“I bear no ill will to the Scarlet heir.”
“Maybe you should. She is reckless and volatile. She is everything wrong with this city.”
“I ask again,” Marshall repeated through gritted teeth. “Is there a point to this?”
His father could say that it was for his own good. He could pull up the city’s every obituary, could show Marshall the sheer numbers that had been lost in these recent few years to the blood feud, a bullet through the chest for no reason other than wandering too close to the wrong territory. It didn’t matter. It was all an excuse.
The Nationalists shunned the imperial monarchy, but when they marched into this city and took it, they acted just as conquering kings and empires did. Different titles, the same idea. Power was only long-lasting if it were a reign, and reigns needed heirs. Marshall’s father never cared to find him when he was a child surviving off scraps. It was only now, when appearances became key, that he remembered Marshall existed.
General Shu sighed, dropping the brewing argument. Instead, he reached into his jacket, his hands brushing past the flashing medals pinned to his lapel, and retrieved a small, square card.
“I divulge this information because I care.” The card landed upon the table, faceup. “There is an execution order from the Kuomintang on the Montagovs.”
In a flash, Marshall shot to his feet, lunging for the small card and scanning the telegram. The stroke of midnight. No prisoners left alive.
“Call it off,” Marshall demanded. His voice turned to steel. He hated when he sounded like this. It wasn’t him. “Call it off now.”
“I can delay it,” General Shu said evenly. “I can continue delaying it. But I cannot call it off. No one has that power alone.”
Marshall’s fists tightened. He imagined marching out right now, through the line of soldiers, past the tall, tall walls bordering the mansion. . . .
“So you tell me as if I should be grateful?” he asked. “You tell me as if I should bless the Kuomintang that they are only soon to be dead?”
General Shu was not bothered by Marshall’s outburst. He never was. “I tell you so you realize what is left out there. Your former gangsters whose lives hang on a thread. Your Scarlet heir under her father’s thumb, your White Flower heir with nothing left under his command. What remains for you? The only place where you are needed is here. As the Kuomintang leadership flock into the city, as the number of meetings rise, as they look to see where the next generation of capable leaders may stem from—you are needed.”
The telegram crinkled under Marshall’s fingers. He was biting the inside of his cheeks so hard that he could taste the metallic tang of blood. The White Flowers were crumbling. The White Flowers hardly qualified as a gang any longer, never mind an empire that could exert power against the city.
“You cannot help your friends by running out,” General Shu continued. “But you can help by staying with me. I am willing to train you in your studies, your potential for leadership. I am willing to bring you up the chain of command, to be my son in proper public view.”
A Nationalist prodigy. An obedient son, one who had stayed in the house that day he found his mother dead, who hadn’t fled the very second he envisioned living only with his stranger of a father. He wondered how much of his past he needed to erase, whether it was his history as a gangster or his history flirting with boys that would be more of a scandal.
“Do you promise?” Marshall asked hoarsely. “We can save my friends? You will help me?”
You will not abandon me? You will not leave me to fend for myself?
General Shu nodded firmly, rising to his feet too. “We can be a family again, Marshall, so long as you do not fight me. We could do grand things, make grand change.”
Marshall released the telegram, let it flutter back upon the table.
“I will keep your friends safe,” General Shu finally said. “I will protect them to the very best of my ability, but I will need your help. Don’t you want a purpose? Don’t you want to stop running?”
“Yes,” Marshall replied quietly. “Yes, I would like that.”
“Good,” General Shu said. He dropped both his hands on Marshall’s shoulders, giving a squeeze. It almost felt fatherly. It almost felt gentle. “Very good.”
If Roma looked at one more map, he feared he would fry his brain.
With a huff, he pushed all the papers out of the way, dragging a hand through his hair and mussing his careful combing beyond repair.