When Reena came at her again, it was without mercy. A fist drove into her midsection so hard she felt it in her spine. As she doubled over, the person holding her let go and she fell to her hands and knees. Reena kicked out at her side. Again. And one more time. She was already tiring, but the damage she did was enough to make Amelia want to pass out.
Clutching the knife hard so she wouldn’t lose it, Amelia rolled away, kept rolling, though it was agony, trying to keep one small step ahead of those stomping feet. She ended up in the water trough face first, the freezing water numbing her. Amelia shoved herself upstream as Reena’s foot came down. The woman slipped and yelped. Snarling in Amelia’s direction she moved and yelped again, her foot caught in the channel.
With that yank she would have twisted her ankle.
Amelia almost tripped getting out of the water, the stupid skirt wet and tangled around her legs. She didn’t get far. Some of the others blocked her way, shoved her back and forth to keep her in place while Reena hobbled toward her.
“What the fuck is going on in here!” The roar was followed by screams as the guard forced his way inside, shoving and punching women out of the way.
Reena made an awkward run for it, seeming determined to get her beating in before the guard could stop her. She didn’t make it. The guard backhanded someone so hard there was a sickening snap and the woman flew into Reena, mowing her down.
“It was her!” the other one who’d blocked Amelia yelled, pointing. “She started it!”
The guard slapped her down with the full force of his tree-sized arm. Broke her jaw and left her moaning on the floor.
Amelia backed away from him, tripped over the dead girl and went down.
The guard grabbed her by the hair and pulled her to her feet, his fetid breath stinging her face. “All this trouble for some whore,” he muttered, his free hand curling into a massive fist. If he aimed it at her, she was dead.
Amelia moved lightning quick. Hand cramped around the knife, she stabbed it into the guard’s neck, closing her eyes at the last second. She hit her mark—at least she thought she did—and twisted the knife for good measure.
The hand in her hair curled tighter for an instant, then loosened and yanked so hard it nearly twisted Amelia’s neck. Not on purpose. He was trying to get free. When he did, Amelia dropped as he reached up to the knife with a baffled look on his face. Gurgling, he pulled the blade out, the worst possible thing he could do. With nothing to plug the hole, blood sprayed out of his jugular to the rhythm of his beating heart.
By the time he dropped to the ground, dead but still twitching, the room had gone quiet. No one moved, no one breathed, except Amelia. She pushed up unsteadily, finding her feet but her legs felt weak and her body was one massive pain. Breathing hurt. She gasped in small breaths, tears stinging her eyes.
When she turned for the door, shuffling her feet through the puddle of blood everyone else was backing away from, no one stopped her. She reclaimed her knife, not ready to give up the only protection she had, and wiped it on her now filthy dress. The feel of soaking fabric clinging to her skin disgusted her. She was covered in human waste and blood and noted with the last speck of wry humor she possessed that this was as low as she could possibly have fallen from her sterile scientific pedestal.
The door had been left open. The others should have been stampeding out of here. Amelia braced her hand against the door frame to keep her balance as she looked back at the others. Every last one of them stared at her with wide eyes filled with something she didn’t dare put a label on. Fear? Shock, definitely. Confusion, most likely. Or was that hope?
Amelia was no one’s hero. She didn’t have time to make speeches, rally troops, or comfort anyone. Who knew how many guards were in this place? Had to be more than one. She had to get out of here before the others came to investigate the commotion.
Walking as fast as her current state allowed, which meant a slow, careful shift of her weight left and right so she could slide the opposite foot forward, she reversed the path she’d taken here in her mind and followed it to the main gate.
Noises behind her. Soft hiss of whispers and gentle thumps of many footsteps. Amelia didn’t look behind her to see who was following. Keeping her blurry gaze straight ahead, she shuffled on, gritting her teeth against the pain.
Her heart sank when she got to the gate and found it barred by a thick wooden beam. The massive guard would have had no trouble lifting it out of its braces. Amelia didn’t stand a chance.
Defeat making her dizzy, she leaned against the wall to catch her breath.
More whispers.
Then four bedraggled, emaciated women, went past her to the gate. They nodded at each other, and on some silent count, put their entire meager weights into it and lifted the beam. Four more came to help them set it down quietly.
Amelia made herself look over her shoulder. There were others. At least a dozen, if not more. She couldn’t be sure but it looked like they were keeping watch. Working together to get out of here.
Gabriel had been right. One person really could affect many others.
Without its brace, the gate groaned open a few inches. The women who took down the beam looked at it, and then looked at her uncertainly.
“We’re going south, out of the city,” Reena said, coming up from behind her. “You can come with us,” she added grudgingly.
Amelia shook her head and pushed away from the wall. “Someone I love is still in the city. I have to find him first.” She didn’t realize what she’d said until she pushed the gate wide open, and then her step faltered. How easily the words had slipped out. How obvious it was. She loved him.
She. Loved. Him.
Amelia picked up her step a little. She had to tell him before it was too late.
“Good luck to you,” one of the women whispered. They were heading south, a path branching off to her right. Amelia’s road lay straight ahead. Back the way she’d come, to the heart of Rome and the viper at its center. A always led to B. If Gabriel was caught, he’d be close to Caesar. If he was free, he’d either look for Amelia or go after Caesar and right now, Amelia had a bone of her own to pick with the bitch.
C and D eliminated. B, here I come.
Only the street she was on ended a few feet ahead in a T. And she had no recollection of which path Lucia and the other soldier had taken to get to this point.
Amelia squinted first left then right, trying to make out something, anything that might be familiar. Without her glasses everything was a blur of the same. Yellow sand, paler yellow houses. Strings hung from one house across to the other, with something hung from them, billowing in the breeze. Clothes. Amelia reached up, wincing at the pain, and snagged the very fringe of something. When it fell she held it up, relieved to see it was a long shirt. Long enough to cover her from shoulder to below the knee. She stripped out of the sodden dress, uncaring of who might see, and pulled the shirt on. It was rough, but it was dry and clean. She felt a hundred times better already.
Decently covered, Amelia squared her shoulders and turned down the left path.
Wait, left?
Yes, definitely left.
But wait. She frowned in the other direction. Why not that way?
Left. Go left.
Still frowning, Amelia continued down the left street. A few more steps and she stopped again, glancing behind her. Maybe she ought to try that way instead.
Go left!
Amelia flinched at how loud the thought was. She might have called it instinct, except she wasn’t one of those people who had it. Amelia didn’t feel her way out of trouble, she thought her way out. And there was no logical reason for choosing this path over the other when they both looked the same.
Shaking her head, she went back to the intersection to consider this properly.
Woman, are you physically incapable of following directions?
Somewhere in the middle of that thought the voice of it morphed from hers to one decidedly male and
extremely agitated. Amelia stopped as if she’d hit a glass wall.
Heart pumping double time, she searched the sky, hardly daring to hope.
“Go. Left,” Tristan growled in her mind—and it was definitely Tristan.
Where are you? she had no idea how this telepathy thing was supposed to work. Would he hear her?
“On approach. Can’t risk breaking atmo in the shuttle. We’ll use the life pod to get down and back up and you have to be there when we touch down.”
He was here! They were getting out!
But wait…
How many will the pod hold?
A pause. “Why, you suddenly got the urge to liberate a planet?”
There was pressure in her head that bordered on pain. Her feet turned involuntarily down the left street and carried her step by step where Tristan wanted her to go. But he wasn’t the only one in her head anymore. Before she could start freaking out, Agent Calen’s voice rang out. “Amelia, your sister says she’s going to kick your ass when we get back.”
I know how that feels. She thought it before she could censor herself and winced.
Her sister’s husband, though, was amused by it. “You girls can sort that out later. Right now, I need you to let Tristan lead you to us.”
Amelia stopped at the very edge of the narrow alley. It was already full day and people were beginning to stir. The streets would fill up soon, with everything from peasants to nobles, to soldiers.
I’m not leaving without Gabriel, she thought, trying to somehow aim it at Calen.
“Unless you come across him along the way, you damn well are,” Tristan growled back.
She was shaking her head.
As if he could see her, his agitation rose. “Amelia,” he said in warning.
No. No way. I’m not leaving without him, she decided loudly. So figure something out. She would find her way back to the arena somehow, even if Tristan refused to help her.
“How the hell are we supposed to find one man in fucking Rome?”
Well that was the easiest thing on this world. Just look for a panther walking on two legs.
Chapter 33
It was day. With Rico’s help Gabriel had managed to get out of the arena, sword strapped to his side. The others had gone a different way. They would scatter for now, retrieve their women while they could, and then disappear. None of them had any ties to each other and no reason to risk their necks unless there was some tactical advantage to it. With Gabriel as the main target, they were better off being far away from him.
This wasn’t a revolt against Caesar, it was a free for all and everyone who could was taking the opening and getting the hell out of town.
Why Rico stayed, Gabriel had no idea.
He was still shaking off the damn tranq and regretted not having bitten the trainer’s throat out. But he was walking on his own now.
“What does it feel like?” Rico asked.
“What? Sticking it to Caesar?” He winced at his poor choice of words.
“Funny guy.”
Gabriel almost smiled.
“Well?”
Persistent bastard. “You’ve broken a bone before, right? Got your skull bashed in?”
“Many times.”
“Well imagine that, but everywhere.”
Rico grunted in noncommittal reply. Gabriel had to admire that. Nothing much got to Rico anymore. He wasn’t sure anything ever had. “Why are you helping me?”
“Who says I’m helping you?”
Now Gabriel grunted. Fair enough.
They stopped in the center of the market. Or rather, Gabriel stopped and Rico followed suit, looking for enemies. “What is it? You hear something?”
He smelled something. It was faint, but he recognized it; would never forget that scent. If there was a hint of it in his nostrils he would follow it through hell or high water to get to her. Amelia had come this way. He inhaled deep, swayed on his feet in relief. She was alive. He felt his face ripple in a slight change, nose flattened, fangs sharp, eyes glowing like candlelight. All because of her. He’d find her. He was sure of it.
Rico was staring at him. “That is messed up.”
Gabriel grinned, felt his lip split wider and made himself purse his mouth to fuse it together again.
Rico stifled a shudder. He looked away, scanning their surroundings. “Which way?”
Right to Honoria’s bed chamber. She would be asleep after an eventful day like yesterday. Easy to sneak in and slit her throat. Or rip out her black heart.
Straight to Amelia. Somewhere out there. He could follow her scent right to her and get them both out of here. There was a shuttleport outside of Rome, one of only two, including Mt. Olympus, which they’d never make. He could get her to the other one easily.
But he couldn’t do that and kill Caesar.
Straight or right?
Rico cursed and pulled him behind the shelter of a street cart as a contingent of soldiers rode by on horseback. “Make up your fucking mind. I’m not dying here for you.”
If he killed Honoria, it would be over. He might make it out of Rome, he might not. He would definitely lose Amelia. If he went right, she would be forever out of his life one way or another.
If he let Caesar live, she would never stop hunting him. On another world, another time, he might have an advantage, or he might grow complacent and be caught off guard. He hated the idea of sleeping with one eye open for the rest of his life.
He hated the idea of losing Amelia more.
So. Straight or right?
Instinct made him look up. A sound not heard but felt drew his eye to the sky. There! A tiny wink of light, so far he’d have missed it if he hadn’t been looking for it. Something on approach. Something small. Hardly a speck in the sky, no telltale burn of entry, meaning low velocity short range pod, in all likelihood. But the pod had come from somewhere.
Gabriel sighed. He’d never hear the end of this.
But he might stay alive long enough to listen to it.
For now, no one was looking that way. It wouldn’t take long before it was noticed, though. He had to find Amelia before that.
Gabriel charged across the market, heading for the alley straight ahead. Rico swore and followed. A glint of movement to his right caught his eye and before he ducked into the safety of shadow, Gabriel looked for its source. Honoria’s bower. His eyes adjusted to see farther, clearer. There she was, the bitch hell had spat out for trying to oust the Devil himself. Honoria in all her morning glory, standing at the top of her stairs with only a bed sheet wrapped around her. Were those blood stains?
She looked up at the approaching pod, the only person who noticed it—but of course she would have been alerted to it already—and pointed an imperious finger, shouting orders at everyone around. Then, as if she felt him watching her, she looked right at him. No way she could see him from so far away. She couldn’t possibly know he was there.
It still made him uneasy. If he ran, Honoria would find him. She’d stop at nothing to get him back, to get even.
A breeze brought him another hint of Amelia. The scent was fading. It would dissipate soon.
Make a choice.
Gabriel’s spine stiffened. He looked at Rico but the gladiator wasn’t looking at him. His eyes scanned the crowds for threats the way he’d been trained. He had not spoken.
Make a choice. The words were plain enough. It was the growling anger behind them he didn’t get. As if somewhere in those two words and a letter there was a hidden threat: it better be the right one.
Holographic panels flickered on next to him and made him twitch. He’d never realized before how cloying the static charge was against his skin. Gabriel edged an inch farther from it.
Chooooooose.
“Knock it off,” he growled, startling himself.
“The hell’s the matter with you?” Rico said.
He had no clue. The longer they weren’t moving, the more on edge he felt. Time was running out. He knew that. Had
been preparing for this for so damn long there was no reason to feel restless. It was about to be over. He should be calm, steady. Ready to get this over with and move on.
This inner turmoil was foreign to him. His head kept turning right, even after Honoria had retreated inside, presumably to get dressed for the occasion.
His feet were shifting to follow Amelia’s scent. It was subconscious. Only it wasn’t. His mind and body were at war and it was so unnatural he fought it on instinct.
A snarl split his lip again. He took off, following Amelia’s scent. A second later, Rico was on his heels. A minute later and the scent was gone. Utterly and completely, as if he’d somehow gotten off the path it had created, taken a wrong turn somewhere. But his feet were still moving, running headlong for something.
And he couldn’t stop. He couldn’t fucking make his feet stop.
Chapter 34
“We found his mind,” Calen said at the same time as she shouted, I see you!
She would have shouted it out loud but caution stopped her. The hooded cloak she’d found on another clothesline fit as if it had been made for her, but the hood kept slipping over her eyes. She shoved it back up again. Amelia was breathing hard from her tromp through the city. Tristan was a merciless navigator. When she would have turned right, walked straight into a contingent of guards, he’d projected a high pitched squealing noise into her head to stop her. It had worked like a charm; she’d stopped so fast she’d fallen back on her ass.
She’d give her last penny for one shot of pain killers straight to the spine.
The problem was Tristan didn’t exactly know where she was, but he knew what, or rather who, was around her.
When she asked Calen why they didn’t simply tell her where to go, rather than navigating her turn by turn, he explained that telepathy didn’t work that way. Tristan didn’t have a convenient glowing dot on a map to mark her location. He was steering her on a safe route but he had to drop all his shields and let in everything to do it. It was taking a tremendous effort on his part to sort through all of that to maintain contact with her. He didn’t have the mental capacity to do more than navigate the maze. No one alive did.
Blood Debts (The Blood Book 3) Page 30