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AS SOON AS JADE WALKED out of the base, Micah knew he’d made another mistake. Her last look at him as she walked away had speared him. He’d hurt her. Yet despite wanting to say something to stop her, despite wanting to go after her, he could do nothing, say nothing. Only stand there and mentally flog himself for his numerous failures.
Walker motioned to him to follow him to his office and he did with heavy feet.
His commander leaned against his desk, arms crossed. “The mountain. I’ve heard what Jade said happened, now I need to hear it from you.” Walker’s gaze was unblinking, his expression blank.
A report didn’t require feelings, only facts. He could do that, right? Swallowing hard past the knot in his throat, Micah started his report. “At 0900 the Earth Erratic had a power leak due to a high emotional state, which damaged the integrity of the mountainside. Whether it was caused by, or an invitation to, the Chaolt is unclear. Minutes later, about seventy-five of them, having broken through the stone barrier I erected blocking the portal, approached our position. While I was fighting them, one boy—”
The young man he’d sent back. The boy he’d failed, after all. He cleared his throat and began again.
“One Chaolt was able to reach Jade, to finish the process of destruction. I pulled her away at the last second, but not before her release of power started the landslide.”
After that, his memories were a jumble of fear and faith. Whispers from the Earth. Jade’s face as he sent her away. And his chest hurting as he realized it would be goodbye.
“The landslide was going to hit the town,” Walker prompted.
Micah nodded, the memory of those moments stealing even his ability to speak of facts for a moment. When he could speak again, he continued. “I remembered Levi and Ajax being able to access their powers when it was crucial. I tried it and was able to use my power to slow the landslide. At least until it started to run out.”
“And you turned it,” Walker finished. “The landslide. You saved the town, sacrificing yourself. You came out unscathed, though we definitely need to talk about how you did that. That was very noble and no less than what I’d expect of a Warrior—”
“No.” The word erupted from Micah’s chest. “None of it wouldn’t have even been necessary if it weren’t for me. I thought draining her slow was the answer this time. I thought draining her quickly would leave her too confused, too vulnerable, and she’d kill herself trying to mine. Instead, I dangled her like a carrot in front of the Chaolt and almost cost her her life. Almost cost the lives of everyone here. That is not the act of a Warrior.”
Walker’s eyebrows raised at his outburst. “What do you mean, this time?”
He stayed silent.
“Micah,” Walker started again, “You’ve made very few mistakes, if any, since joining my team. You saved everyone in Topaz Ridge. You saved the Erratic. And you did it all while taking out a great number of Chaolt and their portal as well. I would count that as an unequivocal victory for the side of Harmony.”
He still shook his head. “If I’d drained her from the beginning, perhaps held her until the effects wore off, none of this would have happened.”
Walker leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms. “And perhaps she would have called the authorities down on your head and made it impossible to guard the portal. It also could have put more humans in proximity of it, of the Chaolt, of danger. Who’s to say they wouldn’t have found another Erratic in the mix to cause a landslide? An earthquake? Or some other disaster?”
He could see what Walker was doing, but still, the possibility of those events happening seemed small in retrospect. More likely, he would have drained Jade and she would have gone her way and he would have gone his. She would have mined her claim while he guarded the portal.
“We’re supposed to drain Erratics of their powers. We’re supposed to protect humans and Erratics from all things, but especially Chaos. And we’re supposed to do all of this unnoticed while balancing the effects of draining, the risks. Occasionally, that requires difficult decisions, difficult choices. And sometimes we succeed in some areas while failing in others. It’s the very nature of Chaos that some things don’t work out the way we planned. It’s the nature of our mission. And it is hard sometimes. You can be forgiven for making mistakes.”
Micah clenched his eyes shut, the old pain erupting through the new. What Walker said...
“I wish I’d heard that years ago,” Micah said, voice gruff, “when it might have made a difference.”
“Then I wish you had, too.” Walker’s expression was serious, sincere. He took a deep breath. “Do you have anything else to report? Anything I need to know?”
He shook his head, jaw clenched. His commander didn’t need to know he’d fallen in love with Jade. He’d let her go, it didn’t matter anymore.
“Do you want to talk about how you survived the landslide?”
Micah shook his head again. He was done talking. There was no way to talk about Tokoni right now, when he was already fractured into a thousand pieces of regret.
“Then you’re excused for now.”
He nodded and rose, fleeing Walker’s office to go back to his own suite.
He laid in bed staring at the ceiling, seeing other things. Memories. All of them, all of his failures and losses, one after another. Beginning, and ending, with Jade’s face.
Normally, he would sing until he could push the pain back down again, but his throat, his chest, were too tight to even take a full breath.
He didn’t even know if he could sing anymore. He had no desire to.
Jade had almost died due to his mistakes, and now she was gone, and there wasn’t enough singing in the world to make him feel centered again.
––––––––
OTHER THAN SOME CURT directions for Rowan, they drove in silence back to the mountain. The landslide was visible from miles away, a pale scar down the side. All the dust had settled, and for all anyone knew, it could be years old. But she had to clench her hands together to keep them from shaking until the trees blocked her view, because she could still hear the fall of stone, still feel it, deep inside. Even now, she could taste the dust and had small particles of rock in her hair.
When they pulled into the campsite, she got out and stood there with her hand on the door, thoughts detached and disjointed.
It looked mostly the same. Her camper where she’d spent most of her time, and Micah’s tent, where she’d spent some wonderful nights. Last night, even, but it seemed like years ago now. All her memories were clouded by the events of today and the revelations she’d learned. Nothing had been what it seemed, and her heart was as cold as the ashes in the fire-pit.
Rowan helped her pack up her stuff and hitch up her trailer. If they talked at all, it must have been small talk, because she remembered none of it. She was operating on instinct, all her thoughts and emotions shut down to delay the inevitable emotional breakdown.
The sun had set and cast everything in deep shadow by the time she was ready to leave.
Engine running, she took a last look around at the ruin of her life. Her mining claim was gone, the gems gone. She’d lost some expensive mining gear she’d need to replace. She wouldn’t have enough money this year to get her mom better care, and would have to hope she’d last until she could save up the money.
And she’d fallen in love with a man from another world, who’d used her feelings for him to complete his mission.
A whisper in her mind told her she was wrong, that it couldn’t be true, but Micah hadn’t denied it, had he? Hadn’t said anything, or come after her.
Her heart was a casualty of a war she hadn’t even known about this morning. Collateral damage. A means to an end. She’d been done wrong, but for all the right reasons.
She turned to Rowan, who stood quietly by his vehicle, hands in his pockets. “Thank you for your help. With the trailer, and my stuff.” She looked down, a crack starting in the shield around her emotions. “And for helping Micah.”
“My pleasure,” he said with a short nod, his words slightly accented. “I’ll follow you out.”
Jade nodded back and climbed into her truck. She circled the campsite and drove out on the narrow dirt road through the trees. She could no longer see the bleak mountain in the darkness, but she felt it, hiding, shattered and broken, in the night.
When she got to the main road, she turned and saw Rowan’s taillights head the other direction.
It was over, done. She was leaving everything important to her behind, buried on the mountain. Her memories, her money. Her hope.
Her heart.
The crack in her shield expanded, splintered and multiplied until she had to pull over, gasping around the sobs. She pressed her forehead against the wheel, hands clinging to it as if the truck would crumble around her the way everything else had.