Dark Horizons (The Red Sector Chronicles) (46 page)

The nurse blinked.
“Of what, Dr. De Lange?”

Paris
looked at him. Her eyes held
ice
.

“That our e
mperor is dead.”

***

The flurry of events that followed rivaled all time warps.

I knew the second Fro
st received Paris’s message
because a hoard of troops marched into the room,
with
Leo and Arika in tow.

“Well, if it isn’t Sloane McAllister,” a girl with a crew cut said, marching forward. She gave me a once-over, then sneered.
Judging from her lack of a mask, she obviously stood on the side of the argument that the virus was a hoax.
“Why does this not surprise me?”

“I didn’t know I had fan girls,” I said, returning her sarcasm with a smirk of my own. “If you want, I can sign autographs later.”

Her eyes flared. “You’ll keep your smartass comments to yourself and follow me.” That last part had an “or else” tone to it.

I glanced at Leo and Arika. Arika was trying really hard not to look scared, which meant she was probably freaking out inside. I felt bad for her, for dragging
her
to
some
place that was obviously way south of her comfort zone.

Leo seemed all right, though I worried about him being exposed to the virus. Nobody had bothered giving him a mask, and I was sure they could sense his vampiric signature.
I could tell he hated being
manhandled
, but he had enough sense to not try to fight it. I wondered what became of
Rook and Dezyre, but right now,
I had other things
to
worry about.

Not wanting either Leo or Arika to pay for my fresh comments, I zipped it and started to follow Crew Cut out the door.

“Wait.”

We stopped and turned around. Aden was climbing out of bed. “I’m coming too.”

“Absolutely not!” I said, rushing back over to the bed to force him back down. “You need to rest.”

It was as if Crew Cut had just noticed him. I supposed as pale as he was, he did blend in with the sheets a bit. “Aden Knight?
” Crew Cut said, her eyes narrowing with suspicion. “
Well, I’ll be damned. You’re alive.
Last I heard, you were close to croaking.”

I clenched my jaw to suppress a growl. I noticed she hadn’t addressed h
im as “Captain Knight.”

Frost must have stripped him of his ranking.

Aden’s cool gaze never wavered. “I made a miraculous recovery,” he said evenly.
I was surprised by the strength in his voice, considering how weak he looked.
“Sorry to disappoint you,
Lieutenant
Davies.”

“That’s Captain Davies,” she snapped.

Aden seemed more amused than affronted. “My apologies,
Captain
.”

Davies pressed
her
lips together, looking like she’d sucked on a lemon.
She eyed him up and down, a smirk growing on her face. “You know, now that you mention it, yo
u should join us. I’m sure the G
eneral will want to know exactly how you recovered from such a fatal illness.”

I spun around, teeth bared. “You’re only asking him to come along because you want to rub it in, what Frost has done to him. And you want to see him suffer. You can clearly see he’s not fit to be moved.”

“Oh, I’m not ‘asking’ him to do anything,” she said, arching a brow. “I’m telling him.”

I had a few choic
e words I wanted to say to that
but kept my mouth shut. I was afraid if I flew off the handle, they’d take it out on Aden. Or Arika or Leo.

My fist shook at my side. Damn. I didn’t like being checkmated.

Davies snapped her fingers, and two guards moved forward to seize Aden.

“For the love of God!” I screeched as they dragged him out of bed. He nearly went down; I saw his jaw flexing as he struggled to stand on shaking kn
ees. “At least give him a wheel
chair!”

It was as if I hadn’t spoken. Holding him up by the arms, they literally dragged him across the room toward the door.

Seething, I raced after them, with every intention of knocking them aside to get to him if I had to, when Davies intercepted me.

“General Frost doesn’t like to be kept waiting.”

Without saying another word, she marched out the door, grabbing me by the arm as she did and towing me along.

I thought about jerking my arm free but figured that would probably just lead to trouble.
With barely contained anger
, I let her haul me along, through the halls and out the doors toward the Council Building.

Davies wasted no time in ushering us inside. My
pulse
started picking up speed as we walked through the onyx hallways toward the main meeting chamber.
I kept glancing ahead at Aden. I couldn’t see his face, but from the catch in his step and the labored breaths siphoning in and out of his mouth, I knew he was having a hard time just staying conscious. Dying had to
of
take
n
something out of
him
.

Davies burst through the doors to the chamber without preamble, and I expected to meet an onslaught of noise and arguments. But strangely, all was silent.

The Council sat in their high seats, gazing at us with a mixture of sadness and loathing. Mrs. Knight nearly leapt out of her seat upon s
potting Aden. His eyes met hers
and he
forced a
reassuring
smile
.

His mom
looked like
she had
seen a ghost. Her normally p
orcelain face looked more drawn
out, like she had lost a lot of weight. That was saying something, considering she was already super skinny.

I felt sorry for her. I couldn’t imagine what it’d be like to think
my
only child was dead.

Frost rose from her seat; I think she only did so to make herself seem more intimidating. She stared down at me with hatred in her eyes. “How dare you show your face again around here, McAllister.”

Her voice chilled the air, but I didn’t budge as Davies led me to the front of the room.

Aden
spoke before I could get a word in. “She saved my life,”
he
said
, struggling to make his raspy words carry throughout the room
. “Possibly all our lives.
Thanks to her, we now have the necessary samples to begin finding a cure for the Red Death.
She is a hero and deserves our gratitude.”

Frost’s frigid eyes snapped to him, widening as if she only now realized he was standing there. “Aden Knight,” she said curtly. “You’re supposed to be dead.”

Mrs. Knight’s face flashed with anger, but she kept her mouth shut.

“I am,” Aden said simply. “But here I am, alive and well, because one woman was willing to take on a Goliath and she won.”

“Nero was a mighty emperor,” Frost said, her words shaking with rage. “How dare you compare him to some fabled villain.”

“Because he was a villain!” Aden shouted
hoarsely
, his words ringing through the hall. “He was worse than Caesar or
any other crook
from our history!”

“ENOUGH!”

I flinched
. Frost had never raised her voice to that level. She’d always relied on quiet
wrath
.

Her glare was all steely eyes and pinched lips. “You will not s
ay another word about our e
mperor,” she said coldly. “Or I will have you executed on the spot.”

A
nother
guard stepped behind Aden,
armed with a gun,
as if to drive the threat home.

He turned his head, probably sizing up the guard from his peripheral vision. I resisted the urge to smirk. That guard, no matter how good he thought he was, was no match against Aden Knight.

“The way I see it,” Frost said after the noise had died down, “all of you a
re responsible for Nero’s death
, if he’s even dead.
”

“He is,” I said, reaching into my bra. “And here’s your proof.”

I chucked the ring at Frost’s head; she snatched it out of the air like catching a fly. As her fingers unfurled and she stared at it in her palm, her eyes widened in shock. She could no doubt smell the acid on the blood coating the emblem.

Fisting her hand around the ring, she lowered her head and closed her eyes for a few seconds, fury rising on her face.

A sick chill ran through me. I knew where this was going.

Frost
opened her eyes and
looked right at me.

“You’re all to be executed at dawn
for the murder of our e
mperor
.”

Mrs. Knight flew out of her chair, as did several other
council
members.

“This is bullshit!”

Every head in the room turned around to gawk at Leo,
who had
managed to wrestle out of the grasp of the girl holding him. He sauntered forward, his faze as fiery as Frost’s was cold.

“How dare you!” Frost screeched. “Insubordination will not be tolerated.”

“Look, lady,” Leo said, biting off each word. “I don’t know who the hell you are, and I don’t
care. All I know is that your e
mperor was one sick son of a bitch that deserve
d everything that came to him.”

I wished I could have disappeared. Frost stood there, mouth agape, staring at Leo as if he had just smacked her. It felt like all the air sucked out of the
room, like Frost would go super
nova on us any second now.

Surprisingly, she was very calm when she spoke. “Nero was a saint, a savior to us all. We would still be lost in the darkness had it not been for him. Wha
t makes you think you knew our e
mperor better than us?”

Leo’s mouth quirked up in a proud smile.

“Because I’m Sloane McAllister’s protégé.”

Aden’s head snapped around, his cool blue eyes narrowing on Leo.

I
grimaced
.
Uh-
oh.

I tried to look away but not quick
enough. Aden’s eyes met mine, giving me a look
that clearly said, “We’ll talk later.”

I could
feel Aden’s conflicted emotions;
anger, surprise, and jealousy all rolled into one.

Let him be angry. It didn’t matter
what he
thought
. I wasn’t going to let Leo die.

“Ha,” Frost laughed dryly. “The terrorist’s protégé. What an award-winning title.”

“She’s not a terrorist,” Leo spat, not backing down. “She’s a hero, but you’re too stupid to see it.”

Frost’s mouth flapped open, as if she
were
trying to come back with a reprimand but her voice di
dn’t know how to work. I guess
she wasn’t used to having people stand up to her so gallantly.

Leo began pacing the arc of tall
chairs, eyeing each one of the c
ouncil members. “All of you know too well how a wolf can easily deceive a sheep looking for a shepherd.” His voice carried through the room. “
As I speak, you’re being deceived right now.”

“Hold your tongue!” Frost shouted.

Leo whirled on her. “No,” he said, his voice strong as iron. “Because someone needs to tell the truth about
Nero
.
Or shall I say,
Orion
.
”

To
my surprise, none of the other c
ouncil members moved to stop him as he launched into the details of Orion’s past, of his childhood favor for cruelty and bloodshed. I’d also had a penchant for fighting, but only in self-defense. Orion seemed to crave suffering like a drug, often starting
fights for no reason. Sometimes
I even saw him as a bully.

The c
ouncil members
’
reactions were very interesting
to watch. Some looked skeptical, others
enthralled. It had probabl
y never occurred to them their Chosen One
was actually more of a
Hitler
.

Leo told them everything – at least, all the details he knew – about Orion’s plans. He spouted off about the lab, th
e club, everything. One of the c
ouncilwomen even raised her lip up in disgust as Leo mentioned the part where Orion had fed off a human girl.