I’m used to going in solo.
I pick an empty, cracked-open window on the fourth floor and phase over to it, through it, in one long breath, pulling myself back together in a dim pool of weak sunlight on the other side of the wall.
I’m in a corner of a long, open room outfitted like a lounge with a number of Gold Towners inside, some of them relaxing on couches while others are pacing, tense, coiled tight.
The one closest to the window spots me, crouched on the floor, one hand holding Wrath, the other gripping the handle of Reason. He jerks in alarm and swings his pistol around to my face, but his hand shakes a little.
“Holy shit,” he says. “Holy shit, it’s you.”
There’s a pause as the rest of the Gold Towners in the room hear him, register what he’s saying, turn to see me there.
I slowly straighten, Trinity’s song low but growing louder as my anticipation sharpens. “Tell me where they are and you live.”
He sets his jaw, putting on a brave face. A fool’s face. “You won’t get anything out of us.”
“Suit yourself.” I mock a little bow—
And then I’m gone.
I’m a shadow stuttering across the open space, attacking and disappearing and blocking. Pulse fire scatters around the room—always a beat too late, always hitting the air where I was just a second before. I’m behind them and beside them, cutting their arms and sides with Wrath and Reason, bloodying their faces with plated knuckles, cutting them off by their heels or knees, kicking them to the ground and slicing downward with the kind of precision that means they won’t be getting back up again.
I lay them out, flat and bleeding on the ground, life leaking out of them in sticky pools of red.
Then I step over the bodies and head upstairs.
Something crunches beneath my boots on the landing for the fifth floor, and I pause, crouching to get a closer look. It’s glass. Dozens of tiny, glittering shards scattered all over, likely from—
I straighten, eyeing the stairwell window, the panes all along the bottom half busted and cleared out. Likely so someone could crawl inside. Someone else who isn’t supposed to be here, like me.
Dropping low, I slink forward, through the stairwell door and out into the hall. It’s empty, the filtered naphtha sconces all along the length of it flickering eerily, but there are noises coming from the room a few doors down on the right. My movements are completely silent as I creep over there. Three people inside—two are sprawled out on the floor, very still. Probably unconscious. The other one is hunched behind the desk, yanking open the drawers to rummage through what’s inside.
In a blink, I phase into the room, just on the other side of the door. Two big Gold Towners are laid out flat, trickles of blood at their temples, their pulse pistols still holstered. Over behind the desk, by the light of a naphtha lantern, the third person is grabbing stacks of records etched onto metal tablets, flipping through them, setting a few onto the desktop and tossing the rest aside. I watch them for a minute, trying to get a read on this mystery assailant, who looks to be about as tall as I am, but rounder in the hips and chest, with warm, light-brown skin and hair that glows a deep, dark purple in the lantern light—
I suck in a sharp breath and scramble to pull off my goggles and mask, needing to see for myself, to know if it really is…
“Dani?”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“THIS IS WHAT THEY WANT. TO GRIND US DOWN. TO ENSURE WE ARE TOO TIRED TRYING TO SURVIVE TO LOOK UP AND DEMAND BETTER. TO CONVINCE US THAT THE ONLY WAY FORWARD IS INDIVIDUALISM AND THAT OTHERS MUST FAIL IN ORDER FOR US TO SUCCEED.”
—EXCERPT FROMTRACTS FROM A REBEL PREACHER
At the sound of her name, Dani jerks upright, drawing the pulse pistol and leveling it at me in one smooth, practiced movement. Her eyes go wide as it hits her just who she’s got a gun pointed at. A deep, new cut slices across her high cheekbone, still raw from being sutured.
“Val…,” she breathes, sounding almost awestruck. Her amber eyes are wide and glistening with tears as she takes me in, and she drops the gun, her body sagging in relief. “Thank the Heralds. I thought you were dead.”
“Same.” My heart is hammering in the back of my throat, and I have the strange impulse to cross the room to her. Part of me knows that if I do that, if I get close enough, she’ll puther arms around me, hug me close, and I almost want to let her. To feel the solid, real warmth of her body so I know this isn’t just another hallucination. “I left the meet-up signal. You never showed.”
She shakes her head, wiping at her eyes. “I didn’t see it. I wasn’t even looking for it. Your lodgings were obliterated, Val. I figured not even you could survive a blast like that.”
My lodgings…“How did you know where to check? I never told you where I lived.”
There’s a beat that’s just half a second too long before she answers. A sickening feeling starts to creep over my skin.
“You didn’t have to. This is what you pay me for, right? My connections. My ability to know everything.” She flashes me a tight smile. “My gorgeousness and charm.”
I don’t return it. Dani has been my frontperson for almost as long as I’ve been working as the Butcher. I’d never intended to have a partner in this business, but she’d been so young. Like me. And she’d sounded so desperate, like me. Orion and I had just shattered apart for good, and I was keeping my sisters in the dark about what I was doing. I’d been lonely, crushingly lonely. Every breath just sharp enough to slowly shred at my insides. It was just me and my knives and I’d given them all names because they’d been the closest thing I had left as friends. So when she’d tracked the Butcher down and asked to help me, I’d said yes. And she’d become my partner. I’d portioned out part of myself just for her, and I’d thought the Butcher finally had someone—just one person—on their side.
