Chapter 32
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
No one Mathias Ariti encountered in the embarkation lobby had a clue his skin was crawling.
When his abilities had first manifested, he had thought he was going crazy. One second, he would be present in a lesson. The next, his vision would fuzz, like that old-timey tube screen static, and he’d see.
Eventually he learned more control. The visions were more like popups.
Annoying, but not overwhelming. He could focus his talent now, seek out specifics.
Operators. Outcomes. It wasn’t a guarantee he’d get to view the things he sought, but he could often figure out if a search would be fruitful or not within a few tries of reaching out his mental feelers.
When Corvinia had approached him, so many years ago, it had given him purpose.
He’d been a sheltered teenager, hadn’t even begun to consider the possibilities his talent could afford him.
He did what anyone else in his position would have: started a betting pool focused on the more popular kids’ dating habits. He made a killing.
But Corvinia had laid out the score. She’d appeared out of nowhere, steel spine in a six thousand credit suit.
Told him what was at stake for the planet, for him.
And the importance of staying off the radar if he didn’t want to become another tool in the infinite arsenal of Emil Bellica.
Scientists disappeared left and right in those days.
She could help him hide, and together they could strike down the regime when the time was right.
What teenage boy didn’t want the chance to help save the world?
What teenage boy couldn’t be manipulated into thinking it was his responsibility?
She’d dropped a comment here about his father’s research, a mention of his mother’s funding. Non-issues under different rule, ostracized in Bellica’s Tanalia. He’d been putty in her hands as soon as she figured out the right pressure to apply.
He didn’t even really resent her for doing it. Mathias didn’t think Corvinia could help herself; she’d been playing the game so long. Her mentorship had blown the pants off any of the other options he had been considering before she showed up and turned his world upside down.
The only real regret he had was that he was rapidly approaching thirty-five, and no one else really knew who he was. He barely knew who the fuck he was, and how much of what he had become had only been carved into being to serve in Corvinia’s war.
The shuttle jerked to a stop. Passengers clutched their bags of discount shoes and leftover pasta and shuffled to the doors, eager to return to their ships.
Mathias followed the crowd down the corridor until he stood at the entrance to the docking platform. The code he was carrying burned a hole in his pocket.
His communicator pinged. An encrypted message from Corvinia read:
Arrival time was accurate. Proceed.
He got in line for the transport pods, deliberately keeping his limbs loose and relaxed. He was in no hurry. Just another shopper returning to his ship. He moved the bag he’d brought with him to the other shoulder and pretended to check his time piece.
The line moved swiftly and efficiently. Transportation pods needed to get full wallets into stores to empty them. Turnover was the name of the game.
Mathias entered his pod and punched the code in his pocket into the control panel.
The airlock hissed behind him as the entrance sealed, and he buckled the safety restraint, lurching sideways as the pod bustled toward a gleaming ship on the far side of the docking platform.
The Glittering Twilight was stenciled on the side of the shiny silver pleasure cruiser.
Before his stomach had stopped lurching, the pod was connecting with the Twilight.
The airlock hissed again, and the pod’s air pressure stabilized to meet the larger ship’s.
The entrance slid open. Mathias stepped out onto black and white penny tiles.
The Rising Dawn was painted in bold red letters on the soft yellow wall of the entrance.
A compact, muscled, redheaded man was leaning against the wall. Mathias recognized him as the ship’s pilot from the dossier that Corvinia had prepared for him. The pilot’s blue eyes twinkled with mischief as he clocked Mathias’s puzzled look.
“We’re rebranding,” he said and stuck out a hand. His brogue was thick, but understandable. “Cairn. And you’re Vinnie’s man, Mathias, yes?”
Mathias took his hand and gave it a shake. Cairn’s grip was strong, but not punishing. They broke the greeting, and Cairn gestured for Mathias to follow him down the hall.
“The crew and the princess are in the lobby. Come along. Also, don’t call her princess. The lass hates that.”
“Corvinia mentioned that.”
They headed down the hall in silence. Cairn didn’t seem to feel the need to fill it, which was fine with him. Mathias hated small talk. Cairn led him into a glittering atrium, then veered off to check on a towering plant in a pot the size of a bathtub.
“Am I going to have to spray you for mites?”
Mathias continued into the lobby. The scent of espresso overpowered his sinuses as he took in the room. The crew seemed to be focused in the area between the bar and a shiny piano. Someone had set up a whiteboard.
A slender, bald Black man sat at the piano. His glasses were perched low on his nose as he took in the keys. His long fingers picked out a jazzy melody, and he nodded along with the conversation happening behind him. Tariel. Two older women sat at a cafe table next to him. The moms.
The princess — Evelyn — and a trim, neatly attired, bearded man — Aiden — sat at another cafe table. He was sprawled in his chair, his arm around the back of hers, whispering something that made her clutch her coffee cup all the more tightly. Mathias felt a smile bloom on his face.
Called that.
A tall, muscular man with a dark goatee came out a door behind the bar, massaging his shoulder as he spoke to his companion.
Veselko. He was talking to the woman the files had described as Veronique.
She was balancing a plate of pastries. The deep pink shade she’d slicked on her lips made her glowing tan skin pop.
And that leaves . . .
Veselko was still holding the door open, and the woman who stepped through took his breath away.
Nannette.
She had the richest blue eyes Mathias had ever seen.
Her smooth brown hair was tinged russet, the reddish brown reminding Mathias of a cinnamon stick.
Her lush mouth was quirked in a smirk, tilted up in one corner.
She wrinkled her nose at something Veselko was saying and batted his hand away from the pastry tray.
Mathias’ vision fuzzed. Static filled his mind in a way it hadn’t since he was a young man, inexperienced with his ability.
He was standing in a tuxedo in the high chapel in the Tanalian capital. The chamber was decorated with dozens of varieties of white flowers, their sweet scent perfuming the air. His hand kept nervously gliding to his pocket, to the small hinged box inside.
Music filled the air. He knew the tune. It was traditional, the song played at weddings for hundreds of years on Tanalia.
His gaze went down the aisle.
Nannette walked toward him. The gown she wore was demure and alluring all at once.
Floral lace skimmed over cerulean satin, mere shades lighter than those eyes he could happily drown in.
The low neckline showed the top of her shoulders and the barest hint of cleavage before the satin caressed her generous curves in a floor-length, flowing skirt.
Lace covered her arms, ending in dramatic bell sleeves.
She was clutching a bouquet full of the same flowers that decorated the chapel.
Her face looked serene.
The grip she had on the flowers told a different story.
Mathias’ vision fuzzed back to reality.
“Is this guy really the best Vinnie could send us?” Nannette crossed her arms as her gaze raked down his body, and only the fact that he was laser focused on her every movement allowed him to notice the hitch in her breath as she took him in.
She quickly arranged her features into a disdainful glare, those beautiful blue eyes icing over.
Fuck.