War of the Marionettes by Adam-Troy Castro

Author:Adam-Troy Castro [Castro, Adam-Troy]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9781625672698
Publisher: JABberwocky Literary Agency, Inc.
Published: 2023-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 11

The Infected

Oscin told Skye’s story in precise, but impassioned strokes, using the third-person “she” for everything Skye had seen or thought or done, but never allowing any doubt that these counted as his memories and experiences as well. Whenever relating something Skye had said out loud he even softened his voice to approximate hers, becoming so much like her in carriage and demeanor that it was impossible to avoid taking comfort in the sensation that she had entered the room and was still with me, an actual presence in every sense but fact.

When he got to the part about the one allied Vlhani who had gone berserk and attacked the others around it, I began to see what he had meant about the madness going viral; when he described the others attempting to restrain its whips rather than just kill it outright, I felt a chill that had little to do with the relative coolness of the air inside the Royko home. And when he concluded with the berserker’s whip-point spearing Skye through the abdomen, I could only look away, my eyes burning with loss I could only hope to be not just premature but unwarranted.

If she dies, I thought, ready to deliver a vendetta with the rest of the sentence. But there was nothing I could say after that. If she died, and the composite personality known as the Porrinyards went with her, it made me no enemies I did not already have. It just turned the universe, a place I had long understood to be cold and pitiless but that had turned a shade brighter with their presence, back into a prison I had no desire to know.

By this point Oscin sat on the edge of the bed, his legs dangling, his strong shoulders bent and diminished by the weight of uncertainty. I was against the wall, my arms folded across my chest in a stance that mimicked self-sufficiency but was actually as close as I could come to holding myself together. Fox stood in the doorway, her arms at her sides, paying attention but so remote that she seemed more supernatural presence that actual presence.

Of us all, only Pakh Valinia showed clear urgency: she’d started pacing midway through Oscin’s explanation, and now stood facing him, urgency burning in every pore. “Take me to her.”

Oscin rubbed his eyes, his measured words emerging in dribs and drabs. “I don’t…think that’s such a good idea.”

“I’m not sure you appreciate how much she needs immediate care, not just the possibility of care hours away.”

Oscin gave her a bleak look. “Of course I do. That’s me bleeding to death out there.”

“We have to do something!”

“I know. But I’m not sure that finding her in time, if that’s what you mean, is even possible.”

“We have to try,” Pakh Valinia said.

“I wish I could. But I only know what the journey looked like at ground level to a wounded person being raced across dusty terrain at high speed—and while we know her starting

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