“We are familiar.”

“As though we were equal. We are not equal. I am a descendant of the Conquerors, of the Iron Golds! I am the lord of a planet. What are you? A—”

“I’m a man with a stunFist.” He shoots Augustus in the chest. Augustus crumples backward as his Praetors gasp. “That’ll show him to not wear his armor to galas. Now!” Fitchner smiles. “Who can I reason with?”

“Me.” The Jackal takes a step forward. “I am heir to this house.”

“Hmm … pass! You’re creepy.”

He shoots the Jackal in the chest with the stunFist.

“Foolishness! Enough foolishness.” Kavax steps forward, pushing his son back. “Speak with me or Darrow. It’s plain enough, your intentions.”

“Indeed. Darrow. You shall come with me.”

“Like hell,” Victra sneers, stepping in front of me.

Fitchner rolls his eyes. “Telemanus, you and your son take the ArchGovernor back to his villa and then return to your own. Matters must be sorted.” Fitchner gazes quietly at the bald Gold. His words now scrape out like raw iron on slate. “This is not a request, Telemanus.”

Telemanus looks to me. “My boy trusted this one. So shall I.”

“I need your assurance my friends will not be hurt,” I say to Fitchner.

He looks at Victra. “They won’t be.”

“Convince me.”

He sighs, bored.

“The Sovereign can’t gorywell execute an entire house absent a trial for treason. Can she? That violates the Compact. And you know how that would make us Olympic Knights feel, not to mention the other houses. Remember how her father met his end. But if you resist, well, that’s another matter entirely.” Fitchner flips a piece of gum into his mouth. “Do you resist?”

“Not today,” I say.

14

THE SOVEREIGN

“Once upon a time, there was a family of strong wills,” she says, voice slow and measured as a pendulum. “They did not love one another. But together they presided over a farm. And on that farm, there were hounds, and bitches, and dairy cows, and hens, and cocks, and sheep, and mules, and horses. The family kept the beasts in line. And the beasts kept them rich, fat, and happy. Now, the beasts obeyed because they knew the family was strong, and to disobey was to suffer their united wrath. But one day, when one of the brothers struck his brother over the eye, a cock said to a hen, ‘Darling, matronly hen, what would really happen if you stopped laying eggs for them?’ ”

Her eyes burn into mine. Neither of us look away. Silence in the sparse suite, except the sound of rain at the windows of her skyscraper. We’re among the clouds. Ships pass in the haze outside like silent, glowing sharks. The leather creaks as she leans forward and steeples her long fingers, which are painted red, a lone splash of color. Then her lips curl in condescension, accenting each syllable as though I were an Agea street child only just learning her language.

“In so many ways you remind me of my father.”

The one she beheaded.

That’s when she fixes me with the most enigmatic smile I may ever have seen. Mischief dances in her eyes, subdued and quiet beneath the cold trappings of power. Somewhere inside is the nine-year-old girl who infamously started a riot by throwing diamonds from an aircar.

I stand before her. She sits on a couch by a fire. Everything is Spartan. Hard. Cold. A Gold woman of iron and stone. All this drabness as if to say she needs not luxury or wealth, just power.

Her face is creased but not faded by time. A hundred years, or so I hear, not cracked by the pressures of office. If anything, pressure has made her like those diamonds she scattered. Unbreakable. Ageless. And she will be without age for some time longer, if the Carvers continue their cellular rejuvenation therapy.

That is the problem. She will cling to power far too long. A king reigns and then he dies. That is the way of it. That is how the young justify obeying their elders—knowing it will one day be their turn. But when their elders do not leave? When she rules for forty years, and may rule for a hundred more? What then?

She is the answer to that question. This is not a woman who inherited the Morning Throne. This is a woman who took it from a ruler who had not the courtesy to die in a timely fashion. For forty years others have tried to take it from her. Yet here she sits. Timeless as those fabled diamonds.

“Why did you disobey me?” she asks.

“Because I could.”

“Explain.”

“Nepotism shrivels under the light of the sun. When you changed your mind to protect Cassius, the crowd rejected your moral and legal authority. Not to mention, you contradicted yourself. That in itself is weakness. So I exploited it, knowing I could get what I wanted without consequence.”

Aja, the Sovereign’s favorite killer, broods in a chair near the window—a powerful panther of a woman with skin duskier than her siblings’, and eyes with slitted pupils. She is one of the Olympic Knights, the Protean Knight to be technic. She was Lorn’s last student before me. Though he didn’t teach her everything. Her armor is gold and midnight blue and writhes with sea serpents.

A young boy enters quietly from another room to sit beside Aja. I recognize him immediately. The Sovereign’s only grandson, Lysander. No older than eight, but so very composed. Regal in his quiet, thin as a scarf. But his eyes. His eyes are beyond gold. Almost a yellow crystal, so bright they could nearly be said to shine. Aja watches me appraise the boy. She takes him onto her lap protectively and bares her teeth, their whiteness fiercely bright against her dark skin. Like a great cat playfully saying hello. And for the first time I can remember, I glance away from a threat. The shame burns hot and sudden in me. I might as well have kneeled to her.

“But there are always consequences,” the Sovereign says. “I’m curious. What did you want out of that duel?”

“The same as Cassius au Bellona. The heart of my enemy.”

“Do you hate him so much?”

“No. But my survival instinct is … enthusiastic. Cassius, as far as I am concerned, is a stupid boy crippled by his upbringing. His stock is limited. He talks of honor but he stoops to ignoble things.”

“So it wasn’t for Virginia?” she asks. “It wasn’t to claim her hand or sate your jealous rage?”

“I’m angry, but I’m not petty,” I snap. “Besides, Virginia isn’t the sort of woman who would stand for such things. If I did it for her, I would have lost her.”

“You have lost her,” Aja growls from the side.

“Yes. I realize she has a new home, Aja. Easy to see.”

“Do you lash out at me, my goodman?” Aja touches her razor.

“My goodlady, I do but lash out.” I smile slowly at her.

“She’ll gut you like a pig, boyo,” Fitchner says quickly. “Don’t give a piss if Lorn taught you how to wipe your ass. Think twice on who you insult here. The true blades of the Society do not duel for sport. So mind your gorydamn tongue.”

I touch my razor.

He snorts. “If you were a threat, do you think they’d let you keep that?”

I nod to Aja. “Another time, perhaps.” I turn back to the Sovereign, straightening. “Perhaps we should discuss why you are holding my house under military guard. Are we under arrest? Am I?”

“Do you see shackles?”

I look at Aja. “Yes.”

The Sovereign laughs. “You’re here because I want you to be.”

An idea comes to me. I try not to smile. “My liege, I should like to apologize,” I say loudly. They wait for me to continue. “My manners have always been … provincial. And so I find the manner of my actions nearly always distracts from their purpose. The base fact is, Cassius deserved worse than what I supplied. That I disobeyed you was not meant as insult by myself or the ArchGovernor. Were he not unconscious on account of your dog”—I glance at Fitchner—“I wager he would do what needed to be done to make amends.”