Chapter 32
THIRTY-TWO
Max covered me until the heat of the explosion blew off. Before black smoke billowed from the body of the ship. The force of the burst snapped any support lines holding the ship upright, and it tilted in the basin, groaning as it fell and creating a loud boom, colliding with the side of the dock.
Fire quickly spread through the ocean liner from the hospital, spilling from the circular windows lining the middle of the ship.
I watched for a moment from the safety of the dry dock, stuck between one fight and another.
Everything would be charred and gone. The evidence of Dupont’s crimes, his project, his aspirations in ashes.
Thankfully, I still had the tapes to prove what had been done here.
Max pulled us behind a maintenance building. His shirt was split open to his mid-chest, soaked from the mist and clinging to his outline. He passed a hand through his silver hair, slicking it back and out of his face. “What did you go back for?” he asked, glancing at my hand.
“Tapes. Dupont recorded everything, and I included our last conversation.” I sighed. “It’s all here. I have the evidence now to clear my name. Maybe even expose the Magister and the Academy. I have solid proof they’re violating the ethical guidelines they claim to uphold. This would ruin them.”
Max snatched my face in his broad hands.
He shook his head, lost in wonder. “My cunning woman.” Then his arms were around my waist, lifting me to his chest to kiss me hard.
The air flew from my chest from the force of his hands squeezing my middle, and I clawed at his wet shirt to pull him closer, thankful for one more moment with him.
“I thought something happened,” I said between breaths. “It took you so long.”
“I’m sorry.” He sighed against my lips. “You took the best of my dice.”
Speaking of… “I have to admit something else.”
He paused his advances, leaning back to look at me. “What is it?”
I pulled the dice from my pocket and showed him the evidence of what had happened during the surge of my Siphon. “I think I accidentally rewrote the codes on your dice, Max. I’m so sorry.”
“You wrote a code?” His gaze shifted back and forth between my face and the dice. “Nina, this is a new code. I don’t even know what these runes are, but they feel like…”
“Everything,” I said.
He nodded. “Only someone with essence in their blood could do such a thing,” he murmured, eyes flashing in the flames stretching high over the ship. A breath of heat swept over the docks. “I heard Dupont mention your mother having a code. What does that mean?”
I swallowed, understanding the deeper meaning behind his question. He’d been trying to figure me out this entire time, and I hadn’t trusted him enough to tell him the full truth. His orange eyes were soft on me.
“It’s my Siphon.” My eyes shut briefly, sorting out my explanation.
“My mother used to be lucid in my younger years, but she started losing her mind the older I got, a little after I noticed I could take essence from others.” I glanced at him.
“Bernard moved us to the Fissures to get away from the Academy. He wanted to hide my magic as much as possible, but he also wanted to hide her, too.”
“Because you have a bloodline, don’t you? You both do. One the Academy doesn’t know about.”
I shook my head. He wasn’t understanding, and why would he? It was an impossible thing to accept, much less acquire on his own. But I couldn’t even say the truth out loud. Not when I’d kept it locked away for so long.
“They know about it, Max. That’s why they want the code.
The problem is, my mother doesn’t really have it anymore.
It’s weakened within her. Completely unstable to the point where I had to sedate her to protect us all.
” I locked eyes with him, resting a hand over my heart absentmindedly.
“I’m the one they should be looking for. ”
His sigh was sharp. “I knew the moment I tasted you that you were different. You had something strange in your blood, Nina. A taste I wasn’t familiar with.”
I nodded. That’s why he didn’t want anyone else to have my blood, then. It wasn’t just jealousy. He’d been protecting me, keeping my secret.
“Who else knows?” he asked.
“You’re the only one I’ve ever told, but that doesn’t mean others haven’t figured it out.
Bria had her suspicions. Dupont obviously knew enough to give my mother to the Magister.
And then Damien got curious after…” My heart rate must have kicked faster, because Max came close again, brushing my hair to one shoulder to kiss my temple.
“The ability to take any bloodline and wield it as your own is a powerful ability. But you can’t fight the entire Academy alone.
” Cold fingers traced my chin, tilting it to look up at him.
“I vowed to protect you both. I meant it. Your enemies are now mine, and anyone who wishes harm on either of you will not live long enough to see it through.”
I smiled, relaxing some. “I’m glad you’re here, Max. I couldn’t do this alone.”
The tender moment was broken by the echo of gunshots. I peered ahead, trying to see through the haze. Were the Cursed still holding the yard? I felt like we’d been inside the ship for hours—
A window beside us burst from a stray bullet. I cursed under my breath, heart jumping between my ribs.
Men appeared in the mist, running toward us with raised guns. Instinct kicked in, and I siphoned, shoving them back with a burst of air that tossed them to their backs. It was simpler with a single die. I only had to desire the power, and my Siphon drew from it.
They lifted their hands as they sat up, calling out, “Cursed! We’re Cursed.”
“What’s happened?” Max asked them, his hand on the small of my back.
The first one was back on his feet, picking up his shotgun from the ground. He wore a faded suit and a hat pulled low over his forehead. “They were holding the gate, but the Commissioner pushed them back and corralled them into the yard against the docks. Now they’ve got their backs to the canal.”
“And why aren’t you with them?” Max questioned him.
He looked at his partner before replying. “We were sweeping the area for a possible way around them.”
Max narrowed his gaze, critical of them. “If what you’re saying is true, Elli and Andre and the rest won’t be able to get out if we leave them now.” He mouthed a curse. “Where is she?”
The Cursed man motioned behind a blockade the rest had formed from shipping crates and the remnants of Andre’s car. “Give me your gun,” Max demanded, and he obeyed without hesitation.
Max slid a bullet into the chamber of the gun before tucking it into his waistband. “Nina, I need to get you back to Ronny’s. It isn’t safe for you here.”
“But I can help—”
“You.” He emphasized the word. “You are too important to me and to this city to risk yourself in this fight. Not with what you carry and not with all our most dangerous enemies closing in on us here.”
He nodded to the one who still had a weapon. “I’ll take you to a car, and these two will ride back with you—”
A swarm of bullets rang out beyond the boundary of stacked cargo, and Max tensed beside me, listening to his friends—his family—be possibly sprayed by the same round.
“Go to her,” I said, nudging him. “She needs you more than I do right now. I’ll be fine.”
Max winced, his heart clearly conflicted. He palmed the other dice in his hand, staring at the men beside us. “Make sure she gets home by any means necessary. If anything happens to Nina, I’ll destroy you. Are we clear?”
The Cursed man cleared his throat, nodding once. I clasped a hand around the briefcase, still glued to my side. Max leaned low to spare a kiss to my forehead before disappearing in the smoke hovering over the shipyard.
“I’ll see you at Ronnette’s.”
The pair of Cursed took us around the perimeter, far from the fight and the guards trying to break through the blockade.
My escorts didn’t say much, only sharp directions between quick surveillance.
They were in a rush to return to the action, and I couldn’t blame them for feeling impatient over being put on my security detail.
The lead man took a shortcut when the way around became too tedious, ducking down a cargo strip that looked familiar. We were close to the gate, but this way brought us close to the opposing forces, where the coppers sprinted to their posts from the broken wall, exposing the yard.
I almost requested to turn back—but was caught by the shoulder in a firm grip.
The hand tightened, burned, drawing a shriek from my chest that had my escorts turning on a heel to finally look back at me. The same hand on my shoulder spun me hard, slamming my back into a brick wall.
“Should have killed me when you had the chance, Nina Veyr.” Cassien towered over me, pressing the length of his thick forearm into my throat. At some point during the maneuver, he’d disarmed me, tossing the handgun that had been tucked into my waistband across the alley.
I gasped, struggling for a breath. My gaze slid to the side, looking between the Commissioner and the Cursed. Cassien didn’t want either of them. It was me he’d been hunting all this time.
Or rather, Dupont. He just didn’t know it yet.
The men stared at Cassien, eyes wide. “I…”
“That’s enough. Report to your superior. Nice work, constables.”
The Commissioner loosened his embrace enough that I could take a deep breath. “What?” I gasped. “They’re undercover? Then where did they send Max?”
“We got a tip tonight, Nina. A certain group was going to raid the docks,” Cassien hissed. “I knew all I had to do was lure one of you into my hands, and I’d strike down most of the crime in this city.” He pinched my free arm and pulled me back where we’d just come from.
“Cassien, wait!”
“I’ve waited long enough.”
“No, you don’t understand—”
He tossed me into the arms of another guard, who held down my arms as Cassien glared at me. “So you’ve told me since the day you were arrested. Tell me, Nina. What am I missing?”
“It’s about Therell,” I said, still clutching the case. “I didn’t kill him, and I finally have proof!”
“Where?” he hissed, thin lips snarling. “What could you possibly show me now that would prove your innocence after all I know about you?”
I nodded toward the briefcase hanging at my side. “Inside the case are tapes, recorded by Pierre Dupont himself. The last one is unmarked. It’s mine, and it will explain everything. You want to know who’s been destroying this city? It’s all in here, Cassien.”
His stare fell to the leather case, frowning. “You’re lying.”
“I’m not,” I said. “I’d bet my life—and I suppose I am—that these tapes will change your mind about me.
You’re a man of the law, even if the truth isn’t what you desire it to be.
Even though we’ve had our difficulties, I know you are honorable.
If there’s anyone who would deliver this justice, I know it would be you. ”
To my relief, he conceded, taking them from my possession.
“Take her to the Gatehouse.” He jutted his chin toward the center of the yard.
“It’s Reven,” I hurled the name aloud, hoping it would catch his attention.
Cassien stilled. “What did you just say?”
I tried to yank myself out of the guard’s grip, but it was futile.
“You once asked me about defected engineers. I think you have suspicions about the Academy, too, otherwise you wouldn’t have mentioned them.
Dupont was acting under the authority of the Academy this entire time.
In that ship that is now on fire, he carried out a project that included creating a new body out of organs from Archetypes. ”
“Keep your voice down,” Cassien hissed as he took a step closer. “What do you mean, under the authority of the Academy?”
“They hid this from all of us,” I told him. “It’s all here, I swear. Please, just call off your guard and let them go. They were fighting to reveal this truth and my innocence. Our innocence.”
The wheels began to turn in his mind, the way his focus fell on something beyond the yard. Lightning flared behind the return of black clouds. The wind stirred the hair off my shoulder, curling the fog between the guards and hiding anything more than a few meters ahead.
Cassien looked to me, eyes empty of any discernible emotion. “Nina, if what you say is true, then you can stay with me, at the Gatehouse, until we figure out what to do about these tapes.”
“Call off your coppers! I’m not going anywhere with you. I did my duty. Now do yours and protect your people!”
He grimaced, looking back where the docks were alive with gunshots and shouts of protest. “Those aren’t my people, Nina. They’re yours.” His eyes slid to the guard behind me. “Arrest anyone still left standing.”
Cassien turned on a back heel and was swallowed by the fog, the briefcase of tapes in his hand. If he didn’t believe me, if he discarded the evidence—or worse, if he was working for the Magister, he could get rid of everything.
Everyone works for the buyer, and Cassien just traded me for the last piece of incriminating evidence against him.