He's not saying anything that I don't already know, but a ripple of irritation runs down my spine.
“We’re going to need to take everyone,” Gryphon says, and I shake my head.
“We can't take everyone. It's not safe to have all of us in one place at the same time. We need to stick to the rules of one of us being here at all times. Oleander is still resting after the Bond being completed, so we can't take her. Her bond is volatile at the best of times.”
We both pointedly don't look at Nox, and I shrug back at Gryphon. “You, Atlas, and I are the only ones who have bonded and found our power increases. Everyone else should stay here.”
Nox reacts immediately and exactly the way I know he will. “There's no way I'm staying here. If there's a fight to be had, I'm going.”
I shake my head, not entirely sure why I’m fighting him when I know he’ll never back down. “You're in the same boat as Oli, you need to let the bond settle.”
“Fuck that. Bassinger and the little poison Bonded both fought the Resistance when they came here the day after they had bonded, so don't feed me that bullshit as an attempt to get me to stay behind. I'm going, and I'm finding Unser.”
I already know that it's going to be pointless to try and convince him otherwise. He doesn't have any particularly strong ties to the Trigger, but we all understand the significance of the Resistance taking him hostage. They know that Oleander has found her Bonded Group and they are doing what they can to shore up their defenses for when they have to face her. Silas Davies having two Triggers at his disposal, one of them with a huge range and the other able to regenerate at the drop of a hat, it's definitely dangerous for us all.
“Fine. The three of us will go. Oli, Atlas, and Gabe can stay behind.”
We make the decision to leave Kieran behind as well, as an extra set of eyes on the Sanctuary. He’s still extra jumpy, thanks to Sage’s mind abduction, and we’re not sure how long we will be gone, as it is a recovery mission.
I find myself as leery about leaving my Bonded as I am about finding Unser dead.
Oli doesn't take the news of us leaving well, not that she shows it, but we can all feel the inner turmoil inside her as she ducks her head and nods. I hate it. I would do anything to fix it for her, but the compulsion to keep her away from Davies for as long as I possibly can is stronger than anything else, especially with the Bond being so newly complete.
Someday soon, she’s going to be as close to invincible as any mortal will ever get. Until then, I’ll be her first line of defense.
“What if you need a power pick-me-up? What if you run out while you're out there?” she says, and while Nox keeps his back to her as he pulls his Tac gear on, I can see that she has his interest.
I already knew that he’d been interested in the power exchange from a philosophical point of view. I get it, I’d never heard of a Bond being able to do something like that before. I know that he had doubled his research on Soul Renders once I had told him what had happened when the Resistance had shown up here and she had funneled all that power through to me.
“I’m not going to need the power. The Wasteland we're going to is still brand new. Between the three of us, we’ll be able to have it dealt with. We have done it before, before you came home to us, and we all know how to do our jobs. Just trust me, Bonded.”
She huffs a little under her breath. “It's not about trust. It's about wanting you all to come home.”
Gryphon stands in the doorway and checks over his weapons one last time, that same obsessive tic that he has as a ritual each time he goes out on a job, as though touching each of his guns and knives in a certain order will ensure his safety. I can’t really give him too much shit about it.
He has always made it back.
We're standing in the supply area sectioned off just for our Bonded Group, mostly so that we can have privacy when conversations like this need to happen, and while I was expecting Nox to get dressed and disappear like he always does, he hasn’t made a move yet to leave us. There's something about our conversation that he is particularly interested in. Oli seems to think it's a good sign, but I'm not so sure.
I don't think my brother can be saved.
I feel a little bit of shame in admitting that, especially since I have been the one to rally so hard to keep him alive and with me, but part of that is my own selfishness and not wanting to lose the last member of my family. William's death had rocked me to my core, and I find myself even more desperate to keep Nox alive now because of it.