Valley of Fires: A Conquered Earth Novel (The Conquered Earth Series) (37 page)

The debate continued, but Holt couldn’t feel the same enthusiasm. Ravan seemed of a similar mind.

“Never seen it this quiet,” she observed, staring out at the lights from lanterns in windows up and down the towers. She was right, it
was
odd, even for how late it was. Faust seemed unusually silent, peaceful almost, and that was all wrong. It only added to Holt’s unease.

“Rogan would say it’s because the city’s stunned at the defeat,” Holt said.

“But you’re worried,” Ravan replied.

Holt nodded. “It’s been fourteen hours, and he hasn’t made a move. It’s not like him: ‘power lost must be retaken.’”

“And here I was hoping he would just surrender.”

Holt looked away from Faust and studied Ravan. The night had always suited her. The shadows and their ambiance accentuated her features. The line of her neck, the way her black hair hung down her back, even her eyes, somehow, seemed to glow more prominently. He’d always been the most attracted to her at night. Such thoughts, he knew, would have been alien to him a few days ago, but things were changing.

“I’ve been thinking,” Holt told her softly. “I’m not going to take the tattoo. You’re right, it was supposed to mean something, and I understand that.”

She didn’t look at him, but something about the way her features tightened suggested she may have been just as torn about him not finishing it as doing so.

“I can’t explain it,” he continued, “it’s like … some part of me thinks she’s still here. I know it’s not fair, that it’s the way it is now, but it doesn’t diminish what I feel for you underneath. I want you to know that. I don’t know where I’m going to come out on the other side of this, but … I hope you’re there when I do.”

She stood silent a moment, her eyes on the city, her thoughts elsewhere. “Don’t do that, Holt. Don’t give me false hope. We are what we are, we don’t have to be anything else.”

The door to the room opened. Three kids entered, all about fifteen, sweaty and grimy.

“Well?” Rogan asked, as if expecting them.

“Trying to get the Isomerization Tanks back online, but so far it’s a no-go,” one of the new arrivals stated.

The statement grabbed Holt’s attention, and he looked to the kids. “The isomerics aren’t working?”

They nodded. “Most of the valves were closed, two of them are stuck. I’d say they were rusted in place, they’re so tight, but … that doesn’t make sense, right?”

“They’ve been off since we got here?” Rogan asked.

“It would explain the lack of heat we noticed down there,” Ravan said.

“Those tanks are
huge,
” Holt continued, musing out loud. “They’re the heart of the Refinery, shutting them down means weeks of work to get them back online. Why would they…”

Holt figured it out before he finished. The way Ravan stared back at him indicated she had too.

“Oh, Jesus…” West breathed, and then yells from below cut him off. So did the violent, percussive sounds of gunfire. A lot of it.

Holt watched the color drain from Ravan’s face, understood why the city had seemed so quiet, why there was no counterattack coming from some other Pinnacle. The counterattack had been planned from the beginning. They’d never taken the Refinery. They’d simply walked into the exact place Tiberius wanted them.

“Move!” Ravan yelled, grabbing her rifle and heading for the door.

The floor under their feet shook from an explosion. No one spoke, just grabbed their gear and ran.

*   *   *

AVRIL WAS A POINT
of stillness in the chaos around her. Pirate fought pirate, guns blazed, knives flashed, people fell and didn’t move. They had been locked in those tanks underneath the Refinery for more than a day before the top hatch had finally opened. It had been an uncomfortable experience, a strange, cramped environment, where the sounds of their breathing echoed off the metal walls.

The three tanks were huge, big enough to hold fifty pirates each. Tiberius had ordered them drained and cleaned days ago. He seemed to firmly believe, now that Holt and Ravan were helping West, that the Refinery would be their next target. So they climbed inside and waited and it hadn’t taken long for her father to be proven right. They’d worked their way up to the top, dispatching West’s men as they went, until they got here, the main platform.

Avril saw Quade snap the neck of one rebel, knock another out with the barrel of his sidearm, and he held her look as he did. She was the only person who knew where his loyalties truly lay, and she wondered what he was feeling, ordered to participate in the slaughter of the rebels he’d secretly supported. She still hadn’t told her father, and she wasn’t sure why. She wasn’t even sure why she was here now, except that Tiberius had asked her to come, and she’d agreed, probably because of how it felt to hurt those kids a few days ago. Avril had felt more herself in that moment than she had in weeks … and it was frightening.

She was teetering on the edge of a line she never would have believed she could walk.

Avril was unarmed; no one had offered her a rifle or knife, because none of them trusted her yet. A pirate charged her from out of nowhere. Her instincts took over, she sidestepped his blow.

She saw another aiming a gun at her, and she dropped and rolled out of the way as he fired. One of her father’s men took the slug instead.

Avril moved toward cover behind a—

Something hard and metallic sent her reeling. A rebel hovered over her with a tire iron, about to strike again. A bullet dropped him, and Avril saw Quade a few yards away. They shared a look before he was swept up in the fighting again.

A boot slammed into Avril’s side. Another kick found her stomach. She felt the anger rising again … and the excitement.

She spun, the rebel who’d struck her was raising a knife …

… and she kicked it out of his hands, sprung up, and one roundhouse kick put him down. There were knives on the ground, guns too, but she leapt into the fray bare-handed. It felt better that way.

For the moment, she had chosen her side.

Avril was a blur, the Spearflow was dangerous and adaptable, even without a Lancet. West’s rebels raised guns, slashed with knives, came at her with clubs, and they all fell, one after the other. Two. Five. Ten. Her training made her more powerful than any of these fools, and she embraced the feelings that flowed through her.

Then she froze.

Ahead of her, through the dwindling crowd of rebels, were two other blurs, moving almost identically to her.

One had a Lancet, streaks of color ripping the air. The other had no weapons, but he was almost as quick, even though he fought with only one arm.

When Masyn and Castor saw her, they froze too. They stared at one another as the battle raged, confused, uncertain … and then Masyn saw the bodies of the rebels at Avril’s feet. Her stare changed.

Masyn advanced toward Avril. Castor, more reluctantly, followed, watching Masyn sling her Lancet onto her back. It wouldn’t be a fair fight otherwise.

Avril felt her first real sense of anxiety as the two took positions on either side of her. She had been Doyen to both of them once, even helped Masyn forge her Lancet after she completed her Spearquest, and now they were, somehow … enemies. What did that say about her?

Then again, what did it matter? Nothing was as it used to be. Those days were gone.

Avril squared her shoulders toward each opponent, her fists clenched, and she closed her eyes, waiting for the attack to come, already deciding how to strike and where, knowing Masyn and Castor were doing the same. She felt them tense, felt them move toward her, felt her own body instinctively begin to—

“Enough!” an older voice yelled and a shotgun blast punctuated its demand.

What was left of the fighting stopped. Avril opened her eyes. Masyn and Castor were flanked now by her father’s men, rifles all pointing at them. A hundred rebels either lay dead on the platform or were on their knees, with their hands behind their backs. The former far outnumbered the latter. Among them, she saw Holt and Ravan and the leader, Rogan West, each bloodied and injured, and every one of the survivors was staring at the figure who had appeared on the platform, surveying the scene with his usual unreadable calmness.

The man’s eyes swept over the crowd until they found what he was looking for: Holt, Ravan, and West. He stared at them intensely.

“We’re through here,” Tiberius said. “Which, of course, means we can start all over again.”

*   *   *

THEY FORCED HOLT, RAVAN,
West, and what remained of the rebels onto their knees. There was no sign of Olive or her crew that Holt could see. He held a dim hope that they’d somehow managed to undock the
Wind Rift
and flee west, but he knew that wasn’t likely. Tiberius was too thorough in his planning.

Holt stared through the Menagerie that surrounded him to the one person he was actually surprised to see. Avril stared back unreadably, Castor and Masyn on either side of her. Then again, she knew now about the role he’d played in Archer’s death, and she’d been in the corrupting presence of Tiberius Marseilles for more than a week. Maybe he shouldn’t be surprised at all. The unconscious bodies of the rebels at her feet showed she’d made her choice. It was too late for him now, anyway.

Masyn, however, had a different view.

She dashed forward in a blur of purple light, aimed straight at Tiberius, slamming into the large guards who circled him. Two of them fell instantly, two more staggered back, and Masyn waded into the rest. They swung at the Helix, but she dodged them nimbly, flipping onto the shoulders of one and dragging him to the ground. In the end, she was too outnumbered, and her Lancet was still on her back.

A fist caught her in the face, another found her stomach. A knee sent her crashing down. Then the others moved in.

“Masyn!” Castor yelled, rushing forward, ignoring blows from the pirates, watching as kicks and punches drove Masyn into the floor as she struggled in fury to get up. He fought to her side—and he did it with both arms, ignoring the pain of the broken appendage—and leapt on top of Masyn while the blows and strikes from rifle butts continued.

Throughout it all, Holt stared at Avril. The pain was apparent on her face, the horror at the beating. She took a step forward once … then stopped, went still, torn.

“Let them be,” Tiberius said. “I don’t want them dead. Not yet.”

The pirates pulled off Masyn and Castor, but Holt couldn’t tell what shape they were in. He looked up to the man standing above them, and Tiberius’s eyes were on Ravan. Holt felt her hand slip into his, and he held it firmly.

“I guess we know now the answer to the question of when you will disappoint me,” Tiberius said.

“I guess so,” Ravan said back.

“Such a waste, and all of it for
him,
” he said. Holt felt Ravan’s fingers tighten in his. “Did you learn nothing from me? About power? About weakness?”

“I learned a lot,” Ravan admitted. “Guess I just valued other lessons more.”

Tiberius shook his head, genuinely dismayed, then pulled his eyes off Ravan to Rogan West. West had been beaten badly, his left eye was swollen shut, blood caked the right side of his shirt. He stared back at Tiberius savagely all the same.

“Rogan West,” Tiberius said. His voice, surprisingly, held no menace at all. “There is no shame in this. You tried taking power, as is our way. I respect it, but you have lost, and I’m afraid, this kind of failure comes with harsh consequences.”

Rogan just shrugged, he seemed resigned. “Do your worst. I won’t be the last.”

“Without question.” Tiberius looked to Quade. “Make it quick. He’s earned that.”

Quade’s eyes moved to Rogan, studying him in an odd way Holt wasn’t expecting. Did they know each other? Had they been friends once? Holt wasn’t sure, but there was … something. At the rear of the crowd, Avril watched the exchange intently.

In the end Quade moved forward and drew his gun, standing over Rogan.

“And
you.
” It took a moment for Holt to realize Tiberius’s voice was directed at him. He looked up and met the man’s glare. There was hatred there, a radiating menace, but a smile formed on his lips all the same. “I see it in your eyes. You
care
again.” He looked down at Holt’s hand interlaced with Ravan’s. “So much the better. Now we can have all the moments we were always supposed to.”

The gunshot rang out jarringly loud. Next to him, Rogan West fell dead, and Quade lowered his weapon. The crowd of pirates cheered so loudly, Holt almost couldn’t make out Tiberius’s next words.

“Prepare a Nonagon match tomorrow, these four will be its competitors.” He meant Holt, Ravan, Masyn, and Castor. “Don’t hurt them anymore. The crowd will want a good show for Faust’s reunification.”

The violent, malevolent cheers intensified, and Holt looked at Ravan. She stared back, and he could sense the same calmness in her as in himself. The strange tranquility that came with knowing you no longer had anything left to lose.

30.
DINING ON ASHES

MASYN SAT WITH HER BACK
against the wall of the small wooden cell pod. She wasn’t tall, but could still barely stretch her legs outright. A few hours ago she felt the cell shake as it was moved down the giant rack system, onto the floor, disconnected, then transported somewhere else. Most likely they were on some kind of lift that would take them up to the Nonagon. Judging by the muted roar she could just hear outside from some huge crowd, the time for that was drawing close.

Her rings and weapon were gone, she’d lost them and was now shamed. Perhaps up there, facing death, she could restore some of her honor, she could still die well. Let it come, Masyn thought. If they expected her to be frightened, they would be disappointed.

Castor was curled up next to her, still and unmoving. Masyn had taken her share of pain earlier, but his had been far worse. She still remembered the way he leapt on top of her, ignoring his wounded arm, absorbing blow after blow meant for her.

She stared down at him softly. Like her, he had lost his Lancet and rings. Like her, he had fallen in battle. She should find him repellent now, dishonored and insignificant … but she didn’t. In fact, she was more drawn to him than ever and it made no sense. She embraced Gideon’s teachings. They were harsh because they had to be, but she was finding them difficult to swallow when it came to Castor.