by Natalie Grey
He looked over at the computer. He could call her, see her face. She’d been so well-behaved, and he knew it annoyed her to be shut away on his estates with no missions to run.
But he couldn’t bear to see her. Not now. Not while he was doing something he knew would horrify her.
He rubbed at his forehead, and gave a sigh when his fingers met only the smooth surface of his mask. He needed not to get carried away. This was fine. Tera was manageable. He would take care of this little problem, and then things would go back to the way they had always been.
He had always won before.
He went to his desk and began to type out a message.
Julian—
Julian was making careful edits to a policy brief when the computer dinged.
He did not look up. This was a delicate process, and he did not want to lose his train of thought.
Soras had given him carte blanche to do whatever he needed to do in order to keep Ymir untouched, and Julian had a talent for it. Oh, there were the simple matters of manipulating the intel on defense satellites and mercenaries—far too dangerous, we would lose too many soldiers—but there was so, so much more than that.
For years, Julian had reached into trade and regulatory agencies to give a boost to any technology that required the ores that came from Ymir. He’d pushed for stronger union regulations, knowing they drove the prices of competing ores up. He had amplified news of separatist groups in various sectors, knowing that certain elements in defense and the parliament would call for more equipment that used the ores only Soras could provide—and see those separatist groups as a far more pressing concern than Ymir.
His employer was woven so deeply into the fabric of the Alliance that politicians now greeted the strategy recommendations with relief. They did not want to go in and take the Warlord out, not if they would need to raise taxes to buy the equipment they thought they needed at prices they thought they would have to pay.
Julian allowed himself a small smile.
He’d been lost in memory, he realized. That was odd. Normally, when he worked, he had a laser focus and unbreakable concentration.
But his mind was wandering tonight. It had been since he got home.
He frowned. He felt oddly peaceful. Even the faint whistling noise he’d been hearing all night didn’t bother him. Neither did the—
Cold.
Adrenaline gave him a jolt and he pushed himself up. When the table came far too close to his eyes, he realized he’d almost slumped over instead of standing up straight. Panic warred with the strange, unnatural calm, and he stumbled away from the table, not sure where he was going, half of him just wanting to lie down on the couch and sleep.
He managed to bring his pen to his mouth so he could bite down hard on it. A capsule released from his back tooth, and even more adrenaline flooded his system. The taste was bitter—but, then, it was supposed to be. It was supposed to be uncomfortable to spur him into motion.
He had to find the source of the noise. That was step two, though. Step one was to find oxygen. Every tower had safety kits in the event of a breached window. He stumbled to the door as fast as he could—he was shaking all over now—and managed to get the mask onto his face within a few tries.
God, it was cold. How had he not noticed this?
Easily. Lack of oxygen was insidious.
He looked around and followed the noise to his sitting room. He rarely used it, and it was at the other end of the apartment from his study. He fought the panicked thought that he had only noticed the sound by luck. If he’d been even a few minutes later, he’d be dead.
One of the panels had slid open and Julian opened the control panel to do a reset of the systems. He stared wide-eyed at the panels as they trembled and tilted just slightly, sliding back into place….
The whistling was gone.
Julian bowed his head. He had to sit down. He was going to be violently ill soon, but he could afford that now. He could even fall sleep—the oxygen would recalibrate, and the heat would come back up. He would wake up from this.
And then he would let the owners of the tower know that he was prepared to make their lives very unpleasant if they did not resolve this to his satisfaction. How could they have been so careless? There were supposed to be automated systems in place to alert them if something like this happened.
He had only just survived.
On the screens, the tiny black and white figure stood staring at the window for a moment before heading back to the kitchen. The oxygen mask gleamed in the dim light.
“Damn,” Tera muttered.
Back to the drawing board.
11
A knock sounded on the door and the Warlord looked up curiously. His servants always entered to go about their business without any prompting, and none of his aides knocked. He checked the cameras outside the room and frowned.
“Come in.”
Ellian Pallas entered with a slight, deferential nod. “Thank you for seeing me unexpectedly.”
“It couldn’t wait until dinner?” The Warlord knew his voice was not entirely pleasant. “I had business to attend to.” His raised an eyebrow. “Besides, it seemed you had some business to discuss with your wife.”
“I did.” Ellian sat without asking, a shocking disrespect—and one the Warlord could see at a glance he was aware of. He crossed his legs. “I will, unfortunately, be unable to complete the weapons deal. I am resigning from your employment.”
He could not possibly have heard that correctly. The Warlord blinked behind the mask and considered. Ellian Pallas was a smart man—or, at least, he had seemed to be up until this particular moment—and a smart man would know that no one stopped working for the Warlord of Ymir.
Ellian had windows into the entire Ymiri defense network. Did he really think he would be allowed to walk away?
He couldn’t possibly.
Which meant he was bluffing. It was the only possible answer.
“Tell me more.” The Warlord sat back in his seat, toying idly with a pen. He could kill Ellian in any number of ways without standing up. He could afford to enjoy this first.
To his surprise, Ellian had an answer ready. “Sir, you know Aryn is Ymiri. We talked, she and I, and she expressed her discomfort with what it is that I supply to you.”
“Surely you explained to her that without the resistance, I would need no such goods.”
“I did.” Ellian smiled, looking for all the world as if he were at a dinner party, relaxing. “Did you know her brother died during an air strike some years ago?”
“Yes.” He’d looked up everything he could find on her before he let her go. He knew she’d been part of the resistance. He also knew that Ellian kept her well in hand, and that she’d be dealt with if she did anything inconvenient.
Or, rather, he had assumed as much.
He hated when people proved stupider than he’d believed them to be, which was why the next sentence out of Ellian’s mouth started a slow smolder of rage.
“I’m sure you understand, then,” Ellian said blandly. “I can’t disappoint her like that.”
“So you intend to get out of the business entirely?” the Warlord said, equally blandly.
“Yes.” The word came pleasantly, and without hesitation.
The Warlord stared at him. This was a joke, it had to be. Ellian Pallas did not have a moralistic bone in his body. He’d made his fortune off the deaths of others, and it was hardly as if he wasn’t aware of that. He knew the weapons he sold, inside and out. He could tell you how many deaths to expect, or what damage.
The Warlord had done his research, too. He’d had to hire an arms dealer he could trust to work in his interest, which was no small feat. He’d sent deals through Ellian for months, watching how he operated. He had looked over the man’s history. He had been through every document and deal Ellian had produced. The man had no conscience.
And now the Warlord was meant to believe that Ellian was going to step out of the bu
siness simply because his wife had requested it? And it hadn’t been a calculated campaign, no—Ellian was suggesting that this had just happened.
“What will you do?” He asked the question as much out of curiosity, to see what Ellian would say, as he did to get his bearings in the conversation.
“I haven’t decided yet.” Ellian looked contemplative. “There’s so much the world has to offer, wouldn’t you agree?”
The Warlord blinked at him.
“In any case, I believe I will take my leave.” Ellian stood, buttoning his suit jacket, and headed for the door. “I do regret any inconvenience—”
“Stay for dinner.”
“Oh, I couldn’t possibly impose.”
“I insist.” The pleasantries made his teeth ache, much the way this entire conversation made his brain ache, but the Warlord did not let his tone slip. “If I’m being honest, I hope to convince you both that you stay in my employ—but if not, we can certainly have a pleasant dinner and get you a good night’s rest. Being on a ship is so tiring.”
Ellian hesitated, and then nodded. “Of course.”
The door clicked shut behind him and the Warlord frowned. Did Ellian know of James’s defection? Did he know of the plan to have Aryn killed?
If so, his bluff hardly made any sense.
Nor did it make sense for him to bluff in order to get more money out of the Warlord. Ellian’s expenses were paid without question, and his salary was undoubtedly more than he could make on his own.
It didn’t matter. Ellian was not leaving this planet alive.
The Warlord typed out two messages, the first a brief summons to James: bring her now.
The second was to Julian: Pallas unreliable. Bring backup substance. Take all possible precautions.
Poison in the drinking water wouldn’t be as easy to target as Ellian’s airborne poison, of course … but if he were being honest, the Warlord had always known it would come to this. Once the sickness of a resistance took root, there was no getting it out. The entire population needed to be put down.
And he could do a bombing run, but really, rebuilding an entire infrastructure would be entirely too time consuming. Yes, poison would get the job done perfectly well, and then the buildings could be cleared out for the next set of workers.
Pallas unreliable. Bring backup substance. Take all possible precautions.
Tera stared at the message. Julian was being summoned. That meant travel, the spaceport….
Now that she knew where he was going, she would be able to learn more and more of the Warlord’s mechanisms—how he got his supplies, how he hid the ships that brought them. Trade with him was officially banned, but everyone knew there was no agriculture on Ymir. If she were to figure out who—
But that was taking the long view, and if the Dragons were attacking now, then there wasn’t time. She had to take Julian out before he could bring whatever it was the Warlord wanted.
12
He was losing his mind. Cade paced around the perimeter of Aryn’s small set of chambers. He had been around, by his count, twenty-three times. He had been sent away, and she was alone with Ellian—he was fairly sure.
Cade knew exactly what he should do. He should accept her choice and walk away, and all would be as it should be. God knew he was smart enough to see the way the dice were falling.
And what did it matter, in the end? They were two people. Very small in the grand scheme of things. It didn’t matter. It didn’t matter at all. He stopped pacing and looked at the bags still piled in the corner. He could take his things and go—Ellian would understand, certainly. He would know he had won, and he had what he’d always wanted: a woman he could trust.
And Cade would drink himself to death on New Arizona. That idea sounded pretty good, all things considered.
There was a knock at the door and he opened it, eyes barely flickering when he saw the two bodyguards.
“Yes?” he asked, unceremoniously.
“Mr. Pallas wants the room outfitted with blockers.” One of them shoved several items into Cade’s hands.
He looked them over.
“And his own listening devices, I see.”
“Mr. Pallas wouldn’t—“
“Oh, come now.” Cade felt the last dregs of his resistance melt away. “Surely we can be honest with one another, gentlemen. You hate me. Mr. Pallas hates me. It’s anyone’s guess why I’m still here. But since we’re all professionals, let’s just call these—” he held up the devices “—what they are. He’s spying on his wife.”
If he were honest with himself, he’d been hoping they would let something slip. Maybe someone would think to admit to him just why Ellian kept Cade here when he so clearly suspected that his wife was having an affair. But the one called Colin simply reached out and pulled the door closed, and he listened to their steps disappear down the hallway. Cade pulled out the desk chair, removed a small screwdriver from one of his cuffs, and began to take the device apart.
He was still employed to protect Aryn, and as far as he was concerned, that meant from everyone. Like hell he was going to let Ellian spy on her.
It was only after he had the devices modified and up on the walls that he realized there had been no point to it. Ellian wouldn’t see anything inappropriate. Aryn’s sadness had been clear—to him, at least—but she had made an unequivocal choice. Cade slumped against the wall and tilted his head back to stare at the ceiling.
He didn’t know how much time had passed before the sound of the door opening jerked him from his thoughts. He only rolled his head sideways. He no longer cared who saw him like this.
“What on earth has gotten into you?” Talon asked. He slipped into the room and shut the door behind him.
“She sold herself,” Cade said bitterly. “Everything she was, to get him….” His throat was closing on his bitterness. “To get him to stop dealing with the Warlord. And it was all for nothing.”
Ellian had been lying. How could she not see that? It destroyed him to admit it, but her bargain might almost have made sense, if not for that.
“All for nothing?” Talon raised his eyebrows. “Then you haven’t heard?” he frowned. “By the way, I’m assuming you fixed all of those things on the walls.”
“I fixed them,” Cade said tonelessly.
“Good. Then here’s the deal: he did stop dealing with the Warlord.”
“What?” Cade said blankly. He let the front two legs of his chair thump back on the ground.
“My hand to God. He went marching into the Warlord’s office, cool as you please, and told him the deal was off, and he’d be taking the weapons and going home. Or something to that effect. I don’t think he’d landed all of them yet. He wouldn’t, if he were smart. And he is smart—”
“Stop talking for a second.” Cade shook his head. “You’re wrong, he—”
“I’m not wrong, Williams.” Talon gave him a look. “Either he means it, or he’s trying to play hardball, but either way, I can assure you the Warlord thinks it’s real.”
Now that was interesting.
“How do you know that?”
“He’s sent for the Dragons. Not me, of course. But others, who very well might come. He must know the weapons are here, and he wants this finished before the resistance has time to arm itself.”
“What good are fifteen hundred people with cheap guns really going to do?” Cade asked bitterly.
“More than you’d think.” Talon looked almost regretful. “Fifteen hundred people with nothing to lose, and a palace that was never built to withstand an invasion. He bet big that no one would ever get enough momentum to overthrow him. The attack sixteen years ago scared him, Williams. He’s been trying to make himself safer, but he overshot. Now he’s running scared while his people walk away from the mines.” He gave a slight smile. “He should never have let that woman off the planet. She’s going to be his undoing.”
“You’re going to be his undoing,” Cade said flatly.
�
�Williams…”
“Don’t.”
“Listen to me—”
The good news was that the door opened before Talon could get out whatever platitude he was going to say. The bad news was that it was Aryn. She paused when she saw them, but she slipped into the room and closed the door behind her.
“He did it,” she said. Disbelief sounded in her voice. “He went and told the Warlord. I almost didn’t believe he would…”
“He’s lying somehow.” Cade couldn’t keep the bitterness from his voice. Talon lay a hand on his arm and he shook it off. “What? Do you want me to lie to her, too?”
“I told you myself that it was real.” There was an edge to Talon’s voice now. “Williams, you know damned well what this man has done, and so you know how much it’s worth to stop him. Yes? Well, that’s what she just did.”
Cade stopped. He had never seen Talon quite like this. Talon was a man who preferred to let people fight their own battles, turning a blind eye to the fistfights and confrontations his soldiers got into. If Aryn and Cade were both under his command, he would have left right now and let them fight it out.
He liked her, Cade realized in disbelief. Talon approved of Aryn, and of what she’d done. The cold-hearted bastard was reasoning it out just like she was, and neither of them could see—
“He’s lying,” Cade said again. He looked between them. “There is something we don’t know about his plans, but I swear to you, Ellian is lying.”
They both looked away, Talon crossing his arms and Aryn biting her lip, but Cade knew they both saw what he did: a nothingness, a pattern just out of their reach to comprehend.
“I’ll find out,” Talon said at last. “I’ll see what I can learn.”
“I’ll come with you.” He might get the confrontation with Ellian that he desperately wanted.
“Williams—stay with her.” Talon’s eyes were cold. “Remember when I said that the Warlord thinks this is real? He does. And you and I both know what that means.”