CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
KYRION
Siya’s transport soared across the chasm and over the neighboring mountains, and we quickly returned to the Collier estate.
Rigel insisted we all go to the main infirmary and get checked out by the House Collier medics.
Vesper, Asterin, and Siya were given some mild skinbonds, while I lay down on a medtable.
Robotic needles pumped me full of more skinbonds, along with antibiotics and other medicines, then sloughed off and repaired the burned skin on both my left hand and my right forearm.
I stared up at Vesper through the clear polyplastic that covered the medtable. “You just like seeing me trapped in this bloody bubble,” I groused.
Vesper grinned, leaned down, and tapped her finger on the plastic. “Yes, I do, especially when it’s for your own good. Now, quit complaining and let the table finish its work.”
I grumbled, but I couldn’t hide my smile. After being on my own for so long, Vesper’s fussing pleased and soothed my inner monster, who let out a little purr of satisfaction.
After I was healed and the medtable released me, Vesper and I joined Siya, Rigel, and Asterin in Lord Aldrich’s library. Our friends had already told Aldrich and Verona everything that had happened, but Vesper and I chimed in and added our own stories to the mix.
The Erzton lord paced back and forth behind his desk, swiping through screens on his tablet.
Aldrich had the same hazel eyes, straight nose, and light brown skin as Siya, although his hair was more iron-gray than black, given he was in his sixties.
Verona stood off to the side, her hands clasped in front of her.
The Erzton lady was a few years younger than her husband, and her long black hair and pale skin made her look like an older version of Asterin.
Verona’s blue eyes flicked from her husband over to Vesper and me. I met her gaze and nodded. Verona gave me a grim smile and nodded back.
Aldrich tossed his tablet down onto his desk in disgust. “Roderick was luring people into his training facility and hunting them like animals?” He shook his head. “I still can’t believe it.”
“Believe it,” I said in a wry voice, flexing my left fingers.
Despite the medtable’s ministrations, my hand still ached, and I knew that I would feel the phantom sting of the lava-rigged blaster bolt for a long time, just as I would hear the echoes of Roderick’s singsong voice as he stalked me through the maze.
Siya swiped through some screens on her own tablet.
“According to the information Jeffrey gave us, Roderick killed more than four dozen people in the maze. No one ever traced any of the disappearances back to the training facility, and Roderick could have easily gone on hunting people for years to come.”
“If he hadn’t decided to pick Kyrion and Vesper as his next targets,” Verona said in a soft voice.
Vesper crossed her arms over her chest. “And that’s my main question. Why would he do that?”
Everyone looked at her.
“What do you mean?” Siya asked.
Vesper gestured back and forth between herself and me. “Why would Roderick pick Kyrion and me as his next targets? Why us specifically and not some other truebonded couple?”
“Roderick told Kyrion he wanted a challenge,” Rigel replied. “That he wanted to test his skills against the best of the best.”
Vesper nodded. “Maybe he did. But if Roderick truly wanted to test his skills, then why not take us both on at once?”
“Because deep down, he was a fucking coward who didn’t want to risk losing,” Asterin chimed in, her voice dripping with venom.
She hadn’t said much since Vesper and I had entered the library. Everyone stared at her now, but Asterin crossed her arms over her chest and kept her gaze fixed on the flames crackling in the fireplace.
Vesper cleared her throat, breaking the awkward silence.
“Plus, the Black Scarab in the maze was trying to capture me, not kill me. Then, later on, in the control room when Jeffrey realized I wasn’t in the maze anymore, he also told the House Battis Hammers to capture me, not kill me.
Jeffrey didn’t want to ruin some deal Roderick had made. ”
Aldrich frowned. “You think something else was going on? That there was some other reason Roderick lured you both into the maze?”
Vesper nodded. “I think it’s a strong possibility.”
“Like what?” Verona asked.
Vesper shrugged. “I’m not sure. Roderick might have wanted Kyrion and me in the maze, but he also wanted us separated. He also wanted to kill Kyrion but not me.”
Her lips puckered, and her gaze grew distant, as though she was considering a hundred possibilities to explain Roderick’s odd actions. The velvety ribbon of her also hummed in my mind.
Anything you want to share? I asked.
Vesper shook her head the tiniest bit. It’s just a theory. I need to think about it some more. I don’t want to tell the others unless I’m absolutely certain.
“Well, I don’t care about Roderick Battis’s motives, only his actions.” Aldrich shot another disgusted look at the tablet still lying on his desk.
“What do you want to do?” Verona asked in a soft voice.
Aldrich started pacing again. “That’s the problem. I can’t do much of anything. I can’t approach anyone at House Battis with this information. If they didn’t know what Roderick was doing, they’ll be stunned. Most likely, they won’t believe me.”
“And if they did know what Roderick was doing?” Asterin muttered, still staring into the crackling flames in the fireplace.
“Then they’ll deny it and cover up the scandal even more so than they already have.
” Aldrich stopped pacing, then scooped up his tablet.
“Either way, news of the transport crash has already hit the gossipcasts, so I need to follow protocol, reach out to Lady Battis, and offer my condolences for her loss.”
I studied the Erzton lord. “Protocol? That’s a nice way of saying you’re going to see how Lady Battis reacts. That will tell you everything you need to know about what she and the other leaders of House Battis really knew about Roderick and the training facility.”
A sly smile curved Aldrich’s lips. “Something like that.”
Admiration filled me. The Erzton lord played noble games as well as anyone I’d ever met. Even with Jeffrey in House Collier custody, it was smart—and devious—of Lord Aldrich to use a condolence call to slyly gather more information.
Verona, Siya, and Rigel nodded, but more disgust twisted Asterin’s face. She spun away from the fireplace, wrenched a door open, and left the library.
“I’ll go check on her,” Verona murmured.
“No,” I said. “Let me.”
The lady glanced at me in surprise, but she nodded.
I touched Vesper’s elbow. “I’ll meet you back in our suite.”
Vesper also nodded, and I left the library.
I found Asterin on a walkway that connected the main castle to the guest wing. Her elbows were resting on the railing, and she was slumped forward, like the stone was the only thing holding her upright. I stepped up beside Asterin and mimicked her stance.
The earlier snow had moved out, and above us, the Frozon moon was shining brightly in the night sky, along with a smattering of stars.
The silvery moon- and starlight streamed in through the clear energy shield that covered the estate and gilded the petals of the blue-moon peonies in the large topiary garden at the heart of the grounds.
“Did my mother send you to check on me?” Asterin muttered.
“No, I volunteered.”
She huffed. “Why? Did Siya not want to come and brag about how she’d been right about Roderick all along?”
“Once upon a time, I was involved with a woman named Francesca,” I said, changing the subject. “She was wonderful. Smart, witty, fun, beautiful. I thought I had finally found a bit of happiness after years of just surviving and going through the motions of life after my parents’ deaths.”
Asterin eyed me warily. “What happened?”
“I found a bottle of perfume in Francesca’s things. Only it wasn’t perfume—it was a chembond.”
Unlike skinbonds, which were designed to heal cut skin, broken bones, and the like, chembonds were used to connect two people for a short period of time.
Chembonds had a variety of academic and military uses, but they were mainly used as aphrodisiacs, especially at nightclubs and other places where people were looking to feel a little less lonely, if only for a few hours.
Asterin blanched. “She was dosing you with a chembond to make you fall for her?”
I nodded. A knot of emotion clogged my throat, and my inner monster snarled. Even after all these years, cold rage still flooded my veins like an ocean of ice every time I thought about how Francesca had fooled me.
Asterin winced. “I’m so sorry, Kyrion. That must have been awful.”
I cleared my throat. “It was awful. What Francesca did was horrible, of course, but to me, the worst part was how stupid I felt afterward. For not realizing what she was really doing and that she cared much more about the Caldaren fortune than she ever did about me.”
Sympathy creased Asterin’s face, and some of the tension trickled out of her body.
She let out a weary sigh and stared out over the garden again.
“When the House Battis Hammers attacked me and Siya in the control room, I thought it was a giant misunderstanding. Or that Jeffrey was the one giving the orders. But then Jeffrey started talking to Roderick in the maze, and I realized Roderick was in charge and that he was going to kill me and Siya and you and Vesper just because he wanted to—just for a bit of sport, as he called it.”
Asterin shook her head, tears gleaming in her eyes. “How could I have been so wrong about him?”
“It’s easy to be wrong about people. Especially people like Francesca and Roderick who only show you what they want you to see and nothing of their true selves. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
Asterin barked out a harsh laugh. “It feels like I did everything wrong, at least when it came to Roderick.”