by Rachel Bach
But when the baron turned to greet us, my soaring turned to plunging. The man Baron Kells had been talking to wasn’t wearing King-class armor as a Devastator should. He wasn’t wearing armor at all, actually, just a nice black suit. His back was to me, but that didn’t matter. I knew him from any angle, and I froze midstep as Rupert turned away from the smiling baron to lock his icy blue eyes on mine.
The guards around me stopped a second later, looking at me in confusion. Archer even reached out to touch my shoulder. “Lieutenant Morris?”
“Morris!” the baron called, glaring at me through his visor. “Stop gawking and get over here. This is the Royal Knight who will be escorting you to the king.”
“But my lord,” I whispered. “This man isn’t—”
“Lieutenant Morris is confused,” Rupert said, and my jaw dropped a second time. His accent was completely gone. Rupert was speaking King’s Tongue like he’d grown up in a wealthy Kingston family.
“I have the order right here,” he continued, all polite smiles as he pulled out a very official looking ledger marked with the king’s own crest. Baron Kells glanced at me curiously one last time, then took the ledger, checking it against his own.
“It bears the king’s seal, and King Stephen’s personal signature,” he said, his voice awed. “Yes, sir knight. We’ve disarmed her as requested. She’s all yours.”
I heard the baron’s words like he was speaking from the bottom of a well. Rupert wasn’t looking at me anymore, but I could see his body leaning in my direction, ready to give chase if I bolted. If he’d actually been the Paradoxian he had everyone convinced he was, he’d have known that wasn’t necessary. With that order, his status as the voice of the crown was cemented. If I tried to expose him, it would be my word against the king’s, which meant my word against the will of heaven. If I fought or ran, if I even tried to argue, I would be committing heresy and treason.
I looked around anyway, but what I saw only sank me lower. Even if I’d had my suit armed and ready with surprise on my side, there was no way I could have taken all the armor in the room. Sasha could have put down the red suits with a little luck, but Baron Kells was a former Devastator. He could probably thrash me solo. Rupert wouldn’t even have to move.
By this point, my escort was stepping aside, all the guards bowing to Rupert as he walked up to take my arm. I didn’t move a muscle, not even when Rupert’s fingers closed like a vise on my wrist. “Come, Lieutenant Morris,” he said, his refined Kingston accent chilling the words to puffs of frost. “We’ve wasted enough time.”
I didn’t have a choice. I followed where Rupert led, walking past the baron and the bowing guards as Rupert steered me through the embassy’s heavy door. He had a car waiting outside, and even this fit the role he was playing. The vehicle was diplomatic issue, brand new and sleek. It was also armored, and as Rupert shut the passenger door behind me, I could hear the layers of steel locking into place like a vault door.
He got in on the driver’s side a moment later, landing with his customary grace as the door swung shut, sealing us in. The sound brought a flash of panic with it. The details were different, but this was just like when he’d beaten me back in the woods. Now as then, I was outmaneuvered and trapped, only this time there’d be no Rashid appearing at the last second to shoot Rupert off me.
But just as the panic started to overwhelm me, I forced it down. This was nothing like the woods, I snarled at myself. Even if she was packed at the moment, I had my suit, my blade, and my guns, all freshly charged. Rupert couldn’t do the symbiont thing in such a crowded city. Mia was strapped across the case in my lap; I could use her to blow off the car’s armored door and make a run for it. All I had to do was dart down that alley, avoid the cops, and come back around to the starport. I was planning how I could steal a ship and get to Paradox itself when Rupert said my name.
“Devi?”
I went stiff. His voice was gentle and accented just as I remembered it, the refined Kingston lilt gone like it had never been. “Devi,” he said again. “Look at me, please.”
Looking at him was the last thing I wanted to do. I didn’t want anything to do with him at all. I especially didn’t want him using that tone of voice on me, saying my name the same way he had when we’d lain tangled together in the dark back before everything fell apart. But even though I’d been planning how to do it when he’d interrupted me, I really didn’t want to run. Even if I could have escaped, there was nowhere left for me to go.
That was the only reason I turned, I told myself. It certainly wasn’t because I’d been a sucker for Rupert from day one, or because, despite everything, some idiot part of me still wanted to see him. No, I turned because I just wanted to get this over with. But as my head came around, I caught a glimpse of Rupert pulling something out of his jacket pocket just before the handcuff locked around my wrist.
“What the—”
The words faded into sputters as he looped the chain through the security handle between our seats and then caught my other arm, snatching it easily when I tried to get away. “I’m sorry,” he said as he deftly lifted my armor case out of my lap and shoved it into the backseat, well out of my now extremely limited reach. “I can’t afford to let you run here.”
“You son of a bitch!” I shouted, yanking on the chain as I tried in vain to get my leg up to kick him.
Rupert said nothing, and he paid no attention to my struggles. He just started the car and pulled out into the dense morning traffic.
I fought a bit more on principle, but it was hopeless. He’d used a heavy steel cuff, and the car was built like a tank. It wasn’t like I could have done anything against him without my suit, anyway. Thanks to that letter, I’d been delivered to him like a shucked oyster.
“So,” I snarled, glaring out the window as I flopped defeated back into my seat. “Are you actually a Royal Knight, or was that just a really good fake?”
“I’m not a knight,” Rupert said as he pulled us into the starport’s main entrance. “But the king’s letter wasn’t fake. When Baron Kells sent your story to the Royal Office, they called our representative on Paradox. King Stephen formally signed you over to the Eyes four hours ago.”
I pressed my eyes shut. Of course. Of course the Eyes would have a direct line to the king. Why not? They were everywhere else. I was a bit surprised my king would give away a weapon like me, but then, he had an entire kingdom to watch out for and no reason to distrust the Eyes. They were the heroes, the guardians who kept everything safe from the invisible monsters. I was just a peasant, and now, by my king’s hand, I was theirs.
The car eased to a stop, and I opened my eyes again. We were at the gate to the priority docks, the ones used for emergencies only. The guard was already on his way over, and I lifted my cuffed hands, hoping to stall things, but then Rupert took a wallet out of his inside pocket and flashed something that looked like a badge at the window. After that, the man waved us through immediately, no questions asked.
I dropped my hands with a glower. “What was that?”
“Top-level government clearance,” Rupert replied, tucking the wallet back into his pocket as he drove us straight onto the dock. “It came with the car.”
I rolled my eyes. “Right. Whatever, Mr. Big Shot.” I leaned my head against the window as we drove past the lines of emergency vessels. “I guess you know everything, then. About the virus and Brenton and whatnot.”
“I read Baron Kells’s report,” Rupert replied, his face perfectly neutral. “My orders are to return you to Commander Caldswell until we can move you to a proper handling facility.”
His cold, calm words slid through me like a knife. A lab. They were sending me to a lab so I could be “properly handled.”
Just the idea sent the image Maat had shown me in Caldswell’s quarters exploding back into my mind. Suddenly, I could see the girl right in front of me, her body held upright by so many restraining straps she looked like she’d been webbed there by a gian
t spider. And the mask, that horrible, blank metal mask without holes or light or escape—
I thrust the image away, but the damage was already done. I took a ragged breath, fighting my trembling body. I would not break down, especially not in front of Rupert. I refused. But I felt so hopeless. All the grief of the last few days—Rashid’s death, Ren’s death, the mines, killing that poor phantom, drugging Nic—it had all been for nothing. I was right back where I’d started.
A tear slipped down my cheek before I could stop it, and I would have doubled over in shame if it wouldn’t have made things worse. The great Devi Morris, crying in her defeat, but I couldn’t make myself stop. I was defeated. All my promises back on the ship, my grand plans, they’d all come to nothing. I should have let Rupert grab me in the forest, I thought bitterly. I should have just stayed with Caldswell. At least then maybe everyone would still be alive. Rashid and Brenton would still be fighting the Eyes, and there would still be hope for change. Now there was nothing. No glory, no hope. I’d thought I could make things better, but I’d failed. I hadn’t changed anything.
The car rolled to a stop, and I heard Rupert’s seat shift as he cut the engine and turned to look at me. “Devi…”
“Shut up,” I snapped, keeping my head down. It was pointless, there was no hiding the tears, but I tried anyway. “You’ve won, okay? Take me to Caldswell or whoever actually runs the Eyes. Stick me in a lab. Grind me up and squeeze the virus out, I don’t care anymore. Just don’t get me near Dark Star or whatever it’s called, the place where Maat is, or I’ll kill her.”
Warning him about that actually made me feel slightly better. At least this way I wouldn’t kill every daughter by accident. Assuming Rupert would even listen, of course. I was trying to think of a better way to explain how dangerous I could be when I heard Rupert’s door open.
I looked up just in time to see him get out of the car. He opened the back to grab my case and then walked around to my door. As I watched him, I realized for the first time that we were parked in front of a small, nice ship. A very nice ship. It was almost the twin of Brenton’s little stealther, but even more expensive looking and straight-out-of-the-shipyard new.
“Whose ship is that?” I asked when he opened the door.
“It’s mine,” Rupert said, reaching across me to undo my cuff.
“Oh, right,” I sneered. “Your Eye ship, for when you’re not cooking.”
“Yes,” Rupert replied, straightening up and reaching down to help me.
I smacked his hand away and got out of the car on my own. The ship’s ramp was already extended, and since it would be suicidally stupid to do anything else at this point, I stomped up it. Rupert followed with my case, closing the door behind us with a wave of his hand.
The inside of the ship was just as nice as the exterior. It had the same setup as Brenton’s, a state-of-the-art cockpit flanked by a tiny cabin with two bunks folded over to act as benches facing each other on the walls. Since there was nowhere else to sit other than with Rupert up front, which I most definitely was not doing, I plopped down on the pilot-side bench as I waited for Rupert to go up to the cockpit, but he didn’t. He just stood by the ship’s locked door, staring at me.
I glared right back. I might have been beaten, but that didn’t mean I was just going to curl up. At this point, defeated, hopes crushed, cast off by my king and bound for a lab, my pride was all I had left. I refused to let him see me break any more than he already had.
But while I was steeling myself for a fight, Rupert still hadn’t moved. It was like he’d gotten stuck. I was about to tell him to get the lead out so we could be done with this farce when he walked over and sat down on the opposite bench, placing my armor case on the floor between us.
I froze, eyes darting to my case. My guns were still strapped to the outside with Mia on top, practically in arm’s reach. Rupert’s eyes followed mine, but he didn’t try to move my weapons away. That actually made me angrier than if he’d threatened me. He might be stronger and faster than I was even in my suit, but if he was going to treat me with contempt, I was going to blast his fool head off on principle.
Rupert sighed at the look on my face and leaned over, sliding Sasha out of her holster and holding her out to me handle first.
I snatched my gun out of his grip and flipped it around, pointing Sasha at his head. “If you’re counting on me not to shoot because of the kick, you’ve got another thing coming,” I snarled. “I’m not afraid of breaking my arm again if that’s what it takes.”
“I don’t think you’re afraid of anything,” Rupert said as he returned to his seat on the bunk. “And I’m hoping you won’t shoot me, not counting on it.”
That seemed like a pretty stupid hope to me, but then, he wasn’t risking much, was he? “Doesn’t matter, anyway,” I said bitterly, tossing my pistol on the bench beside me. “We both know Sasha can’t actually hurt you.”
The words were barely out of my mouth before Rupert reached into his coat and pulled a gun out of the shoulder holster I hadn’t realized he was wearing until that moment. He held it out to me a second later, and my eyes went wide. It was the pearl-handled cannon he’d threatened Caldswell with back on the bridge ages ago, the one I’d seen hanging above his bed when we’d slept together, his disrupter pistol.
When I didn’t take it, Rupert leaned over and placed the gun in my hand. It was heavier than it looked, the pearl handle smooth against my palm and warm from his body.
“Actually,” he said as he settled back into place, “as you should already know, your Sasha can knock me out just fine in this form. You just have to hit the right spot.” He reached up and tapped a long finger against his forehead just above his eyes, right where I’d shot him on the bridge. “A disrupter blast in the same location will kill a symbiont in one shot, even through the scales.”
I stared at him, dumbfounded, and then tightened my fingers around the gun he’d placed in my hand. “Why are you doing this?”
“Because I’ve lied to you since the day we met,” Rupert said. “I do not deserve your trust or respect, but I need you to believe me now, and this seemed like the only way.” He nodded up at the cockpit. “This ship is stocked with enough supplies to last two weeks. There are emergency clearances for all gates in known space in the navigational computer, and I’ve loaded the ship’s petty cash account with a little over a million in Republic Scrip. You can access the money through the central control panel. The pass code is your birthday.”
“How do you know my birthday?”
Rupert’s lips curved in the ghost of a smile. “I looked it up.”
My arm shot up, pointing the disrupter at his head. “What kind of game are you playing? You sound like you want me to shoot you and take your ship.”
“You can if you choose,” Rupert said, leaning back. “I’ve given you all the power, Devi. If you want, you can shoot my head off right now. This ship is fast and stealthy, and I’ve removed all the tracers from the security panel. Without those, even the Eyes will have trouble finding you.”
I held the gun steady, keeping it trained on the spot between his eyes. “Hell of a gamble you’re making, Charkov. I’ve shot you before.”
“You have,” he agreed, his voice calm and clear, like we were discussing dinner plans and not his possible demise. “But I deserved it. And I couldn’t think of any other way to convince you.”
“Convince me of what?”
He looked straight at me, heart in his eyes. “That I am not your enemy.”
My jaw fell slack. For a moment, I could only sit there staring like an idiot. And then I started to laugh.
CHAPTER 12
I laughed so hard I almost felt sick. I couldn’t help it. After all the tension and fear and heartbreak, the idea that he could look at me and say that with a straight face was too much. Rupert watched me crack up with his usual blank hide-everything expression, but I could tell it was getting to him because his jaw was doing that tightening thing
it did when he was upset. And that was what stopped my laughter. Not because I cared that he was upset, but because I couldn’t believe he had the nerve to try playing this card now.
“You’re not my enemy, eh?” I said, my lips peeling back in a snarl as I leveled the gun at his head again. “Well, you sure have a screwed-up way of showing it. If you didn’t want me to think of you as an enemy, maybe you shouldn’t have tried to capture me back in the woods. Or handed me to Caldswell after the phantom. Or forced me off a cliff.”
“I have done you very wrong,” Rupert agreed, raising his hands in surrender. “But you have to understand. At the time, I felt I had no choice. I’m an Eye. Everything I do is in the service of fighting the phantoms. If there was a chance you could be a breakthrough, even a small one, I could not let you go.”
“But now you’ve changed your mind?” I snapped.
Rupert nodded. “Yes.”
I stared at him a second longer, and then lowered the gun with a curse. “What the hell, Rupert?” I shouted. “I don’t get you at all. You can’t really think all this posturing is going to make me forget what you are, what you did. Am I just supposed to buy that you had a change of heart? Especially now, when you just read the report about how I’m the phantom killer?”
“The report has nothing to do with it,” Rupert said, his voice heating. “And I’m not posturing. I gave you that gun precisely because I knew you wouldn’t believe me, but I prepared this ship because I wanted to give you a choice.”
“Choice?” I roared. “Choice between what? Running like a coward until the Eyes hunt me down or giving up early and trotting off to the lab like a good little girl?”
