My grip on the wall loosens, and suddenly I’m tipping sideways as the floor rushes up to meet me.
THEN
Just a little something for the assassin who has everything.
I sit cross-legged on the roof of a building in Covenant’s North Parish, frowning down at the cloth-wrapped bundle in front of me. It looks about the length and width of my forearm, although the cloth could be adding some bulk to it.
My eyes flick up to Dani, sitting across from me, almost close enough for our knees to touch. Ambient light from the airships above and the scattered naphtha streetlamps paints her face in gold and silver, adding an extra luminance to her smooth skin.
You got me a gift?
She lifts one shoulder. A half shrug. It’s taken me months and months to get a better handle on her tells—she’s really hard to read—but I know this one. She does the half shrug when she’s trying to seem casual to cover up nerves or discomfort.
Felt appropriate. It’s our two-year anniversary of working together.
I swallow, fingering one of the folds on the cloth wrapping.I didn’t get you anything.
Who said you had to? I just wanted to do something nice for you.Sheprops her chin in her hands, elbows on her knees, grinning at me.Thought I’d try it on for size, see how the other half live.
That pulls a little chuckle from me. It’s a running thread between us, that we can’t fathom how anyone gets by in the dust by being “nice.”How’s it working for you so far?
Her smile changes, softens, and her amber eyes are so bright, so vivid in this light that I can’t look away.Not sure yet.
Tugging at the cloth, I pull away the layers to reveal a mechanism built from the same matte-black metal as my goggles. It’s a thin, vicious blade of some kind, pointed like a toothpick, but it’s attached to a kind of arm brace.
Do you like it?Dani’s voice is usually bold and unapologetic. Tonight, though, her tone is low and mellow. Intimate.
I pick it up gingerly, turning it over, running the pad of my thumb gently along the perfectly honed edge of the blade.I’ve never seen anything like this.
Dani sets the cloth wrapping aside and scoots closer, and now our knees actually are touching. It pulls my concentration, and I have to force myself to refocus on what she’s saying.
… old friend of my dad’s used to make something similar. He’s… gone, but I found someone else to put it together.She holds out a hand.Here. Let me help.
I give her the contraption, and she sets it in her lap before reaching for my right arm. Gently, she pushes the long, loose sleeve of my shirt up past my elbow, her fingers leaving warm trails along the skin of my forearm. Flicking open the clasps on the brace, she fits it around my arm, locking it at the wrist and then again back toward my elbow.
This right here, she says, indicating a button catch near the base of my palm,releases it, see? Try it out.
Pointing my arm out to the side so I don’t stab either of us, I give it my best go, but it takes a few times before I get the twist and press of it just right. Once I do, though, the blade that lies attached to the brace across the top of my forearm shoots forward. A pointed, deadly extension of myself.
It’s incredible.
I want to say that.This is incredible, thank you so much—something, anything. But all my limited words get stuck somewhere at the bottom of my throat, and I can’t seem to force them out.
Dani watches my face closely, eyebrows raised, amusement tucked into the corner of her lips.Oh, no, Val, you’re trying to say thank you, and it’s killing you, isn’t it?She laughs in that way that makes me feel like I’ve swallowed something too bright and too warm.Please stop, I need you alive.
Twisting the blade back into its brace, I match her expression, her teasing tone, reflecting it back.Who’s gonna help you pay your bills otherwise, right?
Dani doesn’t answer for a moment. She’s gold and silver all over. Her gaze trails over my eyes, the angle of my jaw, the curve of my mouth. She smiles again, but without the edge, without the tease.
Sure, she murmurs softly.We’ll say it’s that.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“ANY PREACHER CAUGHT DEFYING THE SACRED LAW OF THE HERALDS BY STRAYING FROM ITS ORIGINAL MESSAGE AND PURPOSE WILL BE STRIPPED OF THEIR MEDALLION AND SUBJECT TO FULL PROSECUTION UNDER THE LAW. FOR THE LAW IS THE VOICE OF THE HERALDS HERE BELOW.”
—HERALDIC MINISTRY OFFICIAL DECREE (YEAR 508)
Mama sings.
