EPIC: Fourteen Books of Fantasy (260 page)

The door hissed shut.

Quietly, oh so quietly, Tikaya picked up her work. It was possible someone had looked in, not seen anything interesting, and left, but she doubted it. That cursed assassin was the only one who walked without making a sound, and she had no idea what his intentions might be for her, especially now that she had, from the Turgonian viewpoint, escaped with the enemy. And if Rias had run off, too, Sicarius would know he had no intention of accepting the emperor’s offer.

Tikaya twisted the symbols to open a couple of cabinets beneath a nearby workstation. One was empty enough she thought she could fit inside.

She stuffed the cube in one cabinet and knelt before the larger one. Careful not to make a sound, she slid boxes and tools out of the way. She could barely breathe, but she fit.

She pulled the door most of the way shut. Since the cabinets had to be opened with a turn of the symbols, she assumed she could not get out if she locked herself in. Terrifying thought that. No one would ever find her, and the cabinet would be her tomb. The assassin might spot the door slightly ajar, but she had to risk it.

Silence reigned in the lab. Tikaya could hear her heart beating in her ears, her shallow breathing. The awkward position cramped her diaphragm. Minutes dragged past.

She closed her eyes and rearranged digits in her head. The four-by-four box reminded her of a Skiltar Square, those puzzles where the goal was to arrange the numbers so that every column, row, and diagonal added up to the same sum. It seemed unlikely an alien race would have the same math games, but she rearranged and totaled the digits in her head anyway, seeing if she could find a combination that worked from all sides. It surprised her when she found an arrangement where each option added up to one hundred twenty. Could that be the way into the weapons cache?

Her fingers tingled with excitement. Or maybe numbness from sitting scrunched up in a cabinet. Her tailbone ached. She longed to crawl out and check her math with pencil and paper. Maybe Sicarius had left, or had never been there to start with.

Tikaya lifted her hand to the door, about to push it open. Then someone glided past the crack.

Black clothing, blond hair.

She held her breath and closed her eyes, as if the assassin might feel her stare through the crack. He had sensed the clairvoyant watching him, after all.

A minute later, the door hissed again, and she spilled out of the cabinet. Sitting on the floor beneath the pulsing blue light, she checked her math with pencil and paper. Every row, every column, and even the diagonals added up to one hundred and twenty. Maybe it meant nothing. Or maybe it was the solution to the puzzle.

She hopped to her feet, longing to go check it, but thanks to the cave-in she was not sure how to get back to the cavern.

The door hissed again. Tikaya cursed to herself. Now what?

Footsteps sounded on the landing. She reached for the cabinet door, ready to hide again.

“Tikaya?” Rias.

Relief swarmed her. “Up here!”

She skirted the workstations and almost crashed into him at the top of the stairs. He wore his rucksack and carried a rifle, but he managed to envelop her in a fierce hug. She clamped onto him just as fiercely, burying her face in his neck. He smelled of black powder and blood, but it didn’t matter.

“You came for me,” she whispered.

“Of course.”

“The explosions... I was afraid you were...”

“Me too,” he said, voice hoarse. “I feared you’d been caught in that cave-in. Bocrest was too quick to light the charges. He was supposed to wait until—it doesn’t matter now. If I’ve succeeded, they think the weapons are buried and I’m dead.”

She lifted her arms, intending to hook them over his shoulders, but her fingers encountered dampness. A torn section of uniform wrapped his biceps like a bandage. She drew back, staring at blood on her hand.

“You’re wounded!”

“Lancecrest got lucky.” Rias twitched a shoulder. “It’s just a scrape. It’ll be fine. Besides, it was worth it. He was carrying something you might find useful.” He unbuttoned a pocket, withdrew her spectacles, and draped them over her ears.

Tikaya slumped against his chest. She should have been elated to have her vision back, but a lump of guilt lodged in her throat. “You got shot trying to help me. I’m sorry.”

Rias took her face in his hands. “I’d risk a lot more than a trifling arm to help you.”

Comforted by his words, she tilted her head back.

He seemed on the verge of kissing her, but he cleared his throat and glanced around. “Are you...alone?”

“Yes, though Sicarius was here a few minutes ago.” She realized he had probably been wondering about Parkonis, but his eyes widened at the mention of the assassin.

“He was? Rust, he’s not supposed to be on this side of the cave-in. He must have found a way through.” He scrubbed his face. “Maybe we’ll get lucky and be able to avoid him.”

“I haven’t seen Parkonis since before the explosions,” Tikaya said. “Do you know if he... Did any of the raiders make it?”

“I didn’t see him amongst the dead.” Rias took a deep breath. “Tikaya, I’ll help you find him, but I need you to know... When he appeared and absconded with you I... My first thought was to hurl myself into that chasm. But there’s a stigma against suicide in my culture, and regardless it’s always seemed like giving up, which isn’t something I’ve ever strived to master. I fully intend to fight for you.”

“Rias—”

“I know he represents your dream, the life you always wanted, and I know its selfish of me to want you when it could alienate you from your family, but... How is it he’s been alive a year and never found a way to let you know? I would have toppled an empire to get back to you.”

“Rias—”

“I can’t walk away and let him have you, Tikaya. Not if there’s a chance...”

“Rias.”

He opened his mouth again, but she flattened her palm over his lips. His shoulders slumped, and wariness hooded his eyes.

“I appreciate hearing those things very much.” She grinned at the idea of him toppling an empire—for most people, that was just an expression, but she wouldn’t put it beyond his means. “But there’s no need for you to go on.” She lowered her hand, brushing his lips with her thumb. “You have me.”

He gaped at her in stunned silence.

“You have me for a lot of reasons,” she said quietly, “but especially because you’re willing to give up everything to be here at my side, plotting against your people to destroy those weapons. The definition of a good man is someone who makes the moral choice when temptation invites him to do otherwise. The definition of a hero is someone who makes that moral choice even when temptation, threat of reprisal, and the mores of his culture invite him to do otherwise.” She considered her words and issued a self-deprecating smirk. “That was preachy, wasn’t it?”

“Oh, no, I liked it. Especially the part where you’re calling me a hero.” He grinned, eyes sparkling, and her heart danced.

“I’m sure I’m not the first, Fleet Admiral Starcrest.”

“In Turgonia, you’re a hero if you sink more ships than anyone else.” He tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear and laid his forehead against hers. “I like your definition better.”

“Good. I hope you like this too: I don’t want you worrying about being selfish because you want to have a life with me. I want one with you too. Some people are worth changing your dreams for.” She kissed him, wishing there was time for more. “I want to be with you. Always. Even if it means we’re both exiles on your forsaken prison island.”

Rias’s grip tightened. “Cursed ancestors, don’t say that.”

“It’s the truth, though I’m going to be terribly disappointed if the preeminent military strategist of the era can’t outsmart a teenage assassin in order to avoid that fate.”

Whatever Rias’s retort was going to be, it was lost when the door hissed open.

Before Tikaya could do more than think of hiding, Sicarius strode in. His gaze swiveled upward to lock on them. The pulsing blue light painted his face in eerie shadows. Blood stained his short blond hair, spattered the side of his face, and painted his hands. As those dark hard eyes raked her, she had an unsettling hunch none of it was his. Two pistols were jammed into his belt, and he carried a dagger. A drop of blood fell from the blade and splashed on the landing.

“Sicarius, good,” Rias said.

Good? The assassin looked like he was about to kill both of them. Tikaya stifled the incredulous expression that wanted to waltz across her face.

“Do you have the door symbols from the journal?” Rias asked.

“You assured Captain Bocrest you were placing the blasting sticks to provide a distraction, but the tunnels came down in such a way that he believed the weapons cavern had been buried and you with it.” Sicarius spoke in such an emotionless monotone it was almost possible to miss the accusation in those words. “I informed the captain that it was unlikely you would miscalculate so badly. The marines are searching the tunnels for you and her.” His cool eyes flicked Tikaya’s way.

She groaned inwardly. The plan would have worked if the emperor’s perceptive henchman wasn’t here. She glanced at Rias, almost expecting him to dive behind the railing and rip his pistol free for a shot, but he did not.

“Demolitions are dangerous and sometimes unpredictable,” Rias said. “We can, of course, rejoin the others now, though why not get through the locked door and finish the mission while the relic raiders are too scattered to guard their cache? Do you have the symbols?”

“Yes,” Sicarius said, no sign on his face of whether he believed Rias’s lies. “I already tried them.”

“How?” Tikaya asked.

No doubt, he was agile enough to scale the side of that butte, but not with those invisible beams waiting to slice off limbs.

“Bow and arrow,” Sicarius said.

Rias lifted an eyebrow toward Tikaya. He probably had not had as good a look at the entryway as she had. She nodded thoughtfully. If Gali had used telekinesis to nudge the symbols around, she supposed something thrown—or shot—against them could do the same job.

“You lined them up?” Tikaya had assumed the numbers she copied were a different set than the ones that had appeared the day Lancecrest got in.

“As close as I could. Not all the symbols matched those in the journal.”

“Maybe you misread them,” Rias said.

Those dark eyes turned a shade cooler. “I did not.”

“I’ve been told the symbols change periodically,” Tikaya said. “It was probably designed so people who knew the secret to the puzzle could always get in, providing they had the math skills, whereas others would have, well, the trouble Lancecrest’s team has had.”

“You know the secret?” Sicarius glided up the stairs, eyes locked on her.

Rias dropped to the step in front of her, blocking the assassin’s advance. Sicarius halted.

“I’m close,” Tikaya said. Or not even remotely close. It was one of the two. “It would help to see the symbols you have that worked before, even if they don’t now.”

For a long moment, Sicarius stared past Rias’s shoulder at her. Finally, he wiped the dagger, sheathed it with the myriad others he carried, and handed her the torn scrap of paper, neatly folded.

“Thank you.” Half the numbers were the same. She would have to check the sphere to translate the others. “I have some ideas about how to get through the web.” Maybe pretending to include Sicarius in their plans would make him more likely to believe they shared the same goal. She put a hand on Rias’s shoulder. “Can you make something that causes smoke? A lot of smoke?”

“With the right ingredients, yes.” Rias snapped his fingers. “Sicarius, can you get us some bat guano from the cavern?”

Tikaya almost choked. Bat guano?

Sicarius’s eyes narrowed. “There is no potassium nitrate in these labs?”

Of course. Potassium nitrate—salt peter—was harvested in bat guano-rich caves, and it was one of the core ingredients in black powder. The kid was bright. They would have to be very careful—and probably lucky—to trick him into helping.

“I haven’t seen any,” Tikaya said. Which was true. With her spectacles missing she had not bothered examining the lab closely.

“I’ll prepare the vats and put together the rest of the ingredients to make some smoke bombs,” Rias said. “And Tikaya will work on the entry code for us. We can finish your mission before Bocrest even misses you.”

“Bat guano,” Sicarius said. “Very well.”

As soon as the door shut behind him, Tikaya and Rias grabbed each other’s arms and started to talk at the same time.

“You first,” Rias said.

“First, I think it’ll be a lot easier to find potassium nitrate in one of these labs than making it from scratch, but I assume you’re just trying to keep him busy.”

Rias nodded. “Yes.”

“Second, can you look at this and tell me what you think? These are the translated numbers from the door pad.” She fished out the page with her solution for the puzzle, wincing as she handed it to him. It had seemed a logical guess during her in-cabinet mulling, but now that she had to share the hypothesis with someone else, she feared it a foolish one.

“A Skiltar Square?” Rias asked. “It looks like you solved it. In Turgonia, you can get books full of them to entertain your precocious children.”

He smirked, and she wondered how many his parents had foisted on him. Her amusement at the idea faded quickly.

“This can’t be right then,” she said. “Too simple for these people. And surely they wouldn’t have had similar puzzles to what we have.”

“Why not? In your studies, haven’t you found that the fundamental properties of numbers are the same in every language, amongst every people? Mathematics surely transcends humanity, existing whether we do or not, so it doesn’t seem odd to me that another species would play the same sorts of games with numbers. And why wouldn’t this entrance code be simple? Do you think someone carrying a toxic weapon up a ramp would have wanted to stand outside the door for three hours making calculations? What if he dropped one of those poison-filled vials and it broke at his feet? Big oops, eh?”

Tikaya laughed. She had not considered that.