Alterant (Belador #2)(76)

“And you healed.” She put her hand over her stomach. That might not be so bad except for getting skewered. “Wonder what he died of?”

“His head hangs to one side like he fell and broke his neck while he was chasing whoever he thought had stolen his pigs.”

“Is that the worst thing down here?”

“No.”

Of course not. “Then what is?”

“Knowing what’s down here will only make you jumpy, expecting everything to be a threat.”

“Just once, I’d like a straight answer.”

“I’d like to live a normal life,” he said. “Maybe you’ll get a straight answer when I get what I want.”

In other words, never, but that wouldn’t detour her from trying to get as much out of him as she could. “Explain to me why Kizira wants you?”

“She doesn’t want me so much as what I am.”

“What are you that I’m missing here?”

“I told you. A Belador Alterant.”

“Really? You’re the one who keeps saying you aren’t a Belador,” she pointed out.

He made a grinding sound in his throat. “Fine. I’m an Alterant with Belador blood. Does that make it easier? Did you ever try to track down your father or pull your birth records?”

“No, I know it’s a dead end.”

Tristan shook his head. “You haven’t even tried to trace your roots to find out your blood background, when you’ve been free to do so. And you say you really want to help all Alterants. Sure.”

He paused at a crossing in the tunnels only long enough to make a right turn into another endless walk with the same outdoor look.

She stiffened at the censure. “Unlike you and most of the world, I can’t go out in sunlight. I’m bound by my vows to do my duty, which includes being on a VIPER team. I’ve been doing everything I can on the Internet, but nothing on me shows up. I only have so many ways and time to search.”

“I understand—”

“Really? I don’t think so.” She stopped and waited for him to turn around. “If we were a recognized race, the Tribunal would have to give us the same rights as everyone else. That’s what I wish you’d realize.”

“Not going to happen, Evalle. We’d have to be accepted into a pantheon. Who would take us? Macha?”

“I don’t know.” If she had all the answers, she wouldn’t be stuck in the middle of this maze. “But I’d like a chance at life where I don’t have to constantly dodge getting locked up. You can’t just run, Tristan. Look what happened here. You had nowhere better to take three Alterants than to an underground tomb. How are they going to be safe anywhere else when they weren’t down here?”

“You keep expecting me to put my trust in people like Brina, who screwed me in the first place, and the Tribunal, who don’t give a rat’s ass about any of us.”

“I trusted you to bring me into a place I have no way to leave without your teleporting me back out. I did it because I want to find a way to help all of us. Show me a little faith by sharing what you know.”

He gave her a withering look. “I am showing you trust by bringing you here. I’m making a leap of faith that you’ll do as you say and not hand over those three and walk away with your freedom. And I wouldn’t be doing this if I had a choice. That’s more than you deserve after sending me back to the jungle when, if you’ll recall, Brina didn’t deny that I had been caged unfairly. I’m willing to do what it takes to get these three to a better place. My question is what you’ll do when faced with the decision of your freedom over theirs.”

She’d already told him her plan.

He could bite her boots. She was willing to fight to give these three a chance at life and freedom.

That had to be enough.

But she hadn’t survived to this point by lying down for anyone. “I don’t have all the answers. I don’t know if a pantheon will ever consider a bunch of half-breeds. But if you think enough of those three Alterants that you’re willing to hand over your life to the Medb in trade, then why can’t you care enough to fight for the chance to be accepted as a true race?”

He dropped his head, staring down at the clover hugging the soles of his boots. “I have a lot more at stake besides these three.” He raised his head and his soul lay bare in his eyes. “When I can rest assured that everything that matters to me is safe, I’ll fight. But I’m not trusting anyone with what’s mine to protect until then.”

He turned and strode away. End of conversation.

She followed him. Who was he talking about that he had to protect? Now wasn’t the time to push him again, but she’d pry that clam open later when she had a way to keep it open.

He slowed as they neared another crossroads in the tunnels, then kept walking straight ahead where the path curved left, then right, then left for so long that Evalle thought for sure they’d gone in a circle.

Lights flickered along the corridor. She started to ask Tristan if he knew what that meant, when he held up a hand for her to stop and be silent.

She paused ten feet behind him and checked over her shoulder for brick walls, crazy guys with pitchforks or some new terror. When she turned back around, a figure wavered in front of Tristan, taking form little by little until it turned into a soldier, complete with a bayonet-tipped rifle, dirt-smudged Confederate uniform and a bloody rag tied around his head.