CHAPTER 23
Februa 1786
HELENA’S JAW WAS TAUT, HER TEETH GRINDING together as her fingers twisted through the air, pulling, tugging at the feeble connection threatening to melt away from her.
Her right hand was cramping, sharp pain shooting along the tendon to her elbow, but if she broke the connection, let her hand rest for an instant, her patient would die.
“Come on,” she said under her breath as her fingers spun through the air, refusing to give up. “Where is it?”
As if she’d needed to just verbalise her desperation, she found it: internal bleeding where the pressure was pooling.
“Got you. Got you,” Helena said with a little gasp of relief, her fingers moving faster now, manipulating the tissue, repairing the artery, drawing the blood away so that she could focus on the task before her: a rib cage which had been split apart.
She’d been transmuting regenerative lung tissue with one hand and maintaining the heartbeat with the other when she’d realised there was something else wrong, and now, finally, her resonance was not screaming at her that death was imminent.
She gave herself a moment to flex her right hand once before guiding the shattered bones back over the new lungs, knitting together the places where they’d broken, regenerating what was missing. She pushed the mangled skin back, repairing it as best she could. Finally, she rested both hands on the healed chest, drawing it up, making it rise for breath, letting out her own sigh.
There would still be weeks of recovery ahead, at least a month of convalescence at Solis Splendour. The lung tissue was new and delicate, the repaired bones fragile, but he would live to fight another day.
She let herself look at the face, now that she knew he wouldn’t die, checking the intravenous drip before she gestured for the medics to take over again.
He was young. She knew so many of the faces, but she’d never seen his before. A new recruit, or maybe newly of age. No, he couldn’t be of age. He looked barely fourteen.
She had no time to wonder. She had to wash her hands, douse them in antiseptic, and move to the next bed with a ribbon designating the need for intercession.
Don’t look at the face, she reminded herself as the medics and nurses scattered to make space for her.
She didn’t know anymore how long she’d been on shift. A day or two? It was hard to say.
It had been mostly battle injuries at first, cuts and gouges, stab wounds, broken bones. Then it became burns, charred-off limbs, scorched lungs, skin a charcoal crisp that cracked to ooze blood.
The hospital smelled like roast meat, blood, the stench of gut wounds, and the lavender oil they disinfected with.
Helena used to like the smell of lavender.
Her last patient, she lost. The organs failed more quickly than Helena could regenerate them. She was so tired that her hands trembled uncontrollably with every twist of her resonance. She wasn’t fast enough.
Her resonance rebounded on her, a pulse of energy like a blow straight through her chest. Ghostly cold rushed through her and dissipated.
Gone.
Helena slumped, breathing unsteadily, wanting to scream. A minute more and she could have— She pushed herself up, hands shaking as she stepped back, looking at the face before she could stop herself.
The body was so badly burned, she couldn’t tell if it had been a boy or a girl. It was horrifyingly small. She looked around, searching for another ribbon, but finding none. her own sigh.She walked stiffly towards the nearest wall, her knees giving out. Her mouth was parched, and her hands shook as an orderly paused and handed her a cup of water.
She was one of the young ones, with bright-blue eyes. New enough to still be eager at her job.
Helena clutched the cup in her hands, staring dully across the casualty ward, the rows of beds, and the piles of blood-soaked clothes and bandages and sheets on the floor. She could feel that same blood on her face and hair.
Only her hands were mostly clean. The only thing she’d washed in at least a day.
She pressed her hand against her chest, finding the sunstone amulet under her filthy uniform. The fabric was so stiff with blood, it almost cracked as she squeezed the amulet, trying to ground herself.
“You should have been on break hours ago.”
She looked up to find Matron Pace standing beside her, mopping her forehead with a mostly clean cloth, a chipped cup in her other hand.
The matron’s apron was as blood-spattered as Helena’s, and red-stained wisps of greying hair clung to her flushed, swollen face.
“I didn’t see you on break, either.” Even Helena’s voice shook with exhaustion.
Pace had been in medicine longer than the Paladian Central Hospital had existed. Helena heard she’d been a midwife before the national medical licensing laws came into effect. Women needed alchemy certification to qualify, and Pace wasn’t an alchemist, so she’d become a nurse.
Helena sat, the joints in her hands aching from the constant repetitive flexing. Inside her chest, there was a feeling like a rope pulled taut. She dreaded the thought of beginning to feel her feet again.
“Go rest,” Matron Pace said.
Helena shook her head, her eyes fastened on the door where any new casualties would be brought in. “I should stay in case of an emergency. Is Maier still in the surgery?”
Maier was one of the most accomplished alchemical surgeons Paladia had ever produced. He’d left a hospital in Novis to join the Resistance and keep their hospital running after the Undying wiped out all the field hospitals and clinics.
Maier was a genius surgeon and a hard worker, but also short-tempered, and he did not like women. Unfortunate when the war hospital was predominantly staffed and run by women. He kept to himself and the few male assistants he’d brought with him, leaving the management of the hospital and any dealings with medics, nurses, or orderlies to Pace.
“Marino, there are plenty of accomplished medics here. You’ve worked longer than you should have, go rest.”
Helena watched a sheeted gurney pass, already on its way to the crematorium. “I don’t want to sleep right now. I’ll just dream of being in here.”
Pace sighed. “I don’t know that I should tell you this, but there’s a meeting in session. The Council asked for a report from the hospital. If you’d like to go.” racked as sheExhaustion had dulled Helena’s mind to near incomprehension, but the thought of giving a report in the war room left her numb.
She hated going into that room where everything was reduced to figures and zones of interest. The dead were only numbers in that room.
“Do we have the numbers yet?” she asked.
“Just the preliminary ones.” Pace picked up a file, holding it out.
THE MEETING WAS UNDER WAY when Helena entered the war room. The Resistance Headquarters were based in what had once been the Holdfast Institute of Alchemy and Science. The war room was previously the faculty boardroom; now it was an audience chamber. Spanning a wall was a tiered map of the full city-state, the two main islands, and the mainland abutting the mountains, the levels and water districts all marked out.
Most were coloured black or red, a tide of blood closing in on the blue area centred in the upper half of the East Island. There was a gleam of gold in the sea of blue marking the Institute itself.
The Council of Five sat at a dais behind a long marble table. Two chairs were empty. Falcon Matias sat on the far right, beside him was Steward Ilva Holdfast, a gaunt, grey-haired woman with a large sunstone pin affixed over her heart.
The seat of honour, in the centre, sat empty. It had been weeks since Helena had even glimpsed Luc. Was he still fighting?
The fourth seat was also empty, its occupant standing beside the map, a long staff in his hand. As General Althorne touched parts of the map with his staff, areas which had been black turned red, indicating the active combat zones.
To the far left of the dais sat Jan Crowther, his eyes scanning the room, watching the audience rather than Althorne.
Everyone else was seated in rows of chairs split in the centre to form an aisle. Helena hung back. Those in attendance were all clean, and Helena was
covered in blood and other fluids.
“If we continue to push back in the upper trade district, we should be able to press our advantage …” Althorne was saying, indicating a series of e’s a meetingbuildings near the ports.
“Hold, Althorne,” Ilva spoke up. “We finally have the hospital report.”
All eyes turned to Helena, eyebrows rising at the sight of her. She should have cleaned up more before coming. It had felt so urgent when she was on
her way.
“Marino, you have the floor.”
Helena swallowed and looked down at the file in her hands, chest tight as she walked towards the centre of the room where there was a large mosaic of the sun, rays spanning out around it. Speakers were supposed to stand in the centre.
“These are only the initial estimates,” she said, her voice hardly loud enough to carry, but it carried anyway; the spot where she stood had been designed to capture any sound and amplify it due to the oddly stepped ceiling
overhead.
“An estimate is fine,” Ilva said. abutting theHelena opened the file. The numbers felt so incomprehensible, they threatened to stretch and distort as she read them out. Estimated casualties, the blue areaestimates on how many would be permanently removed from combat, estimates on how many might recover enough to return to the front. Every
number but the last too large.
The report was met with a long silence.
Althorne cleared his throat. “Would you say those estimates are likely to rise or drop in the final report?”
“Rise,” she said in a dull voice. “The hospital resorted to triage care per protocol and prioritised the patients most likely to survive, but preliminary
reports are usually conservative.”
There were concerned murmurs.
“Thank you, Marino,” Ilva said, a note of tension in her voice as she nodded towards the map. “Althorne, you may resume.”
“Wait,” Helena said. Her heart was pounding as she forced herself to look up from the numbers, staring at the empty seat where Luc was supposed to be. Anything. Anything. Anything. “I submitted a proposal to the Council a week ago, along with my report on the hospital inventory, and several weeks before, too. I never received an answer.”
There was a tense silence. She plunged on.
“I know—it is hard to consider, but I believe we should offer Resistance members the choice of donating their bodies to the cause in the event that they’re killed in combat,” she said. “Rather than burning the bodies, we could —” She hesitated a moment, knowing she could never take back what she was about to say. “—reanimate them and use them as an infantry in order to protect our living combatants. This would be done only with their written permission—”
“Absolutely not,” Ilva said, cutting her off.
“That is treason!” came another voice.
Helena looked up and met the eyes of Falcon Matias, who glared down at her, his face livid.
“You stand before us and propose a desecration of the natural cycle. This is the reason why vivimancers can never be trusted, not even for a moment.
They are corrupt from conception! This is why this country faces war even epped ceilingnow. One moment of leniency and their corrupted natures will seek to spread their contamination.” He turned to the Council members seated beside him, inclining his head. “I am ashamed that such apostasy could be uttered by my oblate. I beg the Council’s forgiveness. She will be taken in hand, placed in chains, and stripped of all—”
“We are fighting a war against the dead and the Undying,” Helena said.
She’d known they wouldn’t listen, but surely by now they understood the Eternal Flame couldn’t possibly win if things continued as they were. “It wouldn’t be done to anyone who didn’t consent while they were still alive.
Our soldiers are willing to die for the cause; why not at least give them the choice to keep fighting and spare the living?”
“What do you know about fighting?”
The question came from behind her. She looked back, but there were so many people glaring at her, she couldn’t even guess at who’d spoken.
“Your proposal is a violation of everything the Eternal Flame has stood for since the moment of its founding,” Ilva said in a cold voice. “You want us to consider the damnation of our soldiers’ souls? You took oaths, Marino. Did I misjudge you? Have your abilities made you forget your humanity?”
“No!” Helena said, ragged with frustration. The file in her hands was crumpling as she gripped it. “I am loyal to the cause. My vows are to protect life and fight against necromancy no matter the cost. This would be to that
end. I would sacrifice my soul for the Eternal Flame. There might be others who would as well. Can’t we ask?”
Falcon Matias stood up. He was a tiny, bony man, and he looked prepared ies, we couldto launch himself over the dais at Helena and strangle her. “The Order of the Eternal Flame, created by Orion Holdfast himself, was founded on Sol’s principles of the natural cycle of life and death. It was for Orion’s bravery and willingness to sacrifice his life that he was blessed by the heavens and made victorious. Any use of necromancy is a violation of the cycle. Your thoughts and words are a stain upon the Eternal Flame and history itself.”
“Who are we saving right now?” Helena said, her voice rising. “How many more can we lose before—”
There was the firm smack of a flat hand on the marble table, and the ceiling overhead abruptly rearranged itself. Helena’s words were swallowed, leaving a deadly silence.
Jan Crowther lifted his hand away from the dais, his eyes narrowed into slits as he studied her.
“Marino, your voice is no longer recognised by this body,” Ilva said after a moment, her voice cool and deliberate. “However, it is plain to see that you are—hysterical. Given that you are clearly not sound of mind, we will not have you disavowed for this.” As she spoke, Ilva looked sharply at Matias, who looked ready to protest. “In gratitude for your years of service, I will have this outburst stricken from the records.” She closed her eyes briefly as if in prayer. “I’m only grateful that Principate Lucien was not here to witness this betrayal of faith. Tell Matron Pace she will handle all future reports from the hospital. You are dismissed.”
Without another glance in Helena’s direction, Ilva turned towards the map once more. One of her hands rested on Matias’s arm to calm him. “Moving on now. Althorne, you may continue.”
Althorne’s voice was a distant rumble in Helena’s ears as she turned and has stood forleft the war room.
STANDING IN THE CORRIDOR OUTSIDE, Helena looked down at herself.
Except for the clean gloves she’d pulled on as she left the hospital, she was covered in blood.
The file slipped from her fingers onto the floor, and she clamped her hands over her mouth to keep from keening as her chest started to heave.
A heavy hand landed on her shoulder. “Not here. Sweet fire, you’re a dunce.”
She was guided, blindly, down the hallway into the adjoining corridor before being let go. She sagged against the wall, sliding to the floor, head pressed against her knees as she sobbed until her head felt hollow.
She looked up at Soren, who stood a foot away, leaning against the wall, watching her with his deep-set eyes.
If he was here, it meant Luc must be back, too. He must have crashed from exhaustion if they’d run the meeting without him.
“How manySoren shook his head. “You should have cried before you went in for your report, unless you were betting on Ilva forgiving you for reasons of temporary insanity.”
“Shut up,” she said, shrinking smaller, her chest hitching.
“You could’ve at least washed up if you wanted to be taken seriously.”
“Shut—up,” she said again.
“You knew it wasn’t going to work,” he said, folding his arms. “You had a said after ato have known. They’re never, ever, ever in a million years going to approve using necromancy on our soldiers. Or on anyone not our soldiers, before you get any other ideas.”
She pulled her knees tight against her chest. “You have no idea what it’s like in the hospital.” s briefly as if“No, I don’t,” Soren said in a flat voice, “and neither does anyone else in there, so I don’t know why you thought screaming at them while looking like reports fromthat would change their minds.”
She was too tired to argue.
“You know what your problem is?”
Helena said nothing. He’d tell her whether she wanted him to or not. He’d always possessed all the sharp edges and wariness that Luc lacked.
“You don’t have faith in the gods.”
“Yes, I do,” she said quickly.
“No. You don’t. You think you do because you think they probably exist, but that’s not faith. You don’t trust them.”
“Why would I? They haven’t done anything to deserve being trusted,” she pital, she wassaid, her voice thick. “I’ve tried everything, Soren. I try to believe, but it’s never enough. Even if I did really believe—if my soul’s the price of saving ed her handsyou, of saving everyone”—she choked—“that’s not a price. That’s a bargain.”
He dropped into a squat in front of her so that their faces were almost level. “That doesn’t matter, though. They’ll never agree. No one will. You’re just hurting yourself.”
She looked down. “Then we’re going to lose,” she said in a dull voice.
“And I’m going to be the one who puts you back together, over and over, until I have to watch you die instead. And we still won’t win.”
Soren gave a heavy sigh. “I’m guessing no one told you, but this battle was crashed fromactually quite the victory for us.”
She should have felt something at this news, but she was empty. “Whether you win a battle or lose it, all I see is the cost.”
“Just figured you’d want to know, because Luc thinks it’s a sign that things are finally taking a turn.”
Helena felt as if her chest had caved in.
“Don’t take that from him. Please.”
She nodded silently. Soren rested a hand on her shoulder. She could tell he wanted to say something else, but he just stood up instead.
“We’re back for a few days. I’m sure we’ll see you around. You should clean up and get some sleep. You need it.”
He walked away.
Helena stayed curled against the wall, too crushed beneath her despair to move.
looking like
“MARINO.”
A cool voice jolted Helena awake.
Her eyes snapped open, and she found Ilva Holdfast standing before her, both hands resting idly on the head of her cane. Helena was still huddled against the wall where Soren had left her.
“Let’s have a private chat,” Ilva said, her tone even and emotionless.
Helena’s stomach shrivelled as she stood stiffly.
They went up a floor to Ilva’s office, and she produced a little key from her pocket to unlock it.
Helena had always admired that Ilva never tried to hide her lack of resonance, never acted ashamed or apologetic about it. Even though most people didn’t possess measurable resonance, once swept into the world of alchemy, the absence sometimes felt startling to encounter. The guild families staked everything upon their alchemy; their future and fortunes depended on
maintaining their traditional resonance. They were borderline superstitious about their children’s abilities, and so a Lapse in the family was often taken as a sign that the bloodline was weak.
But Ilva had never been hidden away by the Holdfasts. The Faith had long held that resonance was no form of superiority; it was Sol’s will to endow whom he would. his battle wasThe Holdfasts had given Ilva as many opportunities as any other Holdfast.
She’d been one of the first women to study in the science department before deciding her interests lay elsewhere, and the first female non-alchemist to join the Eternal Flame when her brother Helios, Luc’s grandfather, had gn that thingsbecome Principate.
Now she was the only family Luc had left, and he had made her steward, entrusting her to act on his behalf when he was absent.
Helena entered the office and stopped short. could tell heJan Crowther was seated in one of the two chairs across from Ilva’s desk.
He was a needle of a man, plainly dressed, with ash-brown hair combed back from his face. A red flame pyromancer, Crowther had fought in the Eternal Flame’s crusades against necromancy in the surrounding countries until his right arm was paralysed.
He rarely spoke in the public meetings. He managed logistical matters, supplies, rations, and dispatching and assigning the Resistance’s noncombatants. Helena didn’t know why he was there; if she was going to be censured, it made more sense for Falcon Matias to be present.
“Sit down,” Ilva said, seating herself behind the desk, which was covered in files.
Helena sat in the chair beside Crowther’s. She was so tired it was difficult not to slump.
“Seems I’m doomed never to have an easy conversation with you,” Ilva said.
Helena said nothing. There was a long silence, as if Ilva was debating where to begin.
“We’re losing the war,” Ilva finally said.
Helena blinked, the room coming into sharp focus. Her eyes darted between Ilva and Crowther, who remained silent, both watching for her reaction. guild familiesShe didn’t know what to say. Most people regarded it as a preordained fact that the Resistance would win. Eventually. The Eternal Flame was always
victorious. In the battle of good and evil, good always won in the end.
“I know,” Helena finally said.
Ilva inclined her head, her gaze seeming to go through Helena. “Luc is— exceptional. The best of all the Holdfasts, I’ve always said. When you’ve lived as long as I have, you learn how rare it is that anyone with such capacity for greatness is actually truly good, but Luc is one of those rare few.
It’s a tremendous burden, trying to protect someone like that.” Ilva closed her eyes for a moment, her age showing in every line of her face. “I never expected to be steward to the Principate. I’ve spent so much time wondering what Apollo would do, or my brother, or father, but it’s no use—none of them were anything like Luc. He’s so earnest, it pains me.” She pressed her hand over her heart and looked directly at Helena. “I am grateful you at least did not make that proposal with Luc present.”
Helena just pressed her lips together, knowing Ilva’s gratitude wasn’t because Helena would have hurt Luc but because he might have agreed with her. Because he trusted her, valued her perspective even when they disagreed.
But if she’d spoken with Luc present, and he had listened, everyone else would have seen her as a serpent, dripping poison in his ears, corrupting their
golden heir.
“I stand by what I said.”
Crowther let out a breath like a hiss, and the fingers of his hand twitched. s going to beHer eyes caught on the ignition rings decorating his fingers.
“You know it’s impossible,” Ilva said.
Helena shrugged. “Even when we’re losing?”
“Yes, even then,” Crowther said, speaking at last through clenched teeth.
“I know you want to help,” Ilva said, “but we’re not only fighting for ourselves, but for the soul of Paladia. As Principate, Luc cannot allow the principles of his forefathers to be betrayed.” Ilva looked down at her hands, folded before her on the desk. “However, the country has been exhausted by this war. The moral outrage towards necromancy has only dulled further with time. There are many people like you in the city who prefer the idea of necrothralls fighting instead of their sons. The Undying do not ask for food or soldiers, or for their citizens to do without, and that has allowed their Guild Assembly to legitimise themselves and claim that they are the ones for the people.” ordained fact“So what do we do?” Helena asked.
Ilva pursed her lips, drawing a deep breath. “Do you remember Kaine Ferron?”
Helena stifled an incredulous laugh. Everyone remembered Kaine Ferron.
He’d murdered Luc’s father by ripping out his heart at the foot of the Alchemy Tower.
Ferron had been sixteen, just another student, and without warning he’d va closed hercommitted the worst crime in Paladia’s history.
He was never arrested or charged, even though the investigation had yielded multiple witnesses positively identifying him as the murderer, because he’d disappeared.
There were a few reports later listing him as likely among the Undying, but little else was known since.
“Yes, I remember Ferron,” she said, realising that Ilva was waiting for an answer.
“Kaine Ferron has offered to spy for the Resistance,” said Crowther. ey disagreed.Helena’s head swivelled sharply. “What?”
Crowther’s upper lip curled. “He says it’s to avenge his mother.” He rupting theirinclined his head. “A strange motive, given that Enid Ferron died peacefully in the family’s city residence a year ago. When he was reminded of that, he admitted he has a few—conditions for the services he’s offering.”
Helena stared at him expectantly, but it was Ilva who spoke.
“He wants a full pardon for all of his wartime activities.”
That seemed an obvious demand, although entirely out of the question. Luc would never pardon his father’s murderer.
There was something about the way Ilva said it that made Helena feel that a pardon was not all Ferron had asked for.
“And …?”
“He wants you, Marino,” Crowther said. “Both now and after the war.”
Crowther said it casually, but Ilva’s lips went white. further withHelena sat looking between them, certain she was misunderstanding, but there was only silence. sk for food or“His information would be invaluable to us,” Ilva said without meeting Helena’s eyes.
Helena shook her head slowly, not ready for the conversation to move on to estimates of value.
Crowther and Ilva were seated too far apart to look at simultaneously. She had to keep glancing between them; Ilva was not looking at her, while
Crowther studied her with a look of impassive curiosity.
Helena’s voice failed twice before she managed to speak. “But—why would he—I don’t think Ferron knows who I am.”
Crowther gave a slow reptilian blink. “The two of you were academically competitive, weren’t you?”
“W-Well, yes, technically, but—it was just the national exam scores. We never—never spoke. He was guild, and you know how they were—and I was —I was …”
The thirty-six-hour hospital shift had dulled her brain to the point that it was only then that she realised Ilva had not brought her into the office to Undying, butcensure her at all.
She looked between them again. “Are you asking me to—”
“We need that information,” Crowther said. “We have spies, but none at the level Ferron can offer. This would be direct access to intelligence we often spend months trying to piece together.” He tilted his head, studying her sideways. “Given your impassioned advocacy today that the Resistance do whatever is necessary to win this war without thought to personal cost …” He smiled. “We thought you might be interested.”
Helena’s mouth was so dry, she could barely swallow. Her words stuck in her throat.
“We won’t force you,” Ilva said quickly. “It’s only if you agree. You can say no.” question. Luc“Yes,” Crowther said with another thin, empty smile. “Ferron was quite specific that you have to be willing.”
This had to be a test. They wouldn’t do this, not after everything … Ilva wouldn’t sell her.
“You can have a day to think it over,” Ilva said.
“But an answer now would be preferable, for all parties involved,”
Crowther said pointedly.
Ilva’s fingers curled into a fist. “She should have time to think, Jan.”
Those words finally made it real.
Ilva had never offered Helena time to think about any of the irreversible decisions she’d been asked to make. Helena almost felt the now nearly invisible incision scar just below her navel. Ilva, who was always calm, who always did whatever she considered best for Luc regardless of the cost, had finally found a choice that even her conscience struggled with.
Not a test, then.
“I don’t need time to think,” Helena said. “You say we’re losing the war, and this is the only option, so—I’ll do it.” As she spoke, she could feel the blood draining from her face, head and body growing light.
Ilva stared at her and then at Crowther, and she gave a sharp nod. “All right.”
Helena’s fingers had gone numb at some point during the conversation. e—and I wasShe swallowed hard, forcing herself to speak again. “How will you explain it —once I’m gone?”
Ilva cleared her throat. “Oh, you won’t be leaving. Not immediately anyway. To start, you’ll act as liaison between the Resistance and Ferron.
You’ll see him—what was it?”
“Twice weekly,” Crowther said.
“Yes. You’ll go every four days, acting as his point of contact, and pass the information he gives you to Crowther, who will ensure it reaches the right members of the Council and the commanders. The rest of the time, you’ll remain here, and everything will operate as usual.” l cost …” He“Oh,” was all Helena could say.
She should feel relieved by that, but she didn’t feel anything. The room was tunnelling; Crowther and Ilva were down a long telescope. Even their voices were far away.
“Given the sensitive nature of this arrangement, there will be no official records or acknowledgement of any kind,” Crowther said. “And under absolutely no circumstances are Luc or any other friends or acquaintances you may possess to have any idea of this. Do you understand, Marino?”
“Yes.” Her ears were ringing.
Crowther said something else about healing herself as necessary to avoid raising questions. She couldn’t make out all the words.
She just nodded and said yes again.
“I don’t need time to think,” Helena said. “You say we’re losing the war, and this is the only option, so—I’ll do it.” As she spoke, she could feel the blood draining from her face, head and body growing light.
Ilva stared at her and then at Crowther, and she gave a sharp nod. “All right.”
Helena’s fingers had gone numb at some point during the conversation.
She swallowed hard, forcing herself to speak again. “How will you explain it —once I’m gone?”
Ilva cleared her throat. “Oh, you won’t be leaving. Not immediately anyway. To start, you’ll act as liaison between the Resistance and Ferron.
You’ll see him—what was it?”
“Twice weekly,” Crowther said.
“Yes. You’ll go every four days, acting as his point of contact, and pass the information he gives you to Crowther, who will ensure it reaches the right members of the Council and the commanders. The rest of the time, you’ll remain here, and everything will operate as usual.”
“Oh,” was all Helena could say.
She should feel relieved by that, but she didn’t feel anything. The room was tunnelling; Crowther and Ilva were down a long telescope. Even their voices were far away.
“Given the sensitive nature of this arrangement, there will be no official records or acknowledgement of any kind,” Crowther said. “And under absolutely no circumstances are Luc or any other friends or acquaintances you may possess to have any idea of this. Do you understand, Marino?”
“Yes.” Her ears were ringing.
Crowther said something else about healing herself as necessary to avoid raising questions. She couldn’t make out all the words.
She just nodded and said yes again.