Winter

Twenty-One

At some point during the excitement following Emperor Kaito’s arrival, Jacin had placed himself in front of Winter—ever her protector—and she gathered up the back of his shirt’s material in one fist. His presence was part comfort, part annoyance. He kept blocking her view.

Her sight was clear as daybreak, though, as she watched four figures dash through the exit that led down to the maglev shuttles. The doors slammed shut to a volley of gunfire. Though they had been too far away to see clearly, Winter was certain one of them was Linh Cinder.

Her dear missing cousin, Princess Selene.

“Follow them!” Levana shouted. The guards who had been sent to search the emperor’s ship were at the exit within seconds, trying to pry the doors open, but they wouldn’t budge.

Levana wheeled around to face Sir Jerrico Solis. “Send one team through the palace to the lakeside entrances, another through the city. Try to cut them off at the platform.”

Jerrico clasped a hand to his fist and was gone, summoning eight other guards to follow.

“Aimery,” Levana barked, “see to it that all shuttles leaving Artemisia are stopped. Have them searched, along with all connecting tunnels and platforms. They are not to make it out of the city. And find out how they were able to get through those doors!”

Aimery bowed. “I have already summoned the technician. We will have the entire system locked down.”

Nostrils flaring, Levana straightened her spine and turned to face the emperor. He was standing near the back of their small group—alone, but for a handful of Earthen guards and his adviser. Yet he didn’t look afraid. Winter thought he should have looked afraid, but his lips were pressed together in a strained effort not to smile.

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.