by Pierce Brown
“I did not know it worked,” Apollonius says innocently. “But I am delighted by the results.”
The Ash Lord tries to spit at him, but the feeble saliva catches on his own chin. “Is revenge worth sounding the death knell of your race, spoiled cur?”
“My race?” Apollonius stands. “No, no, my lord, I am a race unto myself.”
“How long ago?” I ask, grabbing Apollonius by the throat. “How long ago did you do this?”
“Three years,” he says, not liking my hands on him. “Are we not allies any longer?” He steps back measuredly, touching his throat. At the news, Sevro looks light-headed.
Three years. Three years like this…He can’t have led his men or fleets on Mercury from here. The time delay would make battle command impossible. But how then did they resist me for so long? Who commanded them? Who is responsible for their new tactics? Who was really behind the holos of him on his bridge when we spoke those half dozen times?
“Yes,” the Ash Lord rasps, as if he can hear my thoughts. “Do you feel the dread yet, slave? Knowing you came all this way, fractured your Republic, your family! Made a pact with this devil to kill a sick old man at the end of his days?”
I fight the urge to scream. I feel like I’m falling. What a waste. What an unbelievable waste.
“Who was it?” I ask.
The Ash Lord looks at Apollonius. “Who else? The only daughter you have left me.”
“Atalantia…” I whisper.
“My last Fury.” He smiles with pride. “You destroyed her home. You murdered her sisters. Now you come to take her father. She was a frivolous girl. She would have lived in peace, Darrow, but you have brought her nothing but war.” He mocks me.
“All of this for nothing,” Sevro murmurs to himself. “We killed Wulfgar for nothing. We came all this way. Darrow…”
I don’t know what to say.
“Where is Atalantia now?” Apollonius asks.
“Far from here,” the Ash Lord says. “The peace talks were her idea. She expected you to dissolve the Senate. Take the reins. But you left. You should have gone to your fleet, Darrow.”
There were too few ships in orbit. I assumed most were on the far side of the planet. But now I know what he means. “Impossible,” I say. “They would have been detected.”
He smiles. “Ten years ago, you came upon Luna from the fog of war. She will fall upon your fleet over Mercury. It is at half strength because of your…tantrum in your Senate. It will burn. And your fabled army on the surface will burn.”
Something inside me knows that he is right, because it would be too fine a world for this to end with him, today. If Atalantia has led his forces, if they are en route to destroy the Republic forces, then the war is not ending. It is beginning again. Around and around it goes. I do not know if the Republic can last another blow. It is my fault. I never should have launched the Iron Rain; but for hubris, for so many reasons, I let the Rain fall, and it has not stopped since. I shattered my family, killed Wulfgar, came here all for nothing.
The Ash Lord watches me realize this with little satisfaction. There is no joy in his final moments. No cruel relish. Just a great exhaustion.
“Orion and Virginia have to know that Atalantia is coming,” I say, numbly. “We have to go.”
“Do you think I would tell you this if you could hope to influence it?”
“Darrow, we have to let them know…” Sevro says.
“You came all the way here,” the Ash Lord continues. “Across the great ink, thinking you could kill me and return home to your family. But now there is nothing to return to. No Republic. No family…”
“No family…” I echo.
Sevro takes a step forward. “Say that again?”
“You left your children behind. Didn’t you?”
Sevro lurches forward and grabs him by the neck. “What the hell are you talking about?”
The Ash Lord smiles at him, their faces inches apart. “You are like me, in the end. I spent my children for my war. And now, so have you.”
Sevro’s grip goes slack.
“Your daughter.” He looks at me. “And your son. They have been taken.”
No.
My fingers curl around the wood post of this rotted man’s bed and I feel the shifting of something inside me. The whisper of formless dread that attends when I wake from a horrible nightmare and for a moment forget my human delusions and see the world for as cold a place as it really is. Dark, hollow wind channels through my heart and I know I have lost. I left my boy behind.
“You’re lying,” Sevro whispers.
We’re each in our little worlds of dread, each sinking into the darkness, each unable to grasp, to believe that he is telling the truth. This is the spite of a dying man. That is all it can be. That is all I can accept.
“You’re lying,” Sevro says again. His face is milk pale.
But he’s not. There is too much satisfaction in him.
“Was it you?” I whisper.
“If only. It was one of yours.”
“Who?”
The Ash Lord watches me and then turns his large head to look away from me out to the bright sea, where his spirit has already fled. “Lorn was right,” he says in a rough whisper. “The bill comes at the end.”
“Who took my son?” I shout. “Who?”
With an animal scream, Sevro launches himself past me and slams his fist into the Ash Lord’s face. Again and again till blood coats Sevro’s hands to his wrists and the Ash Lord’s lips are mangled. I pull at Sevro. He hits me right in the jaw. I hold on, sagging against him as he hyperventilates. He shoves me off, wheeling back to the Ash Lord with his razor drawn.
“We need him alive,” I shout. “We need to know more.”
There’s a soft pop and I look back to the Ash Lord to see foam bubbling from his mouth. He spits a false tooth onto the sheets. Apollonius picks it up and brings it to his nose. “Poison.”
“Who stole my child?” I say, gripping him. “Tell me.”
He smiles, baring his rotting gums.
“He won’t talk,” Apollonius says.
Sevro grunts. “Doesn’t mean he gets to go easy.”
“I agree with the halfbreed,” Apollonius says. He grabs something from atop one of the medical machines. A bottle of antibacterial spray the nurses must have used on the equipment. He takes one of the candles from beside the bed.
“No…” The Ash Lord’s eyes are wide with fear, his words slurred from the poison.
“Apollonius…” I move toward him. Sevro shoves me back.
“Burn the bastard,” he sneers.
But Apollonius looks to me. “Reaper?”
The sorrow in me is fathomless.
I killed Wulfgar.
I broke my family.
I lost my son.
For this rotted slaver.
“Burn him.”
“No!” The Ash Lord tries to rise from his bed. “Stop!”
“Ashes to ashes…” Apollonius turns the canister so it points at the Ash Lord. “Dust to dust.” He depresses the canister’s release button. Antibacterial residue hisses out onto the Ash Lord, coating him in chemical sheen. Then Apollonius tosses the candle onto the bed. Blue fire explodes as the candle flame catches the alcohol.
The Ash Lord screams. Fire races over the dry husk of his skin. He flails against the inferno like a thrashing mantis, his skin contracting and boiling and swelling and blackening as the air of the room fills with acrid smoke. The plastic tubes connected to his gut and arms snap taut and jerk the medical machines toward the bed.
Apollonius stands back from the horror in delighted satisfaction. The inferno dances in his eyes, and casts maniacal shadows over his high cheekbones. Beside Sevro, I feel no satisfaction, only a gaping loneliness. All the friends and family tattered and torn by my war, my choices.
Anguish saws at me inside with crueler teeth than these flames.
And as the Ash Lord breathes his last, I turn from
the murder, as lost as I was when I walked the scaffold seventeen years ago and felt the rope around my neck. All I wanted to be then was a father. And now my son is lost.
THE IDLE CHATTER THAT FILLS the Hall of Justice in the Ionian Golds’ capital city of Sungrave evaporates when Romulus au Raa enters the room. He comes in dignified silence, clad in a gray kimono of rough-spun wool. Flanking him are his loyal kin: misshapen Marius, ancient Pandora, a host of die-hard Praetors and white-haired veterans. What is missing and notably absent is the younger generation. Those of my age or thereabouts. The brilliant students of the post-Rising generation all cluster worshipfully around Seraphina, her Dustwalkers, and several other notable captains of Ganymede, Callisto, Europa, and a contingent from Saturn’s and Uranus’s moons up in the stone stadium seats.
The Hall of Justice itself is a dark treasure. All its surfaces are faced in a shiny black stone. The nave is triangular, the south, north, and west aisles steeped stadium rows. The towering ceiling narrows until it makes a pyramid, the peak of which is iron. In the winnowing east chancel, twelve Olympic Knights sit cross-legged in a bowed line on an elevated white marble podium looking out at the nave. Each wears a long cape in harmony with their title. Diomedes’s is storm gray. Helios’s is brilliant white. Behind them, a marble, gold-tipped pyramid floats. The old Justice sits to the right of the pyramid in her living chair of elm. The young Chance from the duel sits to the left in her chair of bone; one remembers, one promises.
After a welcoming benediction and customary rights, Romulus and his men take their seats in the center of the nave on thin cushions. His has been set apart at the peak of the forty others. Helios au Lux, Arab Knight of the Olympics, stares out from the shadow of his cape like an imperious falcon, long-necked, bald but for a long white mustache, the ends of which are held together by two iron clasps. Diomedes sits at his right hand. A toadish woman with huge eyes sits to his left wearing the badge of the Rage Knight.
“Romulus,” Helios begins, his voice a hammer and lacking the nuance for duplicity. “Sovereign of the Rim Dominon, Dominatus of House Raa, you have been brought before the Olympic Council for an impartial hearing on charges brought against you by your accuser, Dido au Raa.”
Alone, Dido sits beneath the council, cloaked all in black. To accuse before the council is a perilous endeavor. If Dido’s charges are deemed false, she will suffer the fate that would have befallen the man were he convicted. Draconic.
“Accuser, present your charges.”
Dido stands without flourish. “First charge: gross negligence during wartime.” The Olympics wait for her to continue the list, but she sits down.
Whispers are exchanged in the crowd. She brings no charge of treason, just as she said she would not. She played everyone like a zither. Once her husband is forced to step down or accept co-rule, she will solidify her position. I overhear the two men next to me voicing a different opinion.
“Base cowardice on her, not bringing treason charges,” one says.
“Nepotism there. He knew. He had to know.”
The room quiets as Helios confirms. “You seek no charge of treason?”
“I do not.” She says nothing more and watches her husband evenly.
“Very well, the accuser may present her evidence or witnesses for the charge of gross negligence during wartime.”
“This first evidence you may have heard by now.” She throws the holo up into the air and plays Seraphina’s evidence of the Reaper’s deception to predictable silent response. Romulus sits implacable on the ground, watching the docks die in the air above him and bathe him in the brilliant light.
The next item of evidence is Romulus’s own communication with Darrow, taken from the sealed communications records of the Battle of Ilium. Romulus’s helmet cam feed appears in the air. He’s in a hallway filled with smoke. Dying men writhe on the ground around him as he stands, armor spattered in blood, surrounded by mechanized Golds and Obsidians in the middle of a firefight. His two sons Diomedes and Aeneas provide cover for him as he makes a desperate call to Darrow. His face is frantic with fear.
“Darrow, listen carefully. The Colossus has altered trajectory and is headed for Ganymede….”
“He’s going for the docks. Can any ships intercept?” the Reaper asks.
“No. They’re out of position. If Octavia can’t win, she’ll ruin us. Those docks are my people’s future. You must take that bridge at all costs….”
“I’ll do my best,” are the last words of the Reaper.
“Thank you, Darrow. And good luck. First Cohort, on me!” The connection to Darrow cuts out and we see from Romulus’s headcam as he and his sons charge down the hallway. A blinding flash of light goes off. The hull to the right ruptures open, and Aeneas, Romulus’s eldest, is speared through the side of his head by a fragment of metal and then sucked out to space. The clip ends.
On the floor, Romulus sits in solemn silence.
One final clip is loaded. It is a conversation between Romulus and Darrow after the Battle of Ilium concluded. Romulus was in the Hanging Palace of Ganymede. Darrow was on his ship. Their two faces float in the air.
“As promised, you have independence,” Darrow says.
Romulus sits on the floor, his face haggard, the stump of his right arm wound with white bandages. “And you have your ships,” he says very quietly, the spirit stripped from him. “But they will not be enough to defeat the Core. The Ash Lord will be waiting for you.”
“I hope so. I have plans for his master.”
Romulus pauses. “Do you sail on Mars?”
“Perhaps.” The Red’s eyes mock, his tone insinuates, while Romulus maintains an even air of military civility. The man had just lost a son, an arm, to say nothing of the destroyed docks. What a picture of a Gold.
“There’s one thing I found curious about the battle,” he says icily. “Of all the ships my men boarded, not one nuclear weapon over five megatons was found. Despite your claims. Despite your…evidence.”
“My men found plenty enough. Come aboard if you doubt me. It’s hardly curious that they would store them on the Colossus. Roque would want to keep them under tight watch. We’re only lucky that I managed to take…” There’s static interference. “…bridge when I did. Docks can be rebuilt. Lives cannot.” It sounds like a threat.
“Did they ever have them?”
“Would I risk the future of my people on a lie?” The Slave King smiles cruelly. “Your moons are safe. You define your own future now, Romulus.” His eyes narrow to two thin slits. “Do not look the gift horse in the mouth.”
“Indeed.” Romulus’s silence is heavy as he swallows his anger, his pride, and lets the Slave King mock him. “I would like your fleet to depart before end of day.”
“It will take three days to search the debris for our survivors.” He insults Romulus’s request. “We will leave then.”
“Very well. My ships will escort your fleet to the boundaries agreed upon. When your flagship crosses into the asteroid belt, you may never return. If one ship under your command crosses the boundary, it will be war between us.”
“I remember the terms.”
“See that you do. Give my regards to the Core. I’ll certainly give yours to the Sons of Ares you leave behind.” The connection with the Reaper cuts off, but the image of Romulus floats in the air. He shudders, the calm wilting away and giving a glimpse of the broken man beneath. The image sputters out.
Dido looks at her husband, sharing the pain of Aeneas’s death all over again. “Noting the duplicity of the Slave King’s actions, it stands as plain fact that more investigation was warranted. Not only into the veracity of the nuclear threat, which was supposedly levied against us by the Sovereign. But toward the veracity of the Slave King’s actions throughout and preceding the Battle of Ilium. The inquiry which was commissioned by the council was quickly scuttled by my husband. I do not believe there is evidence he knew the dark truth of the Slave King’s actions against our docks�
��” She says this to temper the fury of the Ganymedi Golds, who built the docks and saw them fall on their cities. “…but I am not beyond bounds by saying more effort should have gone into assessing the truth. Now I would like to call Seraphina au Raa to the floor.”
Seraphina descends and stands between Dido and Romulus.
Dido addresses her daughter. “When you acquired the hologram evidence of the destruction of the docks and returned with it into Rim Space, were you arrested by sworn men of the Sovereign?”
“I was. As I should have been.”
“Did you divulge to them the nature of the information you carried?”
“I did not.”
“Did, at any point, Romulus admit to knowing the truth about the destruction of the docks?”
“He did not.” Seraphina looks at her father. “His actions toward me and the secrecy under which they were enacted were done to protect me from capital punishment for breaking the Pax Solaris. It was a father’s love. Not a man’s schemes. He knew I entered the Gulf. I do not know if he was aware of the reasons why. But he knew he would have to bring me before the Moon Council.”
“Do you believe he committed negligence during wartime?”
“It is not my duty to judge.”
“Thank you, Aureate.”
Seraphina salutes with her fist to her heart and returns to her place amongst her friends. Dido closes her argument. “My charges are limited because, while I believe my husband misstepped by not investigating further, I do not believe there is evidence to prove he was complicit in hiding information from the council. I do not believe anyone here could call him a traitor.” One of the Ganymedi shouts their dissent. “Thus, I ask only for impeachment from his position as Sovereign.”
She sits down.
Helios continues. “Romulus. Do you contest these charges?”
Romulus stands. “I do not.”
“You wish to offer no mitigating evidence?”
“I do not. In the charge of negligence, I am guilty.”
Heads nod in approval. This is an honorable response, one they expected, one that an Iron Gold would give. On Luna, this trial would have stretched out over the course of years, with endless appeals and warehouses of evidence and armies of Copper lawyers. By the time it was through, half those involved would be dead or have had their relatives kidnapped and tortured till they came to the correct judgment. My grandmother would have burned the government to the ground before releasing her clutch on power.