Golden Son (Red Rising Trilogy, #2)(146)

The poison spreads in me.

I slump to the ground, box in my lap.

Back against the blind statue.

Paralyzed.

The Jackal glides through the midst of this melee, a reptile over ice. He watches stabbing and butchery, and finds Lorn still struggling with Lilath as she tries to cut his throat. Lorn’s managed to take a shard of broken glass from the ground and is reaching to stab Lilath’s leg, when the Jackal bends, examines Lorn for a moment, and slowly puts a blade into his belly.

“They were wrong. Your side isn’t made of stone.”

Lorn’s face pinches with fear as the Jackal pulls the blade up the old man’s body. My razormaster’s eyes jump to me, to his grandchildren. He tries to stand, tries one last ounce of fury. Tries to say something. But his body has quit him. He will never see his island again. Never pet his griffin. Never hear his grandchildren laugh or see Lysander, the grandson I promised him. I did this to him. I brought him back from that separate peace he so wanted, but knew he never deserved. And soon his eyes gaze at nothing and the Jackal retrieves his blade and Lilath finishes her work with a slow sawing motion.

I loose a long moan. It’s all I can manage. Drool slithers down my throat. Victra crawls toward me, blood leaking from her. Amidst all this, Roque stands a statue apart.

Pulse weapons warble in the distance. Thunder rips the sky as dark shapes descend, cracking the sound barrier. They come from a stealthed ship. Something snuck in. Where are the patrols?

Obsidians and Praetorians land in the midst of the clearing, thumping down on the stone. They pursue those who fled the killing ground for the gardens, hunting them down with quiet economy. Antonia directs the slaughter, finishing heirs, clipping bloodlines half a millennium old. Taking hostages. Lilath is laughing with Vixus. They peel away electronic fleshMasks and shake free their golden hair. Behind them, Aja lands in splendor, her armor flashing in the lantern light. She surveys the carnage, face dark and content. I hardly notice her, because an old friend lands at her side. Cassius.

“Virginia?” he asks.

“Missing, I fear,” the Jackal says.

“Warned?”

“Angered. Lover’s spat.”

Victra manages to crawl to my ankle. A slick of blood shadows her path from where she was shot to the place where she now curls. Red on her lips. I can’t feel her touch.

“I didn’t know,” she whispers. “Darrow, I didn’t know.”

Aja bends over Lorn’s body taking his razor from his waist and closing her mentor’s eyes forever. He never even drew the weapon. Cassius comes close, stopping at my feet, where he goes to a knee and watches me.

“Can he move, poet?” he asks Roque.

“No. But he can hear.”

“You killed my family, Darrow. All of them. Me, Julian, that’s one thing. But the children? How could you?” I don’t know what he’s talking about. “I’ll find Sevro. I’ll find Mustang. There will be no mercy.” He touches the enameled hilt of his razor with his new arm.

“You can’t kill him,” Roque says from behind him. “You know what he is.” Roque puts a hand on Cassius’ shoulder. “Cassius, the Sovereign’s orders were clear.”

“Dissection,” Cassius murmurs. He watches me, and it seems that there was never a time when this man called me brother. Never a hope we could ever have been what we are now. Roughly, he takes my hand. I think, for a moment, he is shaking it. But instead, he steals the ring I earned. The iron wolf I killed his brother to possess. My finger is naked without it.

He rises from his bent knee to tower over me, more a beautiful vulture than an eagle. “Julian. Lea. Pax. Quinn. Weed. Harpy. Rotback. Tactus. Lorn. Victra. They deserved better than to die for a slave.” With that, he leaves me with Roque.

The world is silent except for sobbing and the sound of sirens. At my side, Victra watches Cassius leave, her life leaking from her. Those clever eyes of hers look up at me, lost.

“We must hurry,” Aja drawls in the center of the massacre. “They know we’re here. Bring your father and let us go.”

The Jackal nods. “A moment, if you please.”

Several meters away, Augustus lies pinned to the ground by three waiters. They hoist him up as the Jackal approaches, stepping over Lorn’s desecrated body.

“Is the Mask not as you like, Darrow?” he calls to me. “I made it just for you after you revealed your true self to me in Attica.”

The Jackal turns to his father. “What do you think, Father? Was this a ploy worthy your name?”

“You monster.” Augustus spits in his face. “What have you done?”

“So you’re not proud?” The Jackal wipes the spit away and looks at it. “Damn.”

“Stop this. My son, you’ve ruined us.”

“Adrius …,” Aja says impatiently. “We must go.”

The Jackal steps forward. “So now you call me son?” He clucks his tongue scoldingly and straightens his father’s jacket. “Was I your son when you put me on a rock for the elements to claim me? Three days. I was a baby. The Board didn’t even want an Exposure. But you thought I was so weak, and Claudius so strong. Was he strong when I had Karnus put him in the ground?”

His father’s lips tremble. “What?”