the backyard where his house once stood, and only naked, charred two-by-four studs remain. “This is something else. And Ryan's still out there, digging for some payback.” He shakes his head, running his fingers through his long dirty-blond hair.

  After a few seconds, Gunnar reluctantly admits, “I agree with the youngling.”

  Beth hides a smile. There is nothing funny about what happened to Jacky's domicile. But Beth is struck by how ridiculous the situation has become. She also realizes her exhaustion plays a role.