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Sasha couldn’t help being a bad influence. It was all she knew. If she wasn’t convincing her friends to ditch their safe, rule-compliant routines and follow her into risky territory, then she wouldn’t be Sasha. This was running through her mind on loop as she leaned against a decaying rock wall in the middle of the wilderness, massaging her bruises while surrounded by Grime and the remainder of his troops.
“Bet you blame me for losing,” Sasha muttered when she caught Grime looking at her. He grunted instead of responding and turned away. Not very comforting.
“I don’t blame you,” said one toad soldier, laying a hand on Sasha’s shoulder.
“Where in the name of Frog did you learn to use a sword like that?” Another soldier piped up.
“My mom,” Sasha said, which provoked some nervous laughter from the toads. “Seriously. She taught me. She was notoriously good at fencing. And everything else.”
Sasha looked at the ground. She hadn’t thought about her mom in a while. Certainly not since she’d first arrived in this strange new world. She’d only had a single thought about her mom while cooped up in Grime’s prison cell: Wherever I am, at least I’m free to do what I want.
Mia Prince had been among the most influential women back home. She was a trophy wife, a fact that everyone knew and she didn’t care to hide. In fact, she had flaunted the fact that she was a prize that had been won, because she was a prize like no other. She was an Ivy League graduate who was at the top of her class, had a beauty contest trophy from every year since she was fifteen, and was skilled at everything, from fencing to tennis to violin to interior design.
Little Sasha Prince had adored her goddess of a mother. With her father’s wealth and her mother’s guidance, she knew she could grow up to become anything. But that adoration disappeared piece by piece over time, beginning with one unassuming Saturday morning when Sasha was eight. She was on the couch, looking through one of her mother’s fashion magazines.
“Women are pretty,” Sasha had mused out loud, “Can I marry a woman one day instead of a man, Mama?”
“Absolutely not,” Mia had told her sharply. “Women who marry other women are unsightly, and a threat to our society.”
“But why—“
“I’m not discussing this with you again, Sasha. Now get changed. You have a tennis lesson this afternoon.”
Her mother’s words festered in her for a long time after, and Sasha eventually managed to convince herself that she wasn’t interested in women. It was probably something she’d grow out of once she hit puberty.
But then she hit puberty, and so did her friends. It didn’t escape Sasha’s notice that Anne sprouted up at least an extra two inches nearly overnight. Sasha would catch herself daydreaming about Anne picking her up and swinging her around, about pressing Anne’s palm to hers and playing with her fingers.
Sasha looked down at her hands now, remembering Anne’s sturdy grasp. It wouldn’t be the last time Anne literally slipped through her fingers, and she knew it, but for Anne’s sake she hoped it would.
Sasha should have let Anne go years ago. Anne had always been too good for her. But whenever Sasha had Anne over, Sasha could see the disapproval in her mother’s eyes, and the rebellious spirit in her latched on to that. She would make Anne break every rule in town just to make her mother miserable. Anne had become a weapon in her own personal war.
But Anne wasn’t like Sasha. She didn’t have parents she wanted to piss off or the means to save her skin if she got into serious trouble. Sasha should have known that from the start. But she was too rich and too white to see that Anne didn’t have the same privileges as she did. And now she’d gotten her and her friends stuck in a place where she didn’t have the money or the parents to bail her out of trouble.
Sasha looked around. Grime and the other toads seemed to be asleep. The last coals of the fire they’d set were fading, and the air around the makeshift campsite had turned a deep and somber blue. Sasha looked at her hands again.
“I did this to you, Anne,” she murmured. “And I’ll find a way to get us out. I’m sorry.”