WAR STORM (Red Queen 4// Alternate Version)

Chapter 13

Mare

I haven't ever deliberately walked into a snare before. Sure, time and time again I've been blind and stupid, unwittingly fallen into elaborate plots, dreamed up by the most damned of people. In a sense, knowing hurts more than it would to be captured suddenly, the anticipation sucking out my spirit like a leech would to blood.

When I departed, the manor was split in opinions, everyone interested in offering up their suspicions, the Magnetrons particularly keen on giving advice. Jaymes-Lucas' brother-thought it would be hilarious if I were to lock myself inside my old and horrid room; cell, I prefer to call it. Waltzing straight into the ball dressed as Mareena Titanos was always another alternative, garbed in the dress that I first locked lips with Cal in. Surely that would get a rise out of Maven, Jaymes had assured me too loudly, resulting in a clash of gaze with Tiberias himself.

Now, I clutch Tyton's fingers between mine, not a romantic gesture so much as it's a lifeline, the only pieceof reality fastening me from floating off to a nightmare again. The aircraft is too quiet, but I don't brave being the one to speak, to make a joke involving this mess. The Samos's borrowed us one of their older models of planes that I still consider it to be of fine technology. Their standards aren't aligned with my own.

He gently strokes the top of my hand, repetitive and steady at a constant rate, as though it's become a habit. The simple pattern renews itself every three seconds and I begin to count along with the rhythm that doesn't falter, doesn't stop. Mouthing the numbers, I tighten my grip on him just a little, probably hardly something at all to him. Yet he does notice and squeezes back before restarting the motion.

This won't be a long plane ride; I have to expel my worries at intervals. Ever since Maven and his army of Magnetrons dragged me from the atmosphere, I cannot bare sitting in one of these death-traps, which I've been made to do so on multiple occasions. It only aided in my panic when Ptolemus came up to me previous my goodbyes to Rift, and whispered in my lobe that there wouldn't be any Magnetrons to catch me airborne, but Maven still may find other, more creative ways.

I snapped at him to go to Hell, discarding my cares for peacekeeping. I should've slapped him, I decide when looking back.

"Do you actually believe him?" Tyton cleaves through the silence at thirty-thousand feet. Disappointing me, he ceases in his brushing.

"Well, I don't have much of a choice, do I," I respond, not forming a question. According to Jon, any other approach will spiral into my ruin, a future draped in chains and misery. "Against my better judgment, I'm depending on him as a source of wisdom." What else could I do besides for allow Giza to endure beheading? As an eye, he knows all outcomes, every feasible reality that could exist in place of this one. He knows all the right things to say, to convince me of his legitimacy. His lies surpass even those of Maven. "I have a gut feeling," I make up, not really meaning it. Nothing in the lucid part of me agrees with this, some other, wilder part of my mind in control now.

Tyton relents in his useless arguing but unties his fingers from mine. I doubt he can find a more severe punishment for my stupidity. Though I'm also grateful for his lack of will to hurt me further; I'm not sure if I could handle additional retorts and reasons for us to rethink.

We took up a pair of seats in the backmost row, myself unable to tolerate eyes blazing into my back. Instead, I look at the idiots that I call friends and allies, who so dimwittedly signed up for this. Cameron paces near the front, the turbulence affecting her very little; she's restless, with jittery fingertips that continually tap together and the queer ankle rolling midway in steps.

Farley and Davidson sit beside one another, blueprints spread out on their foldable tables, dashed with erasable marks. Honestly, I'm surprised Davidson even volunteered to come with me, as the Premier of Monfort. I wonder who he left in charge to manage relations between the Guard and Rift. Davidson must feel awfully bold or secure to go along with this, though he was the first to express his faith in Jon.