The Ophelia Prophecy (11 page)

His eyes moved to the rivulet of blood seeping down from her neck into her shirt.
His
shirt.

What the hell was he supposed to do now? His amnesiac prisoner, whom he had pledged to interrogate and drag before his father, had just saved his and his sister’s lives.

“Nicely done,” said Iris, passing Asha as she boarded the ship. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

Pax joined Asha on the ramp, conflict and confusion swarming his brain. Why couldn’t he speak? Because nothing he wanted to say made any sense.

Finally she saved him the trouble. “Where’s Beck?”

It was a natural-enough question. Beck had rescued her from the Manti, and of course she would think of him. Why it made him feel like he’d swallowed a glowing hot stone was a question he couldn’t afford to ask himself right now.

ENEMIES AND ALLIES

Asha hadn’t realized how anxious she felt until the moment she saw him, when she all but staggered from relief. She lowered her gaze so he wouldn’t see how tangled up her loyalties were.

“Where’s Beck?” she asked.

“I’m here,” called the man himself, striding over to join them on the ramp. Paxton’s expression tightened.

The leader’s shirt hung in tatters, revealing a long gash across his chest. A piece of bloody cloth bound one of his legs. No trace of his cocky, joking manner remained.

The two men shifted on the ramp, uncomfortable in such close proximity. She knew the hostility they felt toward each other was not far below the surface. What would happen now?

“How many have you lost?” she asked Beck.

The leader frowned. “Many. But it would have been worse if you hadn’t come back. Would have been hard to blame you for running.”

Beck’s gaze flickered at Paxton, and it occurred to her they were both surprised to see her again. Had they believed her capable of leaving them all to die?

“You were right about the ship,” said Paxton. “It was a good call.”

Beck reached out and took hold of her chin, lifting and tilting her face. The skin on the side of her neck stung as it stretched.

“That’s an angry cut,” he said.

She pulled her chin free. “I’m alive.” Scanning the ground in front of the wall, she counted at least eight bodies—two of them very small. She closed her eyes, heart aching. Surviving against all odds, only to die like this.

“Were you attacked?” Paxton asked her.

Her eyes found his face again. “On the bog road.”

He nodded, jaw clenching.

“No doubt they’ll be back,” said Beck, scanning the sky above the abbey, following the path of approach and retreat.

“No doubt,” agreed Paxton.

“You still offering a ride?”

Asha studied the leader, surprised by his change of heart. Though perhaps
not
surprising, considering what had happened since then.

The Manti captain hesitated. “We can destroy the hive. Shouldn’t be hard for Banshee to trace them back.”

“But is it the only one?”

Paxton nodded. “No way to be sure.”

Carrick joined them on the ramp.

“How bad?” Beck asked him.

The priest’s dark gray eyes and heavy brows would have given him an intense countenance in any situation, but especially so now. “We lost twenty-six,” he replied.

Asha moaned softly. A staggering number for the nearly extinct. The fact she hadn’t known they existed until today didn’t make it any easier to hear.

“We’ve got eight gravely injured,” Carrick continued. “One is stung—I doubt she will make it. The others might with proper care.”

Asha remembered how the Manti ship had diagnosed her on board. “Maybe Banshee could help them,” she said to Paxton.

He studied her a moment, and glanced at Beck. “I can get you someplace safe, and look at your wounded, if that’s what you want.”

“Aye.” Beck nodded. “We’d be grateful.”

“I intend to lock you in the hold for the journey,” warned Paxton. “When we let you out, you get off the ship. No discussion.”

Beck nodded. “Agreed. Carrick, tell the others. Tell them to pack up quickly.”

The priest hesitated, dark gaze shifting between the two men. Then he turned and walked down the ramp.

“We can’t take you all on Banshee,” said Paxton. “We’ll have to go for the other ship first. But you can board your wounded now, and we’ll see what the ship can do for them. Make it quick.”

“Thank you,” said Asha.

He moved past her on the ramp without replying, and boarded his ship.

She was still staring after him when Beck spoke to her in a low voice. “I’m going to trust I know where your loyalties lie and tell you I intend to take over those ships. But I need your help to do it.”

She turned, startled.

“He doesn’t trust me,” Beck continued, “and he’s protective of you. He’ll keep us both with him. That means we can work together. And his sister will have to fly the other ship.”

Her eyes darted from him to Banshee’s open entry door. “What is it you want me to do?” she whispered.

“I gather from what you and the bugman were saying about this ship that it’s intelligent, and that it responds to you.”

It was easy enough to see where he was going. Take over Banshee. Maybe hold Paxton hostage to get Iris to give up the other ship. But Beck didn’t really understand. What he proposed was a lot more complicated—and a lot riskier—than triggering the ship’s protective impulses. She found it hard to imagine the ship would stand by while she threatened either Paxton or his sister.

But she needed time to think it through. “I don’t know that it’s possible,” she admitted.

Beck grinned at her. “Sure it is, love. You brought it here without the captain’s order.” He leaned closer. “This bugman has become attached to you, and that’s putting it politely. You’ve mixed up his thinking, and that’s going to work to our advantage. You can’t afford to be squeamish about using that. Not if you want to go home.”

*   *   *

“Tell me we’re bringing them aboard for genetic testing.” Iris crossed her arms, glaring at Pax. “That’s the only way I won’t think you’ve lost your mind.”

He blew out a sigh. “Sure. Let’s test them.”

The fact they, or their parents, had survived the virus that targeted pure DNA was strong evidence they were contaminated.

“And if they’re clean?” Iris persisted.

“They go home with us. Of course.” If they were clean, he’d have no choice. It was Granada or Sanctuary. And relocating them to Sanctuary was problematic. He had to assume Asha had been talking to Beck.

“If they’re transgenic, we leave them here,” Iris said firmly. “Anything else would … create complications.” The statement was unhelpfully vague. And yet absolutely true.

Pax turned to the window. He watched Asha walking with Beck toward the wall, where the wounded had been assembled. From the back—dressed in his clothes, muddied, and with her tousled cropped hair—she might have been a teenage boy. His thinking would be a lot clearer right now if she were.

“We’d just be leaving them to die,” he murmured.

“I need you to explain to me why that has become our problem.”

He looked at her. “I don’t think you’re any more keen on that idea than I am.”
Except for fucking Beck. He can go to the devil.

Iris flushed and let her gaze drift to the window. He had to think whether he’d ever seen her flush for any reason other than anger. But she didn’t give him time to resolve that.

“Promise me this is not about that girl,” she said.

He couldn’t promise her, because it wasn’t true. Asha wanted him to help these people, and it mattered to him what she would think about him going back on his word. More than that, in viewing the whole situation through Asha’s eyes, he couldn’t bring himself to leave them to the wasps. Especially not after what they’d all been through.

Iris turned to study him, forehead creased in concern.

“Doesn’t it ever seem to you we’ve drawn some arbitrary lines in this conflict?” he asked her. “If these people
are
contaminated, they’re not the enemy. They’re just like us. What right do we have to make decisions about how they live?”

“By that logic those winged monstrosities are just like us.”

Pax refrained from pointing out that most humans would just as readily categorize her as “winged monstrosity.”

The wings in question began to vibrate. Her back and shoulders had tensed up because she was frustrated—he recognized it from long experience. Pax knew he overanalyzed. It was his worst failing. He sensed she was about to remind him of this.

Instead, she said, “It’s not really about the conflict anymore, you know that. It’s about preserving our species and our way of life.”

Pax laughed, but he wasn’t amused. She was parroting their father.

“We
have
no species without them,” he reminded her. “We’re artificial constructs. Without our enemies, we’re not sustainable.”

“Not true, Pax. Synthetic DNA is—”

“Untested on that scale. Unreliable and potentially catastrophic.”

Iris groaned. “You’re starting to sound like those religious idiots. None of this matters right now. The thing I’m most worried about is that
girl
, and the spell she seems to have cast over you and our ship.” She rose from her seat at the console. “I want her on Nefertiti with me.”

Good call. But no way
.

“I’m not finished questioning her,” he said. Iris opened her mouth to protest, but Pax stood up and headed out of the cockpit. “I need to keep an eye on her, Iris.”

“Who’s going to keep an eye on
you
?” she shouted after him.

*   *   *

Once the wounded had been evaluated and treated, Beck’s prediction came true. Paxton divided the passengers into two groups: Beck’s group was stowed in Banshee’s hold, and Carrick was sent with the second group to Nefertiti.

As Banshee departed, Asha turned Beck’s words over in her mind. The man was crazy to think he could pull off something like this. And what would happen to Sanctuary if she helped him? Beck seemed to believe the Manti could destroy the city at any time, and they must have some reason for holding back. What if it was discovered someone from Sanctuary had helped to steal two Manti ships? To kidnap the amir’s son and daughter? There’d be no going back from a step like that. Paxton and Iris would have to be held in Sanctuary indefinitely, or the wrath of their father would come down on the city.

But wasn’t it
time
they were woken up? Beck’s plans were murky, but he was at least proposing to
do
something. The longer she spent away from Sanctuary, the more she felt sickened by their complacency. The fact they’d all survived was important, but was it enough? Quiet lives and quiet deaths. Living in a kind of stasis, focused on preserving the past. Unmolested by their enemy because they presented zero threat to them.

It had begun to seem weak and pointless.

Yet she hesitated. The choice would commit more than just her, and she wasn’t sure it was right for her to make it. Despite being a councilwoman’s daughter, Asha had no authority or special influence in Sanctuary.

And she had to consider the two men in question. She didn’t fully trust Beck. And Paxton—despite knowing what she was supposed to feel about him, she didn’t like rewarding his efforts to help Beck’s people by betraying him.

But remember he’s promised no help for
you.

She was staring out the cockpit window, turning it all over in her mind, when Paxton rose from the console beside her.

“Banshee,” he said, “monitor the passengers and take control of navigation.”

“Yes, Captain.”

He glanced down at Asha, seated in the copilot chair. “Come with me.”

It was a command, no question about that. But the lines of his face had softened since she first boarded the ship, leading her to hope she wasn’t about to be interrogated again. Considering his last round of questioning had been interrupted by the discovery of Nefertiti, this was probably too much to hope for.

As they left the bridge, her heart knocked against her chest. Unpleasant as the last round of questioning had been, she’d had nothing to hide. This time would be different.

Banshee’s living space was limited, and a single cabin served as both kitchen and first aid station. Paxton led her there now, directing her to sit at the table while he retrieved the supplies they’d used in treating Beck’s people—a box of pungent salves, and the strange bandages that absorbed into the skin.

He pulled a chair next to her and leaned in to look at her neck. She flinched and drew back.

“Take it easy.” He leaned in again, lifting her chin as Beck had done, and the sudden contact sent a shiver through her. “What made this cut?”

“The mouthparts,” she said. “The hooks in front, I mean.”

His eyes shifted to her face. “It must have been close.”

“Very close.”

Paxton cleared his throat, and he raised his fingers to her neck. Breath hissed through her teeth as he touched the inflamed skin.

“I can do this myself,” she protested softly.

“I don’t doubt it.” But he continued to examine the cut. “It’s not deep, but it already looks infected. Be still for a moment.”

She froze as he smeared salve into her cut, the distraction of his proximity dulling the pain to a manageable level. She was no longer afraid of the physical threat he represented—it was like that side of him had gone to sleep. Now she was afraid of something else entirely.

“How did you get away?” he asked, positioning the flesh-colored membrane along her neck.

“I cut off one of its legs. Like you told me.”

The corners of his lips curled. “That I would like to have seen.” His barely there smile faded as he continued, “I don’t have to tell you what a big risk you took. You must have been frightened.”

Finished sealing the bandage, he drew back and looked at her.

She swallowed. “I thought we’d all die if I didn’t.”

His eyes flickered back down to the box of medical supplies as he replaced the salve and bandages. “We likely would have.”