Golden Son (Red Rising Trilogy, #2)(16)

“Then what is your suggestion?”

“You stop being a little bitch.” She smiles and holds out a dataSlip. Grudgingly, I take the edge of the thin metal slip, but she holds on, pulling me toward the edge of the fountain, between her legs. Her lips part, her tongue playing along the top as her eyes trace my face, up and up to my eyes, where they try to spark a fire. But there’s none there for her. I try to pull back. “Stop hesitating.” With a feline sigh, she lets the dataSlip go. I run it over my personal datapad and an advertisement for a tavern appears on my display.

“This isn’t on Citadel grounds,” I say.

“So?”

“So, if I leave, it’s open season on my head.”

“Then don’t advertise your leaving.”

I take a step back. “How much are they paying you?”

“You think this is a setup!”

“Is it?”

“No.”

“How do I know you’re telling the truth?”

“Most people can’t afford the truth. I can.”

“Oh, that’s right. I forgot. You never lie.”

“I am of the gens Julii.” She stands slowly, anger uncoiling like a razor. “My family trades in commerce enough to buy continents. Who could afford to purchase my honor? If … one day I become your enemy, I will tell you. And I will tell you why.”

“Everyone’s honest till they’re caught in a lie.”

Her laugh is husky and makes me feel small and boyish, reminding me she’s seven years older than I. “Then stay, Reaper. Trust in chance. Trust in friends. Hide here till someone buys your contract, and pray they didn’t do it just to serve you up to the Bellona like a suckling pig.”

I weigh the odds. “Well, when you put it that way.”

“Colonel Valentin?” Victra asks the shorter of the two Grays who wait for us on the ramp of the shuttle. It’s a shit can. One of the ugliest fliers I’ve ever seen. Like the front half of a hammerhead shark. I eye the taller of the Grays warily.

“Yes, domina,” Valentin says, nodding his cinderblock head with the rigid precision of a man risen through the ranks. “You are sure you were not followed?”

“Certain as death,” Victra says.

“We should depart fastlike, then.”

I follow Victra into the shuttle, scanning the grounds behind us. We wore ghostCloaks as soon as we departed Augustus’s villa. A dozen hidden hallways and six old gravLifts later, we arrived in a dusty, seldom-used section of the Citadel’s launch pads. Theodora left us there. She wanted to come, but I won’t take her where we’re going.

A Gray scans Victra and me for bugs as we board the ship.

The ship’s ramp slides closed behind us. Twelve craggy Grays fill the small passenger hold of the shuttle. They’re not the dashing sort. Just craftsmen of a dark trade.

Though there are averages, Colors are diverse in composition due to human genetics and the differing ecosystems throughout the Society. The Grays of Venus are often darker and more compact than those of Mars, but families move. The talent levels in each Color are even more variable than appearance. Most Grays aren’t destined for anything more than patrolling shopping centers and city streets. Some go to the armies. Some to the mines. But then there are the Grays who were born a special breed of wicked and clever and have been trained all their lives to hunt the Gold enemies of their Gold masters. Like these in the shuttle with us. They call them lurchers—after the mutt dogs of Earth crossbred for uncommon stealth, cunning, and speed, all for one purpose: killing things bigger than they are.

“We’re bound for Lost City and it’s just the twelve of you?” I ask.

I know they’re enough. I just don’t like Grays. So I push their buttons.

They eye me with the quiet reserve of a family meeting a stranger on the road. Valentin’s the father. He’s built like a squat block of dirty ice carved by a rusted blade, and his sun-blasted face is dark and set with quick eyes. His lieutenant, Sun-hwa, leans toward us, tough and gnarled as an olive tree.

Both are Earthborn by the looks of their continentally ethnic features. These Grays wear no triangular badge of the Society’s Legion on their civilian street clothes.

“We’re tasked with your protection, dominus,” says Valentin as Sun-hwa loads an exotic circular weapon on the inside of her left wrist. Looks plasma based. “My team has prepared a secure route. Estimated traveling time: twenty-four minutes.”

“If Pliny finds out where I am going, or if the Bellona know I’m out of the Citadel …”

“The lurchers know the situation,” Victra says.

“I don’t see a Gold badge. Mercenaries?”

“Means we are good enough to live this long, dominus,” Valentin says flatly. “We’ve prepared for all eventualities. Contingency plans and support have been organized.”

“How much support?”

“Enough. We’re just the transporters, dominus.” His mouth twitches into a smile and I take his word for it. “Bigger problem than the Bellona is third parties thinking an opportunity’s just stumbled their way. Where we’re going, there will be a hell of a lot of third parties, dominus. Shit complicates our ROI. Sun-hwa?”

“Wear this.” Sun-hwa tosses me a bag of plain clothing. Her voice drones on in a monotone drawl. “You’re tall can’t do shitall about that but we’ll do a quick dye job with this this and this.” She tosses Victra another bag. “For you boss thought you’d dress too fancy.”