“Okay.” His answer came shakily, the single word heavy like a sacrifice. It was a choosing—it was turning away from the commitment of family and following Benedikt wherever he was to go. “On one condition.”
Benedikt’s gaze snapped up. Marshall was looking at him with his eyes wholly black, pupils blown large, his expression pensive and serious.
“Anything.”
A grin slipped out. “Say it again. I didn’t pine all these years to only hear it once.”
Benedikt gave Marshall a shove—a force of habit, really, and Marshall stumbled back laughing.
“Idiot,” Benedikt chided. “In all these years, why didn’t you say anything?”
“Because,” Marshall said simply, “you weren’t ready.”
Idiot, Benedikt thought again, but it was with such fondness that his chest burned with it, a red-hot iron of affection that branded every inch of his skin.
“I’ll say it however many times you want. I’ll romance you until you get sick of me. I am horrendously, horrendously in love with your dreadful face, and we need to go, now.”
The smile that Marshall made was something glorious, so big that it felt uncontainable by the room, uncontainable within the house.
“I love you just as horrendously,” he replied simply. “We can go, but I have an idea. How certain are you that my father is lying?”
Benedikt wasn’t sure if this was a trick question. He hardly had the time to reel from the quick switch in topic. “Entirely certain. I heard him say the execution order was his command.”
Marshall pulled at the cuffs of his sleeves, rolling them up to his elbows as he wandered about his father’s desk, eyes searching through its contents.
“If the order is still in effect, we’re dead if we get caught,” Marshall said. He withdrew a piece of blank paper, then a pen, and started to write. “But not if we overturn the order on an emergency command.”
“With what?” Benedikt asked, flabbergasted. He squinted at what Marshall was writing. “A permission slip for any officer who catches us?”
“A permission slip”—Marshall finished writing with a flourish—“approved by General Shu. His stamp should be in his meeting room. Let’s go.”
Marshall was out of the room before Benedikt could even register the plan, digesting what they were trying to do. Benedikt’s ankle protested as he picked up speed too, catching up to Marshall in the long hall, winding around the house to come to the foyer.
Benedikt came to a dead stop. “Mars.”
“It’s just up there,” Marshall said. He pointed to the stairs, not noticing Benedikt’s terrified expression. “We—”
“Mars.”
Marshall jumped, then turned around and followed Benedikt’s gaze. Through the delicate archway of the foyer, the living room unfolded in front of them: the unlit fireplace, the floral vases, and General Shu, reading a newspaper on the leather couch.
“Oh,” Marshall said quietly.
General Shu laid his newspaper down. In one hand, he was holding a pistol, pointed in their direction. The other hand was gloved, matching the thick fabric of his outer coat, like he had come back inside the house without bothering to get comfortable.
“Did you think,” he said slowly, “that I wouldn’t notice my window wide open?”
“Well, you caught us.” Marshall might have been taken aback upon first sighting his father, but he recovered fast, his voice injected with grace. He walked right up to him, not faltering when his father rose, not faltering even as he walked right up to the pistol. “You promised that you would help me, help the Montagovs. So here we are.”
General Shu was watching Benedikt. Studying him.
“Your place for helping them is through official channels,” General Shu said evenly.
“This right here is an official channel. Unless, of course”—Marshall’s voice turned cold—“you lied to me.”
Silence. The ticking of the grandfather clock, its pendulum swinging left and right inside the glass casing. Slowly, General Shu set his pistol down on the table beside them.
“There is an order to the way things must work,” he said. His eyes darted to Benedikt again, some flare of irritation in the momentary glance. “We cannot make things happen just because we want it. That is tyranny.”
How fast could Benedikt reach for a weapon if he needed to? The pistol on the table mocked him—close enough for General Shu’s immediate retrieval but just far enough to give hope that it was not a threat.