“Do you know why you’re here?” he asks me.
“I’m here to kill you.”
Hisses of “Treason” come from several places and heights on the tiers.
“Why would you want to kill me, Kricket? I’m your creator. Your Maker.”
“There are so many reasons to kill you, Excelsior. The fact that you think you’re my creator is just one of them.”
“I’m also the one who saved you from him,” Excelsior says. He presses another button on his device. A hole opens up in the floor near us and a tank rises up from it. Inside, Manus, the Rafe regent, sways in the water of the medical stasis tank. His skin is blue-veined and translucent. Paper-thin pieces of it hang from him and float in the water. Gone is the dark, rich color of his hair. It’s now bone-white and has shed in large patches. Curled in a fetal position, his gnarled hands warp, as if his bones have become waterlogged and bent. Whatever his medical tank is supposed to be doing for him, it stopped doing it a long time ago. He belongs in some horror-filled sideshow act, a dreadful curiosity to strike fear into chill seekers.
Excelsior prowls toward Manus. “I sent the Strikers to liberate you from his plan to mate with you. My creation!” He says the words as if he’s disgusted by the very thought. He lifts the device in his hand again, and it gives off a stark, piercing noise that cracks the tank. Water squirts from between the cracks until it shatters the glass and spills Manus out onto the ebony floor. The stench that rises into the air makes me throw up in my mouth. The water quickly drains away into the hole in the floor, but it still reeks of decomposition and death.
Attendants are called in; they pick up pieces of Manus as his flesh falls off his bones. The mess of him is quickly discarded into a hatch in the floor and the water vacuumed up by sucker-bots. Attendants bring in water. Tall glasses are poured for each Brother in the theater seats above us. All the while Excelsior watches me with his killer-come-to-call stare.
When the attendants leave the room, he asks, “Do you know why you’re really here, Kricket?”
He wants to tell me, so I let him. “Why am I really here, Excelsior?”
“It was the only way I could get all the Brothers in one room together. They came to see you. I knew that they would. They were hoping you’d kill me so they could be rid of me.”
Choking noises sound from above us. One Brother stands up, holding his throat, and coughs up blood as he topples over the railing and falls into the snake pit with us. More gurgling and vomiting sounds cause chaos in the room. Brothers begin to succumb as blood pours out of their orifices. I look back at Excelsior, who is watching me with keen interest.
“You poisoned them!”
“When znou axicote is found to be the cause of their deaths, everyone will assume it was you who murdered them. I was impressed when I heard you’d poisoned the Rafe defense minister with it. It showed real brilliance and an unflinching desire to survive. You’re the kind of genetic anomaly I strive to achieve in all my work.”
“You say ‘nature,’ I say ‘nurture.’ I wasn’t bred to do it. I was raised to do it,” I reply, denying him any credit for the way I am.
“If only my son had turned out to be more like you. He’s been an insufferable failure,” Excelsior growls as he pushes another button on his device. In the floor, another hole opens up. Out of it rises a T-shaped metal whipping post. Kyon is manacled to it by his wrists. His unconscious body hangs listlessly, held erect by the magnetized irons on his wrists that stick to the top portion of the pole. He looks barely alive. Bare-chested, he’s riddled with cuts and stab wounds. Blood has turned his bruised flesh red.
Inside, my heart feels like it is dying. I search for any sign from Kyon to indicate that he might still be alive. I need him to be alive. My throat aches with anger and unshed tears.
“He must love you, Kricket.”
Pain rips through my chest. “Why do you say that?” My voice comes out raspy.
“When he found out that I had you, he offered himself to me in exchange for you. He said you’d go back to Earth and never bother me again. He said I could have your crowns, the ones you planned to use to steal my rightful throne from me.”
“I will steal it from you!” I say with feigned righteous indignation. “I was meant to be the empress—to wear the crown of the high kings from which I descended. You will bow to me!” Inwardly I cringe. That sounded so fake! Did I overdo the delusional priestess role?
Excelsior’s vicious eyes narrow at me and I think he sees right through me. “I’m the one who is descended from the high kings! You will all be made to bend to me!” He walks to the beautiful crowns, which lie gleaming on a bed of soft black velvet, and picks up the smaller circlet of heavy gold. It’s not delicate, but solid and substantial, a crown that an ancient king would wear—one that a conquering hero would create. He tosses it aside. It clangs on the ebony floor, making my heart beat achingly in my chest.
He’s not going to fall for it! I despair. I want to cry.
He lifts the other crown in his hand, testing the weight of it. It’s the same style as the first one, only this one is bigger. “You’ll never be able to kill me, Kricket. I’ve lived for thousands of floans. I have brought down whole nations of people. You’re just a rabid dog to me—an experiment gone wrong. It will be nothing for me to end you.”
I laugh. “I’ve already killed you, Excelsior. You just don’t know it yet. You’ll never wear that crown!” I fake a smile.
His hand curls tighter around the golden trophy. He raises the shiny circlet to his head. “You mean this crown?” he asks.
My smug smile fades.
Excelsior rests the golden crown on his head, pushing it down for a better fit. The spring-loaded trigger that Kyon designed trips. Four sharp prongs jut out from inside the crown, impaling Excelsior’s skull. His shrill screams race through me, adding to my fear and fascination. Blood oozes from the sides of his temples just as turbine boring worms pour from the hollowed out wells in the golden chaplet. They burrow into his brain, their twisting, wiggling bodies squirming to cut through his bone. Higher-pitched, agonizing caterwauls wrench from his lips as he falls to his knees beside me, knocking his hovering cart of torture implements on the floor and scattering them. The scene is unbearably gruesome. I shy away as the worms devour his eyes.
His screaming stops and the only sound left in the room is my hacking breaths. My whole body is shaking. I open my eyes and try to stand, but my arms are still shackled and stuck to the poles beside my seat. I look around for the remote that Excelsior used earlier. I spot it on the ground beside his head. The worms are squiggling in and out of his cranium, their shiny, rippling white flesh turning rosy from the blood they’ve consumed. I try not to look at them as I rise up as far as I can and point my toe, sliding the remote closer to me with my foot. I use my pointed high heel to press several buttons. Kyon’s manacles release, and he drops to the ground with a loud thud. I cringe, knowing that probably hurt him more. I point my toe at another button on the remote. My hand slips down from a pole. I tap the same button again and my other hand slips down as well.
Rising to my feet, I bypass Excelsior’s corpse and run to Kyon. His skin is cold. I look behind me seeing torture devices strung out on the floor. Finding the razor blade, I clutch it and crawl back to Kyon’s side. His blond hair is pulled back in a ponytail at the crown of his head. I gather what I can and lop off huge chunks of it. It regrows, the shorn-off pieces shriveling and melting away as I cut. I wait for a second to see if he’ll regain consciousness. He doesn’t. I put my ear against his chest. I can hear shallow beats. That’s all I need to get me moving again.