Chapter 28
NIK
“Get out of my way!” Nik fought through the crowd. “Move!”
They were too distracted by their senseless paranoia to notice him. They were all watching the horror unfold on the stage. Everything Lafontaine had laid before them proved they had every right to be afraid: Rebels were among them, and they wanted to kill again.
Arnaud had been arrested under suspicion alone, the evidence so flimsy it wouldn’t hold in a real trial. But he wouldn’t get one. Not if Nik’s father had anything to do with it. And if Elara opened her mouth again, if she gave his father any sort of resistance, she’d be next.
Nik had to get to her first.
“Gaetan Arnaud,” Lafontaine declared, “you are charged with conspiracy to commit treason, as well as the murder of Souverain Lisette Plouffe. How do you plead?”
The hulking man didn’t even look up from where he knelt. “Guilty.”
“No!” Elara fought to get to him. “Don’t do this!”
“Silence!” Lafontaine ordered.
“The only thing he’s guilty of is beating your system!” Elara snarled. “For rising high enough, you had to knock him down. First with bills he had no hope to pay and now this!”
“Shortly after your success during the second round, it was your words being chanted in the streets and plastered on walls,” Lafontaine added. “We found evidence of such propaganda in his bakery. Including paint and flyers for the rallies.”
Lafontaine held out one of the so-called flyers. Even from here, Nik could see it wasn’t real. Someone had designed a fist punching through the memorial in the Senate lobby with information for a meetup near the southern tip of the Restes.
He would’ve laughed at its absurdity if he wasn’t so terrified for Elara. No rebellion would give up their location so easily.
But the privileged, sheltered audience didn’t know that. And they certainly didn’t care.
“It’s fake,” she said.
“How would you know?”
Lafontaine leered down at her. If she confirmed what they both knew to be true, they would arrest her under suspicion as well.
Thankfully, Elara changed tactic, embracing a quieter, softer side.
“Please,” she whispered. “He didn’t do this. It has to be someone else.”
“Then who, Rousseau?” Souverain Faucher piped up.
Shit. If Faucher turned against her, she’d never win.
Elara stared back, feigning resilience, but none of them saw the way she fiddled with the hem of her sleeve or the way she chewed her lip. None of them knew her. Not like Nik did.
Elara knew exactly who was running the rebellion.
“No one.” Gaetan spat a wad of pinkish saliva onto the clean metal stage. “I acted alone.”
“Alone in this treasonous plot, perhaps, but what about the attack on the Senate? Were you a part of Corinne’s rebels?” Lafontaine asked.
Gaetan lifted his head. “Yes.”
“And the others in this photograph were known rebels, yes?”
“As you’ve already stated.”
“They’ve all perished, yet you escaped their fate. How is that?”
“You mean how was I not hunted down in the streets and slaughtered like an animal?” Gaetan spat blood. “I’d call it luck.”
“It seems that it has finally run out,” Gabriel sneered.
“No,” Elara cut in. “He walked away from the rebels before the attack. He had nothing to do with it.”
“Or,” Lafontaine offered, “was he a fail-safe? A way to reignite the rebellion after its inevitable failure?”
Elara bucked up, shoulders taut in a way that promised wrath. Nik shoved closer, arriving in time to watch her face set with fierce determination.
“If someone really managed to do all that,” she said darkly, “it would make all of you look like fools.”
The guard struck her with a resounding crack. Elara toppled into the railing.
It filled him with enough rage to break through to the stage, where he placed himself firmly between Elara and the guard. His hands were up, palms presented in surrender.
“Forgive her,” he shouted. “Forgive her, Counseil.”
Lafontaine slammed his hands down. “Silence, Dupont.”
“A moment, Souverain.” He swallowed a gulp of air and watched as Elara righted herself. Her cheek was red, eyes unfocused from a likely concussion, but she was fire incarnate as she straightened her shoulders. “Please.”
Souverain Faucher waved her palm. “Let him speak, Lafontaine.”
Nik bowed, deeply. “Thank you. Elara confessed the truth of her name to me at the start,” he lied. “As a former resident of the Restes Quarter myself, I understood her need to escape. To live among your grace and power.”
Faucher raised a sculpted brow. “You encouraged deceiving the Counseil?”
“You admitted to the possibility that you might not have accepted her had you known the truth,” he said. “If Elara was operating under Arnaud’s influence, with or without her knowledge, even I didn’t see it.”
“Are you suggesting your Souverain has arrested the wrong man?” Gabriel spat.
“I am suggesting that this is an interview for the Objet d’Art. Not a courtroom.” Nik motioned to Gaetan. “Conduct a trial as you see fit, but not here. Please, honored Souverain.”
Discussion broke out from the crowd. Disagreements on whether Elara was a traitor, whether she was a poor victim under a monster’s control, or whether the Counseil were sabotaging the competition.
“We do not bow to the whims of foolish boys,” Lafontaine snarled.
“But you do answer to us,” Faucher shot back. “From what I’ve seen, you have one photograph linking Gaetan Arnaud to several known rebels. What evidence ties him to Plouffe’s murder?”
“And why are we just now hearing of it?” Souverain Tremblay added.
A knot unhitched in Nik’s chest. If the other Counseil members turned on his father, then there was hope Elara could make it out alive.
The Counseil ruptured in heated debate, topping one another in volume and voracity. Lafontaine attempted to defend his lie of a delayed autopsy, Gabriel supported his decision, and the rest tore them apart.
Nik stole a glance at Elara, who looked between him and Gaetan with such fear that it made him step toward her.
He longed to hold her cheek, to sweep the hair from her face and crush her to his chest and shelter her from this storm he’d brought upon her.
Later, he promised himself. Later he would surrender himself to these feelings. For now, he mouthed, I’ve got you.
Despite the shine of tears, she nodded. Trusting him once again.
“Perhaps,” Souverain Tremblay said loudly, “this is a matter to be discussed in private.”
Faucher stood. “Agreed. Take Arnaud away until we can determine if there is such a case against him.”
Lafontaine slammed his fists. “He is my prisoner—”
“And we do not want to incite a riot if you should be wrong,” Souverain Perrault muttered. “Even in all your infinite wisdom.”
Lafontaine’s face paled.
The police yanked Gaetan to his feet and dragged him backward.
“No!” Elara bolted, and Nik was there to catch her. “No! Please! He didn’t do anything! Nik! Please! He didn’t. I swear!”
She buried her face in his shoulders as her muffled cries filled the silent hall.