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“And we will find them,” he replies. “With precision, not an army.”
“Then we need to refine our search,” the Pink says.
Daxo waves a hand and a map of the reconstruction zone grows out of the table in three dimensions. Thousands of buildings. “Show me the building, Lyria.”
My eyes scan the hundreds of half-completed skyscrapers. They all look the same. “How am I supposed to do that? All these look the same. Wasn’t exactly lookin’ back at the building with crows after me.”
“I told you what would happen if you did not cooperate,” Daxo says.
“Gods, Daxo, give the girl a damn moment,” the Pink says from her side of the table. “She’s clearly been through an ordeal. Do you need pain medication for your arm, Lyria?” I nod in thanks. “Coffee with morphone,” she says into a com. A moment later, a servant enters and sets the tray of steaming coffee down in front of me.
“My name is Theodora,” the Pink tells me after thanking the servant. “I was the steward for Darrow of Lykos.”
His steward? Then she knows the Reaper better than almost anyone. “Thank you,” I say as I sip the coffee and feel the cool relief of the morphone as it dulls the pain in my shoulder.
“We’re all people in the end. Good to remember that. See, this isn’t just about getting the son of the Sovereign back. Pax is dear to all of us. Such a soft soul. You’ve met him?” I nod. “So you can understand how much we need your help. Now, can you remember a logo, a tram depot, a monument perhaps?”
“There was a tramway,” I say. “Broken. I ran there when I escaped from Philippe. I was trying to find a way up out of Lost City.”
“How far did you run? A kilometer? Two?” Daxo asks.
“Maybe four. Couldn’t have been more before I found it.”
He filters out all buildings more than four kilometers from a tramline. “I followed it along like this.” I sketch a finger along the tramline toward the pedestrian stairs that lead up to the checkpoint. I remember the crumbling numbers crawling with lichen. “I started near station…17, I think.”
Daxo nods to Holiday and she steps away to radio teams to search the buildings in the area. “They’ll have gone by now, so send the forensics teams.” He looks over to Theodora. “I want satellite footage showing all ships entering and leaving that district.”
“You’re doing wonderfully, Lyria,” Theodora says. “This is the only way to help yourself—by continuing to cooperate.” I don’t like the way she says it. “Now,” she says with a soft smile, “when did the Society recruit you?”
“What? The Society? I wasn’t workin’ for anyone.”
“You expect us to believe that?” Daxo asks. “My father brings you in, shows you kindness, shows your nephew kindness, and you betray us to the Society—or was it the Red Hand? Tell me the truth.”
“I am.”
“We have video of the device used to disable the transport before it fried the cameras,” Daxo says. “Preliminary forensics tell us that it was a custom build made at great expense. Far beyond your means.”
“If you have the video, then can you see my face?” I snap. “Did I look like a person who expected my necklace to burst into a bloody robot?”
“If you weren’t complicit, then why did your Philippe take you with him?” Niobe says softly. Rain falls on the windows behind her. “Why not leave you behind? Or kill you? Why save your life?”
“Do I look like a lowlife thug smart enough to make fools out of the lot of you? No. So how the hell would I have a bloody clue? Ask him.”
“Was it during your time in the assimilation camp?” Theodora asks. “Is that when someone contacted you, asked you for a favor, or promised you something so long as you helped them? Is that when you met Philippe?”
I glare at her. “I met him here.”
“Is your name really Lyria of Lagalos?” Daxo asks.
“You know it is, or y
ou wouldn’t have let me work in your father’s house.”
Daxo watches me for some sign of duplicity, his hand stroking the aquarium again. “I’ve played this game since I was a boy, Lyria. Half-truths. Hidden hands. The Ash Lord is a master at this subterfuge, as is his daughter. It would not take much to massacre a Red camp. Even less to place one of his agents amongst the survivors. Wound her. Have her impersonate a Red of Lagalos, and then play upon the sympathies of my father so that you could slide into our house. Discredit the Sovereign’s judgment just before the vote on the Peace.” He looks me over. “You look a lamb, but perhaps a wolf lies under the wool?”
“I was born in Lagalos. I can tell you the name of every headTalk and Helldiver for the last thirty years. Try me.”
“But of course you can, Society Intelligence trains its agents well. Perhaps you even believe you are who you claim to be. Perhaps they conditioned you. Your memories, your history, your grief for your dead family could all be a fiction.”
