her. I will not be held hostage by a filthy Maran scout.”
The Chief Architect is the creator of everything that has made the Federation the sprawling dynasty that it is. She is the inventor of its war machines. If I were smart, I’d kill her right here without hesitation. A life, for countless lives.
And yet, I feel her trembling in my grasp and remember the things she’d said to Red in his nightmares, that she too fears for her young son and husband, that she does terrible things in order to protect them. I wonder if my own mother would work for the Premier if she knew he held my life in his hands. It’s this image—my mother standing in the Chief Architect’s place, quivering in my grip and pleading for her family—that makes me stall.
I know the Premier is bluffing, daring me to do this thing that I know he can’t afford. But I stare back at him, search his gaze, and see no hint of uncertainty at all. His expression is unforgiving, his back straight and chin high. Even if he was dressed in rags instead of his lavish coat, I wouldn’t doubt his confidence. He has played this risky game before, and he has always won it.
He smiles grimly at the look on my face. “There’s fear in you. It drives everything you do. I saw it in you when you first crossed my path at the bathhouse. But fear is a good thing. It breeds insecurities, which then breed ambition. And I always admire ambition.” He folds his arms. “You are too good to fight for Mara. Do you know why?”
Within his words is a deep arrogance that digs at me. I can hear in it everything that the Federation stands for—the belief that they deserve to tell us how to live our lives and what we should be sacrificing to them.
When I continue glaring at him, he gives me a thin smile. “Do you wonder how I knew you would come here, and that you can’t speak? It’s because your Speaker—yes, the leader of the nation you defend—sent me a letter warning of your approach.”
His words fall off me at first, then hit me again. He must be lying. They make no sense.
He lifts an eyebrow at me. “You think your Speaker has not thought about the coming collapse of Mara, and his inevitable execution once the Federation conquers his country? That he’s too noble to cut a deal with me, telling me about your mission to destroy my Ghosts in exchange for his life? You think I wouldn’t presume this about your leader and take advantage of it?”
Nearby, Adena hears his words and stumbles in her fight. A guard almost cuts her with his blade, yet she manages to dart away, but not before I hear a broken cry of disbelief come from her. I struggle to keep steady as the room seems to spin. The Speaker has always struck me as a coward, a weak man—but even I’d thought he would stand by Mara until the end.
“What do you think our cease-fire negotiations have really been about?” the Premier says archly to me.
The cease-fires at the warfront, the negotiations. All the Strikers who had given their lives for Mara. All the people, Inner and Outer City alike, who struggle in the throes of our losing war. We have been preparing to make a final stand, while our Speaker has been making plans to save himself all along.
In grief and fury, my knife digs deeper into the Chief Architect’s skin.
Then, all of a sudden, I see the first Ghost shudder.
It’s the one closest to us, so tall that its head nearly comes up to the ceiling of its glass chamber. Barely a moment ago, its bloody teeth had been bared in my direction, and its milky eyes were full of the rage and pain that I’m so used to seeing on a Ghost’s face.
But now it looks away, seemingly confused. Its eyes wander in a restless attempt to settle—and then it shakes its head violently, as if trying to rid itself of something toxic, and lets out a piercing shriek of agitation.
Adena grins. For the first time, the Premier’s confident expression wavers.
Another Ghost follows suit—then another. It ripples through them in rapid succession, the confusion and the rolling eyes, until each one is writhing in agony. I narrow my eyes in satisfaction. Perhaps the Speaker’s betrayal hasn’t stopped us, after all.