“Amends?” Mustang snarls. “Make amends with the woman who burned a moon, Pliny? Are you an idiot?”

“Peace will preserve your line, my liege. More than war. Set yourself against the Sovereign, and what hope can there be?” Pliny is no fool with rhetoric. “Her fleets are vast. Her monies endless. Your name, your honor, no matter how great, cannot stand beneath the weight of the Society. My liege, you raised me to your side because of my worth. Because you trusted my advice. Without you, I am nothing. Your care is all I value. So heed my advice now, if you still hold it in regard, and do not let this wound against the Sovereign fester. Do not let war come of this. Remember Rhea, yes, and how it burned. Preserve your honored family with peace, by any means.”

Augustus raises his voice. “When the Sovereign pushed against me, I bent like Gold should, with grace, with dignity. But now she cuts at me, and beneath the grace, beneath the aplomb, her knife will strike iron. We make for Mars, and for war.”

“We’re reaching the low atmosphere,” Mustang says. “Hold on.”

“What is that light?” Sevro asks. “The blinking one over the altimeter.”

The Blue snaps an answer. “The cargo bay door is opening, dominus.”

“The cargo bay …” I frown. “Can you override it?”

“No, dominus. I’m locked out.”

Why would the cargo bay door be …?

“He volunteered,” Mustang says, voice panicked. “Tactus volunteered.”

“No,” I snarl, startling everyone but Mustang. We realized it at the same time. “Sevro, Victra, on me!” I wheel around and sprint out the cabin doors, head ducked as I move as fast as I can toward the back of the ship.

“Prepare for evasive action,” I hear Mustang say back in the cabin.

“What’s happening?” Pliny whines.

“TACTUS!” I bellow. Victra and Sevro run at my heels. The other Howlers and Housemembers call to me, confused as I sprint through the passenger bay.

Screwface unbuckles his crashbelt. “He went past with the boy.”

“Down!” I say, shoving him in his seat. “Everyone stay seated!”

Tactus wouldn’t. He couldn’t. But why the hell not? Why would I ever assume he wouldn’t do what’s best for him? It’s in his nature.

We slide down railings to the storage level, past the room where the Jackal operates on Quinn. I shove open the door to the cargo hold and am greeted by the howling of wind. The hatch hangs open to show darkness wounded by city lights far beneath. Clown and an Augustus lancer lie unconscious, bleeding. They slide slowly toward the open bay door. As for Tactus, he’s nothing but a distant dot in the darkness. I cannot see him clearly, but I know what he has taken: Lysander.

“Sevro.” I grip my friend’s shoulder. “Stop!” He’s seething. Looks like he wants to jump out the back of the ship and follow Tactus into the air. He can’t. It’s too late. Instead, we catch the two unconscious Golds before they slip down the open ramp. Victra shuts it at the control panel. The door hisses closed.

“He doesn’t have any communications gear,” Victra says breathlessly. “Not after the EMP.”

“Doesn’t need the gorydamn gear.” Sevro points to Clown’s naked feet. “The bastard has gravBoots. Soon as he hits the ripWing scanners, he’ll be picked up.”

I do the math. “We have two minutes till they send boarding parties.”

20

HELLDIVER

I should have known what Tactus would do. He killed his first Primus, Tamara, in the Institute. He only ever followed strength. Only ever sought victory. I knew he was a beast, but I thought he was my beast. I thought I could trust him. No, I thought I could change him. I curse myself. Arrogant fool. I stalk back to the cockpit, where Augustus addresses the Blue pilot.

“Pilot, will you be able to take us clear?”

“No, dominus. Geomet models don’t show a probability of escape.” Her response is fittingly Blue—emotionally distant, efficient, and declarative. Her body is thin, faintly avian. Like she’s made all of twigs, neck long, bald head slightly smaller. Eyes large and as uncannily azure as the digital tattoos of her skull. When she moves, it’s as though she’s submerged in water. Asteroid born, judging by her flat accent.

“What is the likely scenario?”

“They will destroy our engines with ripWing fire. Precipitating a hull breach that will kill all aboard. Alternatively, precipitating a leechCraft assault. Capturing all aboard.”

“Or they’ll just blast us from the gory sky,” Sevro adds.

“Blue, deliver me to my ship and you will receive command of a frigate,” Augustus offers.

“I would prefer a cruiser,” she notes.

“A cruiser, then.”

“Very well.” The Blue adjusts several knobs. “I will fly well, but the paradigm must be altered before they engage our vessel, if we are to survive.”

The stork climbs toward the edge of Luna’s atmosphere. This ship is a big-bellied beast. Fat with storage room, because all they’re meant to do is birth soldiers out of the tubes in their guts. Men like me would tear her apart in our ripWings. We used ships like this at the Academy to launch men in starShells at enemy asteroid bases.

Friction fire wreaths the ship.

“If the hull is breached, hold your breath, dominii,” the pilot instructs. “We don’t have sufficient survival helmets aboard.”

Victra frowns. “Our lungs will explode if we do that.”

“Then exhale,” the Blue replies. “And have thirty secs of life while eardrums explode and blood vessels swell like inflated balloons. I will hold my breath.”

Sevro looks back at me, wide-eyed. “I hate space.”

“You hate everything.”

We pop clear of Luna’s atmosphere. The fire fades and we slip into open space, where the armada’s capital ships glide like behemoths of Europa’s deep sea. Gun turrets dot their hide like barnacles, and hangar bays slice their undersides like great gills. Commercial ships float slowly along the shipping lanes. RipWings and wasps go about their patrols. None pay heed to our presence except those that escort us from Luna. The Sovereign would not broadcast this. Time ticks away.

There is nowhere to flee. We thought to pass just under the guns of the Scepter Armada when we had Lysander. But now we’ll have to run the gauntlet.

Our pilot is calm as metal.

She said the paradigm must change.

What can I do? Think. Think.

“We will open communications to one of the ships,” Augustus says. “Bribe them into sheltering us. Every man has a price.”

“We’re jammed. Can’t even broadcast,” Mustang reminds him.

We’re going to die. We all know it. Augustus doesn’t panic or surrender resolve. I don’t know how I thought he’d handle death. Maybe I hoped he would wail about and turn pale. But for all his faults, he is stalwart. After a moment, he sets a bony hand on Mustang’s shoulder. She flinches, surprised.

“Whether missile or boarding craft come, die like Golds,” Augustus says solemnly to us. Not because he wishes us to think him strong in his last moments, but because he believes in what he is—a superior being, a master of his human frailties. For him, death is merely the ultimate frailty. Humans whimper when they die. They claw for life even if there is no hope. He will not. Death is not grander than his pride.

Golds, in many ways, are so like Reds. Helldivers go to their deaths for their families, for the pride of their clan. They do not whimper when the mines collapse around them or when the pitvipers come from the shadows. They fall and their friends weep and sweep their bodies aside. But we have the Vale to look forward to; what have the Golds? When they perish, their flesh withers and their name and deeds linger till time sweeps them away. And that is all. If anyone should claw for life now, it should be the Aureate.