Page 14 of Anywhere

Rook

I had at least planned to give the guy a chance to be friends, but he’d slammed the door in my face. I wasn’t the type to beg. People begged for my attention, not the other fucking way around. It was humiliating to be forced to come here in the first place, but for Rhys to act like this now… I didn’t get it. I mean, sure, I rejected him, but come on… I was here, wasn’t I?

I reached for my back pocket, realized I didn’t have my smokes, then slumped back into the seat. As angry as I was, I couldn’t take my eyes off that swaying kilt, all too aware of what he looked like underneath it.

“Don’t mind Rhys. He’s actually awesome.”

I looked up to see Mari standing in the doorway. She looked different without the fancy hair and ball gown. Even with the faded jeans and relaxed sweater, she had a wise aura about her.

“You don’t have an accent. I didn’t pick up on that yesterday,” I said, relieved that there was at least one person I’d understand.

“Aye, me do, but me cast it aside when me was livin’ in overseas,” she said, putting the accent on thick. “I wanted to travel and go to school somewhere else, so I spent six years there before moving home again.”

“So why did you come back? It’s so…” I looked around at all the green and the birds singing and couldn’t imagine anyone here ever having fun except for maybe having tons of sex.

The thought of sex made me think about the scene I walked in on in Rhys’ bedroom. It had both enraged me and made me harder than a fucking steel pole to see him with those women. When he’d gotten up and walked towards me naked, his body on full display, I’d begun to question why I hadn’t wanted the triad in the first place. There was this crazy sensation that I’d been experiencing since I laid eyes on him.

I always took the teachings about the great connection with your triad to be mystical bullshit. There was a lot of that out there. I figured the elders needed to say something to entice us to participate in the rituals. I was now discovering that it was real. My chest burned, and my stomach fluttered out of control as the power hummed with the desire to touch Rhys.

“I chose to come home last year when my ma passed away. My pa looks tough, but he took it hard. It’s easy to lose yourself if you lose your triad. My pa’s second had passed on before I was born, so my sister and I decided to stay close to home.” Mari looked around at the gardens. “I miss her, but we go to the gardens every day to talk to her. She wanted her ashes scattered there. It was her favourite place to sit.”

“I’m sorry about your mom,” I said, understanding now what happened yesterday.

“One day at a time. It’s all you can do. So what about you? Do you think you’ll stick around and try to make it work with Rhys?”

I shrugged, hoping it came off casual. “I doubt it. I didn’t want the triad to begin with and rejected the idea, but my father forced me to come here. And as you can see, Rhys doesn’t want anything to do with me.”

I glanced over at Mari. Emotions flowed over her face, but I couldn’t figure out what she was feeling.

“Sounds to me like you’ve got it bad,” she said.

“No, I don’t. Why would you think that?” I scowled and crossed my arms.

Mari shook her head at me. “You seem sort of oblivious to what’s happening to you. To both of you. Do you even know what transpires when a union is decided at the ceremony?”

I sat straighter, annoyed that my cousin was calling me out. “If you’re asking if I’ve ever witnessed it, then no, but I know the premise. I don’t want anything to do with running the family businesses or being the next triad saviour. I just want to sing.”

I rubbed at my eyes as I realized how that must sound, but wasn’t life about living out your dreams? Weren’t we supposed to go after what we wanted and grab it by the horns? For me, that was singing and performing. I felt alive on stage. It was all I ever wanted. Being sent here felt like a prison sentence with a cellmate who hated me for no good reason.

“Some things in life we get to choose, and some are chosen for us. I wanted to be a ballerina, but I was born with a club foot, and it took years before I could walk without special shoes. Yet, here I am, one of the most accomplished warriors in the Adair family. Dreams shift and alter, and you have to adjust.”

“I don’t want to adjust. That’s the thing.” I pointed to the lawn and the spot where Rhys had disappeared. “I don’t want any of this or him, and I shouldn’t be forced to accept it.”

Mari’s face darkened, her eyes narrowing at me. “You have no idea how good you have it. Try being a woman in a Faction.”

I opened my mouth and closed it. There was no argument. She was right. Sighing, I decided to get back to her original question. “I only know what I’ve been told and what I’ve read about the union,” I said and took a sip of coffee. “I never attend the rituals.”

“Okay. Then let me educate you a little. The number one is chosen first and is always the older of the pairing. Strange things happened during your pairing with Rhys. Both of you should be number ones, and yet the spirits saw fit to put you two together.”

“What do you mean, we both could be number ones?” I asked and shifted around in the chair to let my leg swing over the armrest.

“Usually, the pairing is a balance. The older one is, the stronger of the union, and the younger is weaker. It doesn’t have to be by great margins, but there is a distinct difference in power, ability, and personality.” Mari listed off, holding up her fingers as she did. “The two of you are evenly matched in all ways, whether you want to see it or not. From what I’ve seen so far, you’re both strong personalities with a stubborn streak. Your physical stature and power strength are very even. I can feel both of you, and it’s like twin powers pressing on me.”

“Okay, I get it, but I don’t get why that is an issue.” I took another gulp of coffee and savoured the bold flavour. It was a fucking good cup of coffee.

“It’s not an issue. It’s unusual and rarely to never happens. I mean, I haven’t sat down and read every single pairing over the last couple hundred years, but I can’t remember hearing about it. A union needs balance, and two very… um… dominant personalities don’t tend to make a great union.”

I laughed and smiled at my cousin, who I admit was pretty cool. She was easy to talk to and didn’t talk over my head or try to make me feel like an ass for not wanting to be in a triad, yet she wasn’t holding back. I liked that.