“Why? Why me in particular?”
He shoulders hunched as if to ward off her question. “It would be too much a risk to take you for such a reason.”
“What is the reason, Damon?”
Damon turned the blade from side to side, catching the moonlight so that the metal seemed to burn with cold fire. “As you once noted, the offspring of Opir and human are forbidden in Erebus. There are no dhampires there. But sometime during the War, an Opir was said to have discovered that dhampir blood acts as a stimulant and aphrodisiac on the Opir system.”
Alexia lost her balance, dropping from a crouch to her knees. “You mean like the drug that keeps my kind alive?”
“This one is purely recreational.” His teeth flashed in a humorless smile, bright as the blade. “To many, it is only a myth. You probably know better than I how many dhampires have disappeared in the Zone since the Armistice. Some Bloodmasters may have obtained dhampir serfs born before the end of the War, but they would be rare. As you can imagine, the demand is quite high.”
“And Aegis...” She felt bile climb into her throat. “They can’t possibly know this.”
“As I said, it may be only myth.”
That was scant comfort, Alexia thought ruefully.
“Would it work the same on you?” she asked.
“No. I am not full Opir.”
The statement was so final that Alexia decided he was telling the truth.
“And in spite of all this,” she said, struggling to find a little humor, “you don’t think the Expansionists would try to sell me for some fabulous sum?”
“They know Aegis would investigate your and Michael’s complete disappearance.”
“But the enemy would expect that no matter what happened,” Alexia said, shivering in spite of herself. “They’ve got my patch. Maybe they can use me for some kind of experiment.”
Damon frowned and looked into her eyes. “Such speculation is pointless. We still can’t be sure who stole it, the colony or the Expansionists. Even if we knew the Expansionists had it, we’re not going anywhere near Erebus. I won’t risk it until we have more concrete information.”
“Then I guess we’d better start looking for answers closer to home.”
“Some answers aren’t worth the price.” He reached over and laid his hand on her arm, so lightly that she barely felt it. “Lysander did say one thing of value. You shouldn’t be further involved, Alexia. Your partner is dead, and you’ve suffered a grievous injury.
Aegis would not expect you to continue this mission under the circumstances, and—”
“You just said since I was the sole survivor of my team, I had to finish the mission myself.”
She’d caught him, and he knew it. But that wasn’t enough to make him give up. “I was wrong,” he said.
“Forget it.”
He tightened his grip. “Michael would have reported the theft of the patch, but now that task is yours. Our new information makes it even more essential that Aegis be informed of the Expansionists’ plans so that there will be no misunderstanding if and when the colony is attacked. They must know that the Council is not involved.”
“You said yourself that you aren’t privy to the Council’s deliberations. Given what you’ve said about how Erebus would feel about the colonists’ philosophy, what if they aren’t controlling the Expansionists because they want them to do the Council’s dirty work?”
“They are not involved,” he repeated.
“Isn’t that just what you want to believe, Damon? Because if the Council is just as bad as the Expansionists, you have no reason to serve any of them?”
He got up and moved away from her, a few uneven strides in one direction and then back again. “You’re wrong. We agree that any overt move on the colony could be interpreted to be an act of war. The Independents’ entire purpose is to maintain the status quo.”
“Do you really believe Aegis would send soldiers into the Zone because Erebus eliminated its own illegal colony?” she asked, rising to follow him. “That would make war a certainty.”
“How can you agree that this is a highly volatile situation for both sides if you don’t believe Aegis would take action in that case? Why would they have sent you to investigate at all?”
He was right, of course. It was all imprudent talk on her part, an effort to make herself feel less helpless.
“Then explain to me why you told Lysander that Aegis might be pleased if the colony were destroyed?” she asked. “Why would you even suggest that to him?”
“I don’t believe it, Alexia. I was attempting to throw him off his stride in any way possible, and see what might result.” He held her gaze intently. “We once discussed the fact that the Enclave is just as responsible for the serfs in Erebus as the Opiri. The reason I am convinced that your government would act in the case of violence against the colonists is for that very reason. The Treaty specifies that no humans may be killed in Citadel territory.”
He was silent for some time before he spoke again. “There must be much hostility and resistance to the custom of sending condemned criminals to Erebus, and guilt is a very powerful human emotion,” he said. “Would your government dare remain indifferent to a few dozen human deaths, even if the dead were merely cast-off criminals?”
Pulling back a clenched fist, Alexia swung at Damon’s face. He caught her hand with his own good one and held her still, breathing as hard as if they had just finished a knockdown, drag-out fight.
“What is it?” he taunted, leaning toward her. “Is the hypocrisy of your own people too difficult to bear?”
Alexia squeezed her eyes shut. Oh, Garret. “You son of a bitch,” she hissed, hating him even as the feel of his skin on hers sent a spike of desire through her body.
He tightened his fingers around her fist. “What were your orders coming into the Zone, Alexia? Were you only to observe? Or were you perhaps sent to find a way to get the humans out of the colony before Erebus’s factions tore it apart?”
“Where in hell did you get that idea?” she spat, struggling to free herself.
“It would be a way for your government to avoid open warfare and still retain the goodwill of those citizens who reject their method of holding the Opiri at bay with condemned prisoners,” he said, keeping his iron grip on her wrist. “If they made the case that the Council could not keep the Treaty by protecting its serfs from destruction, they could avoid hostilities completely.”
“That’s insane. You’re assuming Aegis already knew what was going on here!”
“You never denied they might have sent another agent ahead of you and Michael.”
“I never said—” A muscle flexed in his cheek. “And the Council’s first agent investigating the colony was killed by an Enclave weapon.”
“I don’t know anything about that!” Her chest grew tight as it occurred to her just how much she might not have known. “I was never told about any previous mission to investigate the settlement.”
“Then consider that Aegis might already have been well-informed about the situation in the Zone and has already planned its response. You would want Aegis to save the colony’s serfs, would you not?”
“You don’t know a damned thing about it!”
Abruptly he let her go. “I, too, have my secrets, Alexia.” He sighed and backed away.
“The current situation makes it impossible to keep them any longer.”
Alexia rubbed at her cramped fingers, her stomach rolling over and over like a trained circus dog. “What?” she said.
“You should know the real reason why I was sent to meet you and your partner.”
“You didn’t come to help us observe the colony?” she asked, anger fading to a formless sense of dread.
“No. I was sent to prevent you from getting near it.”
Chapter 13
All the nerves in Alexia’s body seemed to jump at once, lifting her like an express elevator and then sending her plummeting all the way to the bottom
of the shaft.
“Then I was right after all,” she whispered. “The Council is involved in this, up to its eyeballs.”
“No, Alexia. My orders were to keep you away until the Council could complete its own investigation of the colony, without Enclave involvement, so that they might resolve the situation internally. I knew no more until we met Lysander.”
“You didn’t know about any double agents running loose?”
“Until I spoke to Lysander, I wasn’t aware that the Council had employed such an agent.”
“But you weren’t even aware there were enemies out here. You denied the possibility.”
She took several deep breaths to calm herself. “You suggested that Aegis might be working with the Council. Was that to trick me into admitting something you might find useful?”
“I said it was possible, not that I knew it to be a fact.”
“What other little white lies have you been telling me, Damon?”
He hesitated, and then met her gaze. “Those other hypothetical Council operatives I told you about when we met,” he said, “were sent to fire on us so that we would remain together.”
Now that the first shock was past, Alexia found that she felt very little, not even anger.
“Those people out there?” she said numbly, the faces of the slain Council agents still vivid in her mind.
“I don’t know. I was not told their names. But it seems...” He trailed off, bowing his head.
“Whoever did it,” Alexia said, “it worked.” Oh, how well it had worked. She swallowed, searching for words that could find their way through the vise clamping her throat. “I take it they weren’t supposed to actually kill us?”
Damon crouched to pick up the knife, testing the fingers connected to his broken wrist.
“I considered the possibility that the first shooter we encountered might be one of them.
Then, when we were attacked again, I initially thought it could be the same agent or agents. Until they nearly killed us and removed your patch. That was not in the plan.”
“I guess something went a little wrong.”
He continued to gaze at the knife, carefully brushing dirt off the blade with the pad of his fingertip. “Yes,” he said. “Very wrong.”
She knew then that he had no idea his confession had revealed much more to her than the mere facts of his orders. Oh, it must have been inconvenient for Damon when Michael had “refused” to join him and Alexia on their trek to the colony.
Had Damon been amused when he’d “saved her life” from the first shooter, whom he’d presumed to be one of his own? And what about the second attack? If he’d thought, even for a moment, that the ones who had tried to kill him and Alexia might be on his side, why hadn’t he warned her then?
“We are partners, Agent Fox,” he had said. “That makes us equals, does it not?”
How could they be? He had kept too much from her, vital information that could have helped her make the right decisions, might even have saved Michael somehow. She had believed Damon when she should have been most suspicious.
“Either the Colonists or the Expansionists attacked us to get the patch,” Damon continued, oblivious to her inner turmoil. “As you said, I made an unforgivable mistake in assuming that the Expansionists would not have their own covert agents and risk firefights between Opiri in the Zone. I fear they have already done incalculable damage.”
He feared, did he? Were any of his emotions real? Had all the feelings Damon had expressed for her since the theft of her patch, the intensity and sincerity of his lovemaking, been lies, as well?
“Yet you still have such utter faith that the Council didn’t decide it was more convenient to deter me and Michael by eliminating us outright...and blame it on somebody else?”
“You must trust me, Alexia—” She laughed. “Trust you?”
“Why would they send me if their purpose was to kill you and Michael?”
“Why did the Council send only one agent to stay with us? How could they not know that Expansionists agents weren’t loose in the Zone?” She shot him a withering look.
“None of this says much for your Council’s ability to gather intelligence and deal with unexpected contingencies. Or for yours.”
He glanced up at her, all earnestness and remorse. “What do you want me to say that has not already been said?” he asked. “That we are dispensable pawns in a game we cannot understand?”
“Aren’t we, Damon? Haven’t we always known that, you and I?”
“Yes,” he said heavily. “We are pawns, Alexia, one way or another. But I still have my duty, as you do. I must do it as best I can.”
“And so must I.”
“You will not return to the Enclave?”
The very fact that he had to ask that question again was testament to how little he knew her.
“You’d like to get rid of me, wouldn’t you? Maybe you didn’t kill Michael, but you’re glad he was cooperative enough to die.”
He jumped to his feet, the knife clenched in his fist. “So my honesty has led you to decide that I really would have harmed you or your partner to keep you away from the colony?”
She glared at him. “Wouldn’t you?”
“Have you forgotten that I know as well as the Expansionists do that Aegis would investigate your disappearance?”
“And that’s always been your motive, hasn’t it?”
“No,” he said in a very low voice. “I once said I would never harm you, and I swear by the Blood of the Sires that is still true.”
“Oaths. Promises.” Alexia turned away, feeling as though her bones had melted and her body was filled with air, ready to collapse like a balloon pricked by a pin. “They mean nothing.”
“You no longer believe...I care for you?”
“What do you think, Damon?”
For an endless span of time all she could hear was his breathing, harsh and heavy.
“I’m sorry, Alexia.”
Sorry. What idiot had thought up such an inadequate word? “Maybe it is time we parted ways. I’ll continue with my mission, and you can do whatever it is you think you need to.” She released a sharp, angry breath. “I guess that would be reporting what you’ve learned back to Erebus, since you won’t have me to worry about. That is, of course, unless you intend to stop me. Just be aware that I’ll try to kill you if you do.”
“Alexia.”
She wanted to hold her hands over her ears and babble like a child. “There’s nothing more to say.”
“There is. We have no idea how long the effects of my blood will continue to sustain your body. If you go it alone, you may find it suddenly betraying you.”
Alexia swung around to face him, eyes wide. “Are you actually suggesting we should do it again?” She nearly choked when she realized what she had just said. “Take your blood, I mean?”
The ghost of a smile crossed his shadowed face. “Surely you had already considered that possibility, Agent Fox,” he said.
Oh, yes. It had crossed her mind, and she’d quickly erased it again.
“Maybe the one time was enough,” she said quickly. “Maybe I’ll find the patch.”
“Alone?”
He was right, of course. The odds were incalculably against it. She didn’t know her way around this part of the Zone, and they were probably surrounded by enemy agents.
“There is no telling how long your current condition will last,” Damon said, pushing his advantage. “Are you as prepared to die as you were before?”
He was taunting her now. Somehow he knew that her life had become important to her again, something to be guarded and cherished.
“I’m prepared to take my chances,” she said, pulling her arms tight across her chest.
“Even though your mission may die along with you?”
As useless as it was, she longed to hit him again, smash his handsome nose and bloody his lip. But then she saw the healing gashes on his face, the wrist he still moved so gingerly
, and was deeply ashamed.
“What do you want?” she asked, turning her back on him.
“I propose a truce.”
“Like the one you offered when we met?”
He cleared his throat. “I will not lie to you again.”
“Never?”
His silence told her all she needed to know. She went to gather her things.
“Never, Alexia,” he said quietly.
She stopped. This was the moment of decision. She knew she should never trust him again, that just being with him would create an open wound that could never heal.
That was her problem. But what about his? What about his shadow-self? It was still a complete mystery to her. She had no idea how long it had been part of him, if his masters knew about it, when it would arise again. He didn’t seem to remember his spells, but she had seen the pain and confusion in his eyes after they were over.
Could she find some way to help him if she stayed with him? Or would she only make it worse? How could she possibly know?
Only by refusing to leave him. Accepting that he lied to her over and over again.
Lowering her arms, she felt the bulge of something under her jacket and remembered what she had hidden there.
What about your lies? she asked herself. The communicator seemed to burn like a hot coal inside her jacket, though it gave off no warmth at all. She still didn’t know why Michael hadn’t told her about it before he’d left. Why had Aegis entrusted it to him, and not her?
Signal, he’d said. Was he saying he’d received a signal, or had sent one? Did he want her to complete some task his transformation had made impossible? Had he been part of a plan to remove all the humans in the colony? Was Damon’s theory really so crazy after all?
If it was true, then she had been much more a pawn than she ever could have imagined. But she didn’t dare take the time to try to track Michael down and see if she could communicate with him again...if he was even willing to be found.
I’m sorry, Michael, she thought. So very sorry.
But she wasn’t sorry about keeping this secret from Damon until she felt she could trust him again. If that was even possible.
“What did you have in mind as the next move?” she asked.
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