This was what the Taciturns had been doing over the last few weeks. While we were spinning circles, and going nowhere, Sedia had been testing the Ministry’s reach. Like a true Tribesman, she had been pushing the boundaries of her territory and marking it.
The house we hid in now and twenty-eight others just like it loosely encircled Fandrin’s silver fortress. There were three ways into the massive building on ground level and if our plans went well, there could be five by the end of the night.
Night was a relative term these days. Since The Wall’s breach, the dome had re-engaged, but its surface remained black. It was eerie, like looking up into an abyss.
Tartarus’ sky was almost always brooding, but even those green swirling angry skies were better than this. If you stared too long, it felt like you might fall up and the blackness would swallow you whole. I shuddered thinking about it.
Voices echoed up the stairs from the hidden doorway. This house didn’t have the safe rooms below like Ryker’s had, but it was still connected to the tunnels. All the homes were.
Arden began wheezing again and I gave Otto a meaningful look.
“How about we go upstairs to check on Triven and Archer?” Otto clapped a hand on Arden’s back, already guiding him off the wall and toward the steps leading upward. With one last glance at Fandrin’s photo, Arden went willingly. Otto cast me a look over his shoulder. Subtly, he pointed at his eye and then at Arden’s back with a smile. I’ve got him, the gesture said.
Light feet hopped up the stairs from the subfloor, skipping steps as they approached. A dark head with fathomless eyes came into view. Tensions in the room instantly rose as Sedia bounced up the last step. She was grinning as always, humming something to herself that carried no tune.
She was quick to pick me out in the crowd, her face lighting up. I didn’t return the grin and she didn’t seem to care. Seven other Taciturns sporting an impressive number of tattoos appeared behind their leader. Unlike Sedia, they showed no sign of being happy to see us.
“Your Adroits are fun, even if they no longer wear their colors.” Sedia purred.
I looked past her.
The breath I had been holding released as a pair of tall, dark-haired men brought up the rear with two other ex-Adroits close behind. I had seen the round-faced woman and the squat man many times before, but it wasn’t until a few weeks ago that I learned their birthright.
We couldn’t get the Adroit Tribe to join our cause, but that didn’t mean we didn’t have any. It had been Arstid’s idea. And a good one at that. Getting into a pissing match with explosives was dangerous. But using smaller bombs to trigger other bombs—that could be useful.
Ryker touched his ear, looking me directly in the face. “Maroon team, back. Confirmation on deployment. Everything is in place.”
A chorus of “Confirms” replied before the line went silent again.
“How soon?” Grenald rolled his shoulders, coming to my side. Sedia’s head craned back to get the full view of him. She looked like a child next to our giant. Her head fell sideways, eyes stretching wide—a demented child. Grenald didn’t step away, but it was obvious he wanted to. Sedia had that effect on a person.
“Thirty minutes.” Ryker confirmed checking his watch. He shifted his weight to the good leg.
“You’re big.” Sedia cut in, clearly not listening to anything that had just been said.
Grenald stared down at the tiny woman. “You’re short.”
She twirled with a peel of laughter. There were singe marks in the Taciturn’s hair and her face had suffered what appeared to be a shrapnel assault. Little scabs flecked her neck, cheeks and forehead. Consequences of testing bomb ranges, I supposed.
With the grace of an acrobat, Sedia vaulted herself over the couch. She flounced onto the grey cushions. What I hoped was mud flecked off her boots as she ground the heels into the tightly knit fabric.
“Has anyone raided the kitchen yet?” She patted her stomach, “I’m always starving before a good kill.”
Her Tribe members chortled. A large dark-skinned man at the rear barked out a laugh. Lust was clear in his expression as he stared at Sedia. “Damn, crazy looks good on you woman.” One side of the man’s head was shaved and embellishing the exposed skin was a giant spider, a grinning skull its oversized body while the legs cascaded over his brow and down his neck. It was hard not to stare.
Sedia blew him a kiss as he headed toward the kitchen, dragging along a smaller man with flames covering his bare back. Grenald and another rebel, whose name I hadn’t learned, followed casually.
“Thank you Levo,” she purred. Tucking her chin into her shoulder, Sedia batted her eyes at me. “Insanity does suit me, but we are all mad here.”
I froze. Sedia’s eyes sparkled mischievously.
That was a quote from a book. I knew that, but did she?
“Or you wouldn’t have come here.” I spouted the next part of the line. Testing her. I didn’t remember all of the book in great detail, but that quote had stuck with me.
The change was barely perceptible. If I hadn’t been looking for it, I might have blinked and missed that split second when the insane woman suddenly looked stone cold sober. But it passed so quickly, I thought I might have imagined it.
Sedia clapped her hands and began laughing. “Awe. I love it when people play.” She threw her arms over the couch, propelling herself up onto the back. She stood there, balancing on the edge. “Now, this mouth isn’t gonna to feed itself.”
Quick as a whip, the Taciturn leapt down and snatched my arm, pulling me close. “My brother always said you were smart. I see why he liked you.” Sedia pecked my cheek and loped into the kitchen to find her own food.
I stared after her, utterly baffled.
“She’s something else.” Ryker whispered behind me.
“Definitely something else.” I turned toward the stairs leading up to the bedrooms. Someone had just called my name. “Keep an eye on her.”
Ryker nodded. Sedia might indeed be crazy, but she was also a hell of a lot smarter than she let on.
TRIVEN WAS STANDING at the top of the stairs waiting for me. He had grown his hair longer in the past month, letting it fall over his missing ear. I reached up and brushed it back from his forehead. He leaned into my hand, then took it in his own. Our fingers intertwined as he began to lead me down the narrow hall to the room at the end. Archer would be posted there, eye on her scope watching the streets, The Tower. If anyone so much as sneezed within a five-block radius, she would see it. Otto and Arden were talking about something quietly, it sounded like they were comparing weapons. On one of my raids, we had managed to break into a Ministry bunker and it had been stockpiled with an impressive amount of weaponry. It was not an armory by any means, but it evened the odds a little. We took everything we could carry. From the sound of it, Arden must have gotten an amplified knife.
I moved toward the doorway, but was tugged back. Triven had stopped one door down from our friends. Backing into the dark room, he paused in the doorway and gave my hand a gentle tug. I didn’t need any further encouragement to follow.
Sliding past him, I walked into the empty bedroom. It was the same as all the other rooms in the house. White walls, white furniture, white sheets. The single bed was mussed. Someone had either been crashing here, or was pulled from their bed in the middle of the night.
“This was my room in our house.” Triven shut the door quietly behind us. With a sigh, he leaned against the door and stared at the rumpled sheets. His breathing was steady but fast.
Closing the space between us, I forced my way into Triven’s arms and pressed my ear to his heart. It hammered against his ribs. His hands slid around my waist pulling me close. His cheek rested on my head. There was no flare of passion, no need to get lost in each other this time. We simply stood there, holding each other. Neither of us wanted to talk about what lay ahead, to say out loud what might happen. So, I talked about something else. Anything else.
&
nbsp; “Mouse?” I asked. She was always in my thoughts.
I could hear Triven’s smile in his words. “She’s fine. They made it to their hideout and Petra is keeping a close watch over her. We can com her before we go.”
“I want to, but maybe it’s better we don’t. It was hard enough leaving her this morning. I’m not sure I could handle another good-bye.” Mouse had cried this time. Even though they were soundless tears, she clung to me when I tried to pull away. It nearly undid me. Sucking in a gulp of air, I changed the subject to something else that was nagging at me. “Triven, Sedia said something downstairs. She was talking about her brother, as if I knew him…” I trailed off, there was only one person I could think of. It was impossible, but who else could it have been? Their eyes, the Tribe lineage. But how would she have known about me? They couldn’t have talked, not since he left the Taciturns. They would have killed him for being a traitor. But who else could it have been?
“Is her brother…” I struggled to say the name, but his face was clear.
“Maddox?” Triven finished for me.
“It’s not possible, right?” I asked leaning back to look up at him.
“I had my suspicions the first night we met her. When she attacked us on the rooftop.” Triven’s chest expanded in my arms, then let out with a heavy exhale. “They have the same eyes. The same jaw.”
“She said he told her about me. How? Was he selling us out to the Taciturns?”
Triven soothed my cheek, brushing back a loose strand of hair then lightly tracing the scar. “I don’t think so. I knew he had a sister. One he trusted explicitly. For years, Maddox had tried to get her to join us. To leave the Taciturns and avenge their brother, but she refused. I guess she had revenge ideas of her own. The night we met her, it seemed to fit.”
“Well, she got revenge.” I pressed my face into Triven’s shirt, blocking out the memory of Zed’s face being blown off. A hollow feeling filled my chest. “I didn’t know Maddox had a sister. He died for me, and I hardly knew anything about him.”
“You two weren’t exactly on the best of terms.” Triven didn’t mean it as a jab, he was stating the facts. “What Maddox went through before he came to us, it changes a person. Twists them from the inside. In his own way, I think he loved you.”
“He had a crappy way of showing it.” I muttered. I owed the man my life and still, I hated him.
“He didn’t exactly have the best role models.” Triven hugged me a little closer.
“Do you always have to be so level-headed?” I asked, both annoyed and in awe.
He laughed and kissed the top of my head.
I had a knot in the pit my stomach. A premonition. No—a certainty that something bad was going to happen.
This was the battle we had been waiting for. The reason we were here. The reason we had fought so hard and lost so much. This war had started a long time ago, sparked by our parents’ generation, but this was the hard part. Wars were easy to start, but never easy to finish. And it was up to us to finish this one.
“Don’t die.” I whispered into his chest.
“You either.” Triven replied.
Our lips touched briefly, but no promises were made. We wouldn’t make liars out of ourselves. After all, people die every day.
There was only one promise I needed from him. One we had to keep no matter the cost.
“Gage can’t live. For Mouse’s sake.” I pulled his face down toward mine, searching his hazel eyes.
“For Mouse’s sake,” Triven agreed.
Triven’s lips brushed mine again as there was a soft knock on the door. I pulled away from the comfort his arms as the door shifted, pushing us apart. Archer’s face appeared in the crack, backlit by the torch Otto held above his head.
“It’s time.” She said quietly. I took a shaky breath. Palm open, I gestured for her to lead the way.
When we reached the bottom of the landing, Ryker tossed something at Archer. She caught it with ease in her new hand, but didn’t seem to know what it was. I recognized the small device, but it made no sense. Another flew toward Triven, who grabbed it with a similar confused expression.
“What are these for?” I asked, plucking the gadget from Triven to examine it closer. “This looks like the face shields we used.”
“An improved version.” Ryker said. He stepped forward, taking the apparatus from Archer’s metal fingers and clipped it over her ear. She watched me warily. I narrowed my eyes. Archer knew something I did not.
“What is this for?” I pressed again, shaking the shield at Ryker. “These weren’t part of the plan.”
“It was. We just didn’t tell you.” Archer looked guilty now.
“Or me.” Triven frowned taking the device back. The fact Triven was also in the dark did little to dissuade my anger.
Arden stiffened next to me as Sedia swaggered in from the kitchen. She was licking a powdery substance off her fingertips. Tucked around her ear was the same apparatus.
In fact, everyone in the room had one.
Everyone, but Ryker and me.
“Whose face?” I snatched the shield from Arden this time and practically shoved it up Ryker’s nose as I thrust it at him.
Ryker turned, staring down at me. He chewed the inside of his cheek.
“WHOSE FACE!?” I yelled again.
“There are only two people Fandrin will want to personally see suffer. Who he will hesitate to have killed on sight.” Ryker leaned over me and I shrank away as if he had just slapped me.
Triven clipped the projector over his ear and quickly tapped it. In the blink of an eye, there were two identical Rykers glaring at each other.
“Oooo! Me next!” With a gleeful screech, Sedia tapped the side of her head and an image appeared shielding her own features. Gone were the dark eyes that matched her brother’s, gone were the tattoos and wide smile. The Taciturn vanished, and staring back was my own face.
40. INCURSION
I GLARED AT the backs of my own head. It was surreal. The facial features were impeccable except for one missing feature. The new scar courtesy of Gage. That alone was mine. Still the bodies were all wrong. Too tall, too broad, mismatched skin tones. Tattoos. Rebel uniforms. Wraith colors. Subversive war paint. My face on a hundred different physiques. It was all wrong.
An ache radiated from my jaw, my teeth clenched tight. This was a stupid plan. A reckless and stupid plan.
A dark head moved at the front of our unit. There was a slight limp to his steps, more effort made every time he lifted his right leg. This was the real Ryker. I glared, hoping he could feel it boring into his skull.
This hadn’t been some last-minute scheme, an impulsive notion. No. The rebels had scanned my face the day I wore Petra’s. For months, they had been preparing to use my likeness to get them close to Fandrin. I felt foolish not to have seen it coming, to have assumed we were going to attempt the invasion with pure force. While I was preparing to fight my way in, the rebels had been banking on my face to open the gates.
Ryker was right not to tell me. I never would have agreed to letting anyone wear my image. True, Fandrin might not kill me outright, but the same could not be said for Gage. My face could just as easily be a target as a shield. And Ryker’s visage was equally as dangerous.
It was eerie seeing myself multiplied. Their smiles and scowls twisted my features in foreign ways. A select few kept their own faces—some out of choice, others because we didn’t have enough shields. Thadd was talented, but not even he could make supplies materialize out of thin air, so the number of shields were limited. I tried to focus on those people, the ones who still looked like themselves.
“Fifty-seven projectiles were deployed. They’re on track.” Thadd spoke over the line. He was our eye in the sky.
“Hold positions.” It was Arstid’s voice now.
The people in front halted, obeying orders, but I pushed through them. My feet only stopped when no one else blocked my way. The Tower soared above the other b
uildings in the distance, a pinnacle. A beacon. We were five blocks out. Poised. Ready. And I would be the first in. I burned with anticipation, gun in hand. The rebels wanted Fandrin alive, I had other plans.
One of the Rykers brushed elbows with me.
Triven. He hadn’t left my side since the facial shields went up. He had refused to wear Ryker’s face at first, but the rebel leader made a good argument. If Fandrin saw Triven, he would know the real me was close by. Triven’s face could spoil the entire ploy and risk all the other groups. In the end Triven donned the mask.
I pushed against his arm in reply. It’s me, we were both saying.
The first tremor pulsed underfoot. Fiery fingers stretched up over the buildings ahead of us.
“Initial intersection successful.” Thadd’s voice crackled as another explosion detonated farther away.
“Hold.” Ryker reminded everyone. If we charged in now, we would be running head-long into a minefield.
The concussions were sporadic, each one causing a spike in my heart rate. Bits of plaster sloughed off the white walls of the buildings we were gathered near. The small chunks flecked my hair and shoulders. The falling pieces shattered the illusions of my face, momentarily disrupting the projectors’ feeds. For a brief second I caught a glimpse of Archer’s ear.
Sweat was collecting along my hairline. A bead trailed down my spine. We’re out of range. I reminded myself again.
Another explosion. I gripped my gun tighter.
Our diversion bombs were working so far. The small team of ex-Adroits had compiled their knowledge to create a series of trigger bombs. Through a string of tests— and close calls—the Taciturns had discovered most of Gage’s explosives were heat-seeking. The weapons’ deployments were initiated by general coordinates being set, then the bombs would hone in on their targets based on heat signatures. With Thaddeus’ guidance, we had created a series of our own bombs that not only set off the heat stamp of a human, but that could also be triggered at a safe range. Our bombs went pop, theirs leveled a street.
New World Inferno Page 30
