5. Cym

Chapter 5

Cym

H e knew the man hadn't done it on purpose, but Cym was still skittish about having been locked in the monstrosity Fourteen called a car. He tried to focus on the next thing—get his bag, change his clothes, and put on some freaking shoes. After that, he would get himself someplace safe—alone. What Cym had told Fourteen so far should be enough to assuage his curiosity about the Other. Now Fourteen would be free to go his own way, and Cym could go his.

They walked to the cemetery where he'd stashed his bag. He took a moment to get his bearings and then wound his way through headstones, past the obelisk, and up to the tree he had stuffed his backpack inside, and looked up. It was taller than he remembered. He'd had to climb to reach the hole—something that had been a challenge in the middle of the night.

This time it was broad daylight, and he had help… if he asked for it. Cym was about to ask Fourteen for a boost when the soldier swung himself into the tree with one graceful motion.

"Where is it?" Fourteen looked down at Cym with his impassive gaze.

"About three feet higher and a little to the left you should find a hole. It isn't very big, so I had to jam the bag in pretty tightly."

As Fourteen climbed higher, Cym had no choice but to appreciate the way the man's jacket accentuated, rather than hid, the muscles in his arms. Cym couldn't have looked away if he tried. His throat went dry, and he gave an involuntary cough.

Cym was definitely going to miss Fourteen when he was gone. Aside from Fourteen's obvious handiness, he was the definition of eye candy.

"Got it." Fourteen's voice broke Cym out of his reverie. The man dropped out of the tree and landed on the ground with the finesse of a cat. "Here." Cym's backpack, covered with cute cartoon cats showing off their tiny kitty buttholes, dangled from his fingers.

It had seemed funny and adorable when he'd bought it, but now Cym was pretty sure that if he ran screaming into traffic, it wouldn't be an overreaction to the situation he found himself in.

Instead of choosing that incredibly tempting option, Cym forced himself to snatch his bag from the outstretched hand and quickly slung it over his shoulders so Fourteen couldn't see it anymore.

Say something, Cym. ANYTHING to distract both of you from the fact that your backpack is covered in dozens of cat assholes.

"Thanks. You're, ah, very good at that, um, tree-climbing thing. It's probably all the muscles you have tucked away in your pants. Body! I meant in your body. You have a very muscular body with lots of muscles inside it." Cym wanted to stop talking, he really did, but he'd forgotten how, so his mouth kept going without his permission. "Do you work out a lot?"

This was not the distraction he'd hoped for. Maybe Cym would get lucky and have a stroke soon. Cym wasn't like this. He normally had his words under control, even if he couldn't say the same for his magic. But then did Cym really know what he was truly like? He'd spent so much of his life undersocialized that he was probably going to come off painfully weird to any remotely normal person.

Fourteen looked at him with his customary expressionless face and nodded. For all Cym knew, the soldier had filtered out anything Cym said that didn't have to do with their current retrieval mission. It was also entirely possible that he had heard everything but only thought of Cym as a high-maintenance houseplant. So even if Cym started speculating out loud about how big Fourteen's cock was, the man might not bat an eye.

Oh, Vis no. Why in the name of everything holy would Cym's brain have chosen that as an example? Now all he was going to think about was Fourteen's dick for the next forever. How was Cym supposed to look him in the eye now?

Well…he didn't have to look a person in the eye while talking. It wasn't a law or anything. Cym would know. He'd read over a dozen law textbooks out of sheer boredom during his forced stay at Casa No Fun Ever. But not looking Fourteen in the eye meant looking at the rest of him, and that was doing terrible things to Cym's concentration.

It was also severely hampering his ability to not pop a tent in front of the literal assassin he'd met only a handful of hours ago.

Talking now. Do the talking thing now, Cym, before you start staring at Fourteen's package and he murders you just to end this awkward situation.

"Well, that's… um…" Cym had absolutely nothing to follow that brilliant opener with, but fortunately, the tree next to them exploded, saving him from finding a way to escape the conversation.

He was bowled over by Fourteen as the man tucked Cym's body into his chest and rolled behind a headstone.

The world spun in lazy circles as Cym fought to regain his equilibrium. Cym blinked rapidly until he could focus, fighting for enough cognitive function to be able to take stock of his situation.

The first thing he noticed was Fourteen, wrapped tightly around his body but unmoving. Fourteen's hand cradled the back of Cym's head and was pressing Cym's face into his chest.

Bracing his arms against Fourteen's chest, Cym levered himself back as far as the soldier's grip would allow. It wasn't far. The muscles Cym had so desperately been trying not to ogle weren't just for show.

Why wasn't Fourteen moving? Was he okay? Cym wiggled and squirmed until he was able to snake a hand up far enough between them to reach up until he could check the man's pulse. It was strong, if slower than the situation warranted.

There was a lot more wiggling and shifting involved, but eventually, Cym was able to angle his head enough to see Fourteen's face. Fourteen's eyes were open but unfocused and had a dreamy quality to them. Gods, he hoped Fourteen didn't have a concussion. Cym had zero experience with first aid.

He brushed his fingertips along one of Fourteen's cheekbones, in a silent apology for not knowing how to help. Then he fought his way free from the man's embrace as gently as he could. Strong arms resisted his efforts, but eventually, Cym managed to squirm free.

Once he extracted himself, Cym poked his head around the headstone to see if he could figure out what had happened.

The tree that held his bag had been split right down the middle. White flower petals were drifting slowly in the air as if confused by their early release from the tree.

There was no one in sight, but that meant nothing. Cym could have someone standing right beside him hidden by magic, and he'd never know because he'd never been trained to use his magic.

Cym was probably safe from physical attacks though. If his family had found him and had blown up that tree, they wouldn't want to come anywhere near Cym. They'd just pick him off from afar. That meant he didn't need to worry about invisible assassins.

That didn't mean Cym wasn't close to shitting himself when he sensed movement at his back. He jerked around to see Fourteen trying to haul himself into a sitting position but failing miserably. The man moved like his body was unfamiliar to him, and he hadn't learned how to use it yet. Fourteen reached a hand out to brace himself only to have it collapse under his weight and send him sprawling to the ground.

Cym crawled over to him and ran shaky hands along Fourteen's scalp, looking for bumps or blood, but he found nothing. When a headstone three yards to his right imploded with a sharp pop, Cym knew he had to focus on their attacker first and deal with Fourteen's condition later.

What could he do? Before now, he'd bolted like a bunny every time his family found him, but that option was gone. The gods only knew what would happen to Fourteen if Cym left him behind, and it was his fault Fourteen was there in the first place. There was no running away from this.

Another headstone burst into unholy green flames three yards to his left. Cym could feel the blistering heat on his face and thanked the gods that whoever was blasting them with spells had such lousy aim. They would eventually get lucky though, even if their aim did suck, so Cym had to do something before he and Fourteen got blown to smithereens.

"Astin?" Cym called out, trying to use his big boy voice instead of his I'd rather be buried in ten weighted blankets and eating cake than doing this voice. He was pretty confident he managed to land in between the two and give off an I will get through this and then go home, put on my shark slippers, and look at shirtless pictures of Henry Cavill vibe.

Astin would understand. Cym didn't remember his cousin very well, but he hadn't been a monster when they were young. Just a massive asshole. If Cym could just talk to his cousin, and explain about Fourteen, he might be able to convince his cousin to let the man go.

"Astin isn't here, Boy. Your champion blew a chunk of his hand off," a tinkling voice that had always reminded him of fairy bells informed him. "His chest isn't looking so great either, you little shit."

Goddamit. His cousin Helen had always been completely horrible. There was zero reasoning with her when they were little, and it didn't sound like she'd improved over the years at all.

"Are you trying to make me feel guilty, Hel? I don't remember you being stupid, but things are bound to change after eleven years. Astin was trying to kill us. What did you expect us to do, weave him a gift basket?" Since diplomacy wasn't going to work, he might as well be a catty bitch. There had to be some perks from being the family monster, after all.

"Keep talking, Boy. It's only a matter of time before we find a way around your shield." Another voice came from beside his cousin Helen. This one had changed more over the years than Helen's had, but he recognized him anyway. He wasn't likely to forget his brother Sterling.

Ow. Even Sterling was after him? Cute, chubby-cheeked Sterling, who had spent their childhood clinging to his leg and loving him with every inch of his tiny soul, hated Cym too? He shouldn't be surprised, but dammit. Knowing his baby brother was part of Team Kill the Family Freak fucking hurt.

But Cym couldn't fall into that pit right now. He had a norm to protect. Cym could fall apart later when Fourteen was safe.

Cym kept his head down as low as he could, trying to lay eyes on his family. Sterling and Helen were too young to be powerful enough to hide themselves with magic. Out of everyone in their generation, Astin alone had the age and the training to do such advanced magic.

Cym finally spotted them by the fence. Helen—the spitting image of Cym if he were a girl—was pacing back and forth in clear agitation, but his brother appeared completely at ease. Sterling stood balanced on the old, wrought-iron fence, looking more like a teenage boy trying to impress his girlfriend than one trying to kill his older brother. His mouse-brown hair looked effortless and windswept, but Cym recognized the hairstyle from a teen magazine he'd read a few months earlier.

Had it belonged to Sterling before it came to Cym?

Looking closer, Cym noticed his brother making a circle with the index finger of his right hand, then flattening the hand and pushing it out, as if he were stopping traffic. All the grass died around him in a giant circle, but where he and Fourteen crouched, the plants were unaffected.

"I don't have a shield." Though, improbable as it seemed, Cym was beginning to suspect this was untrue.

"You're so funny, Sunny." A third voice rang out to his left, and he saw his aunt Stella saunter down the sidewalk to join Sterling and Helen. Stella's red dress flared out behind her like a banner and should have looked overly dramatic, but it fit with the long, mahogany hair curling around her shoulders.

Stella had always looked like a movie star to Cym.

The old nickname echoed inside his head, drawing out memories of better times, memories of laughter, ice cream, and splashing by a river. His heart clenched, and a tear fell down his cheek, but there was anger, not sadness in his voice when Cym called out, "You have no right to call me that anymore."

"Whatever, Boy." His aunt's cheerful voice was more appropriate for chasing down a naughty child rather than supervising an assassination. Stella made the same hand gesture as Sterling had, circling the index finger of her right hand and then putting her hand out.

The dead plants around Cym turned to dust, but once again, he and Fourteen remained unscathed.

"I already tried that one, Stella, and got a big, fat goose egg for my trouble," Sterling told her, bored arrogance coloring his words.

Cym took a second to check on Fourteen again, who was muttering something that sounded like, ". . . should have seen that coming," while struggling to pull himself to a sitting position.

"Stay down!" Cym hissed, and when Fourteen didn't respond, he grabbed his hand to tug the man to the ground. Fourteen flopped over and lay still once more.

While Cym was happy the man was no longer presenting a target, his worry was mounting. How was he going to get Fourteen out of here if he couldn't remain conscious? Even if Cym found a way to get past his family, Fourteen was far too big to carry.

"How about this one?" Helen asked her companions, and she put her left hand over her right wrist, grasped it, and pulled it sharply to the left.

Cym threw himself on top of Fourteen as several rows of tombstones had their top halves sheared away. He was showered with shrapnel and felt small cuts peppering his exposed skin. "Stop that!" His voice rang out over what was left of the cemetery. "There's a norm here—an innocent! Just let me get him out of here, and I'll go with you."

"No . . ." Fourteen groaned underneath him.

"You hush. I'm in charge right now." Cym patted his cheek gently.

"I think it's just adorable that our Sunny thinks he's in any position to bargain right now, don't you, dears?" Stella put her hands together as if she were about to say a prayer, then drew them up to the sky, parted them and brought them out in a half circle to rest by her side.

Nothing happened.

"Maybe if we do one together?" Helen suggested. The three came together in a huddle.

Cym couldn't keep relying on whatever miracle was keeping them safe. He had to do something right now. He spied Fourteen's pack and pulled it out from under his body, hoping it contained something that could help him. Inside, he found a few chunks of a gray, clay-like material, so very many guns, and several different types of ammo that he wouldn't know how to install even if he did manage to figure out which guns they went with.

When he got to a wicked-looking knife, Cym paused. He could probably manage to poke it into someone if he could get close enough. Of course, the chances he'd poke it into himself instead were much higher.

Then he got an idea. It was probably a terrible one, but it was all he had.

Due to the chaotic nature of his magic, Cym had never been trained, but it didn't mean he couldn't do magic. He was still technically a witch even if his family wanted nothing to do with him.

He had often done accidental magic when he was little. He couldn't count the number of times he'd had a tantrum as a child and turned the contents of his entire room red from anger or knocked over furniture with a random blast of energy. The only reason the building he'd been kept in hadn't burned down from his accidental fires was because it had dampening spells built into the walls.

Over the years, he had begun to fugue out when his emotions got the better of him rather than explode with accidental magic. Once he escaped, it had been a pain to discard the habit, but he had worked hard to let it go—becoming senseless under stress was the worst thing that could happen to someone on the run.

Cym had gone to the closest library and found a book on stress relief. It suggested methods like meditation or joining a yoga class—something he rejected immediately. Who would want to take a yoga class with him in the room? So he got a book on meditation and learned how to calm his breathing and heart rate. It was hard work, but eventually, he got good enough that he stopped blanking out or having random magical outbursts.

What would happen if he stopped accessing the still, quiet space in his mind earned through meditation techniques? Would it release his magic? Or better yet, what would happen if he let go of the stillness and actually tried to cast a spell?

Cym watched his brother's hands move in a complicated pattern while he argued with their aunt, trying to explain a spell he thought they should try. It looked too difficult for Cym to recreate, but he had just seen a very easy-looking spell performed twice.

Peering around a headstone, Cym pointed his right hand at his family. He took a deep breath, circled his right index finger, flattened his hand, and pushed it out. The only thing that happened was that his family looked like they'd come to a decision on what nasty thing they wanted to try on him next.

Joining hands, they broke out of the huddle. Stella stood tall and strong. The smug look on her face made Cym think she'd won whatever argument they'd been having.

Sterling stepped away from their aunt and Helen, his face uncertain. "I don't think this is a good idea. This is exactly the sort of thing that will bring their attention down on us. Mother told us to be careful!"

With a scornful glance at Sterling, Stella joined hands with Helen and threw her right hand toward the sky. She barked out a sharp, unintelligible sound and reached her left hand out to point toward the buildings behind the cemetery on Cym's side.

Cym really needed to get his spellcasting shit together before he and Fourteen were turned to toast. What was Cym missing? Maybe he had to think really hard about wanting it to happen. He tried again and felt a roiling of something pink in his chest, but nothing happened.

Perhaps pointing wasn't enough—in a lot of the fantasy books he'd read, there had been several components to casting. What were they again?

He bit his lip as he worked to remember. Focus seemed important. Precision too. He was pretty damn focused right now, and he thought he had the hand gesture down, so what else did he need?

There was a violent clap of thunder, and the building behind him came down with a deafening screech. Dust billowed everywhere and bricks and chunks of gods-knew-what began pelting him. He tried to throw himself over Fourteen to shelter him, but he rolled away from Cym as soon as he touched him.

"Don't… touch… me," Fourteen slurred and scrambled backward until he was stopped by a broken headstone.

Stung, Cym crawled away as far as he dared. "S… sorry. The building exploded, and now there's stuff falling. Bad stuff." He gestured toward the debris raining down around them with one hand while trying to protect his face with the other.

Fourteen stayed conscious, but he didn't look good. If Cym didn't know any better, he'd say the man was drunk. Fourteen leaned against the broken stone, pressed his cheek against it, and gazed at his hand like he'd never seen it before. When a brick bounced off his shoulder, he didn't even react.

Cym had to get them out of here. He focused as hard as he could on making his family go away and made the hand gesture. The roiling feeling rose up again, and it felt pinker than it had before, but his attackers remained untouched.

"I'm going to enjoy playing with your champion, Boy. I wonder how long I can get him to scream for me?" Helen's little girl voice was at odds with her words, and a chill went down Cym's spine. "He looks durable. I'll bet I can make him last a few weeks before I break him."

Rage swept through his body, and Cym's hands moved on their own as a giant pink fireball of emotion bloomed inside him, radiating outward from his chest. He felt hollowed out by its passage, and when he looked down, he was surprised to see his hoodie was unscathed.

A trailing scream caught his attention, and he looked up to see a gaping hole had replaced half the cemetery and the entire street behind it.

Cym's family was nowhere to be seen. He blinked dumbly at the results of his work.

"Please tell me you missed my SUV." Fourteen's expressionless voice startled Cym, causing him to jerk his body around to face the man. Fourteen got to his feet slowly, but he looked more lucid than he had a moment ago.

Cym's mouth worked as he tried to find his voice again, and he eventually managed to squeak out, "That part of the street survived," as he pointed toward their parking spot.

Fourteen grunted. "Do you have your bag?"

Cym pointed to his shoulder straps and nodded.

"Let's go." Fourteen motioned for Cym to go first.

Skirting around the hole he'd made, Cym peeked inside, expecting to see ancient and possibly not-so-ancient dead bodies. However, there was nothing but a seemingly endless, dirt-lined abyss.

The ground shook under his feet, and he backed away as the edge started caving in.

"I don't think the hole is done growing." Cym reached for Fourteen's hand to urge him to run, but he dodged Cym's grasp. He understood Cym's intent, though, and managed to keep pace with him back to the SUV.

They both looked back at the cemetery to see the rest of it crumble and vanish into the hole Cym had made. Fourteen unlocked the car with his key fob as they ran toward it. "Get in."

"Are you okay to drive?"

"Do you know how to drive?"

Cym shook his head.

"Then it doesn't matter if I am or not. Get in the car." Fourteen's tone was even, but his words were clipped.

Cym chose not to push the matter and got in on the passenger side. At the moment, haste was more important than establishing good boundaries.

The ground in front of them continued to give way at an alarming rate, and Cym wasn't sure if they were going to make it. Fourteen threw the SUV into reverse the second Cym's butt hit the seat and took the bumper off the car parked behind them. As they took off backward down the road, Cym had a clear view of the bumperless car falling into the hole he'd created.

When Cym noticed a light on inside one of the buildings they sped by, he realized how badly things had gone wrong.

"Stop the car!"

"Negative." If anything, Fourteen drove faster.

"There are people in there, we have to go back right now." Cym could hear the hysteria in his voice.

"There were probably people in the building your family blew up too, but we aren't going back for them either." Having gained several yards between them and the hole, Fourteen made a terrifying three-point turn and continued driving in the same direction, only forward this time.

"But they're innocent bystanders, and it's my fault they got hurt." Cym dug his fingernails into his arms as the realization sank in. "What if someone got killed?"

"You didn't make your family blow up that building, Cym. That's on them. You were just trying to survive." Sirens filled the air as a rescue vehicle raced toward the scene. "Let the authorities take care of it. Right now, our job is getting somewhere safe. Your family is probably sending more people here right now"

"What about the hole I made?" Cym tugged on his backpack, trying to get it off, but he only managed to get it tangled with the seatbelt he'd forgotten to put on. Would Fourteen let him borrow a knife to cut the seatbelt loose? He glanced at the shiny, well-kept interior of the SUV and decided not to ask.

"From what I observed, the hole stopped growing by the time it reached the buildings. People were inconvenienced, not hurt."

Cym frowned at Fourteen's callused response and continued the fight to separate his backpack from the seatbelt. Eventually, he had to remove the plastic buckle on his pack to set it free and cursed when he bent a fingernail backward trying to put it back on again.

When Cym had finally sorted himself, the seatbelt, and his backpack into their rightful places, he looked up and realized they were almost to the warehouse, so he dug through his bag and put on the tattered pair of Converse he found at the bottom. They were tight over the now-dirty bandages Fourteen had wrapped around his feet, but they still fit.

It seemed silly, but with shoes on, Cym felt more capable of dealing with the garbage life was throwing his way.

Once they were inside the warehouse, Cym made a show of looking around for a moment, then asked, "Um, is there a bathroom here I can use?"

Fourteen nodded and gestured for Cym to follow him toward the opposite side of the building they'd stayed in last night.

"Your bathroom is that far from where you sleep?" Cym imagined getting up to go pee in the middle of the night and having to go down two flights of stairs and across a creepy, drafty warehouse.

Hard pass.

Fourteen shrugged. "It's not so bad."

"Says the soldier," Cym whispered under his breath.

Fourteen snorted and said, "Right through there, cupcake," proving his sense of hearing was better than it had any right to be. He ushered Cym towards a shabby closet in the back of a small office. "I'll be upstairs when you're done, and we'll talk."

Cym needed to change his clothes ASAP. He should have done it in the car to throw off potential tracking spells, but he hadn't been able to bring himself to get undressed in front of Fourteen. His face burned at the very idea, and he rubbed at his cheeks furiously. What the heck was going on with him?

Cym dug through his bag and was glad to see a pair of jeans, but the pink tank top made him wince. It might be spring, but in New England that could mean anything from snow in the morning to a toasty seventy-five degrees in the afternoon.

It looked like a visit to a thrift shop was going to be in order so he could get some warmer clothes. He would have to get as much as he could afford to buy—the more clothes he had, the longer he could avoid detection.

Cym shucked off his torn hoodie and sneezed when the dust and debris from the destroyed building filled the air. His pants followed, making even more dust for him to choke on, and he jammed his dirty clothes hastily into his bag. Tattered as they were, in a pinch, they could still help him throw off a tracking spell. As he was stuffing them in, he found the small tin containing money. It was every dime he had left.

When Cym opened it, he was pleasantly surprised to find a hundred-dollar bill instead of a fifty. Past Cym had been very generous when packing this bag. Now he could afford an actual jacket.

He straightened and caught his reflection in the mirror.

Cym had never thought much about his appearance. Having no contact with the outside world made worrying about what other people thought of him seem silly. He examined his face in the dingy, spotted mirror. His hair was thick—something fashion magazines harped about constantly—so that was a point in his favor. He brushed a chunk of plaster out of his hair and finger-combed through the tangles.

Most of his features were delicate enough to appease even the harshest celebrity critics, with the exception of his square jaw. It gave him the appearance of being stubborn—something that had gotten him into trouble a lot when he was little. It was currently streaked with soot, so he wet his fingers from the faucet and did his best to clean it off.

He looked back up to gaze at his sky-blue eyes and wondered if Fourteen liked the color blue.

Realizing what he was doing, Cym backed away from the sink and jerked his bag up off the floor. It was long past time for him to go.

As he opened the window to the bathroom, he thought about how to use the money he had left after his shopping trip. He could use it to gain distance and improvise once he got far enough, or he could see how far he could get walking, maybe even hitch and use the money to make himself look presentable enough to find a job he could tolerate.

Hoisting himself over the windowsill, he decided on the latter. But first, he had to go check on something.