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“How much family do you have in Kaston?” Sebastian cocked his head. One cousin and yet another aunt. “Are you from Kaston?”
“Yes. I am.” Colin gritted his teeth, and Sebastian felt a little bad for prying. It was far out of line with their usual friendship, where they dealt with only what was in front of them, never behind or forward. “They’re all here.”
“I see.” That was some rotten luck. All his family here, in the first city to see combat with the Klah’Eel army in decades. In a city Hess said they could afford to lose…
Sebastian felt sick.
“What?” Colin grabbed his shoulder and shook until Sebastian met his eyes again. “Why do you look like that?”
“Just thinking about the war. I’m sorry.” Sebastian shook his head. And then kept pushing. “Why aren’t her kids here? Headquarters must be safer than some civilian house on the west side of all sides. And there are other kids here.”
A few rooms of them, in fact. Safe rooms were specifically set up for the families of Resistance members and supporters. Sebastian hadn’t checked on them since he’d arrived, but he assumed they were getting near capacity.
Colin scowled and crossed his arms. “Except it must not be safer if you’re here looking for a traitor, is it?”
“Yes, but she didn’t know that.” Sebastian didn’t catch himself before putting his hands on his hips, but he left them. All the better to say unless she did without actually saying it.
The look on Colin’s face told Sebastian he’d heard the unspoken words anyway. Still, he shook his head.
A bell in the room went off them, a sound they were both intimately familiar with.
“Sixty minutes.” Colin smiled grimly. The one-hour bell usually signaled when a team of Resistance soldiers would go out on an operation—sabotage, espionage, or some other aggressive action. They had never had to defend before. And Sebastian had never felt like he was running out of time before.
“There you are!” Sheila herself came in then, moving with quick, nervy movements. “I was wondering if you’d still be in here.” She smiled at Sebastian. “Did you find a new gun?”
“Yeah. I was thinking this one felt good.” Sebastian held up one of the unbalanced and rusted rifles and studied Sheila’s face as her eyes flicked to it.
She blinked.
She knew. Sebastian was sure she knew.
“Wonderful.” She kept smiling anyway and then turned to Colin. “We need to head out.”
“We’ve still got an hour.” Colin pointed at the bell near the ceiling that had just gone off, but Sheila shook her head.
“Everyone else has an hour.” She walked forward and grabbed Colin’s wrist, and started tugging him out of the armory. “I need you to come with me to bring a truck of rations to the western barricade.”
Sebastian stepped smoothly in front of her, thankful for the breadth of Neumann’s shoulders that made it so easy to bar her from the door. “Surely you’ll get even more help if you just wait an hour.”
Sheila came up short before she ran into him. “I don’t need more help. Just someone to lift some boxes and hold a gun while I drive. Just in case.”
“I can lift boxes and hold a gun.” Sebastian motioned to his new—awful—gun. “Colin seems pretty important around here. He should probably help see the men off.”
Sheila’s hand tightened around Colin’s wrist so tightly the tips of her fingers went white. She was running from something. And the little frown on Colin’s face as he looked down at his wrist meant even he was starting to realize.
Sebastian glanced around the armory to make sure all the other logistics people had stepped out, sent some thanks to the universe for that, and then pulled the door behind him shut. He slid the deadbolt into place with the loudest clang he could manage, going for maximum effect. Then he turned back to Sheila. Her face paled, and she shrank back toward Colin.
“What do you know, Sheila?”
“Wh-wh-what do you mean?” Her mouth pinched as she tried to keep her lips stiff. Not a natural-born liar, then. Not by any means.
“You know what I mean.”
Sheila jerked back and looked up at Colin. “Colin. This man—”
“Doesn’t fuck around.” Colin shook his head. He set a hand gently on her shoulder and turned her to look at him. “What do you know?”
She stared up at him with wide eyes, then at Sebastian, and back at Colin. Her eyes started to shine, and a traitorous bit of guilt bloomed in Sebastian’s throat. The unpleasant feeling distracted him enough that he almost missed the expertly thrown groin kick coming straight up his A-frame.
