CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Lucia’s death delayed Cassie’s initiation into Manus Sancti. Samir went on leave from El Dédalo to spend time with his sister and her family. Because he would be Cassie’s mentor, he would play a role in the ceremony.
She was glad he could get away for a little bit and be with people who loved him. Without asking, she knew Jonathan hadn’t gone anywhere after Michael’s death. His best support would have been here.
A few times, she went to the gym with Jonathan, who showed her a little about weight training. She’d never taken an interest before, but he’d told her that working with Samir would include becoming physically stronger. They went to the shooting range a couple of times, where Jonathan continued to practice shooting left-handed. Cassie focused on simulations that featured evil spirits and demons, and ones that posed the challenge of telling the good guys from the bad.
One night, she watched a movie in Jonathan’s quarters with him, Val, and a Knight Cassie had seen around named Tristan Münter. It was a tight squeeze with Jonathan wedged between Val and Cassie on the bed, while Tristan, a big, quiet guy with a dark beard, sat on the floor basically at Cassie’s feet. She was growing accustomed to the fact that no one at El Dédalo had much of a sense of personal space.
Jonathan and Val enjoyed the film more than Tristan and Cassie did because it was in Arabic with no subtitles.
“I thought everyone in Manus Sancti spoke Arabic,” Cassie murmured to Tristan.
“No, we all speak Spanish and English. Some people speak Maghrebi—Moroccan Arabic—and some speak Egyptian Arabic like this.” He pointed at the screen.
“But you all have a few Arabic words you use,” Cassie pressed. “And sayings.”
“Yes. And Latin.”
Cassie glanced over at Jonathan and Val. They didn’t seem to mind that she and Tristan were talking through the movie, but she lowered her voice again anyway. “I get why you all speak Spanish. You started in Spain. But why do you speak English?”
He raised his eyebrows, which were thick and angled, one with a bare patch in the middle from a scar. “Why does everybody speak English?”
Not quite deterred, she asked, “Why did the headquarters move here?” She’d intended to ask Lucia when she got back from Italy.
“It’s a big country. Nobody pays attention. And you leave people with guns alone.”
It didn’t sound particularly complimentary. Cassie doubted he’d been raised in the States. “Do you speak anything besides English and Spanish?”
“German and Maori.” At her confused look, he explained what Maori was, with considerable grace, considering he was part Maori.
Ordinary life at El Dédalo was kind of like living at a college dorm full of much more grownup international students and nobody puking in the hallway. Cassie was beginning to feel at home there.
While Samir was still away, Capitán Renaud assigned Jonathan and Gabi on a short mission, Jonathan’s first since Cassie had arrived. Nic, the mission runner, debriefed them over breakfast at the cantina while she listened, not feeling like a hanger-on because she was supposed to be learning about how things worked now.
“Basic ghost banishing in Amarillo,” Nic said. “The American Quarter Horse Hall of Fame and Museum.”
“There’s a horse museum?” Cassie was sick with jealousy.
“Tell me the ghost isn’t a horse,” Gabi said.
“No. Supposed suicide, but pretty clearly a murder victim. Three people injured so far, no casualties.”
“What do you need both of us for?” she asked. “It’s four hours away.”
Nic shrugged. “It does seem like an easy one, but we always send two for ghosts. You remember what happened in Sligo.”
Gabi half closed her eyes in annoyance. “You may as well send Cassie. A child could do this job.”
“Hey,” Cassie objected half-heartedly.
“You’ve done enough dangerous missions for two careers,” Jonathan said to Gabi. He’d told Cassie before that Gabi was way past her twenty-year obligation and lucky to still be alive and whole. Now he paused, taking a bite of his huevos rancheros. “Maybe you should quit while you’re ahead. Marc and Luis are growing up, they might have kids before long—”
“Before long?” she snapped.
“A long time from now,” Jonathan amended.
“You think I’m too old?” she pressed him. “I’m as good as I ever was.”
Jonathan glanced up at the ceiling. “You know I know that.”
“You’ll have plenty to handle soon enough,” Nic told Gabi. “Capitán wants you for a comandante.”
Jonathan’s and Gabi’s heads swiveled to look at him.
She demanded, “What makes you think that?”
Nic shrugged. “It’s obvious. Taveres in Athens told a few people he was stepping down within the year. Capitán sent you there to command the Furies mission last year, when Taveres was getting treatment. And he encouraged Marc to go to Athens instead of Sao Paolo.” Jonathan gave a huge grin.
Gabi’s eyes narrowed at Nic. “You think you know everything that goes on.”
“There’s a good reason why I think that.”
Cassie asked Jonathan, “Do you want to be a comandante someday?”
Nic and Gabi both stiffened. Apparently, it was a tactless question, but Jonathan was probably getting used to those from her. “No. I mean—as long as we’re together, I couldn’t.”
She would hold him back somehow? She didn’t like the sound of that. “Why not?”
He spread his hands as if this were obvious. “Because I can’t give you orders.”
“Yes you can!” she snapped. Nic and Gabi exchanged an amused look. “Work is work,” she clarified. “Unless they have rules against it.” Maybe they did. At Mission Minerals, a person couldn’t date a direct report.
“We don’t,” Gabi said.
Jonathan folded his arms. “Still not an option.” He had thought about this before. The realization humbled Cassie. His father was a comandante, and he’d probably at least imagined following in his footsteps.
Nic said to Cassie, “Yeah, it would never work. He couldn’t risk you. You’d have missions to, I don’t know, go find Girl Scout cookies.”
She grinned. “Hopefully, they’ll cover that in my training.”
Gabi said dryly, “Well, it wouldn’t be much more dangerous at the horse museum.”
Nic pushed the black file folder toward Gabi. “Cheer up. Maybe something will go horribly wrong.”
“It’s been known to happen,” Jonathan said, more grim.
Sometime after midnight, Jonathan texted Cassie to let her know they’d persuaded the ghost to move on. It had been just as much of a milk run as Gabi had expected, but still worth doing, since malevolent ghost activity tended to escalate. It satisfied Jonathan to accomplish a simple mission again, even if it felt a little strange that Cassie was at El Dédalo without him. He and Gabi returned late the next night, as did Samir. The day after that, Cassie and Jonathan met with Samir and Val in her office to discuss the ceremony.
Samir wore jeans and a white T-shirt damp at the collar from his wet hair, as though he’d just taken a shower. The light had gone out of his eyes. Lucia’s emerald ring hung on a chain around his neck, and Jonathan felt a stab of sorrow at the sight of it. “The initiation is much different from full Knighthood,” Samir told Cassie. “Right now, you’re only indicating your intention to begin training.”
“I’m not promising to complete it?”
He shook his head. “For all we know, you may not be able to.”
Cassie’s jaw set, the expression on her face saying, the hell I won’t. Jonathan doubted there was any chance she wouldn’t complete it…assuming she made it through the initiation. Every time he thought about it, his gut twisted. If she didn’t complete the ordeal, she’d be crushed. Either way, it was going to be brutal.
Samir went on to say, “You’ll promise to never betray Manus Sancti, and that pledge holds for life. And as long as you’re an initiate, you’re expected to obey orders—from Capitán Renaud, from me, and from any other Knight if you shadow them on a mission. But you can choose to end your training at any time.”
“Fair enough,” Cassie said.
“The ceremony is old-fashioned,” Val told her. “It may seem strange to you as a sonámbula.”
Cassie sighed. “Are people going to call me that forever?”
“Not after this,” Samir said.
“I’m a little nervous.”
“I’m nervous, too,” Val said. “I haven’t overseen a ceremony before. I’m surprised Capitán asked me to do it.”
Jonathan’s pulse sped up, although he kept his face neutral. Nervous hardly captured what Val was feeling. The night before he’d left for the mission in Amarillo. Val had sought him out, breaking down into tears.
Should he tell Cassie what to expect? It might make it easier on Val, too. But if he broke his vows like that, he had almost no chance of getting away with it. Val wasn’t the only empath, and someone might notice that Cassie reacted like someone who expected an ordeal. Any one of a couple dozen people in El Dédalo could Read him and prove he’d warned Cassie ahead of time. People who grew up in Manus Sancti knew about the rituals, but outsiders needed to prove themselves. This rule went back a few centuries. Breaking the silence could lead to a long sentence at Solemore, Manus Sancti’s only prison. That might make Cassie lose control of her animal spell, and what would happen to her then?
The ordeal served other purposes beyond a test of courage and determination. It gave initiates more confidence in their own strength and more commitment to Manus Sancti, and it gave their new Manus Sancti brothers and sisters loyalty to them in return. But none of that seemed worth it when he thought about Cassie being in pain.
Maybe she wouldn’t withstand it, and Jonathan would never have to worry about her launching herself into danger again and again as a Knight. But he couldn’t bring himself to hope for her failure. Maybe she’d refuse to do it completely. Probably, she should.
“You’ll do great,” Cassie told Val. Her kindness and obliviousness tore at his heart. “Do you have to memorize anything?”
“Yes, and so do you.” Val gave her a couple pieces of paper.
Cassie took a deep breath. “That’s going to be hard.”
Samir gave Jonathan a grim look. The grieving warrior wasn’t taking Cassie’s initiation lightly, which Jonathan deeply appreciated.
“What?” Cassie said.
“It’ll be a challenge,” Val told Cassie. “But I know you can do it.”