His voice is small. “He’s dead?”
“I’m sorry. I thought you knew.”
He stares at the floor. “How?” I don’t answer. I’m scared. Not by him, but because I know my words are sharper than his knives. “How?”
“The Red Hand. They…took him.” My voice trails away.
“How?”
“They nailed him to a tree.”
He lets me go and I collapse to the floor. He slumps, hollow. Before I can apologize again, he shoves a small silver cube into my hands and says, “Get this to the Sovereign.”
He pushes past me and leaves the ship, stumbling down the ramp like a drunk man.
I follow at a distance, and watch from the top of the ramp as he storms from the hangar. When he’s gone, I’m alone on the ship. I roll the silver cube in my hand. What is it? A message to Virginia from her husband? Or something for Pax?
The AI drones. “Twenty minutes until departure.”
Will Sevro make it back in time? Is he coming back? Am I doing this journey all by myself?
I turn to head back into the ship, then stop. I’m not just alone on the ship. I’m alone in the hangar. Darrow’s ship lies on the opposite side. Welder drones are at work on its hull. More drones trundle in and out of its cargo bay. Its open cargo bay.
I glance back into my ship and its sleek, lonely corridors. I look back at Darrow’s. A smile spreads. I think of Matteo’s last words. Forced to go home at gunpoint. Not a gun to be seen, I dart back into the Mars-bound ship, place the holocube on the table in the commissary, then run out the way I came.
41
DARROW
To the Stars
I WAKE ON THE DAY of departure feeling like a mummy rising from its sarcophagus. Quick said pain was to be expected, but I didn’t expect to feel arthritic after the lightwave treatment. He said it would help with my mobility. To get the dust out of the joints, and the blood flowing, I perform my morning stretches to the rhythmic sounds from the coral aquarium outside my room’s only window. Past the pain of each initial movement lies a pleasant surprise: greater flexibility than I’ve had in years. I jump and touch the ceiling with ease. Damn, but I will miss Quick in more ways than one.
After a shower and a cup of caf, I stride with fresh legs past the suites given to Cassius and Aurae to enter Sevro’s. Stony-faced, he’d said farewell the night before, but I hoped that he’d change his mind. That I’d wake to see him snoring in his bed.
He did not change his mind, it seems. The bed is freshly made and when I arrive at the hangar, I see the ship Quick provided to ferry him and Lyria home with my message for Virginia is already gone.
Wounded, and wary of the wound, I seek distraction. To the sounds of loaders hauling pallets of gravBikes and equipment into the cargo bay, I inspect the Archimedes’s refurbished stealth hull until Cassius then Quick join me in the hangar.
“Factory repaired and sleek as a leviathan’s hide,” Cassius says with a whistle as he runs a hand along the fresh stealth material that coats the hull. “My compliments to your techs, Sun. Even if their brains are all silicon.” Cassius glances in suspicion at the construction drones.
“The material is the last generation of its line,” Quick says. “Its cloaking capabilities are superior to that of the generation Kavax gave you for Mercury. However, it is more fragile against kinetic impacts. As usual, it only works with your shield off, so do steer clear of pirates and Moonies, Bellona.”
“What about scylla and leviathans?” Cassius asks.
“Whatever are you prattling on about sea beasts for?” Quick asks.
“Well, knowing Darrow, we’ll crash on Europa and I’ll have to fend off those beasties with an oar,” Cassius says. “I must confess, I think you are a coward, Sun. Fleeing the fray at a time like this. But your station is the most ludicrous venture I’ve ever heard tell. Congratulations on the audacity, if nothing else.” He extends a hand to Quicksilver. “Prime luck out there beyond the System, Sun. If you find a planet of guileless nymphs, do send word.”
Quick looks at his hand in contempt.
“Your father was a decent man, despite his eyes. Your mother wasn’t and isn’t. As for you…you might be decent. But the man you killed like cattle twelve years ago was a titan. While you frittered away the spring of your life, he suffered, he struggled, only to be struck down by…you. Fitchner was my friend. I’m happy you’ve found accord with Sevro. But, no. Hospitality is one thing. But I will never shake your hand, Peerless. If you were worth anything, Lune wouldn’t be leading a Gold armada. Would he?”
Cassius weathers all the insults but the last with aplomb. The last is a knife to his gut. I showed him the Lightbringer trundling after the Rim. He fears a confrontation, I think. “Per aspera ad astra, goodman.” He bows with perfect manners and excuses himself.
I linger with Quick. “Cassius is—”
“I don’t care. Do you think he knows you plan to kill Lysander?”
“Do I?” I ask.
He chuckles. “Of course you do. You know where he’s going. If the opportunity presents itself, how could you not? He’s the link between Rim and Core. He dies…” He makes scissors with his fingers. “What a way to use your new navy…if it exists.”
“Maybe you do know war,” I say with a grim smile.
“Will he be able to do it?” Quick wonders. “Ten years with someone, that’s a long time. Can you take another brother from that man? Would he let you?” I don’t answer, because I’ve worried enough about that question myself. Quick gestures to a black crate as it enters the Archimedes. “We took everyone’s measurements while you were sleeping. You have the new pulseArmor you requested. My last line. Ten kits. I know you run through them, though you’ll be hard-pressed with this model.”
I turn in interest. “Manuals included?”
“Have I ever not?”
“I will miss your presents.”
“You’ll adore this last. Model’s called Godkiller Mark I.” He winks. “Just don’t use it on me. Jove, don’t smile like that. It’s disturbing.”
“Sorry,” I mutter. “Gear, you know.”
His eyes brighten at the sight of Matteo entering the hangar with Aurae, hand in hand. “Well, they’re a pair.” He’s very right. By themselves each of the Pinks is enough to take the breath out of a room. They laugh like two long-lost friends heading out of the theater talking about everything and nothing.
Quicksilver reaches for Aurae’s hand when they arrive, but it’s his turn to be slighted. With a kiss for Matteo on the cheek, she walks past Quick and carries on into our ship like she doesn’t even notice the wealthiest man alive.
“She’s very political,” Matteo says with a smirk.
Quick sighs. “Fair enough. At least my final rebuke was from a beauty and not a Bellona.” He smiles at me as the drone trailing behind Matteo brings the helmet I saw on his wall. He picks it up and grunts at the weight. I take it from him with one hand. The helmet is the same shape as the starburst helm Fitchner wore as Ares, but it is pure black.