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Car doors slammed in the distance. Two engines sputtered to life.
“I’m going to finish it. I’m going to take the mercs back to my compound, the dead and the sleeping alike. Their computers as well. I don’t trust your father or his lackeys to investigate this on our behalf.”
Lila wondered if the oracle referred to her or Chief Shaw. “You should tell him about this. You need to be protected. He only did what he did to keep you safe.”
“We don’t need him to keep us safe. Everyone forgets that not so very long ago the oracles were battle queens. We made the decisions for our tribes, not the matrons, not the senate, and certainly not the prime minister or the Allied Council. We answered to the gods, and only to the gods. We saw the paths that triggered our visions, and we saw the same paths. Some we wanted to trigger, others we did not, but we could adjust and adjust quickly when the time called for it. The senate is blind, and so is your father. Perhaps it really is time for the oracles to take charge once again.”
“Do you really mean that?” Tristan asked.
“Maybe, maybe not, but others of my kind think it. I’ve tried to be the voice of reason. Life is so very different these days. We’ve not been a collection of tribes for quite some time, but the prime minister pokes his head into our affairs too often for me to be comfortable, and my sisters are angry and worried. The sleeping empire is waking once more. It grows impatient.”
“You believe war is coming.”
“I know it is,” the oracle said. “We’ll investigate this on our own. We’ll tell the prime minister what we want, when we’re ready to tell it, and say it came from our visions. We have access to truth serum, and the immunity to use it. These men’s lives are forfeit.”
“So you’re asking me to keep my mouth shut?” Lila asked.
“I should think you’d want to. Both of us benefit from this arrangement. Isn’t that what the Randolphs are all about? Mutual benefit?”
Lila said nothing as two delivery trucks backed up to the warehouse. The drivers hopped out and reentered the structure. People streamed from the building, carrying bodies to the trucks. They put the dead in one, and the sleeping in another.
“Tristan, I need a moment alone with your friend. Could you make sure my people have begun cleaning the blood from the warehouse floor?”
Tristan nodded, and the truck rocked again as he stood up. “I’ll load the computers into your car while I’m at it, madam. Lila is good with that sort of thing. You might consider asking for her assistance when you begin your investigation.”
Lila watched him drift away, surprised he’d followed her orders.
Perhaps he’d begun to believe. Perhaps she’d begun to believe a little as well. The oracle had gotten to the warehouse far too quickly. She’d been in the neighborhood. Waiting.
“What would have happened if I hadn’t stopped Tristan? He had a plan.”
“He didn’t have a plan,” the oracle replied. “He had intentions. I told you before, he’s making decisions. He knows what he’ll fight for. He’ll fight against those who would threaten his home, and he’ll fight for those he considers his family. You have other concerns, other priorities. Luckily, yours prevailed today.”
“Only because you warned me.”
“You didn’t need me to warn you about this.”
Lila stared at a clump of dirt, unsure if she believed the oracle.
“You don’t fight, chief. You never do. You don’t attack. You defend. It’s why you refuse your birthright, and why you wouldn’t have agreed with Tristan’s plan even if I hadn’t said a word.” The oracle pursed her lips. “In some of my earliest visions, not all the children made it out. In others, none of them did because you weren’t here. Things would have been far worse if you hadn’t come along and stopped your friend.”
“Worse enough to spark the war?”
“As I said before, it will spark regardless.”
For the first time in an hour, Lila felt something stir in her belly, a feeling that she could not name.
Fear? Worry?
“I’ve had the same vision over and over for some time. We all have, and I fear that all paths will lead to it eventually. It’s only a question of degree. There are some among us who are more hopeful. I am hopeful.” The oracle sighed heavily. “But you don’t care about any of that right now, do you?”
Lila looked down at her hands, both folded in her lap. She followed the stitches that crisscrossed her palms. One stitch leading to another like a little chain.
The oracle picked up the German guns and slid them into her coat pockets.
Lila let her.
She didn’t want to see the instruments of death ever again.
