“I still don’t understand why you did what you did to the slaves,” I say. “Rape, Titus. Rape.”
His face is quiet and cruel. “They did it first.”
“Who?”
But he’s not listening. Suddenly he’s telling me about how they took “her” and raped “her” in front of him. Then the slaggers came back a week later to do it some more. So he killed them; bashed their heads in. “I killed the bloodydamn monsters. Now their daughters bloodywell get what she got.”
It’s like I’ve been punched in the face.
Oh hell.
A chill spreads through me.
Bloodydamn.
I stumble back.
“What the hell is the matter with you?” Titus asks. If I were a Gold, I might have not noticed, might’ve just been befuddled by the odd word. I’m no Gold. “Darrow?”
I pull my way into the hall. I move in a haze. It all makes sense. The hate. The disgust. The vengeance. Cannibals eat their own. He called them cannibals. Pollux, Cassandra, Vixus—who are their own? Their own. Golden. Bloodydamn. Not gory. Titus said bloodydamn. No Gold says that. Ever. And he called it a slingBlade, not a reaper’s scythe.
Oh hell.
Titus is a Red.
29
Unity
Titus is what Dancer did not want me to become. He is like Harmony. He is a creature of vengeance. A rebellion with Titus at the helm would fail in weeks. Worse, if Titus continues this way, continues unstably, he puts me at risk. Dancer lied, or else he did not know that there are other Reds who’ve been carved, other Reds who have donned the mask of the Golds. How many more are there? How many has Ares planted here, in the Society? In the Institute? It doesn’t matter if it is a thousand or just one. Titus’s instability puts every Red ever carved into a Gold at risk. He puts Eo’s dream at risk. And that is something I cannot abide. Eo did not die so that Titus can kill a few kids.
I sob in the armory as I resolve what must be done.
More blood will stain these hands, because Titus is a mad dog and must be put down.
In the morning, I pull him into the square in front of the House. They clear away the remnants of the night’s feast. I even have the slaves there to watch. A few Proctors flicker high above. There is no medBot floating beside them, which must stand as their silent consent.
I push Titus down on the ground in front of his former tribe. They watch quietly, mist hanging in the air above them, nervous feet scraping the cold cobblestones of the courtyard. A chill seeps into my hands through the durosteel of my slingBlade.
“For crimes of rape, mutilation, and attempted murder of fellow House members, I sentence Titus au Ladros to death.” I list the reasons. “Does anyone contest my right to do so?” First, I glance to the Proctors above. Not one makes a sound.
I stare at cruel Vixus. His bruise is not yet gone. My eyes go to Cassandra next. I even look at craggy Pollux, the one who saved Cassius and opened the gates for us. He stands by Roque. How loyalties shift here.
How my own shift. I will make a Red die because he killed Golds. He dug the earth like me. He has a soul like mine. In death, it will go to the vale, but in life he was stupid and selfish with his grief. He should have been better than this. Reds are better than him, aren’t we?
Titus’s tribe stays silent; their guilt is bound up with their leader. When he goes, it’ll go. That is what I tell myself. Everything will be well.
“I contest the sentence,” Titus says. “And issue a challenge to you, turdlicker.”
“I accept, goodman.” I bow curtly.
“Then a duel per custom of the Order of the Sword,” Roque announces.
“I choose then,” Titus says, eying my slingblade. “Straight blades. Nothing curved.”
“As you have it,” I say, but as I step forward, I feel a hand at my elbow and feel my friend come close behind.
“Darrow, he is mine,” Cassius whispers coldly. “Remember?” I make no sign of acknowledgment. “Please, Darrow. Let me honor House Bellona.”
I look to Roque; he shakes his head. As does Quinn, who stands behind Cassius. But I am leader here. And I did promise my friend, who now recognizes my ascendance. He requests instead of demands, and so I make a show of considering and then accepting his request. I stand aside as Cassius steps forward with a straight blade held in his fencer’s grip. It is an ugly weapon, but he’s sharpened it on stones.
“Pisser,” Titus snickers. “Wonderful. I’ll be happy to drench your corpse with piss again when we’re through.”
Titus is meant for brawls. Meant for muddy battlefields and civil wars. I wonder if he knows how easily he will die today.
Roque draws a circle in ash around the two combatants. Clown and Screwface walk out with arms full of weapons. Titus picks a long broadsword he took from a Ceres soldier five days before. The metal scrapes over stone. Echoes around the courtyard. He swings it once, twice to test the metal. Cassius does not move.
“Pissing your pants already?” Titus asks. “No fretting, I’ll be quick about it.”
Roque performs the necessities and commences the fight.
Cassius is not quick about it.
The ugly blades sound brittle against each other. The clangs are harsh. The blades chip. They grind. But how silent they are when they find flesh.
The only sound is Titus’s gasp.
“You killed Julian,” Cassius says quietly. “Julian au Bellona of House Bellona.”
He pulls his blade free of Titus’s leg and slides it in somewhere else. He rips it out.
Titus laughs and swings feebly. It is pathetic at this point.
“You killed Julian.” A thrust accompanies the words, words he repeats until I no longer watch. “You killed Julian.” But Titus is long dead. Tears stream down Quinn’s face. Roque takes her and Lea away. My army is silent. Thistle spits on the cobbles and puts her arm over Pebble’s shoulders. Clown looks even more dejected than usual. Even the Proctors make no comment. It is Cassius’s rage that fills the courtyard, a cruel lament for a kind brother. He said he did it for justice, for the honor of his family and House. But this is revenge, and how hollow it seems.
I grow cold.
This was meant for me. Not for my poor brother, Titus—if that was ever really his name. He deserved better than this.
I’m going to cry. The anger and sadness well in my chest as I push through the army. Roque looks at me when I pass him. His face is like a corpse’s.