“If you do not let me go, I will tell Fitzours what you plan, and he will report it to Ménard.”
“Those two will never let you out of here. I might.” I folded my arms. “If I find the colony in Versailles and live to tell the tale, I’ll come back and set you free. On my oath. Do we have a deal?”
The former Warden of the Sheratan bared his white teeth. The links of the chains rang.
“Arcturus is not the only Rephaite with a long memory,” he said, very softly. “If you do not come back within the sennight, I will find another way to escape this place, and I will hunt you, Paige Mahoney. I will take my club to your bones until you scream for mercy. And I promise you, fleshworm—you will find none.”
****
I emerged from the attic heavy with knowledge. Finding the corridor empty, I broke into a light-footed run toward the kitchen. The secrets were scored onto my memory. Now all I had to do was carry them out of here.
Easier said than done. In my rush to escape, I forgot to listen to the æther. As I turned a corner, a baton bashed into my stomach, and I folded, the breath slammed out of me. Next thing I knew, I was flat on my front, and my arms were pinned to my sides.
It was the two Vigiles I had tricked into leaving their posts. They had brought friends with them, outnumbering me six to one. I launched myself into the æther.
All of them had been trained for this. None of them were ready for it. By the time someone roared for backup, two Vigiles had fallen to the floor beside me, empty, wall-eyed in the shock of death.
Escape was so close I could almost taste it. Hope spiked me with impossible strength. I could not be captured now, not when lives depended on the secrets I carried. I danced in the æther as I never had, flashing between adversaries like a bullet between walls, each strike weaker than the last. The sixth and final guard had made it halfway down the corridor by the time I clipped her dreamscape, knocking her unconscious just as she hit an alarm.
A bell drilled somewhere in the mansion. When I crash-landed back in my body, I doubled over. My fingers went to my nose and came away smeared with red. No time to stop. Chest tight, I drunkenly took the baton from my utility belt and ran—straight into the Vigiles storming in from outside the mansion. Guns snapped in my direction. I veered away from their flux darts and broke into a sprint.
Steel blinds snapped down to cover the windows. Boots thundered across the floor. With a knife-like pain in my shoulder and chest, I shot down another corridor and dived for the nearest flight of stairs. I needed to break their line of sight and get back into the hidden staircase.
Another dreamscape. A dark shape blurred from my left and slammed bodily into me. As if I had been charged by a horse, both me and the baton went flying. I hit the floor, too stunned and winded to move again, while my only weapon rolled far out of reach. Agony erupted behind my ribs. I clawed in panic at my throat, as if I could unseam it and let more air inside.
A giant of a Vigile dragged me up. He was as big as a Rephaite, all muscle and armor, his hands the size of plates. I could see my own fear-stricken face in his visor. As soon as I tried hitting him with my spirit, excruciating pain warned me to stop. He slung me over his shoulder.
The guards from downstairs had caught up. Transceivers crackled. The alarm faded. Too short-winded to scream, I grabbed onto anything I could as the massive Vigile hauled me through the mansion, up more stairs. We were back in the attic. So close to the false wall.
Cade was pounding on the door to his cell, calling my name. I made a last attempt to break free, to no avail. My fingers skidded off the Vigile’s helmet. He booted a door open and flung me headlong into my cell. I just about landed on my feet, then stumbled and fell hard into the coffee table, which cut into my shoulder. The Vigile bore down on me and tore off the utility belt, but he missed the shape of the ledger. My shoes slapped to the floor.
A long shadow reached across the floorboards. There stood Ménard, flanked by two of his guards, their rifles trained on me.
“I see you have chosen not to cooperate.” That restrained smile. “You were warned of the consequences of rebellion. A pity that perversion is innate to the anormale.”
“As hypocrisy is innate to the tyrant. You’re trying to court favor with Nashira.” I wheezed out a laugh. “You’re not some untainted savior, Ménard. You’re like every other two-faced bastard in Scion. Taking from unnaturals with one hand, slitting our throats with the other.”
“You misunderstand, Paige Mahoney,” he said. “I have never used anormaux for personal gain. Only to see the extinction of unnaturalness. Preserving my own life happens to serve that aim, for I am the one who will stand against the Suzerain . . . though I must confess that it gives me some pleasure, to witness you collude in your own destruction.” He glanced at the nearest Vigile. “Call the Minister of Internal Security. Tell her we have a prisoner who requires immediate transportation to the Bastille.”
He left without a backward glance. The door was double-locked in his wake.
The Bastille. Shit. If I entered that windowless prison, no one would be able to reach me.
Goosebumps suddenly coursed over my arms. The golden cord was on fire, and I sensed him.
Arcturus.
13
Trust
He had come for me, as I had known he would. I threw myself toward the window and looked down.
No sign of him in the courtyard. Through the thickening snow, I could make out twelve snipers on the roof. Using my gift against even one of them would finish me off—I knew myself well enough to be sure that I was at my limit.
On the east side of the mansion, the first sniper went down. The next fired several times into the dark before he was flung like a doll off the edge of the roof, into the courtyard below, landing in a pile of twisted limbs. One by one, they fell to a faceless shadow. Arcturus was so gentle with me, it was easy to forget that he had once been a warrior.
At speed, I judged the bone-breaking drop to the roof below and took stock of the furniture. The wardrobe was heavy enough to barricade the door. I ran back across the room, braced my shoulder against it, and shoved.
My body trembled with exertion. The wardrobe refused to budge. In sheer desperation, I threw my full weight against it, planted my heels on the wall, pushed backward with all my might —and with a groan, the wardrobe tipped over and crashed to the floor, throwing up a thundercloud of dust. I landed hard beside it, the impact shuddering through my bruises, my chest. When I had gasped back enough air, I groped for the ledger, which had slipped from under my sweater, and crawled toward my shoes, coughing fit to burst.
Shouts of alarm from beyond the door. The handle rattled before the Vigiles started to batter it with their rifles. Breathless with pain, I shoved on my shoes and lurched back to the window.
Arcturus was much closer. His eyes flashed through the darkness. With a surge of adrenaline-fueled strength, I lifted the coffee table and smashed its legs into the window. Glass shattered. Snow came roaring into the room. The nearest sniper snapped their rifle toward me, only to fall in a hail of blood and brains. Their body crunched onto the gravel below.
The door splintered, and the beam of a flashlight glared in. Arcturus was right below the window now, snow flickering around him. He held out a hand.
A spray of bullets shredded the door. I had seconds. Panting, I scraped the glass from the frame and swung my legs over it. I might fear water, but heights—heights were easy. A Vigile smashed through the weakened door and shone a gun-mounted light into my cell—
—just in time to see me jump.
There were two people in the world I trusted to catch me if I suddenly hurled myself out of a window. Nick Nygård was one of them. Arcturus Mesarthim was the other. Frigid air howled in my ears before the collision. It would have buckled a human. Instead, Arcturus caught me as if I were light as a bottle, and then I was on my feet, barely shaken.
“Who sh-shot that sniper?” I could hardly speak for want of brea
th. “Mannequin?”
“Yes.” His gaze flicked up. “Move.”
I followed his line of sight to the window. A Vigile was there, her rifle pointed right at us. Bullets hammered into the roof.
Arcturus shielded me as we ran for one of the tall chimneys and took shelter behind it. Ice had turned the roof to a death-trap. My shoes had no grip, and the ledger was slipping. The instant the gunfire ceased, we struck out for the next chimney, then the next. I slid to a stop behind the fourth and tucked my limbs in tight. More Vigiles swarmed in the courtyard below, too low to get a shot at us.
“I expected this to be a somewhat quieter rescue,” Arcturus remarked from his place beside me.
“That wouldn’t be very me.” Brick dust flew as bullets chipped at the chimney. “You have an exit plan?”
“The east courtyard.” He held out my pistol. “Get to its roof.”
“Take this.” I took the gun and thrust the ledger at him in return. “It’s important.”
He tucked it into the inner pocket of his coat. I readied the pistol. When the Vigile stopped to reload again, I took the best aim I could in a snowstorm and opened fire, forcing her back into the attic.
Something flew toward us from inside. It hit the snow beside Arcturus, a canister with a blinking red light. Almost in the same instant I recognized it as a chemical grenade, I kicked it off the roof, into the courtyard below. With a flash and a crack, blue smoke hissed from the canister and scattered the Vigiles. I ran as hard as I could, aiming for the front of the Hôtel Garuche.
Ménard meant to kill me. That canister had contained the blue hand, the deadly nerve agent Scion used against dissenters. It would have paralyzed me. Fighting for breath, half-blinded by snow, I wended between three more chimneys, swerved hard to the right, and charged up a flight of steps, past a dead or unconscious sniper, over the arched entrance to the mansion. With Arcturus behind me, I descended on the other side of the archway, taking the steps two at a time, and vaulted a balustrade, landing on a steeper roof. My shoes slithered on frosted tiles.
Bullets sparked around us as more and more Vigiles took aim from the windows. Arcturus put himself between me and the gunfire. Fear stripped me to an assortment of body parts. Hands on the roof. Feet seeking purchase. Lips numb with cold. Chest fit to burst. The drop to the street from here was too long, and the nearest building was too far to reach.
A siren droned in the courtyard. A set of exterior doors flew open behind us, and more Vigiles stampeded across the roof. I squeezed off a few shots at them. A moment later, Arcturus swept me against his chest, his arm tight as a harness, and threw us over the edge.
As it turned out, Arcturus Mesarthim could jump like a spring-heeled devil. He cleared the impossible gap and grabbed a balcony across the street before he dropped to the ground. His Rephaite bones swallowed the impact, and then we were on the street and running.
“Are we really going to try and outrun the Grand Inquisitor of France?” I gasped over the sirens.
He pressed a dissimulator into my hand. “I thought you were good at running, Pale Dreamer.”
I shaped the mask to my face one-handed as we pelted toward a public garden. Halfway across it, I threw off the stolen jacket. It might have a tracking device stitched into it.
Sirens keened from all directions. Keeping to the cover of the trees, we skirted the edge of the Place de la Concorde. Snow blew thick and fast. My sweater was damp, my hair dripping, my feet burning in the flimsy shoes. Even if there had been any Vigiles nearby—they must all be converging on the mansion—they would have found it hard to see us.
To our right, the Eiffel Tower reached above the trees. Scarlet light branched through its latticework. The same light filled the fountains, turning them to pools of magma, and the obelisk at the heart of the plaza. Across the citadel, other landmarks would be starting to glow red, indicating a serious threat. Ménard had issued a security alert.
Arcturus kept a firm hold of my hand, lending me his inhuman speed. Once I had been able to run like an engine. Now my chest was in agony.
“I can’t,” I rattled. “Have to s-stop. Arcturus—”
“Stéphane is waiting for us in the underpass.”
Just a little farther. I could make it.
Arcturus led me around a sharp corner, onto a shallow incline. A car idled on an island between two lanes. Vehicles roared on either side of it. Arcturus opened one of the back doors, half-lifted me inside, and climbed in behind me. Before the door was even shut, Stéphane drove off the island and onto the road, seamlessly joining the late-night traffic.
“Well done,” they said. “Did anyone see you come down here?”
“No,” Arcturus said.
“Good.” Stéphane glanced at me over their shoulder. I coughed hard enough to crack a rib. “Are you all right, Flora?”
A nod was all I could manage.
Stéphane stuck to the speed limit. I peeled off my drenched sweater and leaned into Arcturus, a crushing pain in my chest. He wrapped some of his coat around me. When I could draw enough breath, I spoke. “Stéphane, I thought Mannequin didn’t assist captured spies?”
“Your friend was the one assisting.” Stéphane kept their gaze on the road. “Ducos agreed to provide cover fire and transport if he got you out.”
“Thank you.”
Dark eyes met mine in the rearview mirror. “You look bad. Do you need to see Cordier?”
“Yes.”
Stéphane took the next right, across the gilded Pont de L’Inquisition, while a helicopter rumbled over the Seine. I rested on Arcturus and let my eyes drift closed. His warmth and the motion of the car lulled me into a stupor.
Stéphane stopped the car near the University of Scion Paris. “This is as far as I can safely take you,” they said. Just the thought of moving drained me. “Walk from here and watch your backs. Ducos and Cordier will check on you tomorrow night. Until then, close the shutters and stay inside.”
“Thank you, Stéphane,” Arcturus said.
“Okay.”
We got out, into a full-blown blizzard. Arcturus took an umbrella from the boot, drew me to his side, and opened it over both of us as Stéphane drove away. By the time we lurched into the safe house, I was on the brink of collapse. Without letting go of me, Arcturus secured the door behind us, and we sank onto the staircase together, my arms tight around his neck.
“I knew you would come this time,” I murmured into his coat. It smelled of winter. “I knew.”
“I could not reach you in the Archon.” His deep voice coursed through both of us. “I will never leave you in a dark room again.”
I pressed my burning cheek to him. Against the odds, I had survived another Scion stronghold. We were both in one piece. His hand came to rest between my shoulders.
We listened as the din of sirens and helicopters crisscrossed the citadel. A vehicle rushed past, red lights flashing through the window and onto us. Arcturus drew me a little closer.
“They took Portugal.” I closed my eyes. “Gonçalves will surrender.”
“I know.”
He rested his chin on the crown of my head. I almost fell asleep on him. The escape had pushed my body and my gift to breaking point.
In the end, he carried me up the stairs. I stayed conscious for just long enough to peel off the dissimulator, remove my wet clothes, and crumple into bed. Sleep hit me like the flat of an axe.
****
It was the sound of rain that woke me. When I opened my eyes, the first thing I saw was the ledger, which lay beside me on the bed.
Gray light leaked around the shutters. I shivered, unable to so much as lift my head. My cheeks flamed. I was sick as a small hospital—yet somehow, by the skin of my teeth, I was alive.
No more sirens. Ménard wasn’t the sort to waste time. He would have accepted that, for the time being, he had lost his bargaining chip.
Arcturus must have sensed me wake. When he came to me, it was with a steaming mug.
“Terrible. But grateful to be here.” I moved a clump of curls out of my eyes. “Thank you. I’d be in the Bastille by now if not for you.”
“I am sure you would have found a way out of the mansion.”
“I did. Then I scotched it.” I tried to sit up. “Don’t suppose you have a heat pad charged up.”
“I had thought to leave you one, but you developed a fever during the night.”
“Could have fooled me.”
I mustered the strength to lift myself onto my elbows. Arcturus moved the pillows to support me, then skirted a thumb over my fresh bruises, the small cut under my eye.
“Frère,” I said. “She wasn’t happy.”
“Evidently not.” He lowered his hand. “Your fever has not broken. Are you hurt anywhere else?”
“Not badly.” Sitting up made it slightly easier to talk. Or whisper, at least. “You were shielding me. Are you hurt?”
“Some trifling gunshot wounds. My body will expel the bullets in good time.”
Only a Rephaite could be so blasé. He went into the corridor and came back with another blanket, which he wrapped around my shoulders. Drawing it closer hurt the small joints in my fingers.
“If you can speak, I would hear what happened.” Arcturus sat on the edge of my bed. “How did Ménard capture you?”
This was going to be a difficult conversation. I sank back into the cushions and braced my right side.
“I let him,” I said.
There was a tense silence.
“You repeated your tactic,” he said. “Allowed them to take you.”
“Listen. Just hear me out.” I held his gaze. “Ménard was onto me. I needed to find out what he was plotting in there. I also wanted another piece of information for myself. For us.”
Arcturus looked at me as if I were a stranger. I raked a hand through my hair again and let it tumble between my fingers.
The Mask Falling Page 23
