The Destiny (Blood and Destiny Book 4) (21 page)

“Is this some form of
hangar?” she asked as she crouched down beside Holt, balancing on the tips of
her toes.

“We are beneath the
palace. The ceiling is fixed. It wouldn’t make any sense to build or store
airships down here.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a spyglass. He
stared down at it for a moment, then passed it to Larissa. She took it from
him, noticing the droplets of sweat on his brow. She scooted a little closer
toward him, hoping whatever healing ability she still retained might help to
lessen his suffering from the hit of
Anthonium
.

She pulled the spyglass
open, noting the odd filter which had been applied to the lens, and brought it
to her eye.

Larissa’s heart stopped
as the spyglass revealed the truth within the expanse. She wobbled from the
tips of her toes and collapsed onto her backside. “Dear Gods,” she whispered,
tears stinging her eyes. “Professor…”

Holt snatched the
spyglass from her and systematically scanned up and down the room. “Interesting,”
he said. “Do you know what this is?”

“I do. It’s a Machine.”

“We should get out of here,” Holt said,
returning the spyglass to her.

Larissa barely
registered what he’d said. She turned and headed towards the nearest set of
steps leading to the ground, racing down, taking two steps at a time, her heart
pounding in her ears. Two more dead bodies lay spread out on the ground floor,
curious burn marks on their necks, but the room appeared unoccupied by anyone living.
She barely registered their presence as she raced to the square block, using
the spyglass to avoid smacking into any part of the enormous apparatus. The
block emitted a light green glow; the sight of it took her thoughts straight
back to the Cleric. She could only hope this was one of his devices and they
weren’t about to come across yet another robed priest skilled in the art of
illusions. It had been hard enough to kill the last one. She unsheathed her
dagger and plunged it deep into the block. The green light wavered then failed,
and the illusion died.

She took a few steps
backwards and stared up at the structure.

It was incredible in
both stature and design, filling the cavernous room from end to end with an
array of pipes and domes. To her uneducated eye, it looked almost identical to
the Professor’s Machine, only ten times bigger. She stared up at it, dumbstruck.
If the President had his own version, then what did he need to capture the
Professor for? Had this entire horrific turn of events since the first night at
the Hub been a complete waste of time and effort?

“Larissa, we are
wasting time here,” Holt said as he joined her on the ground.

“How can we be wasting
time? This is everything. This is…” She faltered as her heart ached anew for
the Professor. To think, someone had stolen his efforts and then tortured and
killed him for no reason at all.

“Larissa,” Holt said,
his voice low and commanding.

“What?” she barked in a
whisper, turning so quickly her hair whipped around her head.

“We are here for one
purpose, and this is
not
it.”

“If only we had some
Anthonium
left. I think there is a hatch somewhere in the middle. Did you use the entire
last piece?”

When he did not answer,
she turned to find him walking away, his fists balled at his sides, legs
marching with angry strides to the opposite end of the room. Her heart sank.
Had she really upset him so much? Was it the mere mention of the Professor which
made him angry? Couldn’t he tell that someone had already beaten them to the
palace? For all they knew, the President was already dead, and they were about
to walk into a palace full of assassins and pirates.

She stared at him
walking away with tears in her eyes. Until now, she had been so sure of their
course, so determined to push on regardless. Only now, in the shadow of the
looming Machine which bore a terrifying resemblance to the original, did she
start to truly doubt. They could walk away right now, walk away together. They
could rescue Cid from wherever he had ended up, ensure Narry and Sandy were
safe, and just leave. Who would ever know?

“Holt,” she whispered
as he turned past a large copper pipe protruding from one end of the Machine,
moving out of view.

She took two steps and
froze on the spot as the hairs on the back of her neck pricked up.

“It doesn’t work.” A
voice from behind stopped her dead in her tracks.

With a shaky breath,
she turned on her heels and came face to face with her father.

Solomon Covelle,
Professor Ronald Markus, the son of the last Emperor of Daltonia—her father
glared down at her with a stern expression. His hand leaned on a section of the
Machine, more possessive than for balance. His eyes flicked upward to somewhere
behind her head for a brief moment before refocussing directly on Larissa.

“He has lasted far
longer than he should have, given the dosages I provided,” Covelle said.

Larissa couldn’t speak—couldn’t
think. Her entire body seemed to pulse with every beat of her heart. Her eyes
danced across the features of his face—the tanned skin marked with thick lines,
the white wiry beard on his chin and white, wildly curly hair atop his head.
She had his hair and his steely, blue-grey eyes. Her feet inched backwards, an
attempt to put some space between them, but her back bumped into one of the
large copper domes, giving her only one option for escape—to kill him.

“No matter,” Covelle
said with an odd sort of smile. “It will catch up to him eventually.”

“What doesn’t work?”
she asked, finally finding her voice. Why she had asked that question when
there were so many more pertinent ones, she didn’t know. Why couldn’t she just
take her dagger and plunge it into his heart? She could end it all here, now.

“This
Machine
.
It was built to the same specifications as the one Professor Markus was working
on, except for a few modifications.”

“How? There were no
copies. He didn’t share the design for the technology with anyone but Cid.” She
snapped her mouth shut, feeling foolish for involving Cid in the conversation.
There was no sense in dragging his name through the dirt.

“Professor Watts used
various people over the years, builders, mechanics. He paid them all good money
to keep silent. The President ensured they talked by reminding them that they
were complicit in illegal activity and they, and their families would face
serious punishment if they did not share his secrets. The President built this
monstrosity at great expense and found it to be utterly worthless. Not even
Anthonium
seemed to help. It was supposed to provide power to the entire capital, and
then, later, he would modify it to produce weapons. That sort of thing would
secure his position of power for generations.” His eyes twinkled with a soft
smile in the yellow gaslight, and he looked down at Larissa, waiting patiently
for her to speak.

“You sabotaged it?” she
asked.

“Naturally. As I have
done with every other effort the
President
made. He never suspected me.
Arrogant fool. As soon as he is disposed of, I shall secure my reinstatement as
Emperor with this contraption by making it work.” He patted the Machine. “And
as the stupid Empress of Eptora wouldn’t deal with me in the proper manner, I
will destroy her and her people. I must say, child, I am rather disappointed in
your conduct. You need some schooling. Never mind, I shall teach you.”

“You shall do no such
thing,” she said. As if she’d been waiting for him to remind her of what a
horrid bastard he was, that single sentence sharpened her focus. She glanced
down at the dagger stuck into the block, too far from reach to be of use. She
slid the fingertips of both hands between the folds of her skirt on either side
of her legs, seeking another blade hidden within. Her thoughts turned to her
mother, laying on her deathbed, suffering and crying out for the husband she’d
lost. How could he have been so callous?

“As to your boyfriend,
he is not acceptable. I will not allow you to keep him.”

“He’s
not
a pet
and you are not my—”

“Father?” He smiled
again.

Her fingertips found
the edge of a sharp blade which sliced her skin. She flinched, then moved to
find the handle. She felt the skin on her fingers heal instantly, and a slight
flutter of excitement replaced the constant fluttering of fear in her chest.
Larissa rubbed the blood from her fingers and focused on his chest. Perhaps
plunging a blade into his heart would be impossible, since she wasn’t sure he
had one.

“I will give him up if
you tell me how to heal him,” she said. “I owe him so much, I can’t just let
him die. You poisoned him, so tell me how to cure it.”

“There is no cure,”
Covelle said flatly.

“But—”

“No, Larissa. Believe
me, I’ve studied it my entire life. I found the information about the
Anthonium
very easily. The moment I stepped inside the volcano, it was all there, waiting
to be discovered. If only the Eptorans hadn’t let their fears and superstitions
prevent them from going into the mountain or the forest surrounding it, they
would have found it all for themselves. They didn’t mind letting a foreigner go
look, of course. What did it matter to them if a young man got himself killed
up there? Aside from the loss of an assistant or two to those bloody Rifarin,
and the occasional puff of smoke from the volcano, spending all that time there
was surprisingly easy.”

“So there was nothing
you could have done to save my mother?” she asked, her voice quiet and meek,
though she fought back the threatening tears.

“No. I’m truly sorry, my
dear. I did care for her, but I couldn’t really drag her and you around the
world with me. It was far too dangerous. I didn’t know she’d worn my gift as a
necklace. It was meant to have been given with instructions for proper storage.
I even wrote to her telling her to sell it, but I suppose she ignored my letter
or…well, I can’t change that now.”

“There must be a cure,”
she pleaded again. Though she had no intention of giving up Holt, if there was a
chance of discovering how to heal him, it would be worth keeping Covelle alive
for just a few more minutes. Her grip on the blade in her dress tightened.

“If you intend to kill
me, I suggest you make your move,” he said.

Larissa froze.

“You think me stupid?”

“I…”

“Did it not occur to
you how I have spent so many years living
inside
an active volcano?”

Larissa pulled her
right hand away from the blade, giving up the pretence. His sleeves were rolled
up to the elbows, arms dotted with white scars. She pieced the information
together, her stomach sinking into her feet. If he possessed the same healing
ability as she did, sticking him in the heart might not be as effective as she’d
hoped.

“You’ve been injecting
yourself,” she said.

“Good. Smart girl.” He
leaned back, taking a deep breath, looking up at the ceiling, his eyes growing
wistful. “The
Anthonium
grants certain benefits to each recipient of the
element. It has granted you healing power. It granted your friend Holt the
power to disappear. It granted me the greatest power of all.”

“The power to withstand
heat?” Larissa asked, not quite comprehending how such a thing could be
considered so great.

Covelle smiled. It
might have seemed a warm and genuine smile if he weren’t so sinister and
clearly mad. His gaze flicked between her and the ceiling with curious meaning.
Larissa found herself stuck to the spot, unsure where to go or what to do under
the domineering watch of her father.

“I escaped this place the
night the army turned on my father and attacked. I was just a boy, alone and
frightened, dragged from my bed by my priest and whisked into the night as the
fire burned in the palace and the screams of my parents echoed down the halls.
That bastard Hague Senior organized the treasonous act under the ruse of imposing
a Republic in place of the Empirical line, and then he went and assigned
himself President.”

“Wasn’t there a vote?”
Larissa asked, trying to recall her school lessons on politics. Had she known that
history was such an important part of her own past, she might have paid more
attention at the time.

“Oh, there was, of
course, as there has been every five years ever since. Hague Senior won every
time until his son came out of the military after just a few years served, and
then guess who won the next vote.”

“Junior,” Larissa said,
understanding the implications and seeing it all too clearly now.

“They simply replaced
one brand of nepotism with their own, conspiring, treasonous bastards.” Covelle
spat the words out in a flash, then turned his attention back to Larissa, his
eyes twinkling with passion. “If Daltonia is to be ruled by blood, it may as
well be ruled by the
right
blood.” He lurched forwards, grabbing hold of
both of her wrists, locking her into his grasp. “I have the only right to sit
in this palace, to rule the Empire and make it great again, with you by my
side. It was always meant to be this way, Larissa. It just took me longer than
I’d anticipated to bring it all together. Do you know how difficult it is to
find trustworthy pirates?”

“Very,” she said
simply, wary of his growing desperation.

“For years, I’ve been
planning, building, destroying from within. It’s no mistake that I chose my
first disguise to be an archaeologist, specialising in Empirical items. Who
else would know of the locations of such obscure artefacts than someone who had
been born into the family? Of course, I had to regress into my memories to find
the detailed information, but I had my priest to help. Those trinkets, along
with the
Anthonium
, bought me everything I’ve needed to plan for our
future.”

Larissa stared up at
him, listening, trying to take it all in and process the information as quickly
as he spat it out at her. She considered the priest he’d mentioned twice and wondered
about the Cleric. But he had been too young to have done all of that.

“You were the final
piece of my puzzle. I knew you would come here after you showed such
determination and strength. It’s somewhat misplaced. But that can be
corrected.”