A shiver tears through me. “It’s ridiculous that you know more about my body than I do.”
His knife skims lightly over my chin, down the front of my neck, over my chest, pausing above my frantically beating heart. “I should know everything about your body. It belongs to me.”
“Yuck!” I make a face, “I think I just threw up a little in my mouth.”
He stiffens. “You’re so melodramatic.”
“So your plan isn’t to kill me? You plan to keep me,” I say, already knowing I’m right. Part of me is relieved that he doesn’t want to cut out my heart right away, but another part of me is desperate because he still believes he owns me, and I can’t have that.
“We’re going to destroy this ship. I came here to save you.”
“I have another way you can save me: go away and don’t kill anyone. It’s a simple plan, one you can grasp.”
He shrugs. “Eh, my way’s better,” he says with a smug smile. “It’s the prophecy, Kricket. A house will fall. We’re making sure that it’s not our house.”
“You’re the only aggressors here,” I counter. “Rafe isn’t looking for a fight.”
“Oh no? Why have they been after the Tectonic Peninsula? It’s a staging point to mount an attack against Alameeda.”
“Probably because you moved your troops to the borders of Peney first. Don’t try to spin this. You guys were there when I arrived in Rafe.”
From the pocket of his uniform, Kyon pulls out a silver disk. He touches it to the manacles on my wrists; it sticks to them like a magnet. Lights flash as it makes a high-pitched sound until one cuff clicks open on my wrist. “I wouldn’t dream of spinning anything with you. You’re a Diviner of Truth.” I don’t try to correct him with the fact that I can discern only lies, not necessarily the truth. He plucks the disk off the cuff, transferring it to the other one as he remarks, “You cannot deny that Rafe went looking for you at the same time as we did. That wasn’t an accident. They have an agenda, Kricket.” When my other restraint clicks open, I’m unable to hold myself up. Kyon catches me in his arms before I fall down. With a deep scowl, he murmurs, “You’re weak.”
“I’m fine,” I say, as my cheek rests against his neck. I’m really not fine, though. I feel like I may pass out at any second. Black dots swim in my vision.
Trying to focus on something concrete, I stare at Kyon’s tribal tattoos on his throat. They’re military—a distinction for those who serve, but Kyon’s are more than that because they’re unlike the ones I saw on Forester or Lecto, his former bodyguards. He has special markings, about which I know nothing. Whereas Trey’s markings are black swirls and flowing lines, Kyon’s are more like black, connected crop circles.
“How long were you unconscious?” he asks, holding me to him.
I lift my head from him trying to gain some distance, “Long enough.”
“You never even had a chance to see me change our plan, did you?” he asks.
“You wouldn’t be here if I did.”
He scoffs at my bravado. “I think you overestimate your skills for diplomacy. You’re Alameeda; no one here can see past that.”
“All of you Etharians are racists. You guys pretend to be more progressive than humans, but it’s really just a front. You hate each other for the most ridiculous reasons: different eye color, hair color, and skin tone. Seriously, I know a stylist in the ’hood who can make you a brunet in less than an hour.”
“That’s an oversimplification of the situation.”
“Is it? Okay, let’s lay it on the line: your lifestyle choices scare the hell outta me. You can’t own people. It’s wrong!”
“We take care of our priestesses. We make you our consorts.”
“That’s bullshit if there’s no choice, and you know it!”
“Every civilization on both of our worlds has slavery.”
“Not legally. Not anymore.”
“But it exists, legal or otherwise, correct?”
I ignore his point. “But it’s wrong. Might does not make right,” I retort.
“Become mightier than me and we’ll discuss it.”
He lifts me onto my feet, putting his enormous hand on the back of my neck. He bends like he’s about to scoop me up off my feet, but I stop him. “I can walk,” I say testily, trying to shrug off his possessive paw gripping me. His hand tightens, causing me to wince.
“You’re still weak. Do I need to cut your hair again?” he asks.
“No,” I mumble. Under my breath I add, “You total freak.”
Kyon walks me past Geteron’s corpse. I want to kick Geteron because if he’d listened to me in the beginning, he’d probably still be alive. When we reach the doorway of the interrogation room, Kyon slips his hand around my waist, pulling me to his side. He raps on the door. It swings open to show a handful of heavily armed Alameeda soldiers. Amid them is a slight, waifish form of an Alameeda priestess. Her look is Goth-like, with thick, black eyeliner, making her blue eyes resemble hot-spring pools ringed with volcanic sand. Her hair is long, platinum, and wavy, pulled back in a ponytail. Attired in a dark Alameeda military uniform, she looks delicate despite the sharp lines it creates on her.
In my confusion, my mouth gapes as Rafe soldiers walk through the corridor near us. No one raises an eyebrow or sounds an alarm. It’s as if we don’t exist to them. I scream to a pair of soldiers who get close to us, “Hey! Over here! Help me!” I wave my arm, but I can’t get anyone’s attention; they just walk on by as if nothing is out of the norm. I want to cry, but I clamp down on my emotions as my respiration doubles.
Kyon’s hand shifts to my nape again. “They can’t hear you,” he warns.
“Why?” I retort.
Goth-girl’s eyebrows raise in surprise. Maybe she can’t believe the tone I’ve taken with him, or my hostility, or the fact that I’m resisting him at all, I don’t know, but it startles her. She murmurs, “You’ve become a shadow to them, and like all shadows, you’re dark and silent.”
“Is that your schtick? Making us shadows?” I ask scathingly.
“Schtick?” she echoes in confusion. “What is schtick?” She looks to Kyon for guidance.
“Ignore her, Phlix,” he advises. “She’s a savage.”
I can hardly believe what I just heard. I let loose on him, “I’m the savage? Me? I’m not the one bent on eradicating whole houses of Etharians. That’s you, freaks!” I point to all of them.