10

Demeter, the Legion canteen, was packed. Like everything at the Legion, where we ate was organized into a strict hierarchical structure. We initiates sat at the two loud tables beside the tray drop-off point. Past our tables sat the sea of soldiers who’d actually made it into the Legion, ordered by rank all the way to the single head table at the other end of the room. That’s where Nero, Harker, and anyone else level six or above sat. There were only eight of them currently here in New York, and Nero was the only angel of the group. The gods didn’t grant wings to just anyone. I tried not to dwell on the impossibility of the task ahead of me. A task was only impossible if you’d decided it was.

Ivy and I grabbed our trays and headed for the food counters, but Jace and his band of brats barred our way.

“Hey, ladies,” he drawled. “You look awfully tired. How about we help you carry your trays?”

I glanced up at the mirrored ceiling to make sure no one had scribbled ‘idiot’ on my forehead. Nope. Not this time. A few of the Legion brats had done it last week after one of them knocked me out during combat training.

“We’re fine,” I told them, holding onto my tray.

I’d use it to defend myself if I had to, no matter how much Nero might lecture me about ‘inappropriate weapons’ later. Even now, I could feel the angel’s stare burning across the expanse, boring into me.

“You don’t look fine,” Mina said. She was a close second to Jace in terms of outright obnoxiousness. Her gaze flickered to Ivy. “We saw this poor girl collapse on the track. Maybe it was that beating I gave her before. How’s your hand?”

The other brats snorted.

I stood up tall, staring them down. “Back off.”

“You weren’t holding up so well yourself, were you, Pandora?” Jace taunted. When Nero called me Pandora it was at least ten percent charming. When this asshole did it, it was one hundred percent aggravating. “Tripping over your own feet.” He chuckled. “Now that must have been embarrassing.”

It really had been, especially with Nero standing there, telling me to get up. I’d wanted to prove to him that I was as tough as the rest of them, but all I’d succeeded in was demonstrating how out of my league I really was.

I’d always considered myself fit and a better runner than most. But Nero’s idea of a good runner varied enormously from my own. He expected people to run a mile in under three minutes. He wasn’t interested in how impossible that was because supernaturals lived by different rules, he said. He’d once responded to my comment by running a mile in two minutes without breaking a sweat. It had taken enormous restraint not to give into the urge to remind the angel that he was running with all his gods-granted pistons firing, whereas our bodies were still mostly human. He would have just called it an excuse.

“You didn’t look so great yourself dangling from your ankle,” I shot back at Jace. “Did all your wild flailing make you finally fall out of the rope, or did they have to pull you back down like a hooked fish?”

Jace leaned forward. “Didn’t they teach to respect your betters out there on the butt-end of civilization?” Each word pulsed with pure malice.

“No, they just taught us to stand up to people who thought they were,” I said, grabbing Ivy’s hand and pushing past the brats.

“I’m looking forward to meeting you in the ring again, Pandora,” Jace called out after me.

I just kept moving. They didn’t try to stop us, probably only because Nero and Harker were still watching. Standing up to those bullies was probably going to come bite me in the ass later, but I was too mad to care about that right now.

“They are so full of themselves,” Ivy said to me as we loaded up our plates.

“Don’t worry about them,” I told her. “They’re Wonder Bread. All fluffy and pretty on the outside, no substance on the inside.”

“Yeah. Just because they’ve been groomed from birth to join the Legion, that doesn’t mean they’re better than we are.” Ivy laughed glumly.

“They aren’t.”

“Really. I’m all for optimism. Hell, it’s all that’s gotten me through these past few weeks. But every one of those six has one angel parent. Most of them have another parent in the Legion too. How are we supposed to compete with them?”

“This isn’t a competition against others,” I told her. “Only against yourself.”

“Tell that to them when we face them in the fighting ring,” she grumbled. “If they weaken us, we won’t make it. And people like that don’t want anyone else to make it. They think we aren’t good enough for the Legion. They’ve been Legion families for generations. They always make it high in the ranks. Some of the magic the gods grant people passes through to their children. It’s easier for them to unlock magical abilities than for nobodies like us.”

I wrapped my arm around her and said, “Don’t even think about them. We’re a team, and we will make it through this. They might be bursting with magic, but we have dogged determination and our will to survive on our side. Stubbornness trumps raw power every time.”

Ivy snorted.

“Now, come on. Drake is waving us over.”

We joined him at the table and began devouring our dinner. I’d expended several thousand calories today, and I had only half an hour to replenish them.

“What’s wrong?” Drake asked Ivy, who was mostly just staring down at her food.

She didn’t say anything.

“The brats tried to get under our skin. But we’re not letting them,” I reminded Ivy.

“Screw the brats and their pretty plastic parts.” Drake put his arm around Ivy, hugging her to him.

That’s when I saw it in her eyes. She liked him. In a romantic way. As I sucked on my chocolate shake, I wondered if Drake realized it too.

* * *

After dinner, we hurried back to our room for a quick shower. Then, for the first time in a month, we changed into something that hadn’t come out of the Legion’s closets. I slipped into my favorite pair of jeans and a lace-trimmed tank top Tessa had put into the suitcase Calli and the girls had sent over last week. And, just because I was feeling adventurous, I put on a pair of high-heeled boots.

Ivy had selected a pair of red leather pants and a see-through black mesh top with strategically-placed arrangements of lace. The heels on her scrappy gold sandals could have staked a vampire. Drake was sporting a pair of dark jeans and a muscle t-shirt that read ‘I may look like an angel, but I dance like a demon’. Ivy had bought it for him before they’d joined the Legion. Maybe I should get one for myself, if only to see the appalled expression on Nero’s face when I wore it in front of him. I snorted at the thought.

A kaleidoscope of flashing lights beamed down on us at Club Firefall. Our fellow initiates were all letting their hair down tonight, relishing in their freedom for the first time in a month. To the heavy, infectious beat of music, we danced and drank and let loose in a way none of us had in over four weeks—or, in my case, forever. There was something about a month of putting your body through one punishment after the other that made you appreciate life in a whole new way. For this one night, I was free.

As the song ended, I stepped off the dance floor with my five roommates, making a beeline for the cornucopia symbol hanging over the bar. Two Legion brats cut us off.

“Hey, Drake. And ladies.” One of the guys laughed.

His buddy was equally jolly, and it wasn’t just from the rum I smelled on his breath. “So, we were wondering.” More snickering. “Are you even a real man?”

“What are you talking about?” Drake said.

“You’re staying in a room of girls.”

“Exactly.” A smile spread across his lips. “I’m staying in a room with five women. Take a moment to think about that.”

Then Drake returned to the dance floor with our three female roommates, who danced all around him. The two brats watched him with obvious annoyance, then left in a huff.

“They had that one coming,” Ivy laughed, then hurried to join our roommates.

But I was thirsty. I continued on to the bar and ordered a water. I’d already had way too many of those bombastic cocktails, and I wasn’t even sure what was in them. Something that made me really happy. Or maybe that was just my temporary freedom.

“Playing it safe?” Harker said, glancing down at my water as he sat down on the barstool beside me. He had a bombastic cocktail, blue edition.

“Well, I’m supposed to be behaving myself,” I replied. “Showing respect. Not mouthing off.”

“Basically everything you excel at.”

I grinned, lifting my glass. “Exactly.”

We clinked glasses, then fell into silence.

“How are you doing?” Harker asked me after a few moments.

“Great, now that I’ve eaten. It takes more than a few laps around the track to kill me.”

“You’re doing well. Don’t give up.”

“I wasn’t planning on it,” I replied, then lowered my voice. “Ok, what’s their problem?”

He followed my gaze to the trio of Legion soldiers at the other end of the bar. They’d been staring at us since Harker had sat down beside me.

“Legion officers and initiates don’t hang out,” he said.

“Often?”

“Ever.” He smiled at me. “But I like you. It takes a lot of guts to talk back to Nero.”

“He says I have no sense of self-preservation.”

Harker threw back his head and laughed. It was a perfect, honest-to-goodness laugh, without pretense or ulterior motives. It felt nice to be talking to someone who wasn’t trying to get something out of me.

“Of course you don’t,” he told me. “That’s what makes you so much fun. No one has talked back to Nero in a long time. It’s good for his ego, keeps it from getting too inflated.”

“You’re his friend,” I reminded him. “You shouldn’t want me to antagonize him.”

“Nero and I have a complicated relationship. We’re brothers in everything but blood.”

“I have a complicated relationship with my family too,” I said. “Half the time we want to kill one another, but I’d never let anyone hurt them.”

“You are a noble soul, Leda Pierce.” He dipped his chin to me, then stood, going over to join Nero, who’d just entered the bar.

I watched them for a few moments. Whatever they were talking about, it looked serious. Maybe they were debating fresh new ways to torture us initiates come tomorrow morning. As I continued to watch them, Ivy and Drake spun and pivoted off the dance floor to join me at the bar.

“This is crazy,” Ivy said, plopping down beside me. She helped herself to my water. “They are both staring at you.”

I looked back at Nero and Harker. She was right. Whatever the two of them were arguing about in hushed tones, it seemed to have something to do with me. I shook off the thought. Not everything was about me.

“Harker seems to like you.” Ivy fluttered her eyelashes at me.

“I’m pretty sure he’s only being nice to me to annoy Nero.”

Ivy glimpsed past my shoulder. “They are both still staring at you, Leda.” Ivy began to fan herself.

“Should I get you some more water?” I asked her drily.

Ivy laughed. “No, I’m good. Come on.”

She grabbed my hand, leading me onto the dance floor. I could still sense Harker and Nero watching me as Ivy and I danced. I was almost disappointed when they turned and walked away, which was definitely not something I should be feeling about anyone—least of all those two.

Ivy waved her hands in front of my face. “Earth to Leda. Are you listening?”

“Sorry. I was just distracted. What did you want to say?”

Ivy chuckled. “You’re in trouble, girl.”

“What do you mean?”

“They like you.”

“Who?”

“Harker and Nero.”

“No,” I denied immediately.

Ok, maybe too immediately. A slow smile twisted Ivy’s lips.

“Harker was just helping me,” I explained. “And Nero is determined to kill me, one hellish obstacle course at a time.”

“No, they like you.” A slow smile twisted her lips. “And I heard something about Nero.”

I waited for her to elaborate, but when she didn’t, I said, “What did you hear?”

“That he doesn’t usually oversee initiate trainings. In fact, he hasn’t done it in years. But something made him do it this time.”

“Lucky us.”

Ivy chuckled, bright and devilish. “I have a feeling I know what made him do it. Or who.” She wiggled her eyebrows at me.

“No.”

“Do you want to bet?”

No. I wasn’t crazy enough to bet on the intentions of an angel. And what if he had become our trainer because of me? What if this was his way of cracking my secret? A shiver rippled through my body.

“They both like you,” Ivy said again.

Ok, maybe I could see Harker liking me. He’d admitted that Legion officers didn’t socialize with initiates, and yet he’d talked to me in front of everyone. He’d also been nothing but really nice to me ever since I’d arrived at the Legion.

But Nero? No way. He’d made the last month of my life a living hell.

Before I could ponder this further, however, men decked out in black leather flooded into the club, surrounding us all.