“Leviathans are the sigil beast of gens Kalibar. The ruling house of Europa. Cyaxares is their pride and joy. Three-hundred-year-old bull.Twice as big as any other. That one down there was probably middling size. Always wanted to see Cyaxares.”
“And the Kalibar, they ride those things?” I ask.
He nods. “With pressurized suits you can take them a couple dozen clicks down. Not the healthiest hobby, or kindliest mount. Leviathans ain’t loyal creatures. Sometimes they eat their owners. Hungry bastards. Each with five stomachs to fill. I’d prefer a sun drake or a white griffin, me.” He pauses. “Or a unicorn. What would you ride?”
I consider his strange question. “Not a leviathan. A Pegasus maybe. Something nice.”
“Have you met a pegasus?”
“Well, no. But me brothers grew up pretending they were in Pegasus Legions.”
“They ain’t nice, Pegasuses. Carthii breed carnivorous ones too.”
“Is anything nice?” I mutter. He stares at me, taking the question too philosophically. “Why are you talking to me?”
“Why wouldn’t I?”
“You never talk to me. As a rule.”
“My rule is I don’t talk to dead weight.”
I would smile if I hadn’t just learned that Volga might now be a bloodthirsty warlord. What would Ephraim say to that? “You’re a real bastard,” I say. “You know that, right? Leaving Darrow and Cassius hanging out to dry.”
“They went off mission. I saved their asses in the end.”
I glance at the Pink children. “Yeah? Well, I have a new rule. I don’t talk to bastards.”
I turn back to the window.
He doesn’t say anything for several minutes but he stays there behind me, chewing the inside of his cheek, riding some really mad turbulence without so much as stumbling. “I want to know something,” he says. I don’t answer him, but he’s going to ask me whether I let him or not.
“You helped kidnap my kids, unknowingly or so you say, but you were party to it, just the same,” he says slowly.
“Aye,” I say. “And I felt bad about it, so I risked my neck to get them back.”
“Earning the trust of Virginia and Vic, apparently. Enough that you were witness to the birth of…you were there for…my—” He cannot say the words, but I know now what he’s asking about.
The ship rocks. My knuckles are white from clutching the handholds near the viewport and my heart starts to turn black the longer I hold on to the thrill of my anger at him. I relent, and it feels good.
“You want it straight? I helped her deliver Ulysses,” I say. “I…heard her first words to him. Volga was there too, guarding the door while it happened. Later, I pulled him from the tree where they killed him. I tried burying him in the ground. I didn’t know what else to do. I think Victra wanted me there when he was buried proper, because she knew I would rather have been the one in the ground. I’d have traded spots with him.”
“Why?”
I go quiet before finding the words. “He was a baby. He didn’t do anything. I’ve done stuff. I’m not all nice.” I think of my sister’s children. “It wasn’t right is all.”
“And this Volga character?”
I wipe tears from my eyes. “Shit. Volga woulda eaten her own gun if it put that baby back in Victra’s arms. I swear it. That’s what I don’t get. She’s a sweetheart. I know she’s done stuff. I mean, she was pulling heists with Ephraim before I ran into them, who knows the kinda stuff she did. But I thought she was good. Maybe I needed her to be? When she gave herself up to Fá—even after he killed Ephraim, and he was like a father to her—I told myself she was sacrificing herself so he’d leave Mars alone. So people wouldn’t get hurt. To hear that she’s marching with Fá, I can’t believe it.”
“But you do.”
“Whaddya mean?”
“You didn’t call Sigurd a liar.” I stare at him. “You know why? Because you know that people can and will disappoint you. Even this friend of yours is going to let you down.”
“Is that why you won’t take up your da’s helmet?” I ask.
“The hell do you know about that?” he mutters. I shrug. “Cassius, that chatty little shit.”
