Pillars of light and fir.., p.134
PILLARS OF LIGHT AND FIRE: THE COMPLETE SERIES, page 134
“We’re in a fight, that’s for sure,” Arthur said, remembering he’d been thinking the same thing less than a few hours ago.
“I get lost in all the work we do and forget the toll it carries… You look good, Arthur. Prison food seems to suit you.”
“Everyone’s a critic.”
“Percy’s here, if you’d like to see him,” Anora prompted.
Lilly took the hint and gave Arthur a peck on the cheek. “It’s good to have you back, Arthur.”
“And you, Lilly. Doctor.”
Anora leaned against Arthur after Lilly left. “Juno, lock the door, please. We’ll need some privacy.”
The door clicked shut.
Anora pulled out the case and handed it to Arthur.
He took it, caressing her hand with trembling fingers. “It’s worse than you’re saying, isn’t it?”
“‘The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool.’ I am foolish, perhaps, but not so foolish as to rely only on hope.”
Inside the case lay a simple golden circlet. He picked it up and examined it.
“I assure you it’s not a token of my affection, though you should consider it more than I thought I could give you,” Anora said. “That is the Llewelyn. The Mare de Scientia think this will stave off the worst of it, for a short time.”
“This looks like the tiara you gave Morgan—”
“It’s not a tiara. We still use those, by the way, and they’ve come a long way since the prototype we used on your guinea pig sister. Couple that with Beckham’s training program, and Kin bladesmanship is improved over thirty percent. Even Ed is more useful one-handed than he ever was with two hands…”
“Ed and Kai would probably disagree.”
“Statistics are statistics. I’ve been able to retrain Ed quite effectively. I don’t think you’d notice he was ever right-handed…”
Arthur held the circlet in his lap. “Is this it, then?”
Anora frowned and turned away. “We have a suit—” He caught her hand. Her fingers were steady compared to his trembling ones.
“That’s not what I’m asking, Nor,” Arthur whispered.
Anora’s eyes met his. “I’ve been angry a lot, not because you’ve thrown everything away, but because your choice is not my choice. You want things to be better and they’re not. Can you make them better? I don’t know that yet…” Anora’s eyes hardened and shone. It was the first time that Arthur could remember her being driven to tears. “I don’t want our children living in a world where they’re hated. I’d rather they were feared if it came to that.”
Arthur’s heart sank. “I don’t want either of those things.”
Anora sniffed. “Perhaps T. S. and Isolde had the right idea. Better to fight to the bitter end for good things than to live out your days as some sort of monstrous beast.”
“Is it all that bad?”
“The world is different. Why do you have to save him?”
Arthur frowned. “She asked me to.”
“What about me? What about Athena and Apollo and Gal…” Anora gritted her teeth. She did not want to cry.
“Nor,” Arthur said, pulling her to him. “Was Morgan the wrong choice?”
“No. She’s been immensely helpful, and the added ranks of Kin have allowed the Sisterhood to work on new technology. Yes, it was worth it. Damn you! You know you’re right. I know you’re right, but I hate you for it. And I hate myself for hating you. You and your damn Boy Scout ways. Always do the right thing!”
“I never said I was perfect. You know that about me.” Arthur turned the circlet over in his hands. “It’s time for me to atone for my sins.”
“He’s not your sin. And six years isn’t enough?”
“I did have chances to kill him, back in the Cairn and at Tintagel.”
“And you didn’t.”
“Have we found the Grail?”
“That’s not a reason to hold back,” Anora said.
“A long time ago, Maven rescued you from your father,” Arthur said quietly. “Should I abandon him now?”
Anora sighed. She didn’t want to talk about Maven. Her brother was a loving, if painful, memory. Leto’s being an augment was reason enough for Arthur to feel responsible for him.
“Nothing is written,” Arthur said.
“You’re not going to change what will happen.”
“Not if you keep insisting nothing will change, Nor,” Arthur whispered. “There’s always hope. Things are not as dark as they appear to be.” He put the circlet on. “Do I say some magic words or does it do things?”
“Stop talking.” Anora kissed him and his hands slid around her. After years of incarceration, finding the seals of her k-suit was easy.
“I have a special favor to ask—”
“Ask later.”
* * *
“Incoming message.”
Arthur got up from the medical bed. “I’m awake. My back…” He looked for his suit.
“Where the hell are you?” Morgan said.
“Where are you?” Arthur grabbed his under-suit.
“Not the question!” Morgan said in her angry business tone.
Arthur pulled on his under-suit before noticing that Anora was already gone. Damn. How difficult must that woman make it for me to say “I love you”? “I’m still in medical.”
“Get to platform three two seven when you’re done getting your shit together.”
“Someone’s grumpy,” Arthur said. He pulled on his k-suit as quickly as possible. “I have one stop to make.”
“Fuck,” Morgan said.
Arthur disconnected. “Answering that was a mistake.” He sealed his suit and was happy his fingers had stopped trembling, at least for the time being. He scrubbed them through his hair, the memory of Anora echoing in his mind. Echoes.
He opened the medical bay doors. Kai stood waiting. “Uh.”
“She left a few hours ago,” Kai said.
“How long have you been waiting?”
“Crown Guard doesn’t leave you.”
“I feel weird.”
“Imagine how we feel.”
“Now that I know…” They fell into step together. “Can we take a detour?”
“Of course.”
* * *
Arthur knelt and Gal ran into his open arms, silky ponytail flying. Arthur embraced her warmly and picked her up. “Gal, my little bug, you’re getting big.”
“I’m twelve, Dad,” Gal said, her dimples showing as she smiled. She wrapped her arms around him and the memories of her flooded back to him.
“Yes, little bug,” Arthur said, squeezing her close. “I didn’t see you when I arrived.” He held her out to see how tall she’d grown.
Gal looked away shyly, as if she’d been caught doing something she shouldn’t have been. “I was busy with the Sisters, and then I was in the city visiting with Hector. He works with the Shining Suns here. I’m happy Mommy got you free.”
“She helped. I’m about to go away on a mission soon, but I wanted to see you. I didn’t want to miss saying good-bye again—not like last time. Then…” Arthur sighed. He still had to deal with the Templars. Morgan had been appointed his handler, and Arthur reasoned it was probably because no one else wanted to deal with her and she was intimately familiar with the political and personal arenas.
“Then the Templars,” Gal said knowingly.
“Are they going to be a problem?”
“They can be, in the right circumstances,” Gal said vaguely, her bright blue eyes unfocusing for a moment.
Arthur nodded. Had he placed too much faith in them? It seemed so. Arthur heaved her up and carried her back to the Prophet’s antechamber—a place that was overly spacious for a child. Bora stood there. “Are you always around?”
“There’s always a Sister with the Prophet. Preferably an augmented one, though there aren’t all that many of us.”
“You’re a Sister.”
Bora inclined her head and touched the side of her nose. “Just between us.”
“I know more than any man should about the Sisterhood, though I think Avallach has gained some insight into the deeper mysteries of the Mare de Scientia.”
“There will always be some walls. The matron doesn’t trust anyone who isn’t a Sister she knows.”
“You can trust her, Dad,” Gal said.
Arthur studied Bora’s face, and that tickle in the back of his mind returned with a sense of déjà vu. “I don’t have a choice in the matter, but I’m glad you’re being kept safe. Bora will do what is necessary.”
Bora’s crooked smile played at the corner of her mouth.
Gal read his intent. “You want to know about the Grail.”
“It’s been on my mind for the last seven years or so,” Arthur admitted.
Gal slid her fingers into his. She’d grown so much since she’d been the little girl he’d carried on his shoulders. She was twice as old as the last time he’d seen her, and Arthur was struck by the years of neglect he’d never intended, all because he’d made a promise to Morgan. Gal squeezed his hand as she led him into another room. Bora waited in the antechamber, alert and watchful under that curtain of violet-streaked silver hair.
Gal folded herself onto the small rug in the room. Arthur followed suit, feeling less limber but blaming his years of incarceration and not the aging of his body. And maybe just being a little too rough earlier. Arthur pushed that thought out of his mind and focused. “What can you tell me about the Grail?”
Gal tilted her head back and closed her eyes. “There are three Truths to the Grail along the Illuminated Path. Blood of the Sun brings it forth.” Her voice took on a measured cadence.
“That doesn’t tell me as much as I’d like it to,” Arthur said. In fact, he’d heard all of this before. It didn’t inspire confidence in him.
“It is both near in time and near in space. The Truths are tests.” Gal held up three fingers. “Three uncover the first Truth.” She lowered a finger in succession. “Two the second. Only one uncovers the final Truth. Thus the Grail will be achieved and the path you’ve set before your life will be complete.”
Arthur put his hands on his knees and relaxed his shoulders. The fingers of his left hand trembled. He squeezed his knee to keep it from showing. “‘The Blood of the Sun’ can mean many things.”
“It means the end of your path and the beginning of a new path—a bright shining future. Your vision for change, whether good or ill, will be there.”
“End of my path… always ahead of me. I’ve told Anora many times.”
“She understands,” Gal said.
“But she doesn’t like it.”
“I don’t like it, Dad. I have two mothers but only one father.”
“I’ve hardly been a father,” Arthur said.
“What was Grandfather like?” Gal asked.
Arthur shifted, thrown off by the question. His mind wound back to the last time he’d seen his father, besotted with grief still over the death of his mother, Igerne. Had Aidan known she wasn’t truly dead, would things have turned out differently? “He was… a driven man. Once he was charming. ‘Happy-go-lucky’ is the term. He was an army cavalry pilot, the footsteps your aunt Kai followed in, academy and all. He was outgoing, driven, a demanding father, especially to Kai and me. Maybe less to your other aunt and uncles. He took it badly when your grandmother died. He drank more and worked harder. One overtook the other and pretty soon he stopped showing up to work.” Arthur pictured his father, the edges of the image fuzzy with time, the features indistinct. He remembered the last conversations he’d had with his father, when he’d been screened for Project Avallach, when he’d found out his father was the director of the program. He’d explained to Aidan MacGabran his grand plan, the plan he’d built since childhood with his mother and Dr. Maven Myrrdin, but his father had only thought of his own pain and loss. Arthur worked out his next words carefully, framing his father in a good light. “When you’re in the military, it’s hard to lose someone you’ve been close to, whom you’ve fought with. That was hard for your grandfather, but it was harder for him to lose another wife. He’d already lost his first wife to HIV. It was too much for him. Aidan MacGabran forgot how to live.”
Arthur rubbed White Hilt, surprised at the sting of the memories. He’d been stronger than his father back then, and it had still been difficult to stand up to the man. They had come to blows, and Arthur, in his physical prime despite recovering from a war injury, had overpowered his father. Aidan had capitulated and granted Arthur access to the project. A month later, Aidan had been dead. “You and Athena would have had him wrapped round your little fingers. He was hard on Kai, but by the time Domino came around, he’d become a softie to his daughters.”
“Would you do anything for your father?”
Arthur studied Gal, trying to ascertain why she was asking these questions. Was she trying to make a decision herself? “If I could have done anything, I should’ve seen past myself to realize how badly my father hurt.” I have many regrets. “You’re interested in your heritage?”
Gal put her elbows on her knees and her chin in her hands. “I want to understand how children relate to their parents past genetics. I don’t mean nature versus nurture—I’ve read all that. If a father or mother was just a little different, would the child be different?”
Arthur leaned back. “That’s looking backward.”
“Looking backward illuminates the way forward. Many leaders know this principle, Dad.” Arthur stood up, stretching his back. Gal hopped up onto the balls of her feet and gave him a crushing hug.
“It’s something you know already.”
“That’s prescience, not understanding. I want understanding.”
Arthur hugged Gal tightly. Gal pressed her face into his neck as she had done when she was much younger. He inhaled the scent of her hair. She smelled of soap and sand. “Understanding comes when you see why people are the way they are, but you have almost nothing to do with that. You can only deal with them as they are, not as you want them to be.”
“Leto wants to kill you,” Gal whispered. “He can do it.”
Arthur squeezed her. “Don’t worry.”
“I won’t let him, Dad,” she said.
“You can’t make that decision, my little bug,” Arthur said. Bora motioned for him and behind her Kai and Ed waited. “It’ll be all right.”
“Don’t lie to me, Dad.”
“I love you, and that won’t change.”
“I love you too, Dad,” Gal said, her eyes wet with tears.
Arthur let go. It was hard to part from her, but if the first Truth wasn’t revealed… I have time, he assured himself. “I’ll be back.”
Gal said nothing.
Arthur let go of his daughter and left.
9
The First Test
ESSONNE, FRANCE—
Leto watched the small van pass by far below him. It was another cold, ugly day, and he jammed his hands deeper into his pockets. “How much longer?”
“Maybe an hour,” Oxana said, sitting on the ledge and tapping away at her keyboard, unconcerned about the whipping cold wind.
Leto pulled out the secure phone and dialed the only number in its memory.
“Atherton,” the director said. “Still retrieving?”
“I’ve got something. The Templars are going to strike.”
“Where?”
“RAID-A headquarters in Lyon—the Augmentés. Maybe an hour, maybe less. I don’t have a timetable. Should I inform Jean-Baptiste—”
“No, no,” Atherton said. “Don’t do that.”
“Why not?”
“You’re not supposed to be in France, for starters, Director. I haven’t heard a damn thing about this through my channels. How good is your information?”
Leto met Oxana’s eyes. “It’s good information.”
“Doesn’t matter what you think. None of this is going to look good if a Centurion is walking around in the backyard of the Augmentés. What about the Templars? Can you do anything about them?”
“That was my original plan, but—”
“Don’t let me keep you, Director.” Atherton hung up.
Leto pocketed the phone.
“Save the world?” Oxana asked.
Leto stared at the RAID-A—Recherche, Assistance, Intervention, Dissuasion–Augmenté—building, imagining what was about to happen to it, if Oxana’s information was correct. He felt a small twinge of guilt. They were augments. Then he remembered that his mother had survived a bomb blast at his great-aunt’s house with barely a scratch. Something flitted through the clouds. Leto drew more power, his vision sharpening. He made out the silver shape of a Kinsman. “It looks like the Kin might have the same information.”
“I guess the Kin get to save—”
There was a huge explosion at the RAID-A building, sending a gout of flame, smoke, and debris into the air. Oxana slipped and Leto reached out and grabbed her waist. She steadied herself, then pushed him away.
“Maybe not. We’re going after the Templars. How good is this information?”
“Good enough. Your director doesn’t have anything. He doesn’t even have information on Sebastian.”
The Suns ran on personal information networks. While it wasn’t hard to find a member of the Suns, the number of them and how they changed networks fluidly made tracking difficult. If anyone but the Division paid enough attention to them, they could determine that they had a serious problem on their hands. But the Suns’ general passivity made it difficult to take seriously as more than an information network. The Templars were something else, and now that they’d attacked the Centurion compound, they were deemed a threat. Unfortunately, garnering information on them would take time—time Leto didn’t have to waste. He rubbed his neck. “Let’s get going.”
“And the Augmentés?” Oxana asked.
