“Win or lose, this is still Augustus’s fleet,” I say.
“Not if he’s dead.”
I assigned Sevro to infiltrate the Citadel in Agea where the ArchGovernor is being held captive. But I did not tell him to kill Augustus.
“You’re not going to kill him,” I say with authority. “I forbid it. It is …”
“Necessary. You don’t need his legitimacy. Haven’t you figured us out yet? Here you get what you take, no matter the right of it.” He spits on the ground. “You are twenty years old. If you win Mars, Darrow, you become a living god. And so when you reveal what you really are … you transcend Color. Do I register?”
Sevro has grown wiser since we first met. No doubt about that. But I fear he thinks too much of me. Apollo thought he was a god. Augustus thinks he is. A god is not what I should be. A god is something to serve, something to worship. I’ve never wanted that. Eo never wanted that. Sevro will have to learn. This is about freedom. Yet it seems like everyone just wants to follow.
Mustang oversees the troop operations today. She floats through the air with Milia, the horsefaced Gold we adopted at the Institute. Nearer me saunters an ambling, pitiless Gold with a familiar face. I laugh and point him out to Sevro, who curses poignantly.
“Proctor Jupiter?” I call to the man. “Darling, could that really be you?”
“Who else would it be, you uppity brat?” Jupiter comes before me. He’s tall. Careless in the eyes. Hair bound tight. Half a foot taller than me, he’s a sinful, hedonistic beast of a man with an arrogant streak a kilometer long, and it is clear that he and Ragnar are two misunderstandings away from opening each other up. He eyes the razor wrapped around my forearm, and I see his is worn in the same new fashion. “I heard you’re the one responsible for the new style.” He holds up his arm. “I do approve. Bold as a naked prick in an ant nest.”
“Limping still?” Sevro asks.
“Shut up, Goblin,” Jupiter sneers.
“Daddy dearest had a little duel with Proctor Jupiter here to win the Rage Knight post.” Sevro smiles. “Old man sliced him up the same place I did. Right in the ass.”
“That slippery slag Fitchner is … tricky.” Jupiter nods grudgingly. “Very, very tricky. I have been helping the lady,” Jupiter rumbles on, gesturing to Mustang.
“How so?” I ask.
“Most of the Augustus cities are on communication interdict. Can’t get a word out or in. I’m the emissary to those still loyal. Sneak in. Sneak out. Been doing it for weeks now and sending word to remote dropCaches and the other loyal cities. A whole war’s been going on here with her agents and her brother’s while you were out stitching together a fleet. It’s been nasty, my goodman.”
“So what can you tell me?” I ask.
“Well, Daddy Bellona commands the house fleet against your friends. Cassius and Karnus have been allocated to ground operations inside Agea. I am going to help you find them and kill them.” Jupiter raises his large eyebrows, as though telling us how tedious he finds the chore. “That is the point—kill the Bellona family members and all their allies will suddenly wonder why they’re fighting—isn’t it?” He winks at Sevro. “Next best thing to pounding that Luneborn Sovereign’s head in.”
“You sure all Bellona are in Agea?”
Jupiter nods grudgingly. “Last we saw. That was a couple days ago, though, after they brought Augustus down in chains.” He airily holds up a finger. “And there was a peculiar series of heavy shuttles that landed last night.”
I wave a hand, ignoring mention of the shuttles. He squints at me, but I tell him to shut up and get behind me as I meet Mustang and her entourage.
“Everything is prepared,” she says. “We’re awaiting launch orders.” She wrinkles her nose as if smelling something foul. “Sevro, do watch Jupiter. He tends to shit where he eats.”
Jupiter yawns. “Pleasure working with you too.”
“Milia, lovely seeing you washed,” I say.
“Reaper.” She nods and smiles, an ugly thing on her face. “Still playing with scythes? Warms the heart.”
“You’ve a heart?” Sevro chuckles.
She examines his height. “A full-sized one.” She pauses. “I saw Pollux just yesterday, on the other side, however. Been sneaking in and out with Jupiter here. You’ve arranged us all a little reunion. I heard about Tactus. He was a bastard.”
True enough. I glance at my datapad. We’ll be at the launch coordinates in five. My team disperses. Mustang lingers, face thoughtful.
“What’s what?” I ask. “Worrying about me already?”
“A little,” she confides, coming close enough for me to smell the scent of her. “But it’s my father. What if they kill him before we even make landfall?”
“They won’t kill him. They’ll need him as a bargaining chip. Or if they’ve lost, they’ll spare him and hope we do the same for all the Bellona family members. You don’t kill men as important as him.”
I reach for her hand to comfort her, but she pulls it away, turning from me. “We have a planet to invade.”
I watch her go, shouting orders to her men.
38
The Iron Rain
All I see is metal. I’m one of a thousand in the honeycomb of spitTubes. Beyond the metal tube, a battle rages. I feel nothing. Not the shudder of the Pax. Not the missiles as they range through space to bring silent death. Just the throbbing of my heart. Mickey told me it was the strongest he’d seen in a Red, courtesy of the pitviper poison that traced my veins when I was young. It makes my hands shake now as it gallops in my chest. Fear rides in me. Fear of so many things. Fear of letting down my friends, of losing my friends. Of telling my friends the truth about what I am. Fear of being unequal to the task before me. Fear caused by doubt—in myself, in my plans for the rebellion. Fear of death. Fear of being lost in the darkness of space beyond the hull. Fear of failing Eo, my people, myself. But chiefly, fear of hot metal.
Chatter comes over the coms. Perfunctory. The plan is in motion, and I’m nothing but a cog now. The battle is too large for me to take part in all of it. I wanted to lead the Pax from her bridge so I could watch the enemy ships fall to my fleet. But Orion and Roque are better than I am in space.
I wanted to be in the leechCraft carrying the boarding parties through the breech into enemy hulls; I wanted to storm bridges, repel invaders from my own ship, bounce from destroyer to dreadnought, making them mine. But I will not capture Imperator Bellona. The Titans will do that. In the end, my enemies dictate where I go. I chase the grand prize.
A prize that has been my target since after I left Luna.
My true pegasus pendant is cool against my chest. Eo’s hair lies within. Focus on that. On the way her hair moved. Drifting on deepmine winds. Focus there. Thinking of her, I am beset with guilt. I like this life. No matter my reluctance to play the Gold, no matter the sorrowful excuses I make, part of me is like them. Perhaps I was born to be of two Colors.
Slag that. Man wasn’t born to be any Color. Our rulers decided that. And they were wrong.
“Audentes fortuna juvat, darlings,” Sevro says over a private comline. I burst out laughing at the Latin.
“More ‘Fortune favors the bold’ crap? Why not just say carpe diem?”
“Because it’s tradition to say …”
“Do you boys always flirt like this before battle? It is adorable,” Victra adds.
“You should have seen them at the Institute, love at first howl,” Mustang laughs.
“I saw the clips! What a lovely couple.”