The Red Rising: Golden Son Part 19

I look at him in surprise. "You didn't see? Aja used her hands."

"Goryh.e.l.l." His jaw tightens. Dull eyes taking in the scene. "How did we come to this?"

"Octavia was set on this path all along," I say quietly. "Before we even came to Mars, she intended to give the Bellona the ArchGovernors.h.i.+p. The gala was a trap."

"When did you discover this? Before or after the duel?"

"Before," I lie.

"Well played. Makes us seem the victim. I see Mustang failed in her task."

"Did your father send her to infiltrate Octavia's court?"

"No. I imagine it was her own idea. Draw close to the dragon ..."

"The Julii are against us too."

He nods thoughtfully. "Makes sense. Politicos tried to take Victra from us before Karnus and Aja came."

"You don't seem worried."

"Victra is her mother's favorite daughter." He shakes his head, remembering something. "But she took three Obsidians on for me. Three. She's with us, body and mind."

I watch Roque finish removing Quinn's hair. "Will she live?" I ask quietly.

"She has bone fragments in her brain tissue. Even if we stop the swelling, she's hemorrhaging. Badly."

We look down at Quinn, her head bald now. Face peaceful. Only small contusions on the side of her skull. You'd never guess she was dying inside. Roque strokes her forehead so gently, whispering soft things.

"Can you save her?" I turn to the Jackal. "Is there a chance?"

"Not here. If you get us to a medBay, then yes, there's a prime chance."

Roque sings a soft song to her as they lift her body to move to another room. The song is one he made around the campfire as my army ate in the highlands. Quinn was with Ca.s.sius then, as it seems all women are at one time or another. But even then, I noticed her eyes meet Roque's. They are the messenger pigeons from his story, crossing again and again in the sky. How excited he was to be reunited with her.

I crack inside. I can still save her. I can fix this.

The Sovereign was right. I misunderstood my own bargaining power. What was I going to do? Kill her grandson if Aja killed Quinn? What if he killed Sevro, Mustang, Roque? I'm lucky she didn't hurt more of them.

I turn to see Sevro.

He stands quietly in his armor watching us, watching Roque hold the girl Sevro loves but has never told, the girl he could never have. The pain is raw and etched deep into the lines of his hawkish face. Impervious Sevro, immune to hurt, to sadness, to having his eye gouged out by Lilath, the Jackal's lieutenant; it all falls on him now. Quinn never called Sevro Goblin like the rest of us. Victra puts a hand on his shoulder, noticing the pain if not understanding why it's there. He shoves her hand off.

"I don't know you," he snarls.

Victra backs away. "Sorry."

"What are you waiting for, Reap?" he demands. "We're not off this rock yet." He jerks his head. I follow, asking Victra to bring the Sovereign's boy.

Sevro and I climb a ladder and meet Tactus in the narrow corridor that leads to the pa.s.senger hold and the flight cabin.

"Oy, goodman," Tactus calls, favoring his injured shoulder. Wet hair dangles over laughing eyes. His voice is loud, unmindful of Quinn's condition. "Next time you're planning something dramatic, tell us you're coming so we don't go p.i.s.sing our pants."

I push past him. "Not now, Tactus."

"Ever the bore." He eyes Sevro. "Looky, looky. Goblin. If possible, you've shrunk even further, my goodman."

Sevro doesn't smile.

We enter the pa.s.senger hold, where the Augustans and Howlers buckle themselves into bucket seats in preparation for breaching the atmosphere. Tactus follows at our heels.

"h.e.l.lo, psychos," Tactus calls to the Howlers. "Pleasure to see your diminutive forms yet again. Especially you, Pebble."

"Eat s.h.i.+t," Pebble says, looking up from helping buckle one of Augustus's young nephews into his seat.

Tactus leans into me when we're past the pa.s.senger hold. "Good friends to come and rescue you. Thought they were scattered to the Rim."

"Were," Sevro says.

"What brought you back?" Tactus asks. "The weather?"

Sevro says nothing.

Tactus laughs despite the numerous holes in his armor. "Just how you like 'em. Eh, Darrow? Friends who will risk life and limb to always be in your shadow?" He nudges me, a bit too playfully, leaving faint smears of his blood on me. We come to the flight cabin's closed door. Tactus winces as he b.u.mps a bulkhead with his shoulder. Sevro trails behind.

"How's the shoulder?" I ask.

"Better than that girl's head back there. Quinn, wasn't it? The fast one from House Mars. Aja slagged her good. Pity. I'd have taken her for a-"

Sevro kicks Tactus in the b.a.l.l.s from behind, foot going between legs hard enough to dent metal. He elbows him in the side of the head, sweeps his legs in swift kravat form. Three more strikes to the ears before Tactus. .h.i.ts the ground. Sevro puts one knee into Tactus's shoulder wound, a forearm against Tactus's throat, the other knee to Tactus's groin, and his free hand dangles a knife over Tactus's eyeball. "Talk about Quinn again, and I'll cut your b.a.l.l.s off and jam them in your eye sockets."

"Brother always said ... keep your eye ... on the ball," Tactus gags out.

The metal cabin door hisses open. Augustus fills the frame. He stares down at the scene just as Victra brings Lysander forward from the aft of the s.h.i.+p.

"They're almost done, my liege," I say. I step over Tactus and Sevro to join the ArchGovernor in the cabin. Victra does the same, except she steps on Tactus, grinding her heels.

"Prime work," she says to Sevro.

"Slag off, cow."

"Who is the little one?" she asks me as we slip into the cabin and close the door.

I tell her.

"The Rage Knight's son? Nasty little man. I don't think he likes me."

"Don't take it personally."

The c.o.c.kpit is larger than my room in the Citadel's villa. An array of lights ring the pilot and co-pilot chairs. Mustang sits to the left, a Blue pilot to the right. The Blue is jacked into the s.h.i.+p. A blue light glows under the dermis of her left temple. Mustang flies, right hand in a holographic control prism, speaking quickly with the Blue. Out the curved viewport, Earth hovers. Augustus, Pliny, and comically stooped Kavax au Telema.n.u.s discuss our options behind Mustang.

It is quiet.

"Well done, Darrow," Augustus says without looking back to me. "Though you could have chosen a better s.h.i.+p ..."

Mustang interrupts. "What's going on back there? They said someone was hurt."

"Quinn is dying," I say. "We have to get her to a medBay, fastlike."

"Even when we hit orbit, we're thirty minutes out from our fleet," Mustang says.

"Fly faster."

The s.h.i.+p trembles as Mustang and the Blue push it hard.

"It was a good plan," Kavax says, beaming down at Mustang. "It was a good plan, Virginia, infiltrating the Sovereign's household. Just like when you were a girl. The time you and Pax hid in the shrubbery to listen to your father's counsel. Except Pax was bigger than the shrub!" He booms a laugh that startles the quiet Blue.

Mustang reaches back to squeeze his forearm, hand smaller than his elbow. He preens like a hound with a pheasant in its jaws, looking around to see if we all noticed her compliment. She's got a way with men bigger than bears.

The love on the man's face makes Augustus's own disinterest monstrous. And even worse, thinking about the Jackal killing this man's son makes me sick.

Mustang spares me the slightest glance, her hair bound behind her head, the memory of a smile still creasing the corners of her lips, and it's like I've been punched in the heart. There's no smile for me. And the horse ring no longer graces her finger.

There's silence for a long moment. Augustus turns to look at me. "I a.s.sume Octavia attempted to bring you into her fold as well?"

"She attempted."

"Slag herself. Bet you told her to go slag herself, eh, boy?" Kavax booms. He slaps my shoulder, knocking me into Victra. "Sorry." He's bent like a hothouse tree grown too tall for its roof. Water drips from his red forked beard. "Sorry," he repeats to Victra.

"Actually, Lord Telema.n.u.s, I thought her offer tempting. She manages to treat her lancers with respect. Unlike others."

Augustus wastes no time with banter. "We'll amend that. I owe you a debt, Darrow. Provided we make it to my fleet."

"You owe it to Mustang and the Howlers as much as me," I say.

"What is a Howler?" he asks.

"My friends in the black armor. Sevro's the leader."

"Sevro. That wretched little thing that was atop my lancer, yes?" The ArchGovernor raises an eyebrow. "Thought I recognized him. Fitchner's boy." His tone sits poorly with me. "The one that killed that Priam brat in the Pa.s.sage."

"He's with us, my liege. Loyal as my own hands."

The door hisses open and Sevro and Tactus join us. We all turn to look. Sevro recoils slightly. "What?" he challenges.

Tactus scoots off to the side, away from Sevro.

"Does your loyalty lie with me or with your father, Sevro?" Augustus asks.

"What father? I'm a b.a.s.t.a.r.d's b.a.s.t.a.r.d." Sevro looks the ArchGovernor up and down skeptically. "And all due respect, my liege, I could give a cat's frozen p.i.s.s about you too. Your daughter brought me from the Rim. My allegiance is to her. But above all it's to Reaper. That's it."

"Mind your manners, you little puppy," Kavax growls.

"You must be Pax's father. Sorry he went. He's a man I might have died for. But I see he got his good looks from his mother."

Kavax isn't sure if he's been insulted.

Augustus observes this. "Darrow, I owe you an apology. You were right. Loyalty, it seems, can extend beyond the Inst.i.tute. Now ... Lysander." Augustus glances out the shuttle's viewports. We rise steadily. He kneels to speak with the boy. "I've heard tell that you are an exceptional lad."

"I am, my liege," Lysander says as firmly as he can. "They test me regularly, and I train in all manners of studies. I rarely lose in chess. And when I do, I learn, as I ought."

"Do you now? I had a son like you, once, Lysander. But I'm sure you knew that."

"Adrius au Augustus," Lysander says, knowing the lineage.

"No." Augustus shakes his head. "No. My younger son isn't like you at all."

The boy frowns. "Then the elder. Claudius au Augustus?"

Mustang glances back.

"Yes." Augustus nods. "A kind, special boy with a lion's heart. Better than me. Kinder. A ruler." He spares a strange, meaningful glance at me. "You would have been friends."

Lysander tries to look dignified. "What happened to him?"

"They left that part out, eh? Well, a large young man from the House Bellona by the name of Karnus took liberties with a certain young woman my son was courting. My son took umbrage and challenged Karnus to a duel. In the end, when my boy was broken and bleeding, Karnus kneeled, cupped my son's head"-he puts one hand around Lysander's head-"and smashed it on the cobbled stones till it broke open and all his specialness dripped out." He pats the boy on the cheek. "Let's hope you never have to see such a thing."

"Is that your plan for me, my liege?" Lysander asks bravely.

"I'm only a monster when it is practical." Augustus smiles. "I don't think I will have to be this time. You see, we're just trying to get home. So long as your grandmother permits our pa.s.sage, then you will be safe."

"Grandmother says you're a liar."

"Ironic. You will tell her we've treated you well, I hope."

"If I am well treated."

"Fair enough." Augustus touches the boy's shoulder and stands. "Victra. Take him to the pa.s.senger hold."

Victra glowers. Of course Augustus chooses the only woman but Mustang. Tactus notices her reaction and steps forward. "Might I, my liege? I've not seen my own brothers in some time. I wouldn't mind talking with the lad." Augustus nods as if to say he doesn't care. Victra thanks Tactus, surprised by his gesture. He winks at her, punches my shoulder, and pats Lysander roughly on the head, almost knocking him down. I'd hate to know his brothers.

"Come, tiny one. Tell me, have you ever been to a Pearl club?" he asks, leading him away. "The girls and boys there are spectacular...."

The ponderous stork climbs higher and higher. In two minutes, we'll hit the edge of the atmosphere.

"They tried to kill me as I slept," Augustus murmurs. "She knows I will not forgive this."

"She'll come to Mars," I say.