Witch Hunter Robin Fan Fiction ❯ Binah (Understanding) ❯ The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game ( Chapter 22 )

As the Zabinis had promised, the passage was clear and calm. Amon ushered Robin out of the elevator, and they began running down the hall. He let his mind close with the elevator doors. A chime went off and he sealed reality with the little car that went back up and into the fray. Robin needed him. They had to stay alive. He had to think. Reality could come later. He could feel things later, when it was more convenient. For now they had to escape. He ran headlong into the future, into the tunnel. “Do you have any idea where this empties?” he asked.

“No,” Robin answered.

“Do you want to hide in the library?”

“No,” she replied.

“Monica and Vincenzo will expect us to. It's part of their plan.”

“Fuck their plan.”

Amon had never heard her so blunt or so bitter. He decided not to argue. They continued lightly running, their footsteps ringing on the cement around them. Amon concentrated on their path, making mental notes. They were led to another door that marked an older section of the escape route. Again Amon put in his code, and they were let through. Now they were running through an earthen tunnel. Pipes and coils of cable marked the way. Greenish fluorescent bulbs cast humming pools of light. He was reminded of Orbo, of other underground chambers. It was all too familiar. Everything was too familiar. He shook the memory away and kept running.

“Where do you think we are?” Robin panted.

“We must be close to the edge of the property, by now.” He squinted. “I think I see a door. It's only a little further.”

They pounded up to it and again he needed the code to open the stubborn steel door. It groaned loudly in protest. He swept cobwebs away, and stepped into total darkness. “Robin.” She stepped around him, brushing him in the dark, and produced a small ball of flame afterward, resting just above the palm of her right hand. Using her light, they found a set of switches and activated the lights above them. A large object draped in cloth awaited them. Without speaking, Robin stepped forward and drew the cloth away. She dropped it unceremoniously on the ground, stepped back, and drew surprised breath.

“What?” Amon asked. The car sitting before them was a deep, impressive forest green, almost black. It looked almost like an old American muscle model, boasting a wide, tasteful grille, and curved midsection. It was almost feminine, cheerful and sleek.

“It's the 612 Scaglietti,” Robin answered, her voice full of wonder and something like relief. “It's Plan B, apparently.”

“I realize your nationalist pride leads you to assume that everyone in the world knows your Formula One cars, but for those of us who favor more pragmatic German engineering, I think you'd better explain.”

Robin was kneeling at the car, inspecting the Prancing Horse trademark that designated the vehicle as having come from a long tradition of Ferraris. “Sastre helped design this car,” she said, almost wistfully. This, at least, was something that she knew and understood. She could think about it, and nothing else, launch herself into the information. “It was designed to travel faster and handle better than the Lamborghini the Roman police are now using. It's no mistake that both vehicles were unveiled in the same year. Solomon had a lucky leak from the police saying that they had contracted with Lamborghini to produce a car that would compete with speeders on the expressways.”

Amon blinked. He took in the car. Robin continued. “It was designed by Pininfarina, but named for Sergio Scaglietti, the designer who worked for the company in the 1950's. That's why the design is so anachronistic, with these curves. But the CST electronic stability and control system is derived solely from the Formula One technology. And the Bosch computer inside-”

“Stop. Get inside.”

To his surprise, Robin took the driver's seat. “What are you doing? Let me drive.”

She gave him a clear, open look. She blinked. “You're a better shot than me.”

He frowned. “And?”

She nodded at the guns in his hands. “I may need you to shoot, if we're chased.”

There was no fighting that logic. Robin seemed to hate guns, although she knew how to use one. In a high-pressure situation, in a moving vehicle, no less, there was no telling where her bullets might go. Silently, he crossed and entered the passenger side, curling a little to fit himself within the confines of the bucket seat. It was a change from his BMW, designed for lager-swilling Aryan brutes and big-shouldered men like himself, but still relatively comfortable. He shut the door. Robin started the car a moment later, and Amon felt the vibration ripple through his skin and muscles, reaching into his teeth. “What's that?”

“It's a V12,” Robin answered. Pressing a button somewhere on the curvy, science-fiction dash, she opened a garage door, better exposing a ramp that led out of the room. Amon watched her white hand find the gearbox. It was an oddly-shaped T-bar, slightly reminiscent of airplane controls.

“It's not a manual?”

“Formula One automatic,” she answered. “Better handling.” And with that she slid the car into reverse, and after some crafty maneuvering, sent them up the ramp. Like a dutiful driver, she leaned forward and checked for other cars on the lonely little stretch of road bordering the property. Apparently satisfied, she sat back in her seat and turned to Amon. “Is your seatbelt buckled?”

“What if we have to get out-”

“Please buckle your seatbelt.”

Gritting his teeth, Amon did as she asked and buckled the belt. A moment later he was thrown back into his seat as the car roared out of the garage, its rear wheels sliding across the pavement as bright warnings in Italian exploded across the driver's side LCD display. “Robin, what the hell are you doing?”

“Ferrari promised zero to sixty in 4.1 seconds,” she said. “I wanted to see if they were accurate.”

Amon checked the speedometer, suppressed a mild heart attack. “I think they were.”

“They also promised a top speed of 196 miles per hour.”

Amon stared his ginger-haired partner, and swallowed in a suddenly-dry throat. “Robin-”

He was thrown backward yet again as she edged the pedal down, and sent them flying. Adrenaline fizzled into his blood. Amon had only an instant to be angry before a bullet pinged against their rear windscreen. “I think we have company,” Robin said calmly. The vehicle purred pleasantly as she eased into the throttle and shot down yet another country road. Amon pulled his gun and attempted to find their pursuers. Immediately there was further fire. He checked and Robin did not attempt to inch down in her seat and avoid fire. Her face was closed and resolute. One hand was comfortably wrapped around the gearshift, manhandling it in a way that caused him to avert his eyes. The short white skirt rode up her thigh. Her leg flexed, sending them straight into the city. His heart started to pound.

“You're going to try to lose them in Rome.”

She nodded silently.

“You're insane.”

“Then they'd be insane to follow us, wouldn't they?” With a little smirk, she lay into the throttle again, sending them dancing over a hillside, getting a little air under the wheels. When they hit ground a second later, her smile broadened, exposing white teeth and the edge of a pink tongue, poking out and moistening her lower lip like a biological navigational device.

“This is why you could only drive a Vespa, isn't it?” Amon asked wryly, in a throat gone dry.

She nodded; a grin apparent on her face. “I failed my driving test.” She flashed him the smile. “Three times!”

Another bullet hit the windscreen. Amon wondered exactly what fates were responsible for the fact that, despite all other incursions of danger, he had stayed alive long enough to land himself in the hands of an unlicensed sixteen-year-old in control of a Ferrari. It felt like a long, strange dream. He had little time to wax philosophical on the subject, however, as the windscreen was quickly becoming spattered with bullet-holes. He twisted in his seat and began answering fire. “Can you tell who they are?” Robin asked.

“They're not Solomon. They'd be shooting more accurately, if they were.”

Robin didn't answer that, but merely sent them hurtling into the city, letting the civilization around them grow thicker as she was forced to slow down for other cars. Amon was able to breathe a sigh of relief and get his bearings long enough to take some meaningful shots at the men chasing them. “The police are going to begin following us, soon,” Robin commented, zipping around other cars, inciting honking horns and near-accidents in her wake. She headed into oncoming traffic, then darted out of it, ducking and weaving, a boxer on the road.

“And with good reason,” Amon said grimly.

“The more that are following us before we abandon the car, the more we can incapacitate.”

Amon frowned. “Incapacitate?”

“Most cars are made with airbags these days, aren't they?”

As if on cue, a Rome police car nipped into traffic, lights ablaze, sirens screaming. Robin continued her flagrant disobedience of traffic law, whispering through a red light, sending other cars into screeching halts behind her. She took a sharp corner and used the shoulder lanes to jump onto the expressway that circuited Rome. “This is where the Lamborghinis will be,” she said casually. “Luckily, their sirens will dissuade other drivers from getting in our way. Our path should be clear.”

“Did Sastre teach you how to evade police cars, during your little driving lessons?”

Robin turned to him, one corner of her lip tweaked upward, creating a dimple, her green eyes sparking mischief. There was pure, delicious wickedness in her face, now. She was no longer sixteen. They soared down the road together. They were both a little insane, together. Her knuckles whitened on the controls and he noticed her sweating just a little, saw the flush of her excitement in her skin. Her smile deepened, sucked the breath right out of him, and Amon was forced to confront the prickling, irrefutable knowledge that he still wanted her when she smiled like that. It was impossible to stop. He was speeding toward something, in more ways than one. It had never been clearer than it was now. Despite everything else, he still wanted…

“What?” Robin asked. Sirens shrilled around them. The expressway glittered with light. Angular Italian racecars in pale blue and white trailed them.

“Just the beauty of Italian engineering,” Amon answered, because the chase made him feel reckless as the world blurred by.

Robin beamed. Light spread through him. An Italian man behind a megaphone commanded them to stop. Robin flinched, looked around her. Immediately she put the car through its paces, sending it to dangerous speeds. The LCD monitor flashed continual warnings. Lights flickered. An incessant beeping warned of imminent danger. “We're going to lose them in the tunnel,” she said. “How is your Craft, today?”

Amon looked behind them. He knew immediately what she intended to do. He thought of his brother for the first time in minutes. The image of Nagira and Doujima lying in an ever-widening pool of blood filled his mind. His Craft whistled inside, yearning for release. “I think my Craft is pretty fucking awesome today, Robin.”

She smiled serenely. “Go to it.”

Amon brought up his right hand. He concentrated. He breathed. He unleashed.

The windscreen blew out with a crackle and wail, freezing instantly and shearing off the car entirely, flying away to shatter on the road. Amon's ice poured itself out along the road as they sped along. Robin began fishtailing them, slowly and deliberately, so that he could attain better coverage. His ice was black and lethal and covered the road thickly, steadily. The first car squealed as it hit the icefield, spinning uncontrollably. Two cars behind it hit it before they could stop. Cars behind them attempted to brake. They failed miserably, spinning out, hitting one another. A moment later, the blackness of the tunnel absorbed them. Abruptly, Robin veered to the left, sending them into a half-circle. Amon was violently thrown to one side of the vehicle. The brakes shrieked as she ground them to a halt. Not wasting time, she popped the door and hopped out. Amon followed. Directing her gaze at a manhole cover, she watched as it blew open, the lid flying into the air. It landed with a dangerous clang, the letters “SPQR” standing up proudly on its surface.

Robin looked at Amon, and told him with her eyes to move away. He did so, coming closer to her and standing beside the open drain. “I'm sorry,” she said, staring sadly at the car. It promptly burst into flames, over 250,000 US dollars worth of vehicle totalled instantly. They watched it pour smoke before descending into the sewer. Robin used her Craft to pull the manhole cover back over them.

***

Constantino Girardi was furious.

He was isolated in a meeting when the attack came. He began receiving phone calls from the other families, emissaries showed up at his door. They began declaring loyalties. They had declared war, too. The fragile peace was shattered. It was his fault. “Confusion” didn't even begin to describe his state. It was a nightmare come to life.

Patriani had moved without him.

Constantino was furious, but the man he hated most at the moment was himself.

Now his entire family was in danger. It was his fault. He had placed them here, because he had not been willing to buck the authority of the men who were technically his subordinates. He had fucked up. He wasn't strong enough. He had known this fact, ignored it, paid the price. He began placing panicked phone calls to his sister and mother. For now, his mother was fine. Her location on the island helped with that. But his sister…the phone rang and rang. He sweated and swore. He thought he would scream. He was going to kill Patriani with his bare hands. His nerves were savaged and ragged by the time someone answered her phone. It was a man.

“We have your sister right here, boss,” he said, not giving a name. And then he hung up.

Constantino picked up Monica Zabini's vase of pretty flowers and hurled it at the opposite wall, watching the shattered glass and water falling to the floor. For the first time since his father's death, he cried.

***

Somewhere in Tuscany, in an isolated little monastery, a pained and silent priest shut off a radio, gathered some possessions, and began shuffling toward the old farm truck the monastery used to transport its harvest to market.

One of the brothers rose to follow him. “Father?” he asked, tentatively, in the voice of a young man, barely finished with his novitiate. The priest did not answer, and continued walking.

“Juliano?” the neophyte asked. Juliano Colegui turned and looked at the younger man. He said nothing, merely let his eyes bore into the other man's. The brother cowered under their pressure. However, he managed to say, “You shouldn't take the truck.”

Colegui fixed him with a stern gaze. He looked at the truck. He looked at the young man. He made no gesture, but opened the driver's side door. He heaved himself inside, suppressing even the slightest groan brought on by his old bones and weary muscles, so that he could continue keeping his vow. He found the keys and stared the car. It began with a rumble. He began to drive, and watched the monastery in the rearview mirror, growing smaller and more remote, more and more a thing of the past, like his beliefs.

***

Somewhere in Tokyo, Michael Lee saw smoke pouring out of the tunnel and closed out the program bitterly. Aiko stood up behind him and wrapped her arms about him, placing her chin atop his head. “You don't know it was them.”

“They made it look like they were dead. It was them.” He sighed. “They're getting predictable.”

Aiko straightened. She stretched. She walked into the kitchen, found a bottle of milk tea, and came back to the bedroom where Michael's laptop was, and sat cross-legged on the bed. She drank her milk tea through a pink straw taken from a kitchen drawer where all the good chopsticks were. The tea made no sound, traveling silently up the plastic. It was odd. For some reason, it seemed as though it should have made a sound, like a fluid in a cartoon. In cartoons, everything made a sound, even a realization, going off with a chime in a cloud positioned directly above someone's head.

“What happened between you and Robin?” she asked placidly.

Michael jumped in his seat, but turned around, looked at her sitting on her bed, all thick covers and hibiscus prints. Evidence of her was everywhere; it was her home. He was the stranger. If she exiled him, he would not have the comfortable place to go back to—just Ravens' Flat, just wasted youth and bigger monitors, vending-machine breakfast.

“Nothing,” he answered. “Nothing happened between us.”

She swallowed more tea. The unused portion fell back down the straw, lightening it as it went. “Are you sure?”

He nodded. “I'm sure. Nothing happened. Nothing at all. She was just a co-worker.”

Aiko nodded slowly. Her hair was red this week. It shone when she pushed some behind her ear, steady and calm, or perhaps only trying to appear so. She set the milk tea beside the bed, with the plates covered in dried-on rice, the manga, the trendy purse and cell phone covered with little charms. They were messy people. He liked their mess. He liked seeing their mingled clutter everywhere. She faced him again. “I love you, Michael,” she said plainly. “Can you handle that?”

Michael took off his glasses, and set them beside the computer. He turned to Aiko, his chest pressed against the back of the chair. “I had a crush on her,” he said. “But she was fifteen. It wasn't going to happen. I don't think I would have let it, if I'd had the opportunity.” He stood, crossed over to the bed, delicately stepping between teppanyaki cartons and Ramune bottles. He put one knee on the bed, resting half his weight there. “And yes, I can most definitely handle that.”

Aiko smiled, and opened her arms.

***

They wandered in darkness and stink and the ancient ruins of refuse, escape routes for centuries of exiles and fugitives. They stepped on bone-dust and sloshed through shit. He lost track of time. He lost track of the century. What were they fleeing? Could he tell the difference, any longer, between one foe and another? Were they merely re-enacting the flight of other Witches driven to earth to escape the fires of Rome: Templars, Inquisitors, Solomon, did it matter? He couldn't remember their enemies. He saw faces in the darkness. He stepped on rats and saw corpses of years past. He held back screams and followed his leader, small and bright, a pale blur. They waited for dusk before emerging from the sewer into an alley near the address of their emergency apartment that Amon still clutched. She pried it from his grimy fingers. They discovered it to be much like the old one, situated this time above a bar and not a restaurant. It was called Pilade's. Three men outside argued nonsensically about the Templars: he was suddenly afraid, panicked, saw something flashing in a corner. In a paranoid daze, Amon cast a glance inside and frantically attempted to be casual. “Hey, pinball.”

“You're in shock.” Robin waved him upstairs. She let them inside and she pushed him in, guided him to a chair. She scanned the apartment and told him there were clothes. There was no food, however. “You need a shower.”

“What?”

She smiled almost tenderly. “You need to bathe, Amon.”

Robin was surrounded by the halo of kitchen light, bulbs tentatively ignited in the face of their danger and the gathering darkness. He thought he saw shapes moving in there. He blinked and they were gone. She was striding toward him. His hands opened uselessly. Useless. Useless. Him. Robin stared down at him. He tried to speak. His voice came out weak, childish.

“She was covered in blood…”

“I'm sure they're trying to help Doujima…”

His eyes wide and frightened for the first time in years, Amon shook his head. The world swirled with him, moved with his head, smeared at the edges, blurry. Something awful had happened. He couldn't remember what. “Not her. My mother.”

Understanding fragmented Robin's features, then drew them together again, glued them back tougher this time. And she stepped forward, just like with Single-Eye, oh, he understood it now, he knew why Sakaki caved back then a millennium ago, because he heard her heart beating through her stomach when she pressed his forehead there and he said: “I want my brother.”

Reality crashed in halfway, reality fell through a semi-rotted floor, a foot of reality here or there, poking downward through a ceiling in his mind. Reality flailed, gave death twitches inside his head. He remembered. Almost. Too much. Not enough.

Amon opened his mouth and gave voice to the silent scream that sounded in his every nightmare, roaring in one single breath until his body trembled and his voice cracked. Then he did it again, until his tears were acid carving ravines down his face, erosion, time, canyons, and still this whistling wind inside him: he felt the room ice over. He screamed, screamed, screamed. Robin's body accepted the sound, warm, muffling it, a dark and beautiful void of possibility. When the scream died in his throat he felt Robin pull her hands through his awful-smelling hair and there was shame like no other, good Christ, what was he doing, what were they doing, and why? Why in the world would she want to touch him? He smelled like sewer. And he was a baby, weak, helpless, sobbing away, covered in shit. He shook uncontrollably, and hated it, hated this, hated himself. Who was it that said he always hated himself? When was that? Who?

Why did he always hurt Robin? Why did they always end up in tunnels together, down in the shit and the piss, the bowels of the world, the inferno, endlessly repeating the same tired pilgrimage?

He pulled away and she was standing over him, more beautiful than ever, God help him. Lovely and terrifying, powerful. Much better than he could ever hope to be. “I'm sorry,” he admitted plaintively.

Her eyes were sad. “I know.”

He took her hands. The electricity of the Craft tingled between them, danced on their skin. He found her eyes. “Take over,” he pleaded. “I want you to.”

Robin's face threatened tears. He saw them distantly. She fought them; a brave and noble battle. It happened far away from him. She shook her head silently, then said, “No.” It sounded as though she were underwater. She sniffed loudly. “I won't do that, Amon. I want to take it for you, but I don't know what would happen if I lost myself.” He didn't know what made her so sad. Didn't she want them to be together, again?

She stiffened her lips, and led him to the bathroom. She undid his shoes and he stepped out of them. She peeled down his socks and he kicked them off. She pulled off his shirt and when he stared down at her quizzically, all innocence (he could feel it there on his face like a foreign substance) she undid his pants, too, but left him his underwear. A distant roar came from the tub. “Go ahead in.”

In her dress she stepped in, too, and guided him, sat him down. It wasn't like their old tub. Too modern. When was that tub? How many years ago? Or months? Or days? He couldn't remember. “Are we at home?” he asked her.

“No,” she answered quietly. She remained standing in the tub. Water pooled at her calves where she stood between his knees. She was pouring water over his hair with a pail, like when he was little. He blinked with wet eyelashes.

“Before you, where did I live?”

She swallowed. “I don't know.”

“Before you, what did I do?”

Robin gasped suddenly, choking on tears, and broke down, knelt slowly on the floor of the tub and let water crawl up her dress. She collapsed against him and cried, asked him to come back, Amon, please come back, remember me. You promised.

You promised.

***

He came to when it was full dark and the water was tepid. He remembered a car chase. He had used his Craft. He had used it a great deal, actually, freezing more than he could ever remember having done before, on top of what he'd done to Syungi earlier-

Syungi.

What he'd done to Syungi. They had parted on horrible terms. He'd told his brother that he hated him. And now, quite possibly, Syungi was dead. Thoughts swirled inside his head, emotional vertigo, and he clutched the edges of the tub. He would not, could not allow this to get the best of him. He had a responsibility, and the last thing Syungi would have wanted was for his baby brother to get so lost in his own grief that he couldn't handle his own shit any longer. There was Robin to think of. They were in a desparate situation. Syungi cared about Robin; Amon knew that much. He would have applauded Robin's escape from the Zabini compound—he would have directed it himself, given the chance. Syungi, Amon knew, would want them to be safe. And he would want Amon to do what was necessary. Grieving could happen later. He could do it when he finally figured out how it was done. For now, he was cold, and wet… Amon looked down, and frowned. Why was he in his underwear, still? Why was the water cold? Where were they, exactly?

They.

Himself and Robin.

Abruptly, Amon rose from the water, shedding the sopping shorts and hanging them over the lip of the tub. He let the water run out. There was no noise from the rest of the apartment. He toweled off and wrapped said towel around himself. Stepping out into the apartment he saw Robin there, curled on the couch, naked and wrapped in a sheet. He crossed to a shaded window and checked for potential observers. There were none that he could identify. He left the window and looked at Robin.

She was hopelessly, dangerously beautiful, asleep. Like all the things he'd ever wished for when life was awful, when he thought they were bad and they got worse, like all hopes and dreams wrapped up in cotton and skin and hair spilling in wheat sheaves down the furniture. And he was tired. Good Christ, he was tired.

He wrapped himself in a blanket like a sick kid and lay on the floor and slept.

***

Amon woke early the next day because sleeping on the floor during anything other than complete and unavoidable exhaustion was impossible. He narrowly missed bumping his head on the coffee table, and sat up to look at Robin. One bare, apricot shoulder was open to the air, positioned above the sheet. She breathed and her hair stirred. Trained to move silently, he rose and moved to walk. Robin's hand shot out, grabbed his. Her voice was muzzy.

“Where're you going?”

“Food.”

“Wait. You shouldn't go without me. It's dangerous. Don't go alone.”

“If you let me go now, I'll bring back a surprise.”

“What surprise?”

“I can't tell you. It's a surprise.” He moved.

“Wait.”

“What?”

& #8220;Who am I?”

“You're Robin Sena.”

She smiled sleepily. “Okay.”

He found clothes in the closets that were just a little bit too small, but they were all that was available. So he went out in them, pocketing the keys and locking up, stepping into the post-dawn light. It was still early. The streets were relatively deserted. To his surprise, the downstairs bar was still open. At least, it seemed to be. The doors and street-facing windows were thrown wide. A single figure sat alone at a small table, not far from the silent pinball machine, which flashed on unnoticed in one dim corner. Ceiling fans whirred quietly above them, stirring the warm morning air.

Amon stepped forward into the quiet barroom shadow and looked around for the publican. The registers weren't even turned on. Glasses and bottles gleamed with possibility, waiting to be used or opened. There wasn't a trace of the owner.

“You'll not find him here,” the man at the table said.

Amon turned, put on his best polite face. “Oh?”

“He's…out.” The man at the table poured coffee from a plain white china service. “Would you like some of this?”

He frowned. “It's very kind of you to offer, but I need to-”

“You have time, Mr. Nagira.”

Amon's blood chilled. He looked into the older gentleman's powerful blue eyes, and decided that yes, he did have the time. He took the man in: magnificent suit, snowy white hair that still shone, an impressive tan relatively free of liver spots. For such an old man, he also maintained excellent posture. He poured coffee delicately. Amon sat.

“Are you a bounty hunter?” Amon asked.

The old man had the grace to laugh. It was a dry little chuckle. Apparently, Amon's question was very quaint. “Oh my, no,” he answered, and his left hand came up in such a way as to flash the cardinal's ruby ring on his ring finger. It hung there in the air for a moment, mid-gesture.

“I'm not kissing shit,” Amon said bluntly.

The cardinal's lips pursed, but he said nothing. “Anyone can kiss my ring, Mr. Nagira. That's a matter of small importance. However, that of your presence here is a large one.”

“Oh?”

“Don't worry; it's not her I want.” The cardinal smiled. “Not yet, at least.”

Amon willed his Craft to stay under control. He was shivering on the inside. Would he hear it, from here, if Robin called for help? Were there armed men invading the safehouse as they spoke? Sleepy and vulnerable, could she still defend herself?

“What do you want?” he asked slowly.

“Insurance,” the old cardinal answered. “Your former partner, it seems, has the potential to galvanize the Witch population against us.”

“Most Witches hate Solomon already, in case you hadn't noticed.”

Again, the cardinal pursed his lips. Reaching into a leather briefcase beside his table, he brought out a manila folder. He opened it. Photos were inside, of varying degrees of quality and clarity. But they all had a unifying theme: they were all of either Robin or Amon, or both of them together. The Tokyo apartment was there. The Walled City was there. The airports on both sides. The Zabini family house.

We were being watched.

Amon swallowed. He brought his face up and met the cardinal's gaze impassively. He steadied his voice. “You can get to us at any time. I get it.”

“Robin is a child with such potential, don't you think?”

Amon leafed through the photos. Robin drinking coffee. Robin staring out the window, bored. I never gave you enough sunlight. Robin standing in the rain, celebrating the end of summer heat. Robin. Robin. Robin. Close up, far away, it didn't matter. She was in every picture.

“Yes,” he murmured.

“And it would be a shame if Solomon had to…waste…that potential, because she did something rash.”

My mother. My brother. Now her.

“Yes.”

“But, if we had a piece of collateral, something to bargain with…”

“A hostage.”

Faintly, the old man shook his head. “Hostages can be released, Mr. Nagira.” His smile was chilly. “This is a lifetime commitment.”

Amon's face hardened. He sat up in his chair, and dropped the pictures. He placed both hands on the table, and stood. He regarded the cardinal. “It always was.”

Thinly-veiled surprise fluttered over the old man's face, but he said nothing. “Give me a day,” Amon said. “I need until tomorrow morning.”

“You won't run away on us, I trust.”

Grimly, Amon shook his head. “No running. But call off your watchdogs.”

“I'm afraid that will be quite impossible.”

“Then tell them to ease up. You already have what you want.”

The chilly, charming smile showed itself again. “You have no idea what I want.” He cleared his throat. “Meet us at nine,” he said, as though planning a breakfast engagement, and named the place. “Until tomorrow, then, Mr. Nagira.” And he raised his cup, toasting the other man.

Amon wandered the streets. He watched them fill with people. It was like a dream. Or an awful nightmare. Yes, a nightmare—a nightmare that never ended, full of conspiracies, enemies at every turn, no safe place to return to. How long was this his life? He'd almost forgotten the daily business of being a Hunter, although all the old instincts remained in place. He couldn't shed the training, for the life of him. Maybe it would have been better if he could—he could go somewhere else, do something else: if he were just a regular guy, he wouldn't be in this mess.

It didn't matter if he was a regular guy or not. Robin wasn't a regular woman.

He bought groceries because he said that he would, and remembered Robin's surprise. With leaden steps he came back to the apartment, to find Robin mercifully still asleep, still beautiful and gentle and all the things he could ever wish for. He wasn't going to tell her. There was no point. They could run forever. They would always be found. Things would escalate. He would slip, as he had slipped before. She would die. Like his mother. Like Nagira. And he'd made a promise. I never gave you enough sunlight. So he put things away quietly in the kitchen instead, and came back with her surprise, setting it in her eyeline on the coffee table with a spoon beside it and clearing his throat.

She woke up slowly, curling inward and upward, moving carefully with the sheet. Her eyes alit on the gelato momentarily and she froze mid-stretch, turning to give him a look of such pure, distilled love that his breath vanished for a moment, sucked away by the complete understanding burning so briefly between them. Unwittingly, they shared a memory: eating dessert together, the apartment in Tokyo, their boring life that he never knew how much he missed until now. Robin glowed. Her eyes shone. He did his best to memorize it. He wasn't going to see this, ever again.

Silently, almost shyly, she dug into her dessert-for-breakfast. It was exactly right, apparently: she closed her eyes for the first bite and sighed. She swallowed almost audibly. Then her expression grew troubled. She gripped the spoon with white knuckles. “The others are probably waiting for a message from us. And we should think about looking at the local hospitals…” She hesitated, caught his glace and her gaze fell to the floor. “What should we do today, Amon?”

He sat down on the coffee table, across from her. “Anything you want,” he answered.

Robin frowned. This was obviously not the answer she was expecting. Somewhere, some part of him not busy saying goodbye smiled. “No, really,” Amon continued. He sighed, tried to incorporate something of the truth into his story. “We can't expect to get anywhere, today. And this mess has been awful, for both of us. We've spent the past few months cooped up in some house or another.” He frowned. “You're losing what's left of your childhood, you know that?”

Her lips quirked. “I'm not a child, Amon.”

“Then at least let me spoil you like one,” he asked. Robin's eyes widened. They blinked. She sat up straight, the sheet pinned to her body with her rigid arms. He leaned forward. “I want to do whatever you want to do, today. You can have anything you want, Robin.”

Her eyes narrowed, focused. He thought he saw a flicker of flame. “Anything?”

“Anything.” He swallowed.

One tawny, barely-there eyebrow arched. “And if I want to eat caviar and drink champagne all day?”

“Then we will.”

“What if I want you to take me to the opera?”

“Then I will.”

She seemed to grow progressively more aghast with each passing moment. “What if I just want to stay home?” she asked finally, a small line appearing between her brows. The question seemed vitally important to her. “What if I just want to be normal, to pretend like we're normal, and go outside, and come home, and-”

He linked their hands impulsively. She silenced, stared at their hands. “Then, we'll pretend,” he said softly. “If you want to pretend, we'll pretend all you want.”

Robin bit her lower lip. “It's dangerous out there,” she whispered.

Amon tucked a piece of errant hair behind her ear. “Trust me,” he answered.