Red Rising — Chapter 34: The Northwoods

34

The Northwoods

There is agony.

And claustrophobia.

I am sick and wounded.

The pain is in dreams.

It is in darkness. In the pit of my stomach.

I wake up and scream into a gentle hand.

I glimpse someone.

Eo? I whisper her name and reach up. My muddy hand smears her

face. Her angel’s face. She’s come to take me to the vale. Her hair

has turned Golden. I always thought she could be Golden. Her

Colors are golden wings. No Red Sigil on her hands. It took death.

I sweat despite the rains and snows that come. Something shelters

me. I shiver. Clutch my scarlet headband. Mud in my hair. Eo

washes it away. Tenderly strokes my brow. I love her. Something

inside me bleeds. I hear Eo speak to herself, to someone. I haven’t

long. Have I time at all? Am I in the vale? There is mist. There is sky

and a great tree.

I shiver and sweat. Rot in hell, Cassius. I was your friend. I might

have killed your brother, but I had no choice. You did. You arrogant

slag. I hate him. I hate Augustus. I see them hanging Eo together.

354

They mock me. They laugh at me. I hate Antonia. I hate Fitchner. I

hate Titus. I hate. I hate. I am burning and mad and sweating. I hate

the Jackal. The Proctors. I hate. I hate myself for all I’ve done. All

I’ve done. For what? To win a game. To win a game for someone

who will never know about anything I do. Eo is dead. It isn’t as if

she will ever be coming back to see all I have done for her.

Dead.

Then I wake. The pain is there in my gut. It goes through me. But

I no longer sweat. The fever is gone, and the angry red lines of

infection have faded. I’m in a cave’s mouth. There’s a small re and

a sleeping girl just inches away. Furs cover her. She breathes softly

the smoky air. Her hair is tousled and gold. She isn’t Eo. Mustang.

I cry silently. I want Eo. Why can’t I have her? Why can’t I will

her back into life? I want Eo. I don’t want this girl beside me. It

aches worse than the wound. I can never x what happened to Eo. I

couldn’t even run my army. I couldn’t win. I couldn’t beat Cassius,

not to mention the Jackal. I was the best Helldiver; I’m nothing

here. The world is too big and cold. I am too small. The world has

forgotten Eo. It has already forgotten her sacrice. There’s nothing

left.

I sleep again.

When I wake, Mustang sits by the re. She knows I’m awake but

lets me pretend otherwise. I lie there with my eyes closed, listening

to her hum. It’s a song I know. It is a song I hear in dreams. The

echo of my love’s death. The song sung by the one they call

Persephone. Hummed by an Aureate, an echo of Eo’s dream.

355

I weep. If ever I’ve felt there was a God, it is now as I listen to the

mournful chords. My wife is dead, but something of hers lingers

still.

I speak to Mustang the next morning.

“Where did you hear that song?” I ask her without sitting up.

“From the HC,” she says, blushing. “A little girl sang it. It’s

soothing.”

“It’s sad.”

“Most things are.”

It has been four weeks, Mustang tells me. Cassius is Primus.

Winter has come. Ceres is no longer under siege. Jupiter’s soldiers

sometimes come into the woods. There are sounds of battle between

the two superpowers of the North, Jupiter and Mars. Jupiter to the

west, Mars to the east. Since the river froze, they’ve been able to

cross and raid one another. Our buzzards have risen out of their

winter gulches. Hungry wolves howl at night. Crows ock from the

south. But Mustang really knows very little, and I grow impatient

with her.

“Keeping you breathing was a little distracting,” she reminds me.

Her standard lies underneath a blanket near my feet. She’s the last

of House Minerva. Yet unbridled. And she didn’t enslave me.

“Slaves are stupid,” she says. “And you’re already a gimp. Why

make you stupid too?”

It is days before I’m able to walk. I wonder where those nifty

medBots are now. Tending someone the Proctors like, no doubt. I

356

won Primus and they never gave it to me. Now I know why the

Jackal will win. They are getting rid of his competition.

Mustang stalks with me through the woods during the next weeks. I

move stiy through the thick snow but my strength is returning.

She credits medicine she found lying conspicuously under a bush. A

friendly Proctor placed it there. We pause when we spot the deer. I

draw the bow, but I can’t get the string to my ear. My wound aches.

Mustang watches me. I try again. Pain deep inside. I let the arrow

y. We eat leftover rabbit that night. It tastes funny and gives me

cramps. I always have cramps now. It’s the water too. We have

nothing to boil it in. No iodine. Just snow and a little creek to drink

from. Sometimes we can’t have re.

“You should have killed Cassius or sent him away,” Mustang tells

me.

“Would have thought you nobler than that,” I say as I skin the

rabbit we caught.

“I like to win. Family trait. And sometimes cheating is in the

rulebook.” She smiles. “You get a merit bar every time you

recapture your standard. So I arranged for it to be lost to House

Diana by someone else several times. Then rode out to capture it.

Got to Primus in a week.”

“Tricky. Yet your army liked you,” I say.

“Everyone likes me. Now eat your damn rabbit. You’re skinny as a

cadaver.”

357

The winter grows colder. We live in the deep north woods, far

north of Ceres, northwest of my former highlands. I have not yet

seen a soldier of Mars. I don’t know what I would do if I did.

“I’ve hidden from everyone but you,” Mustang says. “It keeps me

alive and ticking.”

“What’s your plan?” I ask.

She laughs at herself. “To be alive and ticking.”

“You’re better at it than I am.”

“How do you mean?”

“No one in your House would have betrayed you.”

“Because I didn’t rule like you,” she says. “You have to remember,

people don’t like being told what to do. You can treat your friends

like servants and they’ll love you, but you tell them they’re servants

and they’ll kill you. Anyway, you put too much stock in hierarchy

and fear.”

“Me?”

“Who else? I could spot it a mile away. All you cared about was

your mission, whatever it is. You’re like a driven arrow with a very

depressing shadow. First time I met you, I knew you’d cut my throat

to get whatever it is you want.” She waits for a moment. “What is it

that you want, by the way?”

“To win,” I say.

“Oh, please. You’re not that simple.”

“You think you know me?” The rabbit hisses out fat over the re.

“I know you cry in your sleep for a girl named Eo. Sister? Or a girl

you loved? It is a very oColor name. Like yours.”

358

“I’m a farplanet hayseed. Didn’t they tell you?”

“They wouldn’t tell me anything. I don’t get out much.” She

waves a hand. “Anyway, doesn’t matter. All that matters is that no

one trusts you because it’s obvious you care more about your goal

than you do about them.”

“And you’re something dierent?”

“Oh, very much so, Sir Reaper. I like people more than you do.

You are the wolf that howls and bites. I am the mustang that nuzzles

the hand. People know they can work with me. With you? Hell, kill

or be killed.”

She’s right.

When I had a tribe, I did it right. I made every boy and every girl

love me. Made them earn their keep. I taught them how to kill a

goat as if I knew how. I gave them re as if I had created the

matches. I shared a secret with them—that we had food and Titus

didn’t. They saw me as their father. I remember it in their eyes.

When Titus was alive, I was a symbol of goodness and hope. Then

when he died … I became him.

“Sometimes I forget that the Institute is meant to teach me

things,” I say to Mustang.

I must learn better than them, not simply beat them. That is how I

will help Reds. I am a boy. I am foolish. But if I learn to become a

leader, I can be more than an agent of the Sons of Ares. I can give

my people a future. That is what Eo wanted.

359

The wolves are hungry now. They howl in the night. When Mustang

and I make a kill, we sometimes have to scare them o. But when

we kill a caribou at dusk, a pack descends from the northlands. They

come from the trees like dark specters. Shadows. The biggest of

them is my size. His fur is white. The fur of the others is gray, no

longer black. These wolves change with the season. I watch how

they surround us. Each moves with individual cunning. Yet each

moves as part of a pack.

“This is how we should ght,” I whisper to Mustang as we watch

the wolves approach.

“Could we talk about this later?”

We take down the pack leader with three arrows. The rest ee.

Mustang and I set to skinning the big white brute. As she slips her

knife along beneath the fur, she looks up, nose red from the cold.

“Slaves aren’t part of the pack, so we can’t ght like them. Not

that it matters. The wolves don’t have it right either. They take too

much from their pack leader. Cut o the head, the body retreats.”

“So the answer is autonomy,” I say.

“Maybe.” She bites her lip.

Later that night, she elaborates. “It’s like a hand.” She sits close

and cozy, leg touching mine. Close enough for guilt to crawl along

my spine. The caribou roasts, lling the cave with a ne, thick

aroma. A blizzard rages outside and the wolf fur dries over the re.

“Give me your hand,” she says. “Which is your best nger?”

“They are all better at dierent things.”

“Don’t be obstinant.”

360

I tell her my thumb. She has me try to hold a stick with only my

thumb. She easily pulls it from my grasp. Then she has me hold it

without my thumb and only the other ngers. With a twist, the stick

is free.

“Imagine that your thumb is your Housemembers. The ngers are

all the slaves you have conquered. The Primus or whoever is the

leader is the brain. It all works pretty gory seamlessly. Yeah?”

She can’t pull the stick from my grip. I set it down and ask her the

point.

“Now try to do something beyond simply grabbing the standard.

Just move your thumb counterclockwise and your ngers clockwise

except your middle.”

I do it. She stares at my hands and laughs incredulously. “Ass.” I

ruined her demonstration. Helldivers are dexterous. I watch her

hands as she tries to do it too. Of course she fails. I understand.

“A hand is like the Society,” I say..

It is the structure of the armies at the Institute. The hierarchy is

good for simple tasks. Some ngers are more important than others.

Some are better at certain things. All ngers are controlled by the

highest order, the brain. The brain’s control is eective. It makes

your thumb and ngers work together. But the single brain’s control

is limited. Imagine each one of the ngers had a brain of its own

that interacted with the main brain. The ngers obey, but they

function independently. What could the hand do then? What could

an army do? I twirl the stick along my ngers in intricate patterns.

Exactly.

361

Her eyes linger on mine, and her ngers trace along my palm as

she explains. I know she wants me to react to her touch, but I force

my mind to be lost on other things.

This idea of hers isn’t part of the Proctors’ lesson.

Their lesson is about the evolution from anarchy to order. It is

about control. About the systematic accumulation of power, the

structure of that power, and then its preservation. It is a model to

show that the Rule of Hierarchies is the best. The Society is the nal

evolution, the only answer. She just slagged that rule, or at least

showed its limitations.

If I could earn the voluntary allegiance of the slaves, the army

created would look nothing like the Society. It would be better. Like

if the Reds of Lykos thought they could actually win the Laurel, they

would be so much more productive. Or if a Praetor on board his

starcruiser could utilize not only his own genius, but that of his

crew of Blues.

Mustang’s strategy is Eo’s dream.

It’s like an electric shock jolts through me.

“Why didn’t you try it with the slaves you captured?”

She pulls her hand away from mine after I don’t respond to her

touch.

“I tried.”

She’s quiet the rest of the night. Near morning, she develops a

cough.

Mustang takes sick over the next few days. I hear uid in her

lungs and feed her broth made from marrow and wolf and leaves

362

boiled in a helmet I found. She looks like she will die. I don’t know

what to do. We’re low on food, so I hunt. But the game is scarce and

the wolves are hungry. Prey has ed these woods, so we survive on

small hares. All I can do is keep her warm and pray a medBot

descends from the clouds. The Proctors know where we are. They

always know where we are.

I nd human tracks in the woods the next week. A set of two. I

follow them to an abandoned campsite, hoping they might have

food I can steal. There are animal bones and embers still hot. No

horses, though. Probably not scouts then. Oathbreakers, the Shamed

who have broken their vows after being enslaved. There’s plenty of

them now..

I follow their tracks through the woods for an hour before I grow

worried. They circle back around, leading somewhere familiar,

leading to our cave. It is night by the time I return. I hear laughter

from the home I share with Mustang. The arrow feels thin in my

ngers as I nock it on the bowstring. I should kneel to gather my

breath. My wound aches. I pant. But I can’t give them more time.

Not if they have Mustang.

They cannot see me as I stand at the edge of the frozen caribou

skin and hardpacked snow that walls o our cave from sight and

elements. The re crackles inside. Smoke seeps out through vents

Mustang and I took a day in making. Two boys sit together eating

what’s left of our meat, drinking our water.

They are dirty and ragged. Hair like greased weeds. Stained

complexions. Blackheads. Once beautiful, I’m sure. One boy sits on

363

Mustang’s chest. The girl who saved my life is gagged and in her

undergarments. She shivers from the cold. One of the boys bleeds

from a bite wound on his neck. They are planning on making her

pay for that wound. Knives heat till red in the re. One boy

obviously enjoys the sight of her nakedness. He reaches to touch her

skin as though she’s a toy meant for his pleasure.

My thoughts are primal, wolike. A terrifying emotion sweeps

over me, one that I did not know I had for this girl. Not till now. It

takes a moment to calm myself and stop my hands from shaking.

His hand is on the inside of her thigh.

I shoot the rst boy in the kneecap. The second I shoot as he

reaches for a knife. I’m a bad aim. I get his shoulder instead of his

eye socket. I slide into the shelter with my skinning knife, ready to

nish the boys o as they howl in pain. Something in me, the

human part, has turned o, and it’s only when I see Mustang’s eyes

that I stop.

“Darrow,” she says softly.

Even shivering, she is beautiful—the small, quicksmiling girl who

brought me back to life. The brighteyed soul who keeps Eo’s song

alive. I shudder with anger. If I had been ten minutes later in

returning, this night could have broken me forever. I cannot bear

another death. Especially not Mustang’s.

“Darrow, let them live,” she says again, whispering it to me as Eo

would whisper she loved me. It cuts to my core. I can’t take the

sound of her voice, the anger inside me.

364

My mouth doesn’t work. My face is numb; I can’t lose the grimace

of rage that controls it. I drag the two boys out by their hair and

kick them till Mustang joins us. I leave them moaning in the snow

and return to help her dress. She feels so fragile as I pull her animal

skins around her bony shoulders.

“Knife or snow,” she asks the boys when she’s dressed. She holds

the knives heated in the re in her trembling hands. She coughs. I

know what she’s thinking. Let them go and they kill us as we sleep.

Neither will die from their wounds. The medBots would come if that

were the case. Or maybe they won’t for Oathbreakers.

They choose snow.

I’m glad. Mustang didn’t want to use the knife.

We tie them to a tree at the edge of the woods and light a signal

re so that some House will nd them. Mustang insisted on coming

along, coughing all the way, as if she were worried I wouldn’t do as

she asked. She was right to think that.

In the night, after Mustang has gone to sleep, I get up to go back

and kill the Oathbreakers. If Jupiter or Mars nds them, then they

will spill where we are and we will be taken.

“Don’t, Darrow,” she says as I pull back the caribou skin. I turn.

Her face peers out from our blankets.

“We will have to move if they live,” I say. “And you’re already

sick. You’ll die.”

We have warmth here. Shelter.

“Then we will move in the morning,” she says. “I’m tougher than I

look.”

365

Sometimes that is true. This time it is not.

I wake in the morning to nd that she shifted in the night to curl

into me for warmth. Her body is so frail. It trembles like a leaf in

the wind. I smell her hair. She breathes softly. Salt tracks mark her

face. I want Eo. I wish it were her hair, her warmth. But I don’t push

Mustang away. There’s pain when I hold her, but it comes from the

past, not from Mustang. She is something new, something hopeful.

Like spring to my deep winter.

When morning comes, we move deeper into the woods and make

a lean-to shelter against a rock face with fallen trees and packed

snow. We never nd out what happened to the Oathbreakers or our

cave.

Mustang can barely sleep, she coughs so much. When she sleeps

curled into me, I kiss the nape of her neck softly, softly so that she

will not wake; though I secretly wish she would if just to know that

I’m here. Her skin is hot. I hum the Song of Persephone.

“I can never remember the words,” she whispers to me. Her head

lies in my lap tonight. “I wish I did.”

I have not sung since Lykos. My voice is raspy and raw. Slowly

the song comes.

Listen, listen

Remember the wane

Of sun’s fury and waving grain

We fell and fell

And danced along To croon a knell

366

Of rights and wrongs

And

My son, my son

Remember the burn

When leaves were re and seasons turned

We fell and fell

And sang a song

To weave a cell

All autumn long

And

Down in the vale

Hear the reaper swing, the reaper swing

the reaper swing

Down in the vale

Hear the reaper sing

A tale of winter long

My girl, my girl

Remember the chill

When rains froze and snows did kill

We fell and fell

And danced along

Through icy hell

To their winter song

My love, my love

Remember the cries

When winter died for spring skies

They roared and roared

But we grabbed our seed

And sowed a song

Against their greed

367

My son, my son

Remember the chains

When gold ruled with iron reins

We roared and roared

And twisted and screamed

For ours, a vale

of better dreams

And

Down in the vale

Hear the reaper swing, the reaper swing

the reaper swing

Down in the vale

Hear the reaper sing

A tale of winter done

“It is strange,” she says.

“What is?”

“Father told me that there would be riots because of that song.

That people would die. But it is such a soft melody.” She coughs

blood into a pelt. “We used to sing songs by the campre, out in the

country, where he kept us out of …” coughs again “… of the public

… eye. When … my brother died … Father never sang with me

again.”

I know she will die soon. It’s only a matter of time. Her face is

pale, her smiles feeble. There’s only one thing I can do, since the

medBots haven’t come. I will have to leave her to seek out medicine.

One of the Houses might have found some or received injectables as

a bounty. I’ll have to go soon, but I need to get her food rst.

368

Someone follows me that day as I hunt alone in the winter woods.

I wear my new white wolfcloak. They are camouaged as well. I do

not see whoever it is, but he is there. I pretend my bowstring needs

xing and steal a glance back. Nothing. Quiet. Snow. The sound of

wind on brittle branches. They still follow as I move along.

I feel them behind me. It’s like the ache in my body from my

wound. I pretend to see a deer and pass quickly through a thicket

only to scramble up a tall pine on the other side.

I hear a pop.

They pass beneath me. I feel it on my skin, in my bones. So I

shake the branches under my legs. Gathered snow tumbles down. A

distorted hollow in the shape of a man forms in the snowfall. It is

looking at me.

“Fitchner?” I call down.

His bubblegum pops again.

“You may come down now, boyo,” Fitchner barks up. He

deactivates his ghostCloak and gravBoots and sinks into the snow.

He’s wearing a thin black thermal. My layered fatigues and stinking

animal skins don’t keep me half as warm.

It’s been weeks since I last saw him. He looks tired.

“Going to nish what Cassius started?” I ask as I hop down.

He looks me over and smirks. “You look horrible.”

“You do too. The soft bed, warm food, and wine giving you

trouble?” I point up. We can just barely see Olympus between the

skeletal branches of the winter trees.

He smiles. “Readout says you’ve lost twenty pounds.”

369

“Baby fat,” I tell him. “Cassius’s ionSword carved it o.” I pull up

my bow and point it at him. I wonder if he’s wearing pulseArmor.

It’ll stop anything short of pulseWeapons and razors. Only

recoilPlate can gird o those weapons—and even then, not well. “I

should shoot you.”

“You wouldn’t dare. I’m a Proctor, boyo.”

I shoot him in the thigh. Except the arrow loses velocity before it

hits the invisible pulseShield, which ickers iridescent, and the

arrow bounces to the ground. So they wear it at all times, even

when they don’t wear pulseArmor.

“Well, that was petulant.” He yawns.

PulseShield, gravBoots, ghostCloak, looks like he has a pulseFist

too, and a razor. Snow melts as it touches his skin. He saw me in the

tree, so I’m guessing his eyes have injected optics. Certainly thermal

scopes and night vision. He has a widget and an analyzerMod too.

He knew my weight. Probably knows my white blood cell count.

What about spectrum analysis?

He yawns again. “Little sleep these days on Olympus. Busy days.”

“Who gave the Jackal the holo of me killing Julian?” I ask.

“Well, you don’t dally away time.”

He did something just as I spoke, and the sound around us

localizes. I can’t hear anything beyond an invisible ve-meter

bubble. Didn’t know they had toys like that.

“The Proctors gave it to the Jackal,” he tells me.

“Which ones?”

“Apollo. All of us. Doesn’t matter.”

370

I don’t understand. “I assume it’s because they favor the Jackal.

Am I right?”

“As usual.” His gum pops. “Unfortunately, you’re just not allowed

to win, and you were gaining momentum. Sooo …”

I ask him to explain. He says he just did. His eyes are ringed and

tired despite the collagen and cosmetics he now wears to cover his

fatigue. His stomach has grown. Arms are still skinny. Something

worries him, and it isn’t just his appearance.

“Allowed to?” I echo. “Allowed to. No one can be allowed to win. I

thought the gorydamn point was to carve our own ladder to the top.

So if I’m not allowed to win, that means the Jackal is.”

“Pegged it.” He doesn’t sound very happy.

“Then that doesn’t make any lick of sense. It corrupts the entire

thing,” I say hotly. “You broke the rules.”

The best of Gold is supposed to rise, yet they already have chosen

a winner. Not only does this ruin the Institute, it ruins the Society.

The ttest reign. That’s what they say. Now they’ve betrayed their

own principles by taking sides in a schoolyard ght. This is the

Laurel all over again. Hypocrisy.

“So this kid is what? A predestined Alexander? A Caesar? A

Genghis? A Wiggin?” I ask. “This is slagging nonsense.”

“Adrius is the son of our dear ArchGovernor Augustus. That’s all

that matters.”

“Yes, you’ve told me that, but why is he supposed to win? Simply

because his father is important?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

371

“Be more specic.”

He sighs. “The ArchGovernor has secretly threatened and bribed

and cajoled all twelve of us till we came to agree upon the fact that

his son should win. But we have to be careful in our cheating. The

Drafters, my real bosses, watch every move from their palaces,

ships, et cetera. They are very important people as well. And then

there’s the Board of Quality Control to worry about, and the

Sovereign and Senators and all the other Governors themselves.

Because, though there are many schools, any of them can watch you

whenever they like.”

“What? How?”

He taps my wolf ring.

“Biometric nanoCam. Don’t worry, it’s showing them something

else right now. I threw down a jamField, and anyway, there’s a half-

day delay for editing purposes. All other times, any Drafter, any

Scarred, can watch you to see if they would like to oer you an

apprenticeship when this is over. Oh, do they like you.”

Thousands of Aureates have been watching me.

My insides, already cold, tighten.

Demetrius au Bellona, Imperator of the Sixth Fleet, father of

Cassius and Julian, Drafter of House Mars, has watched me kill one

son and deceive the other. It takes the wind out of me. What if I had

told Titus that I knew he was a Red because I was a Red? Did they

notice him say “bloodydamn”? Did I say he was a Red out loud or

was that just in my head?

“What if I take the ring o?”

372

“Then you disappear, except for the cameras we have hidden in

the battleeld” He winks. “Don’t tell anyone. Now, if the Drafters

discovered the ArchGovernor’s scheme … there will be hell to pay.

Tension between the school Houses, certainly. But more

importantly, there could be a Blood War between the Augustuses

and Bellonas.”

“And you’ll be in trouble if they nd out about the bribery?”

“I’ll be dead.” He fails in trying a smile.

“That’s why you look like hell. You’re in the middle a shit storm.

So how do I t into this?”

He chuckles dryly.

er you“Many Drafters like you. Those of House Mars get to o

your rst apprenticeships, but you can entertain oers outside the

House. If you die, they will be very unhappy. Especially the Sword

of House Mars. His name is Lorn au Arcos; no doubt you’ve heard of

him. He is prime good with his razor.”

“How. Do. I. Fit. In?” I repeat.

“You don’t. Stay alive. Stay out of the Jackal’s path. Otherwise,

Jupiter or Apollo will kill you and there will be nothing I can do to

stop it.”

“So they’re his guard dogs, eh?”

“Amongst others, yes.”

“Well, if they kill me, the Drafters would know something is

wrong.”

“They won’t. Apollo will use other Houses to do it or we’ll do it

ourselves and edit out the footage from the nanoCams. Apollo and

373

Jupiter are not stupid. So don’t ddle with them. Let the Jackal play

and you’ll have a future.”

“And so will you.”

“And so will I.”

“I understand,” I say.

“Good. Good. I knew you’d see sense. You know, many of the

Proctors like you. Minerva even does. She hated you at rst, but

since you let Mustang go, she’s been able to stay around on

Olympus. Much less embarrassing that way.”

“She’s allowed to stay around on Olympus?” I ask innocently.

“Naturally. It’s the rules of the Institute. Once your House is

defeated, the Proctor heads home to face the music and explain

what went wrong to the Drafters.” Fitchner’s smile contorts when he

sees the sudden glimmer in my eyes.

“So if their House is destroyed, they have to leave? And it was

Apollo and Jupiter who want me dead, you say?”

“No …,” he begs, suddenly hearing the menace in my voice.

I tilt my head. “No?”

“You … can’t!” he sputters, confused. “I just told you, the Sword

of the damn House Mars wants you as an apprentice. And there are

others—Senators, Politicos, Praetors. Don’t you want a future?”

. That’s all. Then I will nd my“I want to rip the Jackal’s balls o

apprenticeship. I imagine it will be an impressive one if I do that.”

“Darrow! Be reasonable, man.”

“Fitchner, my friends Roque and Lea died because of the

ArchGovernor’s meddling. Let’s see how he likes it when I make his

374

son, the Jackal, my slave.”

“You’re mad as a Red!” he says with a shake of his head. “You’re

screwing with the Proctors’ livelihoods. None are content with their

current station. They are all looking to ascend as well. If you

threaten their futures, Apollo and Jupiter will come down and they

will cut o your head!”

“Not if I destroy their Houses rst.” I frown. “Because don’t they

have to leave if I do that? Someone reliable told me those were the

rules.” I clap my hands together. “Now, I have another friend who is

dying and I’d like some antibiotics. It’d be prime if you could give

me some.”

He gawps at me. “After this why would I?”

“Because you’ve been a piss-poor Proctor up until now. You owe

me bounties. And you have your own future to look after.”

He snorts a defeated laugh. “Fair enough.”

He takes an injectable from a medcase on his leg and hands it to

me. I notice how the pulseArmor doesn’t hurt me when his hand

. I thank him by clapping histouches mine. So they can turn it o

shoulder aectionately. He rolls his eyes. The armor is turned o

over the entire body. Then it’s back. I hear the microhum at his

waist where the contraption sits. Now that I’ve got Proctors for

enemies, it’s a good thing to know.

“So what will you do?” Fitchner asks.

“Who is more dangerous? Apollo or Jupiter? Be honest, Fitchner.”

“Both are monsters of men. Apollo is more ambitious. Jupiter is

simple—he just enjoys playing god here.”

375

“Then House Apollo rst. After that, I’ll crush Jupiter. And when

they are gone, who will protect the Jackal?”

“The Jackal,” he laughs.

“Then we’ll see if he really does deserve to win.”

Before I go, Fitcher tosses a small package on the ground.

“Not that it matters now, but this was given to me. I was told to

say that you’re to know that your friends have not forsaken you.”

“Who?”

“I cannot say.”

Whoever gave it to him is a friend, because inside the box is my

Pegasus, and inside that is Eo’s haemanthus blossom. I put the

Pegasus necklace about my neck.

376