by Cooke, Chele
Georgianna pulled back and looked up at him, her eyes wet with tears. He was worried, that much was obvious, but he was smiling. Shaking her head, Georgianna let out a low laugh. She brushed the heel of her hand across her eyes, forcing herself to calm down. As the tears were brushed away from her lashes, she caught sight of his neck. There were scars that wove like spiderwebs across his skin, but no cinystalq collar.
“I thought… I was…”
Her gaze swept across his exposed skin, looking for fresh marks. There was a tan line where the collar had blocked the sun from reaching his skin, there were older scars, but nothing that could have been less than a few days old. However Wrench did it, he was good at removing a cinystalq collar without any damage to the wearer.
“You panicked!” he answered knowingly.
Georgianna nodded.
“You knew I was involved?”
“Nyah,” he nodded. “By the time she told me, it was too late to stop you.”
Finally glancing away from him, Georgianna’s smile fell, her eyes narrowing in suspicion. Why had nobody else come out? Alec had confirmed that it was her, so why were they all still hiding? She turned herself full circle, peering at every corner in the hopes of seeing another of her friends hiding in the shadows. All too quickly, her gaze landed back on Alec, the only one with her in the small, dark building.
“Where are the others?” she asked, looking at Alec curiously.
Alec narrowed his eyes a little, his nostrils flaring as he looked down at her. It was almost as if he was surprised that she’d asked where the others were, like he hadn’t known that they were supposed to be here.
“Keiran and I left to check that the path was clear while Wrench moved on to Nyah’s collar,” he answered slowly. “He told me to come here and check that there were no Adveni about.”
All the relief Georgianna had felt at the sight of Alec was slowly slipping away. The warmth of excitement dripping from her body through her fingers and toes, leaving her body cold. While Alec was safe, the others weren’t. While they stood here hugging, the others could be in the middle of being dragged off to the compound.
Georgianna pulled away, wrapping her arms around her stomach as she rushed forward through the small building to look out of the grimy window. Not even bothering to cover her hand with her sleeve, Georgianna smeared her hand through the dirt, clearing off a small space to peer through into the alley. Apart from the distant activity on the main street, it was deserted.
“George, what’s going on?” he asked. “I thought this was the plan?”
“No,” Georgianna muttered, not turning back from the window. “No, I was meant to meet all of you here.”
Sighing, Georgianna closed her eyes, taking a breath before she turned back to Alec. He stared back at her, his eyes narrowed and his lips pressed into a thin line. Creases lined themselves between his brow as he stood resolutely still. Georgianna stepped away from the window, leaving a small beam of light shining through the patch she had cleaned away.
“The Adveni know about the escape,” she brushed the dirt from her hands. “I heard people talking at the compound. They knew too much to be guesses.”
Even through the darkness, Georgianna could see Alec’s eyes widen. Before Georgianna could even move, Alec had turned and was heading for the door. Georgianna leapt across the space towards him, reaching the door as his hand settled on the handle.
“Alec…”
“No, George, we have to go back!” he said sternly. “We…”
“And get yourself thrown back into Lyndbury?” she demanded, a vicious force to her voice that she hadn’t meant to be there. “If I’m right, every Adveni in Adlai could know who you are, ‘Lec!”
He glared down at her, and for a moment she could only think of the last time they’d spoken before his capture. They’d been angry at each other back then too, saying things they didn’t mean, or maybe did mean, but hadn’t intended to sound as bad as they had in the heat of the moment.
She watched as he took a slow breath.
“We have to go back for them,” he repeated. “Nyah has information.”
“We’ll get them, but we have to…”
He released the handle, grabbing Georgianna’s shoulders and turning her to face him. This was the part where he’d order her down, just like he’d done before, where he’d called her stupid and immature. She knew that face, she’d seen it too many times. Not just on Alec, but on her brother too.
“You don’t get it!” he said slowly. “Nyah has information I need. Maarqyn helped build the pillars, George. I’ve spent two years getting that information and Nyah has some of it!”
Georgianna’s mouth fell open, her eyes widening in surprise. With those words, she knew why Alec had never fought to be freed, why Beck had kept the secret that he was alive. Alec was gathering information for them, he had chosen this.
“George, we can destroy them!”
“You can’t!” Georgianna cried quickly. “They stop it… Without them…”
“Without them, the Adveni wouldn’t dare set off the Mykahnol. It’s their last defence! Even they can’t stop it if the pillars aren’t there.”
Georgianna didn’t know what to say. If Alec was right then destroying the pillars could make the Adveni too scared to even consider going through with their threat. They could build more, she assumed, but it would take time, time the Veniche could use to fight back.
“Information or not, Alec, you have that information too, you can’t be…”
Georgianna stopped, her jaw falling as she looked away from Alec, a thought that wouldn’t go away finally slotting into place.
“Si knew,” she said.
Alec looked quickly away from her, his mouth opening and closing but no words coming forth as he took a slow step back. Georgianna remembered that look, the way he would avoid eye contact when there was something he couldn’t say. Before his capture it had been things about his wife, details that he didn’t feel right sharing with someone he was sleeping with, like he was betraying her. Now, however, Georgianna glared back at him, knowing that he couldn’t tell her because someone had told him not to.
“Si knew about the pillars, didn’t he?” Georgianna demanded. “He was meeting with you, he kept talking about ‘taking them down’.”
Alec frowned, shaking his head quickly as if it didn’t matter. Right now, she supposed, it didn’t, but Georgianna still glared back at him, waiting for an answer. It all fit inside her head, it all made sense. Si hadn’t been able to tell Jaid where he was going because nobody knew that Alec was alive. Beck had wanted to know what Si had found out because it was information about the pillars and their destruction. Everything was fitting into place.
“I was meeting with Si,” Alec murmured finally. “Passing him the information I gathered from Maarqyn. The last time we met, Maarqyn had others in the house, they heard us. They chased him and I… I have no idea what happened.”
“Si was left out in the sun for three days,” Georgianna answered. “Jaid got him back to the tunnels, but he’s not the same.”
Alec groaned under his breath and reached up, rubbing his hand across the back of his neck. Georgianna gritted her teeth.
“So all this for some information?” she asked. “People knew you weren’t dead and they… your brother?”
“He doesn’t know.”
“He was captured!”
Alec had been a master at hiding his emotions, even when they were children, but nothing could hide the pain in his face now. His lips parted, as if he was about to speak, but there was nothing.
Stepping back, Georgianna looked down at her boots and the imprints they had made in the dust. Shaking her head, she wrapped her arms protectively around her stomach. Alec stared past her.
“And Beck said he wouldn’t help.”
“George, he has been helping!” he argued. “He sent Si to meet with me.”
“No,” she corrected. “He wouldn’t help us ge
t you out. I asked him. It was before I knew about you, but I said Maarqyn’s name. So he knew there was a Belsa in that house. He said no.”
“He couldn’t, not if we wanted this information.”
Glancing up, Georgianna shook her head. This was ridiculous. They needed to make sure that the others were safe, not stand around discussing the lies of the Belsa commander.
“I’ll go!” she finally nodded.
Alec placed his hands on her shoulders.
“No! We both…”
“I’m less suspicious, Alec!” she argued sharply. “You’re an escaped drysta, not to mention a Belsa. I can go to see if they’re still there.”
Alec didn’t like it, she could see it in his face. Even after all this time, she could see that he was trying to think of a way to argue, to tell her something that she would have to accept. Though Alec should have known already that Georgianna was stubborn enough not to listen to him.
Finally, he released her shoulders and nodded.
“If you’re not back within the hour, I’m coming after you.”
Georgianna gave him a small smile as she returned his nod. She knew Alec would not stay put for long. He was too loyal, too caring. He wouldn’t be able to sit back and do nothing while other people got hurt. They were too similar to each other in the end.
Pressing her hand to Alec’s jaw, Georgianna pushed herself up onto her toes and planted a gentle kiss against his cheek. She would be back soon, she was sure she would. Alec had calmed her nerves, if only a little. The others would be fine. She stepped back, giving him a final smile before pulling open the door and stepping out into the sunshine.
34 The Preceding Void
Stepping out of the alleyway and onto the street, she didn’t even notice it at first, the way her steps quickened the further she went. Through the Oprust markets, her gait lengthened, her stride more purposeful as she weaved through the crowds and made her way between the rows of stalls. Her gaze darted around constantly, cautious and suspicious. Any of the people in the street might be an Adveni. They could look so similar that if they tried, they would fit in perfectly. Dressed in the right clothes, any person in the market could have been posing as Veniche.
There was one thing Georgianna still couldn’t work out, and that was how they had been discovered. She couldn’t think of anyone who had known the details that would betray them. Maybe Taye had told someone, one of his friends down in the Carae who would do anything for a price. Georgianna couldn’t imagine anyone in the Belsa would have sold them out, even if they’d overheard something, but maybe it was possible.
Frowning as she turned the corner onto the correct street, Georgianna’s gaze swept through the crowd, looking for anyone who was watching the surroundings. All down the street the market was at its peak, lines of stalls covered in different wares, their vendors yelling the wares they were offering over the general craze of people wandering from one stall to the next. In amongst them, people with the odd item or two to sell set up in any space they could find, their calls to buy unable to match those of the experienced vendors. Through the crush of the market, it was impossible to spot anything out of the ordinary. Even if there were Adveni lying in wait, Georgianna wasn’t sure that she could have spotted them.
She assumed Keiran had figured she wouldn’t have been listening when he, Taye, and Wrench were making their plans. Georgianna wasn’t involved, so she hadn’t needed to pay attention. She had anyway. So, continuing down the street, she was able to recognise the two-storey building that they’d talked about.
Even as Georgianna approached, she could see the moss green sign with bronzed letters hanging in the window, but nobody ever slowed to take a look inside. The Adveni owner wanted too high a price for its use, and so the building had remained empty since it had been built. It was a perfect choice for what they’d needed. Once inside, nobody would bother them and it stood halfway down the busy market road, making it difficult to approach with a large force.
Now, standing in front of the gilded wooden door, she was glad she had paid attention as she took one last glance around what she could see of the street. Pushing the door open, she slipped inside, closing the door softly behind her and stepping further in.
One of the windows was broken, glass scattered over the floor. It was an inconspicuous place to meet, not to mention that it had a second floor, meaning that they could keep an eye out over the crowd on the street.
She couldn’t hear anything but the bustle on the street outside. Through the broken window, voices and footsteps filtered in like they were right next to her. Georgianna moved through the building towards the back, taking hold of the rail nailed into the wall beside the stairs, and took the first step upward.
The wood creaked beneath her foot, causing Georgianna to pause. What if they thought she were an Adveni and moved out? No, Taye wasn’t stupid. If Keiran and Alec had been sent out to look for Adveni, Taye would have been the one watching from the window. He would have seen her coming. He would know she wasn’t Adveni.
Each step creaked loudly, the dust muffling her footsteps doing nothing to stop the groan of the disused wood under her weight. With every step, Georgianna paused, listening for sounds from upstairs. If there were anyone here, surely she would have heard it by now? Still, she heard nothing. There was nothing for it. She jogged up the rest of the steps, coming around the banister and onto the open second floor.
Nobody.
Taye, Nyah, Keiran and Wrench were all gone, already moved on to their meeting place, she could only hope. If not, they were on their way back to the compound. She couldn’t believe that. If they’d been taken, she could only imagine that the Adveni would have left people to see if anyone else showed up.
Despite finding no one inside, Georgianna could already see that someone had been there. Smears and patches of wooden flooring gleamed in the sunlight through the dust, round marks where knees had rested, imprints of asses where they had sat perfectly still while Wrench had done his work. In a corner of one of the large glass windows, a gap had been rubbed clean to look down on the street below.
As she moved further across the floor, her steps slow and cautious, Georgianna paused as a glint shone out from one of the corners. It was only for a moment, a reflection of something, but with the rest of the room so utterly bare, she crept forward to investigate.
It wasn’t a weapon, she knew that much already. Not only would she have seen the bearer, it was too close to the ground. Stepping closer, Georgianna let out a relieved sigh as she realised what she was looking at.
She crouched, slipping her fingers around the polished, dark metal, and lifted it from the floor. The cinystalq collar was lighter than she’d have thought. They always looked so heavy, so solid, but now, with wires hanging from the broken end, it was almost delicate.
A second collar lay in the corner, its broken and mangled innards hanging out just like the first. They had to have escaped. The Adveni would have taken the two collars if they’d been caught. Nyah was free, just like Alec. She would be joined with Taye, and even if she had to live the rest of her life in hiding, she would be happy.
Georgianna couldn’t quell the smile that had slowly spread across her lips. She would return to Alec, telling him that everything was okay, if the others hadn’t reached him already. They could take the information about the pillars to the Belsa and this would all be over.
She wasn’t sure what it was that had her moving over towards the window, perhaps the chance of seeing one of them moving down the street, having only left moments before. Georgianna stepped closer to the glass, looking through the small patch that had been rubbed clean, probably by Taye or Keiran as they watched the proceedings, or Wrench while he’d been waiting for the others to arrive.
Standing up on her toes to look down at the street, Georgianna swept her gaze over the crowd in the hopes of seeing one of them, but she couldn’t see anyone she recognised, not even the familiar colour of their hair or the shape of their
stance.
She was about to turn back. She would drop the collar back into the corner and return downstairs, slipping out onto the street where nobody would pay any attention to her. She would make her way through the people, back to the building where Alec was waiting. She could already picture it. Keiran would have arrived by that point, angry and worried that Georgianna hadn’t been where she was meant to be. Taye and Nyah wouldn’t be able to keep their hands from each other, the promised joining ring already on Nyah’s finger. Wrench would be badgering Alec for more information on the pillars, but Alec wouldn’t be listening, his face glowing in relief that she’d not done something stupid. She could already see it. It was so vivid, so real, that she was already leaving when she heard a cry of pain coming from the street below.
Georgianna spun back to the window. She pressed her hand against the glass as she leaned closer to look. A woman was on the ground up the street. A space grew around her as she huddled over, clutching her neck.
The space, empty of people, continued to spread. People ducked out of the way and pressed themselves against walls. Five bodies dressed in black armour tramped down the street. Georgianna turned to look the other way. Five more armoured men were moving in from the other end of the road. Their weapons were raised. They pushed people out of their way, never breaking their stride. The elite soldiers of the Tsevstakre were unmistakable and people knew to get out of their way. Whoever didn’t move was forced to. The soldiers’ unparalleled efficiency often ended in brutal results.
Georgianna didn’t even think about the fact she still held one of the collars in her hand. She turned and sprinted across the second floor. She was halfway downstairs when she knew she would never be out of the building before they spotted her. The Tsevstakre were the best, hunters of the Adveni. There was no chance of getting past them.
She turned and leaped back up the steps. Flinging herself across the room, she opened the door in the corner leading to the roof. All Adveni buildings had them. Georgianna had never really understood their use, but as she wrenched the door open, her foot on the bottom step, she heard it. Footsteps above her were coming across the roof. Edtroka had been right: Maarqyn was an important man, high enough in the Adveni ranks to order a full assault for the recapture of his escaped dreta. Two or three of the Tsevstakre would probably have done the job. They were trained well enough to make up for two or three Agrah soldiers. From what Georgianna had seen through the window, he had at least ten on the ground with more above her. It was a full scale attack under his orders.
