Unbound (The Captive #7)(41)

“Who came up with the plans for this?” he inquired.

“You did,” Aria replied, drawing his attention away from the thick walls.

“They found your designs within one of the caves and used them,” William expounded when Daniel frowned questioningly at his sister. “Your plans are the foundation for all of the safe houses.”

“They used my designs?” he said in awe as his gaze ran over the beams again and the pipes he now saw running in between them. “Do they have functioning plumbing and a water supply?”

“They do. The water is piped in from the nearby lake,” William replied.

Daniel’s chest swelled with pride. “They did a great job here.”

“You’re a talented man,” Aria said.

He didn’t deny it; there was no reason to. He felt Xavier’s eyes on him and turned to meet the man’s steady, inquisitive gaze.

“Did you learn anything about Sabine?” Tempest asked.

“She’s arrogant,” Aria said as she exited the entry room and started to make her way down the hall. The walls brushed against her arms as she walked. “It will be her downfall.”

Daniel continued to study the structure around him, taking more note of the detail and care the rebels had taken to fortify it. There was no sign of bending or bowing in the wood used in the construction. Great effort had gone into making sure this underground fortress stayed sturdy and strong. He knew the calculations and supplies he’d made and listed in his design in order to keep the walls and ceiling this solid, and they had followed them perfectly.

Aria came to an abrupt halt at the end of the hall, causing him to crash into her back as his attention was still on the ceiling. Her shoulders became rigid, as if she were preparing for a blow, before she opened the door and stepped into the room. He followed behind her to discover nearly fifty humans gathered within.

“They weren’t here before?” he whispered to her when he guessed at what had caused her to tense. She was trying to cover it up, but he had read Atticus’s journals too and suspected she was battling her vampire instincts to kill with every passing second. Having so many humans in one place wouldn’t help her.

“No,” she replied crisply.

Xavier muscled his way forward to stand beside her. “I will ask them to leave.”

“No, they are safe here. We need as many of them safe as we can get. Otherwise they could become like the humans we saw earlier.”

“What humans?” William inquired.

“We will fill everyone in at once,” Aria told him and gestured toward a table in the center of the main room.

Someone thrust a drink into Daniel’s hand when he passed and slapped him on the back as they greeted him. He took a sip of the hard liquor. It made his eyes water and his throat burn, but it hit the spot. He watched his sister settle onto a chair and hold herself as if it pained her to move even a centimeter.

He’d almost hoped there would be some way to save her if Braith remained dead, but as he watched her now, he realized it was more than the humans around her that had her so on edge. She was in pain, and it was a pain so deep it had become physical as well as emotional.

***

Aria

Aria held herself stiffly in the chair to face the person who had said her name. Won’t break. Won’t break. She kept telling herself this, but her body felt as if it would fracture and fall apart at any second. Seeing Sabine, or whoever the hell she was, earlier in the forest had rattled the walls she’d worked so carefully to craft this past week.

It didn’t help that she hadn’t expected all of these humans to arrive while she was gone. Their hearts thumped and their pulses raced as drinks were passed around the room and Daniel explained to the group what they’d seen in the forest with Sabine and her followers.

“How can we ever expect to withstand so many?” a man inquired. “We will surprise them, yes, but that surprise won’t last long.”

“They’ll be focused on the palace,” Aria forced herself to say. She had to respond, had to be normal and in control. They were wavering; they needed a leader. Rising to her feet, she kept her head held high and her glasses in place, as she turned to face the room. “They’ll have their backs to us when we attack them. When they turn to come at us, they’ll make themselves vulnerable to the palace guards and they will panic. The surprise won’t last long, but we can drastically cull their numbers before they get over their panic, and by then, it will be too late.”

Aria paced over to stand in the doorway leading out and turned to face them with her hands clasped behind her back. She couldn’t allow them to see that her clenched fingers wouldn’t open.

“She is arrogant,” Aria said. “So arrogant she has her followers dressed in brown cloaks now, to blend in, while she strolls about in a vivid red one. It marks her for all to see because she believes there are none who can beat her. The mad king, Atticus, believed the same thing, yet he is no more. This threat will be met the same way as we met him, and she will be taken down with the same ruthlessness, because she has underestimated her enemies.”

“And the king, when will he be joining us?” a woman asked, and Aria somehow managed to keep herself from flinching as if she’d been slapped. A fresh knife drove through her heart and twisted there at the reminder of Braith.