5. The Fortress #3
“That’s no excuse for her talking to you like a piece of shit she’s stepped in,” Zaheer growls, giving me a look. He can’t hide the smirk creeping across his face.
When I turn to him, his horns seem larger, his teeth sharper, and eyes glow with barely contained wrath.
“Say the word Makina, and I’ll happily tie her to a sink in the basement.”
Now would be a really good time to apologize.
But I can’t do it. No matter how hard I try to make my mouth form the words, I just can’t.
“That won’t be necessary, Zaheer,” she says.
“As I was going to say, had I not been interrupted, everyone who comes to the island wishing to work is offered another choice—two paths, so to speak. There are places for you to work in the kitchens, the stables, the barracks, on the farms. Sometimes you will clean floors. Sometimes you will dig out the latrines. Sometimes you will serve wine to soldiers who have earned the right to forget or hand out warm meals down at the harbor market.” Her eyes shift to me.
“I will not lie to you, the work can be hard, but it is safe. Zaheer and his colleagues removed the chains the seraphim put on you as soon as you landed on our shores. We intend to keep it that way.”
All of the nephilim seem to sigh in relief.
Zaheer looks directly at me. “Unless you force our hands.”
Part of me wants to wish him luck finding wings to chain, but it would be a pathetic brag and only make me feel bad.
Why would he care what his kind did to me?
How they sneaked up on me from behind and…
Don’t go there, Seraphina.
“You said there are two paths. What’s the second?” Jack, the other nephilim from the mast, asks.
It’s a good question. One I should have thought of, but I’m too busy fighting every instinct in my body that repels the idea instead.
“You won’t want that one,” Zaheer says. His voice isn’t unkind, more matter of fact.
“We can be the judge of that,” I say before I can stop myself.
Do better. Blend in.
“Very well,” Makina says. “The other path is the military. Training, games, combat. The Overlords,” she tilts her chin toward Zaheer again, “are not gentle instructors, the games are deadly. Most who choose it… don’t last.”
“The battalion of soldiers outside would likely beg to differ,” I say.
Blend.
In.
Makina gives me a look that makes me feel stupid. “Let me rephrase. Most of your kind who choose it do not last.”
I frown. “We aren’t the first nephilim to visit Vulcaris?” I can’t hide the shock in my voice.
How has this been able to happen right under my father’s nose more than once?
The academy is in his territory. He’s one of the founders. The one who came up with the idea of closing the prisons and instead rehabilitating those who strayed from the virtuous path but weren’t quite Unrepentable.
Virtishans have been graduating from the academy for as long as I’ve been my father’s blade. Both ideas had gone hand in hand; closing the prisons, opening the academies, and making me the Unrepentables worst nightmare.
Prisons were uncouth places, the academy is a place of good, despite whatever Makina believes. The staff there save people all the time. And if that has changed at some point, how can corruption like that have made its way there without my father finding out?
Makina laughs like my question is idiotic. “Far from it. We have many nephilim here.”
A cold sweat breaks out on my forehead.
I have no idea how I’m going to help the eleven in this room escape before going on what is in all likelihood a suicide mission.
If what Makina says is true, the list of nephilim trapped here might have become longer. How many more do I need to worry about? What condition are they in? Starved, emancipated, tortured?
I can’t leave them here. I have to stay and survive long enough to help them escape or convince my father to send in the Legion of Light. Only then can I take my revenge.
Better start blending in better.
Zaheer speaks next, but his voice is different now, more authoritative. “You will train. You will bleed. Many will die. But if you survive, you will become something new. Something those you left behind in Virtus would not believe possible.”
I’m not sure if he’s trying to sell it to us or not, but I know one thing, I am not going to disappear into the kitchens like I did my turret. If I’m to make it to those at the top, make them pay for what I suspect they are responsible for, that’s not the way to do it.
Not only that, if I can prove my worth to my father once and for all, give him enough information about the island, how it runs, how they train cadets, their strengths and weaknesses, maybe he’ll give me some freedom. Take down the walls of my turret or even unlock the door.
Oh, to be able to come and go without needing a mark to go after.
Dare I dream it, if I could present him with a Sister or two’s heads on a stick, might he admit to his people that I’m his daughter?
Becoming his secret assassin was not my dream, but it gave me a purpose. I am good at it.
So no, I will not shy away from these demons, not even power maddened Overlords.
I’ve been weak before. So weak. Even when I had my wings, before the group of rogue demons had breached the front lines and broken into the grounds of Industria’s citadel…
They might have left me forever scarred and damaged, but I will not let them break me, or any of the nephilim in this room again.
“Now,” Makina says. “I would usually spend a bit of time answering your questions. I’m sure you have many. But you were late and I’m afraid we have run over.”
Zaheer shoots me a look, like it’s my fault for staying unconscious for as long as I had.
“Those of you wishing to work back of house can stay here with me. Zaheer will take anyone who wishes to join the army with him, if any. Please understand, there is absolutely no pressure to take that path, but if any of you do, you must be sure. It is easier to settle in while working back of house and then sign on to the military later, than it is to sign on now and regret it. The competition is fierce, and to fail is to die. The Iron Choir training is unlike any other military, but if you are successful, there will always be a home and family for you in the Sisters army.”