Revolution's Shore by Kate Elliott Read Free Book Online Page A

not at first decipher the content of his question. She felt momentarily as if she had wandered into the wrong conversation.
    â€œPero—you’re talking about Heredes!” She shoved herself away from the wall and strode over to stand directly in front of him. “ I want to talk about Finch . Do you remember him—the man you just tried to murder?”
    Her anger emanated like a force off of her, but his initial response was only to reach up and enclose her hands in his own, drawing them to his lips. He did not kiss them, merely held them there, as if he were trying to breathe her in.
    He sank forward, off the bench, and, kneeling, embraced her. Just stayed there, head against her abdomen, face hidden by his hair. His seeming vulnerability drained out her anger.
    â€œHe’s not my lover anymore,” said Lily, grasping for outrage. “That’s long past. You’ve got nothing— nothing —to be jealous about.”
    â€œI know,” he murmured, although he did not relax his grasp on her.
    â€œJehane’s people have accepted my explanation. They’ll let you go. But it won’t happen again. Will it?”
    â€œAs long as I’m never in the same room with him.”
    â€œKyosti!” She put her hands at either side of his face and tilted his head back so that she could see his expression. “I just promised you that he won’t be my lover again. Do you understand? All other things aside, I don’t desire him in that way anymore.” And she leaned down to kiss him.
    It proved a more potent gesture than she intended. Somehow, with pressing and touching and the smooth flow of long practice, she found herself lying on the bench next to him in an intimate embrace. Inappropriate, surely, for such a time, and yet she thought it might be better to reassure him. And he was so close, and so nice to hold.
    He was the one who pulled away. His expression bore no rage, no jealous fury, just simple resignation. “It doesn’t matter,” he said quietly. Deep in his voice she heard the echo of an old, wrenching sorrow. “I have to kill him. Now that you know that, you can keep me away from him.”
    â€œ Why ?”
    He broke away from her and pushed up off the bench to his feet, finding refuge in the corner opposite the bench. “ Don’t ask me that . I thought I had finally escaped. Abai’is-ssa .” The alien word slipped out of him too naturally. “I should have known better. You should have left me on Arcadia.” He did not look at her as he spoke.
    â€œYes,” she replied sardonically as she, too, stood up. “You said something like that before. But Finch is one of my oldest friends. Do you expect me to let it go at that? Who are you going to attack next? Me?”
    Now he turned. His face was set, a mask of sheer impersonal threat, like a red warning light signaling the entrance to a danger zone that is off-limits to all personnel who do not have the complete envelopment of a life suit.
    â€œ Never suggest that to me .” He looked so revolted by the thought that she felt suddenly embarrassed, as if she had set out to deliberately offend him. “There may be people who are that sick, to kill their own lovers. I’m not one of them.”
    His anger completely deflated hers. It seemed impossible, facing him now, to force the issue. She took in a single, rather shaky breath to calm herself. Once they had left Harsh, there would be time.
    â€œI’m not suggesting,” she began slowly, leaping back to his first question, as if the ensuing conversation had not taken place, “that Heredes meant to be executed as Pero, but if he was caught, and knew that they would kill him—and infiltrating their entire defense network was clearly treason—I think he would convince them that he was Pero if only to leave a trail of confusion as his final legacy. After all, Pero is free to work openly again,