“As a rule, I don’t accept invitations to parties from men I’ve tried and failed to kill,” Ajax replies. “Nothing personal.” His eyes fall on my face and the pinkish shadow of healthy skin where my atrocious scar from Darrow’s boot used to be. “I see vanity won out. Thank Vulcan. That thing was monstrous. People will think you’re a Moonie keeping scars like that.”
“Atalantia’s vanity. Not mine.”
His eyes narrow. “It was like that then?”
“Yes. She had it removed from my face in transit from Mercury, after having her goons beat me to smithereens.” I apply ointment to the new pink flesh on my face. “Hurts like mad, you’ll be happy to know. The liver worse than the face, though.” I run a finger along the Peerless scar on my right cheekbone. “Least I got to keep this.”
“It’s vainer to keep marks like that burn. Darrow took my nose once. Imagine me, walking around like a serpent. Imagine him walking around without the fingers I took off his left hand when I was seventeen. Scars are for the poor or the pompous.” He searches behind me. “Where’s your new man friend? The talkative idiot?”
“Cicero, a perfectly lovely human being, is managing the conclusion of my games,” I say.
“Hiding behind his sister’s skirts, you mean. At least she’s brave enough to attend Atalantia’s summit, even though it’s Cicero’s duty. Truly, you must thank your stars to have finally found a friend you can count on.”
“Are you allowed to be jealous when you tried to kill me twice?” I ask.
He pats his razor. “This says I can be anything I gorydamn want to be. You’re welcome to disagree. Others have. You should ask them for advice, but you’ll have to brave the sun.”
I wonder how many Ajax has sent to their sundeaths. Even if I knew, my opinion on duels could not sour any further. I don’t know what transpired on the Venus docks between Darrow and Apollonius, but I’m sure when it all went wrong, it was certainly because of the latter’s lust for a duel.
“I thought you’d be rushing to hunt Darrow,” I say. “I’m sure those holos of Sevro, Cassius, and him running through the halls of the docks caused quite a stir.”
“I’m on assignment.” His eyes twinkle. He may hate Darrow, but any success Darrow has against Ajax’s competitors lessens Ajax’s own shame. “The Minotaur choked on that meal. But then again, so are the Carthii choking on theirs. Mad shit, that battle.”
“I imagine Atalantia’s sending a strike force?”
“Ten legions. First time I’m glad to be missing the action. All those meatstraws.”
“So you’ve come to what, gloat?” I ask.
He raps his knuckles on his gear. “I don’t need armor to gloat. I have an action today in South Pacifica.” His tone softens, and his natural awkwardness slips through, making him seem almost sweet. He’s unable to meet my eyes. “I just came to say…when Atalantia strikes you, don’t hit her back. Certainly don’t laugh. Go to your knees. Not too quickly though, or she’ll think less of you.”
I feel a pang of sorrow for him. “Is that what you did all these years?”
His mood darkens and any chance of him answering vanishes when Atlas joins us.
“Storm,” Atlas says. It is the coldest greeting between a father and son I have ever heard.
“Fear.” The father and son—both Olympic Knights—are strikingly similar in the shape of their eyes but little else. Atlas’s skin is the color of a gray winter sky. Ajax’s is dark brown. Atlas is slender. Ajax has more muscles than most legions. Atlas never blusters. Ajax talks shit like he was a tiny man from a poor family. “Back from butchering babies already?” he asks his father.
Atlas smiles. “Aren’t you due in South Pacifica?”
“I haven’t seen Lysander in eight months,” Ajax replies. “He’s been busy with civic engineering, you see.”
“Now you have. Give the Republic my best, Storm.” Atlas waits for Ajax to leave.
Ajax does not. “I hear you’re off to ‘pacify’ South America after the summit,” he says.
“I am.”
“Strange, considering the man who murdered my mother—the man you said was probably dead—is likely somewhere between Venus and Mars right now,” Ajax says.
“Your point?”
“My point is you never gave two shits about my mother or avenging her.”
“Your mother was a good soldier, but we had little in common except that Atalantia liked our genes. You obviously cared for your mother—so much that you willingly linger in her shadow. So why aren’t you hunting Darrow?” Atlas asks.
I almost step back from the impending explosion of violence. If any other man had said that to Ajax, Ajax would cut him in half, then beg the man’s family to try and avenge him, then cut them in half too.
Atlas looks at the war machines staggering into the horizon, and says, “We all have our parts to play, young man. Yours is to do as you’re told until you can prove you don’t have to be told. Fortunately, you’ve made progress, on that front at least.”
Ajax grins like the skulls on his armor. “One of these days, when the war is won, Atalantia won’t need you anymore. We’ll have a talk then. Son to father.”
“If we must.” Atlas does not care at all. He strides away. “Hurry along, Lune. The Dictator won’t do business after the sun is set. She has a party to attend.”
Ajax watches after Atlas. A film of anger coats his eyes. He would call Atlas Father, I think. But Atlas does not even care enough about him to explain why Ajax is so unworthy of his respect. It is as if by not knowing the answer already, Ajax does not deserve the answer. “Slag him,” I say.
He ignores that. “Remember what I said. Kneel.”
“I won’t kneel to her,” I tell him.
He shrugs. “Do what you like. You might even get away with it. You have a knack for just that.”
“Ajax,” I call after him as he turns to leave. “It is good to see you. Despite everything.”
“Go fuck yourself, Lysander.” He flies toward a cruiser off the coast. I scratch my head. He used to be so sweet. I head for Atlas and the bikes.
“What does Atalantia know?” I ask. “If you loved my mother and father like you always say you do, you’ll tell me. What were you doing on Mercury?”
“I told you to relax.” Atlas looks at me the way I’ve seen beastmasters look at hunting dogs that don’t quite turn out. He shoves the golden bowl from my party into my lap. It is full. “You can carry Tharsus.”
* * *
—
A few dozen antelope drink from a small pond. A brilliant yellow streak sprints at them from the cover of nearby brush, and the antelopes bolt. The herd draws dusty trails eastward over the plains, where two more cheetana emerge from the tall grass and herd them north. Then a lithe, dark-skinned woman bounds down the slope, leaving plumes of dust behind her. She draws her bow on the run and seems to fire two shots at once. Both arrows catch a cheetana just as it turns and send it sprawling down to the dry earth.