This Isn't About Reya

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Svetlana was sitting with her back nuzzled between two outcroppings of black metal in the wall. The floor formed a divot between them, and she fit snugly there. Reya sat next to her on the ground, but they avoided contact with each other. Azrael stood tall in front of both of them, watching her, expressionless. 

She stared at the floor and chewed on one of her nails. She still wore Azrael's cloak around her shoulders. Nobody spoke in the room, until Svetlana eventually broke the silence.

"How would I do it?" she asked quietly.

She was hoping Reya would answer, but Azrael replied first. "You're a Russian pure and the daughter of the White Admiral." Svetlana looked up and met his milky blue eyes. They stared at her blankly. "You could tell them anything and they would follow you."

Svetlana went back to chewing her nail. "Maybe," she murmured. "But I've been with Reya so much over the past month that they might not trust me anymore."

"When was the last time you talked to any of them?" Reya asked her.

Svetlana did not look at her. "I don't know. Not since... Not since the day the power died at school, really." Svetlana looked back up at Azrael suddenly. "It was you, wasn't it?"

Azrael said nothing, and only crossed his arms in reply. 

"You cut the power," she said. "Didn't you?"

"I did." His voice was mechanical. 

Svetlana let out a hard breath and slowly stuck her nail back between her teeth. It bent under the pressure of her bite. She withdrew it from her mouth, stared at it blankly, and drew her knees up to her chest. 

"You didn't just talk to me that whole time," Reya said to her after a brief pause.

Svetlana shrugged. "And Daniil for a short while, after he came back."

She saw Reya nod slowly out of the corner of her eye. 

"You do love him," Azrael said.

"And what would you know about that?" Svetlana retorted, though she did not look up from the floor. There was no anger in her voice; her fire had died, smothered by what she knew she had to do.

"I know plenty," he replied. "Reya has taught me much over the past weeks."

Svetlana looked up in time to see them share a smile. Her lip quivered in disgust. She pressed her nose between her knees and smelled her mother's detergent on her clothes.

They were silent again for awhile. "You're right," Svetlana said suddenly. "I  do love him. But I don't know if he's worth this."

"He's not," Azrael said. He turned and walked back to the controls on the wall, his nerve cords plugging into them.

"Azrael!" Reya scolded.

He did not look up from his work. "But you must decide what he's worth to you."

Svetlana remembered the day she pushed him into the snow. It seemed like a lifetime ago. And yet, the memories still burned her heart. 

She couldn't let this happen to him. Not when she could save him.

Nothing in the world was worth losing him a second time.

She imagined what would happen to Dragotsennost'. And then she imagined her life with Daniil back in it. But what would her father do? She knew he would probably be forced to go to war. He would likely want to lead the hunt for Azrael and the Nephilim. 

She scoffed into her knees. Not like he was a stranger to waging war. The Union had been at war with one hypernation or another for her entire life.