So much for a stealthy landing.
His holocomm pulsed green, the signal that he was in range of the meeting point. He cut the engines and slowed the bike to a crawl, scanning the treeline. This was one of those times Mira would really be helpful. She had a knack for spotting marks he never saw coming.
But he’d sent her to find the Speaker, so he didn’t see the man emerging from the trees until he was already in the clearing.
Zane braked in the middle of the field, sliding off the bike. He didn’t take his hand off his pulser.
The man that approached looked nothing like Mylis. His face was lined and withered by age, marred with what looked to be scars from welts. His graying hair was shorn short, but despite his hunched, emaciated frame, there was an air of darkness about him—one that raised the hairs on Zane’s arms.
As wind howled through the clearing, neither spoke.
What was he supposed to call a former count who’d turned out to be the world’s most infamous traitor? Count Grant? Lord Grant? Certainly not something as plain as Mr. Grant—the man had once been among the most powerful nobles on the planet.
“You’re Zander and Kirah’s son,” Grant murmured at last, as his hazel eyes swept across Zane’s face.
Zane nodded. Grant’s tone felt uncomfortably vulnerable, and he resisted the urge to look away from this weathered, worn-down man.
Grant drew in a slow breath. “You’re friends with my boy?”
“Yeah.”
He smiled, but it looked broken. “Good. My Elle would’ve been happy to hear that, I think. Kirah, too.”
Zane shifted his weight between his feet. Everything about this man put him on edge. He’d been expecting someone menacing, like the other convicts who’d escaped from Titan, but Landon Grant seemed oddly normal. Somehow, that made him seem more dangerous.
“You can get me into the palace?” Zane asked.
Unless it was a trap.
“Can you save my son?” Grant peered past him, and a sharp frown creased his face. “Where are the rest of your men?”
“Mira’s on it.” But the rage he’d glimpsed in Mylis’s eyes quickly seemed to be brewing in his father’s, so he added, “She’s collecting the reinforcements.”
Technically, the Speakerwasbackup. Just not the sort Grant imagined.
Grant nodded, seemingly placated. “Are we waiting on them?”
“No. I’m supposed to be causing the diversion while you locate Mylis. They’ll sneak in and retrieve him while I keep Lexington’s attention.”
“Kirah’s son, through and through,” Grant said softly. He jerked his head towards the treeline and motioned for Zane to follow him. “There’s an escape tunnel this way. Hasn’t been used in… oh, decades now. We shouldn’t run into any guards. But you’ll have to hurry.”
A chill trickled down Zane’s spine. “Why?”
“Your girl’s ship touched down thirty minutes ago. By now, she’s probably in the palace.”
Dali, Sector 4
Undecemmensis-22, 817 cycles A.F.C.
Winter winds roaredlike crashing tides, flinging grit into Kalie’s eyes as she trudged towards the palace gates. She pulled her jacket tighter, but the frigid air pierced through the thin fabric. Shivering violently, she brought her numb hands to her mouth and blew into them. The futility of it crashed down on her like a cloud of darkness, and she lowered her hands. Warmth didn’t matter. She’d be dead soon enough.
As she reached the towering iron gates, topped with soaring golden doves, the sun’s last rays disappeared beyond the mountains. The faint lavender and periwinkle glows vanished from the sky’s canvas, and a blanket of night draped over the capital.
That was the last sunset she would ever see.
Kalie’s throat tightened. She had to do this. The battle was lost, but she could save thousands by turning herself in. Her people, her allies, their troops, Mira and Zane, Mylis and Ariah.
Ariah. Every time her eyelids fell, that horrific image of her rottingflesh was waiting, but it was no better when she opened her eyes. Each landmark she passed—the swing they’d strung up between two withering trees, the river where they’d dared each other to dive, the burrow where Ariah had found a three-legged stray—all of it brought back memories of her laughing, golden-haired sister. The woman she loved more than her own life. The woman she’d abandoned to die.
