The Swarm Trilogy by Megg Jensen Page A

me or his dad, but after a few months of watching me, he began practicing too. It was only after Aric was sure we were both interested and dedicated that he began teaching us to fight.
    Teaching adoptees was risky for Aric. We were brought here for a peaceful mission, not to fight, but he continued every morning. It never occurred to me to invite Bryden. Even with his lame leg, he could have learned so much. Maybe he would have found a way to build up some strength in it. But I didn’t invite him because I thought he didn’t want to be my friend anymore.
    Over the years I grew closer to Kellan, and cared less about Bryden. Kellan, on the other hand, who’d ignored both of us for years, decided the time had come to pick on Bryden. I ignored it or disappeared when it happened. First it was verbal, and then it progressed to the physical, tripping Bryden when the adults weren’t looking or shoving him to the side. The Fithian kids thought it was hilarious and Kellan became a hero to them. But still, he wasn’t enough like them to become friends.
    Bryden’s balance had been terrible since the accident; his leg offered him little stability. He always fell and I never helped him up. Instead I always stood in Kellan’s shadow, pretending I’d seen nothing.
    “I wish I would have done something,” I said. “It was wrong.”
    Bryden shrugged. “It was wrong. But I’d like to think it’s over now. Can we move past it? Start from here?”
    I nodded, feeling like a little girl again. I had my friend back. I knew it probably wouldn’t be so simple, but I wanted it to be. I had so few friends and a new one was always welcome.
    “But you can’t confide in Kellan anymore, Lianne. You have to trust me when I say he’s not on the same team as us.”
    My heart tore at itself, one side ripped by Bryden, my oldest dearest friend. The other by Kellan, the boy I’d loved for years who finally loved me.
    “He’s taking the wrong path,” Bryden said. “I’m sure our people wouldn’t approve of us killing innocent babies.”
    My eyebrows rose. Kellan said no one but him knew the specific plan that the spies from our nation had given him.
    “How do you know that?”
    “I haven’t spent the last ten years sitting on my butt, Lianne. People don’t notice me much. In fact, they try to ignore me because of my limp. No one wants to be seen with an adoptee, much less a crippled one. I learned to blend in, to go wherever I wanted and no one would notice me.”
    I was impressed. I’d spent the last ten years learning to fight and he’d spent them being sneaky. Neither one of us had wasted our free time.
    “I suspected Kellan was planning something, so I followed him. I heard his meeting with those three men, the same three who visited me. They asked him to keep watch over you until our people could come for us. No one asked him to kill anyone and they didn’t tell him about me either.”
    “But he said they gave him plans.”
    “They didn’t,” Bryden insisted. “All they want is for us to be their eyes and ears. They are asking nothing of us yet. But...this might not have been his first meeting with them. It was after his birthday, just days before they were caught and executed.”
    My mind swirled with the possibilities. If Bryden was telling the truth, then Kellan was lying. I didn’t know who to believe. “But we have to do something,” I insisted. “If the king still rules then our people remain captive. That’s wrong too.”
    “I know, I know, but I can’t see that killing him would make any difference, can you?”
    I shrugged. “I don’t know.” I thought of what the king said yesterday, how he threatened my life. The world would be a better place without him. But was it my place to decide who lived and who died?
    “I have a plan. One that doesn’t involve killing. I know you’ve trained for years to become a warrior, Lianne. But deep down do you have the heart of a warrior or a heart filled with love?