SEB STAYED THE night with the man who'd demanded the story. The man, as it turned out, went by Corentin. Now that the introductions and his tale were out of the way, the two of them sat in rockers before a dancing fire, drinking hot herbal tea. He glanced at his host, noting the glint of silver in his hair and the tension in his shoulders. "What are you so afraid of, Corentin?" He sipped at his drink and tried to ignore the thick earthy flavor the oregano gave it. "Out here in the middle of nowhere, I'd think you'd have less to worry about than those of us right under the Supremacy's thumb in the communes and cities."
Corentin snorted. "The fact that you're saying that is proof of how ignorant you are. As long as I'm still alive, I have to look over my shoulder. The only reason they didn't kill me was because they knew I'd give them up from beyond the grave. So I'm in exile here. As soon as they find a way to make sure what I know won't be shared, they'll kill me."
"Exile for what?"
Corentin eyed him from the corner of his eye. "For asking questions. For deciding not to live with the lies anymore." He turned his attention back to the fire. "What I know is enough to ruin every single one of the men at the top."
"You mean..."
"Yes, boy, I do. I was one of them. A Supreme One. At first, being God to a people too brainwashed to see what was really going on had its appeal." He shook his head sadly. "And when I woke up to reality one day, it just terrified me."
"Playing at God terrified you?"
A short nod.
"What made you leave? Give up the power you had?"
"Being a Supreme One isn't the highest you can go. The ones who control them are handpicked from our numbers." He knocked back the rest of his tea with a grimace. "When I was still young and foolish, I wanted in on that top tier. And, eventually, they let me in. Obviously, none of you really know what we do, and the masks ensure you don't know who we are. But I was good at what I did. One of the best out of the thirty Supreme Ones who run the day-to-day operations of the Supremacy."
"Thirty? That's all there are? Just thirty people to run an entire planet..."
"Just thirty, but obviously it wouldn't work without the people under us, the henchmen and minions who follow orders without question." Corentin sneered at the crackling fire. "No one below us had the right to ask questions. But as it turned out, neither did we."
"So when you reached the upper echelon of the Supremacy?"
Corentin tightened his grip on his mug. "I found out we weren't—I wasn't—all-powerful. Far from it. If anyone was, it was them."
"Them? You mean the final tier in the Supremacy leadership?"
Corentin shook his head. "No, no... The puppet masters pulling all of the strings. Oblivion. Their goals, their desires... They were pure evil, and I knew it the first time I encountered them. But when I tried to fight it, tried to back out on it or ask why we obeyed those who had done nothing to build our civilization or enable our success? I was exiled here."
Seb shivered. An evil worse than the Supremacy? How was that even possible?
"It's possible, boy."
He frowned. "I didn't say anything."
"You didn't have to. It's written all over your face." Corentin leaned back in his rocker. "The Supremacy wants to keep their power. They don't have any interest in specifically making everyone suffer. Only in doing what they must to maintain control. Oblivion isn't like that. The beings that run that shadow world want only to inflict pain and create chaos in the human soul."
"I don't understand. Why would they want that?" He leaned his elbows on his knees and stared at his companion.
"Because they thrive on it. And when they've sucked you dry, they turn you into a mindless drone for their amusement or toss you away like a broken toy."
"So you think we should just let the Supremacy continue their madness just to avoid Oblivion's direct rule?"
Corentin finally met his gaze with a grim smile. "Kid, I think anything is better than letting those monsters take charge. If that means the Supremacy, then yeah. I think they ought to stay in power. Because if you want to bring them down without destroying everything in the process, you'll have to bring down the entire branch of Oblivion that operates here too."
"So that's what we do."
The older man chortled. "You have a suicide wish, son?"
"No, but with all due respect, sir, how long can things go on this way?"
Corentin didn't answer. Maybe because he hand no answer. Or, maybe because he did but didn't like it. He knew the Supremacy inside and out, whatever his thoughts on the matter. He had no reason to lie and even less reason to be out here unmasked, uncloaked, and unprotected unless he was telling the truth. Maybe the Father sent him this way to find Corentin. Actually, on further reflection, there wasn't a maybe about it. The Father had directed every step since this morning. This was no accident.
The only question was... Why? Why send him to Corentin, who was clearly jaded, hated his life, and didn't want anything to do with Supremacy? Was it his job to convince Corentin to help him in his quest to save Viv from them? Something whispered that it was bigger than that. That he wasn't seeing things clearly because he so badly wanted to rescue Viv. Here he was, talking about bringing down the Supremacy and this Oblivion organization, but all he really cared about was getting help with it so he could leave in peace. Could Corentin sense his wrong motivation? Was rebellion really the answer? Was it really a rebellion at all when what they had to fight wasn't so much their rules as it was the evil trying to control them?
Maybe he should try a new tact, focus in on another possible avenue. "Do you believe in the God of the Bible, sir?"
The grizzled man stiffened, but he still remained silent.
"You hid His existence for years. The rest of the Supremacy is still hiding it."
Finally, Corentin sighed. "They're hiding it, yes. Don't know if I believe in Him or not. But hiding His book and what His followers say of Him might be the only thing the Supremacy did for good reasons."
"How is lying good?"
"Kid, you'd lie too if you knew the truth meant the death of your entire world. And I don't mean that figuratively."
"Its death? You can't kill a planet."
"If only that were true." Corentin pushed out of his rocker with a groan. "You can stay the night. I'll consider your request, and we'll discuss it tomorrow."
Seb opened his mouth to ask what had swayed Corentin from hostile to neutral on the matter, but Corentin shook his head. "I'm done with the talk, boy. You can sleep in the guest room. Up the stairs, second door to your left."
He just stood there, frowning. The man was impossible. One minute, he was laughing at Seb's plea for action, and the next he agreed to consider it? Was he bipolar? Or otherwise insane? He didn't seem like it.
"Stop gawking and get moving." Corentin turned his back on Seb. "I said I'd think about it, and that's that."
If he didn't leave, Corentin seemed like he might decide it wasn't worth the trouble and kick him back out. He forced himself to say goodnight and trudge up the stairs to bed. But even with a real bed to sleep on for the first itme in a week, he didn't sleep.
After trying and failing for nearly thirty minutes, he gave up. He lay there and stared at the ceiling, praying harder than ever before for a miracle but unsure if what he hoped for was even right to want. And when he exhausted that, he moved on to praying about everything else with Viv and Dane and the mess with the Supremacy. Finally, when the sun's first rays were peeking over the hills, he dropped off to sleep.
VIV SAT ON the porch beside Dane. The week had dragged on, but she'd survived and things between them weren't so bad. Not good, certainly, but not as bad as expected.
"Have you made up your mind on joining me?" Dane interrupted the quiet morning.
She sighed. "What choice do I have, Dane? I can't go along with what they want, and we both know you'll just sideline me if I say no. I made a foolish decision back in those woods that night. And now, there's no way out of this situation, so I have to face the music."
He frowned. "You made a wise choice, Vivian. One that saved Auclaire's life."
But not Mr. H's. And what life would Seb really have out there on the run? Did he know to look for her here? No. And was he even looking? Probably not anymore. She'd vanished, and he knew what happened when those with access to the Supremacy's resources got their claws in someone. He knew she wasn't coming back to him. Hopefully he'd move on someday and find love with someone else. He deserved that much. He certainly didn't deserve to mourn over a woman who was too dumb to realize a trick when she saw it.
If she had her button, she'd be out of here already. It really was true what the Diexebels said about the devices. They were a tool to keep the masses dependent. She'd never understood that until she lost her own button. Now she saw it clearly. She and the rest of society were lost without them. No one would defy the Supremacy, question their lies, or refuse to follow because it meant losing their skies-cursed buttons. She pressed her fingers to the scar behind her ear.
"Do you miss it?"
She glanced at Dane and dropped her hand into her lap. "Miss it? Not really. But not having it makes me feel like a piece of me is..." She searched for a way to describe the hollow sensation she got in the pit of her stomach when she reached for the button, for escape, only to find it gone. "Lost, I suppose. I feel trapped without it."
"Because you can't run anymore. You can only fight or accept."
She nodded. All these years, she hadn't given him enough credit for how well he really did understand her. "And because I don't know what to choose now that running isn't an option."
"Choose both." Dane stood with a smile and extended a hand to her. "Choose to accept me and my deal. Choose to fight the Supremacy, and choose to stop what's happening."
Was it that simple? She stared at his offered hand, knowing that taking it meant surrender and an uneasy alliance with a man she'd been running from for weeks. Did it matter if it were simple? Seb couldn't save her now. No one could besides herself and, maybe, Dane. And saving herself no longer left room for errors or for running. This was her only way forward now. She reached out and placed her hand in his.
MORNING CAME TOO early, and the sun splashed over his face through the thin shades on the window. He sighed and sat up. Time to find out what Corentin would say. Everything hinged on this, and he didn't believe in coincidence anymore. At least, not when he was literally guided every step of the way until he ended up on Corentin's property to be shot at.
He threw his legs over the side of the bed and stood. He stretched and yawned then shuffled to the door and down the hall. Corentin's door opened, and Corentin poked his head through the crack. "You're up early, kid."
"Sun woke me up."
"Well, might as well talk, then."
Seb shoved his hands into his pockets and stared at the wrinkles in his dirty pants. If he'd been thinking about it last night, he would've stripped before sleeping in Corentin's guest bed. Well, if Corentin didn't kick him to the curb—or the fields, in this case—he'd offer to wash them himself.
Corentin opened the door and ushered him inside. The older man didn't look like he'd slept either. Or, if he had, he'd slept in his clothes too. He raked a hand through his graying hair and eyed Seb with a frown. "You know, I've seen some crazy things in my time, kid. Some crazy, crazy things. But nothing crazier than what I'm about to say. Now, I'm only going to say it once, so you listening?"
Seb cleared his throat and nodded.
"Good. I wanted to tell you no. I don't want anything to do with trying to take down both the Supremacy and Oblivion. But even though I went to bed determined on that, I couldn't sleep. And the thought that I should help just kept coming back. So did the memories."
What did this have to do with anything? "The memories, sir?"
"Don't interrupt." Corentin paced the length of the bedroom. "I haven't thought about Angelica for years. Now you show up, and the memories come back with a vengeance. She wanted me to stop them too. Not with violence, but by changing it from the inside. Wanted it right up until the moment they made me kill her with my own two hands."
And the man hadn't thought about it in years? Was something wrong with him? But he didn't interrupt.
"I wiped my own memory of it, kid." He spun on his heel and jabbed a finger into Seb's chest. "Now you show up and ask me for help, and what do you know? The memories all come right back." He shook his head and backed off with a shaky laugh. "I went to great lengths to forget her and everything about her, kid. Now she's back."
"Does that mean..." Seb swallowed hard. "Does that mean you'll help?"
He turned to the window with a heavy sigh. "Yes, boy, it does. Against my better judgment, I'll help. But this won't be easy. We need a plan, and I need to figure out how we should do this. I'm doing it for her, and Skies take it, I won't dishonor her memory."
Indeed they did. Seb swallowed down his excitement. Whooping and jumping around like a five-year-old probably wouldn't earn him a good opinion from Corentin. "I know, sir. There are people who would help, if we can reach them."
"I've got one person. Just one person I want on our team." Corentin turned to him with a smile. "Dane Calister."
Seb's heart skipped a beat. What were the chances? Dane as in the Dane he knew as Dane McGayen? He swallowed hard. If it was, there was going to be a serious issue. Because there was no way he'd work with Dane McGayen after what he'd done.