This Gilded Abyss by Rebecca Thorne

Author:Rebecca Thorne [Thorne, Rebecca]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9798986692456
Publisher: Rebecca Thorne
Published: 2023-06-05T22:00:00+00:00

18

The ship was chaos.

Perplexed stewards took varying forms of control, directing guests back to their staterooms. A few of the senior stewards were addressing irate passengers, spirescraper citizens clearly unused to being ordered around. Nix watched it all distantly, weaving through the crowds to one of the elevators. The promenade would be a guaranteed nightmare for a bit, but if she could get to the upper levels near Hallie’s lab, she could cut through the gambling hall and reach the upper decks that way.

“Hey,” a steward said, huffing. He stepped in her way, narrowing his eyes. “Didn’t you hear the captain? The ship is on lockdown. Return to your stateroom.”

Nix quirked one eyebrow and turned slightly, showing her ichoron sarrant.

The steward hesitated. “Ah, a soldier. You’re supposed to be in the promenade. That way.”

“I’m on special assignment.” When that didn’t seem to register, she heaved an irate sigh. “For Subarch Kessandra.”

He gauged her—but finally stepped aside. “Just… don’t be in the hallways long.” Nervousness laced his voice, and Nix wondered how much he’d been told.

Anything was too much for someone unequipped for combat, as he clearly was. Sympathy swelling, she stepped past him. “Trust me. I won’t.” And she strode into the glass elevator, jamming the button for the nineteenth floor.

As the elevator rose steadily, the atrium level came into view. The soldiers guarding it were gone, and a simple sign on a metal post had been positioned in front of the locked doors. It was hard to read from this angle, but the cursive word Closed was visible.

Such a prim and proper way to say, there’s a massacre inside.

Nix clenched her jaw, turning away from the windows. Find Kessandra. Nix was bouncing on her feet, ignoring the twinge of her ribs as she stepped onto level nineteen. Even the medical bay had been closed. Here, a similar sign was positioned that politely stated, Call if you need medical assistance, with a three-digit number.

Was Ramona safe inside her office? Ah, switchboard room?

Nix could only hope so.

Past the medical bay was another lounge, and Nix stopped short on seeing the bioluminescence out the windows. It was bright blue now, another light in an already bright space—but now the water’s murkiness had cleared somewhat. A massive shape in the distance caught her eye, so tall it was nearly level with the Luminosity. The long, thin shape was fractured at the center, tilting at a precarious angle, but there was no mistaking what it had once been.

A bone. They’d reached the leviathan fall.

Before Nix could contemplate that, a crash echoed in the gambling hall.

Nix stiffened, hand reaching for the sarrant over her shoulder on instinct. She strode swiftly through the wide entrance, shifting to a painful jog as screams echoed in the huge room. Far beyond the tables of slot machines, a panicked thrush of people were shoving for the far exit.

They were, of course, hitting a wall of soldiers trying to do the exact opposite.

And in the room’s center, surrounded by shredded corpses, was the female Elite.

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