Cinder screamed and forced the gun away from her head. Arm straight, barrel pointed at the ceiling. She stopped fighting it. Pulled the trigger. A chandelier shattered above her, glass and crystal and sparks.
The crowd screamed and surged for the exit.
Cinder crumpled to her knees and doubled over, cradling the gun against her stomach. Pain tore through her, blinding her. Fireworks burst in her head. It felt as if her body were trying to dispel all her cyborg parts—explosions and sparks and smoke tearing at her flesh.
Kai’s voice over the tumult in her ears made her realize that the pain was subsiding. She felt hot to the touch, like someone had thrown her into a kiln, but the pain and heat had moved to her exterior, to her skin and fingertips rather than eating her up inside. She opened her eyes. White dots speckled her gaze. Her display was flashing red warnings. Diagnostics scrolled through the corner of her vision. Her temperature was too high, her heart rate too high, her blood pressure too high. Some foreign substance had invaded her blood that her system did not recognize and could not dispel. Something is wrong, her programming screamed at her. You are sick. You are ill. You are dying.
But she did not feel like she was dying.
Her body felt so hot she was surprised she didn’t incinerate the fragile dress. Sweat sizzled on her brow. She felt different. Strong. Powerful.
On fire.
Shaking, she sat back on her heels and stared at her hands. The left glove had started to melt, forming patches of gooey, silky skin on her white-hot metal hand. She could see electricity sizzling across the steel surface, but she couldn’t tell if it was her human or cyborg eyes detecting it. Or maybe, not human. Not cyborg.
Lunar.
She raised her head. The world was covered in a cool gray mist, as if everything had frozen—except for her. Her body was beginning to cool. Her skin paling, her metal dulling. She tried to cover her metal hand, stupidly, in case Kai had been too blinded by the flash to notice it.
She caught the queen’s eye. Levana’s rage seemed to hiccup when their gazes met. The queen gasped and drew back a step. For a moment, she looked almost afraid.
“Impossible,” she whispered.
Cinder called forth every nanobyte of strength she possessed in order to stand, and pointed the gun at the queen. She pulled the trigger.
The red-haired guard was there. The bullet hit him in the shoulder.
Levana didn’t even flinch.
Cinder’s brain caught up with her body as blood dripped over the guard’s armor.
Cinder dropped the gun and ran. Knowing the frenzied crowd was impenetrable, she barreled toward the nearest exit, the massive doors that led into the gardens. Past the guard, past the queen, past her entourage, glass crunching beneath her stolen boots.
The hollow echo of the stone patio. A puddle splashing onto her legs. The fresh, cool smell of rain that had turned to a drizzle.
The stairway stretched before her. Twelve steps and a Zen garden, a towering wall, a gate, the city—escape.
On the fifth step, she heard the bolts snap. The wires tore loose, like tendons stretched to the max. She felt the loss of power at the base of her calf, sending a blinding warning signal up to her brain.
She fell, screaming, and tried to block her fall with her left hand. A shock of pain jolted up her shoulder and into her spine. Metal clattered against stone as she crashed down to the gravel pathway.
She lay sprawled on her side. Holes frayed her glove where she’d tried to catch her fall. Blood stained the beautiful cream-colored silk over her right elbow.
She struggled to breathe. Her head felt suddenly heavy, and she let it slump against the ground, little pebbles digging into her scalp. Her roaming eyes squinted up at the sky, where the storm had fizzled out but for a foggy mist that clung to Cinder’s hair and lashes, refreshing against her hot skin. The full moon sought to break through the cloud cover, burning a slow hole above her as if it planned to swallow up the whole sky.
Movement drew her eye back to the ballroom. The guard who had been holding her reached the stairs and froze. Kai was beside him a second later and screeched to a halt, grasping the railing to stop himself.
His eyes drunk her in—a gleam of metal fingers, the wires sparking at the end of her battered metal leg. His jaw fell, and he looked momentarily as if he might be sick.
More pounding at the top of the stairs. The man and woman appeared in their thaumaturge uniforms, and the guard she’d shot, undeterred by his oozing wound. Kai’s adviser and, finally, Queen Levana herself. Her glamour had returned full force, but all her beauty could not hide the fury contorting her features. Gathering her sparkling skirt in both hands, she moved to stomp down the steps toward Cinder, but the lady thaumaturge stopped her with a gentle hand and gestured up to the wall of the palace.
Cinder followed the movement.
A security camera was on them—on her. Seeing everything.
The last remnants of strength fled from Cinder, leaving her exhausted and weak.
Kai crept down the stairs as if sneaking up on a wounded animal. Stooping, he picked up the rusted cyborg foot that had fallen out of the velvet boot. His jaw flexed as he studied it, perhaps recognizing it from the day they’d met at the market. He would not look at her.
Levana’s lip curled. “Disgusting,” she said from the doorway, safely hidden from the camera’s view. Her words were loud and unnaturally forced compared to her usual lilting voice. “Death would be merciful.”
“She wasn’t a shell after all,” said Sybil Mira. “How did she hide it?”