This Shattered World
Page 21

“Never,” he replies easily enough, stooping to set the bowl down on the floor inside the door. My heart sinks a little, ready to watch him retreat now that he’s delivered the soup. Instead, to my relief, he straightens and leans back against the wall. “I suppose I keep coming back because you’re my responsibility.”
“Your responsibility as in, you’re gonna be the one to bash my head in when the time comes?”
His face shuts down, muscles tensing. He really doesn’t like it when I mention violence—an odd trait for a rebel. “You really are screwed up,” he mutters.
“You’re the one who knocked me out and carried me off into the swamp. If that’s not screwed up, don’t know what is.”
“I don’t know why I’m bothering.” He pushes away from the door, pacing the few steps from one side of the cell to the other.
I look past him at the hallway. It’d only take a few seconds to rush him. A few seconds of agony, with my ribs, with my gash, with my spinning head and rebelling stomach. But then I’d be free. And alive. Just rush him. Just do it.
But one body can only handle so much abuse, and I can only ask so much of it. Maybe I could have done it when my anger was fresh. But I’m tired. I’m so tired, and there’s no one here to know it if, for one moment, I rest.
“Listen,” he says, coming to a halt between me and the door. “I’m talking to them. I’m trying to convince them it’s not worth military retaliation if they kill you. Some of them are listening to me, at least hesitating.”
“Sure.” I snort. “You’re going to single-handedly convince the whole rebel base not to kill such a high-profile prisoner?”
“Yes.” He speaks simply, his eyes on me.
That brings me up short. The smug assurance is gone, the mocking half smile, the arrogant set to his jaw. Instead he looks determined. Resigned. Oddly strong, for someone so goddamn pretty.
Then it hits me.
“Flynn,” I echo. “Flynn—Cormac? Orla Cormac’s brother?”
Orla Cormac, leader of the Fianna during the last uprising on Avon, long before my time. Orla Cormac, the woman responsible for organizing and establishing the base, the one who gave the townie criminals a place to hide. Orla Cormac, executed ten years ago by military personnel acting on behalf of the Galactic Council.
Survived by her only remaining family member, a little brother ten years younger. A boy named Flynn, who fled to the swamps to avoid being shipped off to an orphanage off-world.
And I’d recognize Orla’s face anywhere—we all learned about her in basic training. How to stop someone like her from ever happening again. No wonder I thought Romeo looked so familiar.
He’s quiet, watching me put it all together. “A pleasure to meet you, Jubilee Chase,” he murmurs.
I haven’t just been captured by an idiot with a charming grin. I’ve been taken by the only surviving family of Avon’s most infamous martyr. My hand itches, my hip aching with the absence of my gun against it. If I could have one shot, just one shot, I could put an end to this revenge cycle right here, right now.
Except if what he’s saying is true, and he’s the only thing stopping McBride from whipping the rebels into all-out war, then killing him would solve nothing.
“I’m talking to them,” Cormac continues when I say nothing. “But you need to give me some time.”
“I’m supposed to believe that you, the brother of the woman we executed, actually want to get me out alive?”
“You didn’t kill her,” Cormac replies quietly. “I’m not saying you and I are ever going to be friends, but even if you had signed her death warrant, this isn’t the way toward justice. It didn’t work ten years ago, and it’s not going to work now. I know we need a different way.”
I swallow, the muscles in my jaw tightening. Somewhere inside me, the pain stirs, straining against the bonds of control that lock it away. If I came face-to-face with a member of the group responsible for my parents, I’m not sure I’d hesitate before I blew them off the face of whatever sorry planet they ended up on. In fact, I know I wouldn’t.
“So what now?” I ask finally, my voice sounding papery and thin.
“We wait. And you stop trying to figure out a way out of this cell, because I definitely can’t convince them to let you go if we have to shoot you while you’re fighting your way out of this base.”
“What? How could I—”
“Please.” Cormac lifts his jaw, pointing with it toward the torn corner of the mattress. “The last thing I need added to my list of credentials is ‘stabbed by a mattress,’ in addition to a cocktail skewer.”
Shit.
“Fine,” I say through gritted teeth.
He eyes me for a long moment. “Fine.”
I give him a few minutes to get clear, listening to his footsteps retreating down the corridor. Once all traces of lantern light and footsteps are gone, I slide off the mattress again and get back to work on the spring.
The door bangs open and I jerk awake in confusion. The movement jars my ribs and I gasp aloud, too befuddled to hide it. When did I fall asleep? Shit—what do I—
“Get up, we don’t have a lot of time. Can you walk?”
“Romeo, what’s—”
“Now.” Cormac’s voice is urgent, utterly lacking in its usual lazy insolence. “Take my hand, come on.”
I let him help me to my feet, choking back the groan that tries to escape. It’s only after he starts pulling me toward the door that it hits me.
He’s taking me to be killed.
My muscles tense. It’d be smarter to wait, let him think I’m going willingly, use the element of surprise. But I’m still half asleep, and my body’s acting on instinct. I wrench my arm back with a twist, ready to pin his against his back.
“Will you stop doing that?” He escapes me, barely, jumping backward. He’s got a lantern with him, but it’s mostly shielded. Only slivers of light escape to break up the blue-green illumination of the wispfire. “I’m getting you out of here, you stupid trodaire.”
My brain feels like it’s running on a treadmill in a pool of tar. “Out of here,” I echo stupidly. “Your people changed their minds?”
“Not exactly.” To his credit, he doesn’t try to manhandle me again, keeping a cautious distance.