by Morgan Rice
She had to make a choice. She could run back into the night, but that movement risked being seen, and she might not get another shot at this. Or she could whistle again. She did, and halfway through she realized that she’d been whistling the wrong sequence. Quickly, she changed it.
The light was moving toward Ceres quicker now. Obviously the guard had heard, but Ceres could hear something too: the scrape of stones moving, followed by the quiet slap of rope falling against stone. A rope ladder came down beside her, and Ceres didn’t hesitate.
She clambered up, forcing herself to concentrate on the climb rather than on the light that signaled a rapidly approaching guard. She hurried up the ladder, hauling herself into a small, dimly lit space that was little more than a gap left over by new building and forgotten about. She watched as a man in a rough tunic pulled the stone façade back into place.
He turned to her and drew a knife.
“Who are you, and why are you using out-of-date signal codes? If one of the others had been watching, they probably wouldn’t even have recognized them.”
Ceres stepped into what little light there was, watching the shock spread across the features of the watcher as she did so.
“My name is Ceres,” she said. “And I have returned to lead you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR
Stephania was spending the coin of favors as fast as she dared. Faster, because what she was doing right now might very easily get her killed. When she’d heard what had happened to Thanos, she’d sent her handmaidens out to look for details at once. She’d dressed as carefully as she could, and she’d set out to free him as surely as a warrior in full armor might have set off after some fair maiden in a story.
Except that this wasn’t a story, and her husband, the man she loved, was in danger.
Stephania had always told herself that love was a trap; that the only love worth having was for oneself. Now, she was doing things that might get her killed, and all for a man who was trying to bring down the very Empire that had given her such a good life.
It was a kind of madness, but a madness that made so much more sense now. Finally, she was starting to understand what true love meant, and it wasn’t what she had thought. It wasn’t about possessing another. It wasn’t about hurting them when they refused you. It was this… this willingness to give anything for them.
“Even my life,” Stephania whispered.
“What’s that, my lady?” one of her handmaids asked.
“Nothing,” Stephania said. “Milla, I need you to go and find Captain Delvar. Take him this note. If he argues, remind him who saved his head when the father of his last lover wanted to take it. If that doesn’t work, remind him that I know he hasn’t paid the king his cut of the slaving operations he conducted among the Isles of Teeth.”
“Yes, my lady.”
So many secrets, so many strings of knowledge and obligation that she’d hoarded like a miser. Now, Stephania was running through them almost too fast to keep track of. There had been the secrets spent to find out exactly what had happened in the throne room. There had been the attempts to find out how Lucious had found this soldier, when Stephania thought that she’d disposed of the only link to him. She’d used a noble lady’s former indiscretions to find out which part of the dungeons Thanos had been sent to, and a guard captain’s dangerous habits to secure access to the upper layers of them.
Now she was walking through them, past cells holding rebels and dissidents, thieves and murderers. They were mostly thrown in together, and Stephania could see men and women huddled in barred spaces seemingly at random. She could practically smell the despair there, mixed in with the sweat and human waste of the place. Would she end there, if this went wrong, or would they simply kill her out of hand?
“This way, my lady,” one of the jailors said. His price had been the location for a daughter long believed lost. It was a surprisingly maudlin thing, Stephania thought, for such a rough-looking man. “Ignore all them. They’re just not looking forward to what’s coming to them.”
That was probably death or torture, mutilation or shipment to the Isle of Prisoners. Stephania didn’t particularly care which. They didn’t matter. Only Thanos mattered to her right then. She would see every one of her servants and friends impaled or tied to an execution pyre before she lost him.
She would even risk it for herself.
Stephania swallowed as she walked down through the dungeons, tasting the scent of the guttering torches that lit it as much as smelling them. She could hear screams, only partly muffled by thick doors, and she guessed that was deliberate, designed to put fear into the prisoners yet to suffer.
“Oh, don’t worry,” the jailor said, and he seemed to be enjoying Stephania’s discomfort far too much. “We won’t be working on your husband. Not when there’s the Isle of Prisoners waiting for him.”
If the circumstances had been different, Stephania would have seen that the man suffered for that comment. As it was, she merely nodded and kept walking. Their route headed down, always down, until it seemed that they must be deep underneath Delos, in a space that sunlight never touched.
“This is as far as I go,” the jailor said, pointing. “His cell’s that way.”
“That wasn’t our agreement,” Stephania snapped back.
“Well, I want to live to see my daughter, and those royal bodyguards—”
“What royal bodyguards?” Stephania asked.
“You didn’t think they’d leave him unguarded, did you?” the jailor countered, already walking away.
Stephania stood there and fumed. She hadn’t prepared for this. She hadn’t planned for this, and she should have. An idiot could have guessed that there might be extra guards at a time like this, but Stephania had been too busy thinking about Thanos. Love could make a fool out of anyone.
She pulled her favorite necklace from around her neck. It was a thing of heavy white gold, dripping with emeralds and sapphires. At least she could plan now. She took a small vial from her dress, carefully avoiding contact with the stones as she dripped the contents on them.
She kept walking and found a door at the end of the corridor, attended by a royal bodyguard seated on a chair, his gilt-edged armor reflecting light from a torch and a naked blade sitting across his knee. Stephania saw him rise as she approached.
“Forgive me, my lady, but the king said that Prince Thanos was to be kept secluded.”
“I merely wish to see my husband,” Stephania said.
“The king’s orders were very clear.”
“My husband has been accused of being a traitor and dragged away to a cell without my even getting to say goodbye. I would give anything… anything, just to be able to speak to him for a moment or two.”
“Anything?” the guard asked, and Stephania knew she had him. The royal bodyguards were supposedly incorruptible, but in her experience, no one was. No one except Thanos, perhaps.
Stephania held up the necklace. It was worth more than a man like this would see in his lifetime. Stephania dangled it in her hand.
“Would this be enough?” Stephania asked. “Not even to do anything much. Just to walk away for a few minutes while I speak to the man I love. You can understand love, I’m sure.”
“I prefer the kind I can buy,” the guard said. His fist closed around the necklace. “But this buys a lot.”
He walked away, tossing a key to Stephania as he went. She hurriedly fit it into the lock. Thanos was in there, looking bruised as he sat in a bare stone cell. Stephania ran to him, putting a hand to his cheek.
“Thanos,” she said. “How could you be so foolish as to get caught?”
He smiled up at her. “I thought you’d be angry with me for helping the rebels. I thought you’d hate me.”
“I could never hate you,” Stephania said. “I love you.”
After all the lies she’d told in her life, that one truth felt oh so sweet. She kissed him then, long and deep.
“It isn’t safe for you t
o say that right now,” Thanos said. “It isn’t safe for you to be here, Stephania.”
“I don’t care,” Stephania said.
“You should,” Thanos replied. “You should get as far away from my cell as you can and pretend that you hate me, even if you don’t. You should be the first to condemn me whenever they speak about me. That way, they won’t think you’re a traitor along with me.”
Stephania smiled at that. Almost no one else who had ever been in her life would have put her first like that. They wouldn’t have decided, in a moment when their own life was at stake, that Stephania’s life was worth more. It just showed how special Thanos was.
“It’s probably a little late for that,” Stephania said, pulling Thanos to his feet. “For one thing, I’m carrying your child.”
Thanos stopped, stepping back and staring at her in obvious disbelief. “You’re pregnant?”
Stephania bit her lip as she nodded. “I’m pregnant.”
The world seemed to light up with Thanos’s smile. “That’s incredible. It’s wonderful news!”
Stephania found herself folded into a hug, and she wished that she could stay there like that with Thanos forever. She felt safe like that with him. Wanted. Loved. She could feel tears beginning to roll down her cheeks, because she’d never had anything like this in her life before. She was surprised when she stepped back and found similar tear tracks on Thanos’s cheeks.
“We’re really going to be parents?” Thanos asked, taking her hands.
Stephania could feel the strength in his touch, but also the gentleness there. “We really are, and I don’t care if you have been helping the rebels. None of that matters.”
“It matters if they take me away and kill me for it,” Thanos said. “Or worse, if they kill you just for being married to me. And what about our baby? Even if they leave it be, it will grow up being taught that its father was a traitor. Or worse, they might decide that no one with my blood can be allowed to live. That they’re too much of a threat.”
Stephania didn’t want to think about that, although she also wasn’t sure why Thanos’s bloodline would be a threat. If she had decided to join in the condemnation of him, she had no doubt that the child would have been welcomed, simply because of its obvious nobility. Now, though… now, things would be more complicated.
“None of that is going to matter,” Stephania said. “Because we’re going to get you out of here.”
That seemed to get an even bigger look of surprise than the fact that she was pregnant.
“What? How? Stephania, you can’t take that much of a risk!”
Stephania shrugged. “It’s a better risk than the risk of not having you, and it’s already done. I’ve bribed the people I needed to bribe, and my maids will be putting sleeping draughts in the beer of any guards along the way.”
Although what she’d smeared on her necklace hadn’t been a sleeping draught. She hadn’t had anything that gentle at hand, and she hadn’t been willing to risk the guard going back on their deal. There was nothing, nothing she wouldn’t do for Thanos.
“So you see,” Stephania said, “I’m committed. They’ll kill us both if they catch us now.”
“I won’t let that happen,” Thanos said, and Stephania smiled at the thought that even here, even now, he wanted to protect her.
“I won’t let that happen,” Stephania corrected him. She held out her hand. “We have to hurry though.”
She felt Thanos’s hand slide into his. He looked so strong like that, and she passed him a short dagger.
“Just in case,” she said.
Thanos looked at it and nodded. Stephania could see the determination there.
“Are you sure we’ll be able to get out of here?” he asked.
Stephania kissed him. “Trust me. You’re good at fighting those who need fighting. I’m good at… arranging things.”
Maybe one day she would even be able to tell him about some of the things she’d arranged to keep him safe. Then again, maybe not. Thanos might have helped the rebels, but in some ways he was too pure, too innocent, for the things Stephania had done to protect him.
“We’ll need to get out of the castle,” Thanos said. “After that… I don’t know. Perhaps the rebellion will have a way out of the city. If we can find them, maybe—”
“It’s all right,” Stephania said, cutting him off with a kiss. “I have this covered.”
She led the way up through the dungeons, pulling Thanos along past the spots where there were screams or people crammed in together. She knew her husband would want to save them, but right then, that would only attract attention. And if others had to suffer so that the people she loved would be safe, Stephania didn’t care.
She found guards slumped here and there. Her maids had done their jobs. She thought she glimpsed the body of the royal guard off to one side, but there was no time to check. They’d already spent too long there.
“We’ll get out of here and head for the docks,” Stephania said. “There will be a boat there waiting for us. After that… we’ll find somewhere to go.”
“Haylon,” Thanos said. “We’ll be safe on Haylon.”
Perhaps, or perhaps Stephania would be able to think of somewhere better. The important part was that they would be together.
All they needed to do now was reach the docks.
CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE
Ceres didn’t know the route that the rebel led her along. She traced her hand along the stone of the walls, feeling the strangeness of it. That strangeness, more than anything, told her how long she’d been away from the rebellion. So did the fact that Anka was now leader of the rebellion. It seemed like too much for the former slave to be running, because it seemed like too much for anyone to run by themselves.
In the passages and hidden spaces the rebels had carved out, Ceres saw more people than she could have believed. There were people training and working, laughing and sleeping. There were storerooms and workrooms, hallways and forges…
“Who all is leading you now?” Ceres asked as they walked.
“Besides Anka?” the rebel replied. Ceres could hear the respect there. From the moment she’d announced herself, he’d been as deferential as he might have been with a returning hero. “There’s Edrin and Hannah, Berin and Sartes and—”
Ceres didn’t listen beyond that. In that moment, none of the rest of it mattered.
“My father and my brother are here? Now? Take me to them!”
He led her to one of the sleeping spaces near the forges, and Ceres heart soared as she saw her father, sitting near a small bed—and her brother beside him.
“Father? Sartes?”
Her father looked up as though he’d seen a ghost. He paled, seeming overcome with disbelief, joy, relief. He stood there staring, as if not daring to hope that this might really be happening.
Ceres could understand the feeling. She felt equally shocked, and elated.
She saw Sartes sit up in the bed and clamber from it, rubbing sleep from his eyes.
“Ceres?” he said, and he sounded as shocked as her father looked. “You’re alive?”
He stood there as though not knowing what to do, looking her up and down as though trying to make sure that it was really her, and not some imposter.
Ceres looked him up and down, trying to guess at all that had happened to him in the time she’d been away, but right then, she was just glad he was there. She opened her arms wide, and her brother ran to her, holding onto her tightly. He was a little taller than Ceres remembered, and stronger, too.
“You’re alive!” Sartes said.
“We thought you were dead,” her father said, moving to join in the hug. “I thought… I thought we’d lost you.”
Ceres could hear notes of old grief there. She clung to them then, wanting to reassure them both that this was real.
“I’ve missed you both so much.”
It seemed then as if the moment might never end. Certainly, Ceres didn’t want it to.
“Where have you been?” her father asked. “What happened to you?”
“I washed up on an island,” Ceres said. “There were people there who helped me to learn a lot of things about myself.”
Her father’s look changed a little. “What kind of things?”
“They taught me more about the power inside me,” Ceres said. “And they led me to my mother.”
This time, she saw Sartes frown. “Your mother? But our mother—”
Ceres put a hand on his arm. “Is still your mother, but not mine.”
“You mean we’re not family?” Sartes said. There was surprise there, but also a kind of fragility Ceres never wanted to hear in her brother.
Ceres hugged him again. “We will always be family, little brother, no matter who my parents turn out to be.”
Her father held her at arm’s length. “What did you think of your mother?”
Ceres thought for a moment or two. “She was… strange. Beautiful. Kind. I liked her, but she also seemed… sad. It must be hard for her, alone on the Island Beyond the Mist. How did you meet her?”
Her father shook his head. “That’s a story for another time. What matters now is that you’re here. It’s all that matters.”
“Are you with the army that’s come?” Sartes said. “We can’t find out what’s happened.”
Ceres smiled. “I’m leading the army. And we’re going to take Delos from the Empire.”
“I’d like to hear how you plan on doing that,” Anka said from the doorway.
Ceres looked around at her, pausing as she saw her. She’d heard that Anka was in charge, but it was a very different thing to see it. She stood there, watching the way people reacted to her, seeing that it really was true.
Anka looked different from how she had in the slaver’s cage. Different even from how she’d looked in the courtyard of the castle. Ceres could see the worry etched in her features, but also the sense of strength there.