I traded a look with Scott, both of us looking at the other out of the corner of our eyes. “I guess that makes four of us, then,” I said, trying to bury my skepticism about that idea.
“I think Augustus and Jamal would follow her into hell, too,” Scott said. “Each for different reasons.”
“That’s good.” I settled my gaze on Scott. “Where’s this sudden concern springing up from, huh?”
“Reed …” Kat said.
“No, come on, Scott,” I said, leaning in, “I know this isn’t just out of the blue, and it’s not because Gravity decided to bail. What are you thinking, man?”
Scott pursed his lips thinly, then did a lean-in of his own. “I talked to Miranda about the company accounts.”
“Geez,” I said, letting out a hard breath. “That’s not your worry—”
“It’s a little my worry, since I work here,” Scott said, not taking his eyes off me. “I figured after everything we went through in Scotland, and how much you paid in overtime and bonuses for that—”
“Oh my goodness,” Kat said, and I could tell she was getting it now, too, the point he’d driven us to. “We’re going to make a mint here, all of us who are on this little jaunt. I never even thought about—”
“How Reed’s bankrupting the agency to keep pulling Sienna’s ass out of the fire?” Scott asked, and now he settled back in his seat again. “I didn’t either, at first.” He tapped the side of his head. “The problem with growing up in a wealthy family is you don’t necessarily think about money first thing. But I got to it eventually, just like checking on dad’s business to make sure the golden goose is still laying eggs.”
“Your concern is touching—” I said.
“Cut the shit, Reed,” Scott said. “I don’t care for my own sake, okay? Obviously. Kat and I will be fine.”
“I dunno about that,” Kat said. “I have expensive tastes, and reality TV doesn’t pay as much as you might think. It’s the licensing deals where the real money is—”
“Okay, well, I’ll be fine,” Scott said, “but what I’m worried about is what happens to the agency if you end up busting us flat. Come on, man. We do good work.”
“And we’ll continue to,” I said. “Just … maybe not with as big a roster.”
“Shit,” Kat said under her breath. “Reed …”
“Look, I don’t know what to tell you,” I said. “Sienna needs help, I go to help her. That means that the half or more of our number who expect to get paid—who show up for that specific reason? I have to pay them. More, in this case, because this isn’t the job they signed up for.”
“How bad is it?” Kat asked.
We both looked at Scott. “Miranda didn’t give me a number or anything,” he said, folding his arms in front of him, “but you could tell by the look on her face it isn’t good. Between Scotland and this …” He shrugged. “You’re paying through the nose, and we aren’t working during the times when you’ve got us all in the field for Sienna saving. It’s a huge net negative time. We may get paid decently by local and state law enforcement agencies, but it ain’t exactly a huge bounty, y’know? Which makes it tough to refill the coffers.”
“Yeah,” I said. “And with Sienna’s accounts being tied up and hamstrung since Rose yanked them during the Scotland business …” I forced a smile. “Look … we don’t need to talk about this right now. We have a job in front of us. And whether you wanted it to happen this way or not, we’ve got a nice little army behind us with all these people I’ve paid. So we’re not in it with just the five of us who most care, all right? That’s … it’s worth it, if it saves Sienna.”
Scott did not look so sure. “I’m all about saving Sienna. But, Reed, this agency does things that no one else does. Not even the FBI sends their task force out to deal with state problems the way we do. Especially to the states that don’t always have it in their budget to pay a ton. We go out there, we get it done, because somebody has to. And if we end up running out of money …”
He didn’t need to say it. Kat did, anyway. “It’ll just be the five or so of us anyway,” her green eyes flashed sadly.
“It’s not going to come to that,” I said, as the plane hit a little bump of turbulence. I tried not to take it as an omen. “We’ll make it through.” I forced a smile, but they’d known me too long to believe I was doing anything other than telling them what they—and I—wanted to hear. “We’ll find a way to make it work. Somehow.”
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
Sienna
“Have I told you lately I really love what you’ve done to the place?” I asked as we filtered into Hades’s quarters, sun shining in through the giant pane of glass. “I mean, really, most soul suckers would content themselves to embrace the darkness, but look at you—opening your world like this. It shows real growth of character. Or something.”
“You are ceaselessly amusing, my child,” Hades said, shutting the door behind us as Lethe walked over to the window and stood there, back to us, silent sentinel once more. “It seems it is a joke a minute with you. Have you considered writing a book of all-purpose retorts? You know, if this metahuman law enforcement thing or crown princess-ing doesn’t work out for you? The advertising synergy would be, as you kids say these days, ‘epic.’”
“Maybe we could all do a team-up on it,” Lethe muttered. “It seems quips are our stock-in-trade around here. We could crank it up, make them Revelen’s chief export.”
“It’d beat the hell out of sending superpowered mercenaries the world over,” I said. “Which … it surprises me that’s not our chief export, given how many of the garden-variety I’ve run into that come from here.”
“They don’t come from here,” Hades said, rubbing his overlarge forehead with his thin fingers as if to dissolve a growing headache. His eyes were squinted shut, and I wondered if he was actually suffering from photosensitivity from the window. “They pass through on their way to whatever destination job they’re on.” He looked up and his eyes met mine, the bright flashing. “Yes. We traffic in mercenaries. It’s a poor country, we need to raise money somehow.”
“Have you considered implementing a lottery?” I asked. “It’s what all good first world nations do. It’s a great way to pay for schools and gambling addiction rehab programs.”
Hades snorted. “As you say … ‘you are not wrong.’” He looked away for a moment, as though marshaling his thoughts for the inevitable confrontation. “So, Sienna … what is your favorite season?”
“I … huh?” I’d been ready to respond to pretty much any reprimand he was going to unleash—for fighting with him in the war room, for being a general pain in the ass. Favorite season, though?
That I didn’t have an immediate answer for.
“I prefer autumn,” Hades said, taking slow steps to stand next to Lethe by the window. “Hardly a surprise, I imagine. Death, enjoying the season where we claim our victory for the year. The leaves all dying and falling off … the grim march of winter setting in as life flees to more … hospitable climes or hunkers down to endure the march of cold.” He looked up. “Cliché, I’m sure. But I’m also a sucker for a good apple cider. And Halloween. I’m just a little bitch for children dressing in costumes and getting candy.”
“Ahhhhh … okay,” I said, not sure what to say to … any of that, actually.
“So, what is your favorite season?” Hades asked again, taking his fingers away from kneading his brow.
“Well, there’s only two in Minnesota,” I said. “Winter and road construction. So I guess I pick … road construction?”
“Ah, a local joke,” he said. “I am sure it is very amusing.”
“Having lived in Michigan, where the climate is very similar,” Lethe said, “I can vouch for this. It’s funny.” Yet she didn’t laugh.
“Yeah, you look like it’s taking everything in you to keep down the giggles,” I said, causing her to frown, just slightly. “What’s with the season question? Cuz I’d really prefer th
at if you want to chew my ass, you just get to it and skip the fluff.”
“Just trying to get to know you a little better,” Hades said. His shoulders drooped, like he was so tired he might keel over. “I have no interest in ‘chewing your ass.’ I would rather … ‘chew the fat.’”
“Well, my ass is still a little fat,” I said. “It’s the cupcakes. I’m doing better, but y’know … like Kevin Hart in Jumanji 2, cake is my weakness, though the exploding effect is much less pronounced and more limited to little bits of cellulite—”
“Okay, perhaps I will just move to chewing your ass,” Hades said. “We need to be united in our rule. United behind one person, when we are exercising command over this country—”
“Yeah, here we go,” I said. “Don’t sugarcoat it.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that,” Lethe said.
“You are both so very frustrating,” Hades said, hands back to his forehead. “I know you have your own ideas what should be done, and I am perfectly happy to hear them. Someday, this will all be yours, and under your dominion, but for now—can we try and keep the discord private? Rather than in places where everyone can see?”
“You’re planning ahead for lots of future fights?” I asked.
Hades smiled thinly, looking right at me. “Well, I know your grandmother well enough at this point to assume everyone in your line is a similar sort of pain in the ass.” He caught a glare from Lethe and shrugged. “Would you care to argue that point?”
“No,” she said, but still glared.
“There is plenty of room for strategic disagreement,” Hades said. “I am hardly infallible.” His fingers ran lightly across the front of his suit, and again I could vividly see the scars beneath in my head, as though he were touching the signs of his own past failures. “But command of a country requires harmony, not disharmony. We must be united, a front when among our people, especially the military leaders. It can be a facade. You can despise my decisions in private if you wish—I will listen all day to you telling me what a fool I am. In private. Though I would hope you would restrict your attacks to my ideas rather than my person.”
“I don’t really want to attack your person,” I said. “But … this ‘united front’ business? I don’t think we are united.”
“I wouldn’t expect us to be,” he said. “I am not Harmon. I do not control minds. I am merely suggesting we keep the enmity to a minimum and the argument well below the levels we just experienced.”
“You don’t like conflict?” I asked.
Hades’s eyes flashed. “It depends on the circumstances. It has its place.”
“I figured you had some use for it,” I said, “or I wouldn’t be here.”
“What do you mean?” Lethe asked. Hades did not ask, nor do anything but stand there, his eyes glimmering slightly. Because he knew what I was talking about right off.
“Can we … cut some of the crap?” I asked, staring him down. “You helped power Rose.”
“I told you—” he said.
“Yeah, I heard you the first time,” I said. “I still don’t believe you, though.”
“What possible reason would I have for supplying her with … what you suggest?” he asked. His hands remained at his sides.
“I’m not entirely sure,” I said, smacking my lips together. “But I think it has to do with what you just said … conflict.”
His eyes glimmered again. “Interesting. Go on.”
“I fought her,” I said. “She pushed me to … well, to within inches of death. Real death. Not you, not me. It took everything I had to get out of that fight alive. And she, obviously, didn’t make it out. Conflict. I fight her, she dies.”
A little tug at the corner of his mouth. “And you are all the stronger for it.”
“Yeah, except I lost my superpowers of flight and fire and all else.”
“A smokescreen,” he said, waving them off. “Powers are not necessarily the same as being powerful. Look at the current president, Gondry. He has more destructive firepower at his fingertips than any meta besides …” Now he smiled. “Well … besides me.”
“So you powered Rose,” I said, “another of your so-called progeny, in order to fuel … conflict.”
“In order to fuel our plans,” Hades said, and I could see by the dark certainty he held in his eyes that, yes, he was admitting it. Finally. “This is a game, you see. We require pawns. Like Harmon. Though we were hardly alone in our interest in Rose.”
I looked at Lethe. She didn’t look back, but her lips were sealed in a surly, thin line. “So …” I said, “… now that I won … you’re all … happy to see me? Welcome me into the fold?” I shook my head. “Man. I knew there was more to this sudden offer of asylum than just nukes and good timing.”
“You have failed to ask yourself the right questions,” Hades said. “You have embraced the role of Death when it suits you, contemplated the nobler associations of it.” He stepped forward. “But you do not consider the less kindly role it fills—culling weakness and ensuring the survival of the fittest. You were stronger than Rose. That is why you yet live and she does not.”
“So you have been throwing misery my way,” I said.
“I have thrown trials your way,” he said, eyes almost glowing now. Not with malice, but interest. “And you have risen to the occasion with every one. You have succeeded where no other has.” He raised a hand to me. “Sienna … you have made your own name in this world. Created your own legacy, not ridden on my coattails or hidden in the shadows, afraid of what you can do—”
“Abandoned,” I said quietly. “Alone. No help from you.” I looked at Lethe. She did not look back at me. “From either of you.”
“You did it all on your own,” Hades said, taking another step toward me. “Your strength is known. It is legend, independent of mine or hers—” He waved a hand at Lethe. “That makes you … worthy. Worthy to take up the mantle.” He reached into his jacket, pulling out the vials. “No one has been ready for this singular honor. No one has been worthy of the power that could await you if you but—”
The door creaked and opened behind me. I turned to look, stepping sideways out of the direct reach of Hades. He froze in place, brow thunderously arched at the interruption as General Krall stepped in, followed by ArcheGrey and Yvonne, both of whom spread out in a little triangle with her at the spear point as soon as they were in.
“What is this?” Hades asked, and his voice crackled with enough anger that I realized he’d been seriously holding back in our conversations. I would not have wanted to be on the receiving end of that.
Krall seemed unfazed, though, smiling. “My liege, I have brought news.”
“You could at least knock next time, general,” Hades said, hands still clenched at his sides. “It would be the courteous thing to do.”
“I apologize,” Krall said, slightly inclining her head, but never taking her eyes off me. “I thought you would want to know immediately.”
“Yes?” Hades asked, a little hiss creeping into his question.
Krall looked at Arche, who took a step forward, lifting a tablet computer. “We’ve detected evidence of a cyber intrusion into our systems,” Arche said. Nothing but what looked like computer code was on the screen and scrolling at a rapid rate. “It is constant, probing. I believe it has made it through my safeguards at least three times.” She looked pointedly at me. So did Krall, and Yvonne.
“Oh, shit,” I muttered under my breath.
Hades looked at me, and so did Lethe, coming a step away from the window to do so. “What is this about?” Hades asked. Now everyone was looking at me. Oh, goodie.
“This penetration seems to be very localized,” Arche said, the computer code still scrolling across the tablet on its black background. “It has but a single target, and I have detected communication attempts, all aimed at a single person.”
“Hold on,” I said, “I can explain.”
“So can I,” Krall said, taking a step tow
ard me, Yvonne and ArcheGrey moving to flank me. I was a little too close to the wall for comfort, stuck with them between me and any convenient exit. “It would seem we have a traitor in our midst.”
And she smiled.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
“Well, this trip sure went to shit in a hurry,” I said, taking another step back against the wall. It thumped against my butt, confirming that I was hemmed in on my right by the wall that led to the hallway (probably stone under the plaster and paint), a bed to my left, then Hades, then a window with a hundreds-foot drop below …
And in front of me, cutting off my other avenues of retreat, was General Krall, flanked by ArcheGrey and Yvonne.
Of the three, only Yvonne was looking at me with anything approaching trepidation, but then, she’d seen me in action back in the Cube and probably had some inkling of how things would go if I was cornered. Which I was.
“Let’s … just everybody calm down a little,” Lethe said, taking a step toward General Krall and her minions. “There’s no need for this to get ridiculous.”
“Oh, I dunno,” I said, “like I said before, I kinda figured we were going to get to this a lot sooner.”
“Stop,” Hades said, holding up his hands.
“Make me,” I said, focusing on Krall. I’d have to contend with Arche, too, and her lightning powers, but if I dodged just right, maybe Krall would sponge that up for me, and I could kick that tiny boy-bander into Arche. That’d just leave Yvonne …
Out of these three, at least. I’d still have Hades and my grandmother to contend with, whatever the hell that entailed. They’d certainly proven they weren’t averse to causing me all manner of damage, given that they’d set Rose and Harmon against me, not to mention any number of lesser troubles.
“I will make you,” Krall said, grinning. She shucked out of uniform jacket in an instant, and I got a little unpleasant rumble in my stomach as she stepped toward me, cutting the distance between us to mere feet.
“General …” Hades said, and his tone was not one for trifling.
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