But he was real.

  The boy still looked beautiful. The sweep of his hair. The sharpness of his jawline and the strength of his muscles. I could stare at that face for hours.

  I let his presence wash over me. Let it relax my shoulders and slow my breathing.

  Then I strode forward and kissed him. With the press of his body, I could feel every inch of my chassis. The damp touch of my nightgown. The weight on my chest. The marble-smoothness of my skin.

  Doubt slithered in my stomach like a snake.

  We broke apart, and tears welled in my eyes. I wiped them away, but Samuel noticed.

  ‘You did it, Nell,’ he said, rubbing my shoulders. ‘You’re home. You’re home.’

  I nodded, gazing at his face through a film of tears.

  His smile faded. ‘I assume you’ve read the news.’

  ‘News?’ I shook my head. ‘I’ve been studying since the battle.’ The students at Paragon had been oddly excited about something these last few days. But I hadn’t paid them any mind, stuffing wax into my ears so I could study without distraction.

  ‘Remember that journalist from the local newspaper, Naomi Trynt? She was profiling Adam Weaver for the Stemford Times.’

  Stemford. Ana’s hometown in the Agricultural Islands. And Weaver’s. ‘So?’

  Samuel bit his lip. ‘Well, she dug up some old family records at the back of someone’s closet. She spent a month trawling clues, and eventually, she learned who Adam’s father was.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘A nobody. But more importantly, she learned about Adam’s great-grandmother. Turns out Adam has some important ancestors. The article was printed three days ago, and the public is losing it.’

  A chill crept up my spine. ‘What did it say?’

  Samuel swallowed.

  ‘Spit it out.’ I clenched my teeth.

  ‘He’s got royal blood. Pure royal blood, a lot of it.’

  I fell silent.

  ‘Adam Weaver is the last prince of the Star Prophets.’

  I wore my finest gown to the coronation. My mother insisted.

  Two weeks after my return, Samuel, my mother and I sat in the luxury box at a fresh amphitheatre, built on the burned ruins of Paragon’s old banquet hall. Nobles, journalists and Humdrums filled the stands. Men and women waved flags, bathed in the sunset. My mother had stuffed me into a yellow dress that squeezed my ribs, faintly resembling a lampshade. She had burned the one suit I owned.

  Caimor had won the Battle of Paragon. More than two hundred students had died, but we’d saved the rest. Khaiovhe had escaped, but Commonplace had been virtually wiped out, their revolution crushed.

  No hero stood taller than Adam Weaver. He had driven out the witch, holding his own against the worst dark mage in a century. The pure white fire of his Codex had burned away the dark magic of Khaiovhe, defeating her in noble combat. The papers gushed over him even more than usual. Never mind that he’d barely done any fighting. Naomi Trynt’s article had poured gasoline on to his flames. The Son of Destiny, finding his destiny at last. An ordinary boy, blessed with royal blood.

  And so, reeling from the massacre, swept up in nostalgia and the recent Adam fever, parliament had expelled its Commonplace-sympathising members and voted Adam the Reborn King.

  It made me want to vomit. My father had claimed he had royal blood for years, and no one was putting a crown on my head. It was all such nonsense.

  The old kings of the Star Prophets had been absolute rulers, lording over a massive empire, of which Caimor had been only a province. Adam, by contrast, had a ceremonial role with no powers, merely honouring the decorum of the ancients. The pomp and prestige. An act to spread hope through the nation in dark times, to inspire those who worshipped the Star Prophets, or simply venerated their wisdom.

  I still couldn’t believe it. But history kept marching, caring not for sanity or patience. Adam had burned off Ana’s finger. Now this country was handing him a throne.

  My chest ached, and my jaw clenched. Samuel put a hand on my shoulder. ‘Is everything all right, Nell?’

  ‘Yes.’ My voice sounded strange, foreign. ‘Please excuse me, Mother, my love.’

  I stood and hustled down the wooden steps of the amphitheatre, hiking up my skirts. My legs carried me out of the building, past a refreshments table with a pyramid of wine goblets. I swept into the makeshift restrooms at the edge of the island.

  ‘These are the boys’ toilets, dear.’

  I froze, catching my breath. Adam Weaver stood at the mirror, dressed in a regal military tailcoat with his head tilted back. He lifted a pale worm over his face, dangling it as it writhed. Kshatran Spirit Larva, the most expensive drug in the world. He lowered his hand, and it slithered into his eye like a snake in a rathole. I gagged.

  ‘I’ll allow it, though.’ A droplet of grey fluid slid down his cheek. He licked it up, grinning. ‘You’re special.’

  I swallowed, and looked at his white ceremonial gloves, part of his military uniform. ‘How’s the hand?’

  Adam’s face stiffened. I had heard a rumour this morning, from one of the students at Paragon. Adam had endured an injury after the raid on the clock tower and the blood loss from his lung. Pieces of his brain had gone dark before they swapped him, leaving a permanent wound on his Pith, a part of his body that would crumble into dust no matter what chassis he swapped to. A farewell gift, from Anabelle Gage.

  They were just rumours, of course. Idle speculation. But if they were true, they all pointed to a single, overwhelming fact hiding under those pale gloves:

  Adam Weaver, heir to the throne and hero of the people, was missing his left pinky finger.

  The boy regained his composure. ‘We should meet tonight, after the coronation. You’ve proven yourself these last few months, and I need all the soldiers I can get, now that we’re going to war.’

  ‘War?’ I said. ‘With whom?’

  ‘The Shenti, of course,’ he said. ‘The eastern dogs have their own branch of Commonplace. They funded the Black Wraith, supplied her with weapons and bombmakers. They tried to eat us from within. And in return, we will eat them.’ He cracked his knuckles. ‘I shall be leading our righteous host.’

  I snorted. ‘You’re a figurehead, a prop. Parliament has all the real power.’

  He smirked. ‘For now.’

  I set my jaw. ‘I’ll stop you. I won’t let you devour this country.’

  ‘Stop me?’ he snickered. ‘Like you stopped Khaiovhe from killing all your friends?’

  A fist clenched round my heart.

  ‘Poor, sweet Nell. There’s so much you don’t know.’ Adam smiled. ‘Everyone adores me. Young and old, mage and Humdrum, they give up their love, and I crack it in my teeth like candy.’ He leaned close and whispered. ‘One day, you will kneel before me, with joy and exultation.’ His words crawled down my spine like a centipede.

  I jerked back. ‘It won’t work. Humdrums are smarter than you think. They’ll never bend for a brat like you.’

  ‘Humans are strange creatures,’ said Adam. ‘They dream of wealth, but relate to the poor. They covet beauty, but hate artifice. They cling to power, but feel weak.’ He walked back out of the bathroom. ‘I am the crossroads of these delusions. And men love their delusions more than their children.’

  He jogged towards the amphitheatre. I strode after him, watching him go, and grabbed a glass of wine from the nearest refreshments table.

  As he approached the stage, one of the cops began stomping his feet. Others joined him, a rhythmic thudding of their shoes against the wood. It spread across the amphitheatre like an oil fire, and a low chanting rose from the crowd.

  ‘Pale King! Pale King! Pale King!’ It grew louder and louder, the roar of an awakening beast. ‘Pale King! Pale King! Pale King!’

  Their stomping was like thunder. A vicious storm, tearing open the sky.

  ‘Pale King! Pale King! Pale King!’

  Adam strode on to the stage, basking in the noise. A torch burned behind him, casting him in a dark silhouette. He was a flickering shade, a shadow against the flames.

  ‘Pale King! Pale King! Pale King!’

  He glanced back at me and winked.

  My fingers clutched the wine goblet, turning my knuckles white. I closed my eyes and saw the burnt stump where Ana’s pinky had been. I saw the mark on her cheek from his hand, the look on her face as she’d sunk into the clouds. Adam had maimed her. Then he’d abandoned her and Nima, leaving them to fight Khaiovhe without help, to die.

  The Black Wraith came first. She was the one who had killed my friends. But after?

  I opened my eyes and made a silent promise. I will bleed you dry, I thought. So slow, you won’t even notice. I’ll cut you in hidden places and watch the life drain out. And when you’re shrivelled and broken, I’ll put you into a cockroach. You’ll spend a lifetime as the bug that you are. Then, and only then, will you die. For Korin. For Nima. For her. Our game was just beginning.

  My face broke into a smile, and I raised my glass to our new king.

  after the chaos at paragon, robbing a train was nothing.

  The attack had started fine. Clementine had been on the front line, clearing islands with the Black Arrows. The supposed geniuses at Paragon had gaped like idiots in the face of Voidsteel bullets. It was almost funny. But halfway through, that pale boy Adam Weaver had returned, and Clementine could see the battle was lost.

  So, she’d fled, soaring down to Lowtown in the dark, slipping past the lines of tanks rumbling into the city. Holing up inside her house, while her colleagues died in droves. Commonplace was scattered to the winds. Its Black Arrows were corpses, its followers were being arrested, and its mercenaries were abandoning the cause by the hundreds.

  Clementine had almost left too. But her instincts told her to stay, to hold off on buying her ferry ticket to Kshatra. There was still profit to be reaped from the Black Wraith. And now her loyalty was paying dividends. Two days after Paragon, she had been given a job. A body heist bigger than any she’d attempted. She wasn’t sure what Khaiovhe wanted with all those chassis, but Clementine was happy to oblige.

  A cool wind blew pebbles off the dark cliff. Far below, an armoured train puttered along Caimor’s southern coast. This part of the tracks had flooded, so the carriages had to slow down to wade through the water, wheels leaving a trail on the moonlit surface.

  Clementine jumped, unfurling her black wingsuit. The air caught her, and she flew, cloaked in shadows. She landed on the roof of the engine carriage, kneeling, and reached her Pith into the billowing exhaust from the smokestack behind her. Wielding an air magic spell, she separated the carbon monoxide from the rest of the gases, a clear, odourless cloud floating above her head. She lifted her fingers, holding it in place.

  Then she whipped her hands below her. The gas went down, flowing into the slits of the engine room, the first carriage and the carriage behind it. Everywhere the security guards were stationed.

  Two thumps rang from beneath her. The drivers. Seconds later, more thumps rang from the first two carriages. The guards. Twenty of them, one for each chassis inside. Knocked unconscious from the exhaust of their own engine. They’d live, though the headache would be nasty in a few hours. For whatever reason, Khaiovhe wanted to avoid casualties.

  Clementine strode down atop the train, jumping from carriage to carriage. Stretching her Pith below her to feel for the merchandise.

  She jumped on the penultimate train carriage, and the roof exploded.

  The shrapnel curved round her bullet shield, but the blast still flung her like a ragdoll. She slammed on to the roof of the carriage behind her, and a dart stuck into her neck. A tranquilliser dart.

  No, not a tranquilliser. Null Venom.

  Clementine felt the drug sap the energy from her Pith, blocking her magic. Her ears rang, and stinging dust filled her eyes.

  Before she could blink, a cold, floating sword pressed to her throat.

  A smirking man approached her from the end of the train, blue robes flapping in the wind, a black key hanging round his neck. He smoked a glowing cigarette in the darkness.

  Professor Charles Inwood. A teacher at Paragon, and a mage of the Eldritch Guard. He wasn’t supposed to be here.

  ‘Evening,’ he said. ‘Tell me where your boss is and I might let you—’

  Something thudded in the darkness. The sword dropped to the roof with a clang.

  Professor Inwood fell forward, a dagger buried in the back of his head. He slammed on to the train carriage roof, motionless.

  ‘Hello, Clementine.’

  A raven-haired woman appeared behind the dead professor, wearing a pitch-black evening gown, dark flames dancing over the fabric. Khaiovhe. The two of them exchanged passwords, confirming their identities.

  Clementine staggered to her feet, pulling out the dart in her neck. ‘Thanks, boss. Didn’t know you were joining me.’

  ‘I knew Professor Inwood would be guarding this train,’ said Khaiovhe. ‘I brought you along to draw him out. Distract him.’

  Bait. She’d used Clementine as bait.

  Khaiovhe knelt by the dead Paragon teacher. She pulled her butterfly knife from the corpse, and it danced in her hands, flipping shut with the ease of an expert.

  That’s new. Clementine hadn’t seen her use that weapon before.

  She lifted the black key from round his neck.

  ‘This –’ Khaiovhe held up the key – ‘is the real purpose of our heist. The bodies are just a bonus.’

  Clementine’s lips parted. ‘Then it’s true,’ she said. ‘During the battle. You took the Aeon Scroll.’ That key would unlock it, disarming the bomb in the cover.

  And now they had the bodies too. Clementine extended her Pith below them and pulled a cloth off a large glass case. A pair of black eyes stared at her through a skylight, speckled with stars. A star-woven chassis, worth more than most yachts.

  A laugh escaped Clementine’s lips. She knew she’d stayed for a reason.

  ‘I’m going to be rich,’ she breathed. ‘Rich rich. No more seaside houses. I’m going straight to Hightown.’

  ‘These are going to be delivered to sick Humdrums,’ said Khaiovhe. ‘The terminally ill. The records will be tricky to fudge, but we’ll manage.’

  The air turned cold. ‘What?’ This wasn’t like Khaiovhe. The witch might have been running a revolution, but she always paid her mercenaries well. ‘Boss, what about my usual cut?’

  ‘Afraid not,’ said Khaiovhe. ‘We’re keeping none of these.’

  This was madness. Blood rushed in Clementine’s ears. ‘Please, ma’am. Could you not spare just one chassis? The cheapest one.’

  ‘The cheapest body is going to Arthur Hyll. A boy of fourteen, dying in a Lowtown hospital. So tell me,’ said Khaiovhe. ‘How cheap is a life?’

  ‘You promised,’ said Clementine, raising her voice. ‘I need this.’ Something was very wrong with her boss.

  ‘Humdrums live in squalor. Our enemies at Paragon plot war against Shenten. And through it all, the water rises.’ Khaiovhe gazed at the ocean. ‘Great challenges lie ahead of us. We will all have to manage with less.’

  Clementine’s skin tingled. The boss wasn’t acting like herself. Passwords or no, something was wrong.

  She grabbed the fallen sword off the roof. ‘Who are you?’ she growled.

  ‘Just a girl,’ said Khaiovhe. ‘Nothing special.’ Her face flickered, morphed, long black hair turning short and grey, smooth skin turning sickly and wan. Her left pinky vanished, becoming a flat stump at the edge of her hand. An Edgar chassis. ‘But,’ the Edgar said, ‘you can call me Ana.’

  Clementine’s ears pounded. ‘Anabelle Gage?’ she whispered. She tried to Nudge Gage, but the Null Venom pushed back, blocking her magic. Her body shook, and her fists clenched.

  Gage had killed the boss. She was the boss. Impossible. Absurd. And yet it was true.

  Clementine spat at her. ‘Finish it, then,’ she growled. ‘You’ve been a nuisance since the day I hired you. Tripping on your trousers. Crying in my basement. All you’ve ever done is waste my time. Don’t waste any more.’

  ‘I wanted to kill you,’ said Gage. ‘Nima certainly pushed for it. But while we planned, I read Sophie’s file on you.’ She held up a beige folder. ‘Seven years ago, Paragon rejected you.’

  Clementine’s fists tightened.

  ‘You were a college dropout, unemployed and frightened. You spent your weekends alone, holed up in your parents’ apartment. When you grew your first branch, magic made you feel like a person again. You were special.’

  Clementine’s nails dug into her palms.

  ‘Paragon didn’t want you, so you became a witch of the coin. Got a taste of real power.’ Gage stared at her. ‘And you did terrible things.’

  The train rumbled beneath them. Clementine gripped the sword hilt.

  ‘But I’ve done terrible things this past year,’ said Gage. ‘Fought for the wrong side. If someone had met me then, I hope they would have spared me, given me the chance to grow better.’ She shrugged. ‘So, leave, if you want. I won’t harm you.’

  Clementine laughed, louder and louder until her chest hurt.

  Then she raised the sword and leapt forward, slashing at Gage’s throat.

  The steel made contact, and the girl dissolved into smoke. When Clementine’s shoes touched the carriage, it too melted away. An illusion. She was falling, falling off the edge of the train with her magic blocked.

  Clementine dropped through the air, flailing. The wind whipped past her cheeks, and the water rushed up to meet her. It slapped into her face, ripping the sword out of her hands. The train shrank in the distance, chugging up the coast. When Clementine surfaced, a raven-haired girl stood on the carriage, wrapped in a blue dress with crimson edges. An azure queen, breathing magic like air. Butterflies swirled over the girl, and a scent wafted on the wind. Peaches and cream.

  The girl leaned back, and blue lightning arced out of her eye. It struck the heavens over and over, split into three paths. Three branches.

  For the first time in her life, Clementine looked up at Anabelle Gage.

 

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