Heart of Iron (Heart of Iron #1)(6)
“We’re going, Jax,” she said stonily.
“Come again?”
“It is not wise,” Di agreed.
“See, when the Metal agrees with me, we have a problem,” he noted dryly.
She glared at both of them. “Either we’re going or I’m kicking you both off this ship,” she threatened, the tone in her voice making his stomach twist like it did when he stared at the stars for too long.
He never liked that tone. It usually ended with them trapped in a mine on Cerces, or caught in the middle of a territory war between mercenaries. She wore trouble like royalty wore the Iron Crown, and it fit her a little too well.
“It’s the Valerios’ garden,” he stressed. “They’re worse than any mercenary group out there.”
“We’re going,” she repeated.
He quickly looked away, chewing on the inside of his cheek.
She went on, “And if I don’t get the coordinates this time, I’ll stop—I promise. Just give me one more chance.”
He didn’t want to point out that if she got caught, there wouldn’t be a next time, but trying to argue with Ana was like trying to tell the stars to stop shining. Sighing, he pulled at his long, pale ponytail, trying to convince himself this was a good idea, and turned the ship up toward Astoria.
Ana
The closer they drew to the floating garden, the louder her heart thundered in her ears. Crashing an Ironblood’s party couldn’t be that difficult. She’d gone through worse. The mine on Cerces was worse. This would be easy. This was just a garden.
Just a few Ironbloods.
The floating gardens of Nevaeh were renowned across the kingdom for their beauty and exotic flowers. Ironblood-owned, and Ironblood-funded, the islands rose and fell over the cityscape like the cycles of the moon, and anyone who didn’t have pretty noble blood couldn’t visit.
And sneaking onto the Valerios’ floating garden . . .
She wasn’t sure if she was just desperate—or foolish, too.
Anxiously, she checked the bullets in her Metroid .56; an older pistol Captain Siege had given her three years ago when she turned fourteen.
“Count your bullets and remember where they land,” Captain Siege had warned. She put a hand over Ana’s to steady her aim. “Once you steal a life, you can never give it back, so easy on the trigger. Exhale. Feet apart.”
Ana did as she was told and let the captain fix her posture, straightening her back and crooking her elbow, and she found her aim easing toward the target, her finger effortlessly squeezing the trigger. Bull’s-eye.
“On your way to being a fine captain, I’d say,” Siege had said with a grin.
Ana still remembered that moment, how those words filled her with pride.
She hadn’t killed anyone yet, hadn’t started counting her bullets, but she’d come close. How desperate was she for those coordinates?
The skysailer slipped between the lines of traffic toward the underside of the garden. From this high up, the people in the streets looked like dots of moving sand. Or bugs. If the Moon Goddess existed, did she look at humans that way? As faceless little termites scurrying around, ruining perfectly good foundations?
Ana had never believed much in the Goddess. She only knew the origin story, as sweet as a bedtime lullaby. How, in a kingdom of shadows, the queen bore a daughter of light who chased the Dark away.
But would the Moon Goddess protect an outlaw like her?
Ana prayed anyway, like the old women had in the shrine. Goddess bright, bless my stars and keep me steady.
“Twenty-five feet and closing,” Jax told them, and added, “Try not to get yourselves killed.”
“It is a priority not to,” Di replied, earning a glare from Ana as she spun the barrel of her pistol shut and holstered it.
The skysailer coasted into the marina under the garden, where guests’ skysailers sat parked in rows upon rows of ship ramps. The plan was to go in through the service entrance—hopefully unannounced. The Valerios’ guests used the main entrance on the garden level, so the odds of being found down here were slim to none. Besides, Ana rather liked going in the back door—she didn’t have to knock.
“Remember,” she said through the comm-link to Jax, watching him drop away into traffic again, “keep low until I get the coordinates, and then—”
“It’s not my first rodeo, love,” he interrupted, laughing.
“I do not like this,” Di protested as they hurried across the docking ramp toward the service entrance. “There should be more security—”
The door to the service entrance slid open.
A Messier, clad in uniform blue and black, stepped out. It shifted its blue gaze from her to D09, and lingered on him. Ana went silently for her gun. She didn’t like way the Messier stared, as though nothing ticked inside its metal head. Nothing thought.
Ana glared at Di. “Happy now? Security.”
“You are trespassing,” the Messier said, and turned its HIVE’d eyes to Di. “And you are rogue.”
“I am,” Di agreed, then punched his hand into the weakest part of the Messier’s torso and ripped a small glowing square out of its body. Strings of optical wires came with it, stretching like sinew.
With one final tug, the wires popped away. The Messier’s eyes flickered out, and it dropped onto the docks. D09 pushed the body over, and it fell and fell and fell into the city, until Ana couldn’t see it anymore.