Venus City 1 (17 page)

She straightened up, and folded her arms across her chest. “It's not as impressive as you make it sound.”

“Then perhaps I should show you something else?” He moved closer to her, and she felt trapped. He grabbed her hands, and she chose not to resist this time. His skin was so soft, and she hated that she knew that. She wasn't supposed to be touching this foreigner.

Hatred. Remember,
hatred
was all she was supposed to feel for him. But…

Where had her anchor gone? He was no longer acting business-like. In fact, he’d abandoned that almost instantly, and now she was left to flounder through his sticky charms with nothing to keep her balanced, whole.

Asher brought her hands up to his neck—the thought of encircling it and choking him crossed her mind briefly—and then trailed it ever so slowly down his right bicep and to the bottom of his sleeve, so that her fingers could brush away the shirt and his forearm was exposed. She gasped at the small tattoo just below the angle of his elbow. It looked like a sun, but its rays were pointed like that of a star, and at the ends of those were thin, swirly tendrils, like smoke. It was a dark, inky blue, but faded, as if it had sunk too far into his skin. It could have been merely a shadow.

“That's the master-friend link, Bray,” he said, still holding her hand that hovered over his arm. “You have one, too.”

“Where?” She frowned, not remembering seeing anything like that on her body.

He shrugged, now staring at the exposed skin at her collar. “I don't know. Ness applied it. Want me to find it for you?” As he said that, his hand was brushing up her arm, and she jumped back at his touch. At the same moment, a strange sound came from the other side of the gazebo. It sounded like someone clearing their throat.

“Right,” Asher scowled. “We should start de-hazing. Page is waiting.”

Had Page just seen that entire encounter between them? Braya groaned inwardly. If her mother knew of all the new ways she was interacting with men today, she would surely disown her.

Plus, if she really did only feel hatred for him, why was she so receptive to his attention, to his touch? It was an unsettling thought that Braya didn’t like to ponder.

Page proved to be wholesomely silent. He and Asher remained invisible for most of their trek through Heart District, and Braya couldn't help wishing that Asher had never mentioned Page was accompanying them. While keeping up with Asher's conversation required enough of her energy, she would have preferred the blond boy to say something once in a while as it took more of her energy to figure out where he was standing than it would to talk to him. Sometimes she forgot entirely that he was with them—it was easy, with Asher's constant chatter—but she'd remember suddenly, randomly, that he was near,
somewhere
, maybe only an arm's reach away, and it made her uneasy.

At one point she'd asked Asher why Page never spoke. He merely dismissed her question with a shrug and nonchalant, “That's just how he is,” and Braya didn't know how to broach the subject again, so she dropped it altogether. Perhaps she'd figure it out later, she mused. After all, Braya needed to find the Locer's weakness, and that meant she had to know everything about them.

De-hazing didn't make any sense to Braya. So far they'd spent hours zigzagging through Heart District in pursuit of the red dots charted on the sketched map. Like Asher had claimed, finding the dots posed no challenge—rather, the challenge was in implanting the boosters. The designated locations were always different in nature. The side of a building, shop windows, roofs, the street's pavement, grass, dirt, light posts, Rail stations, even parked vehicles. The boosters reacted differently on each surface, and a few times they had refused the surfaces all together. It was never as easy as it had been when she'd applied the boosters to her own skin.

“I don't get what these boosters are supposed to do,” Braya panted, wiping her brow. They were perched on the top of a coffee shop, and she was trying to apply one of the endless supply of boosters along its shingled roof with no luck. “How will these warn the citizens of war?”

“Bray,” Asher responded in mock admonishment, “don't you remember? You just do your job. Focus on the smaller picture and let the others focus on the big picture.”

“In other words,” she grunted, wrestling the small piece of paper to stick onto the shingles, “You don't know either.”

“You're finally paying attention,” Asher's voice teased. “If you want to know all these questions, why not ask Ness? I'm sure he'd be thrilled to hear them.”

Somehow Braya doubted that. “You sound so resentful when you talk about him,” she commented, her attention still focused wholly on sticking the stupid booster onto the roof. Why wouldn't it just stick? Her enhanced vision allowed her to see all the dents and grooves of the roof, but nothing about the enhanced clarity of her problem was helping her stick the booster on.

“Of course,” Asher snorted. He was somewhere to her right, and his voice sounded as if he'd just moved closer to her. “He thinks himself quite something, he does. I could do a much better job than he is. No, Brays, I don't think resentment is even the right term. Complete and utter disgust might do it justice. By the way, is that something your men folk can't feel either?” If ever a voice held as much expression as someone's face could, Asher would be smirking.

“They don't feel resentment, no,” Braya replied simply, now gritting her teeth. “What does that matter to you?”

“I'm curious,” he replied conversationally.

“Try that panel behind you,” Page's ethereal voice came from somewhere over her shoulder. Braya started, and nearly lost her balance. She'd forgotten he was there again, damn him! She craned her neck to see the panel that Page was talking about. It was a small, square shape embedded into the roof, like a window, although she'd never known windows to be made of metal. Its material was different than the shingles, though, and that's all that mattered.

“So they’re conveniently missing some of the less favored emotions we fully developed folks have, is that it?”

“That’s what it seems like,” she replied distractedly.

“It has to be a woman behind this whole thing. Lust considered a negative emotion?” He snorted.

“There’s no one behind anything. Those are just the facts of life in this day and age. Besides, I never said anything about lust.”

“You didn’t have to. I know enough of this city to figure out that is one of the biggest things these guys lack.”

“Your point?”

“Well, can you honestly tell me you believe the men here are just born like that?” Asher asked pompously. “They're like...dehumanized. Shells of humans, and nothing more. Is that normal to you, Bray?”

“Yes.
Very
normal,” she snapped, crawling toward the panel. She could see that this surface was a lot smoother, and was nearly excited when the booster stuck immediately. A purple shimmer glossed over the panel before disappearing. It was the same reaction every object had displayed so far, and Braya couldn't help wondering what they were meant to do. There were no names on the boosters and the design was horribly complex and indiscernible. “That's how they are.”

Asher's body appeared as she was moving to perch herself at the edge of the roof where they'd climbed up. She had complained that he should have given her climbing enhancement because she had nearly fallen to her death numerous times already.

Asher's eyes danced with amusement, but Braya pointedly ignored him. “Don't you think it's odd, though? Now you see us Ephraimans, strapping and just as capable of experiencing every shade of the human condition as you women are, and you still think that it's normal? Haven't you ever considered it has something to do with Venus Sare?”

“I haven't the faintest idea,” she grunted as she missed a couple of the rungs of the fire escape, “of what you're talking about,” she finished in a whoosh of breath. She landed on the second level platform and glanced down at the ground. Normally such a stunt would have her head spinning, or the ground trembling beneath her, but ever since she'd been
enhanced
, Braya reveled the adrenaline that came with it and secretly wished they would continue this all day if only for her to make use of her new skills.

After they climbed down to the narrow, tidy alleyway, Asher handed her the map.

“You don't know what Venus Sare is? Please tell me you're joking,” he said, leaning against the side of the building.

Braya didn't look up from the map as she replied, “I don't waste my jokes on you, sorry.”

“So you must not know about the other Sares? Ephraim, Nanlynn, I could go on. What do your people here think runs this city, then? Technology? Science?” He snorted. “That ship has sailed. Died with the first stage of the Great War.”

“It doesn't matter, does it?” She replied coolly, trying to analyze the map. She wasn't having a lot of luck, not when Asher was drilling her with questions she'd rather not think about.

“It's called Venus Vault,” she finally admitted, after she realized he wasn't following her to their next location. Braya stared at him, cool and elegant against the slab of stone he leaned on, and shuddered at the ice blue gaze that penetrated her through.

“What is that?” He asked, casually pushing off from the building and walking to the mouth of the alley, where Braya waited. Braya wasn't sure where Page was, but she was sure he was nearby. She could feel it.

“There's this thing called the Venus Vault,” she said impatiently. “It's what gives us everything we need. It gives us what we used to have, before that stupid war destroyed everything. Cars, computers, tech pads, boosters, stuff like that, and much more. Venus Vault provides it, and we don't question it.”

“That's gotta be the Sare, then. You know it's because of the Sares that the war started, right?” He asked condescendingly, his frame towering over her. It was then that she realized how close he was, tried to sidestep him, and collided with something invisible. Asher let out a howl of a laugh.

“Finally useful for something, Page,” he said as his hand curled around her wrist and pulled her close to his chest, like one would a book they were about to read carefully. Even the way his eyes, as cold and soft as snow, studied her, Braya could imagine herself a book he meant to lose himself in.

As riveting as his stare was, something else caught her attention. There was something about his touch—something that had been absent during the nippets of flesh they'd shared on the gazebo—that sent her nerves on overdrive. It ignited something in her, and made her skin ache in a strangely pleasant manner. Asher's gaze smoldered, his mouth curving as if to say something, and then he paused. Had he noticed the weird feeling too?

“Stop fooling around,” Page's clipped voice interrupted. Braya yanked free of Asher with a blush, and stalked away, trying to recollect the scattered remains of her composure as she went.

They were near the Prince Canal, and Braya hoped that the next dot on the map wasn't in plain sight. So far most of the places she'd had to implant—she found that word didn't match what they were doing, but supposed it was better than
sticking
—had been well concealed or there hadn't been a lot of people around to worry about being spotted by. That in of itself, in the Heart District at least, was a miracle. Braya felt like their luck was running thin, though. The Canal was one of the most popular places in the entire city. She didn't know why. It was just another romance gimmick, something that strung women along by two threads; enjoying it themselves and pretending that their men enjoyed it, too. Because they didn't.

When the Canal came into view, Braya felt her stomach clench. It was bustling—no, brimming, no
swamped
—with people. The man-made canal was beautifully constructed. Stone foot bridges arching over the narrow channel of calm, blue water; twisting, flowered vines and ivy clutching at the stone sides; small, pencil-shaped boats bobbing along the water; strings of fairy lights hovering about; dainty shops and restaurants lining the streets on both sides.

People were leaning over the bridges to stare down at the water and wave at the couples floating by. Braya tried to maneuver her way through the crowds of people without being shoved, and silently hoped the two invisibles trailing her would have a stickier time than she had.

It turned out that there were several dots along the canal. There shouldn't have been any surprise there, she scolded herself. As of yet, none of the implants had been more than thirty yards apart. The Canal easily streamed through Heart District for a few miles.

At first it wasn't difficult. The fact that there were so many people actually worked to their advantage. They were too busy, too excited, to notice one girl slinking along the canal and rubbing boosters onto random objects or landmarks, despite the way she was dressed. At the end of the canal was when they encountered the problem.

Braya was meant to place a booster on a regal statue that gleamed under the sunlight at the end of the canal. Its shape was that of a man bending a woman over his arm and kissing her, and there was a long line of people winding up to the foot of the statue, all of them waiting to take a picture in front of the famous statue.

“Get closer and just do it,” Asher's breath tickled her ear, and she felt something against her lower back, something she presumed to be his hand. “Put it on the base.”