Shadow Thief

35 - How to: Armies

"Right," Ravi said, now that we were all back at 'base', "bringin' home your parents murder, perfectly normal. Why don't you two go out on your first date next?"

I rolled my eyes at him. "Look, guys. I know what your thinking. I know that it was stupid that I brought him and-"

"Then why did you?" Mercy asked, a cold bite in her voice. "I may not remember a lot about that night, but I do know that that man tried to kill us. Not to mention he killed our parents."

"If it weren't for him, we'd both be buried six feet under besides Mom and Dad. I know you're against it, but look. Just let him tag along. I mean, we know he has the guts to kill someone and we know he's not working for the Seventh Sword anymore so-"

"How do you know that?" Levi asked.

"What, you think they told him to let me live so he could hunt me down years later? I wasn't even Shadow back then. There was no point."

The others were silent.

"Don't worry," Chris said, strolling in with Bryce and Theo close behind him. "Your friend there already threatened to cut off all my limbs in the most painful fashion and then leave me in Pacific Rose if she even thought I had an idea about betraying you." He was wearing new clothes now, a brown shirt and jean pants, which Ravi had given him. He wore old brand less sneakers that tied with white laces. His short beard from before was shaved smooth and his hair cut short.

"Fine," Mercy grumbled. She glared at me. "I trust you know what your doing."

I nodded my thanks before turning back to the others.

"I know he's not trust worthy but, murderer or not, we need all the help we can get."

"You know I'll agree with whatever you think," Theo said.

Bryce nodded his agreement.

"Levi?"

He gave me a sideways glance before turning back to Chris. "Fine, I'll trust you."

"Thank you."

"Now that we've got that out of the way," Rosy said, coming in with Clover and Mila at her sides, "why don't we get back to business. Shadow, or Lena now, you said you wanted my men, didn't you?"

"That's right. It hasn't been that long since we took you away from your base, so most of them should still be there, right?"

"Probably."

"Do you think they'd be willing to help us?"

"Well, that depends, what do you need them for?"

I looked at her, letting my expression grow serious. "We're going to overthrow the government."

She smiled at me. "When you put it that way, hell yeah."

"And all your men would be fine with it?" Clover asked. "They wouldn't, I don't know, report us or anything?"

"Most of them are criminals and the rest just flat out hate people. A chance like this? I guarantee each and every one of them will be all for it."

"That's just what we're hoping for."

"Then we need a way to get out there, first of all." I thought aloud. "Stealing horses won't be that hard. Thinking ahead, we'll have to get all those people in too."

"What do you suppose we should do about that?" Mila asked, her arms fully wrapped around a bow. "I mean, how many men do you have, a hundred? We can't just march them in and expect to get all the way to Pacific Rose."