Текст книги "Cress"

Автор книги: Marissa Meyer

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Oh, to have styled her hair that morning. To have worn the dress that didn’t have a hole in the collar. Had she even brushed her teeth since she’d eaten breakfast? She couldn’t remember, and now she was sure that she had bits of spinach from her freeze-dried eggs Florentine stuck between them.

“Here, let me speak to her.”

Shuffling from the screen.

“Hello?” A girl again. “I know you can hear me. I’m sorry my friend is such a wing nut. You can just ignore him.”

“That’s usually what we do,” said the other feminine voice.

Cress searched hastily for a mirror or anything that could pass for one.

“We need to talk to you. I’m … This is Cinder. The mechanic who fixed the android?”

The back of Cress’s hand smacked into her clothes hamper. It collided with her wheeled chair, which was launched halfway across the room where it hit the far desk and sent a half-full cup of water tipping and wobbling. Cress froze, her eyes going wide as the glass teetered toward the memory drive that housed Little Cress.

“Um, hello? Is this a good time?”

The cup came to rest straight and still once more, not a drop having spilled.

Cress slowly exhaled.

This was not how this meeting was supposed to go. This was not the fantasy she’d dreamed up a hundred times. What had she said in all those dreams? How had she acted? Who had that person been?

All she could think of was the burning mortification of the country-western dancer (now face your partner and do-si-do!) and her magpie-nest hair, her sweating palms and her deafening pulse.

She squeezed her eyes shut and forced herself to focus, to think.

She was not a silly little girl hiding beneath her desk. She was—she was—

An actress.

A gorgeous, poised, talented actress. And she was wearing a sequined dress that sparkled like stars, one that would mesmerize anyone who saw her. She was not one to question her own power to charm those around her, any more than a thaumaturge would question her ability to manipulate a crowd. She was breathtaking. She was—

Still hiding under the desk.

“Are you there?”

A snort. “Yeah, this is going really well.” Carswell Thorne.

Cress flinched, but her breaths were becoming less sporadic as she cocooned herself in the fantasy. “This is a drama set,” she whispered, quiet enough that they couldn’t hear her. She forced it into her imagination. This was not her bedroom, her sanctuary, her prison. This was a drama set, with cameras and lights and dozens of directors and producers and android-assistants milling about.

And she was an actress.

“Little Cress, pause fitness programming.”

The screens halted, the room going silent, and Cress crawled out from beneath the desk.

Cinder was sitting before the screen now, with Carswell Thorne hovering over her shoulder. Cress glanced at him long enough to catch a smile that was perhaps meant to be apologetic, but only served to make her heart skitter.

“Hi,” said Linh Cinder. “Sorry to surprise you like that. Do you remember me? We spoke a couple weeks ago, on the day of the coronation and—”

“Y-yes, of course,” she stammered. Her knees started to shake as she surreptitiously dragged her chair back toward her and sat down. “I’m glad you’re all right.” She forced herself to focus on Linh Cinder. Not on Carswell Thorne. If she only refrained from meeting his gaze again, she would manage. She would not fall apart.

And yet the temptation to fix her eyes on him was still there, tugging at her.

“Oh, thanks,” said Cinder. “I wasn’t sure … I mean, do you follow Earthen news? Do you know what’s been happening since—”

“I know everything.”

Cinder paused.

Cress realized her words had come out all mushed together, and she reminded herself to enunciate when she was playing such a sophisticated role. She forced herself to sit up a bit straighter.

“I follow all the newsfeeds,” she clarified. “I knew you were spotted in France, and I’ve been tracking your ship, so I knew it hadn’t been destroyed, but I still didn’t know whether you’d been injured, or what had happened, and I’ve been trying to establish the D-COMM link but you never responded.” She deflated a little, her fingers tying knots into her hair. “But I am glad to see that you’re all right.”

“Yes, yes, she’s fine, we’re fine, everybody’s fine,” said Thorne, perching an elbow on Cinder’s shoulder and leaning toward the screen with furrowed brows. Meeting his eyes was unavoidable, and an involuntary squeak slipped past her lips—a sound she’d never heard herself make before. “Did you just say you’ve been tracking our ship?”

She opened her mouth, but shut it a moment later when no sound followed. Finally, she managed a brittle nod.

Thorne squinted at her as if trying to figure out if she were lying. Or merely an idiot.

She longed to crawl back beneath the desk.

“Really,” he drawled. “And who do you work for again?”

You are an actress. An actress!

“Mistress,” she said, forcing the word. “Mistress Sybil. She ordered me to find you, but I haven’t told her anything—and I won’t, you don’t have to worry about that. I—I’ve been jamming the radar signals, making sure surveillance satellites are faced the other way when you pass, that sort of thing. So no one else could find you.” She hesitated, realizing that four faces were gaping at her as if all her hair had just fallen out. “You must have noticed that you haven’t been caught yet?”

Lifting an eyebrow, Cinder slid her gaze over to Thorne, who let out a sudden laugh.

“All this time we thought Cinder was casting some witchy spell on the other ships and it’s been you?”

Cinder frowned, but Cress couldn’t tell who her annoyance was directed at. “I guess we owe you a huge thanks.”

Cress’s shoulders jerked into an uncomfortable shrug. “It wasn’t that difficult. Finding you was the hardest part, but anyone could have figured it out. And sneaking ships around the galaxy is something Lunars have been doing for years.”

“I have a price on my head large enough to buy the Province of Japan,” said Cinder. “If anyone could have figured it out, they would have by now. So, really, thank you.”

A blush crept down her neck.

Thorne jabbed Cinder in the arm. “Soften her up with flattery. Good strategy.”

Cinder rolled her eyes. “Look. The reason we’re contacting you is because we need your help. Evidently more than I realized.”

“Yes,” Cress said emphatically, unwrapping the hair from her wrists. “Yes. Whatever you need.”

Thorne beamed. “See? Why can’t you all be this agreeable?”

The second girl smacked him on the shoulder. “She doesn’t even know what we want her to do yet.” Cress really looked at her for the first time. She had curly red hair, a collection of freckles over her nose, and curves that were unfairly exaggerated next to Cinder, who was all angles in comparison. The man beside her dwarfed them both and had brown hair that stuck up in every direction, faded scars that hinted at more than his share of scuffles, and a recent bruise on his jaw.

Cress tried her best to look confident. “What do you need help with?”

“When I talked to you before, on the day of the ball, you told me that you’ve been spying on Earth’s leaders and reporting back to Queen Levana. And you also knew that once Levana became empress, she planned on having Kai assassinated so she could have total control of the Commonwealth and use that power to launch a full-scale attack on the other Earthen countries.”

Cress nodded, perhaps too vigorously.

“Well, we need the people of Earth to know what lengths she’s willing to go to in order to stake claim to Earth, not just the Commonwealth. If the other leaders knew that she’s been spying on them all this time, and that she has every intention of invading their countries the first chance she gets, there’s no way they would condone this wedding. They wouldn’t accept her as a world leader, the wedding would be canceled, and … with any luck, that’ll give us a chance to … er. Well, the ultimate goal is to dethrone her entirely.”

Cress licked her lips. “So … what do you want me to do?”

“Evidence. I need evidence of what Levana’s planning, of what’s she’s been doing.”

Pondering, Cress sank back in her chair. “I have copies of all the video surveillance from over the years. It would be easy to pull up some of the most incriminating vids and send them to you over this link.”

“That’s perfect!”

“It’s circumstantial, though. It would only prove that Levana is interested in what the other leaders are doing, not necessarily that she plans on invading them, and I don’t think I have any documentation about her wanting to murder His Majesty, either. It’s largely my own suspicions, and speculation on the things my mistress has said.”

“That’s fine, we’ll take whatever you have. Levana already attacked us once. I don’t think Earthens will take much convincing that she would do it again.”

Cress nodded, but her enthusiasm had waned. She cleared her throat. “My mistress will recognize the footage. She’ll know it was me who gave it to you.”

Cinder’s smile began to fade, and Cress knew she didn’t need to clarify her point. She would be killed for her betrayal.

“I’m sorry,” said Cinder. “If there was any way for us to get you away from her, we would, but we can’t risk coming to Luna. Getting through port security—”

“I’m not on Luna!” The words tumbled out of Cress, coaxed on by a twist of hope. “You don’t have to come to Luna. I’m not there.”

Cinder scanned the room behind Cress. “But you said before that you couldn’t contact Earth, so you’re not…”

“I’m on a satellite. I can give you my coordinates, and I checked weeks ago if your Rampion has compatible docking gear and it does, or at least the podships that come standard with it do. You … you still have the podships, right?”

“You’re on a satellite?” said Thorne.

“Yes. Set to a sixteen-hour polar orbit around Earth.”

“How long have you been living in a satellite?”

She twisted her hair around her fingers. “Seven years … or so.”

“Seven years? By yourself?”

“Y-yes.” She shrugged. “Mistress restocks my food and water and I have net access, so it isn’t so bad, but … well…”

“But you’re a prisoner,” said Thorne.

“I prefer damsel in distress,” she murmured.

One side of Thorne’s mouth quirked up, into that perfect half smile he’d had in his graduation photo. A look that was a little bit devious, and all sorts of charming.

Cress’s heart stopped, but if they noticed her melting into her chair, they didn’t say anything.

The red-haired girl leaned back, removing herself from the frame, though Cress could still hear her. “It’s not like we can do anything that will make Levana want to find us even more than she already does.”

“Plus,” said Cinder, exchanging looks with her companions, “do we really want to leave someone in Levana’s care who knows how to track our ship?”

Cress’s fingers began to tingle where her hair was cutting off circulation, but she hardly noticed.

Thorne tilted his head and peered at her through the screen. “All right, damsel. Send over those coordinates.”

Six

“Moving on to the dinner service. Her Lunar Majesty did approve the traditional eight-course feast following the ceremony since last we spoke. For that, I suggest we begin with a quartet of sashimi, followed by a light soup. Perhaps imitation shark’s fin soup, which I think would strike a nice balance between old traditions and modern sensibilities.” The wedding planner paused. When neither Kai, who was laid out on his office’s sofa with one arm draped across his eyes, nor his chief adviser, Konn Torin, offered any objections, she cleared her throat and continued, “For our third course, I thought a nice braised pork belly with green mango relish. That would then lead into our vegetarian entrée, for which I recommended potol with poppy seeds on a bed of banana leaves. For the fifth course I was going to talk to the caterers about some sort of shellfish curry, maybe with a vibrant coconut-lime sauce. Does Your Majesty have any preference on lobster, prawns, or scallops?”

Kai peeled his arm off his face, just enough to peer at the wedding coordinator through his fingers. Tashmi Priya must have been well into her forties, and yet she had the sort of skin that hadn’t aged a day past twenty-nine. Her hair, on the other hand, was making a slow transition into gray, and he thought it might have accelerated over the past week, as she was the one person in charge of communicating the bride’s wishes to the rest of the wedding coordinators. He didn’t for a moment underestimate the stress she was under to be working with Queen Levana.

Luckily, it seemed to him that she was very, very good at her job. She’d accepted the role of planning the royal wedding without a moment’s hesitation, and hadn’t balked once at Levana’s demands. Her professional perfectionism was evident in every decision she made, even in how she presented herself, with deceptively subtle makeup and not a hair astray. This simplicity was set against a wardrobe of traditional Indian saris, lush silk shot through with jewel tones and complicated embroidery. The combination gave Priya a regal air that Kai knew, at that moment, he was lacking.

“Scallops, lobster…,” he murmured, struggling to pay attention. Giving up, he covered his eyes again. “No, I have no preference. Whatever Levana wants.”

A brief silence before he heard the click of fingernails against her portscreen. “Perhaps we’ll come back to the feast menu later. As for the ceremony, do you approve of the queen’s choice of Africa’s Prime Minister Kamin as your officiant?”

“I can think of no one more suitable.”

“Excellent. And have you given any thought to your wedding vows?”

Kai snorted. “Delete anything that has to do with love, respect, or joy, and I’ll sign on the dotted line.”

“Your Majesty,” said Torin, in that way he had of making the title of respect sound like a chastisement.

Sighing, Kai sat up. Torin was in the seat opposite Priya, his hand wrapped around a short glass filled with nothing but ice cubes. He was not normally one to imbibe, which reminded Kai that these were trying times for everyone.

He slid his attention back to Priya, whose expression was professionally impassive. “What do you suggest, for the vows?”

Her eyelids crinkled at the corners, almost apologetically, and he detected something horrible about to come his way. “Her Lunar Majesty has suggested that you write your own vows, Your Majesty.”

“Oh, stars.” He fell back down into the cushions. “Please, anything but that.”

A hesitation. “Would you like me to write them for you, Your Majesty?”

“Is that in your job description?”

“Ensuring that this wedding goes smoothly is my job description.”

He peered up at the ornate tasseled chandeliers that lined the ceiling. After a complete sweep of the office that had taken his security team a week to complete, they had found a single recording device, smaller than his fingernail, embedded in one of those chandeliers. It was the only device they had found. There was no question that it was Lunar, and that Kai had been right all along—Levana was spying on him.

His personal quarters had also been swept, though nothing had been discovered there. To date, these were the only rooms where he allowed himself to speak freely about his betrothed, though there was always a warning hum in his head. He really hoped the security detail hadn’t missed anything.

“Thank you, Tashmi-jiĕ. I’ll think on it.”

With a nod, Priya stood. “I have an appointment with the caterer this afternoon. I’ll see if he has any input on the remaining courses.”

Kai forced himself to stand, though the action was surprisingly difficult. The stress of the past weeks had caused him to lose a few pounds, and yet he felt heavier than ever, as if the weight of every person in the Commonwealth were pressing down on him.

“Thank you for everything,” he said, bowing while she gathered her color swatches and fabric samples.

She returned his bow. “We will speak again in the morning, before Thaumaturge Park’s arrival.”

He groaned. “Is that tomorrow already?”

Torin cleared his throat.

“I mean—fantastic! He was such a joy to have around the first time.”

Priya’s smile was fleeting as she slipped out the door.

Restraining a melodramatic sigh, Kai crumpled back onto the sofa. He knew he was being childish, but he felt he had the right to lash out occasionally, especially here in the privacy of his own office. Everywhere else he was expected to smile and proclaim how much he was looking forward to the wedding. How beneficial this alliance would be for the Commonwealth. How he had no doubt that his marriage to Queen Levana would serve to unite the people of Earth and Luna in a way that hadn’t been seen for centuries and would no doubt lead to greater appreciation and understanding of each other’s cultures. It was the first step toward doing away with years of hatred and ignorance and who on Earth did he think he was fooling, anyway?

He hated Levana. He hated himself for giving in to her. He hated that his father had managed to keep her and her threats of war at bay for years and years, and within weeks of Kai taking the throne, he’d let everything fall apart.

He hated that Queen Levana had probably been planning this from the moment it was announced that Emperor Rikan, Kai’s father, was ill, and that Kai had played right into her hands.

He hated that she was going to win.

The ice in Torin’s glass clacked and popped as he leaned forward. “You look pale, Your Majesty. Is there anything I can assist you with? Anything you would like to discuss?”

Kai pushed his bangs off his forehead. “Be honest, Torin. Do you think I’m making a mistake?”

Torin considered the question for a long moment, before setting the glass aside. “Sixteen thousand Earthens were killed when Luna attacked us. Sixteen thousand deaths in only a few hours. That was eleven days ago. I cannot fathom how many lives were spared because of the compromise you made with Queen Levana.” He steepled his fingers over his lap. “And we cannot forget how many lives will be saved once we have access to her letumosis antidote.”

Kai bit the inside of his cheek. These were the same arguments he’d been repeating to himself. He was doing the right thing. He was saving lives. He was protecting his people.

“I know the sacrifice you’re making, Your Majesty.”

“Do you?” His shoulders tensed. “Because I suspect she’s going to try to kill me. Once she has what she wants. Once she’s been coronated.”

Torin inhaled sharply, but Kai got the impression that this wasn’t news to Torin after all. “We won’t let that happen.”

“Can we stop it?”

“Your wedding will not be a death sentence. We have time to figure out a way. She … still wants an heir, after all.”

Kai couldn’t stifle a grimace. “Very, very small consolation.”

“I know. But that makes you valuable to her, at least for the time being.”

“Does it? You know the reputation Lunars have. I’m not sure Levana cares one bit who fathers a child, as long as someone does. And wasn’t Princess Selene born without anyone knowing who her father was? I’m really not convinced Levana needs me for anything other than saying ‘I do’ and handing her a crown.”

Much as he hated to admit it, the thought was almost a relief.

Torin didn’t try to argue against him. He just shook his head. “But the Commonwealth does need you, and they will need you that much more once Levana becomes empress. Your Majesty, I won’t let anything happen to you.”

Kai recognized an almost fatherly tone. There was affection there, where normally there was only patience and veiled frustration. In some ways, he felt like Torin had become the true emperor once his father had passed away. Torin was the solid one, the decisive one, the one who always knew what was best for the country. But looking at his adviser now, that impression began to shift. Because Torin had a look that Kai had never seen directed toward himself before. Respect, maybe. Or admiration. Or even trust.

He sat up a little straighter. “You’re right. The decision has been made and now I have to make the best of it. Waiting to be trampled under Levana’s whims won’t help anything. I have to figure out how to defend myself against her.”

Torin nodded, just shy of a smile. “We will think of something.”

For a moment, Kai felt peculiarly bolstered. Torin was not an optimist by nature. If he believed there was a way, then Kai would believe it too. A way to stay alive, a way to protect his country even after he’d cursed them all with a tyrant for an empress. A way to protect himself from a woman who could control his thoughts with a bat of her lashes.

Even as her husband, he would continue to defy Levana for as long as he could.

Nainsi, Kai’s android assistant, appeared in the office doorway, holding a tray with jasmine tea and hot washcloths. Her sensor light flashed. “Daily reports, Your Majesty?”

“Yes, thank you. Come in.”

He took one of the washcloths off the tray as she rolled by, chafing his fingers with the steaming cotton.

Nainsi set the tray on Kai’s desk and turned to face him and Torin, launching into the day’s reports that blissfully had nothing to do with wedding vows or eight-course dinners.

“Lunar Thaumaturge Aimery Park is scheduled to arrive tomorrow at 15:00, along with fourteen members of the Lunar Court. A list of guest names and titles has been transferred to your portscreen. A welcome dinner will commence at 19:00, to be followed by evening cocktails. Tashmi Priya will be in attendance at both the dinner and cocktail reception to begin communicating wedding plans to Thaumaturge Park. We’ve extended an invitation for Her Lunar Majesty to join us via netscreen conferencing, but our offer was not accepted.”

“How disappointing,” Kai drawled.

“We are expecting a resurgence of protestors outside the palace with the arrival of the Lunar court, which will likely continue through the date of the wedding ceremony. We have arranged for military reinforcements, beginning tomorrow morning, to ensure the security of our guests. I will alert you should any protests become violent.”

Kai stopped cleaning his hands. “Are we expecting them to be violent?”

“Negative, Your Majesty. The head of palace security has stated this is only a precaution.”

“Fine. Go on.”

“The weekly letumosis report estimates thirty thousand plague-related deaths during the week of 3 September throughout the Commonwealth. The palace research team did not have any progress to report on their ongoing search for an antidote.”

Kai traded withering looks with Torin. Thirty thousand deaths. It almost made him wish the wedding were tomorrow, so he could get his hands on Levana’s antidote that much sooner.

Almost.

“We have received word that the American Republic, Australia, and the European Federation have all instituted manhunts for the Lunar soldiers responsible for the attacks, and claim to be holding multiple suspects as prisoners of war. So far, Luna has not threatened retaliation or made any attempt to bargain for their freedom, other than the previously made agreement that all soldiers will be removed from Earthen soil following the coronation ceremony on the twenty-fifth.”

“Let’s hope it stays that way,” Kai muttered. “The last thing this alliance needs are more political complications.”

“I will keep you posted on any developments, Your Majesty. The last item to report is that we’ve received word from Samhain Bristol, parliament representative from Toronto, East Canada Province, United Kingdom, that he has declined his invitation to attend the wedding ceremony, on behalf of his refusal to accept Lunar Queen Levana as a suitable world leader within the Earthen Union.”

Torin groaned, as Kai rolled his eyes toward the ceiling. “Oh, for all the stars. Does he think anyone feels like she would be a suitable leader?”

“We can’t blame him for this position, Your Majesty,” said Torin, though Kai could hear the irritation in his tone, “or for wanting to make this statement. He has his own people to be concerned with.”

“I’m aware of that, but if this starts a trend among the Union leaders, Levana will be livid. Can you imagine her response if no one shows up for the wedding?” Kai dragged the now-cool washcloth down his face. “She’ll see this as a personal offense. If we’re trying to avoid another attack, I don’t think angering her is the way to do it.”

“I agree,” said Torin, standing and adjusting his suit jacket. “I will schedule a comm with Bristol-dàren and see if we can’t come to a compromise. I suggest we keep this information close for the time being, as to avoid giving our other invited guests any wayward ideas.”

“Thank you, Torin.” Kai stood and matched Torin’s bow, before his adviser slipped out of the office.

Kai barely resisted the urge to collapse back on the sofa. He had another meeting in thirty minutes, and there were still plans to review and reports to read and comms to respond to and—

“Your Majesty.”

He started. “Yes, Nainsi?”

“There was one additional report that I thought might be best to discuss with you in private.”

He blinked. There were very few subjects that he didn’t discuss with Torin. “What is it?”

“An association was recently discovered by my intelligence-synapses. It involves Linh Cinder.”

His stomach dropped. It would be that topic—that one topic that he couldn’t talk to even his most trusted adviser about. Every time he heard her name, he was filled with barely constrained panic, certain that Cinder had been found. She had been taken into custody. She had already been killed. Even though he should have been glad that his country’s most-wanted fugitive had been captured, the thought made him ill.

“What about her?” he said, tossing the washcloth back onto the tray and perching on the arm of the sofa.

“I may have deduced the reason that she was in Rieux, France.”

The tirade of worried thoughts evaporated as quickly as they had come. Sensing a headache, Kai massaged the spot above his nose, relieved that one more hour had come and gone and Cinder was still missing. Which meant she was still safe.

“Rieux, France,” he said, reorienting himself. Everyone had known that the ship Cinder was on would need to return to Earth eventually, for fuel and possible maintenance. Her choice of a small town—any small town—had never struck him as suspicious. “Go on.”

“When Linh Cinder removed the D-COMM chip that had temporarily shut down my programming, I transmitted information to her about Michelle Benoit.”

“The pilot?” Kai had practically memorized the information Nainsi had gathered regarding everyone who had even the most tenuous connection to the missing Princess Selene. Michelle Benoit had been one of their top suspects for someone who had possibly helped to hide the princess.

“Yes, Your Majesty. Linh Cinder would have known her name and her previous affiliation with the European military.”

“So?”

“After retiring, Michelle Benoit purchased a farm. That farm is located near Rieux, France, and it was on that property where the stolen ship first landed.”

“So Cinder went there because … do you think she was looking for Princess Selene?”

“That is my assumption, Your Majesty.”

He jumped to his feet and began pacing. “Has anyone spoken to Michelle Benoit? Has she been questioned? Did she see Cinder, talk to her?”

“I am sorry, Your Majesty, but Michelle Benoit disappeared over four weeks ago.”

He stalled. “Disappeared?”

“Her granddaughter, Scarlet Benoit, has gone missing as well. We know only that she boarded a maglev train in Toulouse, France, en route for Paris.”

“Can’t we track them?”

“Michelle Benoit’s ID chip was found in her home the day she went missing. Scarlet Benoit’s ID chip, it appears, has been destroyed.”

Kai slumped. Another dead-end.

“But why would Cinder go there? Why would she care about finding Princess…” He hesitated. “Unless she’s trying to help me.”

“I cannot follow your reasoning, Your Majesty.”

He faced Nainsi again. “Maybe she’s trying to help me. Cinder knows that if she finds the princess, it could be the end of Levana’s rule. I wouldn’t have to marry her. She would probably be executed for treason. Cinder risked her life going to that farm, and she did it … she may have done it for me.”

He could hear Nainsi’s fan whirring, before she said, “I might suggest the alternate explanation that Linh Cinder’s motives stem from Queen Levana’s desire to have her found and executed, Your Majesty.”

Face flushing, he dropped his gaze to the hand-woven rug beneath his feet. “Right. Or that.”

But he couldn’t shake the feeling that Cinder’s new objective was about more than self-preservation. After all, she’d come to the ball to warn him against marrying Queen Levana, and that decision had nearly gotten her killed.

“Do you think she found anything? About the princess?”

“I have no way of discerning that information.”

He paced around his desk, staring thoughtfully at the vast city beyond his office window, glass and steel glinting in the afternoon sunlight. “Find out everything you can about this Michelle Benoit. Maybe Cinder is onto something. Maybe Princess Selene is still out there.”

Hope fluttered again, brightening with every moment. His search for the princess had been abandoned weeks ago, when his life had become too tumultuous to focus on anything other than keeping war at bay. Pacifying Queen Levana and her temper. Preparing himself for a life at her side, as her husband … and that, only if he was lucky enough not to be murdered before their first anniversary.

He’d been so distracted that he’d forgotten the reason he’d been searching for Princess Selene in the first place.

If she was alive, she would be the rightful heir to the Lunar throne. She could end Levana’s reign.

She could save them all.

Seven

Dr. Dmitri Erland perched on the edge of his hotel bed, with the worn cotton quilt pooling around his ankles. All his attention was on the battered netscreen on the wall, the one where the sound cut out randomly and the picture liked to tremble and flicker at inopportune moments. Unlike the last time a Lunar representative had come to Earth, this time the arrival was being internationally broadcast. This time, there was no hiding the purpose of the visit.