Winter (The Lunar Chronicles #4) - Marissa Meyer Page 0,188

said Iko. “In case you don’t recognize me, I happen to be good friends with Princess Selene. I’m willing to guess you’ve heard of—”

“Apprehend her.”

“I guess you have.”

There was a rush of footsteps, a crash of furniture, two gunshots that made Cinder flinch. “Stop her!” screamed the thaumaturge, farther away now.

A door slammed shut.

“That sounded like the stairwell,” said Jacin.

Cinder’s jaw was tight, her muscles taut, but she drew in a shaking breath and squared her shoulders. “We’d better get out of here before they come back.”

Seventy

Cress was relieved to find that she and Thorne were not the only crazily clothed guests milling around the palace gates hours before the royal coronation. The entire city had come to partake in the festivities, as if Artemisians had nothing at all to fear from a possible insurgence or the crazed claims of a cyborg girl.

The palace’s main entrance was surrounded by an imposing wall topped with sharp finials. The main gate was open, revealing a lush courtyard. The walkway was lined with an assortment of sculptures depicting mythical beasts and half-dressed moon gods and goddesses.

No one gave Cress or Thorne a second glance as they strolled through the open gates, joining the crowd of gathered aristocrats who were drinking from jeweled flasks and promenading between the statues. Between Cress’s frilly orange skirt and Thorne’s light-up bow tie, they fit right in.

Trying to avoid eye contact with the other guests, Cress let her gaze travel up the gilded arched doors of the palace. Like the gates, they were swung wide open, inviting the queen’s guests to enter, although palace guards did stand on either side.

Her heart hammered.

It felt like she and Jacin had only just escaped.

She had been inside the palace a handful of times in her youth to perform different programming tasks for Sybil. She had been so eager to please back then. Can you track the arrivals and departures between Sectors TS-5 and GM-2? Can you create a program that will alert us to specific phrases picked up from the recorders in the holograph nodes? Can you track the ships that come and go from the ports and ensure their destinations match the itineraries in our files?

With each success, Cress had grown more confident. I think so. I will try. Yes, Mistress, I can do that.

That had been back when Cress still harbored hopes of one day being welcome here, before her imprisonment aboard the satellite. She should have known better when Sybil refused to ever bring her through this breathtaking main entrance, instead smuggling her in through the underground tunnels as something shameful and secret.

At least this time she was entering the palace beside an ally and a friend. If there was anyone in the galaxy she trusted, it was Thorne.

As if hearing her thoughts, Thorne pressed a hand against her lower back.

“Pretend you belong here,” he murmured against her ear, “and everyone else will believe it.”

Pretend you belong here.

She let out a slow breath and tried to mimic Thorne’s swagger. Pretending. She was good at pretending.

Today, she was Lunar aristocracy. She was a guest of Her Royal Majesty. She was on the arm of the most handsome man she had ever known—a man who didn’t even have to use a glamour. But most important …

“I am a criminal mastermind,” she murmured, “and I’m here to take down this regime.”

Thorne grinned at her. “That’s my line.”

“I know,” she said. “I stole it.”

Thorne chuckled and strategically placed them behind a group of Lunars, close enough that they would appear part of the group, and they glided up the white stone stairs. The doors loomed larger and larger as they stepped into the palace’s shadow. The chatter of the courtyard was replaced with the echo of stone floors and the resounding laughter of people with nothing to fear.

She and Thorne were inside the palace. As far as she could tell, the guards hadn’t even looked at them.

Cress released her breath, but it snagged again as she took in the extravagance.

More aristocrats loitered in droves in the grand entrance, picking at trays of food that floated in the basins of crystal-blue pools. Everywhere were gilded columns and marble statues and flower arrangements that stood twice as tall as she was. Most breathtaking of all was a statue at the center of the hall depicting the ancient moon goddess, Artemis. It towered three stories tall and showed the goddess wearing a thorny crown atop her head and holding an arched bow, the arrow pointing