Free Rise Against the Faultless by Melissa Hardaway Page A

pushed.
    “Ah.” I drew in a deep breath
and tried to stifle the audible reaction, but couldn’t.
    “Well, it’s not going to look
very nice, but I don’t think any of your ribs are broken.” He ran his hand over
it again, and then grinned up at me.
    “Ok, doc. That’s enough.” He
and Cyril insisted that I sit down for a few minutes before my next round, and
I didn’t fight them on it long. Cyril brought me my water and sat down on the
ground next to me. Shane went off for one of his daily hiatuses.
    “What a jackass.” She said
after Shane was out of earshot.
    “Shane?” I looked at her, “He’s
probably just messing with me.”
    “No, not Shane. Shane’s
amazing. That guy you were fighting.  If he had said something like that about
my sister, I probably would have been seeing red, too.”
    I wasn’t surprised to learn
that Cyril thought Shane was amazing. She liked the way Shane looked. “Yeah, he
was always giving me and my brother trouble at my school. So, you have a
sister?”
    Cyril looked away. She wiped
her face, “I had a sister. She passed a few years ago.”
    “Cyril, I’m so sorry, I had no
idea.” I stopped talking because I had learned after Lo’s mother died that
sometimes there’s just not much that you can say.
    “It’s ok. I mean, I just miss
her, you know. I didn’t get to say goodbye. We didn’t even get to bury her
body.” Cyril stopped talking, too. It was obviously too painful for her to talk
about, and I wasn’t about to pry. Shane returned right then anyway, with the
skinniest girl that I had ever seen. I assumed it was my sparring partner for
the rest of the day. I quickly learned that skinny didn’t equal weak, but
anyone was better than Dione at this point. I was still really shaken up by my
encounter with him and couldn’t get over my anger at Dione.
    After the training day was
over, I headed to the Command training room to meet with Shane. Unfortunately,
he wasn’t the only Brutus waiting on me. He and Ann were both in the room. I
sat down and waited for her to speak. She, as always, took her time. “I heard
that you had a bit of skirmish today after lunch. Angry reactions are not what
a leader is made of, Raily. You should learn to keep your composure.” I looked
at Shane briefly. I guess he ratted me out to his mom. He simply returned my
blank stare. She went on to lecture me about how keeping my composure in front
of others is of the utmost importance. I spaced out a couple of times and
thought about just nodding off. Maybe then she would kick me out of Command and
this would all be over. I could just work alongside the Grime. No, I won’t let
her win.
    She finally dismissed me for
the day. I went straight to my dorm and took my shower. I temporarily forgot
about my bruised side as I was toweling off and got a painful reminder. I could
feel the heat radiating off of it, and it had turned a plum purple color. For
some reason, I briefly thought of Shane’s hand running across that bruise, and
then I quickly shook the thought out of my head. He’s a traitor. I can’t
believe he ran off and told his mother how I had reacted to Dione. Maybe he
didn’t hear what Dione said, or maybe he did and he just didn’t care. Who cares
what he thinks anyway?
    I quickly threw on some clothes
to go meet up with Lo and Adrian in the dining hall. When Adrian suggested that
we all go to the lounge after dinner, I wasn’t so sure that I was in the mood
for socializing.
    “Come on, Rai. You barely
touched your mystery meat. You could eat some more of that delicious bread.” Lo
made a gagging face at my plate, which was mostly still intact.
    “Yeah, and an adult beverage
may be just the thing to take the edge off of today.” I guess Jubal might have
heard about my run-in with Dione. He did have a good point, though.
    “Sure. Why not? Let’s go.”
Besides, what was I going to do in my dorm alone besides sit and stew about the
day’s events? Lo wanted to go change