Traitor Born (Secondborn #2)(50)

Reykin frowns. “Dune was probably trying to prepare you for the life of a Transitioned soldier.”

“Nothing could prepare me for that.” I laugh lightheartedly, even though I mean every word.

The laser moves around, fusing cracks in my bones. My skin and muscle will be repaired after the bone is set. The smell is atrocious, but even that doesn’t matter.

Reykin leans near my ear. “Roselle, what do you want?”

“Want?” I smile dreamily. “I don’t know. What do you want?” He’s silly. No one ever asks me that.

“You can tell me. What’s your greatest ambition?” His aquamarine eyes shine like light on water.

“Middle age,” I mutter with more giggles. The room spins. I close my eyes.

“What else?” Reykin touches my arm. I open my eyes again.

“A puppy,” I whisper. “I’ve always wanted a puppy. Isn’t that a strange word? Pup-pee . . . pup . . . pee . . .”

“Anything else?” A faraway voice asks, distracting me.

“Hawthorne . . . not to hate me.” My eyelids are too heavy to keep open. “Someone . . . who will . . . sticketh . . .” I feel him take my hand.



Someone squeezes my shoulder. I open my eyes, squinting and tearing up in the white lights. Turning my head, I find Reykin beside me. “How do you feel?” he asks.

“Thirsty,” I reply, sitting up and rubbing my eyes.

Reykin hands me a small cup of water. I take it and drink it all in one long swallow. He takes the empty cup and thrusts an armload of clothes at me. “Get dressed. We don’t have a lot of time.”

“For what?” I look down at myself. All my bruising is gone. My skin is smooth.

“I found your father’s body. They’re going to transport him to Swords soon. We have to hurry.”

In stunned silence, I rise and change into slacks and a loose-fitting top. Reykin turns his back and waits by the door. I don’t know whose clothes these are, but they’re comfortable. My ribs no longer ache. I can breathe deeply, without pain. Bending isn’t a problem either. I slip on the shoes Reykin left on the chair.

He opens the door and waits for me to pass through. “This way.” He directs me to a stairwell at the back of the medical facility. Descending several flights, we stop at a red hatch-like door. Reykin uses his moniker to infiltrate a program into the Halo Palace’s operating system. In seconds, the hatch pops open. I pass through.

The corridor is cold and empty, but when voices sound from the junction up ahead, Reykin jerks my elbow and pulls me to a nearby doorway. We flatten against the wall. I glare at him. “Didn’t you clear this?”

“Not exactly.” His jaw tightens. “There wasn’t time. They’re shipping him to Swords in a couple of hours. It was now or never. I don’t know the state of his body, Roselle.”

The corridor quiets. Reykin grasps my hand. Our fingers thread. We hurry to the last door on the end. Checking his moniker, he says, “This is it.” He unlatches the door and opens it.

The morgue contains long steel tables with shiny surfaces. Long hoses hang from the ceiling like tentacle arms of a monstrous sea creature. Fluid congeals inside a swollen sack suspended from above. The air reeks of it. And of death. I hold my fingers to my nose. Reykin closes the door behind us.

No one attends the bodies. Every table has a corpse on it. Most of them are Sword socialites still in their god or goddess costumes. A few are assassins. I pause by one of the Death Gods. He doesn’t have a moniker. It was either cut out and repaired extremely well, or he never had one?

I scan the room for my father. At the far end of the morgue, high above one of the tables, a levitating transporter pod waits to be lowered over a supine corpse. I move toward it, weaving through victims, trying not to look at them. I shudder when I see it’s him, and a small gasp escapes me. His pieces have been fused back together. Someone took their time with him, cleaning him up and dressing him in a plain white outfit.

His eyelids are closed. He looks peaceful. Streaks of tears drip from my chin, spattering on the metal table. Reaching out, I touch his hair, smoothing it back. I don’t ever remember touching it before. Did he ever hold me? Did my chubby baby hands ever touch his face?

“I can’t change this,” I whisper. “I can’t fix anything.”

“No, you can’t change this,” Reykin replies, “but you can change the world, Roselle—the future.”

“Why bother? No one’s worth it.”

“You’re worth it. Do it for you.” I wipe my chin and cheeks with the back of my sleeve, sniffling. “Do you want a moment alone?” he asks gently. I nod, and he walks away to give me some time.

When he comes back, I know it’s time to go.

I dry the tears from my cheeks with the backs of my sleeves. “I’m ready.”

Reykin slips the pinkie ring from my father’s hand. It has an embossed golden halo on it. The ring has been in his family for generations. Kennet loved to wear it because it’s Virtue-Fated, not Sword-Fated.

“Here,” Reykin says, “take this.”

“What are you doing? Put that back!” I whisper-shout. “It’s Gabriel’s now.”

“Gabriel has everything—a palace full of your father’s things. What do you have? Fused ribs?”