Prodigy

Prologue

The car was filled with warmth and happiness as a rock song by Onerepublic played from the radio and thunder rumbled overhead.

I hummed along with the singers and stared out the window as the trees passed in a blur.

"Hey bae?" Ro said as he took the hand I had placed in my lap and intertwined it with his.

"Hm?" I replied as I traced our initials, R+D, on the window that had slowly fogged over, and smiled, happy that yes, yes we where finally free.

"When we get to Shadow City, I was thinking we should go'an visit my friend over there, he's-"

"Wait," I said, cutting him short, "I thought you didn't know anyone there?" Since that was what he'd told me.

He loosed a breath, his chest heaving gently, and I imitated him, sighing deeply, making the right side of his lips twitch in an almost smile.

"Yeah, technically I don't, Conan lives in Warwin, not Shadow City."

This time it was me releasing a heavy sigh as I stared at the thickening fog on the window that was slowly moisturising. I could barely see out the window.

When Ro had presented the idea of running to Shadow City-a bustling city on the west of Warwin, the capital of Lexor-my heart had leaped into my throat at the possibility, the possibility to leave behind Raintown, The House, and everything else that had made and changed me into everything that I had become, and I had agreed, because, what else?

But this... this was news to me, Ro had said he didn't know anyone there and no one knew him, that he had just arranged the plan of escape with certain people who didn't know him too well and wouldn't sell him out and other stuff like that to reassure me, I didn't know the details because I hadn't bothered asking, I had trusted him, and I still do, because who else is there to trust?

"Can we trust him? This Conan guy?" I asked warily.

He chuckled under his breath, probably already assuming I'd yielded, "Yes, yes we can."

I stared at his tanned, soft features, his full lips, soft, sleepy brown eyes, crooked nose and shorn brown hair-courtesy of The House- and watched as he gnawed on his bottom lip, the way he usually did when he was bored, thinking, nervous, or feeling a number of emotions, and decided to just trust him, so I muttered under my breath, "fine."

"Love you." He said in triumph.

But I just stared out the window and said, "You're gonna pay for not telling me this sooner."

"Can't wait." He said with a wide grin on his face and threw a wink my way, I just rolled my eyes and went back to staring out the window, but really, I was thinking about what we were going to do at our next stop, I doubted there'd be a motel nearby, as we where in a deserted area since we had not seen any sign of civilization for a while now, so we'd just sleep here in the car.