Iron Gold (Red Rising Saga 4)

“Husband. I hate calling him fiancé. Cheapens it. He…was a good man. The best. Nothing in common with me, except an infatuation with the lord’s wine. Our private joke. He’s gone now. But you probably guessed that.”

“I’m sorry.”

“We all have our shadows.” He smiles bravely.

“My family was killed on Mars,” I say, surprised to find myself speaking the words out loud. So many people have asked, and dug, but I sealed them off because how could they ever understand? That sadness in Philippe understands me. In his eyes, I don’t feel pitied. I feel seen. “I was in one of the assimilation camps. We were there too long, and the Red Hand came.”

“What were their names?”

I make a small, pained sound. “No one’s asked that.”

“Then I’m honored to be the first to know.”

“My brother’s name was Tiran. My father’s name was Arlow. My sister was Ava. Her children: Conn, Barlow, and Ella. The littlest one…” My voice catches. “She was a baby.” I try to smile. “But I got my nephew out, and I got brothers alive too.”

His silence is that of a man wrestling with something inside himself. The battle plays out in the muscles of his jaw and the shifting of his hands against the bench. After a time, not knowing which side has won, I follow his eyes to the Iron Reaper.

“Know what I see when I look at that?” he asks. “A thief.” He laughs. “Suppose that’s blasphemy to you. He’s your great hero. Your messiah.”

“He’s not my messiah.”

“No?”

“No.”

“It’s incredible,” he says, looking at me.

“What is?”

“Everyone is so loud these days. But you, you’re silent when you’ve all the right to scream. Luna isn’t made for silence. Neither am I.” I say nothing. With him I don’t feel a need to, and maybe that’s why I told him about my family. It was a secret I wanted to hold close because I didn’t want the pity. I don’t want to demean their deaths or prostitute them for attention. “What do you see?” he asks of the statue.

“Rust.” I pause. “And shadows.”

We walk to the train depot in silence. Steam from the heat of the friction on rails billows from the tracks. “Thank you,” I say, “for everything.”

“The pleasure was all mine, Lyria of Lagalos.” He pauses, considering his words carefully. “I know Hyperion may seem too big to reckon. And the people here grander than you. But don’t let them make you feel small.” He pokes my chest and smiles wryly. “You are a world entire. You are grand and lovely. But you have to see it before anyone else does.” He smiles at me, a little embarrassed. “You have my pad number. Don’t be a stranger, little rabbit.” He kisses my forehead paternally and turns into the rain. “Till we meet again.” He hops twice like a rabbit before his bad knee buckles comically. He grins back at me. I can’t help but laugh.

In my bunk back in the Citadel, with the covers tight around my neck, I curl up, too tired to pull up the holo of Mars, and think it marvelous to have finally made a friend.

WE EXTRACT OUR PRIZES from Deepgrave without incident, taking ten other high-value prisoners from the bowels of the station with us in our submersible. Even though they’re paralyzed and bound, the press of their bodies and the stink of their unwashed flesh, stacked in the back of the cramped cabin, is nearly more than I can bear. Stealing only Apollonius would have broadcast our intentions. Now, if the warden doesn’t live up to his end of the bargain, the Ash Lord and the Republic will think it a general jailbreak. I only hope our nonlethal methods and our access into their system doesn’t give us away too quickly.

Despite the success of the mission, I feel trapped. Imprisoned by the proximity of the scum. Apollonius lies atop the pile of fallen warlords in his kimono, like some dread corpse king. In my chest, my heart is made heavier by the dark, silent eyes of my friends hunched in the red light of the submarine—knowing they feel the same weight, that we are all party to some unspeakable deed. Thraxa, who has always held overwhelming guilt for the evil works of her own Color, stares balefully at the prisoners. Were this to go wrong, were these Golds to stand again at the head of their legions, all their evil would rip fast as a wildfire back into the world.

“Sir…I want to apologize,” Alexandar whispers carefully to me so the others can’t overhear. “I was already seasick, from the waves on the trawler, and when I saw the eyes go…well, it was mawkish of me. Not to the level I hold myself, and I hope you don’t think lesser of me for it.”

“Ragnar would puke in null gravity,” I say. “Nothing to apologize for.”

He nods, not hearing me. It must be a heavy burden, being the eldest grandchild of Lorn au Arcos. An impossible standard to follow.

Sevro wonders why I like the youth. For all the entitlement, all the arrogance, a deep vein of insecurity runs through Alexandar, and I feel a powerful protective instinct toward him. He wants to be good. If only he didn’t want to be famous as well.

He reminds me only too much of Cassius.

“Sir, I know it is base to ask. But I wonder if we could keep it between us?”

“You worried about Rhonna mocking you?” I ask. “Trust me, Alex. It’s not her you have to worry about.” I look over to Sevro, who is eavesdropping on the conversation with a nasty little smile for Alexandar. From the back of the submersible there comes a bark. I wheel around to see the skinny Obsidian smiling down at his lap. A small snout pokes through his fingers.

“Don’t tell me you brought the warden’s dog,” Sevro mutters. The Obsidian grins wickedly and opens his bony hands to show us the terrier hidden between his legs. “Dognapping? Careful, mutts, Tongueless here is a bad, bad man.”