Chapter 44
Let me get this straight.” Larke Rosyk stands across from Elegy in the veil room. The three generals flank her, luminous as specters.
She’s still wearing her nightclothes: a silk robe crossed over her chest and belted. It looks fine and delicate—-an expensive garment—-but peeking out from the hem are the worn sweatpants Larke wears to sleep, fraying at the ankle.
“Based on the guard’s memory of a line of ancient poetry .
. .” Larke begins, and she pauses to laugh—-a little forced, because she’s practically trembling with rage—-before continuing: “Based on that alone, you want me to alert the masses and lock down Cedre Station. Even though there’ve been no reported cases of Fever since the shipment was allegedly delivered. ”
Elegy glances at Saetang, standing beside Larke. They look composed, their hands over their abdomen and their dark eyes contemplative. But Elegy can see the pulse jumping in their throat.
On Larke’s other side, Okoro bites down on her thumbnail. Usually, Okoro is focused and aware, but ever since this meeting started, she’s been distant, like she’s not even listening to what’s being said. As if she feels Elegy’s eyes on her, she looks up, then looks away an instant later.
“The shipment was delivered two days ago,” Elegy says.
She doesn’t add, and the Fever takes two days at minimum to take hold. Larke already knows.
“Your Highness, pardon me for saying so, but it’s not just the poetry,” Saetang says.
“It’s the way it fits into the rest. We already know Ykev Talus and Rava Vidar planned this attack together, and we know that whatever their objective was, it had to be mutually beneficial.
Sending a biological weapon to Cedre Station would certainly be mutually beneficial for them, don’t you think? ”
Larke looks like she just tasted something sour. The Dreaded Crease is between her eyebrows.
“Yes,” she says. “I will send people to look at the crates immediately. There are Eyes in the loading bay, so I’ll have people comb through the footage, too.
But until I find concrete proof that the Fever has breached Cedre Station, I am not ordering a lockdown.
I’m not going to cause another panic like the one after the Hoatzin. ”
Elegy winces at the reminder. When the Hoatzin—-the ship where Theren was born among Talusar exiles—-first entered Cedre Station’s orbit, her mother locked down the station.
It caused such chaos that five people died in the stampede for masks.
When the fears about the Hoatzin turned out to be unfounded, there were people—-a lot of people—-who called for the Sword’s removal.
She understands why Larke doesn’t want the same thing to happen again.
But she has to insist. “Larke, we don’t have time to be careful. If this is about our argument . . .”
“This meeting is over,” Larke snaps. “I have said what I intended to say, and as you just acknowledged, we don’t have time for this.”
She turns, and Elegy half expects her to click her boots together—-only her feet are bare, so Elegy can see her short, squat toes, the nails painted black, right before she walks out of the veil and disappears from the room.
The three generals, though, remain behind. They give each other uneasy looks.
To Elegy’s surprise, it’s Okoro who speaks first. “She’s not wrong, you know. You didn’t give her a lot to go on.”
“I gave her everything I have,” Elegy says.
“Then let’s get more,” Okoro says. “What else do you know?”
“The only lead I have is that the Talusar used a candlesnuffer to disable the base’s surveillance before they attacked.
It was probably a Scout who sold it to them.
” Elegy ignores the look of disgust on Okoro’s face.
“I can find out who sold them the candlesnuffer, try to meet them. But it’ll take time. ”
“I’ve been pursuing this using our contacts in Naarm,” Saetang says. “I’ll tell my people to get more aggressive with them.”
“I would advise you both to take as little time as possible,” Okoro says. “I’m on Cedre Station now, so I’ll warn the hospitals and ask if they’ve seen any concerning symptoms. And I’ll work on Her Highness. Maybe I can get her to prepare for lockdown.”
“You believe me?” Elegy says.
“I believe it’s possible you’re correct,” Okoro says. “And as you are in fact the Hope of Cedre, I suppose I believe your word should be heeded.”
Without looking at Elegy, she gets up and walks out after Larke. Elegy, stunned, turns to Saetang, who shrugs.
“That was almost a profession of undying love, coming from Okoro,” Saetang says.
A half hour later, Elegy is in the trailer in Twentynine, and Theren Forint is knocking on the door. Hela is at the Recordkeeper’s, finding out who sold the candlesnuffer.
She sent a message to the others before she spoke to Larke, telling them tonight’s planning session was canceled. But apparently Theren ignored that message.
He’s been staying with Arias and the others in the inn, which is right next door to the Octopus.
It’s a dim, cramped space that used to be a single--family home, but the woman who runs it—-Agatha, who delivers the water—-knows how to keep her mouth shut, and she keeps a clean house, if not a particularly nice one.
If he’s here by himself, he must have walked, since he can’t fly a ship.
She doesn’t let him in. Instead, she steps outside. Theren leans against the trailer’s chrome side.
He knows how to lean, she thinks. Long legs, crossed at the ankle, resolving into a trim torso, his sleeves pushed up to his elbows, his thumbs in his belt loops. His eyes are steady on hers.
“What is it?” she says. “Did something happen?”
“Should be asking you that. Arias filled me in. What did your sister say?”
“She told me to prove it.”
“She’s not wrong to want more concrete information than a quote.” He shakes his head. “But people will die.”
“I’m aware of that,” she says. “That’s why, once Hela finds that Scout job posting, we’ll track whoever answered it and arrange a meeting. If Larke wants proof, I’ll give it to her.”
“Good.”
She faces him, leaning one shoulder into the trailer to mirror him. “Did you walk here?”
“It’s only a mile.” He smiles.
“Still.”
“Still.” He tips his head back and looks up at the starless sky. “You know I’ve been confined all my life? The Hoatzin, then Cedre Station . . . then the Crucible, House Vidar, Losan Stronghold.”
She hasn’t thought of it that way before, but he’s right. The empty desert must feel vast by comparison.
“I’m sorry,” she says to him. “Even your oath was a kind of confinement, wasn’t it?”
“I used to think so.” He shakes his head a little. “Now I think what I called ‘freedom’ then would just have been a lack of obligation to other people . . . and that’s not particularly appealing.”
“No?”
“Caring about people makes you obligated to them,” he says, his dark eyes glittering. “I tried not caring. Didn’t take.”
Elegy laughs a little. “So did I. Not fond of it, to be honest.”
“Hard to believe. You seem to inspire loyalty.”
“It’s probably that whole world--saving--prophecy thing.”
“No.” He looks down at his shoes. “It’s that whole ‘walk into the fire for someone you hardly know’ thing. You did that for all of them, in turn.” And he looks up again. “For all of us, I mean.”
She can’t find the words to argue. Not because she agrees with what he said, but because she doesn’t know what to make of him saying it.
“Did you come all the way here to give me a pep talk?” she says. “It’s working, if so.”
“Sadly, no.” He pulls away from the wall and takes his hands out of his pockets. The moon, Cedre Station, and the white dot of the Sundial are all still hidden behind dark clouds. But she can see him by the light coming from the trailer as he says, “I came to find out why you’re avoiding me.”
“Not sure I know what you mean. There’s a lot to do.”
“You really shouldn’t try to lie to a truthsayer.” He steps closer to her, and she steps back, leaning into the trailer. The chrome is hot even through her shirt, warmed by sunlight. “I’m not asking for you to give me anything more than you have. I just want to know if I should let this go.”
“I can’t talk to you about this right now,” she says, a little too harshly.
“If you won’t give me an answer,” he goes on, like she never said anything at all, “I’ll find it for myself.”
He puts his palm against the wall, right next to her face, and the other one comes up to mirror it. Despite that, there’s still plenty of room for her to get away from him, if that’s what she wants. But it isn’t what she wants, is it? That’s the whole problem.
He leans closer, his eyes fixed on hers, and she waits for the pressure and the heat of his body against hers, but it doesn’t come. He still holds himself away from her, just a breath of distance between them.
She remembers the last time he kissed her, his wet fingers tugging the hair at the nape of her neck as he touched her, the way each movement of his mouth made her even more desperate for him.
She wants, even now, for him to press her up against the warm chrome so she can wrap her legs around his waist; she wants to keep taking until there’s nothing left.
He tilts his head, angling his mouth just over hers. She’s aware of how fast she’s breathing, how hard it is not to put her hands on him, how she can’t quite think—-
“I see,” he says, and she can just feel his lips moving over hers, almost a kiss but not quite. “So it’s not that you’ve stopped wanting me.”
“No,” she replies quietly.
“But something is—-” He pauses, and frowns at her. “You’re afraid.”
“I told you, I can’t talk about this right now.” Her voice comes out softer than she’d like.
He ducks his head, and kisses her throat, so painfully slow she can feel his lips clinging to her skin as he pulls away.
“All right,” he says against her jaw. “Good night, Elegy.”
He drops his hands, and all at once, he’s walking away, back toward Twentynine.
Elegy slides to the ground, and presses her hands to her cheeks to cool them.
An hour later, a crack so loud it sends a shiver down her spine sounds outside, followed by a deep rumble. She pulls back the short curtains that cover the kitchen windows at the sheets of rain coming down outside, the Joshua trees swaying in the wind as if bowing to the distant hills.
She gets up and walks to the door, lured by the smell of petrichor. She opens it, though the air is rough and she shouldn’t be outside. The stretch of land at the base of the trailer is already flooded with water.
She’s never seen anything like this, in a lifetime of living in and around Losan. The wind blows the rain sideways, into her chest, and she’s soaked already.
“ ‘I saw,’ ” she says, to nothing and to no one, “ ‘a great storm, quenching the thirst of the dusty streets of Losan, flooding its streets with water.’ ”
Rain rolls down her spine. She shivers.