Maybe she grieves for Raina too, will feel a lifetime of guilt for telling Constantine to arrest them. Maybe she and the Chief Architect had been true friends, if opposed in their beliefs.

  Nearby, Adena argues with a soldier about what tools she needs by morning in order to make a series of distractions that can help us break into the palace tomorrow. Somehow, even after everything that has happened, she finds a way to dive into productivity. Even though her shoulders are slumped in exhaustion as she reaches her room, she still pulls two blades from her belt and sets into polishing them in preparation for tomorrow.

  “What?” she mumbles when she sees me looking.

  I just smile and shake my head. She rolls her eyes, but I can see the hint of a grin at the edges of her lips. It’s the return of our old rhythm, and I find myself leaning into her warmth. I watch her a moment longer, admiring the grace of her hands, before moving on.

  Jeran talks in soft voices with Aramin. I notice them sitting across from each other in one of their chambers, their hands close enough to touch, and pause, lingering for a moment to see the look that passes between them. Jeran says something to Aramin, a question. Aramin’s brows lift in surprise, and then he laughs. I do not think I ever remember him laughing. Jeran seems surprised by the sound too, but then he smiles, leaning unconsciously into the figure of his former Firstblade.

  I turn away from them and continue down the hall. It takes me a moment to realize that I’m looking for Red. He had left for the inner rooms of the estate earlier, to get his bandages changed, and I hadn’t seen him since.

  As I head inside, my mother looks up from where she’s helping another rebel with an injured hand. She shoots me a brief smile, signing to me with her good hand that she’s fine, that I should go look for Red.

  A fresh surge of anger comes through me as I glance again at her bandaged hand. Constantine’s cruelty is always intentional and targeted. He knew what damaging my mother’s hands could do to the way we communicated, that it would forever remind me of what had happened to her. I chew my inner cheek as I head inside, trying to ignore the tug of Constantine’s mind forever at the other end of our bond.

  Through our link, I sense Red’s heartbeat, steady and reliable as ever. I quiet, listening for it, wondering if he wants to be alone, before I finally notice it becoming more prominent the closer I edge to the window overlooking the estate’s back courtyard. Outside, the tumultuous evening has settled into night, and against the sky, I can still see the faint glow of fires coming from the inner city. In a couple of hours, we will head back out there, ready to commit ourselves to ending the Premier once and for all. But right now, we are here in this strange suspension of time, an odd peace against the chaos beyond.

  By the time I make my way out of the house and into the courtyard, a few stars have begun winking into existence. A cool breeze combs through my hair. I close my eyes, letting myself take a long, slow breath for the first time in a long time, and for a moment, I can pretend that I’m back in Mara, crouched outside my mother’s old home in the shanties around Newage, listening for the croaking of frogs and trying to bring one home in a jar.

  If I look to the horizon right now, would I see that house silhouetted against the night? Would I see the glow of warm light spilling out onto a dirt path?

  I open my eyes. The home behind me is not my home; the steps leading up to the back entrance are unfamiliar, and the flowers in the garden are not the ones that my mother would have spent lazy summer days gathering in a basket.

  I stand there for a moment, letting myself feel the loss. Only after a while do I realize that I had closed my eyes and dreamed not of Basea, but of Mara. That somehow, the country of my childhood was not what appeared first in my mind, but the place that I’d defended with my blood and sweat.

  There had been a time when I would fall so deeply into the pit of my memories that I never wanted to climb out again. But now I turn away from the house and back toward the rest of the sprawling garden, searching idly for Red. Maybe he doesn’t want to be bothered, and the realization makes me hesitate. I don’t know why I’m out here looking for him. I should be getting a couple hours rest too, before we have to head out into the flames again.

  As if he sensed the uncertainty trickling through me, Red’s voice appears in my thoughts.

  There’s a hidden grove in the back of the garden, he says.

  His voice warms me, and I find it easier to push away the pain of old memories by following him instead. In the darkening night, I head through the winding path carved through the grass until I reach a thicket of trees lining the end of the mayor’s property. The breeze is cooler here, funneled through the tree trunks, and I follow the current of it instinctively until I find myself staring at a pomegranate grove at the end of the thicket. Their bushy branches grow so close and thickly together that they seem to form a wall. Fruit hangs fat and red on their limbs.

  Here, Red’s pulse becomes a more pronounced drumbeat in my chest. I crouch, finding a small opening in the grove, and step inside.

  It’s darker in here, the branches crowding out what light might be filtering over from the house, but I have no trouble seeing the small clearing of thick grass in the center of this grove, then the figure curled tightly within it. Red is sitting with his legs crossed, his torso freshly wrapped with bandages underneath a coat, and his face is tilted up at the sky.

  When I look up, I understand what he’s looking at. The branches have blocked out enough light so that the stars in here are more visible, and from this vantage point, it looks like the rest of the world has faded away to leave only this circle of leaves overhead, enveloping for us this piece of pristine sky.

  Red doesn’t turn at my entrance, but in the dimness, I see him shift slightly so that I can come to sit beside him.

  I needed to go somewhere to clear my head, he tells me, his face still pointed upward. I can see a hint of his lashes framed against the night. Found this place. Have you ever eaten pomegranates?

  I shake my head. Once.

  I heard the Early Ones have a story about them, you know. Pomegranates.

  That they do not, in fact, lodge in your teeth?

  He smiles slightly at me. That they were once used to tempt a girl trapped in a place called the Underworld, where the dead are.

  I make a face and wonder if he can sense it through our link. What a thing to tempt someone with.

  At that, Red glances away from the sky to meet my eyes for a moment. His lips curve into a smile. I’ll take them if you don’t want them, he answers.

  I join his side. We stay very still, and I let myself think about the nearness of him, the warmth emanating from his body, the brush of his arm against mine. He has been broken down and rebuilt, just as I had, had survived indescribable trauma, but it has not destroyed who he is. He is still the boy I’ve come to know, at once brave and mischievous and naïve, taking the world in.

  I wonder if sitting in a grove of them connects us a bit to that Underworld, he finally says.

  To the dead?

  He nods slightly. I feel, rather than see, his movement in the shift of his body. We might not succeed in getting to Constantine, he says. Maybe we will fail, and Constantine’s armies will rally around us, slaughter us all before we can take him down.

  I hear the question in his voice, and answer, But?

  But what if we win? He turns to look at me now. What if we do reach the Premier and end his life? What will happen to the Federation then? What will happen to the rest of the lands—Mara, Basea, every territory conquered and brutalized?

  I know what he’s afraid to say. If we do succeed in killing the Premier, if we end his regime, how will this world splinter? Will we really be able to return to where we once lived and see it rebuilt for us? What are we returning to, exactly?

  I don’t know, I admit. Maybe nothing. Maybe something else will replace the Premier and everything will keep on going as it has.

  Red nods slightly. Then he wipes a hand subtly across his cheek. When I look closer, I realize that he’s wiping tears away.

  Maybe he is dwelling on the pain of his own past, just as I had.

  I wait as he releases his sorrow. The currents of his grief wash against my heart, again and again, and I have no way of reaching out and stopping it. I don’t have a right to. Instead, I listen and feel his pain mix with mine.

  After a while, Red leans closer to me. He’s afraid of you, he tells me. He’s afraid of us both. He’s afraid of everything he has ever destroyed, of all the harm in the world coming back onto him. His time is ending, Talin. I promise.

  I nod, and within the grief hollowing my heart, I can feel the burning of a flame. To my surprise, something about that flame brings a lump to my throat.

  Red, I say to him now. I’m sorry.

  He blinks at me. Sorry for what?

  I thought I understood everything you went through as a Skyhunter. I didn’t.

  He quiets for a moment, and then takes my hand. You are the reason I live, he tells me. And as long as I have this life, I will dedicate it to you. I will be at your side in any battle, whether out there at the palace gates or here, in this grove, in your heart. You saved me. I owe everything to you, Talin. Remember that.

  His words flood me with warmth. Without him and the others, my mother might never have made it out of the prison district. Never survived the horrors Constantine inflicted on her. But here she is, after all she has suffered, still able to feed that flame. Still ready to head out and fight.

  None of us could have made it this far without each other. And yet, here we are.

  In the darkness, my gaze finds his. Maybe, I say, haltingly, maybe someday, after we get out of here, that is, if we survive …

  We will survive, he tells me firmly. Then he pulls me to him and kisses me.

  We had sat at opposite ends of a bathhouse before, each dwelling on thoughts of the other. We had kissed once in a dream state, something that felt so tangible that I thought it was real. We had shared a stolen kiss in the shadows of a thoroughfare street, afraid for more. But this moment is different. Not stolen. Not in fear. Just … us.

  Red’s lips on mine, our bodies close together, here in a real grove under a real night sky. He leans into my touch, then wraps his arms around my waist. I kiss him harder in return, my breaths shallow. In spite of his grief, I feel safe in his arms, unbreakable. He shifts to kiss my cheeks, then the line of my jaw, then my neck.

  I run my hands down his arms, then gently against the bandages wrapping his sides. His movements turn faltering now, his gaze shy. He is new to all this, I realize, having spent most of his youth trapped in the lab institute. So I stop and take his hands in mine, then guide him. We say nothing to each other. There is no need to.

  The Federation can do everything in its power to destroy the bonds that tie family together, human decency, love. But it cannot break it. There is a level of power in this small, intimate moment that Constantine, with all his armies and his experiments, can never touch. Here, we are invincible.

  Red kisses me again. I can feel the edge of my shirt sliding up. My hands run along his skin, feeling his scars from the traumas inflicted on him, sensing the human beyond that that the trauma couldn’t touch. He lets me slide his coat off before he tugs my own shirt up over my head.

  He is so warm. I feel myself falling into his embrace, and then I realize that I am lying in the grass, and he is hovering above me, his face perfect and framed by stars, his hair brushing the side of my face.

  I don’t know, really, if this is love. It is a feeling they have tried to rob me of for so long. But if this isn’t love, I don’t want it. Red here in my arms, the quiet of the world around us, the secrecy of this moment.

  This is what I want.

  Afterward, we are quiet. His fingers comb through my hair. His breath is warm against my cheeks. We stare up at the stars together, neither of us willing to speak, each afraid to break the spell. Soon we will have to leave this magical place, but for now, we stay enveloped in our private cocoon and try to imagine that this is the world we live in. I look from the stars to him. Red’s eyes are distant. Despite our link, I can’t guess at what he’s thinking. I wonder if he is imagining some future that has us in it. I’m afraid to think it, but I still dare myself to.

  The Premier can conquer every nation in the world in his desire for power. He can try to erase who we are, our love for our families, our devotion to each other, everything that matters. After all, the Karensans care only about Infinite Destiny, their desperate quest to touch every inch of the land.

  But there are some powers you can’t have.

  37

  TALIN

  I don’t want to leave the thicket. I can’t even remember the last time I felt this close to someone else or savored the sense of security it could bring. Red’s breathing is even and light. I lie against his arm and stare up at the night sky, trying to memorize the constellations. Our limbs are still tangled together, the heat of him still rippling through me. He brushes an idle hand along my arm. I run strands of his hair through my fingers, wondering what it must have felt like before his Skyhunter transformation turned the hair metallic and brittle.

  It used to be light brown, he tells me through our link.

  It’s the first thing he’s said to me in a while, and I turn my head so I can see his face. And soft as feathers, I’m sure, I tease.

  Oh, it’s a tragedy you’ll never know. He glances sidelong at me.

  I murmur a laugh, and it feels so good that I tell myself to remember it forever. When I look at him again, he’s smiling serenely. I can feel the ebb and flow of his emotions against my thoughts. Some of them make me blush. Under it, though, he’s tense, and I know the feeling because it bubbles within me too.

  The instant we step out of this space, the rest of the world returns.

  Finally, Red lets out an uncomfortable cough and stirs so that he can look at me. Can you…, he begins, then stops, as if he doesn’t know how to continue. I can feel where he’s going, though. Can you sense Constantine right now?

  I reluctantly let my thoughts loose and force myself to concentrate on the ever-present beating of the Premier’s heart in my mind. Always, I tell Red after a pause.

  Can you sense his emotions?

  He is being careful with them, I answer, just as I am. But I think he’s afraid.

  At that, Red snorts in disbelief. I hope he’s cowering in some corner.

  I’m quiet. I think about the night I’d found him in that secret chamber in his greenhouse, his hunched figure over his desk, all those frantic maps and drawings pinned above him. I think of the dark circles under his eyes, the constant undercurrent of his fear that his time is coming to an end.

  He’s still just a man, I finally reply. And he comes with all its insecurities.

  Red senses the sober emotion in me and turns to look at me. What do you think his next move will be?

  He knows Cardinia will fall, I answer. And survival has always been his goal. We just have to get to him before he finds a way to escape.

  Red narrows his eyes. He won’t escape. We’ll trail him until he’s cornered.

  He’s always been good at blocking his feelings from me. I give him a grim smile. But I’ve sensed something new from him lately.

  What is it?

  Uncertainty.

  It’s enough to make Red tighten his grip against my arm. A trickle of hope, wary and strained, comes from him.

  Well, he answers. It’s something.

  Adena’s voice rings out from somewhere across the garden. It’s the sound of her that finally stirs us out of each other’s arms, suddenly feeling light and awkward. I look in the direction of her calls, pinpointing where she’s coming from, then begin to pull my clothes back on. Red moves quickly and quietly beside me. Our moment is over, but I still feel the warmth lingering between us like a rope, tugging tight.

  By the time we hurry out of the thicket, Adena has already made her way to the beginning of the grove of trees. She lets out a relieved sigh at the sight of us, then points back toward the estate.

  “Jeran’s already out there,” she says breathlessly. “We could use your help.” She pauses to squint at us. “You two were gone for a while.”

  I concentrate on tying my hair back up while Red coughs. “Talin was telling me about the palace’s layout,” Red says. “I know the palace’s layout a little, of course, ah, but she—”

  Adena sighs. “I’m just kidding. I know what you were both doing out here.”

  I glare at her, while Red turns scarlet. But Adena’s already moved on, her cheeky grin dropping to make way for the serious version of herself. “We have to hurry.”

  A sickening feeling shoots through me. “Why? What for?”

  But when Adena glances back at me, her eyes are alight with possibility. I can see the gears turning in her. “The other artifact,” she replies. “Remember? A rebel has located it.”

  At that, Red straightens. “Where?” he asks.

  “At the other end of the city’s prisons.” Adena hesitates as she recalls what she was told. “Among their textile factories.”

  The diversion we need to block Constantine’s main escape route. This could be it.

  “You want to use it for the palace?” Red says.

  “Exactly,” Adena replies

  He shakes his head at her. “It’s far too heavy to move in time. We’d need more of our people than we can spare. Besides, it’s too hard to control. You remember the first blast. That thing could take out the entire palace if it’s put close enough—along with everything in its radius.”