The Blood Racer (The Blood Racer Trilogy Book 1)

by Winchester, Matthew

  Before I could respond, another man slipped out of the hatch of my ship. I recognized him immediately, mostly from the wild hair and soot on his face. I still didn’t know who he was, but he was obviously a mechanic of some kind. In his hands, he clutched some piece of machinery that I didn’t recognize, but it was blackened with grease and rust. Had he gotten it from my ship?

  “Repair, repair,” he muttered to himself. “Repair injector…must ionize the plasma.”

  He tottered by us without even acknowledging that we were there, and disappeared up a ladder to the second floor.

  “Don’t mind him,” Reinhart assured me. “He’s harmless.”

  I thanked him again, and he gave me a pat on the shoulder that almost knocked me to the floor, but he left me with Darby without asking any other questions. We watched him lumber away until he was well out of earshot before we turned to one another.

  “What are you thinking?” she asked hurriedly. “Audra?”

  I shook my head. “No. That was my first thought, but I think it was actually Beatrice Montgomery.”

  “The Archon!?” Darby’s face was contorted in shock.

  “I found her in my ship last night!”

  Her face was unreadable, some mixture of stunned and confused. “Tell me.”

  For the next several minutes, she and I held a whispered conversation outside of the Kicker. I explained to her about the previous night, when I had stumbled upon Beatrice inside the hold of my ship. I even included the part about her trying to steal my Helios brooch. The odd name was familiar to Darby, but she couldn’t nail down exactly where she’d seen or heard it. I was about to mention the captain’s pin, but a sudden epiphany struck me like a ton of lead.

  “Beatrice,” I said, letting the knowledge wash over me. “When I found her in there, that had to be what she had come to do.”

  Darby chewed her lip, considering this. “And Killian was docked right next to you.”

  “Oh, no…” I breathed, feeling a stab of horror slowly burying itself in my heart. “It was my fault! Those radio guys came to talk to me, and Killian…he was there! He started talking to them so I could leave, and I heard him say he and I were in an alliance!”

  I sank to my knees, but Darby stood in place with a faraway look of melancholy in her eyes. “That’s why he was bombed. Beatrice must have heard it on the radio.” Her voice was very quiet as she spoke.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I’m so sorry. I’m sorry! It’s all my fault!” I didn’t know who I was talking to, maybe to Darby, maybe to Killian, but I felt the terrible urge to throw up. He was dead because of me, because he happened to come to check on me right when Reed and Lex wanted an interview. Such a trivial thing…and it had cost him his life.

  Darby knelt down beside me and put her arm over my shoulder. “That is not your fault,” she said sternly. “There was no way you could have known. If I had been there, I would have said the same thing, and it would be Killian here with you instead of me. It’s just…bad luck.”

  Bad luck. Not just bad, it was the worst luck that anyone could have, being friends with me. Just because they knew me, Darby and Rigel had almost perished several times, and Killian had paid the biggest price. It was more than bad luck. It was more like a curse.

  Without a word, I got to my feet and shuffled through the hatch into my ship. I dogged it behind me and then just stretched out on the floor of the hold, lying on my back and hating myself.

  I didn’t have a watch, so I couldn’t tell how much time had passed, but I was beginning to feel my lips cracking and drying out. I needed something to drink, but I had no idea how to get back to the galley. Even so, I didn’t really feel like leaving the ship. I kind of just wanted to lay there and do nothing. If I was by myself, no one could get hurt because of me. I thought about starting up my turbines and asking to leave. That Edmund guy was right. I was endangering every citizen of Ravencog just by being here.

  A knock at my hatch door stymied any thought of absconding. I knew it was Darby, but I didn’t say anything. I sort of wanted her to go away, but at the same time I didn’t really mind if she stayed. After a moment, the latch squealed open and she stepped inside, holding a decent-sized basket under her arm.

  “I know it’s late, but you should eat something,” she said. She sounded sweet and coddling, like a mother talking to a sick child.

  I was about to ask her to leave me be, but the scent of food from the basket roused the beast in my stomach, and I had no choice but to sit up and make room for her. She sat down next to me and opened the basket, pulling out two skins of water first. I took one and drank deeply from it, feeling the dry flesh in my throat coming back to life. Next, she handed me a plate of fried potatoes and peppers, and finally an apple, which I was impressed by. Sweet fruits were a delicacy to everyone in the Dominion, and the price reflected it. I wondered if they were from a personal stash of hers.

  “Thank you,” I said quietly after I had eaten everything.

  She leaned back against the wall and sighed contentedly. “You are very welcome.”

  For a while, the two of us just sat in silence. I couldn’t tell if she didn’t have anything to say, or if she was just waiting for me to come out of my funk. I yawned and cracked my knuckles, deciding to say the first thing that popped into my mind.

  “I wish Rigel was here.”

  Where did that come from?

  Darby looked over at me and grinned widely. “I bet he wishes you were there.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  She shrugged, still smiling. “Just a hunch.”

  I gave a sideways glance at her, wondering just what she knew. Or at least what she suspected. I hadn’t told her about the kiss on the cheek Rigel had given me back in Shiloh, so I don’t know what she was basing her thought off of. I thought about filling her in, but just the thought was enough to make my face and neck grow hot.

  I wondered what he was doing. Was he flying? Or was he scrambling about on some mountaintop, searching for a clue that I would never have a chance to find? I realized then that if I were to continue in the race, I would have to depend on Rigel, on the information that he collected. He was racing for both of us now. Darby too, in fact. He had made mistakes, yes, but if there was one thing I knew about Rigel, it was that he would never let me down when it really mattered.

  “He’s a good guy,” Darby said, sounding like she had read my thoughts.

  I nodded in agreement, but didn’t say anything. Another moment of silence passed between us before I opened my mouth again.

  “I’m sorry about Killian.”

  This time, instead of trying to cheer me up, Darby just drew in a slow breath and exhaled it in a huff. “So am I,” she said sadly. “May I sleep here for the night?”

  “Yes,” I replied. I would have rather spent the night alone, but I didn’t want to hurt her feelings. She had done a lot for me over the last day. Besides, it would be good to have a distraction for a while, even though I knew I would do very little sleeping.

  I ended up being right. She went to retrieve a few blankets and pillows for us, which were surprisingly comfortable, and we made a sort of nest in the hold of my ship. The blankets were plush and warm, and I guessed that she had probably made them herself. I was a little jealous of her talent. I was a good pilot, but that was more of a work skill. I wished that I had something I was talented at. Darby could make things. Killian had been able to play music, even write his own songs, and that was a wonderful thing. Now he would never play another note again. I was glad that I had at least heard him play a few times. Maybe I could take up an instrument. Maybe the ocarina, in his memory.

  Behind my head, because that’s how we were situated, Darby eventually began drawing in deep, slow breaths. She had fallen asleep relatively easy, despite having lost a close friend earlier. I had a feeling she was waiting to be alone to do her grieving, which meant that she was holding it in, trying to keep things normal, for my sake. I sighed. I k
new the strength it took to do that. I lived it every day with my brother and sister, trying to pretend that things were okay when it was all we could do to keep our heads above water.

  Zanna was growing wiser to it, though. She was at an age where she was starting to do it too, and I began to wonder just what kinds of things she kept from me, thinking that she was protecting me. In my mind, I replayed the argument we’d had about our mother’s garden, how she had hesitated to tell me that it was failing, how she only said something because I had made her angry. I knew it was about time for me to start talking to her like an equal rather than a child. I kept telling myself that putting it off was for her benefit, that she was better off being oblivious to things. But in reality, she was not oblivious. She was smarter than I gave her credit for, and it was my own trepidation and insecurity that kept me from reaching out to her.

  I made a vow then, to myself, to bridge the gulf that had formed between us. It had been me that had allowed it to grow, so it needed to be me that closed it.

  I just wish I knew how.

  With a deep sigh, I rolled over onto my side and let my mind wander back to Rigel. It always seemed to end up there. I toyed with the fabric beneath me and remembered the times that he had I would make little forts in our houses, made out of tattered blankets and sheets, and huddle within them like the rest of the world couldn’t get to us. Our parents would always play along, walking by and saying things like, “Where are Elana and Rigel? They were just here.”

  I smiled at the memory. That was only ten years ago, more or less…but it suddenly seemed like a thousand. I felt like everything I had ever known was on another planet, and I was alone, drifting among the lonely stars and singing my woes to them. A few days ago, no one had wanted to kill me. Now, I couldn’t say the same. People were planting bombs on my ship in an effort to blow me out of the sky. I couldn’t help but blame myself. What kind of pilot doesn’t notice a foreign container on her own vessel? Especially one the size of a small suitcase. I even looked over the Kicker when Beatrice had left me in it the previous night, and I hadn’t noticed it then. It was a total oversight on my part. If only I had made sure…

  I felt a jab somewhere in my memory, a voice telling me to make sure of something. Just make sure that…the only things on your ship are things that can help you. Anything else will kill you.

  Those were the words that Grace Buchannon uttered to me on the docks of Shiloh. I had to practically catch my breath as the realization hit me. She had been trying to warn me. She knew that there was a bomb on my ship, and she had tried to tell me. And later, when Killian’s had gone off, she’d had perfect opportunities to shoot the rest of us, especially Rigel, who had waited so long to finally begin evading. She must have been missing on purpose. And the storm…it was perfect cover. It would have been a perfect excuse as to why we were able to get away. I had thought she was just a bad shot. But in reality, she had taken great measure to avoid killing us.

  I was more awake and alert than I had been in days. The tumblers were finally falling into place. Grace was not an enemy like I had thought. She was a victim. She had been under orders from Beatrice. Being the daughter of an Archon had its perks, truly. But in this case it had been a detriment for her. I don’t know what Beatrice had threatened her with, but whatever it was, it had to have been terrible. She had forced Grace to install the gun on the Amber Sphinx. Of course. That’s why she was so late to Gideon Chambers’ speech! She had been installing an anti-air cannon on her ship. Those were the ‘repairs’ she had been making!

  I thought about waking Darby, to tell her the revelation I had just made, but I decided to keep it to myself for now. She’d had a rough day, and I wanted to let her sleep. I could tell her in the morning, and I needed to try and get some sleep, too. If the captain was right, the racers would be occupied most of the night with a challenge, which would hopefully mean that Darby and I could start off again and still be relatively close to where we were in the pack.

  This brought up another concern. I knew that the captain was basically Darby’s father, but he was still doing us a huge favor. He was moving an entire city of people so that we wouldn’t have to drop out of the race. Something told me that he wasn’t the kind of man to do such a thing out of the goodness of his heart. He had another motive, and I had a feeling it involved me. Why else would he invite me onto the bridge, into his central command, just to speak with him? He had been gauging me for something. Looking back, it was clear. He’d been trying to get a read on me for some reason. He was doing a favor for me, but I knew that it was because he wanted something in exchange.

  I tried to run through the possibilities, to mentally list what things he might ask of me, but other than possibly wanting a share of the prize money, I came up with nothing. It was a mystery, and I didn’t like that.

  If only Rigel was here, I could just talk to him, and he’d be able to say something to ease my mind. He had a knack for that, an ability to get to the root of my troubles and find the right words to comfort me. It had been him, after my mother had died, that kept me from slipping away. He had been there to keep my head above the dark pool of grief, and to give me the strength to continue on. Then, when his own mother had passed from pneumonia, I had done the same for him. We knew how to heal one another. Though I had seen him just that morning, I found myself missing him terribly.

  Even so, with my mind focusing on something other than the race, I was eventually able to drift off to a restless sleep.

  I don’t know how long I was out, but the sound of my hatch door squealing open was enough to startle me into consciousness. I scrambled up onto my knees and fumbled for my pistol, which had fallen out of the holster sometime in the night.

  “Easy!” Moore said, sticking his head through the hatch. His dark skin seemed almost golden in the dim light. “Captain wants to see you. He says your friend is in trouble.”

  Still blinking sleep out of my eyes, I looked over at Darby, who had been awakened with me. We exchanged no words, but immediately clawed our way out of the hold. Darby paused to gather the blankets and pillows from the Kicker’s hold.

  “Go with Moore! I’ll be right behind you!” she shouted.

  Moore was already dashing up a nearby set of winding stairs, and I clumsily bounded up after him, trying to regain my motor functions. He said nothing else to me, but simply led me on the same path Darby had before. At least, I assumed it to be the same path. Things looked familiar, but we were traveling at three times the speed, so I could have been wrong. Either way, we ended up at the guarded door to the captain’s bridge. Gerard was there, yawning as though he had also just gotten out of bed. He gave us a thoughtful look, but opened the door without protest. He must have known we were coming. I hadn’t brought my pistol, so he had no problem letting us breeze right by.

  Once past, Moore stopped just inside and I burst into the room, not knowing just what to expect. Immediately, I noticed that all the technical staff from the day before were gone. It was only Bragginton, hunched over the transponder table just as he had been yesterday. The light from the table cast shadows across the lines of his face. It made him look much older, wearier, and I wondered if he had been awake all night.

  “Who’s in trouble?” I asked urgently, breathing heavily from the run. “Is it Rigel?”

  The man looked up at me solemnly, and gave a slow nod.

  My heart dropped. “What…what happened?”

  Bragginton let out a breath, staring down at the table. “About fifteen minutes ago, the racers left the mountaintop where they had spent the night. The Mistress was in the lead, and the Alpha Red came right up on her tail to pass…”

  The muscles in my throat were tighter than braided steel. I blinked, wide-eyes at the captain. “And then?” I whispered.

  “And then we lost his signal,” Bragginton said gravely.

  The door to the bridge opened again, and Darby stumbled through, carrying a large flask of water. “What’s wrong?” she a
sked.

  I ignored her, taking a step closer to the captain. “What- what does that mean? You lost his signal?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

  Behind me, Darby made a small whimper.

  “His transponder is off,” Bragginton said. “As he was coming up on another ship, I can only think that he was brought down.”

  I leaped for the table, staring down at it as though it would suddenly reveal some clear truth. “Where!?” I asked, my voice rising with agitation.

  Bragginton tapped the screen and swiped his fingers, finding the location on the map which was now blank. A few clicks ahead, of the blank space, I could see the signal of the Mistress motoring on alone.

  “Exactly where?” I asked, now knowing what I had to do.

  The captain tapped the screen and held his finger on it until a set of coordinates popped up in a box of text. Knowing what I wanted, he jotted them down on a piece of scrap parchment and handed it to me.

  “And we are…?”

  Without a word, he swiped his hand and moved the map a bit to the south. There was nothing there, but I knew that was because Ravencog gave no signal. I stared at the second set of coordinates and placed my hand on the screen, using my fingers to judge the distances. My heart was racing, but I tried to remain calm. If I miscalculated the heading, I would end up in the wrong place.

  “Elana, if he went beneath the Veil…”

  “Don’t,” I said, cutting across Darby as she spoke. I wasn’t about to let her plant that idea in my head. Rigel was not gone. There was no way. I would not accept it.

  It took me only a few more moments to gather my heading, and I turned from the table toward the door.