The Pledge

Once they were past us, Max gripped my elbow again and pulled me away from the busy sidewalk, leading me toward the less traveled paths of the alleyways.

I should have been frightened to be alone with him, away from the busier streets of the plaza—in truth, he was a stranger. But I wasn’t afraid.

“What was that all about?”

“What was what all about?” He frowned, nearly dragging me along until we were far from the foot traffic. Finally he slowed.

“Why wouldn’t you look at those men?” I stopped walking, crossing my arms and refusing to take another step.

He raised an eyebrow. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You know exactly what I’m talking about.”

Clearly agitated, he raked his hand through his hair. “Can we just go? Claude and Zafir are going to notice that I’ve lost them and come searching for us soon.”

The hair on the back of my neck prickled at the mention of the other two men. But I didn’t care. I wanted to know why he’d gone out of his way to avoid the guards we’d just passed. “Not until you answer my question.”

“Your imagination has gotten the best of you, I think. Let it go.”

He was lying. I didn’t know how I knew, but he was lyi Bght ste“Young and I wanted the truth. “Why should I? Is there something dangerous about you? Are you some sort of criminal? What are you hiding?”

He scowled. “You’re the only one who’s broken the law. You’re the one who refused to look away when I spoke to you in—” He stopped himself before he finished his thought. “You’re the one who needs to be more careful. Especially if you actually understood what I said.”

My heart raced and my hands shook; his allegation was no longer masked, and I could no longer pretend that he might suspect something.

He knew.

I shouldn’t have trusted him; I should never have allowed him to drag me away from my friends and off the crowded walk-ways at the center of the city.

Sudden

ly Max was my enemy. I turned away from him and ran, not sure where I was heading; I only knew that I couldn’t risk seeing his two enormous friends again either. So instead I moved in the opposite direction, running down a long, barren alleyway.

“Charlie, wait!” Max called, his voice filled with frustration, but I could hear that he wasn’t coming after me. “Charlie! Don’t go! Can we please talk about this?”

But I kept running, my feet pounding heavily beneath me, until I could no longer hear his words. Especially the ones I wasn’t supposed to understand.

VIII

It was hard to work that evening, to pretend to be polite and to smile thinly at the customers who came into the restaurant. Making small talk was nearly impossible.

I was too caught up in my own sullen mood. Angry, and more than a little frightened as well. The implications of someone knowing my secret were almost too much to even consider. No one, aside from my parents, had ever understood what I was capable of.

No one had ever been allowed to know.

But Max had ruined all that, and I had no idea how he’d done it, what exactly I’d done to give myself away. I hadn’t responded to his foreign words, and I’d certainly never admitted to understanding them.

And, most of all, I still wasn’t certain which language he was speaking when he slipped into his class tongue. I shouldn’t even be able to differentiate one from another. All I should be aware of was that it wasn’t mine, and that it wasn’t Englaise.

Yet he’d figured it—and me—out. How had he done that?

He said that I intrigued him, but why was that? Had he seen something in me that spoke of my unusual aptitude for deciphering words, for my understanding of all languages?

I must have been too obvious that night at the club, my fear too apparent.

But why did he care? Why had he come looking for me?

My father’s voice shattered my daydreams, embarrassing me for being so foolish, and I was grateful that he couldn’t possibly know what those dreams had been. “Charlaina? Did you hear what I said?”

“Sorry, what?” I shook away thoughts of Max. I needed to stop thinking about him. I couldn’t trust him. I couldn’t afford to let my defenses down again.

“There’s someone here to see you.” He was irritated to be repeating himself; he balanced plates of food in both his hands. “He’s waiting by the alley door. You’d better hurry, though. This isn’t a break.”

My stomach clenched. Max wouldn’t come here, would he?

But I couldn’t think of anyone else. Neither Brooklynn nor Aron would come to the back entrance. They were both comfortable enough to come through the front, and then act like they owned the place. My mother would usually show them to a table and feed them while they waited.

I tried to decide what to do, whether I should even go back there to find out, but my father was watching me—glaring, more like it—and I knew I had no choice. If it was Max, I needed to get him out of here. I needed to make it clear that he couldn’t come back.

I slipped through the kitchen doors, feeling light-headed. The familiar smells did nothing to dispel my uneasiness.

The back door was closed, and I realized that only my father was rude enough to actually shut the door on someone while they waited in the alley. It was probably meant as a lesson for whoever dared interrupt me while I was working.

I took a deep breath, wrapping my fingers around the doorknob. I wasn’t sure I was ready for this.