go all the way around to get to the parking lot. By heading straight for the wall, I'll make up a lot of lost ground.
I leap over the wall, landing in the park lot. A half-dozen rows over, I spot two figures hurrying toward a dark SUV with its lights on.
Alberto body-checks me, and I sprawl against the pavement, losing the gun. I spin, trying to get back to my feet, and he clips me across the chin with a vicious kick. I keep spinning and slam against a sedan, setting off its alarm. He follows up the kick with several hard punches to my kidneys.
He's strong and well-fed. Even after the protein cram at dinner, I'm not well enough to go the distance with him.
He hits me again, and I fall to my knees. His next kick bounces me off the car I'm kneeling beside, and my head leaves a nice dent in the back of the trunk.
Alberto is on me before I can get my bearings, and he drags me to my feet, throwing me into the back window of the car. I go halfway through the frame, shards of glass raking across my chest. The inside of the car is dark and there's something wet filling my left eye socket. The car alarm is wailing, and the lights on the dashboard wink on and off in time with the siren. I scrabble for anything that might be useful as a weapon, my hand sliding across the leather seat, and then I'm dragged out of the car by my feet. Alberto grunts as he pivots, throwing me across the aisle. I slam into another car, creasing the trunk and fracturing the back window.
I start to slide off the car, and he's right there to help, bodily slamming me onto the pavement. The wind is knocked out of me, and before I can get my breath back, he plants himself on my chest so that he can pound my face with his fists.
Bones moves unnaturally in my cheek after the third punch, and I can't see anything out of my left eye now. I try to shift beneath him, but he's a ten ton rock sitting on my pelvis. He hits me again and I feel something snap near the back of my jaw.
I'm suddenly back on the ship, fleeing from Troy. The storm is trying to capsize our leaking boat, the wounded soldiers are cowering down on the benches, and the masts are moaning as the winds try to tear through our canvas sails. No one expects to survive the night. Troy is behind us—its towers burning, its street slick with blood. Only Aeneas is laughing, his hand firm on the tiller. We are being reborn. We are no longer who we were.
I was a soldier of Troy, and then I became a soldier of Arcadia. I fought, bled, died for others. Time and again, my dead flesh was buried beneath Mother's roots, where I was reborn. Cleansed. Purified. My hands clean of blood. My mind free to make the same mistakes again and again.
I used to hear the voice of the Goddess in bird song. I used to be able to read the stars. I used to be able to see the shape of what might be. I gave all of that up when I let them bury me. I did so willingly because I thought I was getting something better.
Alberto breaks my nose. He knocks teeth loose in my mouth. With my one good eye, I can see his face above me—his lips pulled back from his teeth in a feral grin. I can feel his hips grind against me with each blow; I can feel how much he's enjoying beating me to death.
I see the ceremonial circle at the edge of the cliff near Orongo. The ring of torches, guttering and smoking. The natives, their faces painted white and black. Their naked bodies shining with whale fat to keep them warm in the water. The feathered headdress. The white wings. The steward with her dark eyes and dark hair. Hating me. Hating Arcadia.
I killed the matriarch of his familial clan. I put a knife in her chest, tore out her heart, and tossed her body off the cliff.
I was following orders.
Alberto stops hitting me. He's breathing heavily and he raises his reddened knuckles to his mouth so that he can taste my blood. I want to tell him something, but my jaw doesn't work. My