Chapter 9 #2
“Right.” My mood darkened at the thought of Rylan Baine, my aunt Mafiela’s youngest son, and a high-ranking officer in the Resistance. He and I had been close once, but after his betrayal, I wanted nothing to do with him.
“I thought to consult with you before tackling his case, but it seems as though you do not wish to discuss the subject,” Iannis noted, stroking my cheek with his thumb. “Did something happen?”
“You can give him whatever sentence you want,” I bit out. “He’s a traitor, not just to our country, but to me as well.”
Concern darkened Iannis’s eyes. “What do you mean? Has your cousin done something else that I don’t know of?”
I let out a slow breath. “He hired a witch to put a spell on me so that I would forget to warn you about the Resistance’s plans to ambush you.
” Hot anger surged in my chest just thinking about it.
All those times I’d gone to Iannis, intending to warn him not to get on the dirigible, or to hire extra security, or whatever it took to keep him safe.
Whomever Rylan had hired to put the spell on me had been damn good, because looking back on it, I still couldn’t tell that I’d been spelled.
Every time I’d tried to warn Iannis, something had always come up to derail the conversation, and by the time it was over, I’d completely forgotten to tell him.
If Rylan hadn’t admitted the truth to me, I would still have trouble believing it had happened.
But it had. And Iannis had almost been killed as a result.
“I see,” Iannis said slowly, but he didn’t seem nearly as angry as I’d anticipated. “So Rylan prevented you from warning me, because doing so would have put your life in danger?”
“Yes, but he doesn’t get to make that call. He doesn’t get to decide whether or not I’m allowed to protect you.”
“Indeed.”
I narrowed my eyes at Iannis. “You’re not seriously agreeing with Rylan’s actions, are you?”
“No, but I also can’t fault him for trying to protect you the best way he knew how.”
I huffed. “Men. You’re all the same when it comes to women. You’d rather hide us in the closet and keep us away from the action, even if we have skills and abilities that would be useful.”
Iannis arched a brow, then looked around the cabin. “Unless I’m very much mistaken, we don’t appear to be in a closet. In fact, I believe I’m taking you straight toward ‘the action’, as you put it.”
I smirked. “You’re such a smartass.”
“Your attitude is clearly rubbing off on me.” Iannis kissed me, quick and hard. “In any case, I will do as you suggest and assign an appropriate punishment for Rylan.”
“What about Thorgana Mills?” I asked, now that we were on the subject.
“She’s on her way to Dara now, isn’t she?
” I had very mixed feelings on letting her out of state—she was incredibly dangerous.
But the Minister had insisted on her extradition, and since she was a resident of Dara and her crimes were national rather than local, we had no choice but to relinquish her.
The Minister hoped to get her to reveal additional information on the recent plot to kill and supplant him.
There were probably other plots we had yet to discover, but it would not be an easy task to drag them out of her.
“She will be leaving within the next few days,” Iannis confirmed. “I don’t intend to let her set foot off Prison Isle without the most stringent security.”
“Damn right.” He’d better have a veritable army accompanying her.
“There is also the matter of dealing with Father Calmias,” Iannis said. “He is proving quite troublesome.”
“How so?” Despite his vicious, genocidal gospel, the famous preacher struck me as rather harmless, physically. He had a grandfatherly air about him, and besides, he was human. The prison guards shouldn’t be having any trouble with him.
“Though he obviously incited the humans to riot and rebel, as you witnessed yourself, we can find no proof that he has done anything more tangible to aid the Resistance. The law is unclear on whether that is enough grounds for prolonged imprisonment, once an emergency is over. Many of his supporters are demanding that he be freed.”
“Yeah, I noticed.” On my way back from Shiftertown the other day, I’d taken a ride through Maintown to see how the humans were faring.
Like the other sections of Solantha, repairs were underway.
But I’d seen quite a few posters plastered around town with messages like ‘FREE FATHER CALMIAS!’ and ‘FATHER CALMIAS IS INNOCENT!’.
“He’s not innocent though, and, surely, you can charge him for preaching genocide, or something like that,” I argued.
There was no way a man like him should be allowed to roam free in the Federation—he never mentioned the Resistance in his sermons, only the Ur-God and His plans, but it stood to reason he must be in Thorgana’s pocket.
“Agreed,” Iannis said. “We have offered to let him go if he promised to stop encouraging his followers to engage in mass murder, but he rejected the deal without hesitation. Exile may be the only option, though that is not likely to appease his supporters.”
“Yeah, well, as far as I’m concerned, his followers should be tossed into jail or exiled right along with him,” I grumbled. Normally, I didn’t believe people should be punished just for having contrary beliefs, but I was getting pretty fed up with the pro-Resistance humans.
Noria is a pro-Resistance human, a voice in my head reminded me.
Iannis and I talked for a little bit more, but eventually he set me off his lap so he could review a stack of reports he’d brought along.
Figuring I might as well be industrious myself, I pulled Spellcraft for Beginners, the primer Janta had loaned me, from my bag.
I opened the book and started reading, snacking on some walnut cookies as I did so.
It was an interesting text, with lots of easy yet useful spells in it, but without a safe space to practice any of them, I was soon bored.
An airship wasn’t a suitable place for magical experiments.
“Where are you going?” Iannis asked as I rose from my chair and headed to the front.
“I’m going to bug the pilots to give me a lesson,” I called over my shoulder. “I plan on owning one of these myself in the near future, and I’d like to be able to fly it.”
Iannis twisted around in his chair, and I turned to look back at him, mere inches away from the double doors that separated the pilots from the main cabin.
He stared at me for a long moment, as if he were considering strapping me down into my chair to prevent me from committing such a foolish action.
“Just don’t kill us,” he finally said, turning back around in his seat again. “The Minister won’t be happy if we fail to show up for the meeting.”
“Oh, I’ll get us there on time,” I said, grinning.
I pulled open the doors and stepped into the pilots’ cabin, prepared to convince them to let me take over.
After all, if Annia could fly one of these contraptions, then I sure as hell could learn how.
And I might need to, if I was going to get her out of that Resistance camp in one piece.