The visions rolled through her head again and again. A knife ripping through Iko’s spine. Maha’s broken fingers. The sector residents kneeling at Aimery’s feet.
Her hatred warmed. Simmered at first, low in her gut. But by the time Artemisia came into view, she was boiling.
The ship dropped into Artemisia’s underground port. The ramp was lowered and a guard hauled her up with a squeeze so painful she had to bite back a cry of pain. Wolf’s heavy steps labored behind her.
She was greeted with a slew of new threats. A dozen guards, their bioelectricity as malleable as factory-new personality chips, and three more thaumaturges, whose mental strength always had a certain iron rigidity to it.
Her finger twitched and she wondered how quickly she could have a bullet loaded in her finger and how long it would take to kill them all. She was back in Artemisia. If she escaped, she could go rogue—a lone assassin hunting down the queen.
It was just a fantasy. Her hands were still bound.
She squeezed her cyborg hand into a useless fist instead.
“Thaumaturge Park?”
Cinder peered at the guard who had killed Iko.
“Sir Kinney.”
“Permission to seek immediate medical attention?”
Aimery’s attention darted down to the blood on his uniform. There was a lot of it, though Cinder couldn’t tell where, exactly, he’d been hurt. “Fine,” he said. “Report back as soon as you are cleared for service.”
The guard fisted a hand against his chest, then paced off in the opposite direction.
Cinder and Wolf were shoved away from the docks and into a maze of corridors. Not knowing what else to do, Cinder tried to focus on where they were taking her. She counted her steps, creating a rudimentary map in her head and piecing it together with what she knew of the queen’s palace.
They were led to an elevator bank, flanked by more guards. There was a pause in which Aimery conversed with another thaumaturge, and though Cinder adjusted her audio interface, she could only pick up a few words—alpha and soldier at first. Then insurgence and RM-9 and cyborg.
Aimery gestured and they started pulling Wolf away, down a separate corridor.
“Wait,” said Cinder, panic flooding her veins. “Where are you taking him?”
Wolf growled and strained against his captors, but any fight was tempered beneath the mind control.
“Wolf! No!” Cinder stumbled forward, but arms held her back. The bindings burned against her wrists. “Wolf!”
It was for nothing. They turned a corner and Wolf was gone, leaving Cinder panting and shaking. She felt wetness on her right wrist where the cords had cut into the skin. She wasn’t so naïve to think she and Wolf could have made a successful stand against their enemies, but she hadn’t imagined being parted from him so soon. She might never see him again. She might never see any of them again.
As she was forced into the elevator, it occurred to Cinder that, for the first time since this had all begun, she was alone.
“I’m sorry we aren’t able to give you a private tour,” said Aimery, “but we’re rather preoccupied with wedding preparations. I’m sure you understand.”
The elevator doors shut and they began to descend. And descend. Cinder felt like she was being taken to her tomb.
When the doors opened again, she was prodded forward with a jab in her back. She was taken through a dim corridor, with rough walls and the smell of stale air and urine and bodies. Her nose wrinkled in disgust.
“I hope you’ll find your accommodations acceptable for such a distinguished guest as yourself,” Aimery continued, as if the scent didn’t bother him. “I understand you’re already accustomed to prison cells.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” said Cinder. “The last one could only hold me for a day.”
“This one will be much more suited to you, I’m sure.”
This prison of rocks and caves was nothing like the modern structure in New Beijing. This was dreary and suffocating, and worst of all, Cinder had no blueprint for it. She had no accurate map, no plan, no means of judging her location in relation to … well, anything.
They paused and there was the jangling of keys and the creak of ancient metal hinges. An old-fashioned padlock. How quaint.
If she could reach it from within the cell, she could have that picked in under thirty seconds.
The thought offered a twitch of hope, at least.
As the door opened, the smell intensified. Her lungs tried to expel the air as soon as they took it in.
“You will remain here until Her Majesty the Queen has time to see to your trial and execution,” said Aimery.
“Can’t wait,” Cinder muttered.
“Of course, you’ll want to use the time to get reacquainted.”
“Reacquainted?”
A guard cut away the bindings on her wrists and shoved her forward. Her shoulder hit the edge of the iron door as she stumbled into the cell, catching herself on a rough wall.
Someone whimpered and she froze. She wasn’t alone.
“Do enjoy your stay … Princess.”
The door slammed shut, the noise of it vibrating through Cinder’s bones. The cell was small with a high, barred window in the iron door that allowed just enough light from the hallway that she could make out a bucket on the floor. The source of the rank smell.
Two people were huddled together in the far corner.
Cinder gaped at them, willing her eyes to adjust. She turned on the built-in flashlight in her hand. The two figures shuddered and cowered behind their arms.
Recognition hit her like a right hook and she fell against the wall.