“Not unlocked,” Ryuu said with a smirk. “But unlockable. We can get explosives here to blow up the grate blocking the vent and enter the prison. Hardly anyone else even knows the subway tunnels are being built so close to the prison, so they won’t see us coming until we’re already there.”
“But won’t someone notice an explosion?” Raurie asked.
“Good observation,” Ryuu said with a quick nod, “so we go now while construction is off for the night. In the morning, it’ll start up again, and the noise from the drills will cover the sound of the explosion. We can’t wait longer than tomorrow morning in any case. As soon as the clock in the Tower chimes noon, they’ll start interrogations of any new, valuable prisoners. We’ll break in at dawn and get Teo out before then.”
“How are we going to get into the subway tunnels?” Aina asked.
“We could go through one of the old tunnels used for secret worship services,” Raurie suggested. “The Steels think they managed to close them all up, but they haven’t, and some of them run close to the new subway tunnels. I know of one that we can access through a sewer entrance.”
They worked fast as night fell outside the windows, smuggling explosives and emergency flares into packs that Ryuu split between them. Aina made sure to grab extra weapons, as well as grappling hooks and rope. If she had time, she would have brewed a poison to use on the guards in the Tower, but every passing second might be a countdown to the end of Teo’s life. There was no time for extra precautions.
Once both moons had risen high in the sky with midnight’s approach, they set off.
Teo’s words came back to her as they walked: Decide what’s important to you, and put your mind to it entirely.
Aina was deviating from her plan to find Kouta in order to save Teo. She didn’t know what to make of that, since looking after herself had always been her priority. Setting aside her own goals was anathema to every step she’d taken for years and made her feel like she was walking blindfolded on a tightrope.
Tannis might kill Kouta before she could. Kohl might kill her for all her failures.
But none of it mattered if Teo died because of her. Nothing would matter, then.
26
In the shadow of the Tower of Steel, they walked quickly to the eastern shore of the Minos River. Under the gravel that fronted the river was the handle to a sewer opening, the country’s sword-and-pickaxe seal engraved on the metal.
Ryuu pulled on the handle and lifted to reveal a black pit in the ground. Aina’s shoulders tensed up at the sight. The moons’ light failed to reach the bottom. She gestured for Ryuu and Raurie to go first, then stood alone, breathing in the cool night air for a moment to gather her composure before descending into the dark. The memory of her parents’ bodies lying in the dark with only a thin strip of moonlight revealing them filled her thoughts.
She held her breath as she descended the ladder, double-checking her grip on the rungs each time she took a step farther down. By the time her feet reached solid ground, sweat coated the back of her neck and her hands shook. Ryuu lit one of the flares, flooding the tunnel with a circle of orange light, and they began to walk down the sliver of concrete running alongside the stream of water in the center.
Ryuu and Raurie kept up a conversation about their knowledge of the tunnels and the prison. Aina trailed behind them, trying not to imagine what the Diamond Guards might be doing to Teo right now.
They soon veered off the path, down a service tunnel with a concealed entrance to one of the passages the Inosen used. After another half hour of walking north, Raurie leading the way through twisting tunnels, the path widened ahead of them like the one they’d used to escape the shoot-out with the Jackals. But it seemed more stable, the construction closer to completion than the tunnels in the south of the city. The ceiling curved, dome-like, and rectangular pits were dug in the center with a half-completed rail track.
Their footsteps echoed as they traversed a narrow ledge running alongside the tracks. Doors lined the wall. Most were locked, but after a few minutes of trying different doors, Raurie grabbed the handle of one and managed to pull it open.
With bated breath, they entered the new corridor. Aina coughed on the dust and the stale air of the narrow hall. The only lights apart from Ryuu’s flare were flashing dots on electric panels set in the walls. Fuel tanks stood behind shining silver grates.
“Here,” Ryuu whispered a few minutes later.
They slowed to a stop under a wide, circular ventilation shaft in the ceiling, which was covered with a steel grate. Aina gulped at the sight.
The vent extended upward with no sign of light reaching down. It stared at them like the mouth of a giant snake that would eat them alive were it not for the metal blocking it.
Ryuu had mentioned a ladder, but she considered that an exaggeration on his part. The ladder was merely handholds dug into the wall that led upward beyond the grate. A section of the grate was made to slide away for maintenance in the vent, but it was currently locked with a heavy iron bolt.
“We should have about five hours before construction starts again,” he said.
Aina and Raurie lit candles to create a small circle of light, and Ryuu extinguished his flare. Aina sat close to the light. Water dripped somewhere nearby, the sound like a ticking clock counting down the time until it was too late to save Teo. The thought made her chest clench painfully and her breath shorten. She wished they’d had time to come up with a backup plan—a Blade never worked without one, after all—but they’d had to work with the little preparation time they’d had.
She was veering off course by choosing to rescue Teo instead, and was working with Ryuu, someone she should have killed the first night she’d met him. Everything about this situation went against what Kohl had taught her. But he’d left her to die, so she had to do the best she could to fix that. For a moment, she felt completely out of place here. She imagined how Kohl would forgive her once this mess was resolved.
After a brief silence, Raurie spoke, breaking into her reverie. “Did you know the seventh, eighth, and ninth floors of this prison all hold Inosen inmates? Three whole floors to try to hold us in. It’s an odd feeling to willingly be breaking into the prison most Inosen try to avoid.”
Aina laughed a little. “I never thought I’d be doing this either.”
“I wonder what King Verrain would say if he knew the Steels were building tunnels and trains right next to his old Tower.”
“Maybe he could have negotiated with them on it.” Aina shrugged. “He could have avoided a war if he negotiated instead of just attacking the Steels’ factories.”
“I’m rather happy I was a child, then,” Raurie said, wrinkling her nose. “Most of my memories of the war have faded away, but sometimes they come back.”
“You said your parents died in the war too,” Ryuu said. “Were they Inosen?”
“It was a few years after the war, actually. And yes, they were. They helped build some of the underground worship centers in and around the city. They even went to the mass graves and found the bodies of some Inosen they’d known. They burned those they could find and put their ashes in the cellar of an old worship center near there, but then they got caught and killed. My aunt and uncle and I might have tried fleeing to Marin, where my great-grandparents emigrated from, but June thinks she’s needed more here, and I agree. It’s a risk, but … people die in this city every day no matter what their religion is, and Inosen die whether we hide or not. If your life is at risk no matter what, then you have a choice of either hiding or doing something about it. I’m done with hiding and saving myself while other people suffer. I’ll die one day anyway, so until then, I’m going to take freedom where I can, and I’m not going to hide what I believe.”
Aina went silent after Raurie spoke, thinking of her own parents. They’d known death stalked them at every corner in the violent years during and after the war, so they’d done what they’d wanted anyway by following their faith.
“Well, my parents would still be alive,” Ryuu said. “If it were still legal to sell diamonds for magic, then we would have been able to keep building our fortune that way. That’s what we did before the war. Now, most of our business comes from selling diamonds as jewels.”
“I’d use your diamonds, then, to design and sell jewelry,” Raurie said, lifting the sleeve of her shawl to reveal a handmade beaded bracelet she must have made.
“I’d probably be a baker,” Aina said wistfully.
Both Ryuu and Raurie laughed.
“What? Make little cakes all day?” Ryuu asked. “The Bloody Baker. That’s my new nickname for you.”
They all laughed, the sound echoing a little in the tunnel surrounding them and making the night less frightening as time went on. For a moment, if she forgot where they were and what they were about to do, she could imagine they were all normal eighteen-year-olds, who could talk and laugh together without fear plaguing them at every step.
“My mother used to make flower cakes once a week,” Aina said, her voice softening. “We’d pick these edible white flowers in the fields outside Kosín and put them on little cakes. I haven’t really eaten any since she died, though.”
Her voice tapered off at the end, and she sensed Ryuu’s eyes on the side of her face. She should have known better. Picking flowers in a field and eating them was something poor people did. Ryuu had probably had private chefs since birth.
“That sounds delicious,” he said, while pulling out dried meat from his pack.
She watched his face for some sign of pity, but he wore a simple, kind smile as he held out the food to her. Raurie took the meat from him, then warmed it on a stick above the flames.
Ryuu held out the food to Aina, but she shook her head. She couldn’t eat if Teo might be going the night without any food.
“Don’t you ever eat anything?” Ryuu asked.
She shrugged, but then her stomach growled and gave her away. Reluctantly, she took the food from him and chewed slowly while staring into the flames.
She wished she could count down the time it took for the candles to burn to nothing, but that would only fray her nerves to stubs. She needed some other way to distract herself from thinking about Teo alone in one of those cells.
After they finished eating and Raurie fell asleep, her shawl pulled up to her chin, Ryuu said in a low voice, “Sometimes I can’t even remember my parents’ voices. Sometimes I’m jealous that Kouta was older, so he has more memories of them than I do.”
A dull pain ached in Aina’s heart when he said that. Maybe Ryuu had a photograph, but he had been younger than her when his parents died. Inhaling glue every day had leeched away many of her memories, but she still knew more about her parents than he did. Maybe he needed that picture in his nightstand. She recalled how serious Kouta had looked when she’d spied on him, how every time she’d seen him, he was working away at something. So different from his broad smile in the photograph.
“Your brother … He really took over your parents’ business when he was ten?”
“He had help, but yes. He became very good at running the business—selling tools, mining diamonds—and always made sure our workers were treated fairly. We would have lost everything if he hadn’t put on a brave face and taken over. Whenever it got overwhelming, he would shut himself in the library and devour book after book. I remember once, when I was six, it was the first anniversary of our parents’ death. Kouta was working all day, probably to avoid thinking about it, but I think he heard me crying. I was alone. He asked a maid to bring me sweets, and a while later, he came down and read me my favorite stories until I fell asleep.”
His eyes brightened a little at the memory. “When I got older, he told me he wanted me to pick my own path in life instead of feeling obligated to work for our parents’ business like he’d had to do. But I’ve always loved drawing and designing, so I began to sit in on meetings whenever the city consulted us on construction or ordered large shipments of tools. I’ve apprenticed with architects before too. That’s how I got access to these blueprints. Do you see why I have to help Kouta? My brother’s the strongest person I know. When he was still a child, he had to learn how to run a business, start investigating our parents’ deaths, and he kept me out of it so I could have more freedom in my life than he did. He’d go through hell to save me if our positions were reversed. Now it’s my turn to do the same for him, no matter the risks.”
“So, then…” Aina began, unable to hold back the question anymore. “Why did you agree to break out Teo with me? I thought you’d insist on finding your brother first.”
He gazed off into the tunnel, the candlelight shining on his dark hair as he thought. “Teo has been helping us, and he’s in this situation because of this job. Besides that, he’s a good person and doesn’t deserve this fate. I can tell he means a lot to you, and I know how it feels to almost lose someone important to you.”
He gave her a pointed look, then, and guilt at how she still intended to kill his brother wormed through her. But while Ryuu’s words were admirable, she still found it hard to believe he was helping her. She couldn’t really trust him while their goals were so different. Yet here she was with a Steel who stood in the way of her job, and he was helping her break Teo out of prison. If she still worked for Kohl, would he help her break out Teo like Ryuu was now? She wasn’t sure if she wanted to know the answer.
“So, what happened to you after your parents died?” he asked. “How did you end up as an assassin?”
“Well, the next night after they were killed, I saw people carry their bodies away from across the street. They moved in and made it their house. I was eight, I didn’t know how to tell them to leave, and I didn’t really want to be there either. So after that first night, I slept in alleys, on sidewalks, on fire escapes. Anywhere that people might leave me alone.”
He swallowed hard and avoided her gaze. “Did they? Leave you alone, I mean? It’s kind of surprising—”
“That no one kidnapped me? Yes, I was surprised too. Some tried. Others tried to jump me into their gang. But they mostly left me alone. They figured I would waste away to nothing anyway. How could I work for anyone if I was too high to stand without falling over? So, you had your money, your bodyguards, your mansion, and your brother’s company after your parents died. I had the streets, glue, and the fact that I was too scared to stay in the house with my parents and die like they did.” She paused and took a deep breath before adding, in a bitter tone, “My cowardice kept me alive.”
Her hand moved toward her nose and mouth as if expecting to find traces of glue there.
Ryuu shook his head slowly. “I wish the city didn’t allow orphans to suffer like that. Who knows what your life would be like if you had more opportunities? You still have a chance to do good in the world, Aina. You’re not a lost cause.”
“When did I call myself a lost cause?” she snapped, anger at his assumption rising through her. “What was I supposed to do when I was twelve years old and starving, and the Blood King walked up to me with a job? You’re not going to make me feel bad about being an assassin, Ryuu, because that is what I am. I went from less than twenty kors in my pocket to fifty thousand in savings. I know that’s probably what you spend in a day to maintain your backyard, but to me, it’s a damn load of money, and I’m proud of it, however I got it. Even though my boss took it all back.” She let out a frustrated huff of air, then asked, “What did you do to earn your money? Be born?”
Suddenly the little fortune she’d prided herself on seemed pathetic. No amount of money would erase the addictions, the crimes, the murders, and the fact that Kohl now considered her worth less than dirt. But what more was there to yearn for? Her throat closed up when she realized she didn’t have an answer. Teo’s words,
telling her to decide what was important to her and put her mind to it entirely, rang through her mind again. She’d always thought she had a clear answer to that, but with Teo gone, and Ryuu telling her to do something else with her life, her future took on a blurry, confusing quality.
“I don’t imagine your life was easy growing up,” Ryuu said, ignoring the calls on his own character. “But you’re smart. I’m sure you could do anything you put your mind to. Now that you’re older, why can’t you find something else? Why can’t you reach higher?”
“Because it would mean I’m not a failure. If I can open my own tradehouse, it means I did the best work with the little that I was given. Don’t take that away from me by telling me that I can reach higher, that the sky is the limit. My sky and yours are not the same. Let me touch my own sky.”
After a pause, he said, “You’re right. You do that a lot, you know? You always make me see your side of things. I hope you can see mine too. To you, my brother is the reason you lost your job and the reason your life is threatened by the people you used to work for. So, I guess I’m trying to say that I’m grateful you chose to work for me instead. I’m sorry the sketch I gave to the Sentinel helped make it easier for people to find you. I’m sorry you have to be afraid.”
Her stomach squirmed uneasily as his words faded away. Kouta was a good person who had continued his parents’ tradition of helping Inosen, and his only crime was trying to find the truth behind their murder. But Kohl had ordered her to kill him. If she succeeded, she would get everything she’d ever wanted. If she failed, she’d die at Kohl’s hand. She would accomplish this job no matter what.
But she could no longer kill Ryuu simply because it was what Kohl would do. After all the help he’d been in rescuing Teo, she just couldn’t. Maybe he was rubbing off on her.
She didn’t belong in Ryuu’s world. She belonged in her own, where there was no strife with Kohl and where she could walk freely through the city and know she was safe. Only killing Kouta would fix it all and return her to where she was supposed to be. And it would return Ryuu to living far above—and indifferent to—her. Nothing Ryuu said would change her mind on that. Not even the warmth of his eyes or the way he smiled in her direction would sway her. Those were the things she wanted Kohl to give her once she fixed this.
Diamond City Page 18