Chapter 876: Number 5’s Plan [Bonus - ]

Chapter 876: Number 5’s Plan [Bonus Chapter]

The dueling grounds sat at the southern foot of the Grand Assembly Spire, carved straight out of the island’s black basalt.

It was a wide open stretch of scorched packed earth and reinforced spirit-stone, three hundred yards across, ringed by heavy titanium blast-curbs and humming dampening pylons.

Above it arched a triple-layered barrier dome like a huge frosted glass bowl, built to hold in anything short of a tactical bombardment without letting a single shockwave leak into the rest of the fortress.

’It looks a bit good…’

Along the northern edge, tier after tier of stone viewing terraces climbed into the grey sea mist.

They were built to hold hundreds, and today they looked almost empty.

The masked Council members sat scattered across the lower tiers in small silent clusters with the magistrates stood in a stiff line along the front rail, and in the royal pavilion at the center sat the King, with Alexander standing rigidly beside him and his arms crossed over his navy uniform while his face looked like a thundercloud.

At the edge of the field, in the shadow of the preparation tunnel, Aki stood alone.

She’d taken off her silver overskirt, folded it with careful hands and set it on a stone bench by the gate.

Without it, the deep-blue sheath dress hugged her slim new frame cleanly and left her legs free to move.

’I’ll win this for sure… I need to make Silas proud, plus Ther’Abella would be pissed if she heard I lost to this woman.’ Aki thought.

Her breath fogged faintly in the cold sea air and behind her, heavy black silk brushed softly against the stone.

A warm little smile touched her lips before she even turned around, because she already knew that scent…

Kara stepped out of the tunnel with her long black cloak sweeping the dusty ground with her empty left sleeve pinned neatly to her chest and her right hand tucked lazily in her trouser pocket.

She stopped right beside Aki, her frame throwing a long shadow over her and looked down at her with those purple eyes.

A slow devastating smirk spread across her face, and Aki’s stomach did a breathless little flip.

“Well now, my sweet little Aki,” Kara purred. “You didn’t waste any time, did you? That poor magistrate was halfway through his legal disclaimer and you were already rolling up your sleeves…”

Aki’s cheeks went pink, and it had nothing to do with the cold.

“She asked for it,” she said, lifting her chin with a defiant little pout. “She stood right in front of Father and asked to test me… What was I supposed to do, stand there like a nice polite statue and let her talk down to me in front of the whole Council again?”

“Not at all,” Kara chuckled as she drew her hand out of her pocket. ’She’s very teasable…’

Slowly, she reached out and caught a stray strand of blue hair that had drifted across Aki’s cheek, and tucked it back behind her ear.

Her knuckles brushed against the warm skin of Aki’s temple and lingered there longer than they needed to as Aki’s breath caught.

Her fingers curled into the silk at her thighs, and her heart jumped against her ribs like a startled bird.

’He’s… he’s doing that on purpose,’ she thought helplessly. ’Right before a fight. He’s doing it on purpose for sure…’

Kara was the woman who’d mocked the King of the World to his face and made Enforcers step out of her way just by looking at them, and she was standing here fixing Aki’s hair like it was the most important job in the world.

It made her knees feel weak.

“Go have some fun out there,” Kara murmured, her eyes crinkling at the corners. “You’ve been cooped up in that trial for a week, fighting dirt monsters. You’ve earned the right to stretch your legs a little… Are you nervous?”

Aki swallowed and made herself look straight into Kara’s eyes.

“No,” Aki said and she meant it however she hesitated after as a tiny mischievous spark lit up in her eyes.

“Actually…” she whispered, leaning half an inch closer, “…I have a surprise.”

Kara’s brows shot up.

She leaned down with her grin turning hungry and curious.

“A surprise? What kind of surprise? Did you figure out a new trick with that destruction, little princess?”

“I’m not telling,” Aki said instantly with her chin up.

“Come on, sweet Aki,” Kara coaxed, dropping her voice into that tone that usually took Aki apart in about ten seconds flat. “You’re going to keep secrets from me? After I carried you two thousand miles across the ocean and let you play in the water like a little duckling? Tell me. Just a tiny hint…”

“Not a single syllable,” Aki laughed, taking a half-step backward toward the gate.

She was having far too much fun with the rare sight of Silas being denied something. “I’ve been saving it for a long time, and nobody gets to see it until the right moment… Not even you.”

Kara stared at her for three full seconds, taking in the bright playful defiance burning in her eyes then a slow delighted laugh rumbled out of her chest.

“Fair enough, little mystery,” she said, tapping a knuckle lightly against Aki’s cheek. “Keep your secrets… But you’d better make it look good… I’ll be watching from above.”

“You won’t be disappointed,” Aki whispered.

“Oh, and Aki?”

She paused at the gate and looked back.

Kara was leaning against the tunnel wall again, one hand back in her pocket, and her smile had turned a little sharper.

“Don’t go easy on her because she’s family,” Kara said. “She certainly won’t go easy on you…”

Aki’s lips curved slowly.

“I wasn’t planning to,” she said.

She turned on her heel with her blue dress swirling around her calves, and walked out of the shadow of the tunnel and through the barrier gate onto the scorched earth.

Her face was burning and her temple was still tingling where Kara’s knuckles had touched it, but the moment her shoes touched the crushed spirit-stone of the field, the flush in her cheeks hardened into a focused expression.

Across the field, Kiera was already waiting.

She’d changed out of her court gown into a sleek skin-tight combat suit of charcoal ballistic weave, with light plates of flexible white alloy across her chest, shoulders and forearms, and her royal-blue hair was pulled up into a high severe ponytail that swung against her neck like a whip.

She tilted her head to one side, then the other.

CRACK! CRACK!

The pops of her neck echoed across the quiet field, and her golden eyes locked onto Aki the moment she stepped through the gate looking cold and full of venom.

Aki walked to the center of the field and stopped thirty paces away from her.

For a moment, the two sisters just looked at each other then Kiera smiled, and it was a completely different smile from the one she wore on their father’s knee.

There was nothing sweet left in it at all.

“You know, I almost felt sorry for you,” Kiera said, her voice carrying easily across the empty ground now that there was nobody close enough to perform for. “Three weeks ago, standing there in that dress with nothing in your veins, smiling like a doll while everyone pitied you… It was actually kind of sad, big sister.”

“Was it?” Aki said pleasantly.

“It was.” Kiera rolled her shoulders, and faint violet sparks danced across the white plates on her forearms. “And now you’ve got one little trick, and you think you can stand on the same ground as me… I grew up in the Yamato mountains. I’ve been fighting since I could walk. You’ve been fighting for, what, a week?”

“About that amount…” Aki agreed.

“So when I put you on your back in front of Father,” Kiera went on sweetly, “please try not to cry… It’ll be so embarrassing for the family.”

Aki tilted her head, and her smile didn’t move an inch.

“Kiera,” she said gently. “Do you remember what you said three weeks ago? About being used to sitting on cold stone?”

Kiera’s eyes narrowed, and the corner of her smile twitched just once.

“Good,” Aki said. “Because you’re going to be lying on some very soon…”

A hot flush of anger crawled up Kiera’s neck, and the sparks along her arms snapped brighter.

Aki just smiled at her and waited with her fingers flexing slowly at her sides.

’Come on,’ she thought, and she could feel her own heartbeat in her fingertips. ’Come on, come on, come on… I’ve been waiting so long for this.’

High above the arena, the wind whistled through the girders of the Spire.

Kara skipped the viewing terraces completely.

She climbed a narrow private maintenance stair until she reached the highest observation platform on the tower, a narrow ledge of white titanium and dark granite jutting out from the Spire’s outer wall three hundred feet directly above the center of the field.

It was empty, and that suited her just fine.

’Best seat in the house,’ she thought, stepping out onto the windy ledge. ’And nobody down there gets to see me grinning like an idiot when she wins…’

She walked to the edge of the railing and rested her forearm on the cold metal with her long black cloak pooling behind her boots and her empty left sleeve fluttering in the freezing ocean draft.

Below her, through the faint hexagonal grid of the barrier dome, the two blue-haired sisters stood like little figurines on a huge circle of scorched black earth.

Kara smiled as she watched Aki take her stance as three paces to her left, the air rippled.

It was a soft, almost invisible bending of space, followed by the dry whisper of midnight-silk robes.

Kara didn’t turn her head to see that Number 5 appeared out of thin air at her left elbow.

She was short, barely reaching Kara’s shoulder, wrapped in flowing midnight-silk robes with her hood pulled up and her smooth white porcelain mask turned toward the field.

Her small hands were tucked deep into her wide sleeves and her whole stiff little body was practically radiating suppressed triumph.

…She was alone with Kara White.

The whole Council, the King and the two duelists were hundreds of feet below them, stuck in their seats, completely unaware of what was happening up here.

Behind her mask, Number 5’s heart was hammering with glee.

…She’d waited all morning for exactly this.

She’d spent three sleepless nights in her office in the Sovereign Realm analyzing Kara White’s habits, digging through precedent and hunting for loopholes until she’d built the perfect trap.

Kara thought she was untouchable and Kara thought nobody could ever get one over on her but Number 5 had found the seam.

She had the paperwork, she had the clauses, and she’d rehearsed every line of it in the mirror until she could say it without blinking.

…She’d even practiced the little pause before the final blow, the one where Kara would finally realize she’d been cornered.

’Kekekekekekeekekeke~’

She’d imagined Kara’s face going blank and she’d imagined Kara stammering for the first time in her insufferable life.

It was going to be beautiful.

She was about to deliver the opening line that would finally wipe that smug smirk off Kara White’s face.

Number 5 lifted her mask toward Kara, took a slow theatrical breath and opened her mouth to begin her masterpiece—

“You know,” Kara said.

Her voice was lazy and it rolled right over Number 5 before she could get out the first syllable.

Number 5’s jaw snapped shut behind her mask however Kara didn’t even look at her.

She stayed leaning on the railing with her chin propped on her gloved hand and her black hair blowing across her cheek, gazing out over the dark churning ocean with the calm peaceful expression of a tourist enjoying the view from a cruise ship and she said, with total serene confidence.

“It really is nice how this island floats.”

The platform went completely silent as the wind whistled through the girders.

Number 5 froze where she stood. Her hands, buried in her sleeves, went rigid.

…What?

The word fell through her mind like a brick down a well.

She stared at the side of Kara’s relaxed face.

She looked at the casual lean, the peaceful little smile, and then out at the black water surrounding the most famous anchored fortress in human history… a structure bolted into the seabed above the planet’s Suppression Engines that every schoolchild in the Nine Nations had learned about before they could spell their own names.

And this woman… this terrifying one-armed monster who tore through space and terrorized the World Council for fun… was standing on the highest point of it, looking at the ocean, and declaring that it floated.

Like a bath toy…

Three nights of planning.

The clauses, the loopholes, the glorious opening speech… all of it blew away like dust in the face of such pure, incomprehensible stupidity.

Slowly, Number 5 turned her mask to face Kara.

“…The island,” she said, her voice flat and dead and trembling with the faintest murderous disbelief. “doesn’t float.”