Endgame

So in a few days, it ends. No more dodging. No more war games. Terror and elation battle for supremacy within me. In the end, it’s easier for me to focus on the movement along the ridge. My distance shooting isn’t good enough, but Vel drops one as the centurions push through the mud, through driving rain and wind to fight for nobles who don’t care if they live or die. Their pay cannot possibly be sufficient for the odds they face, and yet they don’t back down. They follow these orders to their deaths. Is that bravery or stupidity?

The enemy hits our mines and explodes in a bright orange ball. Meat that used to be men splatters everywhere. And still they come on. I raise my rifle. Fire. Again.

I am saturated in death, so dirty I may never get clean, and yet I, too, fight on. I take target after target, covering the men ahead of me. I follow orders like the centurions. Because there’s no way out but through—it’s especially true now.

Some famous guy who was about to be executed said this: Give me liberty or give me death. That’s how the La’hengrin feel.

Me, I’ve lost some of my passion but none of my commitment. I’m in this until the end. I will keep my promises.

CHAPTER 55

The camp is hardly worth the name, just a place where we’ve pitched our tents. No fortifications, no precautions, but since we’re marching on the capital, it doesn’t matter. The cells will unite outside Jineba, but until then, the units are small and mobile. Hard to track. It’s worked like a charm so far.

“If I say I might die tomorrow, would that get me some rack time with you?” March has come up behind me, wraps his arms around my waist.

Tomorrow, along with everyone else, we move on Jineba. I should be terrified, or at least worried, but my soul is calm. This feels right. Inevitable. This is where I’m supposed to be. It is a night of perfect synchronicity, where the stars that shine overhead are the ones I’m supposed to see at precisely this moment.

“You don’t have to bargain for it,” I say, facing him. “I’m yours for the taking. Have been for turns. Though so many other things have, that hasn’t changed.”

“Then come on, Jax. Celebrate life with me tonight.”

“Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we may die?”

“Something like that. I’ll settle for the merry part.” He sweeps me into his arms, ignoring the hoots from our unit. Zeeka calls out a teasing remark, and I salute him over March’s shoulder.

He crouches and crawls into his tent, with me still cradled in his arms, a feat not for the weak or uncoordinated. There isn’t much room, and I’m conscious of how our bodies show as shadow shapes. Then he kisses me, and I don’t care if the whole company watches from start to finish. His mouth has always made me feel like that, and it doesn’t matter that extra lines frame it now, or that more silver peppers his dark hair at the temples. He’s not perfect; he’s hurt me. But neither am I, and I’ve wounded him, too. When all the columns are tallied, emotional profit and loss reckoned, I will always, always love him.

I’m glad to hear that.

More kisses, sweet and soft. On the night before battle, I expect him to be fierce and fast, but instead he loves me with a slow, inexorable sweetness that brings tears to my eyes. Not a centimeter of skin is revealed that he doesn’t caress with gentle hands made rough through turns of work. The rasp against my unexpectedly smooth skin surprises me, every time. I don’t know if I’ll ever be used to it. This moment, this spun-crystal starburst of a moment, feels brand-new, like the first time I touched him, only this time, I appreciate what I hold in my hands.

“If I say you’re beautiful, will you get mad?”

I pull back a little. “Why would I?”

“Because you don’t look like yourself. But I don’t mean that anyway.”

“What do you mean?”

“You.” He touches the skin over my heart, the temple where my hair sweeps away from my face. “The Jax part. Not your body. It feels like I’ve loved you forever even when I had no hope of you feeling the same way. Then, later, when I fought despair that I’d ever see you again. I’d wait longer than five turns. I’ll never give up.”

I kiss him, unable to find words for a few seconds. And then I whisper, “That’s my favorite part about you. I can’t decide whether that makes you devoted or crazy.”

“Crazy-devoted?” he offers.

“Mmm. That.”

The talking stops for a while, gives way to hot touches and slow friction. There’s no room for femme dominant when the time comes, but he works extra hard to make it good for me. In the end, he has to kiss me to keep me from screaming. I always thought sex might grow stale, predictable, over long turns with the same person. How could you not get bored? But the truth is, the longer you love the same person, the more mysterious they become. March is like a pocket universe, full of stars, and I will never learn all his light.

Afterward, he holds me, stroking my back with confident hands. He knows how to touch me. Tonight, I won’t consider what’s ahead and how difficult it may become. There’s only the magic of this moment.

“How do you think it will go tomorrow?” I ask.

“Loras is ruthless enough to get the job done. He learned that from Hon.”

“Do you think everything happens for a reason? If I hadn’t abandoned him, he wouldn’t have acquired the steel necessary to free his people.”

March considers, dusting a kiss against my brow. “I’d like to believe Mary has a master plan, but I’m not sure of it. I think we can only do our best, learn from our mistakes, and hope it’s enough.”

“Are you ever sorry for how you treated him?”

He doesn’t need to ask who I mean. Before I saved Loras, March held his shinai-bond, inherited him from his great-uncle. “I could claim it was just the way I was raised, the way I saw people treat the La’hengrin. But it doesn’t excuse my behavior. It only explains it. Wrong is wrong. I didn’t even realize how bad it was until you pointed it out, then it was like my blinders fell off, and yes, I was ashamed. I regret it still, the way I treated him.”

“Have you talked to him about it?”

“Once. He said, ‘You were only worse than other masters in your eagerness to rid yourself of me.’ I made him feel like a burden.”

I nod. “It’s like you said, I guess. About doing our best and learning from our mistakes. You’ve spent turns fighting for him, following his leadership without question. I think we’ve both made up for those old wrongs.”

“Does your conscience feel clean now, Jax? Will you be ready to move on when the time comes?”

I examine my inner landscape. There will always be scars, of course. I carry regret over Doc and Evie. For those six hundred Armada soldiers. For the squad-mates who died on the way. Some of them, like Xirol, I tried to save and failed. I’ll live with that. But pain isn’t the same as guilt, and most of that has melted away.

At length, I nod. “I’m more than ready. I miss grimspace.”

“I’m amazed you’ve been on the ground so long without losing your mind.”

This is the longest stretch, no question. It feels like penance, and I’ve achieved expiation at last. Kept my promises.

“Sometimes, when I’m alone, I close my eyes, and I go flying. I build the colors in grimspace in my mind’s eye until I can feel it. That echo is enough to keep me from losing it. But I need to fly soon.”

“We will,” he promises.

“You, me, Vel, and Zeeka. Quite a crew, huh?”

“The best.”

Then there’s more kissing and little sleep. In the morning, it’s time to take the fight to Jineba. No more fragging around. No more skirmishes in the provinces against targets that don’t matter as much. This war needs to end.

I am Sirantha Jax, and I have had enough.

CHAPTER 56

The city swarms with combatants. The cured La’heng aren’t in uniform, so the centurions don’t know whether they should attack until it’s too late. If they were complete monsters, they would be gunning down even those who cannot fight, but they can’t make themselves do it. After so many turns of benign neglect cloaked as protection, they can’t turn on their charges so easily. It speaks well of them even as they die screaming.

I spot Deven fighting in the distance. His squad is one of the most effective in terms of successful strikes, and I credit his leadership for that. Loss drives him. Unless we free La’heng, his family’s sacrifices mean nothing.

Fire rages in the wealthy quarter. Buildings crumble. I hear Sasha’s work in the heavy thud of toppling skyscrapers. It doesn’t require as much force as you’d think; he only has to destroy the supports low to the ground, and whole structures fall.

Across the courtyard, a centurion falls with his head splattered. Half his skull winds up in the street. The air stinks of burnt meat and ozone, and the constant weapons fire makes the very air feel charged, as if the particles are too heavy with lightning not to tingle against my skin. The survivors of my cell gather round for their last set of orders. Today’s the day. Win or lose it all, we take the palace.

“Let’s see how much steel the Imperator has,” Loras growls. “On my mark, we push. Stay to cover, but don’t let them drive you back.”

“Yes, sir,” we say in unison.

I lose track of how many times I fire my rifle. There’s no close combat yet, but March and Vel are ready. Centurions die as we push, leading the charge. Thousands of La’hengrin press in behind us. This ragtag army makes up in determination what it lacks in skill and training. They will not stop. Nicuan must understand that by now. It will be freedom or death.

Loras leads the charge. In terms of distance, we’re not far from the palace. There is no governor anymore, just officials trying to keep a dead system running. The high-ranking ones are holed up here. Shit, they’ve set up artillery at the top. Heavy weapons, coming in hot.

“Stay low,” March shouts, as a missile hits the wall behind us. “And move!”

I scramble, but the blast still throws me forward, out of a cover. I’m shot before Vel drags me back. This time the armor soaks the damage, though I have an impressive hole in the back of the suit.

“Are you well, Sirantha?”

I nod. “I’m fine. Let’s catch up with the others.”

Ahead, March goes down in the barrage. He’s not moving. I grab Vel’s arm. This can’t happen now when we’re on the verge of a new life together. We’re almost to the happily ever after.

“Do something!”

“On it.” Vel hunkers down, peers through the scope, and finds the face of the man working the launcher. With admirable efficiency, he shoots the centurion between the eyes.

Then he does it three more times, until they stop stepping up to the artillery to man it. Their commander screams orders, indistinct over the rest of the battle, but nobody’s listening anymore. The spirit has been ground out of these men over turns of combat, over uncertainty and the fact that they’re not fighting for their homes. They all know they can choose to leave—to end this. And they’re ready.