Lili St Crow - Defiance

On my left-hand side, there was an empty chair. Christophe rarely sat down. Sometimes he prowled the Council room as if looking for an exit, sometimes he stood beside and slightly behind my seat. Tonight it was behind-the-chair. He hadn’t said a word since I’d closed Ash’s door.

Three chairs down—because he wouldn’t even sit next to Christophe—Hiro perched, ramrod straight. His coppery fingers rested on the glossy tabletop, and his mouth was a straight line. In front of him was an expensive-looking, cream-colored envelope.

My mouth dried up. I stared at it.

Since you have taken my Broken, I shall break another. But Christophe had said this was about Anna, hadn’t he?

Hiro, of course, knew exactly what I was thinking. “It is a communication from the traitor.”

He wouldn’t even call her Anna . It was always “the traitor” or the sarcastic Milady , and the gleam in his dark eyes when he said it made me want to back up a couple steps. I was always glad he never looked at me like that.

I waited, but nobody said anything else. “And?” The single word fell like a rock into a quiet pond.

Hiro shifted, as if uncomfortable. “It is . . . addressed to you, Milady.”

“Okay.” I leaned forward, held my hand out. But it was Christophe who took two steps down the table, leaned across Hiro, and scooped the envelope up. He actually sniffed it, too, bringing it just under his patrician nose and inhaling deeply.

“No trace of nosferat .” But his face was set, his jaw an iron line. That expression was the one that made my heart do a little scared leap inside my chest.

If he ever looked at me like that, I’d find a wall to put my back to. Pronto. “Well, hand it over. I’m sure pretty much everyone here has read it except for me.” But I was wrong about that. Christophe laid it gently in my outstretched palm, and it was still sealed. Dru Anderson was written on the front in block letters, curiously childlike printing in fountain pen, the edges of the letters bleeding faint blue.

“How was this delivered?” Christophe wanted to know.

Ezra shifted in his chair, toying with the cigar. He looked like he really wanted to light it. “A drop box in Newark, an old one. Nothing else in it, and the teams retrieving drop items are on alert. We don’t know what other information she’s passed to the nosferat . No tracks, no scent.”

“Probably one of her Guard delivered it.” Hiro’s lip curled. “I would not have suspected them of professionalism.”

“We trained them and made them loyal to her.” Bruce’s faintly English accent made the words crisp. “She did the rest. They’re not to blame.”

That was enough to get Hiro going on an old argument. “The retainers are not to blame, certainly. It will not make their punishment any less—”

“Here we go again,” August muttered. “Just open it, Dru-girl. Let’s see what she’s got up her sleeve.” Everyone looked at him. He sat bolt upright, and he still looked profoundly uncomfortable. But it was nice having him here.

“Let’s argue once we actually know what it says, all right?” They all shut up, and I tore at the thick paper. Christophe wouldn’t have handed it over if there was anything on it likely to be triggered, but I still used just my fingertips. A ghost of spice clung to it—Anna’s peculiar flower scent, like carnations on the verge of going bad. It made me think of curly red ringlets and her delicate little fangs, the high-heeled boots with the tiny buttons marching all the way down, the silk dresses and the high gloss. She’d pretty much always looked like a model, or an illustration in some fantasy magazine.

Except for when she was trying to kill me. Then her face had contorted and flushed, and she’d had an assault rifle spewing fire while she screamed. Not a nice picture.

I sighed, yanked the folded sheet of matching paper out of the savaged envelope, and flicked it open. That same childlike block printing, neat little sentences.

You think you know everything, but you don’t. If you want to rescue your friend, come visit me. Alone.

It was signed with a huge, florid calligraphy A .

There was another sheet of paper—cheap copy stock, a satellite photo you could pull off the Internet. One building was circled with thick red Sharpie. I took it in, noticed an address typed at the bottom.

Gee. Subtle.

Christophe leaned over my shoulder. “Trap. Not even worth the paper it’s printed on.”

I stared at the address, marking it in my memory. There was something else in the envelope. I tweezed it out, delicately.

A silver earring, just the post part, no back. The skull and crossbones swung as I held it up, and my heart twisted like a sponge in a merciless, bony hand. I made a tiny little sound, like I’d been punched.

“What the hell’s that?” Augustine leapt to his feet.

Christophe’s hand jerked forward, but I snatched the earring away. Folded it in both my hands, as if I was praying. The silver was cold, but it warmed quickly. My mother’s locket was warm against my breastbone, too.

I let out another tiny sound. I couldn’t get enough air in.

“No.” Christophe grabbed my shoulder. His fingers dug in, and I could feel the prickle of claws through my hoodie. “ No , Dru. Don’t even think about it.”

I brought my hands up to my mouth. Inhaled, smelled nothing but the faint fading tang of Ash’s vital, springy fur. Opened my palms a little, saw the earring’s gleam.

“It’s his.” That small, quiet voice couldn’t be mine. It burned my throat, squeezing its way out. “It’s Graves’s earring. He had it when I met him.”

In the American History classroom, in the Dakotas. Before he’d gotten bit. Before everything.

“Oh, fuck .” Augustine dropped back down in his chair. Of all of them, he’d been the only one to move. Bruce and Ezra watched me, a line between Bruce’s dark eyebrows and Ezra’s cigar finally laid on the table instead of in his nervous, slender fingers.

Hiro, on the other hand, was watching Christophe. Very closely.

I swallowed hard. “You can let go of me, Chris.” I didn’t even sound like myself. The very small, very calm voice was almost lost in the static filling my head.

“Not until I’m certain you won’t do anything silly.” He leaned down, and his fingers eased a little but didn’t let go. “Let me see.”

I shook my head. Clasped my palms together. Laced my fingers as if he was trying to pry them apart.

He was not going to take that for an answer, though. “Dru. Kochana. Let me see.”

I shook my head again. Wished he would shut up. The static was getting louder, and if I could just calm down a little, the touch might tell me something. If they would just all be quiet for a few seconds so I could shake the roaring inside my skull away.

“Let me—” Christophe’s other hand flashed forward, caught at my clenched fists. His skin was warm, but his fingers hurt, digging in with more than human strength.

“No. No! ” I actually screamed, jerking away as far as I could. His fingers bit down again, and I felt bone creaking. My bones, the little ones in my hand and the ball of my shoulder.

Hiro’s chair scraped along the floor. The scraping became noise, a lot of it, and Christophe’s hand was ripped away from my shoulder. Someone was yelling. Confusion, my chair hit hard and bumping the table like a balky carnival ride. The earring dug into my palms, and I tried to clear my head. But there was too much noise—a deep thrumming snarl, and the sound of fist meeting flesh.

I opened my eyes. The world rushed in, full of smeared color, and I leapt out of my chair.