“Smoke and mirrors,” he whispers, stooping to run his hand along a seam. “Ha.”
He shines his light on a panel in the floor. It’s so well concealed, I never would’ve spotted it. He pulls some kind of tool from his belt, and when he presses a tab, it fans out with a dozen blades. He uses one to pry open the panel, and a shaft of brilliant light shoots up from below.
We hear a noise, and the light shuts off. Mathias wrenches the panel wider and drops into the darkness. I ease down after him and fall to a slick, hard floor. When I stand up, Mathias flares his laser torch around the space, and the first person I see is Lord Neith.
He’s sleeping under a row of lights that are now switched off. His long, golden body lies stretched on a waist-high table, and there’s something funny about his nose. We step closer.
The Guardian’s nose is tipped up like a hinged lid, revealing a triangle of clear plexine underneath, flecked with bits of glowing metal. “What—”
“Shh. It’s a machine.” Mathias dims his laser torch. It seems we’ve entered some kind of workspace. There’s a bank of inactive smart screens, shelves of exotic gadgets, and dozens of small tools lying scattered over every surface. As his muted light plays over the room, it catches the glint of two green eyes.
“Wake up.”
The room suddenly fills with soft light as screens flicker to life and gadgets begin to hum. Hysan steps forward. “So you’ve found my secret.”
He’s exchanged his court suit for gray workman’s coveralls that show off the muscles in his lean build, and he’s holding what looks like a stylus. Everything in here is stainless steel and spotlessly clean, even the scattered tools.
Mathias touches Neith’s skin with his fingertip, and his face twists with disgust. “Kartex.”
Hysan beams. “Pretty realistic, don’t you think?”
“Why does an android pose as Libra’s Guardian?” demands Mathias. “What are you hiding?”
“Mathias, you have no right to question me in my own House.” Hysan steps closer, and his eyes flash with authority. “But since dear Rho is here, I’ll tell you: I don’t like living at court, so Neith stands in for me.”
Mathias glowers. “Are you implying that you are Guardian of Libra?”
Hysan performs his low bow. “In the flesh.” His gaze jumps to me. “Literally, this time.”
21
I STARE AT HYSAN, completely at a loss for how to react.
For some reason, the first thing that runs through my mind is the Taboo. It’s been around since the Trinary Axis, and it’s pretty much the only rule the Guardians have to follow: We’re forbidden from dating—or loving, or marrying, or even kissing—each other.
I shake my head, as if afraid someone might read my thoughts. I don’t know why I’m even thinking of dating right now.
“I use Neith because I can’t be tied down,” says Hysan, looking at me as though his explanation is for my ears only. “I’m a born traveler. I must have had a Sagittarian ancestor.”
“A born spy,” mutters Mathias. “That android doesn’t even look like you.”
“Of course he doesn’t. I was eleven years old when they named me Guardian. Do you think a boy could ever command respect?”
Eleven.
I’ve been Guardian for barely two weeks, and it feels like a year of my life has elapsed. But Hysan has already been doing this for six years. My eyes meet his, and we exchange a look of loneliness that no one else in the Zodiac could understand.
No one else is a teenager and a Guardian.
“How many people know about this hoax?” asks Mathias, still using a demanding tone of voice even though we’re technically addressing the Libran Guardian in his own home.
“You do enjoy interrogating me, Cancrian.”
For the second time, I glimpse the counterbalance to Hysan’s good nature. The darkness beneath his light.
“How did you pull this off?” I ask, drawing Hysan’s attention from his staring contest with Mathias.
“On Libra, our Guardians predict their own deaths. In their final year of life, they read the stars to find their successor. The new Guardian’s identity is kept hidden until the present Guardian passes.”
I remember that from my lessons with Mom. The thought of knowing the day of your own death always struck me as cold and unnatural. Now I feel like mine could be at any moment.
“When my predecessor, Lord Vaz, chose me to succeed him, he understood no one would trust a boy. That’s why he and I built Neith, in secret. When the time came to name the new Guardian, he announced Neith’s name. Everyone in our government just knows me as a diplomatic envoy who happens to be a distant relative of Lord Neith’s.”
Mathias makes a disparaging face. “This is outrageous. You deceive your own people.”
Hysan’s expression tightens when he turns to him. “My people are wealthy and content. They don’t complain.”