“I don’t understand,” I say. “How is watching sick people fight exciting? Aren’t they clumsy and incoherent?”
“Yes. But you see, we throw them into an arena, and then we throw some of our own criminals in there with them and watch the diseased rip them to shreds before tearing each other up. So it’s really about watching the criminals scramble for their lives.” A twisted smile comes across his features. “But how am I going to appease the crowd if there are no pieces to my game? I can’t exactly send the criminals in there and expect them to fight it out. Well, I could. But it wouldn’t be nearly as fun as watching the diseased get them. The show is this weekend. I have exactly fifty diseased units left to play with. But I want more. So tell me, Rory. What’s your solution to my problem? Give me one—a good one—and I’ll give you your son back.”
I never thought hope and dread could consume me at the exact same time. Like catching one last glimpse of the sun before two walls close in on you.
“Wait,” Titus says. “What about me? I could come up with a brilliant plan to fix this. My head’s already spinning with ideas. Why give her the deal?”
“Because I like her.” Prometheus winks at me. My stomach curls. “But I’ll tell you what. I’m going to allow you both to spend one more night in my hotel tonight. Take the time to think up a solution to my problem. Something brilliant, even better than our last form of entertainment that will ease the transition for my subjects.” He arches a brow. “Whoever comes up with the best plan by tomorrow morning, gets to take Gideon and head back to Ky, and I will even help you return to leadership and reestablish your crumbling country.” His grin vanishes. “But. Whoever has the lesser of the two plans, will be one of the criminals dying in the show this weekend.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE
RAIN
I stroke my hand down Ember’s hair. It’s grown since she cut it, and just barely brushes against her shoulders now. She leans over the chief’s desk, her palms flat on the surface while she studies the list of careers and Titus’s terrible strategy for keeping all necessary careers evenly distributed. I can’t believe she’s here. Even after three days of her return, I can’t believe I can touch her, see her, talk to her. My hand lands on her shoulder, and I give it a gentle squeeze.
“You’ve gotta stop pouring yourself over those documents,” I whisper, longing to have a few minutes with her without Ky taking up all of her attention. “You’re going to exhaust yourself. Besides, Aurora will be back, and you will have exhausted yourself for nothing.”
“How do you know she’ll be back?” She straightens and turns to look at me. Her always-smiling eyes leave me breathless. “Have you heard from her? Or—or Mcallister?”
I breathe in deeply and slowly let it out. “No.”
“They might already be dead.” She crosses her arms and looks away. The dejected look in her eyes tears my heart apart. I almost suggest we go rescue them, but the more selfish part of me demands we hang back. I can’t risk losing Ember again. I reach out and draw her into a therapeutic hug. She melts against me, then wraps her arms around my waist. I kiss her hair. I don’t want to put Ember in any sort of danger. Not now. Not ever again.
And yet, Mcallister is my best friend. And Aurora and I have grown pretty close over the course of the past few months. How could I just let them go?
On the other hand…
“If we go after them, Ember,” I whisper against her hair. “Who will you leave in charge? What if Nashville kills you and takes over Ky? They’re worse than Titus, according to Titus himself.” I pull away and search her eyes. “If you don’t stay for yourself or me, then stay for your people. The country is just now getting back on its feet. They need a leader who’s for them to look out for them. They need you.”
She looks down at her hands and chews her lip. “Was it all pointless?” She looks at me now, tears blurring her pupils. “All this—my supposed death, my being locked away in Indy. Was it all for nothing?”
“No.” My heart aches at the tears in her eyes. What hurts more is that I went months thinking she was dead. I went through all that heartache. Was it for nothing? I refuse to believe it. “Do you remember when you used to think of yourself as the dirt?”
She laughs softly but nods.
“You told me Aurora was the seed, and you were there to prepare the way for her.”
“Yeah.”
“Maybe…maybe it was the other way around. Maybe she was there to prepare the way for you.”
Her gaze snap to meet mine.
“Maybe you were supposed to be the leader of Ky all along.”
She stares at me, both fear and understanding forming in her eyes. But she shakes her head. “No. No. I refuse to believe that—“
A thump sounds from outside, stopping her mid-sentence. We both freeze.
“What was that?” she asks.
My heart starts racing. A plagued victim we missed? A Patrician who still wants us dead? Father coming to get his revenge for being demoted? I wrap my arm protectively around Ember’s shoulders.
“Come on,” I say, steering her toward the doorway. “Let’s get out of here.”
Just then, the sound of shattering glass fills the room, and someone leaps through the window. My heart rate spikes, and I reach for my gun, but not before the intruder has ripped Ember from my arms and placed her in a headlock, a knife at her throat. The intruder is dressed in all black with a black mask.
A literal ninja.
Without thinking, I lunge forward and slam the red button and the office doors fly open. Then I lunge at the ninja, but he whirls out of my grasp, Ember in a headlock and a knife held to her neck as he leaps out to the balcony. Defenders are flooding the room. I follow the ninja, but I’m not fast enough. A bubble-like aircraft hovers above the capitol building, though it makes no sound like the helicopters from the Indy tribe did. The ninja has a rope tied around his waist, and the hovercraft pulls him into the pit while Ember fights against his grasp. And it’s hopelessness and despair and blind rage flooding into my bloodstream all at once.
Defenders begin taking aim, but the ninja is using Ember as a human shield until they arrive at the hovercraft and are pulled inside. The hovercraft bolts forward and out of sight. Headed south.
No time to waste.
I race back into the room where I begin stuffing my belt with the extra guns and knives stored in the weapons drawer. Angry tears blur my vision and I blink them back. My teeth are clenched so tight a migraine begins brewing. That hovercraft was headed south. There is only one civilization I know of in the south: Nashville. No doubt, their next plan is to kill Ember and take over Ky.
And there’s no way in hell I’m letting ANY of that happen.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
AURORA
I sit on wicker chair on the balcony and stare at glistening city of Nashville. If this city was beautiful during the day, it’s breathtaking at night. And considering we’re prisoners, this sure is a great view overlooking the lake in the heart of the city.
Nashville is so different than Frankfort. Frankfort was known as the city that never slept. Nashville…sleeps. I mean, they sleep hard. No one is out this late. Even the majority of the lights in the buildings are turned off, though the actual buildings still glow blue. I wonder if their sleeping has anything to do with the medication that makes them stay young. There has to be something the patient has to do to help the medication do its work. And rest is the best thing for the body.
“What’s your plan?”
Every muscle stiffens at the sound of Titus’s voice. I pull my knees to my chest like a shield, but ignore him. He has such a way of manipulating my thoughts, and without Krin nearby to help reestablish my sanity, I’m genuinely terrified.
“I don’t have one,” I whisper.
“Are you even trying?”
I shake my head.
“So, you don’t care for Gideon all that much, then.”
<
br /> I look at him now. “I care for him more than you could comprehend. But I’m not about to sacrifice innocent lives for his safety. He would hate me for it.” I look away. “I would hate myself for it.”
Titus is silent for a moment. “You get used to it.”
“Get used to what?”
“The guilt.” He says it without any remorse as he comes over and sits beside me. My muscles tense. We’re competing for our lives tomorrow, and he’s sitting beside me, trying to have a civil conversation. This liar—this despicable human who killed his best friend and tried to kill his sister, who has brainwashed and manipulated me and his citizens all his life—is trying to talk to me. All I want to do is spit in his face and walk off.
Fight hate with love.
Thorne’s words echo in my mind. I want to shove them out of my head. I look at the city and rest my chin on my knees, wishing Titus would just leave. “I don’t think I could ever live with the guilt you should be feeling.”
“You could,” he says simply. “It’s always hardest in the beginning. When Father made me kill my first victim, that tore me up pretty bad.” He sighs. “But the next one was easier. And after a few hundred they just kind of looked like faceless nobodies.”
My stomach clenches.
“Then,” he continues, “every action you take is easier from then on out—when you see everyone as no one. It’s easier to send them off to Nashville. It’s easier to use criminals as examples on the Rebels Circle. It’s easier to feed them to the tigers. It’s easier to pick out the fake Defenders like your Mcallister and shoot them in the head.”
Chills spread across my body. Imagining Titus kill someone like Thorne is just…it’s too much. I knew Titus did some crazy things, but I always imagined it was as hard for him as it would have been for me. I always thought he just put on a strong exterior. Because for some reason, those daily visits in my room used to mean something. Up until he used me, they were filled with laughter and stories and bonding. But now, I’m wondering how much of that was real, and how much of it was Titus being, well, Titus. Because how could he act so happy around me while killing people in the streets without a second thought? I don’t understand.
“You’re disgusting,” is all I can get out.
He laughs through his nose. “Water off a duck’s back, sister. I’ve heard it all. And proceeded to kill those I heard it from. Nothing you say can get to me, because I’ve done some of the worst evils, and I’m past the point of remorse.”
Some of the worst evils. I wonder what some of the worst evils are in Titus’s eyes. Because murdering faceless people apparently doesn’t do a thing to him.
“Would you like to know the worst things I’ve done?” he asks, as though reading my mind.
No. I don’t really think I do.
“You should take a guess.”
I shake my head. “I don’t want to know.”
“Come, sister. Tell me.” He leans in closer, his eyes sparking with curiosity. “What do you think is the worst thing I’ve ever done?”
I look at him full on. “Besides make your own sister to sleep with you and then stripping her baby from her?”
He winces, then turns away. So he does maybe feel a tiny bit of guilt for that. Good.
“Besides that,” he says through gritted teeth.
I’m actually surprised he’s not telling me I slept with him by my own choice. That he’s not attempting to manipulate my thoughts right now. I look away and try to think of what other things he might have done. I remember the entry in Mom’s journal, where she said she wouldn’t be surprised if Titus killed her. But I don’t think I want to know.
No. I don’t. I don’t want to know. I don’t want to know. I don’t want to—
“Did you kill Mother?” The question leaves my lips involuntarily, and Titus stiffens.
“That’s your first guess?”
I look at him, hoping that I’m wrong about him. Hoping that he would never do such a thing.
He laughs humorlessly. “I figured you’d go pretty low with your guesses, but not that low.”
I sigh in relief. But then the humor ebbs from his eyes, and he says in an almost inaudible voice, “Yes. I killed her.”
My heart drops into my stomach. I seriously thought Mother was wrong about Father. About Titus. That maybe that journal entry was a dramatic statement.
“Why?” My voice struggles to push through the tightness in my throat.
His gaze is level with mine when he answers. “Father had me do it.”
“What did he say that would make you do such a thing?”
“Mother was a rebel, Rory. It was either her or him. She wanted to take down the government; Father wanted to build it up.”
“Father wanted only to build himself up. Not me. Not even you. I remember the bruises you had.”
He flinches.
“You told me everything, Titus. About how Father beat you in his anger. Even when you came to my defense, he would beat you. How could you think he was better than Mother? How could you have killed Mother after that?”
“I knew Father was going to die someday.” He shrugs. “And then the beatings would stop and the country would be mine. But if I let Mother win, she wouldn’t have allowed that, Rory. She would have taken it for herself.”
“To free it! To make it better!”
“It was the best it could be. We were living in paradise. Until your Indy Tribe messed it all up.”
I stare at the lights of the city. “I can’t believe you killed mother,” I whisper. That’s one thing I’ll never be able to get over.
“What?” he asks. “Does it make you hate me more? I thought you couldn’t harbor any more bitterness toward me than you already did.”
“You were wrong. The way I feel for you right now…” I grit my teeth and take a deep, deep breath, then try to exhale my negative emotions. It doesn’t work.
“Don’t act so disgusted,” he mutters. “I might have killed Mother, be we both know you killed Father.”
Now it’s my turn to stiffen. How could he know that? No one knew. Even though I trusted Titus, I never told him about Father.
“He died the morning after he visited you for your birthday,” he says, as though reading my mind. “Since no one else knew about you, they couldn’t figure it out. But I knew.”
I swallow the lump throat. “Did that…did that upset you? That I killed him?”
He offers a half smile. “By killing him, you made me chief. How could I be angry about that? You did my dirty work for me.”
And it wasn’t long after that Titus demanded I sleep with him. A knot forms in my stomach. I dreaded his visits, few as they were. But he never used me like Titus did. And if I hadn’t killed him, Titus would have kept to himself.
But then…Gideon wouldn’t exist.
So many confusing emotions. I press them out of my head and turn the conversation back to Titus-The-Unremorseful.
“So, you killed Mother. You killed Ember.”
“Not that it did much good.”
“And now you’re going to kill me.”
“Hey, don’t lay this on me. You’re my favorite family member.”
“Doubtful.”
“This is Prometheus’s doing, not mine. I tried to talk you out of coming after me. I honestly, sincerely wanted you to remain safe in Ky.”
I stare at him. I want to shake him. “Then you should have sent Gideon back to me.”
He sighs. “You can still get out of this fair and square, if you just put effort into a new game for him.”
I turn to fully face him. “First of all, Titus, I don’t think my brain is any competition for your sick, twisted mind. Second, I don’t even want to try to play this game.”
“Then you’re just giving Gideon up, huh?”
I look down. This conversation has gone full circle back to Gideon. “I want him back. But, if he grows into the boy I hope
he does, I don’t think he’ll ever forgive me for making that decision.”
“That’s the problem with playing villain, sister. You have to make the hard choices, even if it’s for the good of the people.”
“You mean, the good of the people who matter.”
“Exactly.”
I shake my head and look away. I can see where he’s coming from. Father taught us to have that mindset. He locked me away…for my own good. No. I don’t want to have that mindset; it ends up hurting others. I want to be selfless. I want to be like Mother, not Father.
Titus huffs out a sigh and leans his head back. “Look. I’m going to go ahead and be completely honest with you. I don’t want to lead Ky anymore.”
I snort out a laugh of disbelief. “They’re not brainwashed anymore so you’ll have to actually work to keep the government running. Is that it?”
“Yes. That. And, honestly? I’m tired. I’m tired of hosting stupid parties and watching the Patricians fall all over themselves to please me. There was only one person I ever could really be myself with, and he’s—” His voice chokes off and he looks away.
“Gone,” I finish for him. “You shot him in the head. Tell, me Titus-who’s-past-the-point-of-remorse, do you regret killing Forest?”
“If I could bring back only one person I’ve ever killed,” he says, his voice low and shaky. “It would be Forest.”
“Even if he was on the Resurgence side?”
He nods, leans forward, and puts his head in his hands. “Yes.”
Unbelievable. “Wow. I would have never guessed. Because, I mean, you just shot him in the head.”
white dawn (Black Tiger Series Book 3) Page 36
