seeing me for the first time, and the way it pulls me in is unnerving. I can sense the words he’s about to say next.
“I’m offering you the chance to become a Skyhunter for the Karensa Federation,” the Premier says. “My personal Skyhunter, to shield and protect me at all times.”
A Skyhunter. The most advanced warrior the world has ever known. The deadliest killing machine I’ve ever witnessed.
A Skyhunter, bringer of death, servant to the Federation. Servant to the regime that stole our home. Servant to the Premier, at his every beck and call.
What he’d intended Red to be.
My limbs tremble harder now. This is not an offer. There is no choice in this.
“It’s difficult for you to see the benefit of becoming a Skyhunter right now, when you’ve suffered such a loss as your country has,” he continues. “Someday, you’ll understand why an unbroken Karensa Federation, stretching sea to sea, is the greatest gift for all humanity. Why I will not make the same mistakes our ancestors did. But if not for the treasures I can offer you, perhaps you will do it for your mother’s sake, and for the sake of other Marans we now have captive.”
He glances back to where the soldiers have forced my mother to her feet. “Your mother was in the thick of war,” he explains, “and showed a great deal of courage in the way she fought. I see where you inherited your skills. Unfortunately, this also makes your mother an enemy of the Federation, a soldier who took the lives of some of my men.” He nods at me. “By law, I must make her a prisoner of war, and she must stand for her crimes against Karensa. She will be executed for her actions. You know this, don’t you, Talin?”
One of the guards holding my mother pulls out a dagger.
They’re going to cut her throat here. Her blood is going to spill against the marble floor.
Constantine nods at the soldiers standing beside me. “Let her loose,” he says. “It’s all right.”
The chains over my head clack as they move to unlock me. I feel the weight of my shackles shift, then the slack of the chains as I’m released from them. Immediately, my legs buckle, but I manage somehow to fight for balance and stay standing, swaying in place, my shoulders hunched and my arms still secured behind my back.
The Premier watches me as I fight to stay upright. “Your mother will die, unless you consider my offer. I won’t make it a second time. If you choose to become a Skyhunter to the Federation, I promise you that your mother will be pardoned of her crimes. I will release her and give her the chance to earn a place for herself in the new society that the Federation will establish in Mara. She wasn’t allowed to live inside Newage, but perhaps now she can have a proper home, and some sense of dignity.”
I stare at him, quietly inspecting the soul in his gaze. He knows he will run out of time soon, die young. His weakening body will eventually return to dust. But before then, there is a searing determination in him to build, an urgency to leave behind his legacy before whatever illness he has claims him. A belief that only he is capable of creating an unbroken empire, that he—more so even than the Karensa Federation—is the one destined to inherit the world. All this time, what drives him isn’t fulfillment of the Early Ones’ mantra. It isn’t Infinite Destiny. It is instead what drives all tyrants.
It is his fear of death.
He studies me for a second longer. When I don’t move right away, he looks back at the soldiers holding my mother and gives them a nod.
The guard holding the dagger grabs my mother by the hair.
And I sink to my knees.
There is no other choice I can make. It’s my turn to become the Chief Architect, pledging my loyalty to the Premier, promising to do terrible things for him in exchange for my mother’s life. Here, I am a child again, clutching my mother’s hand and looking over my shoulder in terror as the sound of Ghosts comes steadily closer. I can feel the way my mother squeezed me tightly to her that night, can see the sad smile on her face as we watch the bridges collapse behind us.
And in this moment, I finally, finally understand why I fight for Mara. It is because my