Torn Sky (Rebel Wing Trilogy, Book 3) (Rebel Wing Series) (2 page)

High in the hills on the mountainside of Panthea, on an expansive balcony that overlooked both the forest and the city, Galena Vadim, Ward of Ruslana, sipped a cup of milky tea. Pyralis Nekos, Ward of Atalanta, relaxed in a chair beside her, holding his own cup perched on his knee.

“This is . . . peaceful,” she said. The word felt alien on her tongue.

“It was a good idea for you to come here.” Pyralis’s brown hair was streaked with gray, but he was still a handsome man. The lines that framed his mouth gave it life, and the stress of war had kept his body thin. His pale yellow tunic reminded her of the coat she’d worn when they first met, all those years ago. He’d said it made her look like a bolt of sunlight.

“I came for business reasons,” she reminded him. Or maybe herself. Ever since the ceremony in Ruslana to celebrate Elom’s capture, when he’d kissed her for the first time in twenty-five years, it had been harder for her to separate their professional relationship as allied leaders from their personal one. Their shared history, their hopeful but uncertain future, filled so much of the space between them. “Gods know there’s enough to discuss: the fact that Castalia and Halona are
still
refusing to provide aid, the rumors that Balias wants to ‘liberate’ Elom. . . . It’s never-ending, isn’t it? Our meetings start in less than an hour, and then all day—”

“The world won’t fall to ruin if we take a moment to breathe.” Pyralis lifted a plate toward her.

With a sigh, she took a flaky, almond pastry. As she ate it, she let the sight of tall, full-leafed trees and the distant glint of the city calm her. Soft breezes caressed her scarred face. She understood why Pyralis had chosen a home here, above the rush of Panthea. It was almost possible to pretend that this serenity extended outward, unbroken.

Almost.

“About Elom—” she began.

“He has given us no new intel,” Pyralis cut in, a hint of impatience creeping into his voice. “Speaking of him will get us nowhere.”

Elom had kidnapped Galena, tortured her, disfigured her, and orchestrated her husband’s murder. He was locked in Panthea’s most impenetrable prison, and yet they’d still learned nothing from him.

Galena didn’t push the line of conversation. “What do you miss most about life before the war?”

Pyralis shifted in his chair as he considered his answer. “It’s not so much what I miss as what I wish for. Days with no casualty reports. The lifting of the civilian-flight ban. A time when families are able to return to their homes. I dream of rebuilding. The past . . .” He broke off. “It’s not worth looking back.”

“We’ll get there,” she said. “Now that we know about the bomb, we’ll find a way to stop Balias.”

Pyralis laughed a little. “It’s impossible to talk of anything but the war. Even when we try.”

Galena reached for his hand, entwining their fingers. For one brief second, she closed her eyes and gave herself this small happiness: the soothing sigh of the breeze, the pressure of his hand, the absence of news reports and commanders’ questions. It’d never be more than a second, not while they lived under the shadow of war, but she’d steal the time she could.

As if on cue, “Excuse me, Wards.”

Galena opened her eyes.

Kellan, Pyralis’s assistant, stood in the doorway, his bright red hair catching the sunlight. “I’m sorry to bother you, but Lieutenant Latza and Alistar are here.”

“Thank you, Kellan,” Pyralis said. He squeezed Galena’s hand briefly before releasing it and getting to his feet. “Please show the Lieutenant to my office. I’d like to speak with him alone first.”

“They’re early,” Galena observed, as she followed Pyralis through the high-ceilinged living room. The room still bore his wife Bett’s touch. Vibrant artwork hung on the walls, and a thick white-and-blue carpet dampened their footsteps. The furniture here was delicate, twisted metal with cobalt velvet cushions, whereas Pyralis’s office was full of heavy leather chairs and a giant desk.

When they reached Pyralis’s sanctuary, Lieutenant Jax Latza was waiting for them. Galena took a position near the wall of windows. The bright morning light streamed across the floor, broken only by the black slant of her shadow. Jax refused the chair Pyralis offered him, pacing instead. His dark brows were drawn together, his face tight, and he favored his left leg slightly, a lingering injury from his time in a Safaran prison.

“Lieutenant, your report, please.” Pyralis drew a table on wheels into the center of the room, engaging its tech to bring up a three-dimensional war map of Atalanta.

Jax studied the map. “As you know, Ward Balias has several men posing as him around Safara, using the diatous-veil tech to take on his appearance. The men he chose to wear the veils are quite convincing and he’s effectively created confusion about his actual location. While we’ve tracked down and taken out a few of his doubles, we haven’t discovered the whereabouts of the real ward. We’ll continue pursuing all leads in that regard.

“As for the bomb, there’s nothing new to report. We know the weapon is still in the testing phase, and that it’s no longer being stored in the facility near where Lieutenant Haan went down. But we don’t know where it was taken. Everything points to the weapon not being operational yet, but . . .” He trailed off.

“But?” Galena asked, brow furrowing.

Jax glanced at her, worry seeping into his features. “Well, it’s not something we want to take a chance with, right?”

She tried to keep her own expression impassive. “Indeed.”

“We have another problem,” Jax added.

“And that is?” Galena didn’t like the look on his face.

He zoomed in on the map to show a large, familiar building. “You’ve heard the chatter—Ward Balias is seeking access to Elom. Well, my sources’ latest reports show he’s in the final stages of planning an attack on the prison.”

Pyralis put both hands on the edge of the table, his gaze turning inward. Galena wondered if he was thinking about Bett, who was locked up in the same prison for treason. She’d sold the diatous-veil technology to Safara and been integral in the plot to kidnap and replace Galena, though she maintained she did it for the good of Atalanta.

“The prison is on the outskirts of Panthea, farther than any Safaran soldiers have breached,” Pyralis said. “We’ll increase security. It’s already one of the most impenetrable buildings in the dominion, but I don’t want to risk any collateral damage to the area.”

“We haven’t been able to get Elom to talk yet,” Galena told Jax. Just the thought of him escaping sent ice through her veins. “He must know about the flaming scorpion and where the real Balias is holed up. We need that intel.”

“Actually, I had an idea about that . . .” Jax said, a furrow appearing between his deep-set, dark-brown eyes. “May I call in Alistar?”

Pyralis nodded.

Alistar, along with his sister Samira, had been in charge in Pakan, the village near where Aris had been shot down. Now he and Samira were living in Lux, along with the children they’d rescued. It had been Aris’s idea to send the Safaran refugees there, to her hometown. Lux was quiet, far from the front lines, and largely untouched by the war, even now. Also, it was one of only a handful of villages without refugees already dragging on their resources.

Jax disappeared for a moment, then returned, followed by a tall, dark-skinned man. As Alistar sank in one of the large leather chairs, his pants rode up a little to reveal a sliver of a new-tech prosthetic leg.

Sunshine shone directly onto his face, and for a split second, Galena fought a wave of panic. The mahogany skin, the bald head, the muscled frame, the wide, crooked nose . . . he looked so much like . . .

Elom.

Her eyes widened. Suddenly, she knew exactly what Jax was about to propose.

Dysis grumbled all the way down the long, white hallway to the infirmary, ignoring the handful of soldiers who passed, probably on their way to combat training with Lieutenant Cruz. Lucky them. She wished she could punch someone right now.

Her arm felt fine. A few stitches and some bruising . . . it was nothing. There was no reason why she couldn’t be in the air with her team. If Aris thought she couldn’t handle it because of what happened to Daakon . . .

Dysis shook the thought from her mind. Aris wouldn’t be that dense.

The stationpoint mender’s head snapped up when she stomped into the infirmary. He sat at a desk at one end of the small, windowless room. Behind him, a row of doorways led to examination rooms and two surgical suites.

“I’m supposed to have my arm checked,” she said shortly.

The man blinked a few times. “Of course, Specialist.”

Until her injury, Dysis had never been to the infirmary. When female soldiers were still disguised as men, Commander Nyx had told them there were structures in place if they were injured; there was a list of names—one mender at each of the larger mender points, like Mekia and Feln—that they were supposed to ask for. Spiro’s mender—an older, sallow-faced man—hadn’t been on the list. He still looked surprised and a little aghast every time he saw her.

As he led her to one of the examination rooms and gestured to her jacket, he wouldn’t meet her eyes, and his movements were jerky, awkward. She wanted to smack him. Instead, she removed her jacket and yanked down the collar of her shirt.

“So? Am I cleared for active duty yet?” She didn’t bother hiding her impatience.

The man bent forward to get a closer look, tapping at the skin around the stitches with tentative fingers. “Now, do you, um, feel any pain when I—”

A sudden, massive quake shook Dysis off the table. A second later came the deafening
boom
of an explosion. The room jumped again, sending them both to the floor. The ceiling groaned.

“Watch out!” Dysis yelled, as a jagged span of roofing cracked and fell. The mender didn’t have time to move. The sharp edge of the shard caught him in the stomach. His eyes widened, and his sallow skin went deathly pale.

She swallowed, helpless to save him, as rubble thundered down all around her.

As she turned and scrambled for the mangled door, a chunk of ceiling fell against her back, driving her to her knees. Panting, she fought free of the heavy panel. Sweat stung her eyes and blurred her vision. She managed to drag herself through the main infirmary into the hallway, which was thick with black smoke and the bone-vibrating scream of the sirens.

Shadowy figures staggered through the darkness. Another explosion shook the ground, and flames erupted at the far end of the hall. A high-pitched scream echoed the wail of the siren. Dysis stumbled away from the fire on trembling legs, pulling her solagun from its holster.

She wove through the stifling air, her lungs recoiling at every breath. A red, flickering glow flashed across some of the walls like blood, but other hallways were pitch black.

How much longer did she have before the entire building exploded around her?

She shouldered through a ragged gap in one wall, only to find herself in the burning remnants of the cafeteria. Bodies were strewn across the floor, some still on fire. She tripped over the charred corpse of Lieutenant Cruz, his heavy dark brows still recognizable. Gagging, Dysis pushed through the destruction to a gap in the outer wall. Just before she escaped, Specialist Mann emerged from the smoke.

He ran toward her, leaping over bodies and dodging the still-blazing heaps of broken tables.

“Come on!” she shouted, beckoning to him.

“Go!” He waved her on, but she waited to be sure he reached her.

Together they busted through the wall into open air, just as a fleet of black Safaran wingjets zipped through the sky above them.

Dysis ducked automatically, squinting against the bright sunlight, but the enemy forces were already moving on, unpursued as the wingjets in Spiro’s fleet burned. A few other survivors emerged from the wreckage of the building: Nyal and two men who’d refused to speak to her since she’d rejoined the unit as a woman.

“You okay?” she asked Mann, still panting. Her lungs ached with every breath.

He glanced back at the rubble, eyes wild. He was a transport flyer, a thick-necked, broad-shouldered behemoth who kept to himself and commed his wife with dogged consistency. “We should get farther away. The rest of the building could go.”

A few yards away, Nyal shouted. Commander Nyx busted through a shattered door, soot covered and sagging under the weight of an unconscious soldier. Dysis ignored Mann’s suggestion to retreat. Instead, she winced against the pain in her back and lumbered over to Nyx, taking some of the unconscious soldier’s weight onto her own good arm.

A few minutes later, there was another shout. Dysis glanced up, saw the others looking toward the sky. Sunlight flashed against the bellies of two silver wingjets. She eyed Commander Nyx, both of their faces mirroring the same relief. Aris and the others had returned.

***

Mekia was a larger, uglier stationpoint than Spiro, its structures squat and flat roofed.

Dysis held herself rigidly in formation, even though her side and arm ached. No. It was more than that. The ache had wormed deep inside, through her bones and muscles and tendons, into her head. Into her heart.

Daakon was dead.

And now most of her unit was, too.

Commander Nyx had ordered the survivors to Mekia. Ten soldiers out of sixty still alive. It took two trips in Aris’s transport and Pallas’s recon, the only wingjets not blown to bits in the attack. Dysis had helped where she could, ignoring Aris’s well-meaning but irritating entreaties for her to rest, because it was the only thing she could do to keep herself from screaming.

Over the day—as she’d reported to the new stationpoint, been issued new uniforms, given her statement on what she remembered of the timeline of events— something within her had emptied. Numbed. Now, only hours later, even her anger felt far out of reach.

“Alright, soldiers!” Before her, Mekia’s Major Pova, a short, wiry man with a sharp jaw and even sharper voice, called them to order. “We have some new faces here tonight. The soldiers from Spiro will be stationed with us for the foreseeable future. They’ll join us for physical training and formations but will continue their search and rescue efforts independently of our missions. Please welcome them and take it upon yourselves to give them the space and information they need to settle in.”

Dysis shook her head, trying to break free of the haze that had drifted over her eyes, as if the smoke from that morning still clung to her. Pain lanced through her side as she twisted to follow the others back into the building, but she kept moving. She wasn’t about to let another injury sideline her.

“Dysis, are you okay?” Pallas jogged up beside her. “You look pale.”

“I’m fine. Watch out.” Dysis pushed her out of the way and accelerated, walking quickly toward the door.

Her legs wobbled. The evening sun suddenly felt unbearably hot. Sweat erupted along her brow, and the air thickened until she could barely suck it in. With a frustrated groan, she crumpled to her knees. Dysis couldn’t fight the languor creeping through her limbs, and that scared her.

In a haze, she felt a hand on her shoulder.

“Are you okay? What’s wrong?” Panic oozed through Aris’s voice.

Nothing’s wrong. I’m fine.
The words echoed in her mind, but somehow didn’t make it out of her mouth. She slowly collapsed sideways against someone’s solid arm.

“She’s injured. Was she examined after the attack?” The low, husky voice sent a flash of renewed fire through her, and she struggled upright.
Calix
.

“I’m—I’m fine.” The words scratched out of her throat. Warm fingers drew up her shirt, landing against the bruise on her back. Wincing, she tried to pull the fabric back down. “Leave me alone, I’m—”

“You’re
not
fine, Dysis.” Calix spoke over her, his hand still splayed across her skin. “It looks like you’re bleeding internally. You could—this is bad.”

“What do you mean, ‘bad’?” Aris asked, her voice alarmed. “Can you help her?”

Dysis closed her eyes. The world was spinning now, the sunlight fading to a single, too-bright point. It almost looked like a tunnel, the way it bored into her. She didn’t want to argue with them anymore. She was too tired.

With a little sigh, she let go.