Winter (20 page)

Winter cocked her head, inspecting him. He seemed proud. Borderline smug. She began to feel guilty for having teased him before.

“Stowaways,” he said, once he had Levana’s attention. His shoulders twitched in an unconcerned shrug. “What an unexpected surprise.”

Levana’s face was fiercely beautiful. Breathtaking in her viciousness. “You have brought a known enemy into the heart of my country. In a time of mutual cease-fire, you have committed an act of treason.”

Kai didn’t flinch. “My loyalty lies with the Eastern Commonwealth and with Earth. Not with Luna, and certainly not with you.”

Levana’s eyes narrowed. “You seem confident that I won’t have you killed for this.”

“You won’t,” he said with, as her stepmother guessed, an overabundance of confidence. Winter squirmed, suddenly afraid for him. “At least,” Kai amended, “not yet.”

One perfect eyebrow lifted. “You’re right,” said Levana. “Perhaps I will kill your adviser instead. Surely he was aware of this blatant betrayal of my trust.”

“Do with me as you see fit,” said the adviser, as unshaken as Kaito. “
My
loyalties lie only with my emperor.”

Kai’s cheek twitched. “If you harm any one of your Earthen guests as either a punishment or a threat to me, I will refuse to continue with this wedding.”

“Then I will no longer have any reason to keep you alive.”

“I know,” said Kai, “but you also won’t get to be empress.”

Their gazes warred with each other while Winter, Jacin, and the other guards watched. Winter’s heartbeat was erratic as she waited for the queen’s order to have Emperor Kaito killed—for his insolence as much as for his role in bringing Linh Cinder to Artemisia.

The doors to the palace opened and a guard entered, escorting one of their technicians.

“My Queen, you summoned?”

Aimery stepped forward. “There had been strict orders that the exits out of this port were to be locked, but it seems there has been a malfunction. Her Majesty demands to know what went wrong, and be assured it won’t happen again.”

The technician bowed and scurried around the platform toward the control panel that monitored the exits and the massive spaceship-holding chamber beyond the port doors.

Winter was watching him when her eye caught on a slip of movement. She frowned, sure she saw someone ducking in between some of the Earthen cargo.

Or as sure as she could be of anything she saw, which was not very sure at all.

Her stepmother rounded again on the emperor and flicked her arm toward him, irritated with his presence. “Take the Earthens to their quarters,” she said, “and keep them there.”

The emperor and his entourage put up no resistance as the guards shuffled them away with more force than was necessary. Kai didn’t look in Winter’s direction, but as he passed she could see he was no longer hiding his grin. He might have become a prisoner of the queen, but clearly he saw this as a victory.

The guards’ clomping footsteps had faded when the technician shouted, “My Queen!” His fingers were dancing over the screens, his face set with panic. Levana swept toward him. The rest of her entourage trailed after, and though Jacin moved to keep himself in front of Winter, she dodged around him and skipped ahead, ignoring his low growl. She scanned the stacks of crates and luggage again, but there was no sign of the mysterious figure she’d imagined before.

“What?” Levana snapped.

The technician didn’t turn away from the controls. On the nearest screen, Winter could see a map of the shuttle system and a flashing error message in the corner. Jacin appeared again at her side and cast her a cool glare for leaving the circle of his protection. She ignored him.

“It’s—” the technician started. He swiveled to another screen.

“I suggest you find your tongue before I disable it permanently,” said Levana.

The technician shuddered and turned back to face them, though his hands lingered uselessly over the screens. “The system is…”

Levana waited.

Winter became very worried for this man’s life.

“… inaccessible, My Queen. I can’t … I can’t access the shuttle schedules, the manual overrides … even the entrances to the main platform have been locked. With … with the exception of the corridor connecting it to these docks, which alone was left unimpeded.”

Levana, lips pressed into a firm line, said nothing.

“The system has been hacked?” said Aimery.

“Y-yes, I think so. It could take hours to reconfigure the access codes … I don’t even know what they
did.
”

“Are you telling me,” said Levana, “that you cannot even put a stop to the shuttles leaving the city?”

The technician had gone pale. “I will keep trying, Your Majesty. I’ll have much better access to the system from the palace control room, so I’ll just—”

“Do you have an apprentice?” said the queen. “Or a partner in your trade?”

The hair stood up on Winter’s neck.

The technician stammered, “Th-there are three of us … here in the palace … but I have the most experience, with over twenty years of loyal service and—”

“Kill him.”

A guard removed the gun from his holster. Winter turned her head away, and though it was a petty thought, she was glad it wasn’t Jacin being forced to do the murder. If he had still been guard to the head thaumaturge, it very well could have been.

“Please, My Que—”

Winter jumped as the shot rang through her head, followed by a sound she was all too familiar with. A whimper. Coming from behind a stack of cargo bins.

Behind her, the crackle of wiring and splinter of plastic suggested the bullet had struck one of the screens as well. The guard holstered his gun.

Aimery turned to the queen. “I will contact Jerrico and see if his teams have managed to gain access to the platform, and alert him that their way may be impeded.”

“Thank you, Aimery. Also alert the other two technicians to the problem with the shuttle system.”

Aimery pulled out his portscreen and stepped away from their group, toward the edge of the platform. He was overlooking the piled cargo crates, and though his attention was on his port, Winter was searching for another sign of life below.

There. A foot, she thought, curling in against a large trunk.

Winter gasped delightedly and laced her fingers beneath her chin. Everyone spun to her, startled at her presence, which was not uncommon. “Do you think the Earthens brought us gifts, Stepmother?”

Without waiting for a response, she lifted her skirts and trotted toward the cargo, climbing over the uneven stacks of crates and bins until she reached the lower level.

“Winter,” Levana snapped. “What are you doing?”

“Looking for presents!” she called back, giggling. Jacin’s shadow fell over her from above. She could picture his expression down to the annoyed twitch in his brow, and she knew that from where he stood with the rest of the queen’s entourage, he could not see what she was seeing.

A girl with cropped blonde hair and terrified blue eyes was curled into a tight ball. Her back was pressed up against a crate, her whole body trembling.

Winter lifted her head and beamed, first at Jacin, then her stepmother, doing her best not to look at the spray of blood on the far wall. “This one says it has wine from Argentina! It must be from the Americans. We can toast to such an eventful afternoon.”

She leaned over the shaking girl and unlatched the crate with a loud clack. She pried up the lid. “Oh, drat, the box lied. It’s only packing fluff.” Holding the lid with one hand, she started pulling out the shredded paper as quickly as she could, scattering it over the floor at her feet. The girl gawked up at her.

Her stepmother’s voice had turned to ice. “Sir Clay, please escort your charge from the premises. She is embarrassing herself.”

Her words carried too much weight, but Winter didn’t try to decipher them. She was busy nudging at the girl with her toe, gesturing for her to get into the crate.

Jacin’s boots thumped against the cargo as he descended toward her. Winter grabbed the girl’s elbow and tugged, spurring the girl into action. She scrambled onto her knees, gripped the edge of the crate, and hauled herself inside—the noise muffled by Winter’s crumpling of the paper.

Without waiting to see whether the girl was comfortable, Winter dropped the lid shut as Jacin dropped down beside her. Her grin brightened at him. “Oh, good, you’re here! You can help me carry this paper up to my room. What a thoughtful gift from the Americans, don’t you think?”

“Princess—”

“I agree, Jacin. A box full of paper is a bit messy for a wedding gift, but we shan’t be ungrateful.” She scooped up an armful of the paper and pranced toward the palace entrance, not once daring to look back.

Twenty-Two

Cinder was used to sensing Wolf’s energy—tireless and agitated and steaming off him like heat waves over pavement. But it was a new thing coming from Thorne, who was normally unshakable. As they ran down an endless staircase, deeper and deeper into Luna’s underground, Thorne’s energy was every bit as palpable as Wolf’s. Angry, terrified, burdened with guilt. Cinder wished she could turn off her Lunar gift so she wouldn’t have to deal with her companions’ tirade of emotions in addition to her own.

They’d lost Cress. Levana knew of Kai’s betrayal. Already their group was fragmented and her plan was falling to pieces.

The steps leveled off into a long, narrow corridor lined with robed statues, each holding a glowing orb that cast swells of light onto the arched ceiling. The floor was fitted with thousands of tiny black and gold tiles, creating a pattern that swirled and ebbed like the Milky Way. It would have been a marvel to behold if they had the time to appreciate it, but Cinder’s thoughts were too tumultuous. Listening for sounds of pursuit. Picturing Cress’s face, determined in spite of her fear. Trying to plan their next move, and what they would do if the maglevs failed—for Levana must know where they were heading.

At the end of the corridor they came to another spiraling staircase carved from dark, polished wood. The rails and steps were undulating and uneven, and it took Cinder two flights—gripping the rails to keep from falling headfirst in her hurry—to realize the staircase was carved to resemble an enormous octopus that was allowing them passage on its looping tentacles.

So beautiful. So strange. Everything made with such striking craftsmanship and detail. And all this in just some tunnels hundreds of feet beneath the moon’s surface. She couldn’t imagine how stunning the palace itself must be.

They reached another set of double doors inset with an artfully rendered map showing the entirety of the maglev system.

“This is the platform,” said Iko, the only one of them not panting.

“I’ll go out first,” said Cinder. “If anyone is out there, I’ll use a glamour to make them see us as members of Levana’s court. Any thaumaturges we kill on sight. Everyone else we ignore.”

“What about guards?” said Iko.

“Guards are easy to control. Let me deal with them.” She adjusted the scratchy gloves Kai had given her, then opened her thoughts, prepared to detect the bioelectricity off anyone who might have been on the platform. She pressed her palm against the doors. At her touch, they divided into four sections that spiraled into the walls. Cinder stepped onto the platform.

Empty.

She couldn’t imagine it would be that way for long.

Three shimmering white shuttles waited on the rails. They ran for the first one. Cinder let the others climb in first, ready to call up a glamour at the first sign of someone approaching, but the platform remained silent. Wolf grabbed Cinder and dragged her in with them.

“How do we work this thing?” Iko cried, pounding at the control screen. The shuttle remained open and motionless. “Shut door! Move! Get us out of here!”

“It won’t work for you,” said Wolf, leaning past Iko to press all five fingertips against the screen. It lit up and the doors glided shut.

It was a false sense of protection, but Cinder couldn’t help a breath of relief.

A tranquil voice filled the shuttle. “Welcome, Alpha Ze’ev Kesley, Lunar Special Operative Number 962. Where shall I take you?”

He glanced at Cinder.

She stared at the screen, sifting through the possibilities. Giving directions to RM-9 was a sure way of leading Levana straight to them. She pulled up the map of Luna on her retina display, trying to strategize the best route, one that would lead Levana off their track.

“WS-1,” said Thorne. He was slumped on the floor between the two upholstered benches, his hands draped over his knees, his head against the wall. Between the disheartened expression and collapsed posture, he was almost unrecognizable. But at his voice, the shuttle rose up on the magnetic force beneath the rails and started racing away from Artemisia.

“Waste salvage?” Iko said.

Thorne shrugged. “I thought it would be good to have a Plan B in case something like this happened.”

After a short silence, in which Iko’s internal workings hummed, she said, “And Plan B is to go to the waste salvage sector?”

Thorne looked up. His voice was neutral as he explained, “It’s a short trip from Artemisia, so we won’t be giving Levana too much time to regroup and send people after us before we get out of this shuttle. And it’s one of the most connected sectors on Luna, given that everyone has waste. There are fifteen maglev tunnels branching out from that one platform. We can go on foot for a ways, throw them off our course, then start doub—”

“Don’t say it,” said Cinder. “We don’t know if we’ll be recorded in here.”

Thorne shut his mouth and nodded.

Cinder knew he’d been about to say they could start doubling back toward RM-9. She focused in on sector WS-1 on the map in her head, and Thorne was right. It was a smart plan. She couldn’t believe she hadn’t thought of it herself. “Good call, Thorne.”

He shrugged again, without enthusiasm. “Criminal mastermind, remember?”

Cinder sagged onto the bench beside Wolf, allowing her body a brief respite from the pumping adrenaline. “The system recognized you.”