The Column Racer (29 page)

Areli sat up in bed, looking at Fides. She didn’t allow herself to go to bed, not after what happened. She couldn’t believe Talon. But she was with Yats now. She was completely devoted to him. Talon had his chance . . . and he blew it. She would forget about him again with time. He would become a distant memory. How did he even get into Abhi? It didn’t matter. She had to shake Talon from her thoughts. She had more pressing matters. Her only motivation now was the protection of her friend. She had to figure out just who Sofi has working for her, and she was going to have to be cruel and vicious to get them to back off. Sofi’s informants could no longer be allowed to feel safe to search and pry. Areli would make them all afraid. She would be the protector Fides father could never be.

As Areli sat there, she thought back to the conversation of the night. She had Edsel tell her how he did it. She had him tell her everything.

“The idea just came to me one day,” said Edsel, “I was traveling. It was the first time I had had ever been outside the mountains of the Valley, and I found myself in one of the small towns in Sector C. It was tax day. One of the Emperor’s favorite days.”

Areli knew what happened on tax day. It was a day in which the Emperor got back all the money he paid out for the Empire’s work to be done. Everything from building roads, creating statues, harvesting grains was paid out of his pocket, and on this particular day, he set out his officials to bring his money back. The people had tried to rise up before, because of this, but with the battle dragons at the Emperor’s disposal, their uprise was futile, for the Emperor had never cared about land damage because his hold throughout the world gave him the option to have crops grown elsewhere. Those who didn’t live in his Valley, he allowed to suffer in poverty, stripping them of possessions and money whenever tax days came along. Those who couldn’t pay were given death. The men tortured. The women raped.

“So many innocent lives, Areli. Murdered and wasted,” continued Edsel, “all at the hands of their own Emperor . . . who was only looking for an excuse to kill. It sickened me. Haunted me. Shamed me. So, one day, I thought to correct it. Being the Imperial treasurer, I was in an advantageous position to tip the balance. I have no assistants in the treasury. No additional clerks. Just me and the records I write and ultimately kept. It was easy to tamper with the holding records. The Emperor has so much gold and treasures, Areli, that he doesn’t even know what to do with it all. He just keeps it locked away in the bowels of his palace. If some gold were to go missing or disappear, I knew none of it would be missed. The Emperor would have never known he had it in the first place.

“I was only twenty-three years old when I stole my first gold coin from the Emperor’s vault. The rush . . . well, the rush was exhilarating, even liberating. But I had to be smart. Too much, and I feared I would not be able to cover my tracks.

“So then each day, I would take coins. One became two, two became three. I got bolder, Areli. I became so bold that eventually I was taking a full sack of gold with me when I left every evening. I continued to stock-pile gold for three years before I started recruiting.

“I enlisted the help of retired, disgruntled soldiers, people who wished to make peace with the cruel and terrible things they had done for the sake of the Emperor. People who were on the verge of killing themselves for their sins. I offered them a chance at redemption. All they had to do was deliver the stolen sacks of coins to people less fortunate.

“I sent with them special instructions. Making sure to press upon the soldiers to tell the families they visited that the coins were only to be used for necessary buys. To hide and conceal the coins where no one would ever be able to find them, except for them. I reminded the soldiers to tell the families they were not to brag, not to boast, not to even hint at their newly acquired prosperity. As time went on, people wanted to know the source of their good fortune, and that’s when Degendhard the Great was born. To be absolutely honest, the name was actually the name of my dragon when I was a child. It was such great times back then, Areli. We were making such a difference. We were saving lives. Now. Now, I don’t know if we saved anybody, but just delayed their deaths for a few decades.”

“Where do the messengers come in?” asked Areli.

“As time continued . . . the soldiers aged. They became no longer fit for the physical toll of the task at hand. So I replaced them with messengers. Young men and boys like Talon, here, who volunteered to help.”

“How did they hear of you?”

“I have my ways. But mostly it’s families that wanted to help. Thinking it necessary of them. To help the cause in any way they could. So, when their children became old enough, they sent them to me.”

“But Talon volunteered?”

“Son of a politician. Wanted to make a difference. As do all of my messengers.”

“How did the Emperor find out about Degendhard?”

“That I don’t know, Areli. I wish I did though. It wasn’t until a year ago the Emperor had started to question the fact that people were able to pay on tax day. Previously, though, all the Emperor cared about was that he was getting paid and getting most of his money back. And in a way, he was getting exactly that.

“But before that year, he never cared about what happened outside the Mountains of Abhi. The people were paying, so he just had to find others to kill. Someone to satisfy his violent appetite. I was able to live with the fact that other lands suffered. But what other choice did I have. Our people were suffering here. I couldn’t allow that. Not after that day.

“In actuality, the Emperor’s mind is mainly concerned with two things . . . women and power. I think he actually believed that people were paying because they no longer wanted to suffer. And it took him almost forty years, Areli. Forty years to find out something was not right. I can promise you one thing. I will personally kill whoever looked into the matter. Whoever made Degendhard aware to the Emperor will not leave this world pleasantly.”

Now, Areli was in a position where she would kill to protect her friend. She would do whatever it took to keep Fides safe, and it started with Sofi’s informants.
Cut off the veins and arteries
, she would say to herself,
to kill the heart
. This had to be her focus. She fought hard to suppress any thoughts of Talon. She was with Yats now. She was with Yats.

Areli didn’t know where to start. But when school started the following week, she started to ask questions. She began with the students in her class, inquiring each student if they had been approached by anyone asking about Fides, but she did so with care. The boys were all too eager to talk to her, and the girls thought she wanted to be their best friend. Areli made light conversation with them and only casually brought up Fides name as if it was an afterthought.

Yats had better success, as Areli had no other option but to tell him. He was not at all hesitant to help. Areli was grateful for Yats, as he was the only one she could talk to about Fides’s father being Degendhard the Great. He seemed just as shocked as she was when he heard the news.

“Are you sure?” asked Yats when she told him.

“Yes,
I’m sure
,” said Areli, “do you think I would make something like this up?” He looked at her with an expression of doubt. The look hurt her, as did the length of time it took for him to respond. But in the end, Yats told her he believed her . . . and that is all that really mattered. She then told him about the incident that happened in the library and every detail concerning Sofi’s revenge.

“What do you need me to do?” asked Yats, his face rigid and serious. His eyes set to kill. He was prepared to walk the line of right and wrong with Areli, to protect Amer’s love.

“We need to know who the informants are,” said Areli, “and then . . . and then we need to cut the flow of information.”

As Areli walked through the halls of the school that first day back, it seemed like every eye was watching her.
It could be anyone
, she told herself. Her heart dropped . . . heavily . . . suddenly . . . as a poster remembering Amira was placed on her locker, with a note on it, bold in its demeanor, just like the person who wrote it.

It should have been you, Degendhard’s whore.

Tegan

Areli couldn’t help but burst into tears. She rushed to the bathroom, puked into the toilet bowl, and then ripped up the poster and threw bits and pieces of it into the water before collapsing onto the marble floor. When classes ended for the day, Fides was suspended from school again, and Tegan had to wear an extra layer of make-up to cover up the large bruise on her cheek. It brought a smile to Areli thinking about it. Sisters – friends – you had to love them.

Areli was actually glad Fides was gone for the week. It lifted some of the apprehension swirling in the air, and she could meet with Yats, uninhibited, to discuss one another’s progress. Yats promised Areli that he wouldn’t tell Amer, even though it pained him the same way it pained her, as she held steadfast to her decision not to tell Fides. The two shared everything together. And to have the heft of this secret creating an invisible distance between them was the hardest thing she ever had to do.

Areli talked to the tyros and the jejunes. And Yats questioned the unders and doyens. They met each day during lunch to discuss their results, narrowing the culprits to four people. One in each array.

“What do you want to do?” asked Yats.

“We are going to have to turn the tables on them,” said Areli, “we need dirt on them. Anything, everything. I want to bury them before they have chance to bury Fides.” Yats smiled. He liked mischief. And mischief to help a friend, was even better.

As the weeks traveled past, Areli competed and finished second in every short-go, while spending most of her spare time with Yats, either doing her little investigations or working on her present for Fides. Fides would get in her face only a couple of times about it, but Areli knew it would be worse if she didn’t have Amer.

“I miss my sister,” said Fides when Areli told her that she and Yats already made plans for another week together. “Okay, but you can’t keep ditching me. I love Amer, but sometimes . . . you know . . . there are just things that you can’t tell a boy.” Areli would only smile. She wished she could spend time with Fides or that the four of them could go out like they used to, but she and Yats were busy, secretly building a case to destroy lives if they had to.

The informant in Areli’s class was a girl, Evangeline Green. After some extensive searching, Areli found that Evangeline had her homework done for her by others. Compliments of Sofi. Areli enjoyed that particular day she sat next to her classmate at lunch, sliding Evangeline a paper saying that she wasn’t afraid to expose her to the principal.

“You can’t do anything,” sneered Evangeline, “I’m protected.”

“So am I,” said Areli, “it’s your choice Evangeline. Is the Emperor going to side with me, a column racer, or some nobody, eeking by on the labor of others? I don’t think I need to remind you what happens to cheaters . . . especially here.” In some cases the students were simply expelled. In other’s, tortured and killed.

“What do you want me to do?” asked Evangeline.

“I want you to stop asking questions,” said Areli, “because trust me. You don’t want me to expose you. This is only a grain of salt at the top of a meal. I have a whole file of nasty secrets on you. And if you continue sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong, I will make it my life’s mission to destroy you.”

Areli had never felt so in control as she did in that moment. So alive. The rest of the informants went down just as easily. Jimena Leach, the jejune informant, had a drug addiction. The under informant, Sage Marshall, had an aborted baby. And Amir Sharp, the doyen spy, was Sage’s lover. It almost seemed too easy, but Areli knew just how hard they had to look for that information, and the results were gratifying.

While Fides and Amer were out enjoying the night or making out during lunch hours, Areli and Yats were asking questions. It helped that Yats was allowed a hefty allowance. Some of the information they collected was bought with money or with the promise of prominent introductions to senators or merchants. Other information was charmed from the mouths of the informant’s friends and more from just plain observation, as Areli and Yats followed the informants every moves. Areli could recite from memory what each informant liked to eat, what subjects they liked, who they liked, who they hated, and almost every significant and insignificant detail about their lives. She could have easily been a reporter, and she was glad she was using her newly acquired talent to chop at the roots of the tree that was Sofi. She was also proud of herself for not thinking much of Talon. But now that the informants were subdued, Areli feared thoughts of him might come roaring back.

Areli was flying high after she and Yats were successful at taking the informants down, but that was until she received a letter. It wasn’t a letter she found in her locker, but a letter that was handed to her personally by her driver. She hoped it was from Yats. It was in a gold envelope and her name was displayed on the front with a delicate hand. She opened it and pulled out an elegant parchment with gold bordering.

Areli,

I’m going to first have to commend your efforts for slowing down my cousin. Your boldness is much admired. But if you truly want to save your friend, then you’re going to want to meet me. Visit me at Flame, have your driver take you there after you meet with your parents. You won’t want to miss this.