I’ve never seen a child of the Minority Force before. People used to say that they weren’t real, that they were just normal children play-acting at being strategists and soldiers, that the whole idea was a propaganda exercise cooked up by the Accord then twisted by the Free Limits to show what the true overreach of power looked like.
I study the girl’s face, rolling a bead between my teeth, tasting its dull bitterness before biting down. Considering how she attacked before, I’ll need every ounce of wit I have. As the faint buzz of the breath goes through me, I pick up a pebble, take aim and throw it gently. It takes another four before she wakes.
Her eyes are not even fully open before she lunges, only to crash back to the ground. She swears and struggles, but I have tied her well.
‘We need to talk,’ I say.
She twists, furious. ‘I’ll slice your belly open, carrion. I’ll carve you up for the maggots.’
I sigh and take a syringe from the medkit. Her eyes narrow. Given the doses over the past day, it is remarkable she can even focus.
‘Kill me then,’ she spits. ‘Do it with your little needle, coward.’
‘I don’t want to kill you. I told you, I am a medic.’
‘A medic? You have poisoned me.’
‘I have not. The effects will soon wear off. Anyway, I had no choice.’
‘You killed LaSalle.’
‘I tried to help him. He took the brunt of the crash to save you.’ The girl-child only stares. ‘He told me to say that he died for you,’ I go on. ‘He said he didn’t know about their plans. That you should fight.’
She spits grit from her mouth. ‘He’s the one who should have fought. If he had been vigilant, I wouldn’t be in this mess. He should have killed you when he had the chance.’ After a moment she shifts, grimacing at the cable that binds her. ‘Alright, medic. Name your terms.’
‘Terms?’
‘Your terms. What insurgent scum do you represent and how much do you want for my release?’
‘You’re no hostage. I work for no one.’
‘Then release me.’
I shake my head slowly. ‘You would kill me.’
She doesn’t disagree. ‘And so, what? You propose to keep me tied like a beast?’ A vicious smile curves her mouth. ‘Better to kill me. I’ll get free eventually.’
‘If I wanted you to die, I would have left you for the Seekers.’ I take a steadying breath, pushing away the past self who itches to do what she says, exact my revenge. ‘I do not care who you are, or what you’ve done. I want you to live, for reasons of my own. I don’t expect you to understand.’
The child stares at me, her eyes flicking from my hat to my boots, to my swaddled neck. I resist the urge to pull the scarves higher.
‘I will release you,’ I force myself to say. ‘I will escort you to safety and do you no harm. In exchange—’
‘You want a pardon,’ she sneers. ‘I see those deserter scars of yours. You want a slate wiped clean of all your nasty deeds.’
I laugh, a bitter sound. ‘You could not pardon me.’
How to explain to this child, who is no longer a child, that the tally is all? That it matters over compassion or fear, that it drives me more than the threat of arrest ever could?
‘I want medical supplies,’ I say. ‘As much as I can carry on the mule. That is my price.’
She is silent, her brown eyes fixed. Above us, beyond us, the winds tear through the canyon: the voices of the dead howling betrayal.
‘You will not make it to a base without me,’ I finally say, ‘if that’s what’s on your mind.’
She almost smiles, as if in her imagination she has already garrotted me and dumped my body among the rocks. ‘Why not? I’ve survived in worse places than this.’
‘Do you know anything about Factus?’
‘What does it matter? These border rocks are all the same. And anyway, the Accord will have picked up the distress signal. They will be looking for me.’
‘If you set off alone, you will be dead before they find you.’ She turns her head away, defiant, unconvinced. ‘Alright,’ I say. ‘Tell me then, which townships are in quarantine for yellowrot? Which mining camps have been taken over in revolts, and why would going to Malady Falco’s on the wrong night mean your death? Tell me about the Unincorporated Zone. Tell me about the Edge. Tell me—’
Tell me about them.
I bite the inside of my mouth. Don’t call to them. Don’t even think of them.
‘You know who has power here?’ I ask instead.
‘The authority of the Accorded Nations extends to all known territory.’
‘Tell that to the Seekers. Tell that to Hel the Converter.’
The girl regards me with contempt. Finally, she draws herself up.
‘Very well. You have your deal. I swear to it by the First and Last Accords. Now, untie me.’
Slowly, as if approaching one of Valdosta’s pit vipers, I loosen the knots that hold her, ready for an attack, but she only winces and flexes her muscles.
‘Stop cringing,’ she says. ‘I have sworn by the Accords. That means something to me, even if it doesn’t to you.’ Grunting in pain, she sits up. ‘You have a name, traitor?’
‘Ten Low.’
‘In the hands of a damn Ten,’ she mutters, before shaking back her hair and raising her chin. ‘I am General Gabriella Ortiz, Implacabilis, Leader of the Third Minority Force, Hero of the Battle of Kin and Former Commander of the Western Air Fleet of the Accorded Nations.’
High above, beyond the sky, I think I hear them laughing.
* * *
‘We were on our way to Landfall Nine, on Prodor. The mining enclaves are showing signs of insurrection, some lingering Limiter sympathies in the camps, and the battalion there is sloppy. I was sent in to burn off the corruption.’
I don’t speak, only drive, the burning desert light in
