Between Burning Worlds (System Divine #2) - Jessica Brody Page 0,122

Chatine’s voice was venomous and cold. “Because you think my brother is dead?”

“I never said that,” Brigitte said sternly.

“But that’s what you think, right? That the ship is gone? And the search party will never find them?”

“I couldn’t possibly know that. The outcome is not up to me. Or you. Only your reaction is.”

“So you want me to gather up a bunch of stones and put them in some stupide raindrop-shaped pattern to honor his memory? Because he may as well be dead?” The words were firing out of Chatine now like explosifs dropped from a combatteur. “Well, I’m not going to do that. In my world, we don’t bury our dead. We disintegrate them. We turn them to ice dust. And they become nothing.”

“Chatine—” Brigitte tried to say, but Chatine cut her off.

“Save it. I’ve heard enough. You know, for people who pride themselves on not conforming to the Regime, you certainly seem to have a lot of ideas on who I should be and how I should live.”

Then, before Brigitte could spew out any more Défecteur nonsense, Chatine turned awkwardly on her crutches and hobbled back to the camp.

- CHAPTER 36 - ALOUETTE

“THIS IS THE MONARCH PIECE. You have to protect it throughout the entire game. If you can capture the other player’s Monarch, you win. That’s the end goal.”

Alouette was barely listening as Cerise attempted to explain the rules of Regiments to Gabriel from across a glowing, holographic game board. Alouette was sitting in a chaise on the other side of the viewing lounge, facing out the window, with Marcellus’s TéléCom open on her lap.

“Every other piece can move,” Cerise continued, pointing to the three-tiered board. “But the Monarch always has to stay in the same place.”

“Why?” Gabriel asked. “Why can’t he just cross the board and destroy all the other pieces? He’s the Monarch.”

“First of all,” Cerise snapped, “the Monarch has no gender. It’s not a he or a she. It’s just the Monarch.”

“And that matters because?”

“And secondly,” Cerise continued, ignoring the question, “the Monarch can’t move because it has to stay here, in the palace, where it can be protected.” She’d been explaining this game to Gabriel for the past hour, and she’d lost her patience about two minutes into the explanation.

But Alouette knew they were only playing to keep their minds off everything else. Like the fact that amid the infinite stars in front of them loomed a great enemy, while in the abyss of space behind them was a planet on the brink of war.

It had been two days since they’d watched that disturbing footage from the Red Scar. And none of them had even so much as uttered a single word about it. It was almost as though they were all pretending it had never happened. Alouette supposed it was easier that way. She’d been doing everything in her power to keep all thoughts of the sisters at bay too. After all, how many potential disasters could they deal with at once? Right now, their first priority had to be the general’s weapon. The rest—the grief, the sorrow, the turmoil back home—had to come later.

“Well, that’s just stupide,” Gabriel said.

“No, you’re stupide,” Cerise countered.

“I’m not stupide. The whole game is stupide!”

Alouette glanced over at the flight map on the wall of the viewing lounge.

Eighteen more hours until they arrived on Albion. Eighteen more hours until they came face-to-face with Sister Denise’s mysterious source and discovered what the general was planning.

“I have to agree with Gabriel.” Marcellus appeared in the doorway of the galley holding two full plates of food. “The game is pretty stupide.”

“Wait, you know how to play too?” Gabriel asked.

Marcellus set down a plate of cheese and fruit on the table under the glowing game board. “Unfortunately, yes. My grandfather taught me when I was little. For the past ten years we’ve played every single week. But I’ve always been dreadful at it. According to my grandfather, it’s an effective way to learn and practice strategy and military maneuvering. He said it would make me a great leader one day.” Marcellus’s tone went from bitter to morose in an instant. “Like him.”

Everyone in the ship fell silent, as though afraid to go near Marcellus’s words. Everyone except Gabriel, that is, who seemed oblivious to the tension in the air. “So, is this what you pomps all do for fun? Sit up there in your fancy manoirs and play stupide, pointless games all day, while the rest of us are working