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She’d found the ramblings of two secessionists as well, halfheartedly wishing someone would reinstate the Republic of Tejas. Lila could only chuckle. Roughly a hundred and fifty years ago, the American government had combined the republic with purchased acquisitions from the French territory east of the Mississippi River and a chunk of occupied, disputed territory claimed by the Mexican Commonwealth, or at least what would become the Mexican Commonwealth. America wouldn’t have been formed if not for the rivalry and arguments of the old countries. The Declaration of Peace had almost broken before the ink had dried.
Slightly more concerning were the ubiquitous messages to and from the other oracle compounds. Many believed that the oracles should rally against the civilian government, especially against Henri Lemaire. Bravado spurred bravado, with many pointing out that they had plenty of ammunition, training, and approval from the gods to take back the country, reinstating the old ways.
Lila wondered if her father knew about such sentiments.
She wondered if Mòr did too.
Lila found more than just calls for sedition. She’d also stumbled on porn—lots of porn—and whole libraries of pirated movies and television shows. In addition, they’d also pirated thousands of academic papers and journals, nearly outnumbering their pirated entertainment.
Their naughty behavior didn’t come close to the intrigue and crimes she would have found on a highborn estate, though.
It was almost adorable.
She’d finally run a filter on the results of her sweep, removing porn, pirated content, journal articles, and calls for sedition. While it ran, she’d written the terms of her contact for the disciplinary committee and sent it to Senator Masson for approval, telling him that she wouldn’t begin work on the rest of La Roux’s network until after they’d returned it.
The committee had sent back a signed scan less than an hour later. All five highborn senators had approved it.
Even Senator Hardwicke.
Lila had returned to the logs after securing her immunity deal. Her filter had reduced the results by ninety percent, but the file still bulged. It would take a week to go through all the data.
Before she began, she wrote a piece of code to find the IDs of anyone who had connected to anonymous mail clients while on the property. She’d spent hours hacking into each account, poring over the messages she found.
One user had sent nothing but photographs of kittens.
No one sent so many pictures of kittens unless they had something wrong with them. It piqued her interest, but Lila didn’t have any software that could perform cryptanalysis on the photographs. She’d left the program behind on a hard drive at the shop.
Progress stymied, she’d slipped into bed for a few hours of sleep.
Dixon poked her in the ribs and held up his notepad. Come on. I’m hungry. Kenna invited us to breakfast, remember?
Lila groaned. She’d forgotten that part. “Why are you wearing a pink robe?”
I like it. The color is nice, and it’s breezy.
“You’re going to breakfast like that?”
No, my clothes are in the dryer.
“We need to go back to the shop so you can pack a proper bag. Besides, you should tell Tristan where you are so he doesn’t worry.”
I sent him a message.
“That’s not the same. Why can’t you two ever talk to one another like normal people?”
Dixon shrugged.
“What did he say?”
He dug out his palm from the pocket of his robe and cycled through several screens to their conversation. Dixon’s message had claimed that he needed some time to clear his head.
Some time? With her? What does that even mean? Tristan had written back.
When Dixon hadn’t replied, his brother had sent several annoyed messages, culminating in one last appeal. This isn’t about you clearing your head, is it? Fuck you, Dixon. People are counting on you. I was counting on you. What’s gotten into you lately?
“I’m not getting involved,” Lila said, handing back his palm. “You’ll have to figure it out for yourselves.”
Maybe I don’t want to figure it out for a while. It’s not even about him, not all of it. Dixon yawned under the covers, his long eyelashes brushing against her cheek as he flung his arm around her. His shamrock bracelet chilled her skin.
