“Plans changed,” Tack said. He looked nervous, or sorry, or both.
“Where’s Garren?” I asked. “I need to talk to him.”
Tack shifted. “You’re a prisoner. You’re not exactly in a position to be making demands.”
Fortunately, I knew Tack was an easy straw to break. I spoke in a snarl, as if I planned to sink my teeth into his neck.
“According to Garren, I’m a blasted bargaining chip. That means you need me. I could start starving myself, or you could have him come talk to me.”
Tack took a step back. “I—”
“Tell him to come speak to me, or I’ll hurt myself.”
He scrambled from the room, and I hauled myself up and crossed to the bunk to examine the tray he’d brought. Metal slots were divided into cooked seaweed, a square of pink-colored fish puree, and what appeared to be milk pudding. I picked up the fork, my restraints jingling, and dug into the puree with a vengeance. My head was spinning from hunger, and I needed to think clearly if I was going to do this right. The food was tasteless but filling, and I ate it all. When I’d finished, I returned to my previous position. I left the tray but kept the fork, tucking it out of sight between my knees as I rested my bound hands on my legs.
Garren arrived with an annoyed expression on his face. He already reeked from the overestimation of his own power. He strode inside my cell of a room and clasped his arms behind his back. “I hear you’re threatening to go on a hunger strike.” He looked at my tray, empty of food, and frowned.
“I just want to talk,” I said, and paused. “The food is disgusting, by the way.” I said the last bit for Tob’s sake, for surely he would have said the same if he were here. “It could use some... uh, puffer fish stingers?”
A vein in Garren’s neck pulsed. He was not amused by my pitiful tribute. “It looks like you managed to eat it all anyway. Hardly a hunger strike, Itlantean.”
“Oh, that was just to get Tack to call you in here. I need my strength, if I’m going to be facing Nautilus.” I looked him straight in the eyes. “Doing my bargaining chip duties and all. Of course, on the subject of bargaining, I don’t know that you’ve thought this through. I’ve been inside several of your Dron ships, you know, and I’m a very observant person. I know you can fly the island ships. I’ve gotten a good look at a lot of your equipment. I know passwords. And I am thinking of doing a little bargaining myself, when I’m face to face with my enemy.”
Garren’s hands formed fists at his side, and I squeezed my fingers tight around the handle of the fork between my knees.
If he made any sudden moves, I was going to stab him.
“I thought you might want to know that before you did anything too hasty,” I continued, “like handing over a security risk to your greatest enemy. We aren’t exactly friends, you and I, so you might want to consider what my loyalty would be when faced with your enemy.”
Garren scowled. I could see he was chewing over my words, trying to determine if I meant them.
“Nautilus isn’t going to listen to anything you say,” he muttered.
“You don’t know that.” I paused. “On the other hand, my family would be willing to pay a great deal of money for my return.”
“Your family,” he repeated, a sneer crossing his face.
“They’re quite wealthy. We’ve discussed this before, when you tried to torture me.”
“Right.” He started to turn, and my heart jumped into my throat. He wasn’t listening.
“I think perhaps you should let your superiors in Basin decide before you dismiss the prospect of something that could help your people so much,” I said.
Garren paused. “Basin? Why do you want to go there? What’s your game, Itlantean?”
I kept my voice even. “I don’t particularly want to see Nautilus, so I’m trying to strike a bargain we can both agree on.”
Garren faced me again. “We’re never going to agree on anything, Itlantean. Remember that.”
With that, he left the room.
CHAPTER TWO
I FELL ASLEEP after that, giving in to the sheer exhaustion that lay rough and gritty as gravel behind my eyes and in my veins. My dreams were restless, haunted by Laimila, her face reflecting betrayal each time I accused her afresh, and Merelus, his body weak as he struggled to breath in my arms. I jerked into a sitting position again and again as I dreamed someone pressed a weapon to the back of my neck and ordered me to tell them where the Village of the Rocks was. The voice alternately belonged to Kit, Nautilus, or Valus, but every time I turned around to confront my killer, it was my mother who wielded the weapon. I was too exhausted to stay awake, and dozed off again even as my heart pounded from the residual horror of the nightmares.
I woke when the door hissed open to admit a visitor. It was Nol again. He stood, illuminated from behind by the light from the hall, and then he reached over and punched the button to close the panels. Darkness rushed over us both. The pale light of the room flickered in time with my heart. Looking at him and remembering the trust we’d had once made me feel broken in pieces, but the anger I felt fused me back together, a simmering, roiling adhesive that threatened to swallow me even as it held me together.
A memory assailed me, vivid in my mind.
“Get out of the city, Aemi,” Nol said.
“Why?”
“Something is coming.”
“Are the Dron going to attack? Are you here alone? Are you going to do something to the city?”
Nol shook his head. “I can’t tell you why I’m here.”
“Then why say anything at all?”
He drew closer, and his breath brushed my lips. “Because I love you.”
“You talked to Garren,” Nol said, stepping farther into the room. Shadows smudged the skin beneath his eyes, looking like bruises. A vein pulsed in his neck. He was angry, I supposed.
I rubbed my eyes, trying to alleviate the throbbing behind them. “For all the good it did me.”
Because I love you, he’d said.
The words stuck in my mind, taunting me from within my memories as I looked at him. Liar, I wanted to shout. Liar, liar, LIAR. You don’t. Don’t say that you do. Don’t lie to me. You used me. You don’t care. How dare you pretend otherwise.
But I didn’t say it. The words burned on my tongue, unspoken, little bits of heart fire that tasted like ash when I swallowed them back.
Nol was quiet a moment. “He changed course again, and we’re headed for Basin. Whatever you said, he listened.”
I was silent in my surprise, both at Garren’s choice and Nol’s grudging admittance of my victory.
Nol shifted. He looked at me and then the bunk, as if gauging my emotional state. After a pause, he crossed the room and sat down on the mattress.
“No,” I said. “Go away. I don’t want you here.”
Liar, liar, liar, my mind whispered. Me, or him?
“We need to talk.”
“You’ve betrayed me. Twice. You’re the enemy now. I’m not a fool.”
Was I? I refused to be.
Nol’s face tightened almost imperceptibly. His jaw flexed, and his eyes darkened with an undefined emotion that might have been pain. “Haven’t we already had this conversation? I’m trying to walk a thin line here, Aemi. I am with the Dron, but...”
The word hung in the air, the sentence unfinished.
I moved restlessly, drawing my legs up to my chest as if to shield myself. I did not want to hear his half-spoken promises. He would only hurt me again.
I was finished trusting him.
“I want to help you,” he said.
The laugh that came from my throat sounded like a cough. “Don’t insult me.”
He ground his teeth together as he looked at me. We sat like that a moment, staring each other down, and every flick of our eyes and shift of our bodies was an accusation, an argument. Tension strung my body tight.
“You’re fighting me, and that’s a mistake. I want to help you. I’m n
ot the one who dragged you here.”
Those words shook me free from my anger for a moment. He was right; it was a mistake to let my fury blind me to what I needed to accomplish. And I might as well use his offers to do it.
I needed to get a better idea of what was going on with this ship and with the Dron since I’d last encountered them. Hiding in this cell, while it was what I wanted to do, was not going to help me accomplish that.
Eating with them might.
A sigh hissed through my lips. I stood and stretched my legs. I looked at the clothes they’d brought me. “When is the next meal?”
~ ~ ~
I was allowed to shower in a dingy cylinder that spat icy water over my limbs in spurts while I scrubbed at my body and hair with a square of soap that smelled like soured seaweed. After I was clean, I tugged on the clean clothes Nol had provided. The thick cloth swallowed my shivering limbs, and I looked down at myself. The right cuff of my shift was embroidered with a knife, the symbol of Watchgard, the Dron division of defenders. Soldiers.
Clothes were clothes, and I didn’t care as long as they were clean and dry, but it felt strange to wear a Dron uniform. I braided my wet hair in a four-strand plait, and the ends dripped on the floor with a faint splashing sound that broke the silence.
Nol was waiting for me outside the shower room. He made no comment about the defender uniform, probably because I gave him a look that spelled death as we stepped together into the corridor. He didn’t put my restraints back on my wrists, but he stayed close to me, as if ready to grab me if I tried to run.
The smell of meat cooking wafted on the air, making my stomach clench. I thought of my friend Tob and what he might say. Worry washed over me. Had the others made it safely away from Primus? Were they safe now?
Nol and I entered a low, windowless room filled with metal tables and benches. He led the way, his strides confident, and I trailed behind him. Men and women sat eating in groups, some with their shoulders pulled forward and their heads lowered as if they feared the food might vanish at any moment, others alert and at-ready, as if expecting an attack. I spotted Tack in one of the corners with Garren beside him. My stomach turned over, but I lifted my chin and held their gazes when they looked my way.
I would not be cowed.
The food consisted mainly of a brown-colored stew, congealed with chunks of meat and something green floating in it, and again I thought of Tob. I missed my friends. My chest felt hollowed out, and the feeling was more than hunger.
Once I’d gotten food from a steel table inlaid with round indentions to hold the food, I headed straight for Tack and Garren’s table.
Tack looked at me with undisguised shock as I sat down.
Nol took the place beside me. His bowl clattered in front of him, and he stuck his spoon into the soup without comment.
“What is she doing here?” Garren said to him irritably.
“I wanted to talk,” I answered. “You are the only Dron I know, so I picked this table.” I took a bite of the stew and grimaced.
“Our cook is trying a new recipe,” Tack said. “It’s called ‘cook whatever is left in the galley.’ I’m not sure it’s anyone’s favorite.”
“I’m sorry we don’t have anything for your refined Itlantean palate,” Garren sneered. “Not everyone can live in the lap of luxury.”
“No masks this time?” I looked around the room.
“Those are just to intimidate the Itlanteans,” Tack said.
“Might as well play into the idea that we’re giant monsters waiting to eat your children, right?” Garren said with a nasty smile.
“Do you really want the Itlanteans to fear you?” I asked. “Won’t that make them more likely to try to attack you?”
“They hated us before they feared us,” Garren said. “Fear gives us an edge, keeps you people cautious. But why am I telling you this?”
“Listen,” I said. “Did you see what Nautilus was doing when you kidnapped me? He was destroying my home. I don’t care about whatever you Dron are doing. I want him stopped. So stop thinking of me as your greatest enemy, because I’m not. I happen to be Itlantean, but I’ve got a lot more going on right now besides some centuries-old animosity between your people and mine, especially since I spent the majority of my life elsewhere and have nothing against you people besides the fact that you once kidnapped me, kept me a prisoner, and threatened me with torture.”
Garren and Tack didn’t respond to that. Tack scratched his neck and looked at Nol.
“You grew up together. That’s why he has a weak spot for you?”
Nol glared daggers at Tack.
“We grew up together,” I confirmed. “And we hated each other.”
Garren made a face that suggested he didn’t blame Nol in the slightest.
Tack frowned. “But he isn’t Itlantean.”
“No. I was kidnapped and raised elsewhere.”
“That seems to happen to you a lot,” Tack observed. “Being kidnapped.”
“Right. And I’m getting weary of it.”
I ate the stew. The table was quiet. The ship hummed around us, voices filled the air, and I tried to keep the worry in my chest contained.
After the silence had built to something thick and suffocating, I tried talking again.
“Not all Itlanteans hate you,” I tried.
Garren snorted. “I don’t have to listen to what you think is reality, girl. I have facts.”
“The fact is that your people and mine have had twenty years of no contact—”
“No.” Garren slammed his spoon down. “The fact is that the Dron have dedicated twenty years to avoiding battles, which was a mistake. Look where it’s gotten us. Itlanteans are slaughtering us in even greater numbers, and with more brutality than ever before, and we are too weak to properly defend ourselves because we’ve spent all this time running and hiding instead of training warriors to do battle.”
“Not Itlanteans,” I said. “Nautilus. He’s killing everyone. He’s trying to take over Itlantis. He’s destroyed and ravaged everything he can. It is not the same!”
Garren leaned forward. “To us, they are all Itlanteans. We don’t care about your political nuances.”
I stared at him. My pulse beat in my ears. Arguing this point was like pounding my head against a rock, so I changed the subject. “Why did you stop instigating battles for twenty years?”
Garren sat back and folded his arms across his chest, refusing to answer. By the tightness of his jaw, he was furious. His eyes sparked fire at me.
Tack responded instead. “Opinions shifted. After the disastrous attack on one of our ships carrying a great number of children, those in power thought we should try to avoid starting more slaughter. Which, I might add, is a good idea, because it involves less slaughter.”
“And we’ve been hiding like cowards ever since!” Garren exploded.
Disastrous attack on ships full of children? My stomach turned over. “Why?”
Garren shrugged, switching back to uncommunicative.
“Retaliation,” Tack said. “For attacking a ship carrying scientists from your ice city.” He paused. “Of course, we only attacked it because they had taken our people, young ones. We wanted them back. Surely you can understand that? Doing anything necessary to get your people back?”
“Why would we kidnap Dron children?”
“I’ve heard it said that they were using them for experiments in your city called Arctus.”
A prickle ran down my spine. I remembered Valli’s words to me when I’d still been a captive of the Dron before.
According to the rumors, the experiments were being carried out on humans. The man I heard the tales from swore it.
“It was a place in icy waters,” Tack said. “Cold and clear and blue. My father took part in the raid, and he’s told me stories.”
“That ship was full of doctors and scientists.”
“That ship,” Garren said, “was full of butchers. They refused to t
ell us anything. They fought back. We did not want to kill them. The mission was a failure. We never regained our children.”
My stomach felt like a stone. Garren and Tack looked away, and Garren’s throat convulsed as he swallowed.
“Garren’s brother was among the children taken—” Tack started to say.
“Shut up!” Garren slammed his fist on the table, and Tack fell silent.
Nobody said anything, and the air was heavy with words and thoughts. Pain carved itself across Garren’s face. I let out a shuddering breath as I absorbed this information.
Without the exchange of words between us, the hum of voices from the rest of the room filled my ears. Snatches of conversations about “butcher Itlanteans” and “danger among us” made me uneasy. I rubbed my ears and met every stare that was aimed my way.
“When are we getting to Basin?” I asked.
“You know,” Garren said, throwing his spoon into his empty bowl. “You talk a lot.”
I wanted to reply belligerently, but I bit my tongue and held in the words. Antagonizing my captors was something I would have done a year ago, but it seemed stupid and pointless. Instead, I held his gaze and waited. Garren scowled. Tack looked between us nervously.
After a beat, Nol answered me. “Another day’s travel, roughly.”
I opened my mouth to respond, and the ship shuddered. A siren shrieked from the corridor, and the Dron jumped to their feet as bowls clattered and slid sideways.
Panic exploded in my chest as memories of sinking cities flashed through my mind. I struggled to breathe calmly, but my throat squeezed and my lungs shriveled with terror as I leaped up. Bodies crushed around me, pressing me back against the table, against Nol.
“What’s going on?” I shouted to Nol above the cacophony.
Nol grabbed my elbow and steered me toward the door when there was a break in the crowd. “We’re being attacked.” He spoke tersely, every word clipped. The alarms drowned out most of the sound.
“Nautilus?”
“I don’t know. Itlanteans.”
Fear pooled in the pit of my stomach. I stumbled against the wall as the ship shook, and Nol wrapped an arm around my waist, pulling me close to him to keep me upright. I could feel his heart ramming against my shoulder through his chest.
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