Conspiracy (34 page)

It took a moment, and then realization came
like a shot to the head. His mother. He’d mentioned to her where
he’d be going. “Idiot,” he whispered to himself.

“
What?” Books
asked.

Akstyr growled and sat up to investigate his
wounds. The shoulder stung, but the bullet had only grazed him. On
the other hand, the dog bite was ragged and deep. He hoped it
wouldn’t get infected. He didn’t have a good history of healing
infections. He wasn’t even sure if he could concentrate well enough
to heal normal cuts with pain distracting him. Another disgusted
growl rumbled in his throat, and he flopped back onto the floor.
“They were waiting for me, Books.”

“
Yes, I apologize for not
coming to your aid. I was in the navigation cabin, focusing on not
bumping into that cliff, and I didn’t hear the gunshots at first.
Who were they? Soldiers?”

“
Not soldiers,” Akstyr said
and debated whether to share more. Maybe he should pretend he had
no idea who they were and what they’d been doing up there.
Otherwise, he’d have to admit there was a bounty on his head and
that he’d foolishly told his mother about some of the team’s plans.
It’d be best to feign ignorance. Except he might need the group’s
help to take care of the Madcats, especially now that it didn’t
look like he’d be getting out of the city any time soon. “They were
from the gangs, from the city. They were after me
specifically.”

Books frowned. “Why?”

“
The Madcats have a bounty
on my head.”

“
How would they know you
were
here
? You
didn’t tell anyone about our mission, did you?”

Akstyr’s lips twisted. “Just my mother.”

“
Oh.”

“
Yeah, oh. All she wanted
from the beginning was to get a piece of the money on my head. I’m
a slagging fool for thinking...” Akstyr snorted, wishing he hadn’t
asked those dumb questions about people changing. He’d let Books
witness his naiveté. “It doesn’t matter now. Pieces of that pass
blew so high that they’ll be splashing down in the Gulf. Those boys
won’t be trouble again.” Unfortunately, there were a lot of other
people in that gang.

“
Did you tell your mother
any other details of our mission?” Books asked.

“
No, I didn’t tell her
details at all. I just said I’d either be at the pass or
Forkingrust.”

Books frowned. “So, it’s possible she sent
people here and to Forkingrust where the rest of the team is.”

“
I didn’t say anything
about Sicarius or the others.”

“
I see. You’d only betray
them to bounty hunters, not your mother.”

Akstyr’s leg was throbbing, and he was busy
worrying about the Madcats, so it took him a moment to grasp what
Books was talking about. A chill stampeded down his spine. Books
knew what he’d done. Did the whole team know? “I...”

Books’s lips were pursed in disapproval.
“Your bounty hunter buddy decided he’d rather have Sicarius on his
good side than be on yours. He shared the tale of how you
approached him.”

“
I didn’t mean for it to
make trouble,” Akstyr said. “I was just trying to get some money. I
wasn’t even going to tell him where Sicarius really
was.”

“
Oh, how noble. You weren’t
going to put us all at risk, but you were going to steal from
someone else.”

“
It wouldn’t be stealing if
he was greedy enough to fall for it!”

Books stood up, disgust curling his lips.
“Disregard what I said before. Most people never change.”

He climbed the ladder, taking his lantern
with him, and left Akstyr in the dark.

Amaranthe and Maldynado sat in a hollow
scraped out between two hillocks of coal. They had their knees
pulled up to their chins and their backs to the biting wind as the
train barreled toward the mountains at fifty miles per hour. A few
feet away, on the opposite side of the car, Basilard and Yara
hunkered in a similar position. The coal hills wouldn’t provide
much cover in a firefight, but Amaranthe didn’t think anyone
looking in from the ends could spot her team. Sicarius hadn’t
returned from scouting.

Amaranthe opened her pocket watch and tried
to read the face, but clouds obscured the moon, and little light
brightened the train. The dark, towering evergreens speeding by on
either side further blocked the sky.

“
I reckon he’s been gone an
hour,” Maldynado said.

“
I didn’t know clock-free
time-telling was one of your skills.” Amaranthe tucked the watch
back into her pocket. However long Sicarius had been gone, it felt
like too long. If he was limiting his scouting to the roofs of the
cars, there wasn’t that much area for him to explore. If he’d gone
inside... he shouldn’t have. There were far too many alert soldiers
in there.

“
I got good at it when I
was working for Costace,” Maldynado said.

“
That was the lady in
charge of the male escorts place, right?”

“
Yes. She used to send me
off with old crones who regularly competed in the city’s Most Trite
and Tedious Conversationalist Contest. Costace said it wasn’t
seemly for me to check my watch every three minutes, so I perfected
the art of telling time—and knowing when my hours were up—without a
clock.”

“
It’s amazing that you’re
such a noble and compassionate man, considering all the terrible
life experiences you’ve endured.” Amaranthe peeked over the coal
mound, checking for Sicarius.

“
I know,” Maldynado
said.

With him, Amaranthe was never certain if he
was truly oblivious to sarcasm or if he simply chose to ignore it.
She shifted her weight, trying to lessen the discomfort of sitting
on lumpy coal for prolonged periods. “As long as we’re here
chatting, why don’t you tell me about your brother? Is he—”

“
An arrogant, condescending
know-it-all who couldn’t be bothered to spit on you to cool you off
if you were staked out naked in a scorching hot desert? Yes. Yes,
he is.”

“
I was going to ask if he’s
politically conservative or progressive,” Amaranthe
said.

“
He’s about as progressive
as a rock.”

“
How does he feel about
Sespian?”

“
I haven’t talked to Ravido
for five years, and Raumesys was still alive then, so Sespian
wasn’t much discussed, but my brother doesn’t approve of anyone
with new ideas. He only likes spending time with devoted soldiers
who, when they’re deep in their cups, talk about things like duty
and honor and the good old days of the empire.”

“
I can see why you two
might not have gotten along well then,” Amaranthe said.

“
I haven’t gotten along
well with anyone in my family, not since... Never mind.”

Amaranthe was debating on prying further
when a touch on her shoulder startled her. A dark shape slipped in
beside her. Sicarius.

She tried to scoot over to give him room,
but bumped into Maldynado. “Why don’t you go entertain Yara for a
while?” she told him. “She can’t understand Basilard’s signs, so
she’s probably missing your charms.” Actually, if Amaranthe read
Yara correctly, the woman appreciated the silence and had been
relieved when Maldynado and his charms had sat down on the far side
of the car. But there wasn’t room for three, and Amaranthe wanted
to digest Sicarius’s report without the others around.

“
Of that I have no doubt.”
Maldynado slipped out of the hollow.

“
Find anything?” Amaranthe
patted the vacated spot, inviting Sicarius to sit.

“
Sespian is in the fourth
car back.”

Sicarius sat beside her, keeping a few
inches of space between them. Amaranthe thought about scooting over
to lean against him—after all, it wasn’t exactly warm in that coal
bed with the autumn wind sweeping past—but Maldynado and the others
were in sight. A mercenary leader probably shouldn’t be witnessed
cuddling up with an employee.

“
Is he surrounded by
soldiers?” Amaranthe asked.

“
Yes.”

“
Full car?”

“
Very.”

“
See any other assassins
lurking about?”

“
No,” Sicarius
said.

Amaranthe wondered if
Sicarius would be chattier than this when he came face to face with
Sespian. How many years since they had spoken, she wondered. Or had
they
ever
spoken?
If Sespian had grown up being afraid of Sicarius, he must have gone
out of his way to avoid the dark figure slipping in and out of his
halls like an ancestor spirit. Ah, Sicarius, she thought, how much
of the angst in your life might have been mitigated if you simply
smiled at Sespian and gave him a lollypop when he was a
kid?

“
Is there anyone with him
except for soldiers and bodyguards?” Amaranthe asked.

“
A woman. Sixty,
sixty-five. She was reading a book. Sespian kept his back to
her.”

“
Sounds like the woman
Basilard described from the athletes’ dinner. She must be his Forge
escort to ensure he doesn’t get out of line.”

“
Not for long,” Sicarius
said.

“
Er, don’t you think you’ve
killed enough of their people this week? If we turn them into
martyrs—”

“
She may be the one who put
that implant in Sespian’s neck,” Sicarius said. “She may be the one
who has the power to kill him if he goes astray.”

“
She
may
simply be along for the
ride.”

“
I’m not risking that.”
Nothing in Sicarius’s tone suggested she could persuade him
otherwise.

Amaranthe sighed. “Be careful then. She may
be a practitioner.”

With the darkness shrouding
Sicarius’s face, she couldn’t
see
him giving her a you’re-stating-the-obvious look,
but she could feel it.

“
I know, you don’t need my
advice on how to navigate battles, but women say things like ‘be
careful,’ when we
mean
, ‘I care about you, and I don’t want you to get hurt.’ It’s
our way of keeping feminine sentimentality to a minimum. I thought
you’d appreciate it.”

Sicarius said nothing to that, though his
gaze seemed to soften a tad.

The clouds had blown away, revealing a
quarter moon. Amaranthe leaned back against the wall of the rail
car and pulled her watch out again. Two and a half hours to the
pass. “Maybe... once we have Sespian on our side... we can help him
fix the empire and turn it into a place where you don’t feel
compelled to kill people anymore.”

Sicarius sat back against the wall as well,
this time letting his shoulder touch hers. “What would I do for a
living?”

Amaranthe squinted at him, suspecting him of
making one of his oh-so-rare jokes. With all of his skills, he
could qualify for countless jobs. “I understand Maldynado is still
acquainted with that lady who runs the male escort service. With
your physique and agility, you ought to be able to entertain her
clients effectively.”

“
At what rate of payment?”
he asked in his usual monotone.

The prompt and unexpected
response made Amaranthe fumble her watch and drop it. Now,
she
knew
he was
joking. She thumped him on the arm and said, “Never you mind. If we
fix the empire, you’re not entertaining anyone except
me.”

Sicarius picked up the watch and pressed it
into her hand. The warmth of his fingers brushing hers made her
think of... Well, she wasn’t thinking of the mission.

Something clanked at the end of the coal
car, and Amaranthe jerked away with a start. Had that been a door
opening?

She sank deeper into their hollowed valley.
Sicarius stayed low, but he shifted into a crouch.

“
Corporal Kevelak?” someone
called from the door to the first passenger car. “You up
there?”

Across from them, Maldynado stirred as well.
Amaranthe lifted a hand, hoping he saw it and wouldn’t take any
action. She didn’t want anyone thinking it would be a good idea to
impersonate the corporal. Nothing in the soldier’s voice sounded
alarmed. For all he knew, his comrade had gone to water a bush and
been left behind in Forkingrust. Amaranthe had a feeling the army
would do a thorough search, but she hoped it would take time. It’d
be far better for her plan if they could wait until the train
reached the pass and the distraction of the blocked railway before
her team had to make its move.

“
You seen Corporal Kevelak,
Sergeant?” the soldier called, louder this time. From the sound of
his voice, he had poked his head over the lip of the coal
car.

“
What?” someone bellowed
from the side door of the locomotive cab.

“
Corporal Kevelak! Is he up
there?”

“
Not since we left
Forkingrust,” came the return call.

“
He was here, though,
right? He handled the refueling?”

“
Yes.”

After a moment, the door clanged shut again.
The soldier had gone back inside, but whether to search for his
colleague or alert a superior that something was going on,
Amaranthe didn’t know.

She leaned close to Sicarius to ask him his
opinion, but his hand covered her mouth as soon as she opened it.
She squeezed his arm to let him know she understood the message. Be
quiet.