32. Castor

Forrest sitsacross from me and Annabelle on the slashed-up sofa. I flick my eyes to Eros who's eating cold fish stew from a can.

"We'll wait for Michio to get done with his shower," Eros says.

"I'm here." Michio's wearing some of Eros's old clothes. The tunic is tight and too short, but not as tight as the one around Forrest's stomach. Michio runs his fingers through his wet hair. "What have you told them?"

Eros tries to hand his brother the can, but he shakes his head. "How we found you, brought you to my shack, and scanned the blocks."

"So that's it, then." Michio nods, his face blank.

"What did you find on the blocks?" Annabelle asks.

"I'm sorry, Sunshine. That's Michio's way of saying it's classified."

"Oh." Annabelle looks at me. I'm a proxy governor. I could push them for more, but not with Holter and Annabelle in the room.

A firm knock on the door vibrates through the room. Everyone freezes, but Annabelle jumps up. "Nico?"

"No." Eros turns his tablet around, showing the rest of the room who it is. The king. Eros lifts his chin to his brother, who pulls Forrest to the other side of the room, letting them into the hidden library. When the sliding library door clicks into place, Eros nods to me and I open the front.

"About time," Atlas barks.

"Atlas." My eyes flick over my old friend. It's been a long time since we've had a good conversation. We're both too busy. Swimming around the sculpture garden of our youth feels like yesterday and a million years ago. There's something off about him, more than how he changed when he became king. Atlas was always the life of the party, the jovial one who kept Nico in check with humor. He made me put my studies away to go out and play a game in the stadium.

"What are you hiding?" he asks.

"Hiding?" I shrug.

Eros clears his throat. "Why do we have such an honor in my old home?"

"I was surprised when I was given the message that you were caught out during curfew traveling to Zaffiro to stay in a dome that is clearly one of the least defendable in all the Veiled City. It made me think that the four of you—five of you—are up to something. Where is Nico?" Atlas cranes his head around the room and takes off for the bedroom. "What the hell happened here?"

"There—" Eros starts.

"Not you or you or you." Atlas points at Eros, me, and Holter before rounding on Annabelle. "You. You tell me. What happened here?"

"I don't care who you are, Atlas, or what our past is. If you talk to my mate with disrespect again, I will finish you," Eros growls.

"And then I will feed your flesh to the ground dwellers on the bottom of the seabed," I add.

"Nothing from you?" Atlas raises his eyebrow at Holter.

"They have it covered. But I'd comb through history, removing your name from the record." Holter twitches his lips up at Atlas.

"Spoken like Nico's little brother. Now I'll put my life in jeopardy and ask respectfully: what happened here? And where is your other mate?"

"Firstly, you are part of the security council as king. You know what happened here. And secondly, there is no curfew anymore. Nico is simply out." Holter crosses his arms over his chest.

"The curfew just lifted, and I didn't pass him in the hall."

"He's Nico. The curfew is lifted. He's a capable male." Annabelle nods at him.

"I am not the enemy here."

"Yet we don't know if you are a true friend either in these times, yes?" Annabelle moves closer to Atlas.

Atlas breaks out into a wide smile. "Are you sure you're not the politician here, Annabelle Portsmouth? Collector of dangerous males."

"They're no more dangerous than I am." She nods. I don't like the banter between the two of them. It feels too much like flirting.

"I don't know what's going on here"—Eros steps between Atlas and Annabelle—"but it's starting to feel like foreplay to me. And there's no way I'm going to deal with you and Nico and him in a pod."

"I'm not looking for a mate. And I'd rather slit my own throat than join a pod with Nico, as much as I actually do like the missing asshole."

Something drops in the hidden library. Remarkably, the only one who turns is Atlas. The rest of us act as if we didn't hear it.

"What was that?" Atlas steps over to the wall of bookshelves. The way the room is built into the angle of the dome, it's hard to tell it exists. "Is there someone behind these bookcases?" His eyes flick over each of us, and he turns back to the shelves, running his hand down the central support. "I'm taking that as a yes. As you all know, it's against the law to lie to your king. Open it."

Eros crosses the room and flicks the latch, letting the door slide open.

Atlas is standing in front of the door when Michio appears. He smirks at the king and leans on the doorframe. "Forrest's large ass rubbed a book when he had his ear to the door. Atlas." He extends his arm in the traditional greeting like it's normal to pop out of a hidden chamber when you're missing.

"Michio, thank Poseidon. Forrest." Atlas takes the Stele's governor's arm as well.

"King Zennon."

"We have much to talk about. Like where the hell you went and what you know. There are going to be many wary eyes staring at the two of you. How did you get out of the dome?" Atlas crosses his arms over his chest. He hasn't let either Michio or Forrest out of the library.

"We should talk somewhere private about this," Forrest says.

"You mean not in front of them? Oh, I'm sure they know more than you about anything that's going on. Castor's an acting governor and the next in line, according to every Glyden citizen you ask. And I'm sure the two of you didn't end up in Eros's secret library by chance. So. Which of you is going to start talking?" His blue eyes glare around the room. And it's the first time I can see why the Diamont dome put him up as king. He saunters over to the torn sofa and sits in the middle of it. "Let's have a chat. Hell, with me here and the governor of Stele, it's almost a quorum for the security council."

"One member is hardly a quorum."

"Yes, about that. The members of the security council are decided by the king. It's just that over the years, no king has taken the seat away from a dome. But the power hasn't been balanced enough. The seats are going to change. Really, this is one of the few things I have a unilateral ability to do. I'm taking the Tinom seat and giving it to Zaffiro." He looks at Michio, waiting for a response. He's impulsive and, unlike Michio and Forrest, doesn't seem to care about those in the room who don't have clearance. But he's right. Holter, Annabelle, and I have more knowledge of the issues at hand than the average citizen.

Michio glances at the marble floor for a second before moving around to a chair at the end of the sofa. "Zaffiro accepts. But I will want changes."

I feel my stomach tighten. Interesting. I'd not thought of Michio Herod as one who would want to change.

"I too feel the time is right." Atlas smiles at Annabelle again, and now I feel the need to step in between the two of them. But Eros doesn't need to worry about Atlas. That's just who he is, his charm. If he was going to take a mate, he would have already. It certainly would have made things easier for him this year. "Continuity shouldn't be overlooked. Stele will keep its seat."

"Stele, Zaffiro." Atlas glances at me. "The other three in the council—Braesen, Koralli, and Vitrom?"

"Vitrom will remain. Without Tinom, the council will need balance. I wish I could take Vitrom's seat, but with Bellucci dying in the Maelstrom, it would . . . appear wrong."

"Then Koralli and Braesen," I growl.

"May I speak?" Annabelle asks.

"Please."

"I don't know about the governor of Koralli, but his mate Porcia saved my life in the Maelstrom. She didn't need to, not when everyone was bracing for the glass to break. That takes courage and honor." Annabelle steps up and sits on the arm of the sofa, but it wiggles and she slides down onto the slashed cushion.

"I agree. Ovid Septimus is a male of honor as well." Atlas turns and looks directly at me. "Then I give Braesen's seat to Glyden."

I nod. Because this is a fucking whale of an opportunity for my dome. It's also a curse. If we are going to expose Braesen for what they are, they are going to fight back. The accusations will fly that we tarnish their name to raise Glyden's.

"I know you're a shrewd business male, Castor, but I thought you would have some emotion over this."

"We have more to tell you, Atlas." Forrest sits next to the king and puts his hand on Atlas's knee, like a father about to have a talk with his son. "I don't want to overstep. Your decree is good. But there are things you aren't privy to yet. Let us fill you in."

"Good. Start with where you've been."

Forrest nods. "Eros took us to where his agent equipment is kept." Atlas flashes his eyes at Eros. "Yes, well, we needed help, and he helped us. He showed us how to use the device to read the blocks Braesen tried to steal."

"I don't know where you're going with this, Governor Mason, but it's not sounding good for you." Atlas leans forward.

"Right... I'm getting ahead of myself. But be patient. Eros was going to leave us there until he could clear our name. But after scanning three blocks, we had enough proof."

"You've skipped some steps. How did you get these three blocks? What was the proof, and how and where did you scan them?"

Eros glances at Forrest and Michio. They both shrug. "I'll answer the proof portion first. We used a secure government scanner. It's not connected to any network. There are multiple communications from Haden Moretti to the governors of Permula, Seolfor, and Koralli. In the messages, Moretti calls them the lesser domes. It's as if he's trying to goad them into some kind of action."

I can almost understand the Braesen doing research on their own. I would never condone the way they are doing it. But this? This is sedition.

"And how did you get out of the Maelstrom with blocks?"

"We used the personal cloaking tech to swim from the top of the dome before it collapsed," Michio says.

"I see. That tech is for approved agents only. And to my knowledge, only five sets have been made."

"Yes, I have Stele's and Koralli's." Forrest doesn't look at Eros.

"I was given Vitrom's for an assignment." Eros holds his chin up.

There's a tick in Atlas's jaw. He obviously didn't know that Eros was an agent of Tristan Bellucci. He recovers, though. "I see."

"Show him, Annabelle," I say.

She pulls the disc out of her pocket. "This must be either Tinom's or Braesen's." She walks it over to him, placing it in the palm of Atlas's hand. "We found it on the sofa."

"Tinom's, then." Atlas scowls at it and glances up. "But no, none of you think that, do you? A room of Glydens, and you aren't ready to point fingers at Tinom? Interesting. Why? Glyden has a history of hating both Tinom and Vitrom."

This is it. There's no more keeping our suspicions to ourselves. Richeal did that all those years ago and look where it got her. No, we have to tell Atlas, and the nation.

"It's time," I say. "We have a multitude of evidence against both the governor of Braesen and the scientific community of their dome going back thirty or more years. It's a lot more than we could ever have imagined when we started."

"Braesen? What did they develop—a new species of seahorse? One big enough to ride? Because that?—"

"No, Atlas, listen." Holter pulls one of the dining chairs in front of Atlas and sits. "Listen, their scientists aren't just working in the nation's labs. They have a network of levels below their dome, full of experiments and equipment. Some of it is old and abandoned, but we've seen it ourselves, Eros and I."

"You used the cloaking device to get into these labs?"

"No. I knew the secrecy of it. It wasn't until the dome came down that I used it for my own mission."

Atlas nods at Eros to continue.

"We have a verbal recounting from a male living in Boston now. He's half Kraken. He says Braesen scientists took him to these labs and ran experiments on him. That he saw geminae birthing pods there too. But that's not the most damning information." Eros cocks his head at Michio.

"Really?" Atlas leans forward. "More?"

"Michio." Holter waves at him.

"Forrest's agent was given a message that something was going to happen at the Maelstrom," Michio says. "Not what it was going to be, though."

Atlas cocks a single eyebrow. "And you didn't think to bring this to me?"

"Forgive me, your highness. But for the last?—"

"Yes, yes, I know. Go on." Atlas waves him to continue. For the last year, the governors have been handling things themselves. Much of the time, they weren't able to contact him.

"Yes, well, I trust Michio more than any other of the governors. I brought him into the loop. I thought of having an agent take this on, but... I didn't have a way for him to get into the Maelstrom, not without using the device the entire time. I was able to get access to the Koralli's. The information I received was that there would be a diversion. I never thought the whole dome would come down. I... I will regret that decision for the rest of my days. We used the devices and found another agent there stealing tech from the chambers. Michio and he fought. The male hit his head and died. We took the bag of tech he had and escaped. Uncertain if the agent had an accomplice who would come after us, we remained hidden until we used Eros's equipment to figure out why they were going after it at all."

"And?" Atlas asks.

"It's convoluted. I wish there was an easy solution," Michio says. "When we caught the thief in action, I believed that was all it was: a theft. But after we scanned the blocks... now I wonder if there might not be assassinations coming too."

Atlas grips his leg.

"This is a lot, and I don't want to steer your attention away from it, Your Highness." Eros has his hands behind his back.

"It's ‘your highness' now. Interesting. All right. What more could be going wrong?"

"We had word from a half-Kraken that while my sister did promise a Kraken she would go with him, she didn't mean to keep her word. She didn't leave of her own free will. If you would reach out on behalf of Marina?—"

"She lied to a Kraken? Damn, that's foolish." Atlas's smile lasts for only a few seconds. "What do you suppose I do? If you were me, how would you proceed?" he asks me.

"I'm not you. But they are going to want something. Resources, money perhaps, but they tend to like other things better. A trade route opened to them. But if it's money they want?—"

"Zaffiro will pay. We have money, perhaps not as much as Glyden but enough to get my foolish sister back. Then I will lock her in my parents' apartment and take all her tech away. She's a menace to herself and our dome. But she is still my sister." Apparently satisfied with that matter having been handled, he moves on to the next bit of news. "We have a ledger of Tristan Bellucci's."

Atlas's eyebrows shoot up. "Now, how did you get that?"

"Eros saved him from plaster landing on him." I grimace. "He pushed him away from it. His things were on his podium, so I told him I'd carry them for him. We called after him to stay with us, but he fled out the main doors."

Annabelle steps into the library and returns with the ledger in hand. She gives it to Atlas. "Here it is."

"It's in code."

"A simple cipher. It's a ledger where he makes multiple payments to a Gerrard Legend and Cyril Rizos."

"Does he now?" Atlas flips through the book.