“Even Metias had trouble watching out for you. “I thought I could protect you, and that the best way might be to keep you close to me, to try to win you over.

That night at the ball-when I looked at your face-” His voice cracks. But you make it so hard for people to protect you, June. At Day’s execution, I tried to come up with a way to stop Commander Jameson from arresting you. “He told me not to hurt you,” Thomas continues. I wait, light-headed from the words he’s saying. Finally, he runs a hand through his hair and mumbles, “I knelt over Metias and watched him die. I trail off as Thomas continues to stare at the floor, his expression oscillating between blankness and pain. I don’t need to explain that evening for Thomas to know what I’m talking about. “The celebratory ball,” I muse, aloud this time. Did he love Metias back? He had tried to kiss me that night after the celebration for Day’s capture.

I wonder whether Metias ever acted on his attraction, and whether Thomas reciprocated. But she refused, and he chose to do it anyway. Maybe he even tried to persuade Commander Jameson to assign the mission to someone else. I try to imagine a scenario that I can bear. Then she tasked me with taking care of Metias.” The security admins decided to forward a message on to Commander Jameson anyway. “Turns out that my silence wouldn’t have made a difference. I have never kept anything from Commander Jameson.” He pauses here for a second. I promised him I wouldn’t tell anyone, but deep down, I wanted to. Thomas drops his head back into his hands. You cross the Republic too many times, and eventually you get burned. The admins reported it to me first, with the understanding that I would pass the message to Commander Jameson. “Security admins found traces he left behind when he hacked through a loophole in the system,” he replies. Finally, I say through clenched teeth, “Tell me what happened, then.” Thomas looks up at me from his hands, a flash of confusion lighting his face. But you still turned him in?” I shake my head in disbelief. Thomas’s silence tells me far more than anything he’s said aloud. My thoughts are now a whirling, jumbled mess. I don’t understand.” I lean back against my chair and take a deep breath. Instead, he keeps his head in his hands and repeats, “I took an oath.” “Metias was in love with you,” I whisper. He must have done it for Thomas’s sake, even though he knew that it meant any chance of a relationship would be impossible.Īll of this flashes through my thoughts in a matter of seconds. Metias had been the one to recommend Thomas for Commander Jameson’s patrol. Officer and subordinate relationships are strictly forbidden. Of course Metias never talked to me about it.

Marie lu legend and prodigy