“And they chose you?” I asked. “Last supplicant of the Celestes?”
“Trust might not be the best word. They needed someone they could control.”
“Ah. Desperation begets control. Of course.”
He sighed. “Of course.”
“Kind of irresponsible. Hiding this artifact in me and then letting me run off to the gutters.”
“We had our eyes, close to you.”
“Who? Valentine? I can’t imagine him working for you.”
He shook his head, still not looking at me.
“Who then?” I stepped close to him, one hand on the railing. The pale light of the Singer made my father look frozen in place, in time. He almost looked noble. “Who were you paying to be my friend?”
He grimaced and looked at me, his eyes sad and hollow.
“Emily.”
I gripped the railing and the shotgun. The trigger creaked under my grip.
“Bullshit. Emily’s a friend, a…” my voice stumbled “…we’re close.”
“Yes. That was the job description.”
I punched him, weakly, my fist glancing off the sagging fat of his jaw. He hardly moved, just leaned away from me, then batted my arm down.
“You’re a fucking liar, Alexander Burn! It’s not possible, Emily would never, she couldn’t. She could never do that to me. You’re just a damn liar.”
“Yes, I am. The Church required it. There was always a chance you’d go off on your own, stray from the desired path. We set it up, before, to make sure you would take to her.”
I slumped against the railing. Her shotgun clattered to the floor.
“I’m sorry, son. It had to be like this.”
“No. It didn’t. Nothing does.” I braced myself, trying to find a place in my mind to fit Emily the spy, the traitor. “Who knew?”
“The Council. Elements in the Church.”
“Tomb?”
“Angela was her handler. That’s how we knew the Cog was in the city, finally, once we lost contact with Marcus.”
I put both hands on the railing and looked down. The sand below was smooth and blank. “What am I supposed to do,” I asked, more to myself.
“What can you do? You have the Cog, and your heart.” He turned from me, looking at the Singer. “You can do pretty much anything you want.”
“I don’t have the Cog,” I said numbly.
“What? How could you… who has it?”
“Sloane. I think. He tracked it down, stole it. I think he killed a friend of mine.”
“Jacob, you can’t mean that. We can’t let them have control of that thing. If it gets back to the Angel-”
“Why would it be any safer from the Angel with me? I haven’t done a great job of protecting the things I care about, recently.”
“They’ve… for fuck’s sake, Jacob. Sloane and his people are negotiating with the Angel. They’re offering him some kind of sacrifice.”
“A deal? But what can he offer them?”
“They’ll think of something,” he said bitterly, then hunched over the railing and closed his eyes.
“If she’s your agent, do you know where Emily is now? Sloane took her, said he had special plans for her.”
He nodded, slowly. “We know.”
“What? What are they going to do with her?”
“Jacob,” he said carefully, “The Angel can’t hold together, not without that Cog. And they aren’t going to offer him that. But a body, specially modified for the purpose-”
“Emily! They’re going to give Emily to the Angel? But, can she survive that? Why would they pick her?”
“Something happened to her, I think. Our sources indicate that there was some kind of surgery, before Sloane got a hold of her. Makes her an ideal candidate.”
“Camilla. Gods, I’ll bet she knew. I’ll bet that little bitch thought to use her to get out. Godsfuck.”
“Whatever it was, they have her.”
“Where is she?” I asked again. I turned toward him and staggered forward. “You know. I can tell, you know.”
He rolled his eyes to the ceiling and sighed. He was measuring me, weighing his options, my possible reaction.
“I can’t tell you, Jacob,” he said, finally, sadly.
“I’ll find out. You know I will.”
“Not from me.”
“Then in spite of you.”
He nodded slowly, but didn’t move. “Forget her, Jacob. Don’t go rushing in…”
“To get her. To get captured,” I snarled at him and poked the air in front of his face. “That's what you're afraid of, isn’t it?”
He flinched, then flexed his fingers around the pistol grip. “Perhaps.”
“Which is why you told me. That’s why you flipped your card. If I knew she didn’t love me, that the last five years have been staged and she was your little spy, you thought… you thought I would abandon her.”
He didn’t look at me.
“I don’t want you to waste yourself on her.” He spoke quietly, as he spoke to me when I was a child. “They have her, yes. They’re using her as a lure. Think about it, Jacob. They’ll get you, and then they’ll have everything.”
I watched him, stared at him, his pale, noble face watching the motionless Singer.
“We don’t understand each other, father. If that’s what you thought, that I’d abandon her.”
“You can’t save her.”
“So what? I can try.” I turned angrily from him and snatched up the shotgun. “I can fucking try.”
His shoulders sagged, and he closed his eyes.
“Actually, Jacob, your father understands you quite well.”
I turned. Angela Tomb stepped out of the shrine of the Noble, along with three of her Housies. Wood clattered. Guards emerged from all the shrines, shortrifles in hand.
“He wanted a chance to dissuade you,” she said. Her voice was cold and numb. “He had it.”
“It was a lie, then? About Emily?” I asked as I twisted my hands on the empty shotgun.
“It was not,” Alexander said without opening his eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“We’re all sorry, Jacob,” Angela said. “But we really can’t let them get you.”
“You’ve said that before, Ange. You’re going to shoot me again?”
“Someone here will, if needs must.” She grimaced. “We’re all packing Bane this time, Jacob. Don’t make it happen.”
“You can stop them,” I said. “You can go to them and stop them.”
“We can’t,” father said. “We’re sorry. There’s too much at stake.”
“Let us handle this our own way, Jacob. Let us negotiate. If they have the Cog, and we have you… terms came be made.”
“Not good enough,” I said. “You’re going to let this happen, Alexander?”
He shook his head. “I’m sorry.”
“Maybe,” I said. I backed up until the railing was against my legs, the quiet goddess at my back. I raised my empty gun.
Chapter Sixteen
“I gave you your chance, Alexander,” Angela said. She had one hand on her hip, the other flourishing a heavy caliber dueling pistol. “We can’t have it both ways. Give it up, Jacob.”
“I can’t, Angela.” I twisted the shotgun in my hands, like a wet rag. “I just can’t do that.”
“We’re your family, son,” Alexander said, though his spirit wasn’t really in it. “Who else are you going to trust? They have the Cog. We really can’t let them have you as well.”
“But you won’t be content with just me. Will you? You’ll want the Cog as well, and what sort of terms will you come to with Sloane to get it? The Cog is powerful, but nothing like it could be if you had my heart to go along with it.”
“One item at a time. We can enter negotiations with Mr. Sloane later on.” Angela smirked, then flicked her pistol to the guards. “Now. Put down the shotgun.”
“Where’s Emily?” I asked. “Where’s Sloane holding her?”
“Why does it matter?”
“I’m going to save her. You fucks won’t take care of your girl, I’m going to.”
“Always the brave lad,” Angela said. “Always the hero. You’ll never get her. They have her locked up tight, up on the Torch’.”
“Why up there?”
“Council’s got part of the base sectioned off, has for years,” Alexander said. “Experiments, trying to break free of the Church’s grip. The surgery they’re giving her, it’s very specialized. Building cogwork without a church-sanctioned pattern. Very difficult stuff. And the equipment they’ll need to do that, it’s up there.”
“You have to let me go. You have to let me help her.”