Fire & Soul (2 page)

"You two are hard to find."

I barely register drawing my gun, but Jye doesn't even flinch. He just stares up from where he's perched on the adjunct's wrist  and waits in silence as I holster my gun.

"I take it you're our new anam," Mikscn says as he replaces the panel.

"You're twins," Jye murmurs. "No wonder you're so powerful. Your synchronization rates must be through the roof."

"My name's Mikscn. This is Temsha," Mikscn says like Jye hadn't even spoken. "You two've already met?"

"Not as such, no." His eyes flick between Mikscn and I. "My name's Jye."

Mikscn nods and turns around to face us, dusting off his hands. "Nice to meet you, Jye. You'll have to forgive Temsha his lack of manners; he forgets to use his words sometimes."

"Hi," I mumble, feeling my face heat. Not like Mikscn isn't affected too, he's just better at hiding it.

Jye smiles and the expression isn't mean the way it is sometimes with other people. "Hi."

*~*~*

Breathe. In. Out.

"Initializing sequence."

Breathe. In. Out.

"Sequence initialized. Reading trifecta."

Breathe. In. Out.

"Trifecta confirmed."

Breathe. In. Out.

"Pilots confirmed. Pilot synchronization initialized."

Breathe. In. Out.

"Anam confirmed. Coordination with anam initialized."

Breathe. In. Out.

"Pilot synchronization holding at 98%."

"Coordination with anam holding at 90%."

"Pilot synchronization dropping to 90%."

"Coordination with anam dropping to 88%."

Breathe.
Be calm.

"Pilot synchronization at 93%."

"Pilot synchronization at 95%.

"Pilot synchronization at 98%."

"Pilot synchronization at 100%."

"Coordination with anam at 95%."

"Coordination with anam at 100%."

"Adjunct operating at full capacity."

"Adjunct holding at full capacity."

"Sequence completed."

"Ending sequence."

I open my eyes as the adjunct's computer disengages. The HUD disappears behind my eyes as the cockpit opens. I let out a soft breath, trying to still Mikscn's excitement.

"Beautiful," Aiya says from where she's sitting on the adjunct's knee. She's got a tablet in her lap, her fingers dancing over the screen. "I've never seen such a flawless sequence, even for you two."

Mikscn crawls out of the cockpit first and I follow carefully, awareness singing through my veins. Aiya chatters away, and I push Mikscn's attention to her, desperately reining in our curiosity. But Mikscn won't be distracted and we both watch as Jye crawls out of his cockpit, located beneath ours, where the adjunct's armor is thickest.

His eyes show just a strip of blue around his blown pupils, and arousal hits us low in the gut. We let out a breath as he stares at us and watch intently as he licks his lips.

"Oh. Huh." Aiya's voice cuts through the air and we turn to look at her. She's tapping her index finger over her lips. "You two never get worked up like
that
."

She's right, and it cuts through us like a hot knife through butter. Mikscn thinks an apology, but it comes through my lips and we sigh.

Aiya snorts. "I know you guys pride yourselves on your freakish ability to come back down in a couple of minutes with nothing but a hug and smile, but I'd like to remind you that that's abnormal."

I frown as Mikscn nods and the discordant note pulls between us, stretching under our skin. I feel Mikscn's wince pull at my muscles.

Jye runs his fingers down my spine and Mikscn laughs when I nearly jump through my skin. Mikscn's amusement pulls against the aggression pounding through my veins, the urge to shove Jye against the adjunct, but only for a second until my brother gets yanked along beside me.

"You have a room," Aiya shouts. "Go away so I can run diagnostics."

We scowl and Jye laughs and our irritation is lost as we turn to him. He tumbles off the adjunct's arm, a controlled fall and we follow, the instinct to chase jumbling up with the need to claim, slipping through each other's skin.

Mikscn tries to slow us down, but Jye tilts his head and grins like he knows and we lunge forward. He leads us through the estate, a chase that pounds through marble halls with our heartbeat.

He hesitates and we catch him, press him to the locked door and he fumbles with the keypad as we give in to the urge to touch. We snarl a little in frustration—two bodies, not one, too many hands—and fall forward as the door slides open.

Jye laughs as we struggle to right ourselves and the sound sinks into our thoughts, cools some of the desperation. I breathe in deep and fall back as Mikscn presses forward, his hands working at Jye's belt. Jye's hands pet over Mikscn's shoulders and I watch, purposefully stifling everything that tastes like Mikscn inside me.

Mikscn shoves Jye onto the bed and glances back at me with heavy-lidded eyes. I cross my arms and lean back against the door, my teeth gritted. Mikscn stares at me a heartbeat longer, asking permission, and I look at Jye waiting patiently on his back, his arms stretched above his head. Mikscn's lips quirk in a grin and he turns around and peels his shirt off before setting a knee on the bed, everything in him leaning forward, focused on Jye.

I clench my hands against the feel of Jye's skin under our fingers, and Mikscn stifles a laugh. He deliberately trails his fingers over Jye's ribs, and Jye shifts under the touch, making a soft, impatient sound. I lean forward despite myself and Mikscn dips down to taste Jye's throat. Jye tilts his head back accommodatingly and I bite my lip. There's no reason to push Jye more than he's comfortable with.

Mikscn straightens with a pang of frustration and turns to glare at me. Jye lunges up and rolls them both so he's on top, settled over Mikscn's hips. He twists to look at me, his hair all mussed and his pupils blown wide, and it takes everything I have to slip back out the door.

I slam down on the link between Mikscn and I, strangle it until the only thing left over from synchronizing is a restless itch between my shoulder blades. I draw a slow, shaky breath and force out the urge to taste Jye's skin, see if it tastes the same on my tongue as it did on Mikscn's.

The gym. Working out will help me calm down. That's what I need to be focusing on. I run a trembling hand through my hair and set off in the direction of the gym.

The compound is quiet this time of day, everyone either in class or at lunch. When I come into the gym, there are a few people sparring and Njande in a corner, practicing a slow zharma.

I take up a spot a good distance away and follow his movements. Njande tilts his head in my direction but doesn't otherwise acknowledge my presence. The physical exertion helps slow my mind, lets me focus on something besides the mess of emotions and all the ways they tangle up with Mikscn.

When I finally come back into my head, there are a few more people around Njande and I, mostly older pilots with a few anams thrown in. Someone suggests a match and we break into a circle around a pilot pair.

I sit cross-legged on the floor, calling out pointers as the pilots spar. Desin and Yenja haven't been in the same trifecta long, and it shows in their sparring, how it's not quite a dance. There's a little too much clashing, but they're still refining their technique.

"Here." I accept the bottle of water from Njande with a nod. He sits next to me, a knife and polishing rag in his hand. "They've improved," he murmurs.

"Yeah." Njande doesn't talk much; the general consensus is that he just can't be bothered to. The Zhunai are a strange race, made to be cheap labor and repurposed as assassins, unfailingly loyal and obedient. But a slave is a slave is a slave, and even though Jheghda married his assassin, his right-hand, Njande had still been bought and paid for fourteen years ago. He's the only one of Jheghda's men we'll accept in our midst.

"Your anam good?"

I watch Njande from the corner of my eyes, but his attention is divided between his knife and Desin and Yenja's match. "Yeah." I don't think he's prying for Jheghda, and I've never heard of him betraying confidences, but it would be stupid to trust someone who shares Jheghda's bed.

He just nods. "Good."

Desin and Yenja break apart with a laugh and a kiss. Neina and Tiamin get up next, trading lingering touches before brutal punches.

"Match?" Njande suggests.

"Sure." I haven't sparred with Njande in a couple of weeks. Mikscn and I had been too busy with Misa to pay attention to anyone else.

Neina and Tiamin have been partners for a long, long time, and watching them spar is always a pleasure. Njande lets out a low chuckle when Neina trips Tiamin and pins him, a feral grin on her face. Tiamin pulls Neina down for a kiss and Neina allows it, laughing. I wonder if sparring with Jye would be like that, a flowing push-pull scattered with kisses and glancing touches.

I shake my head as I move to stand opposite Njande in the circle. That's not something I can be wanting, not something Jye is likely to want. Like Cherian doesn't get to keep his pilots, Mikscn and I never get to keep our anams.

"Ready?" Njande asks. His eyes are half-closed. He looks like he could fall asleep where he's standing, and that puts me on my guard more than if he looked eager to kick my ass.

"Are you?" I challenge, and he flashes a grin before charging.

*~*~*

"What the fuck is wrong with you?"

I groan and bury my head in my arms, try to curl away from Mikscn's avenging presence. "Leave me alone," I grunt.

"I cannot believe you slept in the adjunct!" I sigh. "We fell asleep waiting for you to come back! Why did you leave?"

"Because I felt like it," I snarl.

"Bullshit."

"Maybe I didn't feel like fucking someone I just met," I bite out.

"Don't act like you're not obsessed with him," Mikscn snaps.

"Leave me the fuck alone!"

"Not until you tell me why you left!" Mikscn shifts closer, blocking out the sun. "All I got was some sort of guilt about Jye? He's ours!"

"No he's not," I snarl, bolting out of my interface cradle. "He will never be ours," I breathe, an inch from Mikscn's face. "He's only with us because we're the most powerful pilots here. As soon as Jheghda pisses off the wrong House, they'll recall him, and the next time we see him, it'll be in a dossier on our enemies."

"You've got some issues, babe."

I look past Mikscn on reflex and glare at Jye. "Fuck you."

Jye leans forward, his hands braced on the edges of the cockpit. "You didn't, actually."

Despite myself, I feel my face heat. "Why are you here?"

"Talk to each other," Mikscn says, his tone flat. He brushes past Jye and gives me a long look before slipping out of the cockpit.

I collapse into my interface cradle and pull up a HUD, sighing as it flickers behind my eyelids.

Jye drifts closer, his fingers brushing over panels and circuits. "You take excellent care of your adjunct."

"Aiya does most of the work," I say.

Jye perches near Mikscn's cradle. "It's not that you don't like me," he says slowly. "No, you like me a lot."

"I don't want to talk about it."

"Is it because you're so inexperienced? I don't care either way."

"I said I don't want to talk about it," I say, my fingers biting into the interface relays under my hands.

"No, I think it's because you don't know how to be in control of a situation."

"No, I—" I snap my mouth shut, and he nods.

"You don't necessarily have to be in control, Temsha. Or out of control. You've spent your whole life obeying orders. If anyone's supposed to be in control of this trifecta, it's me."

I stare at him hard, line up what he's saying with all the anams who've come before him. All of them too young, not powerful enough, most of them female and therefore very unlikely to be the kind of anam Aiya thinks we should have in terms of
calming down
. And all of them were off-limits because they weren't
ours
, didn't belong to us the way Micca belongs to Aiya and Keito, because we never get to keep our anams.

But Jye's free. He belongs to himself—decides who he belongs to. Could maybe decide to not belong to himself anymore.

I bury my head in my hands. I don't know how to do this. It's one thing to obey orders—though disobeying Aiya isn't exactly conducive to living—but it's something else entirely to give up control to our anam. Whenever Aiya and Keito piss off Jheghda, Micca steps forward and takes command, takes over reporting, protecting his pilots because even free pilots can suffer, and punishing, disciplining his pilots when needed. Before, it's always been Mikscn and I trying to shield our anam, trying to extend their life just a little longer by keeping them beneath Jheghda's notice and behaving ourselves. I don't know how to do this.

"You don't have to," Jye murmurs, and rests his hand on the back of my neck. It's a move so reminiscent of Aiya or Keito that I can't help but relax, surrendering under someone that's supposed to be in charge for once. "I'll take care of it," Jye continues, kneeling in front of me so I have to look him in the eye. "Trust me."

I make myself breathe out slowly, and nod.

*~*~*

I blink up at the dimmed lights above the bed, and sigh. Beside me, Mikscn curls further into Jye's warmth. I pet a hand through my brother's hair and the bond between us resonates with contentment. I spare a couple of seconds to close it down gently, so Mikscn can sleep a little bit longer.

Once I've rolled out of bed and dressed, I carry my boots into the hall. Keito's waiting a few doors down, his arms crossed in front of his chest and his hair a disordered mess. He waits while I put on my boots, and I let his presence soothe away the disquiet sitting in my chest. We walk to the gym together; it's early even for the sky forces, early enough that when we get to the gym it's entirely empty.

I follow Keito to a corner and follow him in our morning zharma, letting my mind drift as my body flows from one stance to another, stretching out sleep-heavy muscles and waking up my appetite. "He's a good guy," Keito says when we reach the end of our morning ritual. "I knew his father, knew him when he was still a kid."