Again, instead of doing the smart thing and keeping my mouth shut, I kept right on talking. “But if the sensors aren’t fixed, then every single ship is in danger of crashing. And if even just one cruiser goes down, especially one of those in Imperium service, then you’re looking at thousands of casualties. And that’s just on the ship itself. There will likely be many more casualties on the ground, just as there was with the Velorum crash.”
“That’s the idea,” Rowena muttered.
Confusion filled me. “Wait. You actually . . . want people to die on your spaceships? But that will ruin everything—your corporation, your House, and especially your standing among the other Regals.”
Rowena lifted her chin. “My corporation, House, and standing among the Regals are none of your concern . . .” Her voice trailed off, and she snapped her fingers at Conrad. “What’s her full name again?”
“Vesper Quill,” he replied in a smooth voice.
I looked at Conrad, and he stared right back at me. Despite his calm features, I thought a bit of regret flickered in his eyes, but most likely, I only imagined it, the same way I had imagined he had ever cared about me. I might have been planning to sell the stolen files about the Velorum crash, but Conrad was actively participating in the Kents’ cover-up. And for what? So Sabine would buy him another fancy suit? So he could keep being Rowena’s corporate lackey? So he could keep enjoying the crumbs of wealth and power the Kents occasionally tossed his way? What a greedy climber. What had I ever seen in him?
Rowena turned to Conrad. “Scrub her terminal and all her work related to the Velorum crash. And make sure she didn’t download any of the files onto another drive. This information will not leak. I don’t want to spend the next six months denying rumors that there’s something wrong with the new cruisers—or worse, having to repair them on the sly. And you don’t want me doing that either, as I would be most unhappy with you, Mr. Fawley, despite the fact you are currently fucking my daughter. Do you understand me?”
A sheen of sweat popped out on Conrad’s forehead, and he bobbed his head in quick, nervous agreement.
“Get rid of her,” Rowena ordered, staring at me again, her face as cold and blank as the beige walls. “The usual method is fine. Let Holloway think we are still loyal and beholden to his precious Imperium.”
Hal and the three guards stepped away from the wall and headed toward me. Even though I knew it was pointless, I shot to my feet, grabbed Rowena’s untouched water glass, and slammed it against the table. She yelped in surprise and shoved her chair back, as did Sabine and Conrad.
Several pieces of glass dropped to the tabletop. I snatched up the biggest shard and whirled around, ready to stab the first guard who came at me.
But the guards were enhanced with strength and speed, and I was not, and Hal was already standing in front of me.
“Bet you wish you’d been nicer to me now,” he said.
I raised the shard, but he lunged forward and punched me. Pain exploded in my jaw, my legs buckled, and I hit the floor. I blinked and blinked, trying to banish the stars swimming in my eyes.
“Finish her,” Rowena ordered.
Hal grinned and leaned down. I looked past him at Rowena, then at Sabine, and finally at Conrad. All three of them stared back at me with a mixture of annoyance and disgust—
Hal’s fist plowed into my face again, and everything went black.
CHAPTER FOUR
VESPER
I was having the dream again.
I was strolling through the corridors of a . . . Well, I didn’t know exactly what it was. Not a simple home and not a mere mansion either. It looked more like . . . a castle.
An old, run-down, dilapidated castle that had fallen into ruin.
Most of the furniture was covered with gray sheets, which in turn were covered with dust. Thick wads of silken cobwebs clustered in the corners of the high ceilings, while others hung off the grimy stained-glass chandeliers, slowly listing to and fro like ghosts that couldn’t decide if they were going to stir themselves enough to haunt the structure. Still, despite the dust and cobwebs, everything in the castle was real—real stone, wood, and glass—instead of the plastic versions in my apartment.
Years ago, when I’d first started having this dream, everything in the castle had been shined to a high, sparkling gloss. But as time had gone by, the structure had fallen into disrepair. Now, an . . . emptiness permeated the air, as if all the people, life, love, and laughter that had once filled the castle had fled, and all that remained were the faint, hollow echoes of those lovely things.
Really, though, it wasn’t a dream—it was my mindscape.
That was the term the Imperium academy instructors had used, which was just a fancy way of saying this was the place inside my mind, heart, and body where my magic resided. Like all children living on Imperium-controlled planets, I had been tested for psionic abilities when I was five years old, although by the time I was seven, the academy instructors had deemed my magic too weak to waste time training me in how to use it. They had labeled me a failure in that regard, a sentiment my mother had repeated after she had gotten the news.
Useless child. Her words echoed in my ears again, but here, in my mindscape, I was able to shrug them off a little more easily than before.
I ambled through the corridors, but everything was the same as the last time I’d had this dream, a few weeks ago, right before I had decided to blow the whistle on the Velorum crash.
Eventually, I ended up in my favorite room, the library. It was among the castle’s smallest areas, a cozy space lined with real wooden bookcases filled with real paper books. Sometimes, if I stood in the center of the library and drew in a deep breath, I could actually smell all that dry, slightly musty paper. Ahh.
I sucked in a couple of breaths, but the papery scent eluded me, so I walked over to the fireplace in the back wall. No flames crackled behind the grate, and my breath frosted in the chilly air. A silver-framed portrait hung above the fireplace, but I could never quite make out the people’s faces, the same way I could never quite read any of the book titles.
Once again, I tried—and failed—to see the people’s faces, so I looked to my right. A door appeared next to the fireplace, beckoning me to venture even deeper into this dream. I walked through the opening, stepped onto a tight spiral staircase, and trudged downward.
The gloom that cloaked the rest of the castle quickly receded, and light bloomed, along with pale blue flowers that twined through the dark stone banister and gave the air a sharp but slightly sweet scent, like the sticks of spearmint candy I had loved as a child.
Sigils were also carved into the banister, although I had never been able to decipher them. Still, as I trailed my fingers along the stone, the sigils glowed with various colors and sensations. Some were as hot as fire, while others were as cold as ice. A few even made sounds, as though the markings were people whispering their deepest, darkest secrets to me.
I reached the bottom of the stairs, which opened into a round room. More pale blue flowers bloomed down here, clinging to the walls like oversize spiders. I had never seen a different kind of flower anywhere in the castle, which struck me as odd. After all, since this was my mindscape, I would think my imagination would occasionally conjure up roses, orchids, or some other expensive blossom I had seen on a gossipcast.