As Gwen poured a bucket of water over her head, body wracked with sobs, a fist pounded on her bedroom door.
What now?
Her bath was dark pink from the blood the Grimm Reaper drew.
Again, a knock sounded at the door. Swallowing back tears, she finished washing, wrapped her hair in a towel, and hopped out of the tub.
She still shaved half of her head. The scars from the incisions had started to fade somewhat. She wondered just how many scars she’d left tonight.
Don’t think about that right now.
There wasn’t time to deal with that. If she allowed herself to linger for too long on the hours she’d spent disfiguring perfectly healthy cyborgs, she’d never leave her room again. She’d address the horrors she’d committed once the competition was over and the cyborgs—those who remained—were safe.
Slipping into a bathrobe, she swiped her pistol from the bathroom counter. She was under no illusion that the remaining performers held any fondness toward her. They were scared, and scared people tended to lash out. As she walked across the room, she paused.
The project she’d been tinkering with for weeks sat on her bed. She’d pulled it out before stepping into the bath. Gears and wires stuck out in all directions, which held a strange metallic glow in the artificial light of her gas lamp. Now, anger swelled within her at the sight of it, and she shoved it into her wardrobe before heading toward the door.
The person outside her door knocked again as she opened it.
Behind her back, Gwen cocked her pistol. When she saw who it was, she lowered her weapon.
The shorter woman’s dark skin paled. “Oh my gosh, Gwen. Are you all right?”
Having glanced in the mirror before her bath, Gwen knew her human eye was purple and swollen. She was covered in matching bruises, which her bathrobe did little to hide.
“No.” Gwen looked over Rora’s shoulder to the watchmen in the hallway. “I’m terrible company, but you’re welcome to come in.”
Slipping in, Rora shut and bolted the door behind her.
“Don’t bother.” Turning, Gwen strode into her washroom and placed the gun on the sink. Dropping her bathrobe, she pulled on a clean pair of sleeping trousers and a shirt. “The Mistress doesn’t respect anyone’s privacy around here anyway.”
The acrobat nodded. “Celeste had the watchmen unlock everyone’s rooms the morning of the second competition. Trust me, I know.”
Gwen toweled her hair before sitting on the bed. Rora sat down beside her. As she did, Gwen noticed how she carried her cyborg hand, cradling it in her human one.
With half a glance, it was obvious the implant was completely destroyed.
There were deep indents from the dragon’s teeth. Gouges in the metal exposed the wiring beneath.
Rather than asking for help—help she so clearly needed—Rora stroked Gwen’s cheek with her human hand.
“I ran into Bastian when he was returning to his rooms. He told me what the Mistress did to you.” Dropping her hand, Rora shook her head as her eyes fell to her lap. When she looked back up, tears filled her eyes. “You shouldn’t have come.”
Gwen flinched as though slapped. “And let you and the other performers be the only ones to risk your lives? Not happening. Besides, I had to help…”
Marzanna.
She’d hoped to get to Marzanna in time and fix her foot. And she’d been too late.
“But I didn’t help.” Bitterness rooted in Gwen’s chest. “Nothing I did made a difference, and I had to harvest innocent people anyway.”
Turning away, she studied the stone walls of her room. Stars, she couldn’t cry. Not right now. Not with Rora right there.
“It can’t be easy… being forced to hurt someone.” Rora’s voice was soft and not unkind.
The damn woman was trying to sympathize with her when she had a broken implant and was probably in as much pain as Gwen was, perhaps more.
Swallowing, she tried to push back the lump in her throat. “It’s not the first time I’ve killed someone.”
Her voice was harsh, wavering.
But she had killed several people tonight. Unlike the first competition, there were many performers who’d relied on their implants to live. And she’d taken those implants from them. Unfortunately, several of the eleven performers who’d died in the forest had been a part of larger acts. Acts she’d been forced to harvest.
A soft, human hand found hers. Still, she kept her eyes trained on the wall. Eventually, the tears came, trailing soundlessly down one cheek.
Rora’s thumb swiveled back and forth atop Gwen’s hand, her calloused skin rough.
“I killed in deep space,” Gwen said. “There were pirates, thieves, and other delinquents who always cropped up. When we were boarded, I killed plenty of people. It had been in defense of my trade and my life. But this… this was murder.”
Gwen wiped her cheek with the back of a hand. “Celeste threatened to take my eye back, among other things, if I don’t do as I’m told.”
The bruises peppering her skin said as much.
“Even still, I can’t do nothing.” Letting go of Rora, Gwen leaned forward and cradled her head in her hands. “Bastian insists that the Mistress will terminate my contract, and I won’t be able to help anyone—to remove their implants safely or fix the implants of the performers who are still at this stars-forsaken circus. But all I can see—all I can think about—are the people I’m forced to harvest.”
Anger ripped through her as tears streamed down her face in earnest.
“And I haven’t helped a single person. I can’t even do my fucking job right. Marzanna is all but dead because of me.”
How had everything gone so wrong?
She’d taken the job with the circus not only to save her life but because she liked a challenge. She’d wanted to figure out just what it meant to be a cyborg tinkerer—and a good one at that. After the first competition, she’d stayed to help the cyborgs. People unwanted in the Crescent Star System. People like her. She wanted to protect them from the monster they called Mistress.
A monster who was willing to murder within the walls of her own home.
But Gwen had done nothing but hurt the people she’d stayed to protect. She was nothing like her parents, whatever their names were.
Helpless rage splintered through her as more of her memories were lost, slipping from her grasp like oil between her fingers.
How could you lose your memories from a simple cyborg implant? None of this made any sense.
The smell of rose and peach blossoms filled Gwen’s nose.
Rora didn’t reach out to touch Gwen. Instead, she sat quietly.
Waiting for me to calm the fuck down.
Eventually, she sighed. “I’m sorry you had to see this. I just… I can’t stand feeling… useless.”
Rora’s brown eyes were bright. “If not for you and Bastian, we’d all be dead right now. You did help us today. You risked your lives to save ours.”
Gwen winced, unable to hear those words right now. Not when something even larger loomed over her thoughts. “How’s Marzanna?”
“She still hasn’t woken up,” Rora said. “But the healer is doing everything he can.”
After she’d finished reclaiming implants of the thirteen losing acts, Gwen had spent hours with Marzanna. She’d done everything she could think of, but nothing helped. Nothing at all.
“I did this.” Those damn tears came again. “It’s my fault her foot malfunctioned and she isn’t waking up.”
“It was an accident,” Rora said, and it sounded like she believed it. “You’ve been fixing implants for weeks, and so many people are better for it. I’ve…” Her gaze slid down to her useless hand. “I’ve been able to get by longer than I thought possible with my old hand.”
Rora looked up, and their gazes locked. “The first time I saw you, something inside me changed. I’ve made plenty of friends in my time at the circus, but I’ve always felt alone. I never realized it until the first time we spoke. You sparked something inside me. I felt something I hadn’t felt in years, perhaps longer…”
The Forgetting, Gwen realized. Rora couldn’t recall if she’d always felt this way.
Throat tightening, Gwen tried not to think about her own past that she struggled to remember.
“You made me feel cherished,” Rora said. “Like I had value beyond my performances. Like you wanted me for me.”
“I do,” Gwen said simply.
And damn her, she meant it.
Looking down, Gwen studied Rora’s useless implant. Could she make it through the final competition without it if Gwen uninstalled the unit entirely? Or if Gwen dared to tempt fate and intervene, would Rora fall into a deep sleep just like Marzanna, never to awaken again?
Fear swam through Gwen, making her dizzy. She’d nearly killed Marzanna. There was no way she could…
But before she could finish that thought, Rora’s eyes skirted around the room and locked on an object within the open wardrobe. Gwen hadn’t bothered to close the doors when she’d stashed her secret project earlier. And she wasn’t sure if she regretted that decision.
In the center of the wardrobe, easily viewable from Gwen’s bed, was the cyborg hand she had been tinkering with for weeks, creating nearly from scratch.
Standing, Rora went over to the hand, her eyes round. She picked it up and turned back to Gwen. “Is this… Is this what I think it is?”
Biting her lip, Gwen felt as though she might drown in fear—fear of what she might do to the woman she was falling for.
But she couldn’t find it in herself to lie to Rora. Not with those beautiful brown eyes full of hope. Not when a new hand could make the difference between Rora winning the third competition and being banished from the circus forever.
“I’ve been working on it since the first time I tinkered your hand,” Gwen admitted.
After joining the circus, she quickly learned from the ever-present watchmen the rule surrounding new implants—largely that performers never got new implants, refurbished or otherwise. They were expected to live out the thirteen years of their contract with a single implant.
Thanks to the Cyborg Prohibition Law forbidding the manufacture of implants, they were incredibly rare and disgustingly expensive. With pricey new implants out of the picture, that left only the Mistress and perhaps a tinkerer with the appropriate skill set to create refurbished implants—under the assumption that there were enough parts lying around.
Fortunately for Gwen and Rora, there were.
Unfortunately, Gwen’s cyborg tinkering skill set was juvenile at best.
Regardless, by creating a new implant for Rora, she would be breaking the circus’s rules of no new implants. But she deeply cared for the acrobat, and she’d do anything to help her. They could only hope no one noticed Rora’s old implant had been used as a dragon’s chew toy.
Rora’s mouth dropped. “That long?” She shook her head, turning her gaze from the polished implant to Gwen’s eyes. “I can’t believe you did this for me.”
“I want the best for you.” Gwen looked away. “I wanted to help.”
Slowly, Rora sat beside Gwen, placing the new hand on the bed. It was made from scavenged parts and in far better condition than the acrobat’s current hand.
Reluctantly, Gwen met Rora’s eyes.
“Today has sucked,” Rora said, rather bluntly. “You’ve had to do horrible things, and I’m sure you’re exhausted. But what happened with the implant extractions wasn’t your fault. The Mistress forced your hand. You were not responsible for those deaths. The blood of those cyborgs is not on your hands. Do you hear me?” As Gwen started to look away, Rora grabbed her chin. “You also faced a dragon, and you beat it. You saved my life in the process. Sure, bad things happened. But I believe Marzanna is going to get better. I believe in you.”
Overwhelming gratitude swelled in Gwen’s chest. Words utterly escaped her as tears rolled down her cheek. But she managed to grab Rora’s hand, nodding.
As the tears subsided, she took a deep breath. And then three more.
“I’ll install it if you want me to.” Fear tightened Gwen’s chest, but she pressed on. “I’m terrified of hurting you like I hurt Marzanna.”
“I trust you.” Rora gestured to her limp hand. “Besides, you can only go up from here, right?”
Sighing, Gwen moved back toward the wardrobe and rummaged among the things for her tool kit. “We’d better get started if we want to get this thing installed.”
“Right now?” Rora’s eyes grew wide.
Placing her tool kit on the floor and sitting down beside it, Gwen nodded. “I want plenty of time before the final competition to make sure it’s installed properly. I don’t want to risk another massive malfunction out in the wilderness or wherever. Because who knows what asinine idea will be concocted for the final competition.”
“You don’t know what the competition is?” Rora asked as Gwen gestured for her to lie on the ground.
Gwen disinfected her equipment. To her surprise, she found herself wishing Bastian was there. If only for his calm temperament and steady hands to assist her. It certainly wasn’t for comfort as she wondered if she was about to kill the woman she cared deeply for.
“No.” She passed a flask to Rora, who took a deep swig. She then placed a leather strap between her teeth. “Rumor has it we should find out tomorrow.”
Pausing, they looked at each other—Gwen with uncertainty and Rora with utter trust.
Rora nodded, the gesture seeming to say, “Just do it.”
With that, Gwen started uninstalling and reinstalling a new cyborg implant, praying the whole time she wasn’t about to send Rora to the Reaper’s door right beside Marzanna.
As they worked through the night in near silence, Rora’s grunts of discomfort muffled by the leather strap, Gwen wondered just what was in store for them tomorrow.
There was only one competition left before they saw the emperor.