Theo isn’t actually all that hungry, which is convenient. In the event of real hunger, Zabele’s taberna is probably the worst place they could have picked to rectify the situation. The limp stack of acorn-flour dappham was cold when it arrived, and the severely watered-down hops isn’t much better. But Zabele herself is easy on the eyes and always good for a laugh, with her trashmouth humor and wild gold lion’s mane, so Theo’s never all that annoyed about meeting Griff here for their weekly debrief.
Darius Miranda, though. That was a surprise.
Any vestigial hunger they might have had vanished the second he approached their table, livery duskra and oysterman’s boots clashing ridiculously. It didn’t matter that they’d never spoken before, Theo had known him on sight. Even if they weren’t a spy, didn’t have a vested interest in keeping tabs on the top-ranked Intelligentia’s movements, that’s just how life in the Regio Capitolio works. Eyes open and ears perked, aware of who’s who and how, precisely, they can be used to further one’s own career if and when the moment presents itself. Two days undercover in Naevia Kleios’s office was all it took for Theo to know that, when it comes to lies and deceit, the Revenants have got nothing on politicos.
They watch Miranda leave the taberna through narrowed eyes, and send a silent thank-you to whoever’s listening that they’d been here to intercept him. It doesn’t take a genius to put the pieces together—someone’s clearly tipped him off that Zabele’s is a common Revenant meeting place. And it had been easy work, getting rid of him, encouraging him to abandon their trail and sniff out whatever half-baked theory he’s come up with instead. So now the question left spinning in Theo’s mind, unsettled and disquiet, is how in the savage Quiet he knew to look here in the first place.
Gods, they need another drink. Today’s been a fucking ride.
No sooner do they think it, though, than Griff is sliding casually into the empty seat across the table. Floral duskra and native-style trousers of sturdy, faded blue cotton twill, she looks to all the world like any other nice, middle-aged dear out for a drink at the end of a long work day. Theo isn’t fooled. They set down their unfinished dappham, but take their time chewing the last mouthful of onion-tomato pancake.
“Griff.”
“Theo. Those any good?”
“Not really.”
Griff nods, then gets down to business. “Arran Alexander.”
Theo looks up sharply. That, they hadn’t expected. They didn’t even know Griff knew Arran’s name. Although maybe by this point they should stop being so surprised by the true extent of just how much Griff knows. “What about him?” they ask.
“You two spent the day together.”
“What, are you having me followed now?”
Griff rolls her eyes, smacks them fondly across the arm, not hard. Like they should know better than that. “Please. Pa’akal saw you two coming out of Vorndran’s.”
“Yeah. We were looking for his sister. Selah went missing.”
And hadn’t that been a terrifying development. Not only for the girl in and of herself—and Theo had tried very hard to separate that, done their level best not to imagine the very worst scenarios their mind could conjure when it came to Selah’s fate—but for what it could mean. The simple fact that Griff needs her, alive and whole and willing to wield some esoteric weapon for the cause, and still Theo doesn’t understand how a spoiled patrician girl could possibly be so important.
They don’t have to understand. All they needed to know was that, so far as Griff was concerned, Selah Kleios was their responsibility. And they needed to find her before someone else did. Before someone else got their hands on her and this Iveroa Stone, if it’s really as powerful as Griff claims. And what had concerned Theo the most out of all the rest was that little voice in the back of their head reminding them that the Revenants still have no idea who really killed Alexander Kleios, either. Theo had done their best to put that whispering voice out of their mind and focus instead on just finding Selah.
There’s no alarm on Griff’s part, no sudden moment of surprise, but Theo knows her well enough to recognize the slight widening of her eyes, the way she sucks in her cheeks in just that way. “Missing?” she asks, a hush.
“Yep. Don’t worry, we found her. Safe and sound and cozy in her big mansion.”
“You should have checked in with me first.”
“Probably,” they acknowledge. “But there’s no harm done. Selah’s fine. As for Arran, she loves her brother, so honestly making friends with him can only help if you really want her to trust me.”
Friends. That’s one word for it. Theo isn’t completely sure when they stopped being an open book with Griff, only maybe it’s something to do with the fact that this is new and unexplored territory.
They’ve fucked plenty of people before. They’ve used that countless times as a means of getting closer to what the Revenants need—information on sentry changeover at the Ministerium of Defense, the key to a pawnbroker’s shop in the Financial Quarter. This was supposed to be a means to an end. They’ve never known what it’s like for it to be more than that. They weren’t entirely sure they wanted to find out, actually, and had resolved not to. That was before they quite literally ran into him again in the middle of the street.
“Friends,” Griff repeats, quiet, and Theo doesn’t know if it’s paranoia on their part or just the natural consequence of those unwavering gray eyes. “Maybe so. But the problem is, Theo, he’s not the only friend you’ve made today.”
And Theo draws up short, dread pooling somewhere in the pit of her stomach, and the unbidden image of Darius Miranda’s pale face comes to the fore. So Griff saw them. Of course she saw. Vaguely, Theo wonders just how long Griff was there, waiting in the shadows of the Kirnaval tenement alleys as they laughed and drank with him. It had been an act, of course. It’s easy with men like that, letting the blackbag see whatever he needed to in them so long as it meant getting what they wanted in the end.
They open their mouth, intending to say as much, but then they feel it.
The blade’s edge is subtle, but unmistakable in its presence just inside the crook where their hip bends beneath the table. The slightest nick to their femoral artery and they’ll bleed out—and sure, it’ll take a few minutes, but they’ll be immobilized in the meantime, unable to seek help without collapsing, while Griff walks away with no one the wiser. Theo would know. They’ve done it themself enough times.
So it’s with a deep sense of awareness that Griff could, and very much would, go through with it if she doesn’t like the answers she gets, that Theo leans forward to meet her gaze.
Not a mother, they remind themself, heart pounding. Not a mentor. A spider.
“Yes,” they tell her simply, quiet and calm as they can. “Darius Miranda approached me. He recognized me from the Senate.”
“You two looked cozy. It didn’t look like the first time.” Griff’s voice is low now, too, and laced with something utterly dangerous. Theo’s skin prickles with it, heart spiking.
“Well, it was. He wanted to know why I was here, that’s all.”
“And you said—”
“Nothing. I said nothing. He’s got no idea who I really am.” Someone laughs at the table next to theirs, and Theo wishes they could take a moment to appreciate the irony.
“I’m yours.” They will themself not to blink as Griff’s searching gray eyes seem to see right through their own. “Yours.”
And then they do something completely suicidal.
Reaching down, they place their hand gently on Griff’s—not the one resting on the slick-tack tabletop, no, but the one holding the small paring knife bare centimeters from their own hot, pumping blood. They lay their hand atop Griff’s and ever so lightly press. Blades are Theo’s specialty, as subtle and simple as people. So while they don’t apply enough pressure to break the skin, they can practically feel as the surface fibers of their sturdy canvas trousers slice away under the knife’s edge.
Griff’s eyes widen slightly, then narrow in, as she registers Theo’s meaning.
She is the spider that holds the strands of the Revenants’ webs together, and she is the spider that plucks them as needed. Her unquestioned judgment is more important than one life. People are expendable, even the ones you value, even those the most devoted to you. People are expendable. Revolutions aren’t. And if Griff decides the strand that is Theo is a threat to the health of the web, then so be it.
Of course, Theo really, really hopes this display of trust means that she won’t. They’re staking their life on it, actually.
A long moment passes, then two, then three. At the next table, the drunk woman lets out another shriek of laughter. A sound like the crack of thunder goes off somewhere in the distance. All around them, Zabele’s patrons carry on drinking and dining and shouting, oblivious to the fact that Theo’s short life could end right here at this table.
It doesn’t.
Instead, a shrewd sort of smile extends across Griff’s mouth, and she lifts the blade away. Theo barely registers their exhale of relief, the cold sweat trickling down the back of their neck.
“Sorry, but I had to be sure,” Griff says, pleasant as a meridiem date once again, pocketing the knife into some unseen sheath within her outer tunic. “I didn’t enjoy that.”
“Trust me, neither did I.”
“So. Tell me about Darius Miranda.”
Theo breathes a steadying exhale. “Well, I’d put him early thirties. Average-ish height. Blond, which is a frankly criminal hair color for a person to have, in my op—”
“Theo.”
“Poor idiot’s in over his head.”
“Don’t tell me we’re feeling sorry for blackbags now.”
Theo laughs, more a dump of breath than anything else—the necessary exhale of all that fear and determination built up behind their teeth finding some sort of release at last from tension. “No chance,” they say. “But we can’t use Zabele’s anymore. He knew to look for us here.”
“How?”
“Great fucking question.”
Griff frowns, that divot of worry in the center of her brow, and Theo has to stop themself from giving into the bizarre urge to squeeze her hand. This is what they do. This strange dance where Griff could easily threaten their life one minute and still Theo’s right there the next, a shoulder to lean on when she needs. They curl their hands back into their lap.
“Anyway, he didn’t seem fully convinced that tracking us was worth his time,” they say instead. “I may have . . . encouraged that line of thinking. So that’s the Intelligentia off our backs for a minute.”
“You’re sure?”
“Pretty sure. Miranda’s definitely a threat, we shouldn’t discount him. But I think he’s ambitious, too. And way too convinced he’s right. Whatever he’s doing now, he won’t let it go in a hurry, but you should have someone keeping an eye on him in case that trail goes dry and he starts looking for us again.”
“I’m guessing he wasn’t kind enough to tell you why he was tracking us.”
“No, but did he really have to?”
“Mm. The Historian.”
“The Historian.”
Griff smiles, grim. “Good catch.”
That ease is back, the one Theo usually feels with her. Like the last ten minutes never happened. But they did. They did, and it’s enough to remember that they’ve never gained ground with Griff by being anything but honest. Even if it means reckoning with themself.
They like Arran. They do. There’s something endearing about him, something in the coaxing out of honest reactions through the mask he’s so carefully constructed. A personal triumph in every genuine smile, every blank look of shock, and the way his slender fingers tap along his collarbone when he’s considering something Theo’s said. They like his laughter—the real kind—and they feel nothing but guilty about that, something rotten at the center of delight.
They don’t want to give that up. But they also don’t want to lie to him.
There’s the truth.
They don’t want this to be a means to an end.
“While we’re on the topic of my excellent foresight,” they say, fortified in their resolve, “we should talk about Arran Alexander.” Griff stops mid-sip, then continues to drink. “I want to bring him over.”
This time, Griff actually sets down her pint.
“You’ve never recruited anyone before,” she says—not accusatory, exactly, but definitely somewhere to the left of neutral. “Only canaries.”
“Always a first for everything.”
“Why him?”
“You want Selah Kleios, right? They’re close. Closer than you’d think.” And here Theo takes a breath, leans in, and plunges on ahead. “If I can get Selah’s brother, then I’m a hell of a lot closer to getting her loyalty, too. Fuck, he’ll probably do it for me.”
Face still as glass, it’s impossible to get a read on Griff.
“Anyway,” they plunge on, “I tested him some today and he seemed open. Didn’t go screaming for the blackbags, anyway. And he seems . . . ready for a change. No surprise, given his background. He was talking about going back into the legions, but it definitely wasn’t out of patriotism. I think he’s a perfect candidate.”
“And that assessment has nothing to do with your personal feelings?”
“Of course it does,” they reply coolly. “My personal feelings always affect my personal judgment. And I think you’d agree that my judgment’s usually on point.”
It was Theo’s judgment, after all, that got Griff to where she is today. They don’t think it’ll help their case much to throw that in her face. It sits there between them all the same.
“You like him.”
It’s not a question.
“I do. And he’d be a good asset. Those aren’t mutually exclusive concepts.”
When Griff leans back in her chair, there’s something akin to pity in her eyes. Theo isn’t used to being annoyed with her, but after a near-death experience they think they’re allowed an exception or two.
“What?” they ask, an uncharacteristic snap pulled out from a long, drawn-out moment of Griff saying precisely nothing.
But she just shakes her head and says, “You’re so young.”
And they feel the heat rise in their cheeks—not from embarrassment, but bitter irony. Young is a matter of perspective, and Theo has not been young for a very long time. They’re not an idiot. They’re not a small child. They didn’t have the luxury of that even when they were a small child, not since their life was stolen from them for the crime of being Jarol’s family. And they don’t appreciate being treated as anything other than clear-eyed and prepared to do what needs to be done to prevent the same thing happening to another innocent person—as they’ve proven to the Revenants time and time again. As they proved when the previous Griff made as though to surrender to the insurrection, and it was only Theo’s quick thinking that stopped him from slitting the new Griff’s throat instead.
They weren’t young then, the man’s blood running in rivulets down their blade and wrist, and they certainly aren’t young now.
“Your judgment of character is a thing I depend on, Theo,” Griff says quietly. “More than I should, probably. You backed my leadership in the overturn. You thought Avis Tiago-Laith was weak. You trust Pa’akal and the others. But we all came as part and parcel of the cause to you. You have clarity where we’re concerned because you didn’t bring us to this danger. What happens when this boy joins us? What happens when it’s his life or the cause? Will you be able to set your personal feelings aside when the moment demands it?”
“Ten minutes ago I was ready to bleed myself out for the survival of your—”
“There’s a difference,” says Griff, with an unmistakable edge of finality, “between sacrificing yourself and sacrificing those who matter to you.” Unbidden, the image of Alexander Kleios and the bloodmark Griff left to honor him swims in Theo’s mind, and the breath hitches in their lungs. “I don’t think it’s a good idea. I’m sorry.”
Theo’s heart sinks. “But—”
“The plan stays the same. You’re in place for a reason. Close in on Selah Kleios and the Iveroa Stone. Let me know if there are any new developments. And whatever this is with Arran Alexander, end it. End it now.”