Harlequin Nocturne May 2016 Box Set (23 page)

“Yet I can find no other explanation,” Isis said, holding Anu's stare. “I was left to die.”

“If this is true, it is only more evidence of a conspiracy within Tanis,” Anu said.

“A conspiracy?” Isis said.

“You asked how the city could have descended so far. It did not happen by accident.”

“You think the Lawkeepers are involved?”

“Not until this moment.” He lifted his head from his fist. “Can you name these half-bloods?”

“I would know them if I saw them again.”

“I will have Hermes call them to the tower in small groups, so that none will suspect that they will be questioned.”

Isis inclined her head, but her mind was racing. So Anu was suggesting a conspiracy, when he himself was surely at the center of it?

Why shouldn't he speak of it?
she thought. Who would seriously suspect Anu unless he or she had Isis's experiences and knowledge...or was one of his allies among the Opiri or the Nine? He could so easily deflect any idle suspicion by acknowledging that something had turned rotten at Tanis's core.

“Where does this conspiracy originate?” she asked him.

“I fear that human rebels are involved,” Anu said, “though what they intend remains unclear. We will soon know the truth. And now that you have returned safely, you must join with us in presenting a united front to our people.”

“What of the army guarding the humans?”

Anu glanced at Athena. “That is an unfortunate, but temporary, necessity, both for security and protection. I have explained to the others why it was necessary to keep the force's existence secret, so that no outsider spy could learn we had readied defenses against an attack.”

“And what is being done with Opiri who injure or kill humans?”

“This situation will not last,” Anu said, absolute confidence in his voice. “I have called a meeting of the Nine and the Council for midnight. Everything will be explained there. For now...” He smiled at Athena. “Please attend Isis in her quarters here. We would not wish her to become ill again.”

“Of course,” Athena said.

“I will send servants to collect your things from your ward apartments, Isis,” he said. “Rest while you can.”

With that, Anu seemed to dismiss them, though Isis could feel his stare on her back as she and Athena left the suite. They took the elevator to her long-unused quarters. As Isis was considering what next to try, human servants entered to remove the dustcovers from the furniture and pad quietly about the suite, making it fit for habitation. Isis waited until they were finished and drew Athena to a couch in the sitting room.

“What are your observations?” she asked Athena.

“Anu is hiding something,” Athena said. “I have no reason to disbelieve anything you have told me. I will give you whatever help I can.”

“You said you wouldn't be my only ally.”

“I will approach Bes, and my most trusted companions. Without further proof that Anu has actually caused the troubles in Tanis...”

“He isn't alone. Hannibal is part of it, but he must be afraid of what I might say of him to Anu. He is the one who told us about Anu's scheme, under duress. But he could also do us much damage.” She touched Athena's arm. “I must find Daniel, and Trinity if possible. You've heard nothing about prisoners in the towers?”

Athena clasped her hands in her lap. “There is a place in the tower that I have not seen,” she said, “an abandoned Household. I have heard rumors that special prisoners are being kept there, the worst of the troublemakers. If they caught Daniel attempting to return to the city, he might be there, as well.”

“You have no idea where it is?”

“If anyone else would know, it would be Hermes, since he still guides the Lawkeepers.”

“Could he have known that some of his half-bloods tried to kill me?”

“I cannot believe it. They must be working directly for Anu.”

“Then speak to Hermes, if you can find him. I do not care what you tell him, but see if he knows anything about Daniel.”

“I will,” Athena said, rising. “Be patient, Isis. Remain here. I will return as soon as I have learned anything of use.”

Isis's patience had almost run out when Athena returned.

“I found Hermes,” she said. “I didn't tell him about the incident with the Lawkeepers who attempted to poison you, or of our fears about Anu, but I know he senses that something is wrong. He told me where to find the prisoners' cells. We can only hope that Daniel is there.”

Unless he is dead
, Isis thought. But her heart told her otherwise.

Only a half hour before the midnight meeting was to take place, one of Hermes's favorites, dressed as plainly as a servant, came to fetch Isis. He led her by back ways between and behind the Household suites through a series of narrow staircases and corridors built so that human serfs could come and go quietly when they served their Opir masters.

One of the corridors opened onto a dim stairwell, and the stairs led to the rear chambers of an abandoned Household that stank of stale urine, blood and perspiration. Isis's hair stood on end. She tried to breathe evenly, and caught a single thread of scent among all the others.

Daniel. Alive.

CHAPTER 24

“G
o,” Isis whispered to Hermes's Opir. “I will find my way back.”

Without hesitation, her guide vanished. Isis crept into a wider corridor with cell doors, dozens of them running along each wall. Groans and cries followed her progress as she followed the scent, and she felt as if she had been poisoned all over again.

She found Daniel in one of the cells midway down the hall. The smells of sweat and blood were almost overwhelming, and she choked as she put her hand on the lock and pulled.

The door refused to move. “Daniel?” she called. “Can you hear me?”

There was no answer. She pulled harder, using all of her strength, and the door creaked. Righteous rage coursed through her, and she nearly tore the door off its hinges.

Swallowing again and again, she stepped into the cell and looked down at the shape huddled on the filthy floor. Daniel was curled in on himself; his bare legs were a mass of bruises and raised welts, and his face was a patchwork of black and purple. One eye was swollen shut, but she knew when the other one saw her.

“Isis?” he croaked, bracing his arms against the wall. He struggled to stand, but she fell to her knees and stopped him.

“Daniel,” she whispered. “Oh, Daniel.”

“You...should not be here,” he said, his voice as ravaged as his body. “They will find you.”

Isis had no intention of getting into a pointless argument. She pulled him up, doing her best to disregard the ugliness of his condition, and half supported him to the door of the cell.

From some inner reservoir, he found strength to help her and take most of his weight on his own legs. Isis guided him toward the rear of the Household, stepping in anytime he stumbled, and all too slowly they arrived at the stairwell.

“Go...ahead of me,” Daniel whispered, the words sawing in his throat. “I'll catch up.”

Isis stepped in front of him. “Move slowly. I will be here if you fall.”

Daniel must have recognized the futility of disputing her. He began to descend, bracing himself against the side walls of the stairwell. Isis remained close enough to feel his ragged breath on the back of her neck.

But he never lost his balance or stumbled again. At the foot of the stairs, he leaned heavily against the wall, his body trembling and fresh blood running from his more recent wounds.

Though it was dangerous to take the time, Isis knew that she had to help him heal, even if just enough to stop the bleeding.

She helped him to sit and, ignoring his faint protests, bit his neck as gently as she could. She released the healing chemicals into his bloodstream, praying that her efforts would bear fruit.

After several minutes he pushed her away weakly. “I'm all right,” he said.

Isis saw that his bleeding had stopped, the worst of his wounds beginning to close as if they had been stitched by an expert hand.

She helped him get up and led him carefully along the corridor, constantly listening for sounds of discovery or pursuit.

They were following a curving passage that ran just inside the wall of the tower when she heard the voices. They were barely audible, but they were not far ahead.

She didn't ask if Daniel could fight. He would try; he would most likely attempt to protect
her
, as if she were the one who had been tortured. Retreating was out of the question; they were as likely to meet guards in the cell block as they were in this corridor, and here, at least, only one enemy could come at them at a time.

They would have to keep moving.

“Stay behind me, Daniel,” she said. “If you try to fight, you will put us both at risk.”

He shuddered. “Not for me,” he said. “Go back, Isis.”

The sound of softly moving feet stopped abruptly just around the curve of the corridor. She heard rough breathing and footsteps approaching from just out of sight. Isis prepared herself, knowing that she would use her influence to the fullest extent to save Daniel.

“Who are you?” a voice called out softly.

So there would be words instead of immediate attack. Isis didn't let down her guard. “I know you,” she said in the same low tone. “Loukas?”

“Isis.” The Opir came into view, his pale skin like a beacon in the darkness. “Daniel?”

“Why are you here?” she challenged.

“Athena sent me to find you, and I quite literally ran into these humans.” He gestured behind him, and she recognized another familiar face: Hugh, the human who had so gruffly asked for her help, along with his companions Kevin and Jessica. She could see several others with them, hear their shuffling feet and fast-beating hearts.

“Serfs,” Loukas said. “We're getting them out of the tower.” He peered past her uneasily. “Someone could find us anytime.”

“How are you getting out?” she asked.

“Follow us.”

Loukas turned and disappeared around the bend. Isis had already made her decision. She glanced at Daniel, who nodded, and they fell in behind Hugh, Jessica, Kevin and—ahead of them—a ragtag group of five humans.

Moving at a fast pace, they began to descend successive sets of stairs. She turned frequently to check on Daniel, whose face was drawn with pain and exhaustion. He met her worried glances with eyes blazing defiance, and she knew he would falter only if his body collapsed under him.

Still, she was profoundly grateful when they reached the bottom of the stairs and found a regular corridor again. It was short, and ended at a door that might lead anywhere.

“Lady Isis,” Hugh whispered. “We're on the bottom floor of the tower. From here, we go underground.”

Without waiting for her reply, Hugh turned away again and helped Loukas pull up part of the floor, the edges so well disguised that Isis might never have noticed the trapdoor.

“There is a ladder here,” Loukas told her, frowning toward Daniel. “Can he make it?”

“Don't worry about me,” Daniel said. He swallowed a cough. “Go ahead.”

One by one the humans descended into darkness. Loukas followed. Hugh remained behind.

“I'll go last,” Hugh said. “Go on.”

Isis dropped into the hole, gripping the rungs of the ladder and pausing until she was sure Daniel was strong enough to follow. Blood dropped onto her cheek. She continued down, watching Daniel carefully place his feet and clutch at the side rails with clawed fingers.

Somehow, they made it to the bottom and to a tunnel just high enough to allow the tallest of them to walk upright. Then began a journey in darkness, Loukas in the lead to guide the humans, Hugh still taking up the rear. They moved through tunnel after tunnel, and Isis sensed that they were approaching the center of the city.

Abruptly Hugh took the lead and guided the party into a much lower tunnel that opened into a small, dimly lit but well-built room furnished with simple chairs and a table. There was a door on the other side, and Isis realized that they had probably been paralleling the official network of tunnels once used by serfs and poor Freebloods during the heyday of the Citadel.

The humans fell into the chairs without any prodding, and Daniel slumped against one of the stone walls. He slid to the ground, his chest heaving, and Isis knelt beside him.

“I'm all right,” he rasped, flinching away when she tried to touch him.

“He needs medical attention,” Isis said, looking toward Hugh.

“We'll do what we can,” Hugh said, “but we're not in any position to contact a human physician now.” He crouched before Daniel. “Can you keep going?”

“By the Eldest, let him rest!” Isis cried. “He was beaten to within an inch of his life.”

“So were some of the other serfs.”

Isis kept her rage inside. “How many Opiri are keeping serfs now?” she asked.

“We don't know,” Hugh said. “But one of them escaped, and he was able to confirm that Anu's behind this.” He turned his head and spat. “A few Opiri have offered to help us. We have some in the resistance now, and we've managed to get a few more serfs out of the towers.”

“Do you know about the quarantine of the human citizens by Anu's secret army?”

“Yes,” Hugh said heavily. “And Loukas has told us about the hostage being held here to ensure the commander's cooperation.”

“Trinity,” Daniel said, bracing himself on his arms. “She escaped. She found me...in the cell. She was in the elevator heading down...when she left.”

“Where was she going?” Isis asked.

“I told her to...try to find Hugh.”

“She never got to us,” Hugh said.

“We must get to Ares.”

* * *

Daniel pushed himself to his feet, blocking the shriek of pain along his nerves. Isis stared at him with open concern, but all he felt was shame.

For two weeks he had been a prisoner, treated with less dignity and compassion than a rat in these tunnels, and all the old memories had come flooding back. The man he had been since he had escaped Erebus was drowning in those memories, and he wasn't sure he could ever find his way to the surface.

And yet he hadn't stopped fighting. Not as long as Ares and Trinity and the others in danger needed any help he could give.

Not as long as Isis believed in him, even when he couldn't bear her touch.

“Will telling Ares about Trinity not put him in an impossible position, when we still don't know her fate?” Isis asked.

“He must know,” Daniel said, his voice almost unrecognizable to his own ears. “His men can help search for her, and no one will question them.”

Isis carefully took his bloodied hand, and he managed not to pull away in self-disgust. “Hugh will also alert the resistance to watch for her,” she said.

“And there may...also be a way for Ares to pretend to obey Anu and still...turn the army against him,” Daniel said.

“Wouldn't Ares have done that already, if he could?” Hugh asked.

“Only if he's thinking clearly. Under the circumstances...” Daniel shifted his weight and held very still until the waves of pain passed through his body. “Isis...you stay with Hugh and the others.”

“You know I will not stand idly by,” she said, her delicate chin jutting defiantly. “I will not be separated from you again.”

Daniel looked away. He knew why she was so afraid for him. He knew why she would never let him out of her sight, because he knew what it had been like for his father where Trinity was concerned.

Isis loved him.

And he knew he wasn't worthy. He never had been.

“Can you assign someone to get us to Ares's soldiers...in the quarantined wards?” Daniel asked Hugh.

The big man nodded. “It'll be risky, because we'll have to move into the main tunnels to get there.”

“If you can tell us the way—”

“No. I'll see to it myself.” Hugh turned to Jessica. “Get these other people to the safe house. Kevin, inform our people about Trinity. Tell them I'll be back as soon as I can.”

* * *

They reached the human wards an hour later, moving cautiously from the narrow tunnels used by the resistance to the paved passages dug out at the time of the founding of Tartaros. They were extremely lucky not to have been seen.

Even so, Daniel kept as physically close to Isis as he dared...as if he could defend her better than she could herself, he with his battered body and unstable mind.

Ares's army had cordoned off two of the human neighborhoods, Bes's and Hera's, to contain most of the city's human population. But when Hugh, Isis and Daniel cautiously emerged from a passage hidden in an uninhabited apartment, they soon found that only a fraction of the army had been left to “protect” their charges.

Isis convinced Daniel that she should be the one to approach Ares's soldiers, since she would attract less attention than a known resistance member or a bloodied human with torn and dirty clothing. Daniel watched from cover as she boldly walked up to one of the Freebloods and spoke to him with a familiarity that suggested she'd met him when she had been recovering in Ares's care.

She hurried back after only a couple of minutes, her expression strained with worry.

“Ares has been commanded to meet Anu at the tower,” she said, holding Daniel's gaze. “His troops are supposed to have been secretly deployed to the other towers inhabited by Opiri.”

“Why?” Daniel asked. “Why guard the Opiri when he intends to give the Citadel back to them?”

“I do not know,” Isis said.

“Hugh?” Daniel asked.

“It makes no sense,” the human said.

“Whatever the reason,” Daniel said, “Anu may have sudden doubts about Ares's loyalty. If Trinity escaped, he wouldn't want Ares to know about it. But if he recaptured her...” A crazy thought came into his mind. “We have to convince the remaining soldiers here to come with us to the tower.”

“I do not understand your reasoning,” Isis said, alarm evident behind the even tone of her voice.

“Deception won't work, and neither will secrecy. Ares virtually controls the city now. Anu won't be expecting us to march right in with the soldiers left to watch the humans.”

“And then?”

“With the humans unguarded, the resistance will have a little breathing room, at the very least. If Trinity is still on the move, we'll buy a little more time for her.”

“And if Trinity has been recaptured?”

“We'll deal with that problem when we come to it.”

“Why would you put yourself in Anu's hands again?” Isis asked.

“I won't hide anymore, Isis. If I have to, I'll challenge Anu himself.”

“You want revenge, even at the cost of your own life.”

“I want to give this city a chance at survival.”

“You know that you are quite mad.”

More than you can understand
, Daniel thought. “There's nothing sane about any of this.”

For a while she simply stared at him. “How do you expect to get the soldiers to obey you?” She hesitated. “I shall have to use my influence to—”