Secondborn (Secondborn #1)(73)

I can hardly sleep. But finally, I get Hawthorne’s address, and from an unlikely source. As it turns out, Emmy can be bought with crellas and a daily gossip visit. I hate using her, but I’m desperate.

It’s been hard waiting to leave the Stone Forest Base, but first I have a private luncheon scheduled with Clifton and some buyers. I haven’t asked who, and he hasn’t said. It’s better this way.

At least I get to pilot the Anthroscope to Copper Towne. The moderately sized city is near the border of Swords and Seas. Usually Clifton and I leave together from his apartment on Base, but he has something scheduled this morning in Forge and requested that I take his chauffeured airship, but I harassed him until he agreed to let me meet him in Copper Towne. I’ll dine with Clifton, and then if all goes well, have dinner with Hawthorne.

I change into a stunning rose-red dress and black heels that I find in my locker. Clifton’s assistant provides my “uniforms,” coordinating them through my Stone attendant. Pulling the long, fingerless satin gloves to my elbows, I breathe easier, knowing my scar is covered. The thigh-high stockings are next. I pick up my black wrap and clutch, and make a dash for the hangar.

After receiving clearance for takeoff, I plot a course for the border of Swords and daydream about what I’ll say to Hawthorne when I see him tonight. The trip takes several hours, but I arrive at the Salloway warehouse a little before our appointment.

I walk unhurried to the front offices of the Salloway Munitions satellite warehouse and testing facility. It’s not the exquisite headquarters—that’s in Forge. This building is “serviceable” and “secure,” according to Clifton. Entering through the front doors, I pass through a full-body scanner. Inside the large lobby, sophisticated, masculine-leaning furniture sits beneath a sword the size of a blue whale. I choose the leather chair directly beneath its sharp point.

Ordering a very potent alcoholic beverage from the table unit, I watch as a short, fat glass with two perfect ice cubes pops up through a hole in the veneer. I touch my lips to the rim, marking it with red lipstick, and take the tiniest of sips, just enough to have it on my breath. Then I lean back in my seat, cross my legs, and wait. After ten minutes, Clifton approaches. I let him devour my legs with his eyes. “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here,” Clifton remarks by way of greeting.

I try not to giggle. My boss reaches down and takes my hand, helping me to my feet. He kisses both of my cheeks. His lips linger a little longer than appropriate. Then he indicates a brutal-looking man with a thick red scar that runs from his temple to his cheek. “This is Valdi Kingfisher.”

I’m given first names only, with last names of birds—it’s a hallmark of the business. I nod. “Firstborn Kingfisher.”

“This is Pedar Albatross,” Clifton continues.

“Firstborn Albatross,” I reply, with another nod.

We take the hallway to the main weapons-testing room. Clifton runs through the specs of the new prototype Culprit-44. He gives them each a weapon without the magazines and gestures in my direction. “Roselle, if you would.” I approach the station, and they crowd around behind me as I assemble the weapon in under five seconds. I enable it and pop off twenty shots at twenty targets in twenty seconds—all head shots. Clean. They’re duly impressed. I casually look at my red-painted fingernails and trigger the weapon, spraying the targets in a barrage of silver hydrogen energy, decimating them. That has them whooping with glee.

Pedar sidles up to me as I put the weapon into its case. He leans in close, about to say something, and then I feel his hand on my bottom. I’m debating the best way to kill him when the distinct whine of the Culprit-44 powering up sounds next to us. Pedar and I glance at Clifton. His face twists in a scowl. “Never touch her. She’s not for sale, only the weapons.”

Pedar drops his hand. Valdi smacks him upside the head, ordering the smaller man out of the building to wait in the airship.

“My deepest apologies,” Valdi says to both Clifton and me. “He’s an animal. I will deal with him later, on your behalf.” I nod, but Clifton is fuming.

“Shall we have lunch?” I interject.

Clifton takes my arm and places it in the crook of his own. Wordlessly, we leave the testing room. A light repast is set up in the penthouse office suite. We sit around a table with luxurious white linen. Above the table, a chandelier with hummingbird crystals sparkles with golden light. As we eat, I sit quietly while Clifton and Valdi discuss quantities and delivery dates.

Dessert arrives, a confectionary bird’s nest with two ice cream eggs. I eat some, then sit back and sip coffee. The conversation turns to the Secondborn Trials. Valdi and Clifton discuss the merits of last year’s competitors, especially the winner of The Trials, a burly Sword-Fated man named Nazar who decapitated a Star-Fated woman in the “Headless-Friendless” challenge and torched a Sword-Fated man in the “Shade of the Sun” winner-takes-all finale.

“I’m sorry,” Valdi says to me. “Are we boring you with our talk of brutality?”

“No,” I reply.

“Were you able to follow it?”

“Quite able. You’re an odds maker, Firstborn Kingfisher. You make money not only by calculating the likelihood of a winner, but also by making sure that the person who’s least likely to win doesn’t.”

He chuckles. “That’s exactly right. I’m curious, Roselle. Why is it, do you think, that a Sword wins the Secondborn Trials each year? One could argue, and many do, that a Star or an Atom, with all of their ingenuity, should have better odds of winning the title.”