by Bella James
THE FIGHTING STOPPED. It stopped with the Plutarch's army and the Centurion still loyal to the Plutarch herded into the buses that had brought most of them to Pastoreum. Guards were posted on the buses until they could be transferred to rebel bases to be imprisoned.
Livy found a moment alone with Arash while the Plutarch's people were dealt with.
His mouth tasted sweet. His arms made her feel safe.
"I don't want to be apart from you again."
His grin was mischievous. "You may come to regret that wish."
She looked him over closely. "Undoubtedly," she said, and kissed him again, up on her toes to reach his mouth when he didn't automatically bend down obligingly. She'd grown taller again, but he still towered over her, lean and muscled and safe.
Selene stalked over to her. "You're safe." It was a question and kind of a demand. There was concern on her face that made Livy realize Arash was largely supporting her.
Well, that was all right. Her 17th birthday had come and gone unnoticed. For only just over a year she'd been out of her depth, struggling to keep up with the changes confronting her and the demands being made of her.
She'd done all right. She deserved to –
Sit down rather unexpectedly. Selene instantly dropped down beside her. "You're all right."
This time Livy answered. "Yes. Just – resting."
That made Selene meet Arash's eyes and laugh. "Olivia Bane," Selene said when she sobered. "I swear myself to your service."
Livy blinked. "I thought you already had."
Selene didn't laugh. "That was on the Plutarch's behalf because it kept us both safer. This is on your behalf. Do you accept?"
In answer, Livy hugged her. She felt the shock radiate through the warrior woman right before Selene's arms closed tight around Livy in return.
When she let go, Livy said, "I have to find my family."
"They're safe," Arash and Selene said at the same time. "We can leave here any time," Arash added. "There's more than enough people to take care of the arrests. We can go back to your home, let Julia hook us into the world networks. The other cities are reporting in."
Livy shook her head stubbornly. "Find someone to bring my family to me. All of them. Where in all the hell's is Pip?"
"Your father has all but chained her to his side. He's not letting anything get to her," Selene said.
Arash said, "The feeds – "
And Livy, who had deferred to him often enough in the past, shook her head. "We can do that here. I'll go find Julia."
"Someone else can," Arash started.
Livy shook her head again. "I think she's my cousin. I'll find her."
Arash spared the time before going to find the other Banes to give Livy a teasing smile. "What does one have to do with the other?"
Livy laughed. "Not ability or responsibility. Just desire. Now I know she's family, I want to talk to her."
"Girl talk?" Arash mocked. "We'll be here for hours."
"Very funny. We will be here for hours. We need to find out about Arcadia. And link all the feeds. And start talking about how the plans for the interim governments will come together."
Arash stared at her like she was a stranger. "You realize such plans have already been made."
Livy nodded solemnly. "And I realize that I'm the face of the rebellion and the one to implement them. Let me be the new face of government and it will come together faster. When they're sick of my face – "
Arash demurred, with cheerful condescension.
Livy rolled her eyes, relief in the moment making her giddy. "When they're sick of my face, the new governments will be in place."
Arash started to say something but Livy interrupted. "If these plans that are already in place? Are there plans for cementing the powers?"
He gave her a long speculative look. "Like?"
Livy grinned. "The marriage of the mother of the race to the father of the rebellion."
He smirked. "Are you asking me to marry you, Olivia Bane?"
"Only for the good of the free world, Arash of the Desert."
He moved toward her, his eyes dark and full of hunger. "If it's for the good of the free will, how can I refuse, Olivia Bane?"
"You cannot refuse a decree from the despotic destroyer of – um, despots," Livy said, trying not to laugh. She was afraid it would come out hysterical and too aware of time slipping by, time in which they needed to see the feeds from Arcadia and around the world, find her family, address the rebels.
Start a new world.
It could wait. For a few more kisses, it could wait.
IT HAD TO WAIT. The ornithopters bore them back to Arcadia. Beautiful city, even with parts of it still smoldering. There had been less damage done than it had seemed.
Livy ordered the assembly in the town hall, ordered the Plutarch and his cabinet onto the dais where countless so-called traitors had been questioned, tortured and executed and where Livy and Julia's friend Viola had been whipped for daring to run from the pleasure palaces.
The pleasure palaces were shut down now. The Gammas freed. Places were being found for them to train and study, work and live. The palaces themselves were dorms, housing the workers until other arrangements could be made.
Into the square Livy had the Plutarch and his cabinet, his administration, brought.
"John Malvin, for crimes against the world," began Selene Devereaux of Pastoreum, and read the charges in a clear, hard voice under the brilliant September sky. The rest of the administrators and cabinet members had been dealt with, either fired and banished or jailed in the new prisons, or kept on because they'd done their jobs well, and weren't to blame for who they'd been forced to do those jobs for.
When the list of crimes had been read, some simply read as multiple counts of, Livy stepped forward.
"John Malvin."
He was diminished. Smaller, now, his hair graying, his shattered shoulder bound in a sling. He stood tall, though, and glared at Livy, who gave him mercy because she was Olivia Bane.
And because mercy would probably hurt him more than any other thing she could do.
"I banish you to the Void. Not the Forbidden Zone, or the borderlands, but into the Void. You will take with you enough food and water and portable shelter to last you a fortnight." She paused, and looked hard at him. "After that, it would be best if you knew how to fend for yourself."
There was no appeal. He chose not to make one.
Even if she would have allowed it.
"THAT WAS MORE than he deserved," Arash said as they stood together on the dais, watching the crowd dispense. A small September breeze started up, cooling the town square.
"No, it wasn't," Livy said. She reached out for his hand and held it.
After a few minutes of watching the stragglers depart, Arash asked, "What if it had been Earnestine Balk?"
She could feel his gaze on her but Livy didn't look at him, just let the malicious smile twist her mouth; she didn't face Arash. "Oh, well, Earnestine Balk. Her I would have fed to the sand snakes."
Julia, dismantling her communications array behind them, laughed.
Arash said, "You would not."
And Livy smiled. And didn't answer. Always good to keep an air of mystery in a marriage and in any friendship.
Always best that to her own self, she remain true.
EPILOGUE
L ivy dreamed.
The dream was familiar. The rebellion, as it hadn't happened. In the dream, she runs across a battlefield, toward what used to be her home in Pastoreum. The fields and villages burn. The villagers, victims of government and plague, run, trying to get free. The rebels are coming, but not in time. The Plutarch's army is there, training their guns on anyone they call a deserter, anyone trying to leave their own village.
Her family is there, running, her brothers, her sisters, Pip, her parents.
Her grandfather, magically alive again because Livy dreams and in the dream she's desperate to keep him alive and safe.
That's when the soldier appears, lifting his weapon to fire. The shot goes wide. Her grandfather falls, but Livy's sure he just tripped. She's sure she can see him breathing. She can't accept he's gone.
Somewhere outside the dreams she knows she'll keep him safe in her heart.
Then the soldier's weapon swings around. He targets her mother, trying to run, carrying the baby, Livy's little sister. The gun settles on them.
And Livy acts. She walks to the soldier and puts a hand on his shoulder, stilling him.
"There are no factions anymore," she tells him. "You are a figment of my fear. You are a revenant."
And he falls away, without Livy having ever seen his face.
When she turns, Arash is standing on one side of her, and Selene on the other. The three of them take hands, Livy with her husband on one side, her best friend on the other, and they walk toward her family.
Where her parents and siblings stand. The baby in her mother's arms turns its head toward her.
Livy holds her breath.
But always, now, the child has a future, and a face.
Copyright © 2016 by Bella James
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Table of Contents
The Choosing
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
The Rebellion
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
The Revolution
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Epilogue
Copyright