Then she saw it.
A shadow of acceptance touched his face. He cast her a final glance—his eyes glossy and haunting. She pled with him to run. But he didn’t; instead, he looked to Reznik and spoke stridently “I’ve chosen to live peacefully among humans. Now I choose to die peacefully among them.” He shut his fists, severing the flow of magic. A whizzing sound skipped through the air. His head flapped back and his gasmask split down the front, before he collapsed amid a gust of cheers.
Snofrid bit down on her tongue until it bled. Desya grabbed her wrist and guided her between two stalls. She couldn`t see through her tears. Around the square, hydrocops began amputating Halos to hinder any attempt of an Inborn stand. Their electric forearm blades buzzed as they sawed off arms and legs amid shrieks and pleas for mercy.
Reznik, watching from his dais, tapped his gasmask. “They wear our human faces, but don’t be cheated. They’ve stolen them, just like they’ve stolen our planet. And now we’ll pass judgment.”
Reznik gestured to three of his hydrocops. They saluted him and rolled the iron crate from the train onto the center stage. He used the iris scanner on the crate and with a beep it opened, revealing a giant, knotty tree with a single hole in its trunk. The hole contracted like a hideous mouth. A bonecopse—a carnivorous tree from Armador. It writhed and wriggled horribly, stabbing the air with its screeches as it tried to pry its roots from where they’d been strapped down.
“Their reckoning begins now.” Reznik nodded at the hydrocops. “Destroy them.”
The hydrocops muscled their way toward the bonecopse, hauling bludgeoned Inborns behind them. The tree seemed to know that it was going to be fed, for it ceased writhing.
“Kill them!” people demanded with flashing eyes. “Kill them!”
The hydrocops shoved the wailing people through the tree’s opening. Then, they chucked in the amputated limbs. The bonecopse wiggled faster, bulging in and out, as if it were chewing. Blood seeped down its craggy bark. The screams escalated into high-pitched shrieks; paired with the echo of ripping limbs, it was the most hellish sound Snofrid had ever heard. Cupping her ears, she tried to run from the square, but the churning throng ensnared her like a fisherman’s net.
Immune to the brutality, half of the crowd went on cheering.
RETRIBUTION!
The Devil’s Notebook
Snofrid, Desya and Lycidius abandoned the city square. Desya’s bluecoat clearance got them exempted through the evacuation queues until they arrived at the plaza.
As they drove, Snofrid clenched the sides of her chair to still her shaking. Deep inside the nub of her terror, she embraced the same impulse she’d had in Oubliette: survive. But this scenario was different. She had a family that she needed to look after now. Protecting them was an automatic instinct, like it had been encoded into her brain; still, she sparred with the desire to run and hide. Neko’s bravery had given her a shot of strength, though not one strong enough to smother her dread of watching Inborns be tortured and killed. Her courage shrank inside of her. She feared this purge would turn out like Memphis: an energy shield had been thrown up there a few months ago. No Inborns had survived. There was nothing to give her hope that this purge would end differently.
“Lycidius and I are gonna hit the Trojan bunkers,” Desya told Snofrid as he braked outside the garage. “They might give us shelter if we get there first. But we need you to stay here and wait for Jazara.”
“I’ll stay. But Dez, I’m…”
“I know. Come here.” He stretched across the console and she clutched him tightly. “We have to keep our heads up until we’re clear of this,” he encouraged. “We’ll be back in forty-five minutes and I’ll call you if anything goes down.”
“Be careful, Dez. Please.”
“We will. I promise.”
Snofrid hopped from the jeep just as Lycidius skated past her. “Go inside the house,” he said. “Put the system in lockdown and don’t open the door for anyone but Jazara.”
“I won’t, Lycidius. May we meet again.” She jogged through the garage into the dim kitchen. “Lights on,” she called, pulling off her gasmask. “System lockdown.”
The lamps flickered on and the door locks engaged. Night was descending fast, presenting a blushing, silver moon. Snofrid stood frozen in the silence, cupping her mouth to stifle a sob. Of the people she’d met, Neko had been one of the few who meant something to her. She didn’t know how to, and didn’t want to, come to terms with the idea that he was gone.
Choking on tears, she scaled the ladder to her loft, only to be reminded of her cage. Out her window she watched electrical currents spark at the apex of the energy shield and ripple down its edges with the vigorous flash of lightning.
Desya had described the shield as a sphere. Half stretched over them, blocking escape by sky, and the other half extended below them, blocking escape from under the earth. The shield was programed to allow in news signals, select aircrafts and atmosphere such as rain, wind and snow. Only the mightiest magic stood a chance against a human energy shield. They’d need at least thirty Lambent Necromancers, all masters of the fire element, to breakout. But, as far as she knew, they didn’t even have one.
Her phone jingled and she swiped it up, counting on a message from Desya.
Hey, Snowball. Just making sure you’re alive.
She tossed the phone onto her mattress. If Fergus knew she was an Inborn, he’d hand her over to Chief Reznik without a second thought. “Television on,” she said, wiping her eyes. “N.U.C. Broadcasting Company.”
The orange screen above her desk switched on, presenting an impressive young man seated in a wingchair on the bottom floor of a grand library. She made a move to change the channel, but stopped.
Behind the man, a gilded butterfly staircase rose into a warren of mahogany bookcases. He reclined with one ankle propped over his knee, dressed in a grey-silk, two-button suit, with his rich black hair slicked back. His lean physique and powerful radiance reminded her of a black stallion. She read the name on the screen: Julian Forsberg.
“Wars will always make certain individuals and organizations wealthier,” he told the pretty interviewer, who was seated across from him. “As they destroy, they also create opportunity. This is a fact of life, Miss Dallan. Soldiers need guns. The black market will always exist, our military will always require contractors, and public officials will always accept bribes.” His mouth stretched into a bored smirk. “You refer to me as a war profiteer, yet my family’s companies ensure that our troops receive weapons, clothing and supplies. And we do not overcharge. So, Miss Dallan, in your practiced criticism of what you do not understand, tell me how I am hurting the New Global Union?”
I know this man. Snofrid stared at Julian’s face, thinking she’d be unsurprised if he looked at her and said ‘cheers’. His voice was the kind that made one want to listen all night, and his Swedish accent glided through her ears as naturally as her own Mystish language, Prenax.
While he talked on, she analyzed his voice, hoping it would spark a memory of him. To her regret, he proved to be a ghost of a memory like all the others.
She took to pacing her tatami mats, hatching escape plans until she lost track of the time. Her ears pricked up at imagined sounds, which propelled her to the window to check for Jazara. Whenever a hydrocop patrol marched by, she was barraged by a cyclone of ghoulish images from the city square—in particular, the haunting look Neko had given her before the bullets had split his gasmask. Yanking the rock shard from Oubliette out of her satchel, she scraped blisters into her palm until her panting slowed to cool, even breaths.
By the time 6:11 came, Snofrid was exhausted from worrying. Thinking a cup of tea might give her a boost, she went into the kitchen. Her hands shook as she suffused green tea leaves in a porcelain teapot, until, sudden as a fluttering wing, an idea popped to the front of her mind; she froze, hands on the teapot. Hessia Nabash. The Seer had promised payment in exchange for acting as bait for the wel
x hunt. The specifics of this offer were vague, so demanding an escape from the city might be too steep of a request. But there was still a chance.
Before making a decision, Snofrid took into account that assisting the Commander and Hessia would require confidentiality—more specifically, she’d have to lie to Desya and Lycidius. This made her question if she was being impulsive.
Or maybe she was just afraid.
She flipped the rock shard around in her palm, face heating up in shame; fear was the real reason she didn’t want to act as bait. But what did she have to fear? She could heal; Desya and Lycidius couldn’t. Rocking on her feet, fingers gripping the countertop, she urged herself to be brave. Daringly dared, half of it won, she told herself. She didn’t know where she’d learned this phrase, only that it gave her courage.
Behind her the genkan sliding panel opened and she reeled around. Lycidius strode into the kitchen, his jackal gasmask in hand. Snow dappled his hair and bomber jacket, and his left eye was as dark and as glowering as a solar eclipse.
“We can’t stay with the Trojans.” He pitched his mask onto the table. “They’re only harboring Inborn children and babies.”
“We’ll hide in here, then,” she said, her voice smaller than she’d intended. “The humans won’t find us if we go on as normal.”
“It’s all we can do for now,” Desya agreed, as he came in on Lycidius’s heels. “Chief Stoker’s gonna wait for our kind to bite back. We need to act like the humans would, and that means doing our jobs and acting normal until we can get help.”
“Help?” Snofrid stepped forward, hopeful. “From whom?”
“The Empyrean City. The shield can only block technological transmissions, not one’s powered by magic, so we can use a transmission globe. Ours is busted right now, but Cid knows a few guys who’ve got globes of their own. We can check in with them. But trust me, Inborns all across the city are probably calling the Empyrean City as we speak.”
“Dez, there are four-thousand Inborns living in Hollowstone at most. In Memphis, there were six-thousand. The Lords would never send a Sky-Legion to Hollowstone for so few.”
“No one can say anything for sure at this point, Snofrid. We just need to try.” He scanned the kitchen with a frown. “Where’s Jazara?”
“She didn’t come,” Snofrid said. She caught a trace of worry in his face. “But it’s still early, Dez.”
“Not for her. She zooms here the minute she gets off of school almost every day. I’ll call her.” He cracked a trapdoor in the floor by the stove, then glanced up at Lycidius. “Grab the hard drive. I’ll boot up the computer.”
“Give me a minute,” Lycidius said. He faced Snofrid. “Come with me when I drive out to borrow a transmission globe.”
“I can’t,” she answered. If she was going to meet Hessia Nabash, she’d need to leave in less than two hours. “I want to be here when Jazara gets here.”
His tone was disappointed. “That’s fine.”
“I’m sorry about before, I don’t mean to panic.” Snofrid pressed her palms over the painful knot in her chest. “Desya told me Neko was your friend before—”
“He was your friend, too,” Lycidius reminded. A hint of compassion softened his features, then faded as he drew back a retractable wall in the cupboard. Behind the wall was a safe, and after using a security iris scanner, he took out a hard drive. “Let’s go,” he said.
She entered the trapdoor after him and descended a spiral staircase, which led into a basement zen garden, designed with heaps of mossy rocks, pruned trees and leafy ferns, and a bamboo fountain. Crisp gravel raked to mimic water ripples bordered the wooden pathway.
“Took you long enough,” Desya remarked. He sat on a tangerine cushion in the center of the room before a low desk with a hologram computer screen.
“Sorry, I didn’t realize we were talking so long,” Snofrid said, taking a cushion beside him. “Did you—?”
She cut off upon feeling something, like a pair of fingers, tugging gently at the tip of her braid. Turning, she found Lycidius standing behind her, his arms folded over his chest. Her suspicions dispelled. Maybe she’d imagined the feeling.
“Did you reach Jazara?” she asked Desya.
“Yeah, her housemother is driving her over. She got a pass to crash here tonight, but don’t let her talk you into planting roots. If she leaves the orphanage right now, it’ll make her a target.”
“I know. I’ll make up a bed for her in my room.”
Lycidius tossed the hard drive to Desya. “Pull it up.”
Desya swiped the hard drive over the computer, connecting it, and then began interfacing with the holograms. Lycidius booted the third cushion into the gravel, puffing up dust, and crouched beside Snofrid.
“Why are we looking at this drive?” she asked Desya. “What’s on it?”
“Dirt.” He coughed croakily; it sounded like he was coming down with a cold. “It has the IP address and access codes to a deep-web system called the Devil’s Notebook.”
“Is the ‘dirt’ criminal activity?”
“More. The system’s a fat pile of dirty laundry. We can use it to pull Chief Stoker’s records.”
She narrowed her eyes, getting a foggy feeling of distrust. “This really seems deep, Dez. How did you get the system?”
“Lycidius stole it from a guy in Gehenna.”
“Who? Is he a Swangunner?”
“No. You didn’t know him,” Lycidius said. “He was one of the Lozoraitis intelligence contacts, but he’s buried in a hillside now.”
She wasn’t comforted. “As long as no one knows we have it. This could be a huge security risk.”
“Ryuki was a top-level white-hat hacker,” Lycidius reminded. “Desya learned from him.” He pointed out a red and black pictogram at the top of the screen: a horned beast leering from the heart of a five-point star. “Everyone who uses the Notebook stays anonymous. The human government couldn’t name the real Devil if they tried.”
“I think I got something,” Desya said, and accessed a file called the Helios Society.
Lycidius’s face hardened. He rocked forward on his toes. “Verify that Reznik has real ties to Helios.”
“Yeah, give me a second, man. I don’t have tentacle hands.” Desya tapped on a link and loaded another page. Photos hugged the middle-text, showing white labs, pillared bank buildings, grand country estates, thought-controlled plane prototypes and plasma weapon systems. He scrolled farther down before halting on an insignia of an emerald serpent coiled around a fiery-orange sun disk. “Stone me,” he cursed.
“This is bullshit,” Lycidius muttered. He elbowed Desya aside and took the cushion before the computer, then entered a long string of code.
“Is the Helios Society a political party?” Snofrid whispered to Desya, as he crouched on the floor beside her.
“It’s more like a secret club with strong political influence. They popped up in England about eighteen years ago. Some banker named Sir Northrup Castle started everything, but now, most human world leaders have been initiated.”
“They mean nothing,” Lycidius said, now flipping through criminal records. “Only three families threaten us: The Forsberg’s, the Leathertongue’s and the Castle’s.”
Snofrid thought back to the interview she’d watched and wondered if she’d been hallucinating. “Dez, I’m almost positive I know Julian Forsberg.”
“What? Why would you think that?”
“I recognized him during an interview.”
He exchanged a skeptical look with Lycidius. “If somehow you’re able to bilocate and have a couple hundred billion golds stacked up somewhere, then you probably do.”
“Dez, I’m serious.”
“Okay…” He mulled over the idea, before shaking his head. “You never met him that I know of.”
She believed he was telling the truth for he had no reason to lie. Claiming to know a Forsberg was probably the same as claiming to be close friends with an Inborn Lord, and
yet, the sense that she knew Julian lingered like perfume in an elevator. “Do you think the Chancellor is a member of the Helios Society?”
“If he is—” Desya sneezed abruptly, then wiped spittle from his mouth. “If he is, then Chief Stoker sure as hell is, too.”
“Why are they a threat to us, though?”
His expression turned sheepish. “They finance Regulative, Sno.”
She stared at the beast pictogram with as much fear as if it might spring out at her, for Regulative was her kind’s worst nightmare. A year after her kind had come to earth, the humans had formed the Regulative organization to study her kind. Rumors claimed that their first objective was to find a way to extend the human lifespan through Inborn DNA.
“Hey, pull up the lab photos,” Desya asked Lycidius.
“Let me finish. Show her the pictures after.”
“Don’t worry about it, Dez,” Snofrid interrupted. Lycidius didn’t look like he’d budge even if a bulldozer tried to force him. “Just tell me what Regulative is, and I’ll have a look later.”
“Yeah, fine.” He rose up on the balls of his boots, gesticulating. “Regulative scientists cross-engineered human clones with our DNA, but they always turned out more like beasts, so we call the things Mongrels. The Helios Society created a couple Mongrel batches and tried storing existing consciousnesses in them. Basically, these guys wanted to be able to jump from body to body without losing their knowledge.”
“So, it didn’t work?” she asked.
“No, the project bombed.” Desya turned abruptly and coughed hard into his sleeve.
“You should drink some tea,” she advised, rising from her cushion. “I’ll make you a cup upstairs.”
Hatred Day Page 11
