Chapter 124: The Surface Freak

Astrid Vale

"You still owe me a rematch," Liora said, nudging my shoulder as we walked through the market the next afternoon. "You cheated yesterday."

"I didn’t cheat. I lost because you had a head start."

"That’s called strategy."

"That’s called cheating with extra steps."

She laughed, and I found myself laughing too, easy and unguarded, the kind of laugh I hadn’t let myself have in longer than I wanted to think about. Two days into whatever this strange friendship was, we already had inside jokes, already had a rhythm between us that felt disarmingly natural given everything else happening beneath the surface of my time here.

We were passing near one of the food stalls when a group of Elarisi, younger than us, maybe fifteen or sixteen, fell into step a few feet behind us. I noticed the shift in tone before I fully understood what was happening, their voices dropping into something sharper, more deliberate.

"Surface freak," one of them said, loud enough to be heard.

Liora’s shoulders tensed beside me, though she kept walking, her chin lifting slightly like she was trying to ignore it.

"Trying to impress the outsider, Liora?" another one called out, and a ripple of laughter followed.

"Doesn’t she know surface people carry disease?"

"Maybe that’s why she’s always sick lately."

Liora’s jaw tightened, but she said nothing, and something about her silence, the way she’d clearly learned to absorb this kind of thing without reacting, made my chest burn with an anger I hadn’t expected.

One of them, a boy with a sneer already fixed on his face, stepped closer and shoved Liora hard enough that she stumbled sideways into a stall.

I moved before I’d fully decided to.

I stepped between them, my body angled to block his path to her. "Don’t touch her again," I said.

He looked at me like I’d grown a second head. "You don’t belong here."

"Neither does your hand on her," I said.

His friends laughed, but something in my voice, or maybe my expression, made him hesitate. I didn’t need to shift, didn’t need to prove anything with claws or strength. I just stood there, unmoving, making it clear that whatever they’d planned to do next, they’d have to go through me first.

"Come on," one of the others muttered, tugging at his sleeve. "She’s not worth it."

They left, throwing a few more muttered insults over their shoulders, but the confrontation dissolved as quickly as it had started, and I turned to check on Liora, who was straightening her dress with hands that trembled slightly.

"Are you okay?" I asked.

"I’m fine," she said, though her voice wasn’t entirely steady. "You shouldn’t have done that."

"They were attacking you."

"You don’t understand," she said, finally meeting my eyes. "You put yourself at risk for me. People here don’t do that. Not for me."

Something in the way she said it, quiet and resigned, like she’d simply accepted this as the shape of her life, made my chest ache in a way I hadn’t expected.

"Well, I do," I said. "So get used to it."

She didn’t answer, but something in her expression softened, gratitude and disbelief tangled together in a way that told me this wasn’t the first time she’d been treated like this, and probably wouldn’t be the last, regardless of what I’d just done.

We walked the rest of the way back in relative quiet, and it wasn’t until we were alone in our room that night, both of us sitting cross-legged on our respective beds, that Liora finally spoke again.

"You asked me yesterday," she said slowly, "if I’d ever met someone from the surface before you."

I went still. "You told me you hadn’t."

"I hadn’t spoken to one," she said. "Not directly. But there’s another girl. In the medical section."

My heart started pounding immediately. "What?"

"I don’t know much," Liora said carefully. "Ordinary people aren’t allowed near that ward, the one you’re not supposed to be near either. I’ve only heard the doctors mention her a few times, in passing. Another surface arrival, they called her. She’s under observation."

"Is she alive?" I asked, my voice barely holding steady.

"As far as I know," Liora said. "Yes."

I was on my feet before I’d fully processed the decision, my mind already racing toward every possible way I could reach that ward, every risk I was willing to take to get there.

"Astrid," Liora said, watching me carefully. "Who is she to you?"

I stopped, forcing myself to sit back down, forcing myself to actually explain instead of just running blindly toward a door I didn’t yet know how to open.

"Her name is Ivy," I said. "She’s my roommate at Moonshade. She was the first person who talked to me when I arrived, before I even knew anyone else there. She never once made me feel like I didn’t belong, even when everyone else at that academy made sure I knew I was different." My throat tightened around the next words. "She’s family, Liora. Not by blood, but she’s the closest thing to it I have left."

"You’d risk everything for her," Liora said, not quite a question.

"Yes."

She studied me for a long moment, something shifting behind her eyes, some understanding settling into place that hadn’t been there a moment ago. This wasn’t simply curiosity anymore, or friendship built on pastries and scooter races. This was something she was being asked to be part of, whether she’d fully agreed to it yet or not.

Where is she?" I asked, my voice sharper than I meant it to be. "Do you know exactly where in the medical facility?"

Liora shook her head slowly. "I only know she’s somewhere in there. Under observation, that’s all I’ve heard."

"Can you take me to her?"

Her hesitation lasted a beat too long, and I already knew what she was going to say before she said it.

"I can’t," she said. "That section is restricted. Even I can’t walk in and out of it freely, and I’m training there. If I brought you inside without authorization, it wouldn’t just be trouble for you."

"Why won’t you even try?" I pressed, frustration bleeding into my voice despite myself.

"Because I don’t know what they’re doing to her," Liora said. "And neither do you."