First Love, First War, First Step |√|

Treason

I finally managed to wrangle out the truth of what had occurred between Matthew and Meara a week later.

He was sitting at the table, comparing the notes we had stolen to the formula in the vial that sat in front of him.

Sliding into the chair across from him, I smoothed the worn fur on the teddy bear I had retrieved from Anna before taking a deep breath.  "What happened between the two of you while Andie and I were smashing things?"

"I was wondering how long it would take you to ask," Matthew said without looking up.  "In fact, I suspect that you suspect exactly what happened, but you're just wanting to make me squirm."

"You hurt her, Matthew.  You took what she was offering and tossed it back in her face.  She didn't want to love you, she didn't want you to know, and she most certainly didn't want to come to the understanding that you didn't return her feelings."

He glanced up at me for a few seconds.  "I wasn't trying to hurt her, but I didn't feel like it was the best time to get involved in a relationship."

"But how did you tell her that?" I asked.

"Ilania," Matthew gritted out, giving up the pretense that he was focusing on something else, "I don't see how it's any of your business, but I told her that my interest was somewhere else."

I blinked at him, hardly believing what I had just heard.  "Of all the insensitive things I've heard you ever say, that's got to be the worst.  No wonder Meara was heartbroken!"

"I meant that I was more worried about the Igniters right now, not another girl..."

"But she doesn't know that!  You insensitive oaf!  You should have told her that you weren't interested in a relationship until you had accomplished what we had set out to do!"

He pinched the bridge of his nose, staring me down.  "I didn't want her to think that there could be something between us even after the Igniters are dissolved.  I have sworn off relationships, Ilania!

"Do you think that I want to be just like you: spending more time at your boyfriend's grave than at home, wearing his loss like a coat you can't ever remove, and now carting around that stinking teddy bear?"

"This was one of the last things Luke ever gave me!" I growled.  "Maybe you don't think that falling in love isn't worth the pain that will come if you lose them, but I wouldn't trade what I had with Luke for anything!  The only reason he is gone is because of you!

"You are a selfish, unthinking jerk that only looks out for that which can benefit himself!  You don't even care that you just crushed someone's heart beneath your heel!  You don't care that you took the only person in the world that had managed to bring me back to life since my mother died!"

I closed my eyes as my tirade ignited a flood of tears and tried desperately not to show how much I was hurting.  The only thing keeping me anchored now was the stuffed animal that I cradled in my arms.

"I'm sorry, Ilania," Matthew said after a long moment of silence.  "That was wrong of me to goad you like that.  I know how much you miss Luke."

A sob escaped me, and I bit my lip hard, hoping that the pain would force back the wave of sadness.

"You were right though.  I shouldn't have said what I did to Meara, and I shouldn't have turned in Luke like I did," he whispered, and I felt his hand on my shoulder.  "I'll apologize to her first chance I get to track her down and try to do a better job of explaining exactly what I meant."

"It won't be necessary to hunt me down," Meara said from the stairs, and something in her voice made me look closely at her.

For the first time since I had really seen her, she was dressed in the uniform of an Enforcer, a holstered gun hanging heavy on her right hip.  The glint of friendliness had vanished from her eyes, and I only felt bitter cold as she gazed at us.

"I did what I should have done the first day that I found you in my house with my mother.  You have two choices now: you can come with me quietly, or you can fight and force me to do something I don't wish to do."

"Meara," Matthew started, stepping forward with his hands outstretched, "if this is about what happened between us, please leave the others out of it."

"It's too late," she answered frostily.  "Your other treasonous friends have already been taken in by my fellow Enforcers.  I was permitted to come retrieve the two of you alone because they thought it would be less messy."

He glanced back at me, and his eyes were filled with hopelessness, an expression that made the remains of my heart to sink to the ground.  "Our place is with Diane and Andie."

With those seven bleak words, he walked close enough to Meara that she could handcuff his hands together.  The pair of them vanished up the stairs, and she returned without him.

"Ilania, you still have a choice," she said in a clipped formal voice.

I took several deep breaths, clinging to the worn bear in my hands.  "All this over a broken heart?  Matthew happens to reject you in his oafish way, and you go turn us all in.  What about Diane and Andie?  They had no part in what happened between the two of you, yet you're going to punish them.

"We welcomed you.  I trusted you because I saw how broken you were over Luke..."

"Luke's death was necessary, as will your deaths, to preserve the peace of Cineres.  The longer you go unpunished, the more unsettled our world will become," Meara snapped.

"I'm sick of playing by the rules, and I thought you were too!" I answered, lifting my chin in defiance.  "I'm not going to bend just because you're standing there with all of Enforcement's threats hanging over my head.  You're just as guilty as the rest of us!"

She yanked her gun out of its holster and pointed it at me.  "I will shoot you if you don't shut up!"

I watched her hands tremble as she held the weapon up at my head level.  "I'm ready to join Luke at any time.  I don't think you have the guts but go on, prove me wrong."

When I got no response, I tucked the teddy bear away and spread my arms wide as I walked towards her.  "I dare you.  Shoot the person that your brother loved enough to die for."

Just as she was lowering the gun, her finger slipped on the trigger, and I felt the bullet sting my lower left torso.

Whether it was accidental or not, I only remembered the weapon clattering to the floor and her running footsteps before my body met the floor, and I left the world behind for a sea of black.