Born of Fire

“Then why did you do it?”


To retaliate for his sister’s death. He hadn’t been big or seasoned enough to kill the bastard himself. So he’d allowed the authorities to do it for him.

But that was something he’d never admit to. In the end, he got what he deserved, too.

No good deed goes unpunished.

I’m coming back for you, you little bastard. And when I do, you’ll suffer like no one ever has. So help me, gods. I should have let your mother drown you when you were an infant. See what mercy gets you? A bastard seed who betrays you to the grave. May the gods make you suffer every day you live and may each one be more painful than the one before it.

Those had been the last words his father had ever spoken to him. To this day, they warmed the cockles of his heart.

And it proved the one point Syn had lived his life by ever since.

Everyone betrayed.

He’d sold out his father and his son had turned his back on him. And just like he’d done to his own worthless father, his son called the authorities any time he tried to visit.

Poetic justice really.

“Syn?” she asked insistently. “Why did you turn your father in?”

“I told you. It seemed like a good idea at the time.” Shahara shook her head, unwilling to accept that. He was hiding something more, but it was obvious he didn’t trust her with it. And why should he? She hadn’t been exactly trustworthy where he was concerned.

So she changed the subject to something less volatile and to the only thing that could save her life. “Fine. Let’s assume you’re telling the truth about all this. Why didn’t the Merjacks kill you? If you’re the only person alive who knows what they did, why would they take the chance on you telling someone else your story?”

“Because they couldn’t find the chip. That’s the only reason they haven’t killed me . . . yet. After all, who’s going to believe me? A lying, sack-of-shit convict whose father’s memory can still make seasoned assassins piss in their pants?”

Confused, she tried to make sense of it. “I don’t understand. If you’re dead, why would it matter where it is?”

“Anyone could find it and expose them,” he said as if he were talking to a small child. “I’m actually surprised no one has found it yet. It would have been real easy to locate. We’re just lucky they haven’t.”

“Then why haven’t you gone back for it and exposed them for the murderers they are?”

“Because until you showed your pretty little neck in my home, they’ve mostly left me alone. I mean, sure they tried seriously to find me for a couple of years after I escaped prison, but I changed my name and they eventually went away. I was practicing the live-and-let-live social policy of survival.”

“But if they killed someone, how could you not—”

“Look,” he snarled, cutting her off. “Better him than me. Believe me, I’m sure Fretaugh had skeletons aplenty in his closet none of us know about and I don’t have your wonderful little sense of justice. That’s one luxury I’ve never been able to afford. The only law I answer to is the law of survival. And that law says for me to keep my ass as far from Ritadaria as I can.”

She clenched her teeth in frustration. She’d never understood people like him. People who could turn a blind eye to corruption, to crime.

If what he said was true, how could he just let criminals get away with . . .

Oh, he was a criminal. No wonder he lacked her morals. If he’d had them, he would never have done all the things he’d done. And that was something she’d have to come to terms with for the next few days until they located the chip.

“So where are we going?”

He opened one eye and pierced her with a glare from it. “You’re not about to let me rest, are you?”

“Well, I would like to know where it is I’m heading. Seeing as how I am a part of all this . . . now.”

“Fine,” he said in a voice as equally aggravated as hers. “First we need to get a ship to tel-ass out of here. Then we need to find some place to stay for a night until I can protect myself, and unfortunately you, from the bastards after us.”

“And then?”

“Then we go to Ritadaria and find that damned chip.”

She frowned in disbelief. “I thought you were practicing the live-and-let-live law of social survival stuff.”

“Yeah, well, screw it. I was never all that bright anyway.”

Damning himself for stupidity, Syn closed his eye and took as deep a breath as he dared. He ached from one throbbing molecule to the next and all he could think about was the betrayal that had caused each fierce blow.

She’d done this to him.

He’d been living a quiet life with only a few inconveniences as certain morons came after him. But no one had ever found his address before. He’d been very careful about it.

Until now.

Now he was once again a hunted animal with nowhere to call safe and no one to turn to. No one except the person who’d put him in danger.