LOGIN(Lena POV)
Diane said it plainly, the way she had said everything else.
"You're pregnant."
I heard the words.
I understood them individually. I knew what they meant in sequence. My brain processed the sentence with complete competence and then sat down and refused to do anything further with it.
"No," I said.
Diane said nothing.
"No," I said again, louder, which didn't help and I knew it didn't help
(Theo POV)I left Danny to spread the word and went west to Jake Morrison's house first.Jake answered the door in a sleep shirt with his hair sideways and looked at me and said, "It's midnight, Theo.""I know," I said. "Let me in."He stepped back and I came in and his older brother, Cole, was already at the kitchen table because Cole never slept before two and everyone knew it. Cole looked up from whatever he was reading and closed it and said, "You've got the face.""What face?" I said."The face you get when something happened that you've been waiting to happen," Cole said. "Sit down."I sat down and Jake poured water and sat across from me and I told them about Varden first because that was the thing with the clock on it. Four days, eastern border, Walter's order, the window it would create when Darius pulled compound resources toward the response.Jake leaned forward with his elbows on the t
(Theo POV)Mira put her hand on my arm first.Not hard, not restraining, just there, and I looked down at it and then at Lena standing in front of me and I breathed out through my nose and unclenched my hands and took a step back from whatever I had been about to do with the energy moving through me."Sit down," Mira said. "Please."I sat down.Lena sat across from me and Mira stayed standing for a moment, looking between us, then went to the stove and turned the burner back on under the kettle because that was what Mira did when a situation needed thirty seconds of buffer before it continued.I looked at the table. The soup bowls were still there. The bread was half eaten. Everything in the kitchen was exactly what it had been ten minutes ago and nothing was the same."Theo," Lena said."I'm fine," I said."You said you were going to kill him.""I'm not going to kill him." I looked
(Lena POV)Mira was sitting on the ground outside the gate with her back against the compound wall and her phone face-down in her lap, and she stood up the moment she saw me coming through."You were in there for a long time," she said."I know."She looked at my face and didn't ask anything else, just fell into step beside me and we walked away from the compound and into the Lowlands street without discussing where we were going, because there was only one place to go and we both knew it.The evening had gone cool and the street was mostly quiet, a few lights on in windows, someone's radio coming through a wall somewhere, a dog moving along the fence line ahead of us and disappearing into a yard. Mira put her arm through mine and we walked like that, her shoulder against mine, and I didn't say anything and she didn't make me."Are you staying," she said, when we turned onto Theo's lane."For a while," I said. "I'm not going back to the compound tonight."She nodded. "I'll get your th
(Kai POV)Julian let her in on his way out, the two of them passing in the doorway without a word, and then Sienna was standing in my quarters looking at the wine stain on the wall and the glass on the floor and the book I'd never picked up, and I was sitting in the chair with my throbbing hand and no particular interest in explaining any of it.She didn't ask.She came in and sat down in the chair across from mine and folded her hands in her lap and looked at me, and I waited for the version of Sienna I knew, the one who arrived with an agenda wearing a sympathetic face, but she just sat there and said nothing for a moment."You look terrible," she said finally."Thank you, Sienna.""I'm not being cruel. I'm just..." She stopped, looked at the stain on the wall again, looked back at me.She was wearing a plain dress, no jewelry, her hair down instead of arranged, and she looked younger than I was used t
(Kai POV)The door closed and I stood there looking at it.My knuckles were throbbing. I pressed my fist against my thigh and breathed.Julian came in without knocking, looked at the wall, looked at my hand, and went to pour himself a drink without being asked."Well," he said."Don't.""I haven't said anything.""You're about to." I went to the window. Outside the compound was moving through its evening routine, guards rotating, lights coming on, everything indifferent and continuous. "She went to Varden.""I know.""She crossed into their territory and stayed for days and said nothing to anyone.""Yes.""While I was in the borderland every morning. While I stood at that marker." I stopped. "She was sitting inside Walter's compound the whole time."Julian sat down and turned his glass in his hands. "Harrison sent fake delegates to Varden while she was there."I
(Lena POV)He was standing when I walked in.Not sitting, not pacing, just standing in the middle of the room with his arms at his sides and his eyes on the door like he had been there for a while. The wine glass was on the table untouched. The lamp was on. Everything else was exactly as I remembered it and I made myself stop cataloguing and look at him instead.He looked at me for a long moment without saying anything.Then, "You left.""Kai...""After everything I did for you," he said. "You left."His voice was flat. Not loud, not cracked open the way I had been half-expecting, just flat and cold and completely controlled, and somehow that was worse than shouting would have been. I stood near the door and said nothing because everything I could have said would have pulled the document into the room with us, and I was not ready for that yet, I did not know how to do that yet, and so I stayed quiet and watched his face read my silence as something it wasn't."Nothing," he said. "You
She said it so simply that I almost missed it.We were still at the table, the plates pushed to the side, her tea gone cold the way she always let it go cold when she got absorbed in thought. She was looking out the window when she turned back to me with an expression I hadn'
The walk back to the quarters felt endless, my body moving on autopilot while my mind remained buried with my mother. Julian peeled off at some point, murmuring something about giving us privacy, and then it was just Kai and me walking through corridors that felt too bright for a wo
My father stood and moved toward the door, but instead of opening it to dismiss me, he paused with his hand on the handle."Walk with me," he said, and it wasn't quite a command but close enough.I followed him out of the study, past Harrison who was pacing in the hall
The woods called to me, offering the solitude I desperately needed. I walked past the training grounds, past the gardens, until the manicured grounds gave way to wild forest. Here, away from the compound's scrutiny, I could actually breathe.Julian's words kept circling in my







