Since her conversation with Si, Georgianna hadn’t been able to get his revelations out of her head. She avoided the Belsa encampment as much as she could. The moment Jaid had returned to take over her shift on the Way, Georgianna had excused herself, heading out into the camps. While her pride still smarted from Halden’s accusations, she figured that facing those feelings had to be better than confronting the Belsa marshall.
She couldn’t understand why Beck would be so keen on keeping these people hidden. She’d been suspicious since he told her that he wouldn’t help in Landon’s escape from Maarqyn. Now she could only wonder how many other Belsa out there had been captured instead of killed, and how many of them Beck had kept secret.
She hadn’t been able to get any more information out of Si, he was too confused and agitated by the time she tried to press him for more information. Georgianna knew that she needed more evidence before she approached one of the other Belsa about her suspicions, she couldn’t accuse Beck without proof. She realised that the only way she could do it was to wait until Landon was free. With Landon free, he would be able to tell the other Belsa what Beck had done: how Beck had left him with an Adveni to be tortured. Just a few more days, then all the lies would be out in the open.
While Halden was home—those few moments between him returning from work and Georgianna disappearing to return to it—questions bubbled silently between them. Halden didn’t dare mention Keiran or Alec, not in front of their father, and Georgianna didn’t want to share her confusion. Instead, they avoided it, and avoided each other.
Unfortunately, avoiding Halden didn’t do anything to wash his words from her head. She didn’t want her brother to see her as a child, only doing things that made her happy. However, the more she thought about it, the more difficult it became to dismiss his opinion as big-brother ramblings. Even Liliah had claimed that she only did things until they stopped feeling good, and while Georgianna wanted to argue, she wasn’t sure that her friend was wrong. She’d tried using the fact that she went into the compound, that she was helping Nyah and Landon, but in the end, those things made her feel good about herself. She was even letting others take the risk by not being the one to actually get Nyah and Landon from the house and remove their collars. She would be in the compound, safe and sound, feeling good about it all.
What was worse though, as helping Nyah and Landon had good repercussions for other people as well, was that she’d not been able to stop thinking about what they had both said about Keiran. She didn’t want to admit it, but she did really like the man, more than she’d originally intended. She’d thought she could handle the no-strings, casual thing that they had going. However, more and more, she realised that she didn’t like knowing that Keiran was seeing other women when she wasn’t around, or wondering if he liked them more than her.
She wasn’t ready for a joining ceremony, that was ridiculous, but maybe someday she would be. Hard as it was to imagine, she was suddenly very scared that when that day came, Keiran would be gone.
As such, Georgianna had done the only thing she could think of that left her some semblance of control. She avoided him. She blamed it on avoiding Beck, she told herself that it was safer this way, but the hope constantly nagged at her that surely, if she didn’t see him, if she didn’t remember how well things worked between them, then it wouldn’t be as difficult to move on.
So far, the plan had fallen flat on its face. Every time she let her mind wander, it went straight back to Keiran. Georgianna knew that she’d have to see him eventually, especially since their plan was set for the next day, but she didn’t want to have to have that conversation with him that ended in “I think it’s best that we don’t see each other anymore”. Before they had that conversation, she could at least pretend that everything was fine.
Medics’ Way had been quiet, too quiet for Georgianna’s liking. She didn’t want to see people injured, but the lack of patients to check on or tend to was giving her far too much time to think, not only about Keiran, but of everything that could go wrong the following day. With each new scenario that came to mind, she came one step closer to backing out completely.
“Hey, George!”
Georgianna turned, her arms filled with bandages she’d been reorganising. Wrench was climbing into the car, a tyllenich rifle hung over his shoulder.
“Hi Wrench, how’s things?”
Wrench dropped himself heavily onto one of the makeshift beds, adjusting the tyllenich by his side.
“Good. Nervous about tomorrow.”
She wasn’t sure whether it was a statement of his nerves or a question about hers so she simply nodded.
“Anyway, I just came to get some more of that paste.”
“The hyliha.” She nodded.
Moving to one of the lined crates, she dumped the bandages into it without bothering to organise them. She picked up the box with the hyliha powder in it, and taking one of the small cloth bags, poured in a generous amount.
“You just need to add a little cold water,” she explained, tying the strings from the bag around it and grabbing the first dressing her hand found.
Wrench nodded, placing the bag and dressing in a jacket pocket. Giving her a grateful wink, he got to his feet.
“We’re all ready for tomorrow.”
“You found another absorber?” Georgianna’s voice filled with excitement and relief. Of the things Beck had refused to help them with, the second absorber had proved the most difficult to find.
Grimacing, Wrench shook his head.
“What are you going to do?”
“The charge might last enough for two collars,” Wrench explained. “They’re designed for copaqs, which give off a stronger charge.”
“It might last?”
Wrench shrugged.
“Can’t promise. Only thing we can do, I guess, is hope for luck.”
Georgianna nodded, but it didn’t ease her fears in the slightest. Wrench moved towards the door, stopping just as he was about to jump out, and glanced back.
“See you when it’s done, George,” he said with a cheerful smile.
Once Wrench had disappeared down the tunnel, Georgianna went back to her counting. However, the task was pointless, as she never got all the way through the box before she became distracted by her thoughts, and lost count. In the end, she gave up and simply organised them by size, which she could do without distraction.
The afternoon was slow going. Jaid was meant to take over at sundown, but Georgianna was considering telling her not to bother. After all, Georgianna would need to be here in the morning because it was easier to get to the compound from the tunnels than the camps. She didn’t have a shift in the Rion district, and didn’t exactly want to go crawling into Keiran’s shack. However, knowing that she needed sleep if she was going to be alert the next morning, Georgianna decided that she would simply sleep at the back of the train car with Jacob.
The young man was practically healed. While he still had his scars and anxiety levels to rival a rabbit being chased by coyotes, he was physically fit enough to leave Medics’ Way. The problem was that he didn’t have anywhere else to go. So, instead of kicking him out, Jaid had agreed to let him stay as long as he needed, on the condition he pulled his weight.
She wasn’t sure what kind of weight that might be: he was still rather skinny and didn’t like touching other people. But as it turned out, he was good at inventory and slowly coming out with more and more information from his training as a herber. Georgianna had yet to find anyone who would take him on. Funnily enough, it wasn’t that she couldn’t match the price they were asking, or that they didn’t want an escaped drysta (she had left that part out for now), but just that they didn’t have the necessary supplies to do a good job. Despite her disappointment, she was impressed with their honesty. Some people would just have made the deal anyway, but the ones she’d asked seemed like nice people.
She hadn’t yet asked Liliah. Georgianna trusted her friend to see that Jacob would be expertly trained, but she hadn’t wanted to put that sort of pressure on her. Liliah would immediately know how Georgianna knew the young man, and once that knowledge was there between them, Liliah would have no say in whether she even wanted a secret like that.
“You avoiding me, George?”
Georgianna jumped. She glanced over and gave Keiran an anxious smile.
“No, just busy, you know.”
He pulled himself up into the train car, an amused smile on his lips. She was sure that he didn’t believe her. Even as busy as Georgianna usually was, she found time to see him. In fact, it was usually when she was busiest that she saw Keiran the most, because his shack was rather conveniently located.
“Yeah, those stocks look riveting.”
Keiran’s tongue darted out to wet his lips. She shifted her weight from one foot to the other and reached up to scratch her ear. She’d never thought it would be so difficult to have a conversation with Keiran, and yet here she was, with no idea what to say.
“Just nervous, I guess,” she finally mumbled. “About tomorrow.”
He smiled, shifting the strap of his weapon from his shoulder and placing the device down on the bed. Moving over to her, he took hold of her arms.
“We’ve got everything covered,” he bent a little to look at her properly. “You just need to do your thing at the compound then meet us when it’s all done.”
She nodded, avoiding his gaze. Yet with him this close, she could see his face in her peripheral vision everywhere she looked, which only made trying to evade the awkward conversation worse. At the end of it all, she did want to keep seeing him.
Leaning forward, Keiran placed a gentle kiss against her cheek, squeezing her arms as he stepped back again. Unlike usually, when Georgianna would have leaned into him, this time, she found herself moving away. She couldn’t do this; she couldn’t keep pretending that she was fine with casual when she wasn’t. It was only making things more confusing.
“Are you coming to mine tonight?”
She frowned and chewed on the inside of her cheek.
“I don’t know.” She tried to think of a reasonable way out of it and couldn’t. “It’s not a good idea.”
“Why not?”
“I don’t know, I just…”
Georgianna looked away. She went and sat on the bed, tracing her fingers carefully along the barrel of the gun he’d put down.
“What’s going on with you? I’ve not seen you for days and now you’re being all weird.”
Weird was hardly the word she’d give to it. She’d maybe been a little more emotional, but seeing as Keiran had his wonderful reputation with women, surely this wasn’t the first time a girl had realised she wasn’t happy keeping their relationship at just sex.
“I dunno, I’ve just been thinking and… and my brother said some things…”
“Your brother, huh?” He nodded in understanding as he took a seat next to her. “So, am I about to get my face beaten in or do I need to provide a grass symbol before the week is out?”
Georgianna glanced at him. So, this definitely wasn’t the first time someone had had an issue with the just-sex arrangement. Only maybe it hadn’t been the girl he’d been sleeping with, but her family that had the problem.
“I think he’s more likely to beat me up than you.”
Keiran whistled.
“Well, that’s a relief!” He mockingly brushed the back of his hand against his forehead. “Dunno what I’d do if I had to go up against a horse rearer.”
Georgianna smacked his arm.
“This isn’t funny!”
Keiran sighed. Moving a little closer to her, he slung his arm carelessly around her shoulder. Georgianna wanted to be angry at him for mocking her brother. Halden was only trying to look out for her. However, she was almost impressed that Keiran remembered what he did.
“Okay, so what did your brother say?”
She scraped her front teeth over her bottom lip as she glanced at him and away. If she was going to tell him and sound like an idiot, she might as well get it over with.
“He accused me of liking you,” she mumbled.
Keiran gave her a look of mortified shock.
“How dare he?” he mocked. Georgianna rolled her eyes. He could at least try to be serious.
“He doesn’t think you and I just having fun is…” she paused, trying to think of the right words. “He thinks I’m kidding myself. He said I was being childish because I thought you and I just having fun would work… that I should stop being with guys for fun, and instead think about the future.”
Keiran looked at her, eyes narrowed, and hummed out his thoughts for a moment.
“So he wants the grass symbol,” he answered.
“No,” Georgianna defended quickly. “He just thinks that I should… I don’t know, it’s ridiculous. But he’s wormed in and… and I don’t know.”
Keiran reached out and hooked his finger underneath Georgianna’s chin, turning her to look at him.
“You’re not happy with things the way they are now?”
When he put it like that, she didn’t know what to say. She loved how things were now between them. Not right this second, because it was awkward and embarrassing, but in the more general sense, yes, she did like what they had. She just wasn’t sure she liked that he also had the same thing with other women.
“No,” she mumbled before her eyes widened in panic. “I mean, yes, I do. I like how things are between you and me, but…”
“But…”
She looked down at her knees.
“I think I want it to be just you and me,” she murmured. “I want to…”
“You want to be together, properly,” he finished.
Finally looking up at him, she shrugged a little. Clasping her hands tightly in her lap, trying to stop herself from fidgeting, she found herself drumming her fingers nervously against the backs of her hands.
“I… maybe.”
Keiran nodded slowly. He stared past her, his tongue darting across his lips again. She held her breath, wondering whether he was about to tell her that this wasn’t what he wanted, that he couldn’t be just with her. Only, when he looked back at her, he smiled and leaned forward, pressing a kiss against her lips.
“Look, we’ve got a whole lot of shit to deal with tomorrow,” he said as he brushed a lock of wavy blonde hair back from her face. “How about, you stay at my place tonight, we free some dreta tomorrow, and then we’ll discuss what this relationship stuff entails?”
Georgianna’s mouth dropped open. Had he just agreed to it? He hadn’t walked out. He hadn’t told her that he wasn’t interested. He wanted to talk about it. Staring at him blankly, she blinked and shook her head.
“Yeah, yeah that sounds good.” She smiled.
“Good,” he answered. “And tell your brother that who you have sex with is not a conversation to have with siblings!”
He leaned forward, planting another soft kiss on her. This time, instead of being worried, instead of leaning away, Georgianna felt her lips smiling against his. She leaned into him until he pulled back.
“I’ll see you in a bit, alright?”
She nodded, not moving from her place on the bed for a few minutes, even after Keiran had left, the sound of his boots against the stones fading through the echoing tunnels. That hadn’t gone nearly as badly as she’d thought it would. Oddly enough, it made her feel a little better about the next day too. She knew where she stood, and by the end of the next day, she would have two of her friends standing there with her, almost free.
YOU ARE READING
Dead and Buryd
Ciencia Ficción"You are an inmate, not a medic. You should get used to that." On the planet Os-Veruh, the native Veniche have endured a decade under the oppressive rule of a race of invaders, the Adveni. When Georgianna Lennox, a Veniche medic, discovers her child...
