Divided: The Alliance Series Book Four (20 page)

My heart dropped, fists clenching. Did he think I was so naive? I’d never met my birth parents, but from what Nell had told me, I’d had a lucky escape.

“No,” I said. “My family were as bad as the rest of them, from what I heard. They’re
not
my family. My real family is…”

“On Earth,” said the StoneKing, with a chilling smile.

Oh. God.

The StoneKing’s smile widened. “I think if we need an incentive, then it will be a simple matter to track them down. I’m sure they’re worried about you… worried enough even to illegally enter the Passages, am I right?”

God. No.
“You bastard.” I dug my nails into my palms, simmering with anger.

“Now we have an understanding.” The StoneKing shook his head. “I’d rather avoid coercion, but if you give me no choice in the matter, I’d be happy to restrain you until we reach our destination. I have allowed you freedom, haven’t I? I’ve allowed you to speak to your human friends. But we are more than human. Where would you go, even if you could run?”

My fury boiled over the edge. “I’d go to hell before I’d be your assassin.” The words tore loose from my throat as I jumped at him.

The two giants moved faster than I’d expected considering their size. My fingers grazed the StoneKing’s face before they dragged me back. I clenched my teeth as their rock-like hands crushed my arms—they could break both of them in a second. I cursed inwardly, not stupid enough to struggle.

“Enough,” said the StoneKing. “We will reach Enzar in a few days, and I would not have her incapacitated. We need our assassin to be whole.”

“I am
not
an assassin,” I spat.

“You have killed. That makes you a warrior.”

No.
A sour taste rose in my mouth.

“It doesn’t make me
yours,”
I said.

“Your only option is to stay with us, Adamantine. There’s nowhere for you to run. This world has no source. A dying plant is all that remains of a once-prosperous world.” He looked around. “It’s a shame what your parents’ war did to the Empire.”

My heart dropped, and it took every ounce of willpower not to tear myself free and leap at him again. But the Stoneskin giants would rip my arms clean off before they let that happen.
No. He’s trying to provoke you.

“Shut up,” I said.

“You don’t want to hear of your family’s achievements?” His eyes gleamed with menace. “You can call
me
a murdering bastard, but I’ve no desire to destroy what’s left of these sorry worlds.
Your
people, however… I believe they’ve sacked ten worlds, maybe more—not counting the ones drained of resources to fuel the Empire before they went to war. In assassinating the major players in the conflict, you will be assisting in bringing this regrettable war to an end. Don’t you want your homeworld to stop destroying itself? Your people to stop killing each other? A person like you, Ada, can make all the difference.”

Waves of fury crashed over me. “You don’t see me as a person at all,” I said. “You see me as a weapon. And you’re forgetting what caused the conflict in the first place.”

People like me. Weapons created by the Royals. And deep down, maybe I’d always known I’d wind up going back.

I’d rather die than be responsible for any more deaths. On a high-magic world like Enzar, I wouldn’t dare use magic at all even if there wasn’t a war going on. Every human in a hundred-mile radius would be collateral damage. But it was no use saying any of this to the StoneKing. He and his soldiers were made out of antimagic. They had no reason to fear me. Why would they care about whoever got in their way?

“Yes, but the magebloods have never had an effective defence against the devastating power of the Royals, Adamantine. We were created to be shields. Thanks to you, we’ll take their power and become gods.” An inhuman grin stretched his marbled face.

He’s going to kill us all.
The proof of it was enough to stop me in my tracks. Was there any hope of escape at all? If I ran, they’d catch me, and if I hid, I’d either starve to death in the wilderness or get eaten by killer plants. And the other humans would die, too. I’d stuck with them for the sake of self-preservation, but there was no denying it: on a high-magic world, I was a walking bomb. I could use magic under my own power, but trapped between the magebloods, who had extraordinary levels of power of their own, and the invincible Stoneskins…

“I will give you time to consider, Adamantine. Your fellow humans will have plenty to say to you, I am sure.”

Shit.
They would. Not only did everyone know my name now, they knew I was his target. It would be quicker for them to kill me, not to mention a slap in the face to the StoneKing.

Stop it, Ada. You’re not going to die.
Until the last hope faded, I’d fight for my life, and for the others, too. Just because the options seemed nonexistent didn’t mean there was no way out. I’d escaped Central before, a building made out of the same material as these creatures. There were always chinks in the armour if you knew where to look, and evil or not, the StoneKing’s so-called master plan was full of gaping holes. Like doorways. They used keys to open doors, so they were dependent on them. Maybe that was kind of a weakness.
Come on, Ada. You’ve thought your way out of tough spots before.

“As it happens, I do have a special plan for your companions,” said the StoneKing, with a jerk of the head in the direction of the group gathered on the roadside. “But they’re expendable, magic-wielders or not. It would be a crying shame to build up their hopes now, Ada, whatever you’re scheming. If you were as ruthless as your parents were, you’d already have worked out how to use them to your advantage. Think on it.” He addressed the giants holding my arms in place. “Let her return to her own kind.”

I stumbled back, heart in my throat.
He’s planning to make me do
what? I could absorb other magical abilities through skin contact—but what had he implied? I could take power from other people?

The large Stoneskins barred the way as I attempted to approach the StoneKing again. “Wait,” I said. “What are you planning to do with—?”

“Later, Adamantine,” he said, green eyes glittering. “I will tell you the details of my plan when we reach our new world. I believe I have located a new magic signal to follow, and so we will leave this sorry wasteland behind.”

Hell.
I had to check to see if my message had got out. If I hadn’t imagined that signal. Maybe my communicator was glitching. Maybe the Multiverse was playing an elaborate prank on me, to build up my hopes. But that was hardly more ridiculous than the StoneKing’s insane plan.

The humans all stared as I made my way back through the crowd. Several edged away from me, muttering. I caught the word
adamantine.
And
like them.
Maybe they thought the Stoneskins and I were close relations.

The StoneKing was worse even than I’d feared. My head hurt, and my eyes were starting to sting again. Maybe I
had
picked up an infection from the swamp water. Maybe I’d go blind before we reached Enzar. No—I was pretty sure Nell had said Enzarians’ eyes were particularly resilient. Something to do with magic in our blood.

I’d always been aware I was different—it seemed a superficial term. I’d lived on Earth most of my life and if it wasn’t for the ties I felt to the Passages, to the shelters, to offworld, I
could
have had a normal life on Earth. And perhaps that would have made me happy. I didn’t feel pure Enzarian. I didn’t speak the language, and what little remained of the culture had been burned away by the war twenty years ago. Most people didn’t know how the war had begun. Not that my parents had probably started it.

The last Royal’s child. Nell took you from the palace.
Those facts had followed me throughout my life, but I’d thought nobody else knew. We kept a pretty low profile even amongst other Enzarians, and none of them knew the truth about my magic. Nell had never even been back to the transition points. She’d only been in the Passages a handful of times, to show
me
the way. Seeing as she’d had three kids and a bunch of refugees to take care of, I’d never questioned it too much.

Jesus. No wonder she kicked up a fuss when Delta and I went wandering off around the Passages.
But she couldn’t have known she had a reputation so far offworld, otherwise she’d never have let me go out at all.

I wished the other humans would stop staring. I wanted to run somewhere quiet, just to think. To process. The StoneKing’s words replayed, interspersed with things Nell had told me. Things she’d let slip. How magebloods and nonmages alike had used magic for generations to wipe out diseases, and that was why I’d never had so much as a common cold. And most Enzarians looked like they might be related, at first glance, because of selective genetics. On both sides of the war. Only eye colour separated them. Nell had said…

God. I wish I’d listened better. I wish I’d questioned her.
She hadn’t shared most details of her life before she came to Earth. She hated talking about it. I didn’t know the full story of her escape. But if I was going back there, to a war zone on a high-magic world—if I couldn’t get away, then what?

Hands shaking, I checked my communicator. No response. I closed my eyes, my body trembling.
Keep it together.
If I fractured now, if I gave in, more than my own life would be forfeit.

“Ada?” Gervene’s concerned eyes looked at me. With difficulty, I forced my thoughts back to the present. To the pitiful, half-formed escape plan I’d been contemplating.

“Yeah?” I said. “Sorry. Just found out they’re planning to take us to our deaths. Enzar.” My voice was too loud, and I didn’t care. “A high-magic world, an empire, at war. I’m their freaking
assassin.”
I clamped down on the hysterical laughter before it broke out of control. “They think I can win a war and stop the Empire that enslaved ten universes. The only thing I’m good for is blowing shit up.” I didn’t even care who could hear anymore.

“Ada.” Gervene’s hand on my shoulder steadied me. “There’s something I didn’t tell you, too. I… when I was on Valeria, I used to be an assistant researcher at a research station run by a man called Dr Campbell.”

Her words distracted me. I snapped my head up. “You—you worked for the Campbells?”

Gervene studied the floor. “I didn’t know them personally. That’s no excuse, but it’s the truth. I was support staff. I didn’t know what they were planning to
do
with those pieces of old tech from Klathica they bought from the KimaroTech labs. But when we got caught, they arrested the whole department. I was going to be jailed for life, like the others.”

“Yeah, they all deserved it,” I said, panic and hysteria giving way to anger. “You know what the Campbells tried to do to me? They tried to use me to ignite a bomb in the middle of London. It would have wiped out the entire Earth’s council, maybe even the world, and the Balance across the Multiverse would have been knocked out of sync. That’s what you were working for. Just like what those lunatics over there are planning to do to me.”

Gervene shook her head, her face chalk white. “It’s not like they
told
us,” she said. “Those machine parts are common trade. The Campbells’ sister company uses them in hover-tech. That’s not illegal. The KimaroTech labs supplying the tech from Klathica work for the Alliance. How was I to know the Campbells were working against it? They were respected across the Multiverse.”

“I’ve had enough of dodgy people from Valeria trying to ruin my life,” I said. “First the Campbells, then the Conners—don’t suppose you know about them?”

“Conner… Gavin Conner? I think I met him once.”

“Mr Conner and some of his friends decided to raid the Campbells’ place after they’d been arrested, looking for whatever they’d left behind. They stole magic sources and nearly caused a cross-world war. And they killed even more people.”

Aric, who’d moved closer, shot me a sharp look. He’d probably heard his family’s name.

“Stop that,” Gervene snapped. “You think anyone could possibly have known? You can’t know the consequences of all your actions. If you weren’t here, that selver might not have killed people because the Stoneskins were protecting you.”

That was a cheap shot.
“All right, all right,” I said. “I get it. You were an innocent bystander, who—”

I cut myself off. I was going to say,
used an illegal Passage.
But I’d done the same. Knowing it was connected to Cethrax and the likely source of all the Alliance’s problems.

“That’s my story, anyway. I think you owe me yours.”

I glanced ahead. “They’re packing up soon. We won’t have the chance to attack them later. I sort of have an idea. But I’ll need help.”

“What?” said Aric, who’d been listening in. “I wanna get out of here, but I’m not risking my neck. Unless you prove you’re not gonna get us all killed.”

“I’m not,” I said, in a low voice, “if you don’t do anything stupid. The Stoneskins have a weakness.”

“They do?” Aric’s interest sharpened, as did Gervene’s.