The Sun Dwellers (10 page)

“Delicious,” I say around the hunk of fruit in my mouth, copying Roc’s word from earlier. “What kind of fruit is it?”

“You mean you…”

“Nope. Never had it before.”

“But don’t you get sick? Fruit has all kinds of important vitamins in it,” Roc says.

I laugh. “Vitamins? What are those? There’s a lot of disease in the Lower Realms, but over time I guess we’ve just adapted to a diet without fruit. Every household also receives a vitamin ration every six months. It’s supposed to be this big benefit for paying taxes, but everyone knows it’s just so the men are strong enough to work in the mines.”

Roc smiles wryly. “Well, that changes everything. The one you just ate is banana, but I’ve got apple, apricots, and mango, too. You should have all of it.” He pushes the dried fruit toward me, but I put out my hands to stop him.

“No, Roc. We’ll share it. Please.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice,” he says, animatedly crunching another piece of what I now know is dried banana.

I laugh. “But save me some,” I say.

“Here, try this one. It’s different. It’s soft. We call it mango.”

Eagerly, I snatch the new piece of fruit from Roc, feeling the difference in texture with my fingertips. Whereas the other piece—the banana—was hard and crisp and yellow-brown, this is squishy, sort of gummy, and orange. Mango.

I take a bite. “Mmmm,” I murmur when the flavor registers. It’s incredible and weird at the same time. The taste is incredibly delicious, but it’s also so different than the banana, which is weird. I mean, they’re both fruit, right?

“You like that, huh?” Roc says.

“Mm-huh,” I say, smacking my lips as I chew the mango.

“Here, have the rest of that one. I prefer the others anyway.” This time, I accept the offer, resting the fruit on my crossed legs. For a few minutes we sit in silence, eating dried fruit by candlelight.

Then Roc says, “Isn’t it crazy that we’re here?”

“What do you mean?” I ask, right away thinking of my thoughts from earlier. It’s like Roc read my mind.

He runs a hand through his black hair. “Well, there are so many variables at play, from the timing of events, to the political climate, to what time we wake up each day. It just seems crazy that it all happened the way it did, that we’re here, you and Tristan, me and Tawni…”

“Trevor?” I say.

“Sure. Yeah. Him, too. Do you believe in fate?”

His brown eyes are studying me carefully, as if everything hinges on my response to this question. I never realized how serious a guy Roc is. I always thought he was just a jokester, quick-witted and clever with his words. This is a new side to him.

“I don’t know,” I reply honestly. “I sort of did, but then my mom told me something that made me question everything that has happened.”

Cocking his head to the side, Roc says, “What did she tell you?”

Although I had originally planned to keep my mom’s revelation to myself, I’ve now told Tristan, who may or may not remember it, and I’m about to tell his best friend. But everything about Roc feels trustworthy, like he’s a guy you could share your darkest secrets with and never lose sleep over it.

“She told me it was no accident that Tristan and I met.” My words come out louder than I’d planned, echoing twice off the walls before fading into the night.

“I knew it!” Roc hisses, keeping his voice down.

Huh?
It’s not the reaction I expected. “What are you talking about? Knew what?” I whisper, leaning my head in.

Returning the remaining dried fruit to his pack, Roc clasps his hands together, his grin wider than ever. He leans toward me, mimicking my movements. “From the beginning I knew something was off,” he starts. “Tristan was acting so unlike himself.”

“How so?”

“After that first day he saw you, was
near
you, he was so fixated on finding you again, on testing the feelings he felt for you. There was no arguing with him, which is unusual. Normally, he listens to me, listens to reason. Yeah, he hates the Sun Realm, but to pack up and leave it all for some girl—no offense, but it’s just not like him.”

I frown. So much of what Roc’s saying makes sense. I’d had similar thoughts myself. Everything about the way we met—how he left the Sun Realm, how he tracked me down, how he protected me from Rivet—seemed so surreal that I could barely comprehend it. But with no other explanation available, I’d just chalked it up to our powerful connection and coincidence. But maybe I was wrong.

“But what did my mom mean by ‘
no accident
’
?
” My mind is racing. Did someone force us together somehow? Were we hypnotized or given some strange elixir that altered our judgment? Everything just seems so farfetched.

“Has he told you about the fainting?” Roc asks.

“Yes, but…what does that have to do with anything? Any number of things could have caused him to faint. Hunger, thirst, lack of slee—

“But none of those things caused it.
You
caused it.”

It’s like I’m incapable of comprehending anything Roc says to me. Each new piece of information is like a shard of glass from a broken window, except no matter how many combinations you try, the splinters refuse to fit back together again.

“But I didn’t
do
anything. I wasn’t even sure Tristan saw me. And I certainly didn’t know he was chasing me—at least not until he defended me from Rivet at the edge of the Lonely Caverns.” And yet…yet something about what Roc is saying makes sense, because it lines up perfectly with my mother’s words. There’s something else, too.

“The scars,” I say. My mind conjures up an image so vivid that it’s almost like I’m experiencing it for a second time: Tristan’s naked back as we dressed his wounds after the fight with Rivet, his muscles toned and beautiful, his skin spotted with scars; the exhilaration I felt as my fingertips brushed his skin, working to clean him up; the one scar that looked so different than the others, midway up his back, on his spine, unnaturally crescent-shaped. At the time I was curious about the scar, but I chickened out and didn’t ask him. Then, when Tawni told me about a scar on my back that I didn’t know about—also crescent-shaped and in a similar location—I wished I had.

“What scars?” Roc asks his eyebrows arched.

“Tristan has a scar on his back.”

“He has a lot of scars.”

“But this one is different. And I think I have the same scar in the same spot,” I say.

Roc is silent as he stares at me, processing the information.

Everything is lining up too nicely to just be a coincidence. “It just can’t…” I start to say, trailing off.

Roc’s watching me carefully. “Can’t what?”

“Can’t be true,” I say lamely, a sinking feeling settling into my gut.

“Because if it
is
true, then that means your feelings for Tristan, and his feelings for you…aren’t natural? Is that what you’re worried about?”

Roc’s perceptiveness once more takes me by surprise. I really didn’t know him at all. He’s got me figured exactly. Mine and Tristan’s “relationship,” although slow moving and separated by hundreds of miles of bare rock and tunnels and subchapters at times, has intensified as of late. But if we were brought together by some unnatural force, then we’re living a lie. Our relationship is a sham. He’s just another guy.

“Yes,” I admit.

“You can’t think like that,” Roc says, and I jerk my chin up from where it’s fallen to my chest. “Think of it this way. Different people are brought together in all different ways. It’s what you feel once you’re brought together that matters, regardless of how you got together in the first place. Does that make sense?”

It does, but our situation is different. “Yes, but what if what we felt for each other once we were together wasn’t natural either? What if something was causing those feelings? Then they wouldn’t be real, would they?”

Roc opens his mouth to answer. “I don’t know,” he says, and my head falls once more, because deep down I’d hoped he’d have a better answer, that he’d contradict my line of thinking, come up with some wise alternative.

“What are you guys doing up?” Tristan’s voice asks from the side, and a shred of anger at having been interrupted creases my temple, which is totally unfair to Tristan, who’s done nothing wrong. But the thought of not being able to finish my conversation with Roc, and having to carry on a normal conversation with Tristan, makes me angry for some reason.

Before I say something I might regret Roc comes to the rescue. “We couldn’t sleep,” he says.

Rising from his bedroll, Tristan approaches, glancing from my face to Roc’s, and then back to mine, his dark blue eyes piercing my soul, and for a second I’m worried my doubts are exposed, running down my face and arms like sweat. But then every fear—every doubt—is replaced by a warm sensation radiating out from my heart and reaching every part of my body. It’s the feeling I’d felt earlier when touching Tristan, except this time I’m feeling it just being in his presence. It’s not the tingly spine and buzzing scalp—no, those feelings are long gone—but in a way it’s better.

“Everything all right?” Tristan asks.

“Yes,” I say, my reply a lie and the truth, all at the same time.

Tristan

H
er expression is unreadable, but I feel like I’m intruding on something private.

“What did you say to her?” I say to Roc, an accusation in my tone.

“What? Why do you always think I’ve done something wrong?” Roc says, throwing up his hands.

“Maybe because you usually have,” I say.

“That’s an obvious exaggeration,” Roc says, smirking.

“What about the time when you stole Killen’s boots and blamed it on me?”

“I had forgotten about that. It was pretty clever, wasn’t it?” Roc says.

“Or the time you overslept and didn’t complete any of your chores so I had to do them all to cover for you?”

“Never happened as far as I’m concerned,” Roc says, his eyebrows rising innocently.

“That’s because you were sleeping,” I say, unable to stop a laugh.

Roc laughs, too, his eyes sparkling in the light. “There are two sides to every story,” he says.

I glance at Adele, and I’m surprised that she’s not laughing, too, her gaze averted from us, as if she’d rather look anywhere else. Something really is wrong.

“Can’t you all keep quiet for a few more hours? I need my beauty sleep,” says Trevor, propping himself up on his elbows to look at us.

“You can say that again,” Roc says.

“I need my beauty sleep,” Trevor mimes. “Didn’t you hear me the first time? What time is it anyway?”

“Time to get a watch,” Roc says.

“Ha ha. Sorry, we weren’t privileged to own such luxuries in the Star Realm,” Trevor retorts.

“Good point,” I say, glancing at my watch. “It’s five in the morning.”

“We should try to get a little more sleep,” Adele says suddenly. My eyes flick to hers. She’s wearing a strange expression. Looking away, she says, “I mean, we can’t leave now, right? It’s too early.”

“She’s right,” Roc says. “The festivities won’t start until at least eight. We’d stick out way too much wandering the streets now.”

“Now that I’m up, I don’t think I can go back to sleep,” Trevor says.

“Me either,” I say.

“Want to play a game or something?” Roc jokes.

“Or we could train,” Trevor says, narrowing his eyes at me. “If you’re game, that is,” he adds.

“Sure, why not,” I say. “Roc could use a little training.”

“After what Trevor did to you earlier, you could, too,” Roc says.

“Oh, it’s on!” I say. “Adele—you in?”

“Is this really the time for training?” she asks.

“It’s
exactly
the time,” Trevor says. “If we don’t stay loose our muscles will tighten up. Think of it as a bit of stretching.”

For the first time since I woke up, the usual gleam returns to her big, green eyes. “Okay. I’m in,” she says.

“I’m out,” Tawni says, rubbing her eyes as she approaches.

“Good morning,” Roc says cheerfully. “It wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to learn a few things, Tawni. You need to be able to protect yourself, in case anything happens.”

“And you’re going to teach her?” I ask.

“That’s right,” Roc says. “While you three are beating the gravel out of each other, trying to prove your manhood, or whatever it is you’re trying to prove, we’ll be getting ready for battle.”

“I’m most certainly not trying to prove my manhood,” Adele says, finally letting a short laugh slip out.

“I should hope not,” I say. “Okay. Roc, you give Tawni the basics on this side of the fire pit”—I motion to the right half of the cavern—“and we’ll train on the other side.”

“Good luck,” he says, glancing between me and Trevor, “but honestly, my money’s on Adele.”

“Thank you, Roc,” Adele says, and once more I get the feeling that there’s some private
thing
between them that I don’t know about. I really hope Roc hasn’t told her anything he shouldn’t have, like what my father showed me on my fifteenth birthday. I know I need to tell her, need to tell everyone, but not yet. The time just doesn’t feel right.