Chapter Twenty-Four

She'd always been able to personalize a space.  Even here with nothing but prison jumpsuits and concrete she'd carved a place for herself.  Little yellow streamers crisscrossed the ceiling, staked to the ceiling with makeshift shivs, and a curtain of the same yellow fabric had been fashioned by stretching it thin and staking it in the same manner as the streamers.  More impressive still were the hand mirror and cosmetics she'd managed to obtain despite their status as contraband.  She may have softened with time, but she was as bold as ever leaving them in plain sight. 

"Hi Dad, what'cha lookin for?"
Behind the door, as always.  Jeanine had been a great scout when she was under his command, but after she left she'd devoted herself to mastering the art of stealth and death.  She was probably the most dangerous peasant alive, or at least the only one who'd ever demonstrated it. 
"You as a matter of fact, gifts from your friends?"  He gestured at the cosmetics.
"Is the room bugged?"
"I'm obligated to deny it."
"Then it isn't.  I made them, watch."

She pulled one of the stakes from the ceiling and cut her left index finger with it.  She quickly replaced the stake, re-securing the dangling streamer.  Then she bent over and traced a small pattern on the concrete, blood marking the ground as she trailed her finger through the dust.  Placing the finger at the center of the small circle it glowed, and as she drew back her hand a small stick of lip gloss sprouted from the ground.  Both light and circle vanished as she removed the tube, sucking on the tip of her finger as she did. 
"See?  The collar is inscribed to block the use of magic, but alchemy is about memory and exchange.  Since blood is already magical, I can get anything I want even though I can't actually use magic."
"And you chose to memorize the patterns that allowed you to create cosmetics?  You have a loophole that would allow you to escape at any time, and you would rather look nice?"
She nodded enthusiastically before using her new lip gloss. 
"I'd have thought my sister would have taught you better than that.  Although I'm surprised she taught you anything other than blowing things up."
"Aunt Lindi's actually quite versatile, blowing things up is more of a hobby.  You should see what she can do with cats."
"She makes a living at that now?"
"Makes a killing at it really, just sits back and lets them do all the work for her.  It's given her a lot of time to refine the art of blowing things up."
"I assume she taught you about interpersonal communications?"
"When I was eight, if I remember correctly you didn't approve of any of it at the time.  Why are you interested in magic all of a sudden?"
"My job entails a lot more contact with mages these days.  It would be dangerous not to know."
"And?"

She wasn't reading his mind, growing up with Lindi had mandated learning how to guard himself against such things.  No, she just knew him well enough to tell that he wanted to know for more than just his own safety. 
"And I wanted to get in contact with the outside.  All our communications have been shut down.  The head f research goes directly to the emperor for all his commands, in person.   The rest of us are just stuck here."
"Executive research director Grath, I've made the acquaintance.  Slimy, stuck up, pimply lecher that one; I hear he wears gloves now."
"Yes, shiny black ones."
"I took his right hand after he pinched me, blew the mission over it but it was worth it just to see him whimper."
Not a glimmer of repentance.  It was startling to see his little girl become such a cold-blooded killer.  Not that he wouldn't have done the same had he known, but this was his little princess talking about cutting a man's hand off.
"I'm sorry Dad.  But the system relies on having the right people in charge.  I couldn't just let it linger and allow the Empire to decay further, it needed to be purged.  I had the power, and I was willing to use it.  I'm not sorry I killed them, I'm sorry it didn't change anything."
"Because you killed the wrong ones."
"What?"
He'd thought about it since he'd met Grath.  Grath's father was one of her victims, killing him had put the pimply slimeball into power. 
"You needed to kill the ones who had good children, not the ones who were worst.  If you could get the right people into power then the system would rectify itself.  People could see what a proper noble is supposed to be and they'd be able to affect the ascension of future nobles.  Soon we'd have the right sort of people in charge, ones who wouldn't gorge themselves on taxes and look down their noses at the kneecaps of men twice as worthy to hold their title."
"But you always said the system was already working?  What happened to you Dad?"
"Jeanine, this isn't a prison.  This is death row.  They're going to tie people to rockets and launch them into upper space in the name of science."
She looked at the mirror.for several minutes.  The silence seemed to drag on before she broke it.
"Captain.  The people need me, guide my blade."
"Tell your friends to be ready at the front gate in a week.  Find out what's going on out there and figure out how to keep me posted after you're gone."
"Yes Sir."