Part 8 (2/2)
Persis looked up at him, her expression unreadable.
Silly aristo. ”DAR is a sickness of regs,” he explained, frustrated. ”No one in power in Galatea cared what happened to them.” He regarded her carefully. ”Can you honestly say it's any different in Albion?”
”We have very nice sanitariumsa”” Persis began halfheartedly.
”Let me guess. Beautiful gardens, impeccable grounds, bars on every window?” he scoffed. ”Don't tell me what they're like. I trained in one. And you know very well it's the same here. There's a reason your family wants your mother's condition kept secret.”
Persis said nothing, just stared at him with a defiantly raised chin.
”Your Princess Isla talks about avoiding a revolution,” he said. ”Perhaps she should start by admitting things in her country aren't as different from those in Galatea as she wants everyone to believe.”
She pursed her lips. ”I wouldn't know much about that,” was all she said. ”And I don't really care, either.”
”Then what do you care about?” he practically shouted.
Persis was silent again. ”I care about my mother's future. I know someone who works at the west coast sanitarium. Noemi Dorric. She's a brilliant medic,” she added, though Justen wasn't sure he should take Persis's word on the matter. Still a ”If you're serious about this, I can arrange to have you installed in a laboratory there as soon as tomorrow.”
He looked at Persis. ”You can do that?”
She rolled her eyes. ”Justen, I'm one of those aristos whose crus.h.i.+ng power you're always deriding. We can work it for good, too.”
”True,” he allowed with a chagrined smirk.
She lifted her shoulders. ”Besides, even if that weren't the case, you're a Helo and under the protection of Princess Isla. Your only challenge will be finding time to turn down all the invitations you're about to get for your medic services.”
”True again. Shall I rely on you to be my social secretary, then?”
At that, the aristo graced him again with one of her dazzling smiles. ”You couldn't have chosen better if you tried.”
Ten.
FOR A LONG TIME, the soldier called Trina Delmar floateda”weightless, senseless, like she used to at the bottom of the tide pools in the cove where she and her brother played when she was younger. Back then, she used to dream she was a fish, and wished she had the money to get a gengineered sea pony like the aristo girl up the bay had. But then the revolution had come and the aristo girl and her parents had disappeared and one day, Trina had seen the pony washed up on the sh.o.r.e, its marvelous coral flippers ragged and torn, its big, faceted golden eyes lifeless and swarming with blackflies.
The revolution. It was supposed to save them all. But then her brother had told her of impossible treasons and she'd tried to help him, only to be confronted with bleeding old men and guards who didn't seem to care as much for equality as for making people pay and a cliff top where the last person she'd expected to voiced the same fears as her brother hada”fears she didn't even want to admit were possible.
Senses began to intrude on her solitude. The m.u.f.fled sound of people talking, far, far away. A light, white and creamy, soft and blurry. The smell of orchids in the air. A soft, melodic tinkle that sounded almost like water in a fountain, but was far too musical for that. And, most of all, the ropes binding her ankles and her arms.
Trina's eyes shot open to see a bright dome above her head, framed at the edges by palm fronds strung with orchid leis. She sat up, and a wave of dizziness overtook her, but she tensed her muscles and blinked her eyes until her vision cleared.
”h.e.l.lo, Citizen Delmar,” said the womana”or rather, the girla”seated on the dais before her. She was all white from the tips of her high-piled hair to the sculpted white eyebrows against her golden-brown skin to her long cape and s.h.i.+mmering gown. As her feet knelt two handmaidens, both swathed in hooded robes of silvery gray. The princess regent of Albion, Isla. A royal, an aristo, and an enemy of the revolution. ”Welcome to my kingdom.”
In a rush, Trina's memory flooded back. The Wild Poppy. She'd been captured by the Wild Poppy. She looked desperately around the room for an escape route, for a weapon of some sort. The white cus.h.i.+ons and rugs wouldn't help her. The enormous planters would be too heavy to lift, even if she could break free. She tested the bonds and they tightened further.
”Trina,” the princess admonished, in a tone that meant she'd probably said the word a few times already. Right. Her name. So they didn't know. That could be useful. ”Don't waste your time, dear. You can't escape from nanothread ropes.”
”What do you want?” Trina asked. Her voice trembled on the words, which was not ideal behavior for a revolutionary soldier, but it's not as if she'd had much training in that area. She might have skills with a gun, but she was no Vania Aldred.
”To talk to you,” said the princess serenely. ”Though, to be honest, I personally don't see the value in it. You were captured by a sea mink. You're hardly a crack soldier.”
Just a child, echoed her brother's voice in her head. You can't possibly help. She'd hoped to prove him wrong, and now a ”But the Wild Poppy a.s.sures me you have potential, and his is an opinion I trust.”
”Hers,” Trina corrected before she could stop herself. ”I saw her. She's a girl.”
The princess regarded Trina, her eyes half-lowered, as if she was bored by the whole proceeding. ”Nothing wrong with her memory, I see.”
Trina felt the urge to cower. It must be that she was effectively at this woman's mercy, bound and imprisoned. After all, she'd not been raised to feel inferior to aristos, to bow her head before royalty.
”This is a waste of time,” Princess Isla said now, her tone almost thoughtful. ”Let's just kill her where she lies. I have some gengineered neuroeels in my dungeon I've been dying to put to use.”
Trina's blood ran cold. She'd seen neuroeels once, while diving for abalone with her brother down at the cove. A whole flock of them had descended upon a manta ray nearby. Her brother had held tightly to her arm as they watched the fight in horror. Not that it had been much of a fight. The ray was big enough to ride on, yet a few seconds into the attack the eels' neurotoxin sent its muscles into spasms. The ray had bolted toward the surface, its ma.s.sive, seizing wings churning the sea into a froth. Shudders had run the length of the manta ray's body, making its smooth gray skin look like ripples on a pond. The neuroeels clung fast to its white underside, little more than deadly black strings on the wings of a dying angel.
They'd never known what triggered the attack. Her brother had explained that neuroeels generally didn't go for large prey, despite the strength of their poison. He'd wondered, later, if they hadn't been escaped guard beasts, trained to torture people. One never knew what the queen had kept in her dungeons. At least, not until the revolution.
”Please a” she whispered. ”Please don't.” If she died here, her brother would never even know what had happened to her. No one would. Even if there was a record of ”Trina Delmar” being captured by the Poppy, she'd still disappear without a trace.
And then her brother would be truly alone in the world.
The princess blew out a breath of air through her nostrils. ”And you think this girl would make a good spy? Please. What will happen the first time Citizen Aldred threatens her with a Reduction pill?”
At the sound of the name, Trina flinched again. Citizen Aldred would never Reduce her. Ground her for life, possibly. It was her brother who would kill her for getting into this messa”that is, if she did get out alive.
All she'd wanted to do was help him before his moment of temporary insanity branded him an enemy of the revolution. What did she care about some Reduced aristos? But then she'd gone east and seen what was happening to old men, little children. Somehow, seeing the Reduced made all the difference in the world. And she'd started to understand why her brother had risked it all.
A flash of gold hovered near the princess's hand, and she turned over her palm and closed her eyes for a moment. ”A bandage on Lord Lacan's thumb,” she murmured to no one in particular, ”is hardly evidence of sympathy to our cause.”
Trina could certainly agree with that. She was not the one trying to stop the revolution. That was all on her brother. The idiot.
Then she cringed, remembering the way the guards had laughed when Lacan had cut his thumb. Remembering the way his grandchildrena”real children, not practically grown teens like hera”had been stumbling about in the field, their voices silenced, their brains wiped. What could they have done to deserve Reduction?
But that didn't mean she was on the side of the Wild Poppy.
One of the handmaidens cleared her throat. Another golden flower buzzed at the princess out of nowhere. Flutternotes, Trina realized. She'd never seen them in person before.
”Perhaps she just wanted to keep him alive to suffer longer,” said the first handmaiden, lifting her head. Trina recognized the blue-haired girl from the attack.
”Of course I wouldn't do that!” she snapped.
”Oh, so you wanted him dead?” the princess asked.
”No! Ia”” Why were they asking her these questions? What did it matter? ”I wasn't even supposed to be there, all right?”
Now the second handmaiden raised her head, and Trina saw the face of the girl dressed as a boy who'd attacked her on the skimmer. The face of the Wild Poppy.
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