Chapter 28 #2
Blair regaled me on what she had overheard the Biwban discussing the night before. How The Crucible was being audited, and the director’s complete misuse of funds. Together, we devised a plan to set trial six ablaze and force them to evacuate us. Then fight our way through to find the auditor.
“They won’t just let us waltz around outside. If the auditor is really in the tower tomorrow, they’re going to do anything they can to keep us out of sight,” Blair said.
“We’ll need to fight our way out if need be. This might be our only chance to get justice against them.”
She chewed on her bottom lip.
“What is it?” I urged.
Blair’s eyes were downcast. Whatever thought was on her mind must have been one she knew I wouldn’t like. But survival doesn’t give a damn about preferences. So I took her chin and met her gaze. “Tell me.”
“Well, there is someone we can call for help.”
“Call for—”
She pulled out the feather and held it between us.
I should have known. My insides twisted as I stared down at the feather like it had suddenly grown fangs.
It wasn’t difficult to guess who she meant by the look of hesitation in her eyes, but as much as I longed to deny it, she was right.
There weren’t many people with the power or the influence to rally a last-minute attack against the Biwban. But even so…
“No.” The word came out more petulant than I intended.
“You know we don’t have a choice,” Blair reasoned. “I know you two aren’t exactly friends—”
“Wild understatement—”
She cut in. “But they can help us. He can help us. And he’s got just as much reason to hate them as we do.”
I laughed bitterly. “He hates them. He loathes me.”
Memories flooded back from years I’d thought my mind had long buried.
Lokbaatar standing at the top of the dam all those years ago.
How the bastard waved just before a bomb obliterated the bottom half, causing the murky waters to flood Tynfo City.
Revenge for the skyships I’d used to set his city ablaze the year prior.
The Broken Plains War had been going on for generations, but we made it personal.
We traded destruction like drunken, angry gods. My uncle’s skull was his goblet, his father’s spine made up the dice of my hulloran board.
Even the end of our world and the beginning of a new one wasn’t enough to stop it.
In this new world, I was still the king of Dulba, and in order to unite the scattered bands of what remained of our people, I needed every clan to bend the knee.
Something the Singing Arrows would never do so long as Lok lived.
Most recently, I’d poisoned his armor and taken his own Zhali match hostage, and she ended up hurt because of it. By all rights, he should have mounted my head above his mantel.
And now I needed to beg for his help.
“Don’t think for a second he’ll help us just because he also hates the Biwban. He’ll want something in return. He always wants something.”
She sat up, drawing me with her. “You said before that you wanted to unite the Sankado under one banner. That it was the only way for your people to survive in this new world. Can you really make that future a reality if you two can never come to some kind of agreement?” She placed the feather in my hand.
“You’ve already tried killing each other again and again.
I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of the definition of insanity, but fighting the same guy over and over to no avail is pretty damn close to it. ”
I stared down at the communicator; its metal bristles poked into my palm as I resisted the urge to crush it.
Lokbaatar and I had stolen much from each other through the years, but none of it compared to the destruction the Biwban had caused.
They needed to pay for their crimes against us, and justice was hardly ever won easily.
“They destroyed our world,” I muttered, not to Blair, not to anyone—just to the silence. “Rounded us up like animals and dropped us on some cheap hack job of a planet. And now the only person who could aid my vengeance is the same bastard I’d spent most of my life trying to kill.”
Blair placed a hand on my cheek. “It’s our vengeance. That’s reason enough for him to help you.”
Our vengeance.
Yes. That he would understand.
I strummed my hand across the side of the feather and called the bastard.
It wasn’t the general’s voice who answered, but a woman’s—soft-spoken, with the mildest lilt of an accent I couldn’t recognize. She tilted her head at the sight of me. “Osid?” Concerned marred her features. “Where’s Blair?”
I studied her face. Ah, Lok’s wife. Of course.
Her image flickered on the screen, one hand was covered in mud, while the other held a small hand shovel.
A blue wide-brimmed hat covered most of her wild red hair, yet I could still make out a faint pale scar just above her ear—no doubt a remnant of Blair’s pistol.
The memory of that day and the hand I played in it made my skin itch.
I offered her the closest approximation of a smile. “Ah, Dory. Glad to see you are well.”
She didn’t return it. “Uh-huh. Where’s Blair, is she safe?”
“Here I am!” Blair called over my shoulder. “Yeah, I’m fine. But we need to talk to your man, Lok. Well, Sol too, really, since we’ll need a lawyer. Are they around?”
Confusion laced Dory’s voice as she asked, “What would you need a lawyer for? Don’t tell me you burned down that tower or something.”
“Not yet,” replied Blair with a singsong lilt.
A glimpse of a purple arm moved in front of Dory, and Lokbaatar’s horned silhouette filled the communicator screen. A sack of sapling plants rested near his side, and his arms were covered in dirt, much like his wife’s.
“Osid Nanphrey,” he purred, drawing out my name like a raptor toying with its prey before it struck. “Bold of you to be showing up on my wife’s communicator after our last exchange of…diplomatic courtesies.”
Dory’s hand pushed lightly at his chest. “Be nice,” she whispered.
His gaze fell to her and softened the tiniest fraction, then it was gone. “Well, did you call to deliver your next ransom note, or did you just miss the taste of my fist?”
Arrogant son of a—
I pressed my tongue to the roof of my mouth and exhaled. “I’m calling because I need your help.”
Lokbaatar let out a low, incredulous whistle. “Stardust, did I hear that right? I must be losing my mind.”
“Lok, hush,” she said, rolling her eyes, but she didn’t bother hiding her smirk.
I pushed on, bruising each word as it left my mouth. “We’re staging an attack on the Biwban’s tower tomorrow. I can’t get a message to my men, and you are the only one with enough soldiers to get to the tower before tomorrow. I need you at my side.”
Lokbaatar barked out a laugh. “At your side? Not kneeling at your hooves?”
I ignored that and continued. “Be serious for a moment. You know as well as I do that the Biwban have been treating us like animals. They need to pay for what they’ve done.”
He raised a brow. “Obviously. I also know that their technology far surpasses ours. If you plan on going to war with them, you’ll need a lot more than the meager band I could scrounge up on a day’s notice.
Even then, winning a war with a species capable of creating and destroying entire planets seems a bit… suicidal.”
I nodded in agreement. “That’s why we’re not going to war.”
Blair smiled wide beside me. “We’re going to sue them!”
Lok cracked a grin. “So that’s why you needed Sol too. All right, you have my attention. What’s that have to do with orchestrating an attack for tomorrow?”
“My queen overheard the Biwban talking. The BCI is being audited for misuse of funds, and the auditor is coming to inspect The Crucible tower tomorrow. They seem adamant to keep us away from him, which leads me to believe they’re trying to hide more than just a misuse of funds.
And if we can get to them and tell them everything…
” My hand balled involuntarily. “It’s the only shot we’ve got at justice. For every Sankado.”
Dory slapped Lok’s shoulder repeatedly. “Oh, oh!”
Lok stilled his wife’s excited hand. “Use your words, darling.”
“The war crimes!” she shouted. At Lok’s blank look, she continued.
“Remember when the Intern figured out we could talk? He started freaking out about us being a class A species. He said the Galactic Federation was going to demote him to waste collector or worse if they found out. That must be what they’re trying to hide! ”
Lok’s eyes widened, and a slow predatory smile crept in.
“So. They’re trying to keep us quarantined so they don’t have to admit they violated some kind of interspecies protocol.
” He stroked a muddy thumb down his jaw, thoughtful.
“But that still doesn’t answer my previous question.
Will I be standing at your side or kneeling? ”
I took a breath, steadying the pit of irritation that had started to undermine my resolve. “You’ll stand beside me. You have my oath,” I said.
“And after?” he pressed. “My men won’t follow you while my head remains on my shoulders, and I don’t intend to let you kill me to appease your addiction for control.”
The smell of smoke rose. “Addiction—”
Blair moved a hand to the nape of my neck, soothing the area like I’d done for her so many times before.
I swallowed the sour taste on my tongue and continued.
“You and the rest of the Singing Arrows will be welcomed by the Dulba Empire as a vassal state. When we take control of the female enclosure—”
“No!” Dory cut in. “Frittata will remain an autonomous state.”
“Frittata?” Blair asked.
Dory shrugged. “They found out I named the planet Waffles and just stuck with the breakfast theme. Anyway, sorry to burst your bubble, but the women here are not going to let a bunch of men come in and start ordering them around as if they own them. They are just as sick of being jerked around as you are. You can ask the Roamcrest how well they took to men suddenly invading their space.”