“Sure, easy.” I laughed, deciding I’d at least rinse my feet, while we were there. I sat on a bench facing the water, kicked off my shoes, and dipped my feet in. The warm water felt damn good.

  Anone grinned, sitting next to me. She waited while a boy entered and brought tea, setting it on a stone ledge that jutted out from the wall. For a long moment I sat there, enjoying the warm water and watching the steam from the tea curl up and vanish in the air. It reminded me of my charms. I thought of Lamb’s teaching, trying to ignore the awkwardness of Anone and focus on that instead.

  “So Malina’s really your sister?” Anone asked, breaking the silence.

  I nodded.

  Anone sat on the bench next to me, taking her tea and blowing on it, gently. Her eyes rose to meet mine as she took a sip. “She as badass as they’re saying?”

  “You haven’t met her?” I asked.

  “I’ve seen her around, heard some things is all. But no, haven’t met her yet.”

  The level of trust here seemed higher than appropriate, but I needed to seem like I was playing along, like I was into it, so I couldn’t ignore the question. That said, I also didn’t know how much my sister wanted me to share, or what role she really played in all this.

  “We called her Blinder, before she took the name Malina,” I said. “That was her role, anyway. To use her powers to momentarily blind the enemy. There’s more to it, of course—”

  “I’ve heard some of it.”

  “Right… And yeah, she was one of the best of us, someone whose shadow was very hard to fill.”

  Anone nodded, sipping her tea again, then set it aside and stared at me. “You stand on your own, you know. I see you—you’re strong, badass… and hot. Damn hot.”

  I frowned. “Thanks…?”

  “You’re one of us.” She scooted in closer. “This is where you belong. Not back there with those pricks at Supralines, and not up in some rogue guild.”

  As she said it, she started to lean in like she was trying to seduce me. I panicked—I didn’t want to be there, and I certainly had no interest in kissing this lady. On instinct, I let out a breath of blue. I’d never done it before, only even thought about trying something because the thoughts of Lamb’s class were still fresh in my mind. But there the breath was, as natural as could be. She leaned in and the breath caught her, then faded. When she opened her eyes, it had already worked its magic.

  The look of seduction and curiosity that had been there moments before was now replaced by confusion and annoyance. She frowned, blinked, and moved away from the bench… Hesitating, she looked back, frowned, and then walked off.

  Part of me was feeling confused about whether I should have turned her down like that or not, but mostly I was focused on the fact that I’d just learned how to harness my charms in a new way I’d never considered before. Holy shit, what Lamb had been teaching was working.

  As I kicked my feet to shake off some of the water, I realized I was alone. Anone was supposed to be leading me to get briefed or something, and now she’d wandered off because of my blue charm. That was bound to come back and bite me somehow, but in the short term this could be to my advantage. I pulled on my shoes, ignoring the soreness of my feet, and stretched before making for one of several arched doorways.

  Watching Trance and Silencer mingle with the others, I thought about how crazy it had been for me to agree to this mission in the first place. I’d signed up for my sister, but also because of my childhood dream of going to Supralines. It wasn’t like I’d expected to have the best of both worlds, but… a part of me had really hoped that would somehow have been possible. I don’t know how. Maybe I’d hoped Malina would’ve abandoned us to really be a student too, and the two of us could’ve been there together, learning to harness our powers and level up, making a new path in life. Two sisters as superheroes.

  Instead, I got a slap in the face from reality. Nothing new there, but it was still a huge letdown.

  Looking over this place, I couldn’t help but think there was more to it than they were letting on. As part of the guild, we’d heard plenty of secrets, of back-room deals and betrayals. It wouldn’t surprise me at all to learn that some of the guards and professors at the academies were involved. This was too much, otherwise.

  That and the question of what the real goal of the attack on the school had been—why the boys had been running, and what the attack on the girls was a diversion from—were hot on my mind. So much so, that I didn’t even notice Prancer walk right past me and start to strip until his pale ass caught the corner of my eye.

  “A warning next time,” I said, turning away.

  He laughed, followed by the sound of his body submerging in the water. I turned back to see him reclining, eyes on me.

  “What, you don’t bathe where you’re from?” he asked.

  “Not with the opposite sex.”

  He arched an eyebrow. “Oh, you’re a fan of the love tunnel over the love stick?”

  “What, I didn’t…” I rolled my eyes, about to leave.

  “Hey now, just an observation. It’s not true?”

  “I don’t play favorites,” I countered, not wanting to discuss this with him in the slightest.

  He chuckled, turning to grab soap and start rubbing it on his chest. “Listen, I was thinking… Talking with your pals. You’re all rogues, right? But… Ice says you have special powers that make you particularly good at what you do.”

  “Relatively new powers, in a sense,” I replied, figuring he meant the cloaking ability.

  “Right.” He started to stand, so I turned away again. “I’m making a trip to Rocadium, and want you with me.”

  I started to turn back, but the hint of his nude form reminded me not to. As curious as I sometimes was, the annoying way I’d met this guy totally overruled that. “You want me to go to Rocadium?”

  “Me and you. Let’s say it’s a test, or a bet, if you will. A challenge, I mean—we need you to steal this guy’s underwear.”

  “What?” This time I spun on him, and luckily he was submerged again. “You want me to sneak in there with you to steal some guy’s underwear? I’m lost.”

  He winked. “Something I’ve learned he keeps in his underwear drawer, actually. But same idea—get in there, help me retrieve a hidden ward he keeps, and get out.”

  “And a ward is…?”

  “I’ll tell you on the way. You in?”

  I considered, then nodded. Rocadium had always piqued my curiosity, though not as much as Supralines. If I was going to get into trouble on this trip, I might as well get some good sightseeing out of it.

  Before setting off on our mission, we gathered in the briefing room to discuss the plan. While Prancer was debating, I found my mind wandering back to Laurel and the others. I’d barely been gone at all, but it was already starting to feel like forever, like a piece of me had been torn off, the blood still pouring free.

  Others had arrived and reported that the other base in the cliffside had fallen. Apparently Lamb and the guards had even put in a call for help from the Citadel, one said, and with Hadrian’s portal ability, time wasn’t exactly a luxury. This led to new rounds of complicated strategy talk, all of which bored me. When Prancer noticed me yawning, he excused himself and came over, lowering his voice.

  “Get some sleep,” Prancer said, leaning against the wall and chewing on his fingernail as he eyed me. “Got a big day tomorrow.”

  “We’re going in broad daylight?” I asked, having half-expected to head out that night, as exhausted as I was.

  He nodded. “When would you be expecting someone to sneak in? Nighttime. So we go in the middle of the day, when their guard is relatively down.”

  That made sense enough. Giving him a nod good night, I left, following Anone with the others to where we’d be sleeping, a long hall with several cots set up. My curiosity at this place was still pushing me to stay awake, to wander about and learn what I could, so that when the moment came to go with my sister or betray these people to Lamb, I’d have everything I could possibly need. But even standing there considering it, my eyes started to close, dreams already hitting me.

  Soon I was halfway between waking and into a dream about Laurel and I riding a great white dragon, flying over muddy swamps and shouting at the top of our lungs that we were ready to take on the world.

  If anyone had spoken to me at that moment, I’m sure I would’ve come back with something that related to flying or tearing Laurel’s clothes off of her. It was a good thing that didn’t happen. At some point I must’ve managed to wobble over to one of the cots and fall into it, because during the night I woke having to take a major piss and found my face pressed up against the abrasive material of the cot.

  I staggered up, found several stalls with holes in the floor, and took care of business. Finishing and making my way out, I ran into Anone. She stood against the roots of a tree that was growing through the dirt wall that hadn’t been taken out, staring at me.

  “Everything all right?” I asked.

  She nodded, but then frowned with a shrug. “You’re confusing.”

  “I don’t try to be.”

  Brushing past her I thought I was in the clear until I felt her hand on my tail. I whipped around and let my tail slap her in the face. “Did I say you could touch me?”

  “You have bite,” Anone replied, hands up in surrender.

  Apparently, the charm I’d given her wasn’t super long-lasting. “I’m just trying to get some sleep,” I said, and kept on moving. Three paces away, I frowned, turned back to her, and said, “What exactly did you hope to accomplish by grabbing my tail?”

  She frowned. “Good luck, maybe? Never touched one of your kind before.”

  “Just when I was starting to think you all might be different,” I said, and continued on to my cot. It hadn’t been something I’d really been thinking about, but now that I was lying there, half awake, I realized there might be some truth to that. While at Supralines, almost everyone seemed to be looking at me with judging eyes. Here, Anone’s little comment and touch had been the only signs that I was looked on as being anything out of the ordinary. The rest hadn’t even seemed to notice, let alone treat me worse for it.

  What did that say about the two groups, I wondered? It could be as simple as me having misjudged who had issues, or it could be a bit more complicated. Maybe the supervillain group was used to more abnormalities, due to circumstance and the way outcasts would often feel they needed a group to belong to, and the main societal groups couldn’t give that to them.

  My eyes grew heavy again as I contemplated this. Soon I was back in dreamland, this time Laurel riding me instead of the dragon. However that worked.

  22

  Prancer had woken me early the next morning, pulling me out of the cot and helping me to the baths, where he dunked my head in the water to wake me up. His laughter echoed in the early morning of that place while I spluttered and threatened to tear him limb from limb.

  “Relax, sweet strips.” He backed up and turned to camo mode against the wall, jokingly pretending to vanish. “Had to get you up—we’ve got to go.”

  “I thought you said midday?”

  “Ah, but we have to get there first, plan an entry… all that fun stuff.”

  I shook myself dry, wiped my eyes, and nodded. “Fine, but first chance I get to sucker punch you, just know it’s coming.”

  “Noted.” He grinned and motioned me to follow him. “We have several Rocadium outfits. Let’s get you in one that shows off that bod. Know how to drive a hover bike?”

  “Finally, you’re speaking my language.” I grinned, following him and excited to get back on a bike. At the guild, we passed our down time by practicing heists on each other and racing hover bikes. What the hell else would we do? Plus, they often served as the easiest means of escape after a job well done.

  We reached a storage room filled with outfits from Supralines and Rocadium, along with several others, and even the black and green body armor of the supervillains. He gestured for me to go at it and went to the corner where a training bot was powered down. As I dressed, he powered up the robot and went a round with it, not even glancing over when my breasts were fully exposed. I wasn’t sure whether to be offended or relieved that maybe there was a gentleman in the mix.

  I secured my top and turned, fully dressed, to watch him perform a sweeping kick on the robot, only to get whacked across the face with a forearm. It sent him stumbling back. He would’ve fallen, if not for the fact that I lunged forward and caught him.

  “Try it again, but like this.” I demonstrated the same kick but with more of an angle with my upper body. The robot tried to compensate, but I was ready for it and leveraged the motion into a takedown.

  “Hot damn,” Prancer said, still rubbing his forehead, but smiling.

  “Takes practice and I have an advantage when it comes to balance,” I admitted, waving my tail behind my head. “But I think you can get there.”

  He nodded, gesturing to the next door over. “Well, let’s see if you can ride as well as you can fight.”

  “Better,” I said. It wasn’t bragging, just the truth.

  We stepped through the door to find bikes the likes of which I’d never seen before. Whatever I’d used back home had been like scrap metal compared to these bad boys. I’m talking gleaming metal, thrusters, even attached weapons that looked like they had swivels. Auto-aim as well, I imagined.

  “I even packed a picnic,” Prancer said, tapping the side of his bike as he hopped on a red one.

  Silver for me, though I noted the camo button right away and even cloaking ability. Fucking amazing. As I powered the beast on, it purred smoothly between my legs, giving me a whole new reason to grin.

  He laughed and pulled his bike out of its docking station, giving it a second for the hover function to stabilize, then the far wall pulled open and we were off, tearing out and away from that supervillain base. With the crisp morning breeze gliding through my hair, the taste of a misty morning, it was almost enough to make me forget we were on our way to complete a mission for the bad guys.

  That thought made me laugh, as I wondered when I’d become such the good versus evil, black-and-white type. Maybe the moment I stepped foot into Supralines? No, I realized as I pulled my bike in front of Prancer’s, letting out a whoop and then laughter, it had always been that way, to some degree at least.

  I wondered if that was part of why even my charm breaths had materialized as they did. My mind had been struggling with the concept of good and bad since day one, only I hadn’t chosen a side. But somewhere along the way I had—I wanted to be good. Desperately. That much was obvious.

  The idea that it came at the price of betraying my sister still didn’t quite sit right with me, though. Wasn’t betraying family wrong in its own sense? Where was the line when that was part of the equation?

  Prancer came up alongside me, using the tree to his left as a surface to roll his bike and try to show off, but as he started the climb, I swerved hard and used his bike as my surface, therefore throwing the two of us into a loop that didn’t end until he—screaming for his life—pulled out of it and nearly crashed into a tree.

  “You’re fucking nuts!” he shouted, pulling to a stop.

  I kept going but pulled back to circle him, ducking to avoid a low-hanging branch. “Better you learn that now than later.”

  He laughed, shaking his head, and put his bike back into drive, trying to get the upper hand. “There’s gotta be something I’m better at than you. You can’t have fighting and riding!”

  “I’ll give you the next thing, whatever it is.”

  A flock of birds took to the sky. More erupted out of trees in the distance, and I marveled at the beauty while worrying that they’d give away our position. Apparently nobody was watching for that, as all that happened in the following minutes was birds crisscrossing paths, circling and spiraling, and even a couple diving down to fly alongside us for a bit before taking back to the sky. They sported feathers of turquoise and red. Some looked like brightly colored versions of the all-black ones I was used to back home, and others had faces that had more of a squished pig look to them. Not everything in life could be beautiful, but there were plenty that were to make up for the others that weren’t.

  We rode together, the sunrise casting long shadows of pink across the land, sprinkled with shadows from the trees. I loved it—this was my color! I’d always thought that, when the sunrise or sunset chose pink instead of orange or red or whatever, it was the universe’s way of saying this would be my day or night.

  It was time to make a difference.

  We rode until the pink had faded and the sun was at a forty-five-degree angle overhead, then Prancer motioned to a spot by a lake and we stopped for food. He’d prepared two bowls of fruit, with plenty of my favorite—pineapple. There were also skewers of meat, some sort of fowl, I imagined, like the types we’d seen on the ride over.

  “You just lived your life up there, huh?” Prancer said, eyeing me between bites.

  “Is there another way to go about it?”

  He laughed. “For a bigger cause. Yeah.”

  “Such as… this one?”

  “One side’s going to win out, eventually.”

  I scoffed, then composed myself, remembering I wasn’t in a position to show my true colors. “Good versus evil… what drives us to the side of evil?”

  “For you, I’d wager insanity.” He winked. “Then again, the fact that you think of it as good versus evil still shows a lack of understanding.”

  “Oh, so this is going to be your thing, huh? I have fighting and racing, and you get intellectualism?”

  He shrugged. “Why not?” When he saw I was waiting for him to elaborate, he took another bite, considering the topic, then swallowed. “I didn’t choose evil, Charm. The side I chose was labeled ‘villains’ by the other side, but that doesn’t make it so.”