Existence Read Online Free PDF Page B

more of a Tlaloc than any of them.
    â€œ I like her, Mamá. That seems somewhat more relevant.”
    His father, as usual, remains silent on questions of love.
    â€œShe’s going to put ideas in your head,” his mother says.
    â€œHow do you know I’m not going to put ideas in her head?”
    â€œOh, Jago.” His mother leans forward and clasps his hands. “You think you’re such a strong man, but you’re still a soft boy. You’re weak, here.” She taps his chest. “You always have been.”
    â€œWhat are you worried about, Mamá? That I’ll be happy?”
    â€œThis is a girl who doesn’t understand anything about your life or your responsibilities, Jago. If it were simply a distraction, if you weremerely slacking off . . .” She stops him before he can object. “Yes, I know all about the training you’ve missed, and I don’t care. Boys will be boys, and all that. I want you to have your fun, Jago. But you can’t go thinking it’s anything more. This girl, she doesn’t fit into your life—not now, not ever. And you can’t afford to start thinking that the two of you are the same. What you do . . . you can’t just quit because you get bored.”
    â€œDon’t you think I know that?” he snaps.
    He’s thought about it plenty, what it would take to walk away, how much he would have to want it and how much he would be giving up.
    â€œWatch your tone, Jago.”
    â€œAlicia isn’t just some girl, Mother. She’s not a distraction, but she’s also not a bad influence. She’s . . . Alicia. She’s amazing. And you would see that, if you weren’t so judgmental.”
    He’s the only person who dares talk to her this way, and often she likes it. Not tonight.
    â€œI could forbid you from seeing her,” his mother muses, as if weighing the idea.
    â€œDon’t do that,” he warns her. “Don’t make me choose.”
    Her eyebrows shoot sky-high. “Oh?”
    He can’t look at her.
    â€œI see,” she says. “Then I suppose I’ll simply have to live with it, won’t I?”
    She stands up with great dignity, turns her back on him, and strides out of the room. He’s won, he thinks. But he doesn’t feel that way. Maybe because she’s right about one thing. Alicia has put ideas in his head, made him wonder whether violence and duty are his destiny, or only one choice among many.
    He could be the Player without being a criminal, he thinks. He could choose a different life without renouncing his obligations. Isn’t that possible? He could walk away from the family business, be a poet or a musician or some anonymous man selling fried meat in an alleyway . . . couldn’t he? The Tlaloc family’s rule over Puno has beeninextricably linked with Endgame and the Players for as long as any of the Olmec can remember, but just because something once was, must it always be?
    He could even walk away from Endgame altogether, renounce his status as the Player, hand the sacred duty over to someone else. He could be free of all the training, of having the fate of his line rest on every choice he makes.
    Jago remembers the first time he truly felt like the Player. He was 13 years old, just months past swearing the oath, binding himself to this life and this duty. He had been on training missions before, of course, but this one was different. This wasn’t simply some exercise put to him by his uncles, an attempt to hone his skills. This was real. Meaningful.
    He had scaled a skyscraper in Buenos Aires, disabled an alarm system, slipped past a security force armed with machine guns, cracked a safe owned by the richest man in Argentina, and taken an ancient Olmec knife that this man’s ancestors had stolen from Jago’s people long ago.
    There have been so many missions since then that Jago barely remembers this one. He left some bodies