Page 60 of Red Rooster

“He calls himself Valerian. I don’t know why. But I know that he shouldn’t be trusted. He was in chains long before the Institute bought him, and that’s where he should stay.”

“If he’s so terrible,” Trina said, and realized she was angry, “then why not execute him? Why keep him locked up and take his blood like some sort of lab rat? That’s inhumane – at the veryleast.”

“You lock human criminals up in prisons.”

“Not forcenturies.”

Collette gave her a patronizing smile. “Don’t try to apply human morality to the things that happen to us. It won’t get you very far.”

~*~

Nikita took the train to Queens. He’d always found it soothing; there was no view, but something about the rattle and the sway sent him back home, to the trains of Russia. Perhaps not a fond time, but a familiar one. It seemed fitting, given his errand today.

The Ingraham Institute was, oddly, right out in the open. He’d envisioned an underground lair with caged lights and sinister service elevators. Instead, he faced a modern, five-story glass and concrete building with front planters full of tiny cypress trees. He stood on the sidewalk, looking at his reflection in the front doors. He probably should have dressed better, for the benefit of the security cameras, but he planned to take care of those right away. He tugged up the hood of his sweatshirt to cover his face, affected a limp, and entered through the airlock. He passed a bank of elevators, the restrooms, and vending machines, and another glass door let him into a waiting room where men and women with various braces, casts, and crutches flipped tensely through magazines.

These were the wounded vets searching for a miracle cure.

Several looked up when he entered. One even nodded in a commiserating way.You, too?his look said, like he saw something wounded in Nikita’s face.

He nodded back and limped to the reception desk. The girl stationed there wore purple scrubs that matched her nail polish; her blonde hair had been styled into careful barrel curls, her makeup flawless. He didn’t see a ring on her finger.

She glanced up. “Hi, how can I…” Her eyes widened, dilated. Caught.

“Hello,” he said, and turned his voice to velvet. Pushed his will out through the air between them, imagined it as a net draping over her, wrapping her up, cutting her off from any thoughts or wants or needs that were not his own. “I was wondering if you could help me.”Help me, do for me, give me what I want, and I’ll reward you.

She opened her mouth and half-smiled, a breathless, gasping sort of sound leaving her lips, almost like ecstasy. “Y-y-yes. I can help you.”

He corrupted people. That’s what he was best at. Before, as an agent of the oppressor in a black coat, he’d corrupted slowly, a little at a time. His boys, Sasha, Katya. And then he’d devoured Rasputin’s heart and he’d gained the ability to corrupt immediately. He could have laid this nurse back across the desk and had her any way he wanted. Could have drained her dry and she would have thanked him for it.

He corrupted, and hehatedhimself for that.

But sometimes it came in quite handy.

~*~

Lanny picked up a chair – it was the plush, cozy kind that came with a matching footstool, dark brown with orange and green flowers – and, marveling at the ease of it, shifted it to one hand, balanced precariously by one leg in his palm, the arm of it resting against his head. “Shit,” he said, laughing. “This is never gonna get old.”

Colette had said her basement needed “some tidying,” which was so gross an understatement it was basically a lie.It wasn’t dirty; the concrete walls and copper pipes all seemed to be in excellent shape, no leaks or wet patches or mold.But it was a large basement, one with little root cellars and closets dug into the sides, and it was packed cheek-by-jowl with what looked to be centuries’ worth of furniture.

The job seemed like busy work, but Lanny hadn’t felt like he could argue with Colette. He didn’t think anyone could.

“Here, kid,” Lanny said, “catch.” And tossed the chair to Jamie.

Jamie scrambled to set down the painting he held and said, “Oh shit, no!” eyes wide and panicked. He lifted his arms, though, and caught the chair. Cringing the whole time, and then gasping in surprise when he saw that he’d done it. “Fuck you,” he muttered.

Lanny chuckled. “You’ve gotta lighten up a little. What good are super powers if we don’t use them?”

Jamie lifted his brows. “Is that what you’re doing when you’re moping around scowling at nothing? When you tried to beat Alexei to death? Lightening up?”

Lanny plucked up the chair’s footstool and chucked it across the room.

Jamie caught it with less theatrics this time, expression smug. “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

“Shut up.”

“Uh-huh.”

It was quiet a moment as they picked through Tiffany lamps and elaborate chess boards, dusty rolled-up rugs and pottery that looked ready to crumble at a touch – Lanny let Jamie move those, not trusting his own indelicate hands.