39. Something Off About Haven
SOMETHING OFF ABOUT HAVEN
DAWN
Cordon Sennett. House Sennett. Fae bloodline: lar Vuorlar, direct lineage. Affinity potential: moderate. Status: terminated.
The road was nice while it lasted. They were cutting their own path again. Making decent time until a patrol burst from the tree line. Fucking green cloaks. Six enforcers spread across the narrow trail and swung their rifles around.
Dawn was ready for a fight. She counted three rifles, two carbines, one scattergun. She could drop the scatter first, pivot left, maybe get one more before they tore her to pieces. The math was ugly.
Talia nudged Jonquil up before Dawn could fire, blocking her sightline. Raised both hands. “Stand down. I’m the one you want. Talent Salaren of Vaelis.”
Wild move. She must have trusted that whatever the Pentarchy wanted from her wasn’t a roadside execution.
Got them to lower their guns, at least. The leader circled back to the patrol and said something under his breath.
Dawn caught Salaren heir and early. Then the man dismounted and dropped to one knee.
“Forgive us, Lady Salaren. Haven is honored by your presence. We were not expecting you so soon.”
They ended up riding through Haven’s streets as honored guests instead of in chains. Made no fucking sense.
Crowds surged forward as they rode past. Men swept off their hats, children pressed hands to hearts. A whole city kneeling to a bunch of strangers. Dawn’s hand stayed near her guns. It all gave her the creeps.
Her chamber had a feather bed piled with pillows, and a huge copper bathtub. The wardrobe held a charcoal jacket lined with pink satin, trousers reinforced at the knees, and a wide-brim felt hat. If this was a trap, whoever was setting them up had impeccable taste.
She checked the windows. Three stories up, clear sight lines to the courtyard.
Two exits, one into the hall, one to a servant’s passage.
The bath was too hot, and the soap had been carved into little flower shapes.
She sank into it anyway. Four hundred years of dust and blood taught you to take pleasure where you could get it.
She didn’t trust any of it, but damn, it felt good.
The jacket fit like it was made for her.
Must have been. Was this what that enforcer had meant when he said they weren’t expected so soon?
Why were they expected at all? Satin whispered when she moved.
In the mirror, she looked dangerous and civilized.
When an orderly summoned her to dinner, she went armed.
The banquet hall was packed. The table sagged under buttered fish and perfect fruit.
Servants moved in sync like clockwork. Talia sat in the middle of it all.
The girl was glowing in a red corset dress that showed off all her curves.
Those soft Consortium men were here, and she was putting on a show.
Correcting their Starscript. Laughing at their jokes.
After everything they’d been through, here she was again.
The girl Dawn had met in the flux shop, polished back down to nothing.
Fuck. Everything about this felt wrong. Dawn couldn’t put her finger on it, exactly. The enforcers shouldn’t have welcomed them. They shouldn’t have fancy clothes and sweet-smelling soap. The whole place was too polished for a military post this far from the coast.
Dawn caught Riven’s eye across the table and tilted her head toward the door. He nodded. After the twelve millionth toast, she excused herself. He followed. It seemed they got out clean.
They were a few blocks outside of the complex when she picked up a familiar vinegar smell. She followed it down an alley to a warehouse. The door had an ironbound frame, new hinges, and a shiny new lock. Riven had it open in ten seconds.
The wash of smells hit her as soon as the door creaked open. Blood and vinegar. Burned fur. Old piss and shit underneath.
Rows of cages stood empty. Straw darkened where bodies had been.
A drainage trench cut through the floor, sloping toward a grate.
Dawn’s hands tightened on her revolvers.
She moved down the row. Some cages were small enough for cats or lapdogs.
Others big enough for worse things. Water dripped from somewhere, otherwise it was dead quiet.
“How many can they hold here, you think?” she asked.
Riven studied the cages. “At least forty. Maybe more if they double up.”
Forty fluxborn. So where are they?
Just then, footsteps echoed in the alley outside. Dawn killed her lamp and spun, guns ready. Riven tensed beside her, hand on his blades. The footsteps paused. Then moved closer.
Dawn set up next to the door. When a figure stepped through, she almost shot Holloway in the face.
“What the fuck.” She lowered her guns. “What are you thinking sneaking in here?”
“I wasn’t sneaking,” he said, all defensive. “I was following you.”
“Same damn thing.”
“I saw you come in here, and I thought—” He stopped, color rising in his cheeks. “I was just walking down the street, and you both ducked in here. I thought I’d have your back while you—” He gestured at the air.
Dawn stared at him. “While we what?”
His face went from pink to red.
Riven’s rare laugh rolled through the warehouse. Dawn snorted.
“You thought I was fucking him?” Dawn jerked a thumb at Riven. “Soldier, he is not my type.”
Holloway’s gaze darted between them. He looked like he wanted the floor to swallow him up. “Right. Obviously. I just—you both stepped out, and I thought—”
Dawn cut him off. “We’re looking into this.” She holstered her guns and gestured at the empty cages. “Forty-some cages, all empty. Fresh enough the blood’s still wet.”
“What did they have in the cages?”
“Why don’t you tell us, Captain? These are your people.”
He stood up straight. “Have you checked the offices yet? Pentarchy loves paperwork. I bet they wrote it all down.”
The office upstairs smelled like dust and old paper. Filing cabinets lined the walls, unlocked and unguarded. The officials here must be absurdly confident. This was all too boring to be a trap. Riven started sifting through piles of papers.
“These have to be fluxborn,” Riven said, showing her a table with what looked like numbers and dates.
“What about fluxborn?” Holloway asked, pulling out another drawer and leafing through some files.
Dawn and Riven exchanged a look. He shrugged. She rolled her eyes. Fine.
“Pentarchy’s been caging monsters,” Riven said. “They’re transporting them here, and we think”—he glanced at Dawn—“it resembles a kind of fae technology.”
Holloway went still. “I knew they were building something out here. Research facilities, fortifications. But I didn’t know that, exactly. Not in those terms.”
“You knew they had a secret research facility?” Dawn snapped. “When the fuck were you going to say something?”
Riven cut in. “Stop. You both need to see this.”
He held up a thick folder, flipped through it. Pages and pages of branching lines, what looked like names connected by ink strokes. Family records, Dawn realized. Going back a long time.
He leafed through the drawer and pulled out a file, which he handed to Holloway. Dawn tapped her foot, watching them read. Fidgeted with her guns. Useless fucking symbols. She hated needing other people to parse the world for her every damn time things turned to text.
“Find anything good?” she asked finally.
“Genealogy,” Riven said softly. “Family trees for all the ruling families of Sovana. Detailed notes on bloodline strength, magical potential.” He glanced at Holloway. “I gave him his family’s file.”
Holloway’s finger traced down the sheet, then it stopped. His face went three shades lighter.
“What is it?” Dawn asked.
“Cordon.” His voice broke. “My brother. They crossed out his name. There’s a note—” He looked up, eyes wet. “Terminated.”
The folder slipped from his hands. Papers scattered.
Dawn went to say something. Stopped. What the fuck was there to say? His brother’s name was crossed out like a canceled order. She dropped a hand on his shoulder and squeezed.
Something creaked below them.
Riven’s head snapped up. “Company.”
Dawn killed the lamp. “Grab what you can. Let’s move.”
Holloway dropped to his knees, scrabbling for papers in the dark. Riven snatched a handful of folders.
Boots echoed through the warehouse. Four, maybe five men. Voices drifted up: “Records audit’s tomorrow… chancellor’s orders…”
The steps paused directly below them. Dawn grabbed Holloway’s sleeve and hauled him under a table. The footsteps moved again, slower now, like the guards were checking the cage doors. Then they faded without coming up the stairs.
Dawn counted to sixty. “Out. Now.”
She put both hands on the railings and slid down.
Her feet hardly touched the stairs. Riven and Holloway followed just behind her, bolting into the night air without a word.
The fluxlight was a strange golden color.
Everything seemed too bright, too clean.
They paused three blocks away, just long enough for Riven to hand Holloway the files.
He shoved them in his harp case one at a time, then let out a low groan.
“I need to go back. It’s not all here.”
“Not tonight,” Dawn said. “That’s suicide.”
“They know what happened to Cordon—”
“And they’ll still know tomorrow.” Dawn met his eyes. “I’ll go back there with you first thing in the morning. Just not tonight.”
Riven looked down at his hands. “I found something in Talia’s file.”
“What’d it say?” Dawn asked.
He hesitated, looking at Holloway.
“A little late for secrets,” Dawn said. “Just spit it out.”
He huffed out a breath and took his time. Something big, then. “It’s her affinity. She was already channeling flux in Vaelis, as far back as seven years ago.”
“Channeling flux? What’s that mean?” Holloway sounded a little frantic.
“You didn’t know she had an affinity for mind weaving?” Dawn tried to sound gentle. Wasn’t sure she got it right.
“I don’t know what that means,” Holloway snapped.
Riven cut in. “There’s more. They’ve been grooming her for Pentarchy leadership. Since she was a kid.”
“Well yeah,” Holloway said. “The Salarens are one of the Five Families. But what do you mean—”
“Did you know they always planned for her to come here? To Haven?” Riven asked, turning to Holloway. To the boy’s credit, he didn’t shrink.
“No, that’s not right. I was told to make sure she didn’t leave Gateway. She was never supposed to come here.”
“Never, or not yet?” Dawn asked.
It would make sense. Talia had asked about channeling the very first time Dawn met her.
Could she really study something like that without the Pentarchy knowing?
Maybe even helping? Made Dawn wonder what Lore knew.
He had agents planted all up the Pentarchy command chain.
Hard to imagine he hadn’t come across this information.
They walked the rest of the way in silence, sticking to shadows, avoiding the main streets. Back in her room, Dawn should have felt safe. Soft bed. Locked doors. Weapons within reach. But she didn’t even try to sleep. She stood by the window and counted patrols as they passed below.
They hadn’t stumbled into Haven. They’d been expected here. All of them, but especially Talia. The question was, for what?
The bond spiked. Talia was struggling. Dawn was on her feet before she realized what was happening.
The girl wasn’t in pain. She was with Lore.
Fucking hell. Good for her, I guess.
Dawn sent a pulse of strength down the bond. She didn’t have to like her friend’s taste in men to support her. Then she built a wall and stayed on her side of it.