The Complete Razia Series, page 44
"Oh, we don't care when we're leaving," Ganon said, as they were pulled upwards. "Let 'em know we were here. Give the boss a bounty boost!"
Razia felt Sage's eyes on her, waiting for her trademark scoff about his own bounty standing. But Razia's eyes were on the ground disappearing beneath them, her thoughts wondering why the Great Creator continued to torture her.
***
"Did you kids have a fun time!" Sobal cheered as Razia hoisted herself onto the open hatch that she had leapt from just under an hour before. It seemed like an eternity ago. She had been so angry at herself for thinking she was going to burn in Plethegon, and now it seemed as though it was just foreboding.
One of the three huge men that Sage employed as his bodyguards was helping Lizbeth back onto the ship, while another extended a hand to Ganon, who brushed it away and pulled himself up. Sage was the last one to climb aboard, ordering one of the beefy men to tell Keal, who was piloting the ship in Ganon's absence, to get them as far away from this planet as fast as they could.
"You okay?" Sage said to Razia.
"Fine," she muttered. "I've done magnetic pullbacks—"
"No, I mean…about finding out about Tauron," Sage said more gently.
She felt eyes on her and did her best to shake it off.
"It’s fine," Razia lied, standing up. “Don’t want to talk about it."
"You looked pretty shocked," Sage said, reaching a hand out to her.
She batted it away with gusto. "I said I don't want to talk about it."
"Well, I do," Lizbeth said, checking her appearance in a reflective cabinet. "Jukin paid five billion credits to Congressional Minister McDougall? What in Leveman's is that about?"
"Tauron's…" Razia trailed off.
"Yeah, but besides that," Lizbeth said, waving Razia off. "That's a lot of money just to kill one man—"
"Lizbeth, don’t," Sage said warningly.
"Oh, so you think this is just another break in the case?" Razia whispered, anger punctuating every word. "Yet another twist in your little investigation?"
"Yes, I…" Lizbeth trailed off when she finally sensed Razia's anger.
"He stole from me to pay off…" Razia couldn't even finish the thought. She could feel the lump growing in her throat and was dangerously close to breaking down in tears. But she would be damned if she cried in front of Sage's crew.
"But why the Congressional Minister?" Lizbeth asked. "Don't you think it's odd—"
"Who cares!" Razia roared, taking everyone by surprise. "Who cares? Tauron is dead and….God in Leveman's…it was my money."
"So?" Lizbeth replied.
"So?" Razia stammered. "So?"
"So he stole your money, but that doesn't mean you had anything to do with it!" Lizbeth said. "If anything, wouldn't he have paid off General State?"
"He killed Tauron!" Razia screamed, her words bouncing off the walls in the room.
"And that had nothing to do with you," Lizbeth replied. "God in Leveman's Vortex, quit playing the victim!"
"V-victim?" Razia sputtered.
"Lizbeth, seriously, just leave it alone," Sage warned, interjecting before the situation got even more out of hand. "You don't understand."
"No, she needs to hear this," Lizbeth snapped. "Everyone walks on eggshells around you because they're afraid of sending you off the edge of some abyss. Leveman's, even Harms is afraid of pissing you off!"
"Excuse me?"
"Seriously, that is enough." Sage growled.
"No," Lizbeth snarled at him. "Enough is when she quits acting like a damned child. What she needs is a swift kick in the ass."
Razia smiled icily. "How's this for a kick in the ass: you're on your own from now on."
"Oh am I?" Lizbeth laughed.
"Yeah, I'm done," Razia growled. "I'm done digging into whatever in Leveman's is going on. I'm done sneaking around with you and getting shot at. I'm done doing things that could very well get me kicked out of the web! Or worse."
"Because you're doing so well as the laughing stock of the pirate web," Lizbeth retorted.
"At least my only move isn't to sleep with pirates in order to get them to talk with me."
"Enough!" Sage bellowed, stepping between the two before they came to blows. "Everyone just needs to take a five minute break and calm down."
"Get sucked," Razia hissed at him. "And take me back to my ship. Now."
"Yes, Sage," Lizbeth said, "take her back to her ship. Keep coddling her like she's a priceless doll that will break if you let her make a mistake."
"He doesn't coddle me!" Razia seethed.
"He jumped out of a damned ship for you after you threw a temper tantrum!" Lizbeth replied.
"I didn't ask for him—"
"You're a piece of work, you know that?" Lizbeth shook her head. "Everyone comes to your rescue and you just act like you have your shit together. Well, you know, you don't fool me, Lyssa Peate!"
Razia was about to fire back when she heard Ganon speak.
"P…Peate? As in…Jukin Peate?"
Razia became acutely aware that the small room they were standing in was filled with the entirety of Sage's crew; all of whom were staring at her with their mouths open.
"Shit," Lizbeth whispered, her hand over her mouth. "Oh, Lyss, I'm so…I didn't mean…"
Razia stared at her, unable to speak. She felt exposed again, the same way she'd felt jumping out of this ship not even an hour ago.
But this time there was no one to lean back into.
"Okay, yes," Sage said with authority. "She's Jukin's sister. But if any of you tell a soul, you will piss blood for a month." His eyes alit with fury as he dared them to contradict him. "Trust me, he didn't do her any favors."
Razia suddenly felt a surge of anger towards everyone and everything. She just wanted to hurt something, to make something else feel the pain and the hurt that she felt.
So she turned to the only thing within reach.
"You…stupid…bitch!" Razia growled, lunging towards Lizbeth. She might've killed the other woman had Sage not yanked her back, a firm grip on her flailing arms, her hands so eager to wrap around Lizbeth's neck.
"Ganon, get her out of here!" Sage said, struggling to keep Razia away from Lizbeth as she kicked and clawed and struggled against his grasp on her. "Lock her in a room somewhere and get us back to D-882 so we can put a few systems between these two!"
"I hope you burn in Plethegon!" Razia screamed as Lizbeth tore out of the room with Ganon and the door slammed shut behind them.
She took a few deep angry breaths as she stared at the closed door. Her whole body was shaking.
"Lyss," Sage whispered. "I know she didn't mean it."
She clenched her teeth together and stared stonily ahead, unwilling to show any more weakness than she had already displayed. Her head began to thud with a dull ache as the weight of everything settled on her shoulders.
"My crew won't tell a soul, I promise," Sage continued behind her. "I trust these guys with my life, and they'd never…they know better. I promise you, they won't."
She took another deep breath and closed her eyes, focusing all of her energy on trying to keep the tears from leaking down her face. She wouldn't cry, not over this.
Not in front of Sage.
Not again.
"Just get me back to my ship," Razia whispered.
***
She had just finished her last exam, and she was feeling lighter than air. Her things were packed and she had shuttle ticket to the nearest transport station, where she'd hop another and then another until she reached D-882. Tauron would be there eventually; he always was. He liked to make her work to find him, but she welcomed the challenge. And this time—the very last time she would be leaving the Academy for D-882—well, she had hoped he would make it really difficult to find him, as a "welcome to the pirate web" sort of present.
She remembered wondering if Tauron had already called Dissident to tell him to put her in the web. He'd promised her he'd toss in a few credits and his name, but she'd have to make her own way, just like Sage when he finally decided to break out on his own.
She remembered the way she had her entire life planned out at that moment.
Then she saw the news, playing a live feed from the half-finished prison on D-882.
Jukin Peate had captured Tauron Ball and his crew.
And they were to be executed.
There was no jury, no trial. Simply capture and kill.
It was going to send a message.
She knew she needed to tear her eyes away, to get out of the Academy and get to him, to figure out some way to break him out of that prison on D-882. She had to go help him. After everything he had done for her, she had to.
But all she could do was stand in the middle of the hallway, staring at the too-small screen, watching the execution of the only man who'd ever really loved her.
The rope went around his neck.
The hood covered his face.
The floor gave way.
He was gone.
And it was her fault.
She swallowed the tears, opening her eyes to the residential planet. The sounds of birds and idle chatter on the patio of this coffee shop replaced the sickening sounds in her head. She had no idea what the name of this planet was or how she even got here, but she had been here so long that the waitress had stopped coming by to ask if she wanted a refill on her cold coffee. She would have preferred something stronger but couldn't gather the strength to get up from the table.
She wanted to forget everything that she now knew about herself.
Every time she closed her eyes, she saw his resolute face on that pixelated screen, the last time she would ever lay eyes on him. She heard the sickening sound of the floor giving out from under him.
The spectacle of it all.
Paid for with her credits.
She'd often wondered if Tauron's soul had made it past the Arch, or if his soul had been damned to burn in Plethegon. He was a pirate, but he was so...good. And kind to her. He gave her a home when no one else wanted her. That had to be worth something to the Great Creator.
Even if she wasn't worth anything to Him or to anyone else.
Her mother hated her.
Her father had abandoned her.
And the one person—the only person in the universe to ever care whether she lived or died…paid for with her credits…
She lay her head on her arms, staring through the small holes in the wrought iron table. She couldn't close her eyes, or they would fill with visions of pixelated faces. So she stared through the hole, opening and closing one eye and then the other, mesmerized by the way the holes seemed to shift. It was a simple effort, and nobody would be killed when she did it.
She heard the chair in front of her scraping away and she didn't have to even lift her head to know who had come.
"Break up with your girlfriend?" she asked, her voice sounding odd as she tried to pretend she wasn’t a mess.
"Are you okay?" Vel placed his hand on top of hers.
"No," she whispered, opening both eyes to look through the slits in the table.
"Want to talk about it?"
"No."
"Lyssa, come on," Vel said, not letting go of her hand. "Just because that money was earmarked for you doesn't mean it's your fault it was stolen. If anything, he would have stolen the money from one of our other brothers."
"No, he stole it from me because Sostas chose me instead of him," Lyssa rasped, not lifting her head. "Jukin left the Academy because Sostas chose me instead of him. Jukin wanted to make a name as a great crusader for justice because of..." she trailed off. "Mother was right. I never should have been born...I just screw everything up by existing.”
"Lyss," Vel said, squeezing her hand. "I thought we were past all this nonsense?"
She didn't respond.
"Remember?" Vel said, shaking her hand a bit. "You led us to the Arch. You never would have been able to do that if the Great Creator—"
"Then why did He take away the only thing in this entire universe that ever made me happy?" Lyssa barked, snapping her head up to look at him for the first time. She was sickened by the way he watched her lovingly. "Why me? Why does everyone else get to be happy and...and I don't."
"Because you don't let yourself be happy," Vel replied gently but with edge in his voice. "You obviously cared a lot about him; you trusted him. And you haven't trusted another person since, me included!"
"I trust you," Lyssa mumbled, unable to meet his eyes.
"No you don't. Because if you did, you wouldn't have been jealous that I had a new girlfriend. If you trusted me, you wouldn't be sitting here telling me that you still think you're a bad person, and that you're damned to Plethegon even though I told you otherwise. If you trusted me,"—he reached across the table and took her hand—"you would tell me what you saw last year."
"I can't," she whispered, anxious at the thought of sharing something so personal.
"Well, you can't go through life pushing people away and expect to find the same kind of safe haven you found in Tauron," Vel said, releasing her hand and sitting back. "To get that kind of connection again, you're going to have to trust that maybe not everyone is the enemy. Maybe you'll lose someone again, but that's no excuse to shut everyone out completely, especially the people who obviously care about you."
They sat in silence as the minutes dragged on.
"I saw myself," Lyssa whispered, barely audible.
"What?"
"At Leveman's Vortex, I saw myself," she said, barely moving her lips. "I saw this girl who everyone had abandoned, everyone had kicked around. And I realized that...I'd done it too. I-I abandoned myself.
"And I spent all this time trying to create this person—Razia." She looked down at her hands, feeling quite silly vocalizing all of this. "I thought Lyssa was...weak. Damaged. But, she, Razia, she wouldn’t be anything without...without..."
"Without Lyssa," Vel finished for her.
Lyssa finally looked up at Vel, who was watching her comfortingly.
"And you know what?" she laughed. "I…I actually like being Lyssa. I like excavating planets, and I like…I like being me. But I can't stop…I can't stop thinking that being Lyssa is…bad…that I ruin everything…" She softened. "I made Sostas leave and I… Tauron…"
"First of all, you did not make Father leave," Vel snapped, the harshness in his voice shocking to Lyssa. "If you ask me, maybe he finally saw what his actions were doing to you, and decided that it was time to pull his head out of his ass."
"What?"
"Leaving an eight year old girl on a planet alone? Dragging her through Leveman's Vortex?" Vel snapped, sounding angrier than she'd ever heard him when it came to Sostas. "You saw what happened when you left me alone for three days!"
"He didn't care about me, Vel."
"From what you and Dorst have told me about him, he was obsessed. Oblivious to how his actions damaged other people, including you. Maybe when the Great Creator showed him what was headed his way when he died, he finally decided to quit tormenting you."
"Maybe," Lyssa whispered, having never considered that option before. She was sure nothing could have wrenched Sostas from his studies, but maybe seeing his mortal fate could have shocked him enough to change his perspective.
"And as for Jukin," Vel sighed, "from what I can tell, he's the exact same way. He took your money because he saw a means to an end, not because he was intentionally trying to hurt you."
"What makes you say that?"
"Because you would have found out about it when it happened," Vel said. "Believe me, in our family, if he had wanted you to know, you would have known."
Lyssa nodded, knowing the way her elder sisters gossiped.
"You've made so much progress, Lyss," he said. "Don't abandon yourself again."
"Nope," Lyssa said, on her feet in a second and walking away out of sheer annoyance and panic. It was a mistake to tell him. He now knew her deepest fears and it was…Oh, it made her skin crawl to think—
She didn't get too far before Vel caught her, yanking her into a firm hug. She couldn't believe that he was so much taller than she was now. She felt like resisting, like running away, but she found herself tired of running from him. After all this time, he had finally worn her down.
With a great sigh, she laid her head on his shoulder, defeated. He wrapped his arms tighter around her, as if he were trying to make up for months of lost time. She didn't resist or fight him, and she even quietly admitted to herself that it was nice to not have to pretend to be so strong all the time.
"Thank you for telling me," Vel said, his head on her shoulder. "I know it's hard to change old habits."
She sniffed.
"Also, I think you need to apologize to Lizbeth," Vel said, releasing her.
"What?" Lyssa snapped, stepping back from him. "She needs to apologize to me! She's the one who told everyone about…well… my thing."
"She was trying to help and things got way out of hand, from what I hear."
"Yeah, and she should apologize first."
"Or, you could be the bigger person and just get it over with. Besides, I can't say I don't agree with her about you playing the victim."
"I do not play the victim," she said, but the protestation died with Vel's skeptical face. "I don't want to play the victim."
"Then you need to trust us," Vel said, taking her hands. "And we'll be able to trust you with handling the truth and not throwing a temper tantrum when we do."
"What else have you not told me?" Lyssa asked, scrutinizing him.
"I've been going to the Manor on weekends at Dorst's request," Vel said. As Lyssa puffed up in indignation, he gave her another knowing look and she deflated. "And," he continued, chuckling. "I've been doing my level best to grease the wheels for that time when you feel able to come home and have a proper conversation with the family. Dorst as well."
Lyssa scoffed. "Don't bring him into this."
"One of these days, maybe you'll be able to see that he's changed. He's really looking out for your best interest these days."
"Whatever."
"Good God in Leveman's, you hold a grudge," Vel laughed good-naturedly. "Do you not even realize how much flack he's been getting for you missing all of your license renewals?"
