I step over the bodies, wiping my blades clean, and fix the helm in place. Don’t need the airship drifting around suspiciously while I’m trying to do a job. Then I turn and step back out into the dark-red corridor, using the edge of my thumb to adjust my goggles.
Time for part two.
CHAPTER TWO
“EVERY SAINT IS BORN AND CHOSEN BY THE HANDS OF THE HERALDS AND GIFTED WITH THEIR DIVINE POWER. AND, ACCORDINGLY, THEY ARE TO BE DELIVERED UNTO THE GATE OF HEAVEN, WHERE THE HERALDS WILL EMBRACE THEM.”
—THE DIVINE ORIGINS OF TRINITY, THE ARCHIVAL COUNCIL OF THE HERALDIC MINISTRY
I move silently through the corridor to the galley and the embedded trapdoor that leads to the lower level. There are people down there, gathered in a group in the cargo hold. Quite a few people, actually, each one exuding life and heat and movement that my lenses pick up. I count nine total, which is strange, but maybe this whole operation is a lot bigger than even Kilpatrick knew. Maybe Eteri collected a whole crew around her so she could start her own gang in another borough.
I could pry open the door and climb down the ladder, but I’ll lose the element of surprise and for no good reason. Every person down there is already marked to die, according to the terms of the job; phasing in front of them just cements the matter. It’s aninstant death sentence. No one can know what I do and live—it’s how I make sure my secret stays a secret. And it’s why people hire the Butcher. No witnesses. No survivors.
I phase down, knives out, into the crowded space.
It only takes me a heartbeat to realize something is very, very wrong.
The cargo hold doesn’t have any stolen water containers. No Gold Town defectors in ratty duster clothes, either. Just nine people seated around a table, wearing gold-threaded robes in four different colors—two in white, two in black, three in green, and two in red—and they’re all wearing masks. Gold masks formed into exaggerated faces with stoic expressions. Nothing else visible.
And now all nine of those masks are turned toward me, stunned into silence.
Dread lodges in my chest. Something has gone real fucking wrong. This isn’t who I was sent to kill.
Shit.
I close my eyes, inhaling slowly, drawing air down into the bottom of my lungs to steady me. All the whirling thoughts in my brain crystallize around the certainty of what I have to do now. It doesn’t matter who they are or why they’re here—they’ve seen me phase.
None of them can leave this room alive.
One of the figures in white jumps up, rips the golden mask from his face, and I catch the flash of a gold collar at his neck, half hidden by the robe.
A Heraldic preacher. What in every version of hell is a preacher doing here?
He stares at me—a masked, faceless figure covered in bloodsplatters and crouching in the shadows. His expression is a mix of confusion and shock and greedy reverence.
“A saint!” His voice is an awed whisper. “A lost saint. By the grace of the Heralds!”
I know what comes next. One of them will go to the steerage deck and send out a signal that will bring Trinity’s Archangels down upon us. And then those monsters will take me away from my sisters, from our home, from the life I’ve carved out for them with ragged nails and bloody teeth. I’ll disappear into the Gate of Heaven, never to be seen again, just like every other saint who’s ever been born, and Halle and Kelda will be left behind, alone and abandoned. Again.
That won’t happen. It can’t.
One of the guys in red calls my name—Butcher—and distantly I recognize his voice; it’s familiar, but there’s no room for hesitation. I’ve already made up my mind. I clock his size, the way he moves, the flash of bright-silver metal underneath his robe, and instantly tag him as my biggest threat in this room.
But not for long.
Because I’m already gone, I’m already behind him, and he doesn’t even realize it until the moment I slam Wrath deep into the base of his skull, right where it meets his spine.
He drops to the floor in a heavy heap.
The other one in a red robe reaches for their own mask with a shout of alarm, but it dies to a gurgle when Reason flashes across their throat.
The two in black swing to their feet, drawing pulse pistols that gleam cool gold in the naphtha lantern light as they point the barrels at my head. I inhale and phase, popping back into existenceright behind them, raking Wrath across the backs of their knees and then making fast, deadly strikes to their necks with Mercy. I’m gone again before their blood can even leave a mark on my clothes.
The other one in white—the one with their mask still on—awkwardly wrestles a gun out from under their robe and stutters off a few shots before I get in close and stab Mercy deep into their temple. I’m on the other side of the room again before their face has even hit the deck. Moving so fast that the rest of the people packed in here are only just now starting to register what’s happening.
Five down. Four more to go.
The trio in green are up now, guns out, standing back to back to back in a protective circle, but it doesn’t matter because I’m between them and behind them and in front of them in a blur of movement. I work my blades like artists’ tools until they, too, fall.
