The Atlas Six (The Atlas 1)

“If Rhodes were here,” he said deflatingly, “then maybe I could do something with it. But as it is, it’s just… that.” A spark. “Whatever that was.”

“So you need more power?”

“More than that. More than more.” He drummed his fingers in the grass, a brief return to his usual state of fidgeting. “It’s not a matter of how much, it’s how… good. How pure.”

“So if Libby were here it would be something?”

“Yes.” He sounded certain. He always sounded certain, but that particular certainty was more persuasive than smug. “I don’t know what, but something.”

“Well.” Reina paused to shield her eyes as the sun broke through the cloud cover overhead, enveloping them in a harsh wave of brightness. “We’ll have to find her, then.”

There was a pulse of tension as Nico braced himself again.

“We?”

“If I can help, yes.” She glanced at him. “I assumed you were doing something already.”

“Well—” He stopped. “I’m not. I’m out of options, but—”

“Your friend,” she guessed. “The one who can move through dreams?”

He said nothing.

“You never mentioned that about him,” Reina observed aloud. “His name, yes, but never what it was he could do.”

Nico seemed retroactively guilty, kicking out his feet in the grass. “I never planned to tell anyone.”

“Because he is… secretive?”

“Him? Not so much. But what he can do…” Nico sighed. “It’s just best if people don’t know.”

To her displeasure, Reina found herself more

annoyed by that than usual.

“You should trust us.” She was surprised by how adamant she was. “Don’t you think?”

Nico’s expression in reply was one of total, incomprehensible openness. Parisa had been right that he was scarcely capable of guile.

“Why?” he said.

Reina considered it. Nico would want a good answer, a thorough one, and for possibly selfish reasons, she needed him to be persuaded.

“Do you understand,” she said slowly, “how alone we are one thing, but together we are another?”

A beat of silence.

Then, “Yes.”

“So it is a waste, then. Not to use the resources you have.” Another simple concept.

“You would trust Callum? Or Parisa?”

Nico sounded skeptical, for good reason.

“I trust that they are talented,” Reina confirmed slowly. “I trust their skill. I trust that when their interests align with mine, they are useful.”

“And if they don’t align?”