Gameboard of the Gods

Page 49

“We need to talk.”
“I would love that,” he said.
As a sign of goodwill, Callista made sure their egos and Mae’s guns were returned. She invited them back to her home, but not without first asking, “Can I expect a military raid?”
He smiled sweetly. “Depends if I make my flight tomorrow.”
“Understood.” Callista was smart. As soon as he’d received his ego back, he’d activated its GPS signal and sent a message to local authorities to track him if he didn’t check in by a certain time tomorrow.
Callista’s house was in that old, run-down region, but it in no way resembled its neighbors. It was new and expansive, with grounds extending in all directions. Guards stood outside its fence, though they didn’t display any guns. Borderlands might have been able to sneak weapons behind closed doors, but security guards in the open could hardly flaunt guns when regular Gemman patrols continually passed by.
Mae remained silent for the journey and said nothing until they were escorted into a luxurious sitting room decorated in an Old World Spanish style. Left alone, Justin reached for a pitcher of water and a cup sitting out on an ornate wooden table.
“You think that’s safe to drink?” asked Mae.
“We’re fine. I’ve got Internal Security tracking us now.” He poured the water.
“You should’ve done that the instant we stepped off the plane.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t think we’d traveled back in time to some barbarian civilization. This place has been Gemman for five years.”
“It takes a long time for people to give up on their old ways. I still see it in the Nordics, and it’s been almost a century.”
The door opened, and Mae jumped up, readying herself for a threat. What actually came through, however, was a young girl, probably only a year or so shy of hitting puberty. Extremely pretty, she possessed Callista’s exquisite features and carried a tray containing bandages and a dark glass bottle.
“My mother wanted you to have this,” the girl said shyly, setting the tray on a small table. “She’s finishing up some business but will be ready to talk soon.”
Justin vaguely remembered a name. “Persia?”
She flushed with pleasure. “Yes.” To Mae, Persia said, “Do you need help?”
Mae glanced at the tray, face cold. “No. I’ll do it myself.”
Persia gave a small nod of compliance and moved toward the door. “Thank you,” said Justin, not entirely sure how to interact with this serious-eyed woman-child. She nodded again and disappeared.
Mae picked up the bottle Persia had left, uncapped it, and sniffed. Seeming satisfied with what she found, she began cleaning and wrapping the cuts on her arms with military efficiency. When she finished the ones she could reach, she turned around and peeled off her tank top, glancing at Justin over her shoulder. “Will you help me?”
Not even he could find that sexy, though he was charmed at her modesty, considering everything she’d done. His efforts were clumsier than hers, and he cringed when he applied the antiseptic to the cuts caused by the barbed wire. For her part, she didn’t even flinch.
“Are you going to finally tell me about Callista?” Mae asked.
“She’s the one who used to work with Golden Arrow.” He paused to tape down some gauze. “She’s apparently traded employers, though. Or, well…just morphed her goddess a little. Amarantha’s kind of a combined goddess, drawing mostly from Artemis and Hecate, the last I knew. It’s not that out there, since the goddesses have some overlap. In the ancient world, they got blurred together a lot, and some viewed them as faces of a triple goddess: virgin, mother, crone. I guess the virgin thing—Artemis—wasn’t working for her.” That must have been what Raoul meant about Nadia’s changing allegiances. She’d left her Celtic moon goddess for this Greek one and pooled resources with Callista.
He finished his first aid handiwork. Mae donned her tank top and overshirt again before turning to face him. “How can a goddess be all those things? Or a merging of multiple ones?”
“It’s a common thing in religions. Deities are all-encompassing.”
He didn’t quite know how else to articulate it, and she obviously didn’t follow. Gemmans who didn’t make careers of religious history had very two-dimensional views of gods and goddesses.
“You seemed surprised by all of this,” said Mae.
“The knife fight? Yeah, that was definitely a surprise.” Bringing it up made him think of the elephant in the room, the topic Mae was pointedly avoiding: the part where she’d gone on a superhuman rampage. Ignoring it for now was fine with him, because he didn’t really know what to say either.
She shook her head. “I mean the religious developments. Even I know this group isn’t licensed, and there’s no way they fall under the law for acceptable religious practices. Even the secular practices don’t. You’re going to report this, right?”
He shifted uncomfortably. “We’ll see.”
Her eyes widened in disbelief, but her protests were interrupted as the door opened again. Persia returned with two armed guards. “My mother will see you now—just Dr. March.”
Mae strode across the room in seconds. “No. No way is he going without me.”
Persia turned nervous, but a stone-faced guard took over. “Callista’s orders. He goes alone.” He tightened his grip on his gun, and Justin could tell from Mae’s face that she was already planning how to disarm him or pull her own gun.
“Let me go,” Justin told her. He’d seen too many guns today and didn’t want a shoot-out. “Everything’s okay.”
“Going off with unlicensed zealots with illegal guns?” she asked incredulously. “Nothing about that is okay.”
The guards’ faces darkened. Persia stepped forward. “I swear, nothing will happen to him. My mother just wants to talk.”
“Please,” said Justin, meeting Mae’s eyes. “Trust me on this. Remember—we’re tracked. And you’ve got your ego too if I don’t come back.”
Mae said nothing for several tense moments. Finally: “Fine. If he’s not back in an hour, I tear this place down around you.”
The guards looked skeptical, but they stayed outside the door when Persia led him away. She took him to the far side of the house, to double doors that opened into a bedroom. Callista sat at a vanity, clad in a long silk robe, brushing her hair in the mirror. She glanced up at their approach. “Thank you, dear. You can go.” Persia retreated, closing the doors behind her.
Justin stood there waiting as Callista finished her hair and then rose gracefully to her feet, managing to do it in a way that let the robe make the most of her body. “Always drama with you,” he said as she walked over to him. “But I guess that’s part of the job.”
She brushed her lips against his cheek. “Lovely to see you again. Shall we talk?”
“Here?” he asked.
“I didn’t think you’d mind, but if you’ve gone chaste on me, we can go outside.” She glided over to a set of glass doors and stepped out into the warm night. Justin followed, finding a table already set with candles and wine on a garden terrace. More drama.
Callista poured him a glass without asking and then leaned back in her chair, crossing her legs so that the robe slipped off of one of them. She gazed up at the starry night and then looked back at him with a smile. “Are you here to arrest me? How did you even find me?”
“Luck, more than anything else.” He took a drink of the wine, some kind of deep red that Dominic could’ve learned a lot from. “I got a tip after paying your former associate a visit. I actually came here for Nadia, though you were the one I ultimately wanted.”
“So flattering. How is Mr. Arrow these days?”
“Awaiting trial. He tried to drug servants of the government.”
Callista’s lips curled in disdain. “He was always so stupid. Using tricks instead of the discipline needed to get real power. It’s half the reason I left.”
“That, and it’s easier to gather followers in unregulated borderlands?”
“It’s becoming more and more regulated every day,” she said. “Bit by bit, the RUNA’s blanket of uniformity is enveloping this place.”
Justin wasn’t fooled. “Don’t act like that’s a bad thing. You grew up in civilization. You know it’s better than having a bunch of armed nutjobs running around, no matter how gullible they are.”
“Speaking of armed nutjobs…” Callista’s expression of easy charm transformed, making her the hard-edged leader who had ordered around Menari’s people. “What the hell were you thinking bringing her here?”
“Why do you keep saying that? I didn’t bring her to you. We were captured.”
Callista traced the edge of her wineglass, gazing into its depths by the candlelight. “I never thought I’d see the day someone like you was traveling with someone like her. Of course, from what I can tell, a lot’s changed with you.”
“Traveling with a prætorian’s not that weird,” he countered. “Especially in light of today’s events.”
Callista jerked her head up. “She’s a prætorian?”
“Isn’t that what you’re talking about? How else do you think she did what she did?”
“You know how she did what she did! She’s an undisciplined and uninitiated elect,” she snarled. No more flirtation now. “Chosen by someone powerful from the looks of it. It was a wonder the rest of them couldn’t see the glamour—and don’t act like you couldn’t. You’ve got a lot more control since the last time I saw you. I didn’t actually think you’d embrace your calling.”
“I haven’t,” he said firmly.
Callista’s face said she didn’t believe that. “What god follows her?”