Cress (The Lunar Chronicles #3) - Marissa Meyer Page 0,25
said some variation of this line when she was preparing to leave. “Of course, Mistress. Thank you for bringing me this new work, Mistress.”
A chime sang through the room.
Cress recoiled, but instantly attempted to morph her expression into nonchalance. Just another chime. Just another non-suspicious alert for one of Cress’s non-suspicious hobbies. Sybil had no reason to question it.
But Sybil’s attention had swerved to the single black screen that had awoken with the alert.
A new message had appeared.
MESSAGE RECEIVED FROM MECHANIC: ETA 41 MINUTES. NEED FINAL COORDINATES.
The satellite tilted beneath Cress—but, no, it was her own balance leaving her.
“What is this?” Sybil said, nearing the screen.
“It’s—it’s a game. I’ve been playing it with the computer.” Her voice squeaked. Her face was warming, cooled only where her damp hair clung to her cheeks.
There was a long silence.
Cress tried to feign indifference. “Just a silly game, imagining the computer is a real person … you know how my imagination can be, when I get lonely. Sometimes it’s nice to have someone to talk to, even if they’re not—”
Sybil grabbed Cress’s jaw, shoving her against a window that overlooked the blue planet.
“Is it her?” Sybil hissed. “Have you been lying to me?”
Cress couldn’t speak, her tongue heavy with terror, as if she were pinned by a glamour. But this was not magic. This was only a woman strong enough and angry enough to tear Cress’s arms from their sockets, to break her skull against the corner of the desk.
“You had better not even think to lie to me, Crescent. How long have you been communicating with her?”
Her lips trembled. “S-since yesterday,” she half sobbed. “I was trying to earn her trust. I thought if I could get close enough, I could tell you and—”
A slap sent the world spinning and Cress hit the floor. Her cheek burned and her brain took a moment to stop rattling inside her skull.
“You hoped she was going to rescue you,” said Sybil.
“No. No, Mistress.”
“After all I’ve done for you. Saved your life when your parents meant to have you slaughtered.”
“I know, Mistress. I was going to bring her to you, Mistress. I was trying to help.”
“I even allowed you net access to watch those disgusting Earthen feeds, and this is how you repay me?” Sybil eyed the screen, where the message still lingered. “But at least you’ve finally done something useful.”
Cress shuddered. Her brain began to cloud with the instinctual need to run, to escape. She shoved herself off the floor, but tripped on her hair and landed hard against the closed doors. Her fingers sought out the keypad, punching in the command. The doors zipped open. She did not wait to see Sybil’s reaction. “Close door!”
Cress flew down the corridor, lungs burning. She couldn’t breathe. She was hyperventilating. She had to get out.
Another door loomed before her, an identical switch beside it. She barreled into it. “Open!”
It did.
She stumbled forward and her abdomen smacked into a railing. She grunted from the collision, bracing herself before she could topple over it and straight into the cockpit.
She stood, panting and staring wide-eyed at the interior of a small podship. Lights and flashing panels and screens glowed all around her. The windows formed a wall of glass separating her from a sea of stars.
And there was a man.
His hair was the color of golden straw and his body strong and broad in his royal uniform. He looked like he could be threatening, but at that moment he seemed only astonished.
He raised himself from the pilot seat. They gawked at each other as Cress struggled to find words amid her tumbling thoughts.
Sybil did not come alone. Sybil had a pilot that brought her here.
Another human being knew that Cress existed.
No—another Lunar knew that Cress existed.
“Help me,” she tried to whisper, gulping when the words couldn’t form. “Please. Please help me.”
He shut his mouth. Cress’s hands twitched on the bar. “Please?” Her voice broke.
The man flexed his fingers and she thought—was it only her imagination?—his eyes seemed to soften. To sympathize.
Or to calculate.
His hand shifted toward the controls. The command to shut the door? To disengage from the satellite? To fly her far away from this prison?
“I don’t suppose you killed her?” he said.
The words seemed like they came from a different language altogether. He said them emotionlessly—a simple question. Expecting a simple answer.
Killed her? Killed her?
Before she could form a response, the guard’s eyes sped past her.
Sybil grabbed a fistful of Cress’s hair and yanked her back toward the corridor.