“Course I gory heard you. I’m missing an eye, not an ear.” He taps his bionic eye with a bony finger. “Course I know she cared. But never in the way I wanted. She deserved to live. If any of us ugly little shiteaters deserve it, it was her. There wasn’t a cruel bone in her body. Not one. But it didn’t matter. It doesn’t matter if we’re good or we’re evil. It’s all up to chance.”
“It was chance you knew her at all,” I say. “Chance that brought her to House Mars.”
“No. It was my father,” Sevro says. “He drafted her, traded a pick with Juno to get her.” He shakes his head. “All because he thought she would temper us, govern our anger. If he hadn’t picked her, we wouldn’t have met her, and she’d be alive.”
“Maybe,” I say, thinking of Eo. “But she chose to come here. She chose to follow me. To follow you.”
“Just like Pax.”
I nod, touching my pegasus.
“It’s all piss and shit. Isn’t it?” Sevro says. “Doesn’t matter how pretty they dress it up. We’re still in the game. We’re always going to be in a slagging game. Spit on their empire. Spit on this piss and this shit. I came for you because he told me what you are.”
I stare at him, unable to understand.
“What do you mean?” I ask with a nervous laugh.
“Turn it on,” he says. “I know you brought one. You’re thorough, Reaper. Always thorough.”
“Why are you acting so—”
“Shut up and turn it on.”
I nod and activate the device in my pocket. A jamField deploys. I’m not so prideful as the Sovereign to believe no one could listen in. Sevro stares as me till I shift uncomfortably.
“So what am I?” I ask.
“Even now?” he asks, shaking his head. “You are wound tight. Say the name of the person who sent me.”
“Mustang sent you. You told me she brought you in from the Rim. Same with all the Howlers.”
“That’s right. She did. Took six months to get from Pluto. But guess who came to me during my layover in Triton. Go on, Reap. Guess.”
“Lorn?” His lips curl into a sneer. “Fitchner?”
Sevro spits in my face, right under the eye. “Guess wrong again and I leave you like this.” He snaps his fingers. “I will not come back. I will not help you. I will not bleed for you. I will not sacrifice my friends for a man who doesn’t give enough of a shit about me to put his neck out just once. Trust goes both ways, Darrow. This time you have to take a leap.”
He’s not bluffing. And I know what I want to say. But how can it be? Sevro is a Gold. A bloodydamn Gold. He heard me say “bloodydamn” to Apollo. He covered it up. Didn’t he? Or was that a mistake? Is he trapping me? No. No, if that’s true, then the game is already over. Eo’s dream has failed. Who is closer to me than he? Who loves me more than this strange, nasty outcast? No one.
So I look him in his dull gold eyes. “Ares sent you.”
Silence between us.
A terrible five seconds. Six. Seven. He stands and locks the door before pulling a small black crystal from the pocket of his crumpled pants. “For your breath only.”
“A whisperGem …”
I take it tenderly, knowing how much it costs, and blow against its surface. My breath makes it wobble, then shatter. Small motes of black rise, drifting up like fireflies out of the grass as dusk settles in deep summer. They coalesce. Floating and forming a rough holo that hovers between Sevro and me. The spiked helmet of Ares.
“My son,” he warbles. “I am sorry. Harmony has betrayed you. She has betrayed me and initiated a campaign against our principles. I discovered her intended use of you too late. But you were wise. This is why I chose you. Steps are being taken to curb her efforts. Continue with your own. Set Augustus against Bellona and fracture the Pax Solaris.”
I try to ask it a question, but it is a recording.
“I realize this must be difficult. I have asked too much of you already. But you must carry on. Sow chaos. Weaken them. You have much reason to doubt me. We have not contacted you until now, because you were watched by Pliny, by the Jackal, and the Sovereign’s spies. Troublemakers breed interest. But I have watched you too, and I am proud. I know Eo would be as well. In case you doubt the veracity of this message, a friend would like to say hello.”
Ares’s helmet fades and Dancer smiles at me. “Darrow, I want you to know, we’re with you. Your family is alive and well. The end is coming, my friend. Soon you’ll be with us. Till then, trust the man Ares sent; I recruited him myself. Break the chains.”
The image erodes, blackish light decaying into the air. And I’m left staring at the shower floor.
“You look good for all that surgery,” Sevro says. His smile is no less nasty than usual. “Ares sent that cripple to me. The one who sent you to the Institute. Dancer.”
He can’t say any more because I’m hugging him and crying. I sob and hold on to him, shaking, scaring him. He doesn’t move except to pat me on the head. All the weight falls from my shoulders. Someone knows. He knows and he’s here. He knows and he came to help me. To help me. I can’t stop shaking and saying thank you. Eo was right. I was right. “You are my friend,” I tremble out like a child. It almost makes him cry seeing me this way.
A true friend.
“Of course,” he says haltingly. “But only if you stop blubbering, man. We’re still Golds.”
I pull back from him, embarrassed, wiping my face on my sleeve. I think I mumble an apology. My vision’s bleary. I sniff. He hands me a towel, which I blow my running nose into. He makes a face.
“What?”
“That was for your eyes.”
We laugh together and then sit in an awkward silence. In time, I ask him how long he’s known. He suspected something since the Institute, he says, where he heard me say “bloodydamn” to Apollo. My voice went all thick, all rusty. Then Dancer showed him the video of my carving.
“Somehow they knew you could trust me, even if you didn’t, shithead. Always been that way. Always will be that way.”
“It doesn’t … bother you?” I ask him. “What I am?”
“Bother. That’s a tiny ass word for a gory big thing.” He scratches his buzzed head. “A crotch rash bothers me. Bad fish bothers me. Entitled dickweeds bother me. This …” He shrugs. “Piss on it. You like my angle more than any other pisshead in the worlds. Figure I’d return the favor, even if I really am bigger than your rusty ass.”
I laugh at that. He would have dwarfed my Red self. “You must know what I’m here to do? It isn’t just infiltration. It will end with the fall of the Society.”
“Rise too high, in mud you lie.”
“That’s it?” I ask incredulously. “You’re on board?”
He snorts. “It took me six months on a torchShip to reach you. Three months from Triton after Dancer showed me the truth. Was I confused? Damn straight. But still I boarded the ship and had three months to reconsider. Still I am here. So I think the time for second-guessing my commitment has passed. Anyway, my Gold ‘brethren’ have been trying to kill me since I was born.” He looks around, uncomfortable even after all we’ve shared, despite the jamField. “Only people to ever treat me decently are people who don’t have a reason to. LowColors. You. I think it’s time to return the favor.”
“And what of the others?” I ask intensely. “Pebble, Clown?”
“Not my secret to share. Quinn would have understood,” he says slowly, fighting back something. “Rest might go along. Thistle won’t. Roque won’t. Not in a million years. Too in love with their own species. Don’t know about the tall arrogant one.”
“Victra. And Mustang?” I ask.
“I don’t give love advice, shithead.” He stands. “Say, just because I’m a revolutionary doesn’t mean I can’t get a massage from a Pink, does it? That would suck sack.”
“I don’t know,” I laugh. “I’m still figuring it out, to be honest.”
“Slag it. I’m getting one. Back feels blood
y broken.” His crooked teeth bare themselves as he laughs. “Feels good. That’s how I know it’s right, Reap. Despite all this shit. It feels good in here.” He taps his thin chest. “It feels … how do you say … bloodydamn good.”
Victra finds me after I’ve said my goodbyes to Sevro. “Augustus sent me to tell you the Ash Lord’s stateroom is yours.”
“Augustus is giving me the largest room?”
“Your ship, your spoils, he said. You know how particular he is about order.”
“I hope you know the way. I’m already lost.”
She motions me along. We walk in silence through the halls. I’m weary, but happy enough knowing Sevro is with me, that Ares still believes in me, and that Dancer is still alive out there. It’s a salve on the pain from Quinn’s death.
“I suppose you know my family has betrayed the ArchGovernor,” she says.
“I’d heard. But you’re still with us.”
“As I said. I do what I want. Mother doesn’t control me, or my accounts, like she does Antonia’s.” She grins sideways, watching me. “I like you when you’re like this.”
“Like this?” I can’t help but laugh. “What do you mean?”
“I don’t know. You seem calm. At ease. Despite what’s happened.”
“And you seem particularly kind,” I say.
“Kind? A quaint fiction. But we both know I’m far from kind.”
We walk in silence till we reach the door to my stateroom. I glance back and see Ragnar trailing in the halls behind. If it weren’t for the bandages on his body, I wouldn’t have seen him at all. I motion him away.
At the door, I search Victra’s haughty eyes. “You could have sent a lowColor to tell me I was to be in the stateroom.”
“But then I wouldn’t get to see you.”
“Is that the only reason?” I ask.
She smiles mischievously. “I think I’ll keep my secrets.” After a moment, she looks up at me. “But I do worry for you.”
“For me?” I roll my eyes. “What are you playing at, Victra?”
“Nothing,” she says, offended. “You’re such a hypocrite, Darrow.”
“Me?”
“Remember when Tactus discarded your violin because he was suspicious that you wanted something? Now you treat me the same way. Same as when I came to you in the gardens on Luna. Is it too much to believe I’m your friend and care about you?” She wrinkles her nose. “You’re making me emotional, and I hate it.”
“I’m sorry,” I say. “You’re just …” I try to find the right words for the tall woman. There aren’t any. So I shrug and say, “It’s hard knowing you’re Antonia’s sister. That’s the full of it.”
“But I’m not her.”
“I realize th—”
“Do you?” She reaches out and touches my face. Her lips part searchingly. I remember the feel of them on mine before I launched myself through the spitTube. I let her kiss me then. Even if she is a cold woman, there is something in her heart for me. Different from Eo. Different from Mustang. I move gently away from her hand and shake my head.
“You are a strange man,” she says with a soft sigh, all the vulnerability that was in her now gone. Her claws are back on. She leans back against the wall opposite me, bending a knee and putting a boot on the wall, laughing at me with her eyes. Here’s the Victra I know.
“You love women, but you do not enjoy us.” Smile lines crease as her lips part slightly. My eyes cannot help but trace the slender contours of her neck, the strength in her slim shoulders, and the rise of her breasts. Her eyes burn into me. “There’s much to enjoy. Do you even know how soft my skin is?”
I cough out a laugh. “You’re mocking me.”
“As ever.”
Victra is a schemer. It’s her way. But for a moment, she was vulnerable. And seeing that … seeing that made all the difference. I kill the sexual tension the best way I know how.
“Good night, sister,” I say, and kiss her on the brow.
“Sister? Sister?” She laughs dismissively as I leave. It takes her a moment, but she calls to me.
“Is it because you think me wicked?”
I turn back to her. “Wicked?”
“Is that why you’ve never wanted me?” She pauses, choosing her words with care. “Because you look down on me?”
“Why would you think that?” I ask gently.
She shrugs and looks around the hall, strangely hesitant. “I don’t …” She shakes her head, trying to find the right words. She gestures to herself. “This is how I survive, do you understand? It’s how my mother taught me. It’s what works.”
“What do you say we try something new?” I offer, walking back to her. I extend a hand. “Darrow. Contrary to popular rumor, I don’t eat glass. I love music, dancing and I’m very fond of fresh fruit, particularly strawberries.”
She snorts a laugh. “So stupid. We’re reintroducing ourselves?”
“No armor. Just two people. I’m waiting,” I say playfully.
Rolling her eyes, she steps forward, looking either way down the hall. She brings up her hand, fighting back a childish smile. “Victra. I like the way stone smells before rain falls.” She makes a face, cheeks flushing red. “And … don’t laugh. I actually hate the color gold. Green goes better with my complexion.”
I cannot sleep. The bodies of those I’ve left behind float in the darkness with me. I wake a dozen times, flashes of bombs, slashing of swords ripping into my dreams. I earned these sleepless nights. I know that, and that’s what makes them all the harder.
I stand and pace my new quarters, wandering its expanse. Six rooms. A small gymnasium. A large bath. A study. All belonging to the man who burned a moon. The father of the Furies. How could I sleep in a room like this? I take the pegasus pendant from my pocket, almost forgetting it’s a radium bomb.
Wandering the halls of the ship, ghostlike, I look behind me, wondering if Ragnar follows. I told him to sleep, but I know little of his moods, how he thinks, what he does at night. There is much to learn.
I pass through dimmed halls, past Orange technicians and Blue systems operators, who quiet and bend as I pass through metal halls down to the bowels of the ship, where Golds never tread. The ceilings are lower, meant for the Red workers and Brown janitors. This ship is a city, an island. All the Colors are here. I remember the roster. Thousands of jobs. Millions of moving parts. I examine a maintenance panel. What if the Orange who worked it were to overload the panel? What would happen? I don’t know. I wager few Golds really do. I make a note of it.
I continue on, hunger drawing me to the mess hall. Food could easily be delivered to my rooms, but my valets have not yet been organized. Anyway, I hate being waited on. In the mess hall, I find someone as sleepless as myself sitting at a long metal table.
Mustang.
24
Bacon and Eggs
I slide across from her.
“Can’t sleep?” I ask.
She wraps her knuckles against her head. “Lot rattling around.” She nods to the clamor of pans back in the kitchens. “The cook’s beside himself,” she says. “Thinks I need a feast. Told him I just wanted bacon and eggs. Pretty sure he’s disregarded everything I said. He babbled something about pheasant. Has this Earthborn accent. Hard to understand.”
Moments later, a Brown cook stumbles out from the kitchen, carrying a tray of not only bacon and eggs, but pumpkin waffles, cured ham, cheeses, sausages, fruits, and a dozen other dishes. But no pheasant. His eyes turn the size of the waffles when he sees me. Apologizing for something, he sets the tray down and disappears, only to reappear a minute later with even more food.
“How much do you think we eat?” I ask him.
He just stares at me. “Thank you,” Mustang says. He mumbles something inaudible and backs away bowing.
“I think the Ash Lord was a bit different from us,” I say. Mustang pushes the fruit toward me. “Thought you didn’t like bacon,” I say.
She shrugs. “I h
ad it every morning on Luna.” She delicately butters her waffles. “Reminded me of you.” She avoids my eyes. “Why can’t you sleep?”
“Not much good at it.”
“You never were. Except when you have a hole in your stomach. You slept like a baby then.”
I laugh. “I think comas don’t count.”
We talk about anything but the things we should. Innocent and quiet, like two moths dancing around the same flame. “Amazing how big the beds are, even on a starship,” Mustang says. “Mine’s monstrous. Too big, really.”
“Finally! Someone else agrees. Half the time, I sleep on the floor.”
“You too?” she shakes her head. “Sometimes I hear noises and sleep in the closet, thinking if someone’s coming for me they won’t look there.”
“I’ve done that. Really does help.”
“Except when the closet is big enough to fit a family of Obsidians. Then its just as bad. She frowns suddenly. “I wonder if Obsidians cuddle.”
“They don’t.”
Her eyebrows rise. “Have you researched it?”
I finish a handful of strawberries, shrugging as Mustang frowns at my manners. “Obsidians believe in three types of touch. The Touch of Spring. The Touch of Summer. The Touch of Winter. After the Dark Revolt, where the Obsidians rose in arms against the iron ancestors, the Board of Quality Control debated destroying the entire Color. You know how they gave them religion, stole their technology. But what they wished to kill most of all was the incredible kinship the Obsidians then possessed. So they instructed the shaman of the tribes, bought and paid for liars, to warn against touch, saying it weakened the spirit. So now the Obsidians touch one another in sex. They touch each other to prevent death. And they touch each other to kill. No cuddling.” I notice her watching me with a small smirk. “But of course you knew all that.”
“I did.” She smiles. “But sometimes it’s nice to remember all that’s going on inside you.”
“Oh.” I redden for some reason.
“I forgot you can blush!” She watches me for a moment. “You probably don’t know this, but one of my dissertations on Luna concentrated on mistakes in the sociological manipulation theorems used by the Board of Quality Control.” She cuts a sausage delicately. “I deemed them shortsighted. The chemical sexual sterilization of the Pink genus, for instance, has led to a tragically high suicide rate within the Gardens.”