Unknotted

Mercy and Belief

Georgie

Peth’s fingers twitched. I didn’t dare to open my eyes though. I grappled against the horrible emotions welling up inside me. Peth had to live. She had to.

I squeezed her hand tighter, hugging it to my chest. Tears pushed at the backs of my eyes. Magic stay, I chanted in my mind, as if I could will it so. Stay and allow Peth to heal.

“Not cool.”

My eyes flew open at the sound of her moan. “Peth?”

“Pethany!” Jik squealed, rubbing at his damp cheeks, while Kova checked her pulse on her wrist.

“Peth? How do you feel?” I checked her wound, wiping the blood away to find a silvery round scar resting an inch beneath her rib cage. All healed. Thank the Core.

“Not cool,” Peth moaned again.

“Well, you were shot,” I said. The tide snapped away, sharper than it ever had. Left in its wake was a dull world. But still beautiful because Peth was alive.

She shook her head. “It’s not cool that you tried to run over your pragmora. R.F. Letcher would be ashamed.”

Relief bubbled out of my chest in a manic giggle. I snorted it back and swiped the drippage from my nose with the back of my hand. “Not my pragmora.”

She cracked an eye open. “Not yet. The Core’s not done with you two.”

“Did we really save your life so you could scold me?”

“I just had a near death experience. Don’t you want to know what I heard from the Between?”

I shook my head. “Absolutely not.”

“My little cheesecake…” Jik brushed the hair back from her forehead. “I was so frightened I would lose you.”

Peth frowned at him. Maybe I was imagining it, but the expression didn’t seem to have the same edge as it usually did. “You’re going to make my hair frizzy, combing it like that.”

“Care to tell me what you three were up to now?” Kova’s brows were drawn down and together. “What was so important? Was it worth getting Peth shot?”

Peth pushed up onto her elbows and gave her brother a sheepish smile. “We had to fetch Bruce.”

“Bruce? Who’s Bruce?”

Jik peaked over her shoulder. “Georgie’s truck, of course.”

“You were shot over a truck? Why would someone shoot you for retrieving Georgie’s own truck? Or for that matter, why did you have to ‘fetch’ it at all?”

“Do you really want to know?” Peth raised a brow. “The more you know the more incriminating it would be for you in the unlikely event we are caught doing what we do.”

Kova’s lips pursed. “How many times have I told you to quit whatever foolishness you’re caught up in? Next time I might be too late.”

“No way.” She punched him in the arm, but the movement seemed heavy and slow. “You’re on time for everything, brother.”

Mumbling under his breath, Kova gathered up his empty vials and packed them into his bag. His hands shook so hard it was clear he was struggling to not crush the glass in his grip.

Peth grabbed his hand. “Would you believe me if I told you the risks that we take are worth it?”

He shook his head. “I don’t know what to believe, little sister. But I know I can’t stop you. Just—” He pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. “Just be more careful. Okay?”

She smirked. “Okay.” Though potions had replaced some of her blood, her face still looked pallid. I knew from experience that healing potions, while they worked absolute miracles, always left the consumer drained of energy and strength. It would be a few days before Peth was back up and running.

“I need to call my boss. Explain I won’t be in today.” Kova rose, looked at his hands tacky with blood, and stomped from the room. With the studs of the interior walls exposed, we could still see him, but his voice faded with the distance.

Peth sagged back, falling into Jik’s lap. She scowled at him but must have been too tired to protest further. “What’s the plan, lady? We have Bruce. Are we going to scope out the Den now?”

I rested a hand on her shoulder. “You aren’t in shape to be going anywhere.”

“What about those hybrids in the shipment?” Peth checked that Kova was out of earshot. “We can’t give up on them.”

“We’re out of leads.” I sagged. “I’m going to fetch some water and towels so we can clean up. You rest.” A small grin wiggled on my lips. “Jik will take good care of you. You’re in his charge now.”

Jik swelled up like a peacock displaying his impressive plumage. She shot me a flat glare.

I strode outside. The day had warmed, the sun dropping past its zenith. Instead of descending the stairs, I climbed the ladder I used to lay the cedar shingles. The roof was almost done, but the peak needed a few more layers of cedar. From there, I gripped a tree branch and climbed higher until I reached the limbs that bent and strained to hold me. Atop this mammoth tree, I could see over most of the surrounding forest. In the distance rose the first signs of the Core cresting the horizon, Tredema lurking in its shadow.

Most on this broken planet treated the Core as a deity. Believed it was sentient and orchestrated the past, present, and future, occasionally relaying those events through cryptic messages delivered through the Whisps. That was why thousands were willing to die in the Expansion War over a prophecy. Why hybrids chose lives that focused more on growing the strength of their coavani knots than building love and romance shown in R.F. Letcher novels. It was why some accepted being knotted to someone they didn’t love or even know.

Once I had believed all those things. A long time ago. Until I decided I didn’t want some unknown power to dictate what territory I belonged to, who my family would be, or who I was destined to love. Was that pulsing ball of energy, hovering in the Between, really sentient or had the planet’s people made it all up to comfort some innate need to believe in a higher power? Maybe the prophecy was only a Whisp managing to string words together into something barely coherent.

I didn’t know the answer to most of the questions that inevitably followed my desertion of faith. I had long since accepted I wouldn’t find those answers either. That was a sour potion I had to swallow time and time again.

After what had happened with Peth, the way the tide had remained just long enough for the potions to pull her back from the brink of death, I couldn’t help wondering if there really was more to it than luck. I had felt the tide ebbing. The magic should have been ripped away far too soon.

Except, it hadn’t been.

The Core pulsed, strings of white light that flickered with rainbow pieces as it kept its magic to itself. Tonight, I would accept that the Core did have something of a plan, and it had heard my plea and decided Peth was worth saving. That she had a part to play in the future of this broken planet.

Or maybe, sometimes, the Core grants everyone a little bit of mercy.

Whatever the reason, I was grateful the tide had lingered. For the first time in years, I bowed my head and whispered my thanks.