Morning Star (Red Rising Saga 3)

“Yes, my liege.”

“Then tell me, how is it that you are still alive and your Imperator is not?”

“I only barely managed to escape the battle,” Antonia says, seeing the danger in the line of questioning. Her voice modulates accordingly. “It was a…terrible calamity, my liege. With the Howlers hidden in Thebe, Roque…Imperator Fabii, fell into the trap twofold, through no fault of his own. Any would have done the same. I made an effort to rescue his command, to rally our ships. But Darrow had already reached his bridge. And torchShips were burning all around us. We did not know friend from foe. It’s haunted my dreams, the sounds of the Obsidian Horde pouring through their ships….”

“Liar.” Mustang snorts her derision.

“And so you retreated.”

“At grave cost, y

es, my liege. I saved as many ships for the Society as I could. I saved my men, knowing they would be needed for the battle to come. It was all I could do.”

“It was a noble thing, saving so many,” the Sovereign says.

“Thank—”

“At least it would be if it were true.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I don’t believe I have ever stuttered, girl. I do, however, believe you fled the battle, abandoning your post and your Imperator to the enemy.”

“You are calling me a liar, my liege?”

“Obviously,” Mustang says.

“I will not stand aspersions against my honor,” Antonia snaps at Mustang, puffing up her chest. “It is beneath…”

“Oh, be still, child,” the Sovereign says. “You’re in deep waters here, with larger fish than you. You see, others escaped the battle, others who transmitted their battle analytics to us so we would know what happened. So we could assess the calamity and see how Antonia of the Severus-Julii disgraced her name and lost us the battle, abandoning her Praetor when he called for aid, fleeing for the belt to save her own hide, where she then lost her ships.”

“Fabii lost the battle,” she says vindictively. “Not I.”

“Because his allies abandoned him,” Aja purrs. “He might still have saved his command had you not thrown his formation to chaos.”

“Fabii made mistakes,” the Sovereign says. “But he was a noble creature and as loyal a servant to his Color. He was even honorable enough to take his own life, to accept that he had failed and to pay justly for it and ensure he would not be interrogated or bartered. His last act in destroying the rebel docks was the act of a hero. An Iron Gold. But you…you scurrilous craven, you fled like a little girl who pissed her Whiteday dress. You abandoned him to save yourself. Now you slander him in front of all. In front of his friend.” She gestures protectively to Cassius. “Your men saw the reptile underneath, that is why they turned on you. Why you lost your ships to your better sister.”

“I would see whoever lays these claims against me in the Bleeding Place,” Antonia says, trembling with anger. “My honor will not be smeared by faceless, jealous creatures. It is sad that they would manufacture evidence to smear my good name. No doubt they have ulterior motives. Perhaps intentions against my company or my holdings or they seek to undermine Gold as a whole. Adrius, tell the Sovereign how ridiculous this all is.”

But Adrius remains quiet. “Adrius?”

“I’d rather have the loyalty of a dog than that of a coward,” he says. “Lilath was right. You are weak. And that is dangerous.”

Antonia looks about like a drowning woman, feeling the water coming over her head, undertow pulling her down, nothing to grab onto, nothing to save her. Aja swells behind her like a dark wave as Octavia denounces her formally. “Antonia au Severus-Julii, matron of House Julii and Praetor First Class of the Fifth and Sixth Legions, by the power vested in me by the Compact of The Society, I find you guilty of treason and dereliction of duty in a time of war and hereby sentence you to death.”

“You bitch,” Antonia hisses at her, then to the Jackal, “You can’t afford to kill me. Adrius…please.” But she has no ships anymore. No face. Tears stream out of swollen eyes as she seeks some hope here, some way out. There is none, and when she meets my gaze, she knows what I am thinking. Reap what you sow. This is for Victra, and Lea, and Thistle, and all the others she would sacrifice so she could live. “Please…,” she whimpers.

But there is no mercy here.

Aja grasps Antonia’s neck from behind. She shivers in horror, shrinking to her knees, not even attempting to fight as the huge woman slowly closes her hands and begins to strangle her to death. Antonia snorts, wriggles, and takes a full minute to die. When she has, Aja completes the execution by snapping her neck with a violent twist and tossing her atop Sevro’s corpse.

“What an odious creature,” the Sovereign says, turning from Antonia’s body. “At least her mother had spine. Cassius, your shoes are filthy.” Blood crusts the rubber soles of his prison slippers and spatters the green jumpsuit’s legs. “There’s a complex of sleeping quarters through there, a kitchen, showers. Clean yourself. My valet has been attempting to foist a meal on me for hours. I’ll have him serve it here for you. You won’t miss the battle. The Ash Lord has promised it will last another several hours, at the very least. Lysander, will you show him the way?”

“I won’t leave your side, my liege,” Cassius says very nobly. “Not till this is through and these monsters are put down.” The Truth Knight rolls his eyes at the display.

“You’re a good lad,” she says before turning toward me. “Now it’s time we dealt with the Red.”

Aja drags me to the Sovereign’s feet at the center of the holopad. The cold sneer of command is etched deeply into the tyrant’s marble face. Her shoulders are weary though, pressed down by the weight of empire and the shadowy mass of a hundred years of sleepless nights. Her tightly bound hair is shot with deep rivers of gray. Tendrils of blue worm through the corners of her eyes from relapsed cellular rejuvenation therapy. She’s had no peace from me. Kneeling and bleeding though I am, it does my soul good to know I’ve haunted her nights.