I don’t dare look directly at the Chief Architect beside him. But even from my peripheral view, I can see her figure turned fully toward me, her focus on what I’ll do.

  Adena stares up at me, waiting in the wake of my hesitation. In her gaze, I see the Striker with whom I’ve fought side by side, who had brought me baskets of pies after Corian’s death. Who would fashion endless gadgets to help me stay alive at the warfront. For a moment, we are no longer standing on opposite sides of the divide. We’re companions again.

  The crowd around us stirs restlessly, then begins chanting again. Some are chanting for her death; others are chanting something that takes me aback.

  Mercy. Mercy.

  Constantine rises, then lifts his arms. He raises his voice.

  “My Skyhunter moves to defend me,” he calls out, “but for this good performance, this excellent entertainment, I order the life of this Striker spared.” His eyes meet mine again. “May she entertain us again on another day.”

  Constantine is sparing Adena’s life.

  I don’t know if it’s because he wants to appease the restless crowds, or if he’s sending a message to his people that he can be a merciful ruler. I don’t know if this is his way of reasserting authority, a way to soothe the fraying nerves at the edges of his Federation, or a way to disguise my defiance to the public, that he is actually capitulating to my demand. But I don’t care.

  I drop to my knees before him anyway, on top of the maze structure, and bow my head in his direction. My subservience. My obedience to the Premier, on full display.

  Mercy granted.

  For a terrible moment, I think he will order his soldiers to kill Adena anyway.

  But he doesn’t. Instead, he nods at me and folds his arms, as if he expected my reaction all along.

  Nearby in the balcony, General Caitoman looks away in disgusted disappointment. The Chief Architect merely folds her arms.

  I’m shaking. I don’t know what this will mean for my mother. But if I continue to head down this path, I’ll reach a point of no return. Where I will do something I’ll regret for the rest of my life. Where my own mother would shake her head in grief at my action.

  Adena and I lock eyes a final time. She gives me a faint nod before the guards come. Then they grab her, and she’s escorted down the remaining path to the holding room at the end of the maze. The arena roars in delight over a stunningly entertaining game.

  Somewhere in the audience, Red is watching. I can feel the pity in him, the deep understanding of why I’d done what I did. He is proud of me. He is afraid for me.

  Fury simmers low in my stomach. Thank you, I force myself to say to Constantine through our bond.

  But his eyes remain cold, and his voice chills me to the bone.

  I wouldn’t, he answers.

  19

  RED

  As a child, I’d stand in this arena with my father at my side, Laeni sitting on his shoulders, and cheer as horses would thunder around the track. Or as prisoners were brought in to fight one another to the death. Or as traitors were executed.

  You’d always cheered. What else do you do? It’s supposed to be fun, isn’t it?

  Sometimes you’re the happiest when you’re most ignorant. Better not to know the truth and enjoy life as you know it. That you’re not witnessing a horror.

  But now I know, and the knowing is agony.

  For once, the walls that Talin has put up around her emotions crumble in this arena. Being this close to her again puts everything about her in greater clarity, and I feel the flood of her anguish and desperation and sadness. All I want is to reach out to her. I want to take her hand and lead her out of this place.

  As I focus on my bond with Talin, Jeran watches the maze with his hands balled into white-knuckled fists, his eyes fixed on Aramin. We look on helplessly as Tomm falls, then Pira. Jeran lets out a shuddering breath as Aramin reaches the safety of his gate, followed by Adena.

  And then we see Adena raise her gun toward Constantine.

  I see Constantine gesture for Talin to fly down to where Adena is making her stand.

  And I see Talin stand her ground, refusing to strike down her friend.

  Everything feels like a blur. I can’t believe what I’m seeing.

  Then Jeran leans toward me. His voice is hoarse and soft, but clear. “The Premier is ill today.”

  It’s only then that I notice he’s right. Constantine is leaning visibly against the edge of the balcony today, and his figure looks hunched, exhausted. Even the paint on his face can’t hide the hollows of his cheeks. We can see his weariness from here.

  Talin lifts into the air and soars back to the balcony amid a cacophony of cheers and boos from the crowd. Beside her, the seemingly invincible Skyhunter, Constantine looks even weaker.

  And if we can see it, surely the rest of the arena can too.

  I narrow my eyes at him. I can feel that Skyhunter rage tingling in my limbs, feel it stretching against the boundaries of my body, wanting to set my blood alight and unfurl my bladed wings.

  With a mighty effort, I pull myself back. Down below, soldiers emerge and pull Adena into the shadows behind the gates. The games are over, at least for today. I turn my focus on Talin as she stands beside Constantine. To my surprise, she is dry-eyed.

  And looking straight in our direction.

  I don’t know if she can see us here; her Skyhunter eyesight is keener than it should possibly be. But I return her stare anyway, willing her to hear me. My hands clench and unclench.

  I’m going to find a way back to your side. I’m going to free you.

  I swear everything on it.

  20

  TALIN

  I can’t stop thinking about Red.

  Long after the horrors of the arena have been left behind, long after the streets of the capital have quieted, I sit up in my bed with the moonlight slanting into my room, my arms wrapped around my legs. My eyes are closed. Constantine has fallen into an uneasy sleep, his dream state shallow and rhythmic in the way I’m used to sensing through our bond. I concentrate on keeping my emotions even, but my mind keeps replaying the feeling of Red’s heartbeat.

  Red is here in Cardinia. Here!

  My heart lurches even now, hours later, at the thought, and it takes all my effort to keep myself steady. I always feel Red’s heartbeat, of course, but the pulse of it had been so strong in the arena that I could look in the direction it came from and imagine him there in the stands. Even though he was far enough away that I couldn’t pinpoint exactly where he was, I knew it was him.

  It was him.

  I draw in a slow, shaky breath and let it out through my mouth, again and again.

  Maybe his presence had given me the courage to rage against the Premier, to stand there and refuse to kill Adena. Maybe I would have felt compelled to do it without him. I don’t know. I don’t know. All I remember is Adena’s eyes locked on mine, unrelenting and furious.

  She was ready to die at my hands. I could see that in her, the familiar look she used to get on the warfront whenever it looked like we might lose our lives at the hands of Ghosts.

  But I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. And her eyes had widened instead in disbelief. Not only had I rebelled against the Premier’s command in my mind, but Adena had sensed it. Seen it for herself. So had Red. I’d looked back at Constantine and dared him to punish me in front of that crowd by ordering his guards to kill Adena anyway.

  But he hadn’t. I knew he wouldn’t. If he did, the entire audience would have known that he’d been forced to make his other guards do something that I’d refused to do. They would have realized that his hold on his Skyhunter isn’t as solid as he’s promised and—worse—that I can act independently of his authority.

  Better to play along instead. Let the crowd think that Constantine had planned to pardon Adena of her actions all along, that she had performed so well in the maze the Premier himself felt generous and wanted her to live.

  But how long is he going to let her live? I know, deep in my bones, that he will make sure Adena and Aramin die in the next games. He’ll never let them survive and give me that satisfaction. This time I’m going to be forced to stand by, forced to watch the warfront family I’ve had since childhood be slaughtered for sport.

  The thought sends me shaking again. No, no, no. I can’t let this happen. But how can I possibly stop it by myself, when I’m trapped by the Premier’s side?

  I wince and clutch my head in my hands. This is going to hurt my mother. What was I thinking? But what else could I have done?

  My mother’s safety or Adena’s life. It is not a choice.

  Red, I call through our bond. I feel my voice echoing futilely, like sound through a tunnel with no end. Look what is happening to everyone I love. Why can’t you just stay away and protect yourself?

  I sit with my head in my hands and count the minutes. In the morning, I will have to walk back out there with Constantine. Stand ready at the Premier’s beck and call. Shadow General Caitoman on tours of the city. Dole out punishments as they see fit. The solstice celebrations will continue. There will be banquets and dancing. There will be another game, and this time I will see Adena and Aramin murdered, I know it. And I’ll have to attend all of it.

  Someday, I remind myself again and again. Someday, this will be over. The rebellion will unfurl, Raina and Mayor Elland will turn the country against Constantine, and the unrest stirring in all corners of the Federation will finally crack open. And I will be at the heart of it, taking him down.

  The thought of it is so clear and sharp that I immediately force my feelings back into line. Push all images of Raina out of my head. Stop thinking about Red. Stop thinking about Adena and Aramin. I focus on stilling my emotions until my heart beats at a normal pace again, slow and steady.

  I don’t know when I drift off. I’m only aware I’ve fallen asleep because when I suddenly stir, I am heading down a rope bridge suspended in a fog of darkness. Down below is an endless chasm. And somewhere ahead is a land of pale mist, its air pulsing with the slight, steady rhythm of Red’s heart.

  I must have opened myself up again, enough to let my link with Red come through. Our dreams have bound us together, letting us meet once more in this singular state of unconsciousness.

  The realization sends me into a new panic. No, Red. Go away.

  But in this state, I’m helpless. Gradually, Red’s mind responds to mine. Fragments of his surroundings materialize around me.

  He’s somewhere on the outskirts of Cardinia, outside of the city and beyond the bridges that stretch over the river encircling the capital. Out here, there are cheaper installations displayed in the same pattern as those inside the city—narrower thoroughfares radiating out from the city walls, with old bits of twisted steel taken from stolen fields and razed forests arching along their paths. Messier apartment towers sprawl outward. Many of them are worn down, some of them painted on. One of these towers casts its shadow into the alley where Red’s camped for the night.

  He’s curled on the ground in some quiet, abandoned corner. And beside him is a companion—a Striker with a distinct, graceful presence.

  Jeran? Jeran! All the breath leaves me in a rush.

  In my dream, I feel as if I’m standing right at his side. The moonlight cuts blue and gray across the narrow alley, slanting an arc of light against his face.

  Red opens his eyes and sits up. Then he stares directly at me. Is he really awake? At first, his stare looks wild, like he can’t quite be sure where he is. Strands of his metallic hair cling to the side of his face.

  “Talin?” he whispers aloud. Then he blinks and really sees me for the first time. He realizes we have linked in our dreams. And his entire face changes.

  He reaches for me before I can say anything more, then pauses, his hands stopping before they touch me as if he’s afraid.

  Why are you here? I whisper in our dream this time, and the sound seems to come out like a sob. I told you to stay in the wilds outside Newage.

  He doesn’t speak right away. Instead, he bows his head. I am next to him, but not. I can feel the stir of his breath against me, but he feels far away, the warmth of him dampened. I can feel every painful edge of his emotions, but I cannot see the finer details of his face. He looks like I’m gazing at him through a fine, translucent cloth, his features softened. I am keenly aware of the way the moonlight outlines the edge of his arm and neck and shoulder in silver.

  I turn away in my dream, in a desperate attempt to escape this meeting. I’ve caused enough pain in one day. If I hurt Red now …

  Then Red lifts his eyes and looks directly at me. Wait, he says.

  I stop, listening for more.

  You fear Constantine sensing the tide of your emotions, he says. But there’s nothing we can do to stop ourselves from seeing each other in our dreams like this. It’s inevitable.

  I shake my head.

  But maybe we can control what he senses from you during these dreams, he continues softly. Maybe we can alter these meetings somehow, manipulate our emotions so he can’t suspect anything is amiss.

  I start to shake my head again. Even with Raina’s tonic, the thought of hurting the Strikers and Red again is terrifying. How can I feel anything but anguish and yearning and fear? How can I—

  But as I think this, Red takes a deep breath and closes his eyes.

  The dark alleyway, the scene of Cardinia at night.

  It all shifts abruptly, like a ripple on a pond. Red opens his eyes and then looks around us. He glances back at me.

  Think of the warmest memory you have, he tells me. Think of a place that brings you peace.

  Peace. It’s such a foreign, distant thought that I want to laugh through my tears. But instead, I find my thoughts going immediately to a tree-lined street.

  The tree-lined street of my childhood.

  Their branches once arched so low that I could simply pull myself up into their crooks and idle away. Those trees are long gone now, burned away when the Federation had first conquered Basea. But I imagine it regardless, painting in my mind the picture of their wide leaves and the sun-dappled ground beneath them. Flowering bushes grow thick on either side of the small street leading to my family’s home.

  And as I imagine it, it appears around us. Those beautiful, curving trees. The little stall on the side of the street that I used to visit, selling frozen cubes of sweet strawberry juice and ice-cold watermelon slices. The houses of our neighbors, each of their doors unlocked and some of them open, because there was simply no need to worry about thieves. And instead of me crouched in front of Red in the dank alley, we are instead both swinging our legs as we sit on the branches of the largest, oldest tree, savoring a breeze between the shady leaves, watermelon juice sticky on our lips.

  It is so real that, in this dream, I believe it. My terror melts away, replaced by the deepest serenity I’ve felt in a long time, a sense of security and belonging and home. My emotions settle into a still lake. Peace hangs over the surface.

  I let out a breath. Oh.

  Red smiles as he looks around us in wonder. Now this is much nicer, he says gently.

  If Constantine feels anything coming from me now, he will sense only my nostalgia, my contentment. And with any luck, Raina’s work in weakening my bond with Constantine should only help.

  The warmth of having Red nearby seems so real that I lean into it, letting myself believe that if I wanted to, I could …

  Touch his hand.

  Touch his face.

  Pull him to me.

  Feel him whisper against my neck.

  With all my effort, I hold back and keep my distance. Where are you in the city? I ask him instead.

  Near the National Museum, he replies. He hesitates. We’re trying to gather more information on the artifacts that Constantine brought back from Mara.

  An image flickers between us of the lab institute on the day before the first game. I catch a glimpse of him standing with a crowd as two soldiers rush a bleeding man to the institute on a gurney.

  I frown. Why?

  He shakes his head. I don’t know. But there’s something more to those artifacts—they must be more than a potential energy source for the Federation.

  I nod, looking around at the serene street of my childhood. There is always another reason with this Premier.

  Always, Red agrees.

  We’re quiet for a moment as we soak in the peace around us. The metallic sheen of his hair shines under the dappled light. Even in a dream, he is so beautiful.

  I wish this were real, I say. I wish I could erase everything that had happened in the arena with this.

  Red searches my gaze. There was nothing you could have done differently, he tells me.

  He saw what happened. He knows what it’s like. I turn my face down, determined to keep the peace in my mind.

  I’m a Striker, I finally whisper to him. I’m supposed to know what it’s like to lose those we love out on the warfront. I take the hit and I don’t make a sound, so I can live to fight another day. But I just … couldn’t take this hit. I couldn’t do it. Not after I put them there in the first place. Not when I was the one standing by and allowing soldiers to shackle them.

  I swallow, the guilt lodging thick in my throat. What if Constantine hadn’t taken my bait today? What if he had ordered me to go ahead and kill Adena anyway, or told his soldiers to do so? How would I have lived with it if he had?

  Red doesn’t answer, but I can feel the pulse of his emotions through our link, his answering pain. He has been down this road before, countless times. What’s the point of taking the hit if there is no hope left? What’s the point if you lose either way?

  You shouldn’t have to, he finally answers.

  I tighten my lips. I have to get them out of there, I say. I have to get them out, Red. I just … have to.

  I finally look up at him to meet his gaze. His eyes are steady and somber, the deep blue that makes me think of open seas and evening skies. Somehow, all I can think of is the afternoon in Mara when we’d both been down in the baths, each of us in a separate bath but the same house, able to sense the other through our new link as steam shrouded everything around us. I had not been able to see anything of him through our link that day, other than the glimpse through his eyes of locks of his hair floating serenely in the water. It hadn’t mattered. Some of our closest moments were when we aren’t close at all.