Page 82 of Bride of the Enemy Alien

“Temporary containment in East Nine dry cistern. Salt, ash, bone pins. Door open. Witnesses present. He teaches us every off-world signal pattern he knows. We set watchers for sky response, not bells. We keep the City normal until we know more.”

“Door open?” Adran asks.

“If you want a cage, say cage,” she snaps.

He stops arguing. I should be grateful. Instead, I am afraid. Not of Syin’s blade or Merra’s hands or Adran’s suspicion. Of Kessa refusing to pretend the choice is simpler than it is.

Rosalind nods. “Done.”

Visidion says, “And if a stronger signal comes?”

Everyone looks at me. The blood relay under my ribs pulses once through the salt cloth.

Pause.

Again.

Kessa’s face gives away nothing, but she curls her hand once against the table. I lift my bound arm, offering the burn, the glow, the proof they need to stop pretending I am merely a male in a room.

“Then follow it,” I say, looking at Kessa. “But do not follow it with her.”

Her voice is ice. “You do not command where I go.”

“No,” I say. “I do not.”

The line under my throat pulses.

Once.

Pause.

Again.

I turn from Kessa before wanting becomes another open door.

“Then make the evidence useful,” I say.

They stare, not one of them understanding except Kessa. She does. She narrows her eyes, purses her lips and shakes her head, almost imperceptibly, but enough.

So I give them the word they need, the word they already made of me, the word I can choose this once before it is used against everyone I do not want to lose.

“Use the weapon.”

21

Kessa

Use the weapon.

His words hang in the chamber like smoke from bad oil, thick enough to taste, dirty enough to make everything it touches feel spoiled.

I stare at him with what I hope is a blank look because the words are what I was thinking, but hearing him say them makes me feel wrong for having thought it. My stomach churns acid because hearing him say it makes the thought feel uglier than it did in my head.

No one answers as the seconds interminably stretch towards a minute. Eyes dart to him, to me, back to him, while others look anywhere but either of us.

Rosalind stands beside the long stone table with both hands flat on its surface, one finger softly drumming, shoulders squared like she can hold the City upright by refusing to bend.

Visidion’s wings are folded tight enough to make the edges look carved from shadow.