“Yes.”
“On Point Juno, maybe…” He wet his lips. “Thirty thousand.”
Thirty thousand lives.
Scattered among the stars.
“In Halow, I don’t think anyone knows the death count for sure,” he went on. “They laid waste to any human civilization nearest the debris zone, firing from planetary orbits. Their warships are…” He drifted off. “This would have happened anyway. He always had Arcon. He was always going to disable the defense net. They have been preparing for centuries. You couldn’t have stopped it—”
I pressed my trembling hand to the screen, covering at least a hundred bodies in the distance. “Millions of lives?”
“Yes.”
Genocide.
The fae would wipe humans out. We were theirs to do with as they pleased, and they had grown tired of our games. I looked at Kellee, the last of his kind, and saw the barely hidden distress behind his brave attempt to remain detached. He had seen all this before.
I gently lowered myself into the flight chair. “Where is he?”
Kellee engaged the shuttle’s engines and turned us away from the wreckage. Juno would forever be a graveyard. “The fae were delighted to have their prince return. And with humanity gift wrapped too. I have no idea where he is. Probably in one of the warships at the front line.”
Gift. It was. For me.
“Do you know if he went back to Faerie?” I asked, listening to the hollowness in my voice and wondering if I’d ever be full again.
“Reports are sketchy. Communications barely function. Some say he’s back in Faerie, some say he hasn’t been seen anywhere and might still be in Halow. I haven’t seen him since you threatened to kill yourself to keep me alive.”
“I was bluffing.” The words startled me. I didn’t remember thinking them, but there they were, out and real.
He tensed, hands pausing over the shuttle controls. “It was a good ruse.”
You left me with him, Marshal. You left me with a monster.
I closed my eyes and shook my head. These thoughts weren’t helping. I was alive, and I was here, thanks to Kellee. Alive was always better than dead. It wasn’t over. I could still carve out Eledan’s heart.
“How did you escape?” I asked, opening my eyes.
He flicked the autopilot on and turned his chair toward me. “He healed me and left me alone somewhere in Arcon’s hundreds of rooms. I cut through the restraints and walked right on out. Nobody tried to stop me.”
Probably because Eledan had been preoccupied, draining me of magic, and he hadn’t had time to weave new instructions into his puppet-staff.
I glanced at Kellee’s hands. There was no sign of the claws he had used to cut himself free. He had left me there a second time. “But you came back?”
Kellee rubbed his jaw and ran the same hand down his neck. I hadn’t seen it before, but now I caught a glimpse of a fresh scar there. Eledan had slashed his throat wide open. He shouldn’t even be here. He should be dead like the millions of others. “After what I saw, after you… tricked him into saving my life…” He bowed his head and took a few moments before looking up. “I couldn’t leave you there.”
Again. Leave me there again. Leave me to the whims of a fae who fucked with my mind for nine whole months.
“You took Talen with you?” I asked, shaking the thoughts away. It didn’t matter. None of this mattered. I knew what I had to do now.
Kellee leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. He rubbed his hands together. “I freed him in exchange for his help in getting you away from Arcon.”
“Why is he still with you?”
Kellee looked me in the eye. “He knows who you are. Figured it out the second he saw you. I suspect he wants something from you. Besides, I doubt he has anywhere to go.”
Talen didn’t know me. He believed he did, just like Kellee believed. “He could go home, to Faerie?”
“The fae exiled him for rebelling. He won’t—can’t go back to Faerie.”
“How convenient.”
Kellee caught the derision in my words and glowered. “Centuries ago, I hunted him down in the debris zone. He was scavenging ancient tek and abandoned ships to stay alive. If he could go home, he would have long before then.”
There was more to it, something he wasn’t telling me, but we both had secrets and now was not the time to interrogate him. If he wanted to befriend his enemy, that was his mistake. “And you’re not concerned that he might want revenge for the years you kept him imprisoned?”
“It’s possible.” Kellee leaned back and shifted in the chair, sinking down a few inches. He propped his boots on the flight controls and cast his gaze out of the shuttle screen. “Keeps things interesting.” The marshal smiled. “He’s not a fighter.” He lifted his hand and turned it in the light. His nails sharpened to points and grew out into claws. “He knows I am.”
I admired the five half-moon-shaped claws, feeling the bite of instinctual fear. The marshal was useful. Eledan had surprised him, like the fae had surprised me, but Kellee had experience fighting the fae. And he had a score to settle.
I needed Marshal Kellee.
“You can bind him,” Kellee suggested, raising an eyebrow as though the thought had just occurred to him. He flicked his hand, banishing the claws. “He’s already offered once.”
Talen had. He had submitted to me the first time we had met but only to get himself out of the cage. “You heard that?”
“Not much gets by me.” Kellee’s eyes turned shrewd. “He offered to be yours. Agree and he can’t hurt you. Ever.”
“Maybe,” I mused. Part of me liked the idea. Liked it enough to almost silence the concerns. But why would a fae willingly submit to a saru? They wouldn’t. I’d already had my beliefs turned upside down. I wasn’t sure I could ever trust Talen, even if he was bound to me.
“He’s useful,” Kellee added, echoing my thoughts. The marshal twisted, angling himself once again toward me. He leaned forward, bringing himself closer. “There are pockets of resistance out there. I’ve contacted a few. Right now, the human population is trying to stay alive, but when the dust settles, they’ll fight back. They’re humans. It’s what they do. We can help.”
“We?”
“Me, Talen, and you…”
Perhaps, once, I may have believed it. But I was a ghost, wasn’t I? “What can I do?”
Kellee’s stare darkened. “I can’t imagine what he did to you. But I know what you were like before. We only met a few times, but you were something, Kesh. You had a spark. You know the fae and how their system works. You wanted to get your friend back and you wouldn’t have stopped until you found him. You were brave enough to go up against Eledan, even knowing what he was.”
In the end, my so-called bravery hadn’t mattered. “You have Talen.”
“He’s fae. The people won’t listen to him.”
“You look human.”
“Until they see me fight.”
“What are you asking of me, Marshal?”
“I just… I’ve seen the fae ruin worlds. I can’t sit back and watch it happen again. We can do something.” Enthusiasm and hope brightened his green eyes. “Not yet, I know that. But… will you think on it?”
I looked into the marshal’s hope-filled gaze and searched inside myself for the spark he’d mentioned, for any sign that I cared enough to help. But all I found was the yawning emptiness that threatened to pull me down and bury me.
“He took everything,” I said. “He stole it all. My past, my mind, my purpose. The only thing I know for sure is that I don’t save people, Kellee. I kill them.”
The marshal turned his chair to face the screen and lifted his hand, propping his fingers against his temple, half hiding his face. The words hurt him, but whatever hope he had was wasted on me. He closed his eyes and kept them closed for a second or two too long. I had disappointed him, and I couldn’t find it in myself to care.
Chapter 22
Get up.”