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It’s a guess. He’s guessing.
There’s no way he
could know. I’ve been careful, and
careful
at Blackcliff translates to
paranoid
for
most people.
Silence falls at my table, at Marcus’s.
Deny it, Elias. They’re waiting.
“You were squad leader on watch this morning, weren’t you?” Marcus says.
“You should have been thrilled to see that traitor go down. You should have
brought him in. Say he deserved it, Veturius. Say Barrius deserved what he got.”
It should be easy. I don’t believe it, and that’s what matters. But my mouth
won’t move. The words won’t come. Barrius didn’t deserve to be whipped to
death. He was a child, a boy so afraid of staying at Blackcliff that he’d risked
everything to escape it.
The silence spreads. A few Centurions look up from the head table. Marcus
stands, and, quick as a flood, the mood of the hall changes, turning curious and
expectant.
Son of a whore
.
“Is this why your mask hasn’t joined with you?” Marcus says. “Because
you’re not one of us? Say it, Veturius. Say the traitor deserved his fate.”
“Elias,” Helene whispers. Her eyes plead.
Fall in. Just for one more day.
“He—”
Say it, Elias. Doesn’t change anything if you do.
“He deserved it.”
I meet Marcus’s eyes coolly, and he grins, like he knows how much the words
cost.
“Was that so hard, bastard?”
I’m relieved when he insults me. It gives me the excuse I’ve wanted so badly.
I spring toward him fists-first.
But my friends are expecting it. Faris, Demetrius, and Helene are on their
feet, holding me back, an irritating wall of black and blond keeping me from
beating that damn grin off Marcus’s face.
“No, Elias,” Helene says. “The Commandant will whip you for starting a
42
fight. Marcus isn’t worth that.”
“He’s a bastard—”
“That’d be you, actually,” Marcus says. “At least I know who my father is.
I
wasn’t raised by a pack of camel-stroking Tribesmen.”
“You Plebeian trash—”
“Senior Skulls.” The Scim Centurion has made his way to the foot of the
table. “Is there a problem?”
“No, sir,” Helene says. “Go, Elias,” she murmurs. “Go get some air. I’ll
handle this.”
My blood still burning, I shove through the mess doors and find myself in the
belltower courtyard before I even know where I’m going.
How the hell did Marcus figure out that I’m going to desert? How much does
he know? Not too much, or I’d have been called to the Commandant’s office by
now. Damn him, I’m close. So close.
I pace the courtyard, trying to calm myself. The desert heat has faded, and a
crescent moon hangs low on the horizon, thin and red as a cannibal’s smile.
Through the arches, Serra’s lights glow dully, tens of thousands of oil lamps
dwarfed by the vast darkness of the surrounding desert. To the south, a pall of
smoke mutes the shine of the river. The smell of steel and forge wafts past, ever-
present in a city known solely for its soldiers and weaponry.
I wish I could have seen Serra before all this, when it was capital of the
Scholar Empire. Under the Scholars, the great buildings were libraries and
universities instead of barracks and training halls. The Street of Storytellers was
filled with stages and theaters instead of an arms market where the only stories
told now are of war and death.
It’s a stupid wish, like wanting to fly. For all their knowledge of astronomy
and architecture and mathematics, the Scholars crumbled beneath the Empire’s
invasion. Serra’s beauty is long gone. It’s a Martial city now.
Above, the heavens glow, the sky pale with starlight. Some long-buried part
of me understands that this is beauty, but I am unable to wonder at it, the way I
did when I was a boy. Back then, I clambered up spiky Jack trees to get closer to
the stars, sure that a few feet of height would help me see them better. Back then,
my world had been sand and sky and the love of Tribe Saif, who saved me from
exposure. Back then, everything was different.
“All things change, Elias Veturius. You are no boy now, but a man, with a
man’s burden upon your shoulders and a man’s choice ahead of you.”
My knife is in my hands, though I don’t remember drawing it, and I hold it to
43
the throat of the hooded man beside me. Years of training keep my arm steady as
a rock, but my mind races. Where had the man come from? I’d swear on the
lives of everyone in my platoon that he hadn’t been standing there a moment
ago.
“Who the hell are you?”
He pulls down his hood, and I have my answer.
Augur.
44
W
VII: Laia
e race through the catacombs, Keenan ahead of me, Sana at my heels.
When Keenan is convinced we’ve left the aux patrol behind, he slows
our pace and barks at Sana to blindfold me.
I flinch at the harshness in his tone. This is what’s become of the Resistance?
This band of thugs and thieves? How did it happen? Only twelve years ago, the
rebels were at the height of their power, allying themselves with the Tribes and
the king of Marinn. They’d lived their code—
Izzat—
fighting for freedom,
protecting the innocent, elevating loyalty to their own people above all else.
Does the Resistance remember that code anymore? On the off chance that
they do, will they help me? Can they help me?
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