Her personal guard was standing just off the dais, wearing a dark scowl.
“Ah!” Heart fluttering with a thousand startled birds, Winter broke into a relieved smile. “Did you catch the monster?”
There was no return smile, not even a flush of his cheeks, which was the normal reaction when she let loose that particular smile. Instead, her guard seemed to be developing a twitch over his right eye.
“Your Highness. I have come to retrieve you and escort you safely back to the palace.”
Righting herself, Winter clasped her hands graciously in front of her chest. “Of course. It’s so kind of you to worry after me.” She glanced back at Jacin, who was eyeing the guard with distrust. No surprise. He eyed everyone with distrust. “I fear tomorrow will be even more difficult for you, Sir Clay. Do try to think of me when you can.”
“Try, Princess?” He smirked, meeting her gaze again. “I can’t seem to think of much else.”
Four
Cinder lay on the ground, staring up at the Rampion’s vast engine, its ductwork and revolving life-support module. The system blueprints that she’d downloaded weeks ago were overlaid across her vision—a cyborg trick that had come in handy countless times when she was a working mechanic in New Beijing. She expanded the blueprint, zooming in on a cylinder that was no longer than her arm. It was tucked near the engine room’s wall, coils of tubing sprouted from both sides.
“That has to be the problem,” she muttered, dismissing the blueprint. She shimmied beneath the revolving module, dust bunnies gathering around her shoulders. She eased herself back to sitting. There was just enough space for her to squeeze in between the labyrinth of wires and coils, pipes and tubes.
Holding her breath, she pressed her ear against the cylinder, which was right where the blueprint had told her it would be. The metal was ice cold against her skin.
She waited. Listened. Adjusted the volume on her audio sensors.
What she heard was the door to the engine room open.
Glancing back, she spotted the gray pants of a military uniform in the yellowish light from the corridor. That could have been anyone on the ship, but the shiny black dress shoes …
“Hello?” said Kai.
Her heart thumped—every single time, her heart thumped.
“Back here.”
Kai shut the door and crouched down on the far side of the room, framed between the jumble of thumping pistons and spinning fans. “What are you doing?”
“Checking the oxygen filters. One minute.”
She placed her ear against the cylinder again. There—a faint clatter, like a pebble banging around inside. “A-ha.”
She dug a wrench from her pocket and set to loosening the nuts on either side of the cylinder. As soon as it was free, the ship fell eerily quiet, like a humming that she’d never noticed before had vanished, finally drawing attention to itself. Kai’s eyebrows shot upward—nervously, she thought.
Cinder upended the cylinder, peering into its depths, before she stuck her fingers in and pulled out a complicated filter. It was made up of tiny channels and crevices, all lined with a thin gray film.
“No wonder the takeoffs have been so rocky,” she muttered.
“I don’t suppose you could use some help?”
“Nope. Unless you want to find me a broom.”
“A broom?”
Raising the filter, Cinder banged the end of it on one of the overhead pipes. A dust cloud exploded around her, covering her hair and arms. Coughing, Cinder buried her nose in the crook of her elbow and kept banging until the biggest chunks had been dislodged.
“Ah. A broom. Right. There might be one up in the kitchen?… I mean, the galley.”
Blinking the dust from her eyelashes, Cinder glanced over at Kai and grinned. He was usually so self-assured that in the rare moments when he was flustered, it made all of her insides swap wrongside-up. And he’d been flustered a lot lately. Since the moment he’d woken up aboard the Rampion, it had been clear that Kai was twelve thousand kilometers outside of his element, yet he’d adapted as well as he could. He’d learned the terminology, he’d eaten the canned and freeze-dried meals without complaint, he’d traded in his fancy wedding clothes for the standard military uniform they all wore. He’d insisted on helping out where he could, even cooking a few of those bland meals, despite how Iko frequently pointed out that, as their royal guest, they should be waiting on him. Thorne had laughed, though, and the suggestion seemed to make Kai even more uncomfortable.
While Cinder couldn’t imagine him abdicating his throne and setting off on a lifetime of space travel and adventure, it was rather adorable watching him try to fit in.