“We talked for hours. He was as angry as I was over the War Leader’s restrictions. He said we needed to send a message; one the leaders couldn’t ignore.
“W-we came up with the idea of bombing the Administration building. He said that the offices were always empty whenever there was a Touchpoint, that it would get our message across that everyone should have the chance to attend a Touchpoint, not just the War Leader’s special few.”
I thought back to the Touchpoint and the thousand Somas who had participated. The child obviously didn’t understand the complexities of fighting a war.
“He said he had contacts, people who could get us what we needed. I had started volunteering for extra shifts in the Administration building. He told me he couldn’t do it, because he would be recognized on security cameras, but no one would notice a young intern moving some boxes around.
“The morning the Touchpoint was announced we met up and he gave me the cart with the boxes. He told me how to get to the boiler room and how to arm the bomb.
“I was terrified, but I had lost everything because of these policies. I had to dosomething,and what were some empty offices compared to all the Somas who were dying? I thought I followed his directions to the letter. He told me I would have thirty minutes to get to safety after I armed the bomb, but I must have made some kind of mistake. It wasn’t even ten minutes later that the bomb went off.”
I shook my head. Naya didn’t see that she was a liability, that the man who manipulated her had most likely expected that she wouldn’t survive the explosion.
She turned to look at Rhuyin and I.
“I am so, so sorry,” she said, then started sobbing. “I know you guys got hurt. I was so afraid when the explosion happened. I thought it was just supposed to be something small, that it would just be making a point. I didn’t expect…”
I knelt down next to her.
“Naya, have you spoken to this Kyrmenos since the explosion?”
“I haven’t been able to reach him,” she said. “All my messages are bouncing back. It’s like he just disappeared. I thought maybe I could find him at the park. That’s where I was trying to go the day I met Tik in the hall.”
“Would you be able to recognize him if you saw him?”
Her sobs had started to trail off as she tried to focus on Luke’s questions.
“I-I think so,” she said hesitantly, wiping tears away with the back of her hand. I noticed distantly that her painted nails were chipped and broken, some chewed to the quick and bloody.
“Did he have any distinguishing features? Scars? Tattoos? Anything like that?” Helios asked.
She started to shake her head, then stopped.
“I remember thinking it was a little weird. He wore gloves whenever we met,” she said.
“Probably to avoid leaving any fingerprints that could be tracked back to him,” Elex offered.
“I guess. I remember noticing that the little finger on his right glove was always flat, like he had a really short finger or the glove finger was empty.”
Rhu’s eyes shot to mine, our thoughts moving in in sync. We spoke in unison.
“Kopanos.”
My thoughts were moving like lightning, pieces falling into place. His insistence on my title. Calling memikros prinkipus.His hidden sources of information.
“Kopanos works for Alexandria,” I breathed as I finally saw the big picture.
“But why would Kopanos work with Alexandria?” Hel asked. “He’s a fucking Soma!”
I shook my head, still pulling my thoughts together.
“He’s a Soma, but his career has been stalled for years. His family has a history of being political leaders, but he’s been unable to find a Mageia to Bond with,” Rhu said. “Garrick is his uncle. He was the former War Leader that Polemos—Erix—replaced.”
“He’s been responsible for training the new Mageia pairs. Erix mentioned that an inordinate number of new pairs had been killed in recent years,” I added. “What if Kopanos has deliberately been sabotaging the training of Bonded pairs at the behest of Cyrius? If he is teaching them something that is making them vulnerable, it would make it easier to take them out in a fight.”
“It makes sense,” Allard offered. He had been quiet throughout Naya’s confession. “It’s exactly the kind of plot Aurelius would set up.”
Aurelius was my father’s Spy Master and had been Maalik’s lover and mentor.
