I drew the katana. The blade caught the light from the window and held it as I headed for the stairs.
The stairwell behind usdripped with blood. My shoulder burned where the sutures had torn, and the gunshot graze on my side leaked warm against my waistband. We'd left a trail of bodies from the armory to here, and my hands still shook from strangling Zeus's doctor with his own stethoscope.
I hit the courtyard with the katana drawn.
Diego grabbed my arm. "Jasper, stop."
I yanked free. Eight sat at a table with a teacup in front of her and Zeus at her side, like this was a fucking garden party.
Zeus pushed up from his chair and put himself between me and the table, one hand on his sword hilt.
I planted my feet. Blood ran down my arm from the shoulder and dripped off my fingers onto the stones. "Move or die."
Zeus kept his sword sheathed. "You're frightening her," he said quietly.
Eight had closed a fist around a butter knife and gone rigid in her chair. She looked ready to spring. In a few seconds she'd gone from a content little girl back to a weapon.
I'd done that to her.
I lowered the katana and looked away.
Diego kept his shotgun shouldered. "She's not who we're aiming at."
"Diego," I said quietly and pushed the barrels down. "Don't."
"He's using her like a shield," Diego insisted. "Let me shoot him, guapo. Let's end this."
Diego was right. But Eight sat two feet from Zeus's chair, and I could still smell the blood on my hands from the last room. She'd endured enough.
Diego lowered the shotgun.
"Good," Zeus said, though he kept one hand near the sword. "Now we can talk like civilized people. Tea?" He gestured to the table behind him.
Eight still gripped the knife. She stared at me the way a child stares at the monster under her bed.
I looked at the table. At the tea. At Zeus standing there with his hand on a sword and a smile that said he already knew I'd sit.
I sat. The katana went across my lap, where I could reach it. Eight's knuckles had gone white on the butter knife, and if I kept standing with a blade in my hand she'd keep looking at me like that.
Diego lowered himself into the seat beside me, shotgun across his knees. He moved stiffly, one arm guarding his ribs.
I pressed my hand against my side. Blood seeped between my fingers.
Zeus returned to his chair and picked up the teapot. "I take it all my men upstairs are dead?"
"Da," I said stiffly.
"The doctor as well?"
"Very," Diego added.
Zeus sighed. "A pity. I always liked him. But you did what you thought you had to do. What you were trained to do. I suppose that means the blame falls on me."
"We wouldn't be here at all if you had a shred of decency," Diego blurted.
"Decency," Zeus said, sliding a steaming cup in front of Diego, "is what brought us here, to this crossroads. Isn't that right, Hephaestus?"
"It's Jasper." I said it through gritted teeth.
