Her hand slid over my abdomen to a jagged scar left by an iron rod, a red-hot iron rod. She traced it with her finger and I felt the wetness of a teardrop soak into my skin as her cheek rested on my chest.
“What happened, Kai?”
It was time. She needed to know everything before I left. “That was an iron rod when I was twelve.” Her hand froze on top of the scar and I heard her sharp inhale. “My mother sent us to a place when we were young after my father died. She called it ‘the farm.’ A place where you’re taught to survive and if you fail, you’re dead. Different ages, males, females, it didn’t matter. We were there to learn how to kill. But we also had to learn how to write and speak effectively. We learned the ways of the world. Although, their idea of the ways of the world were somewhat distorted.” I paused. “If you made it to eighteen, you were sent on assignments.”
“How old were you when you went there, Kai?”
“I was seven, my sister five.”
She gasped, then after a minute said, “You have a sister?”
I stiffened as a wave of pain gripped me. I’d blocked her out for so long, the farm did that, but over the last few years with the emotions creeping back in, so had my sister, Chess. “She’s in France. Mother had her imprisoned.”
“But why would your mother do that? Why would she send her kids to a place like that and why imprison your sister?”
I curled my fingers around hers resting on my chest. “My mother is a bitch and she wanted control of Vault.” I explained to her about Vault, the board members, what they did, what they stood for then and now.
“Where are the kids now?”
“Some became operatives, others have been killed. Some never made it out of the farm. Kids disappeared in the night and new ones appeared all the time. You never slept well, fearing you’d be next. Disappearing was never good, because we knew those who disappeared weren’t coming back and were probably dead.”
“Handlers looked after us. Conditioned us, I guess you could say. Pain was a daily ritual. After a while, you grew accustomed to it. Immune. Numb. It’s the fear that eats away at you and they were good at making you fear them.”
Resting my hand on the small of her back, I softly drew paths going nowhere, meaningless paths. “But it wasn’t fear for me. It was fear for my sister.” She stiffened. “They knew it, too, and used it against us. It’s when I learned that what they wanted was to break me to the point where I didn’t care about anyone.”
She remained quiet, but her tears said it all. I wasn’t telling her so she’d pity me or feel sorry for me. That was the last thing I wanted. I needed her to know, so if Vault ever took her, she’d understand what type of people they were.
“It’s why they start us so young, fewer attachments, easier to break and condition us. But my sister… she kept breaking rules. Kept trying to help other kids. When she was about fourteen, she helped a kid escape. I don’t know how she did it, but she was taken away and none of us saw her for a long time. That’s when we were moved to another place. I guess they were afraid the kid who escaped would tell the authorities.”
“Oh, God, Kai.”
“When she came back… I don’t know why, but she looked okay and she began to learn how to fight like the rest of us. She was compliant. But a few years ago, she went on a mission and didn’t come back.” I sighed, closing my eyes for a second as I thought about her. “They found her. Brought her back and she’s been imprisoned ever since.”
“You don’t escape them, London. You do what you have to in order to survive. You learn to play their game by your rules.”
“Like now.”
“Yeah, baby. Like now. You’re an attachment and they would end it if they knew you were with me.” I cupped her chin and tilted her face to look at me. “If they get to you….” Fuck. I didn’t know if I’d be able to save her. Maybe I had lied to her because Vault was the one place I may never be able to save her from.
“How…? God, Kai, how could your mother do that?”
“I may have her tainted blood running through me, but she isn’t a mother. I call her that because it’s my game. My card to play, so she feels comfort in thinking I’m her loyal son.”
“Are you? Loyal?” she asked quietly.
“I have a house they don’t know about and I have the daughter of the man who supplies them with a drug hidden in it.”