Meridian Six Part 5

I accepted a small cup of water with a nod. "Go underground?"

"Yeah, Dare said we're going to make big move on the mosquitos, but after we might have to hide for a while."

I froze. "Wait, you said 'we're'--as in you're going to help with the attack?"

He nodded with exaggerated patience. "Of course. I'm really helpful." His tone was heavy with offense, like I'd wounded his pride. "Icarus said I'm going to be really important to this mission."

I shouldn't have been surprised Icarus was going to let the kid take part, but I was shocked Dare was allowing it. She watched over Rabbit like he was her own young. "Hey Rabbit?"

"Yeah?" he said over a mouthful of dried meat I'd refused when he offered it to me.

"Did they say what they're going to do with me?"

A shadow filled the doorway, blocking out the dim light from the hallway. I recognized Dare's pet.i.te silhouette. "Rabbit," she snapped, "Saga needs help in the library."

The kid flashed me an apologetic look. I smiled back and shoved the rest of the dried meat strips into his hand. That earned me a real smile before he ducked out of the room. Dare stood aside to let him pa.s.s. The tenderness with which she'd watched him fled the minute he exited. Then those eyes hardened and watched my reaction as she slowly closed us in together.

The meager light from the lantern didn't do much to expel the shadows standing between the vampire and me. Her yellow eyes glowed in the dark. She didn't approach immediately. Just stood with her back to the door, letting the tension rise between us like a poisonous gas. I might be d.a.m.ned but I wasn't going to be the first one to speak.

Finally, she pulled away from the wall. "Have you ever tasted blood?"

The question was so unexpected, I jerked in shock. With a wary frown, I hesitated. "Yes."

"Whose?"

I licked my dry lips. "My own."

She nodded and took her time absorbing this information. "By your own choice?"

I looked up and met her eyes. "No." I'd expected this information to please her. Instead she grimaced and looked away.

"We're not all monsters, you know." She looked back at me, to make sure I'd heard. I didn't react. Her posture was tense and her mood too unpredictable for me to want to give her any reaction that might set off a chain reaction. "I haven't had blood fresh from the source in years." She paused. When she spoke again her tone was quiet, like a confession. "And I've never had any high blood."

I stilled like an animal sensing impending attack. "Dare--"

She shook her head. "Don't worry. I'm not here to feed from you." She reached into her jacket and removed Icarus's old Colt. "I'm here for this."

Perhaps I should have felt shocked. Or scared. Or ... something. Instead, a weary numbness settled deep into my bones. Holding her gaze, I rose from the cot. She raised the gun a little higher in warning. I raised my hands out to the side and raised my chin. "Just be done with it."

Her eyes widened. "You're not going to ask me to spare you?"

I shook my head. "What's the point?"

"You're pathetic," she spat.

I lowered my arms. "What do you want from me? To beg for a life that never belonged to me in the first place? To fight for the chance to let another set of masters use me? I'm done being anyone's wh.o.r.e, Dare." I jerked my head toward the gun. "Do it."

The gun lowered a fraction. She stared at me intently for a full thirty seconds before she spoke. "What did they do to you?"

I squeezed my eyes together, but a traitorous tear escaped to roll down my cheek. "Just do it," I gritted out through clenched teeth.

"Six? Look at me."

I heaved out a harsh breath and opened my eyes, prepared to let her have it for dragging this out to the point of torture. But when I saw the look on her face, the numbness was burned off as hot anger roared to life. But before I could scream at her or rush her and punch the pity from her face, she spoke again. "You stink of them, you know. Their scent clings to you."

Now it was shame's turn to make an appearance. "Then you know what they did."

She tilted her head. "I thought the concubine thing was just an insult because you spoke on behalf of the Troika."

I laughed bitterly. "In exchange for my services to the Troika's propaganda machine, I was pa.s.sed around like a trophy among the highest level vampires. It was something of a badge of honor to vein f.u.c.k Alexis Sargosa's daughter." Now that I was talking, the words spilled out like bile. "Some only kept me a few days. Others claimed me for months, a couple for years. Those ones delighted in turning me into their personal slave. I did everything from clean their silver to playing a starring role in their s.a.d.i.s.tic games. A few were kind compared to the others and educated me to amuse themselves. One or two preferred me to fight back so they taught me how to use weapons and my fists. Then they'd delight in disarming me and delivering punishment for being too good a student. But mostly I just served as a blood dispenser."

She'd lowered the gun and crossed her arms. "That's why you finally left. You couldn't stand it anymore?"

"No." Now that I'd admitted so much, I decided it wouldn't hurt to offer one last confession before I met the maker. "I left because after enduring their tortures, they found the one invasion I could not endure."

She frowned.

I laughed, but the sound felt flat to my own ears. "You haven't put it together yet?" I didn't wait for her to confirm what I already knew to be true. "Several months ago, the Prime came to me with good news. I was going to be given a great honor. The Troika officials loved my sweet blood so much that they were going to make me the first brood mare in their blood stables."

Dare gasped softly but I was beyond offering consolation.

"According to him, I was going to be put in a special dormitory and given my choice of men of high blood with whom to mate. If any of the children I created turned out to be AB-, they would be raised in the most favorable conditions and be given the honor of becoming concubines to the top Troika officials."

"And if they weren't high blooded?"

I looked her in the eye and ignored the phantom pain in my stomach. "Aborted."

The silence in the room was complete. Unlike the last time, it wasn't a silent gulf that kept two foes separated. Instead, those quiet moments were filled with shared knowledge of duty and loss and the longing for a tiny heartbeat against the skin.

"The night I left?" My hand went to my belly. "They just had informed me that I was to be impregnated again. I couldn't go through that again-the loss." I looked up again and saw empathy in her yellow gaze. "But more than that, I was terrified it would work this time and they wouldn't abort it. How could I doom a child to my life?"

She watched me silently for a few moments. Tension zinged through the s.p.a.ce between us like lightning. Finally, she sucked in a long, slow breath. "How can you say you want to run? They took your mother. They took your life." She stepped forward and pointed at my stomach. "They took your child. They took your choices away. How can you just run when you have every cause to turn around and fight back?"

I blinked to stall the tears. "Because I want a chance to live for whatever time I have left."

She snorted. "Running isn't the same as living."

"Unbelievable." I shook my head at her. "You walked in here ready to kill me, but now you're angry that I'm not trying hard enough to live."

She made a disgusted sound and shoved the gun into her rear waistband. "I wasn't going to kill you. He just told me to scare you a little until you agreed to help us."

I crossed my arms. "That's what I don't get. Why would you want the Troika's wh.o.r.e to help you?"

She licked her lips and glanced sideways. "Look I-- I'm sorry about that. But see it from my perspective. You showed up all glowing and healthy and with your reputation preceding you. How could I not be suspicious of you?"

I laughed bitterly and lifted my s.h.i.+rt. Her eyes widened when she saw the patterns of bruises and scars covering my abdomen and torso. "They made sure the skin that showed was clean for the camera, but the rest was open season. And as for my reputation, well, I gave you credit for being too smart to believe their propaganda."

She grimaced at the dig. "Look, can we start over? We both came in with our own prejudices. Hard not to when we've both been burned, right?"

I nodded slowly. "Suppose so."

"As for why we need your help, well, it's obvious--or should be. You have inside knowledge of the Troika. You're the only one who's met the key players and knows their habits and perhaps their weaknesses. I know you want to run far from here, but where will you go? The Troika control the entire country. There's no place to hide, there's no normal life to return to. If you're going to survive, your only choice is to pick a side, dig in and fight. It's not a safe or a comfortable sort of life, but it's the best any of us can hope for right now. And maybe someday, if we keep fighting, we'll finally have a chance at safety and comfort again."

I sucked in a deep breath and released it slowly. Her words exposed my half-baked plan for the child's quest it had been. Children trusted wishes. Adults trusted facts. And the fact was I wouldn't last a week on my own. But I also might not survive three days if I stayed on to help.

"Look," she continued, "I understand the urge to lay down and just wait for death to take you." She unb.u.t.toned her jacket. Peeking above the fabric of yellowed tank top she'd tattooed two red hearts. "But the way I look at it, if I'm going to die anyway, I might as well try to send as many of those b.a.s.t.a.r.ds to h.e.l.l as I can before I go. It won't bring them back." She placed a palm over the hearts. "But I'd rather die trying to destroy the Troika than to let death catch up to me because I couldn't run fast enough."

Her pa.s.sion and anger reminded me of another strong female. One who took up arms against the Troika and inspired others to join her in the fight. One who would hold me in her lap while she made impa.s.sioned speeches to disheartened people about the importance of never losing hope. My eyes sought out the twin hearts on Dare's chest.

Red means life.

My mother had been talking about the red light of the Sisters of Crimson. But now I realized there were many meanings. Right then, it meant that the only path to freedom--to a real life-- lay in spilling the Troika's blood.

"Well?" Dare said, her voice full of challenge. "What's it going to be?"

I sucked in a deep breath and held it, hoping the oxygen could dispel some of the fear. It didn't work, but at least my heart slowed a bit. Like it or not, I'd started this the moment I decided to run. In my hubris, I a.s.sumed I'd be able to outsmart my captors and manipulate the rebels to help me without having to get involved in the war. But once I'd seen the world outside the Troika's walls and saw the truth without Castor's propaganda-colored gla.s.ses, I knew I'd been a fool. The Chatelaine had been right--no one survived in this world without choosing a side. And since I could never choose the Troika, the process of elimination left the rebels.

I blew out the kind of deep breath one lets out just before they dive off a cliff. "Okay. I'm in."

Mom would have been so proud.

Two hours later, we all stood over Saga's map again. Icarus and Saga seemed to accept my change of heart like they'd expected it all along. Only Icarus seemed confused about the newfound respect between Dare and me. I could see in the looks he kept shooting at her that he wanted to know how she'd changed my mind. The blank stares she shot at him and the secret smile she tossed my way told me she'd keep my secrets safe. Whether out of feminine honor or just because she was mad at Icarus for electing her my executioner if I'd refused to help, I didn't know.

After the initial awkwardness when Dare and I had emerged, we got down to business. Rabbit sat nearby reading a book while the adults debated the plan.

"First we need to know who is most likely to be there," Dare said.

"Astyanax will be there," Saga said. "As head of the army and the Prime's personal guard, they'll want him there to oversee security."

The scent of brimstone and blood filled my nostrils as the scent memory of my last meeting with General Astyanax bullied its way in my brain. I shut down the memory of those weeks in the infirmary and focused on the mission.

"You can bet Castor will be there, too."

"But he's head of propaganda," Dare said. "Wouldn't they want to keep this quiet?"

I nodded. "Yes, but The Factory was his idea. He won't miss his moment of glory for anything."

"They need to know it was us," Icarus said suddenly. "Let Astyanax and Castor know that the rebels mean business."

I shook my head. "Absolutely not. You have to make it look like a mistake so they'll take it as a bad omen."

"Explain," Saga demanded.

"Castor is incredibly superst.i.tious. You don't have to destroy the Factory. You just have to stage a convincing enough accident that Castor believes it's a bad sign. At a minimum, it will delay the project while he tries to figure out how to reverse the bad energy."

Icarus frowned. "There's no way we'll be able to get close enough to stage an accident with the General and his forces there."

Dare forced a derisive snort. "And if we get caught, the Troika will scramble to kill the camp prisoners faster in retaliation."

"Astyanax isn't as much of a threat as Castor," Saga said, almost to himself. "She's right, if we scare Castor we'll gain the advantage."

Dare and Icarus frowned at his dismissal of their concerns. "How can you say that, old man? Astyanax is the fiercest vampire alive."

Saga waved a hand to indicate the millions of books bearing witness to this dangerous meeting. "Because he who controls the information, rules the world. No weapon possessed by the Prime's army is more destructive than a single word from Castor's lying mouth."

"You'll never get to him, either," Dare said, turning away.

"It won't be easy," I said. "But it is possible. Castor is smart, but he's also got weaknesses."

"Like?" Saga asked, leaning forward.

"His ego, for one. He believes himself to be invincible. But he's also incredibly superst.i.tious. I know for a fact that he's terrified of crossing the Sisters of Crimson."

"Why?"

I shrugged. "I have no idea, but he goes to church every Friday."

Dare looked up quickly. "Really?"

I nodded. Our eyes met for a brief moment. "There's a special chapel for upper-level Troika in the city. Its location isn't made public for security reasons, but I've been there."

"Why would they take you there if it's so secret?" Icarus sneered.

"Because when you're seen as nothing more than a blood dispenser," I tossed his words back at him, "no one believes you're capable of remembering anything important. If you want the biggest bang for your buck, go after The Factory. Make them believe their G.o.ds have d.a.m.ned their actions. It'll rattle their cages."

Saga rubbed his chin for a moment and eyed the map. "If we want to make a statement that will scare the Troika, we need to go big." Everyone stopped and stared, waiting for him to continue. Rabbit looked up and even Polonius tilted his head. Saga smiled and addressed us as one. "We've got to blow up the entire d.a.m.ned thing."

Seven.

The Factory loomed in the distance-- a slumbering metal giant. The cold, blue steel of the place set against the harsh light of the full moon sent a s.h.i.+ver down my spine. Train tracks webbed out from the complex, creating silvery moonlit traces.

Air steamed out of my mouth creating billowy white clouds against the blue night. On either side of me Dare, Rabbit and Icarus s.h.i.+vered in their s.h.i.+rt sleeves. "You're sure Castor will be here?" Icarus demanded, keeping his eyes trained on The Factory.

"The last time I saw him he was discussing this meeting. He said it had to be tonight because it's auspicious to begin new endeavors on the Feast of the Blood Moon." The Sanguinary Church celebration of the Feast of the Blood Moon was the vampire church's New Year, and Castor had decided to add ma.s.s murder to his list of resolutions.

Before we could discuss the matter further, a grinding noise echoed through the valley. We all jerked from surprise. Three warning alerts sounded from sirens posted along the rooftop.

"It's starting," Icarus said grimly.

Several windows lit up with bright orange and red light as the incinerators roared to life. A few moments later, white smoke belched from the thick chimneys that jutted from the roof like volcanoes.

Dare whispered, "They've woken the dragon."

A shudder pa.s.sed through me and I swallowed the sudden knot of fear. This was suddenly all too, too real. When I'd told them about The Factory, I'd just been talking fast enough to save my life. But now, in the harsh cold of night with that monster breathing fire in the moonlight, I was paying the debts incurred by my quick tongue. Blowing up The Factory was one thing. Doing it with the head of the Troika's propaganda machine inside and his entire army surrounding the complex was a suicide mission.

"Steady," Dare whispered to me.