When one of the maids reaches for my earrings, trying to take away the last bit of my old life, a surge of fear pulses through me. “Don’t touch them!”
The girl jumps back, blinking quickly, and the others freeze at my outburst.
“Sorry, I—” A Silver wouldn’t apologize. I clear my throat, collecting myself. “Leave the earrings.” My voice sounds strong, hard—regal. “You can change everything else, but leave the earrings.”
The three cheap pieces of metal, each one a brother, aren’t going anywhere.
“The color suits you.”
I whirl around to see the maids stooped in identical bows. And standing over them: Cal. Suddenly, I’m very glad the makeup covers the blush spreading over me.
He gestures quickly, his hand moving in a brushing motion, and the maids scurry from the room like mice fleeing from a cat.
“I’m sort of new to this royal thing, but I’m not sure you’re supposed to be here. In my room,” I say, forcing as much disdain into my voice as I can muster. After all, it’s his fault I’m in this forsaken mess.
He takes a few steps toward me and, on instinct, I take a step back. My feet catch on the hem of my dress, making me choose between not moving or falling over. I don’t know which is less desirable.
“I came to apologize, something I can’t really do with an audience.” He stops short, noting my discomfort. A muscle twitches in his cheek as he looks me over, probably remembering the hopeless girl who tried to pickpocket him only last night. I look nothing like her now. “I’m sorry for getting you into this, Mare.”
“Mareena.” The name even tastes wrong. “That’s my name, remember?”
“Then it’s a good thing Mare’s a suitable nickname.”
“I don’t think anything about me is suitable.”
Cal’s eyes rake over me, and my skin burns under his gaze. “How do you like Lucas?” he finally says, taking an obliging step back.
The Samos guard, the first decent Silver I’ve met here. “He’s all right, I suppose.” Perhaps the queen will take him away if I reveal how gentle the officer was to me.
“Lucas is a good man. His family thinks him weak for his kindness,” he adds, eyes darkening a little. As if he knows the feeling. “But he’ll serve you well, and fairly. I’ll make sure of it.”
How thoughtful. He’s given me a kind jailer. But I bite my tongue. It won’t do any good to snap at his mercy. “Thank you, Your Highness.”
The spark returns to his eyes, and a smirk to his lips. “You know my name is Cal.”
“And you know my name, don’t you?” I tell him bitterly. “You know what I come from.”
He barely nods, as if ashamed.
“You have to take care of them.” My family. Their faces swim before my eyes, already so far away. “All of them, for as long as you can.”
“Of course I will.” He takes a step toward me, closing the gap between us. “I’m sorry,” he says again. The words resound in my head, echoing off a memory.
The wall of fire. The choking smoke. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.
It was Cal who caught me earlier, who kept me from escaping this awful place.
“Are you sorry for stopping my one chance of escape?”
“You mean if you got past the Sentinels, Security, the walls, the woods, back to your village to wait until the queen herself hunted you down?” he replies, taking my accusations in stride. “Stopping you was the best thing for you and your family.”
“I could’ve gotten away. You don’t know me.”
“I know the queen would tear the world apart looking for the little lightning girl.”
“Don’t call me that.” The nickname stings more than the fake name I’m still getting used to. Little lightning girl. “That’s what your mother calls me.”
He laughs bitterly. “She’s not my mother. She’s Maven’s, not mine.” Just by the set of his jaw, I know not to press the issue.
“Oh,” is all I can say, my voice very small. It fades quickly, a faint echo against the vaulted ceiling. I crane my neck, looking around at my new room for the first time since I came in. It’s finer than anything I’ve ever seen—marble and glass, silk and feathers. The light has changed, shifting to the orange color of dusk. Night is coming. And with it, the rest of my life.
“I woke up this morning as one person,” I mutter, more to myself than to him, “and now I’m supposed to be someone else entirely.”
“You can do this.” I feel him take a step toward me, his heat filling the room in a way that makes my skin prickle. But I don’t look up. I won’t.
“How do you know?”
“Because you must.” He bites his lip, eyes shifting over me. “As beautiful as this world is, it’s just as dangerous. People who are not useful, people who make mistakes, they can be removed. You can be removed.”
And I will be. Someday. But that is not the only threat I face. “So the moment I mess up could be my last?”
He doesn’t speak, but I can see the answer in his eyes. Yes.
My fingers fiddle with the silver belt at my waist, pulling it tight. If this was a dream, I would wake up, but I don’t. This is really happening. “What about me? About”—I hold out my hands, glaring at the infernal things—“this?”
In response, Cal smiles. “I think you’ll get the hang of it.”
Then he holds up his own bare hand. A strange contraption at his wrist, something like a bracelet with two metal ends, clicks, producing sparks. Instead of disappearing in a flash, the sparks glow and burst into red flame, giving off a blast of heat. He’s a burner, he controls heat and fire, I remember. He’s a prince, and a dangerous one at that. But the flame disappears as quickly as it came, leaving only Cal’s encouraging smile and the humming of cameras hidden somewhere, watching over everything.
The masked Sentinels on the edge of my vision are a constant reminder of my new position. I’m nearly a princess, engaged to the second most eligible bachelor in the country. And I’m a lie. Cal is long gone, leaving me with my guards. Lucas isn’t so bad, but the others are stern and quiet, never looking me in the eye. The guards and even Lucas are wardens to keep me imprisoned in my own skin, red behind a silver curtain that can never be pulled away. If I fall, if I even slip, I will die. And others will die for my failure.
As they escort me toward the feast, I go over the story the queen drilled into me, the pretty tale she was going to tell the court. It’s simple, easy to remember, but it still makes me cringe.
I was born at the war front. My parents were killed in an attack on the camp. A Red soldier saved me from the rubble and brought me home to a wife who always wanted a daughter. They raised me in the village called the Stilts, and I was ignorant of my birthright or my ability until this morning. And now I am returned to my rightful place.
The thought makes me sick. My rightful place is at home, with my parents and Gisa and Kilorn. Not here.
The Sentinels lead the way through the maze of passages in the upper levels of the palace. Like the Spiral Garden, the architecture is all curves of stone, glass, and metal, slowly turning downward. Diamondglass is around every corner, showing breathtaking views of the marketplace, the river valley, and the woods beyond. From this height, I can see hills I didn’t know existed rising in the distance, silhouetted against the setting sun.