But for now, the speech droned on and on, and Andi lost herself in watching the crowd instead. Some smiles were genuine, like that of an expectant mother across the room, her hands splayed across her swollen belly as she watched General Cortas speak of the future and an ever-brighter tomorrow for the galaxy.
Across the room, a group of girls clustered together, giggling silently as their parents sent them looks of disapproval. A few feet away, two handsome young Arcardian soldiers, their hair groomed back and glowing under the lights, watched the girls with open interest.
Later, Andi knew, they’d walk up to the girls, try to win them over with their smooth words. Hopefully, if the girls were smart, they’d shut the boys down.
But they likely wouldn’t. They’d dance together. They’d plan their futures, set on moving higher and higher up in society until they reached the top, just as Andi’s parents had.
Andi sighed and glanced over at Valen. He stood in the shadows of the stage, his mother beside him with a gloved hand on his shoulder.
Maybe, in another life, Andi and Valen would have been the same.
Two young Arcardians with bright futures, possibly joined together as society deemed they should be.
Now Valen was staying here.
And she would be gone, never to return.
Their eyes met for a moment, and the new friendship between them made Andi’s chest ache a little. She rolled her eyes and pretended to yawn.
He smiled, as if he wanted to laugh. But then something passed over his eyes, and he looked away, his jaw tight.
“Valen,” the general said. “My son. Would you join me?”
Valen approached the podium with his mother in tow. They looked like the perfect family to anyone who didn’t know about Valen’s kidnapping, the general’s devilish dealings and the way Merella often turned a blind eye for the sake of the family’s reputation.
Everyone in the crowd craned their necks, eager to get an up-close look at the lost son, returned home at last. Andi watched, too, not because Valen was a spectacle, but because she knew, perhaps more than anyone, that he hated to be on display.
Merella stopped short, and Valen’s footsteps were the only sound in the room as he walked across the stage to join his father.
General Cortas placed a hand on Valen’s shoulder.
Andi noticed the flinch. Almost imperceptible, but there nonetheless. For a moment, Valen looked stiff and pained, as if the darkness of Lunamere was threatening to appear in this room, in front of this crowd and all the watching eyes across Mirabel.
But then he relaxed, sank into the persona of the smooth politician’s son he’d been trained to be since birth.
“We are a resilient galaxy,” General Cortas said, staring into the cameras, “fully capable of coming back stronger than ever before.” He squeezed Valen’s shoulder. “My son is proof of this. Many of you know that Valen, my precious firstborn, was taken by Xen Pterran mercenaries two years ago.”
The crowd nodded, hushed sounds of disapproval and sadness sweeping across the room.
The general pressed a hand to his heart as if he was touched by their concern. “Thanks to an Arcardian-born hired hand,” he said, pointedly not looking at Andi, “he has made it back safe and sound.”
The crowd roared, and the general raised his hands, his voice booming into the mic.
“Having my son back home after two years of imprisonment on Xen Ptera is proof of our strength and resilience in even the most trying of times. We will not be broken! We will not bow to fear!” He held a hand out to Valen.
With strange, almost broken steps, Valen moved forward.
General Cortas placed a hand on his son’s cheek and smiled.
Valen did not smile back.
Chapter Eighty-One
* * *
VALEN
THIS WAS HIS MOMENT.
The crowd was loud, the cheers meant for him booming over the sound of his father’s voice on the loudspeaker. As Valen looked out across the packed crowd, he saw the looks of adoration in their eyes, people pressing kerchiefs to their faces to wipe away freshly fallen tears, others clapping and waving beneath the glorious skies.
He’d dreamed of this, people calling his name, their sights set only on him. Not because of his father, and not because of his last name. Just Valen, standing with his sister, watching the world appreciate them, worship them.
“For you, my son,” his father said now.
Valen nodded and plastered a false smile on his face, but it was all a lie.
These cheers weren’t for him—never could be, because nobody truly knew him. Nobody truly understood the things that Valen had been through.
His father’s hand felt like a flaming whip on his cheek.
“My son,” the general said, the mic sending his voice out across the crowd, where it echoed back and into his ears and his brain. Valen wanted it out. He never wanted to hear that voice again. “Welcome back to Arcardius. Welcome home.”
The crowd roared louder, a wave that was cresting, ready to break on top of him.
Valen had made it back to Arcardius, that much was true.
But he wasn’t home. He was far, far from it.
Lunamere had been full of terrors, but those terrors had given way to his salvation.
In the back of his mind, he heard a young woman’s voice, tender and loving, yet full of power and presence as she spoke to him. He saw golden eyes, dark hair and a heart intent on bringing light back into the galaxy.
It was time.
Valen felt it, as much as he felt the tainted blood pumping in his veins, as much as he felt the separation between himself and the man who stood before him now, pressing a too-hot hand to his cheek.
In Lunamere, Valen had learned of the true darkness his father harbored. A soul as black as the night with secrets as sharp as thorns. They may have shared a lineage, but that was only half of who Valen was.
The other half had taken over him, helped him to become who he had always been beneath the surface.
It all began tonight.
Home, his father was saying. Home.
“This is not my home,” Valen said as he stared into the eyes of the man he’d once been so desperate to be loved by. “It never will be.”
Valen’s hand was steady as he retrieved the blade from the inner lining of his suit pocket.
I am Valen Solis, he told himself. Vengeance will be mine.
He smiled and drove the knife into his father’s chest.
Chapter Eighty-Two
* * *
ANDROMA
FIRST THERE WAS the silver flash of a knife.
Then there was blood.
Andi watched, frozen in horror as it bloomed like a crimson nebula on the general’s chest.
He staggered back once. Twice.
He reached for Valen with a trembling hand. The knife was soundless as Valen pulled it from his father’s chest. General Cortas tumbled to the stage with a sickening thump.
A woman’s scream pierced the air.
Andi saw Merella, Valen’s mother, fall at her husband’s side.
Then an explosion rocked the ballroom. Glass shattered as the walls were blasted open.
All around her, soldiers clad in crimson began to swarm through the crowd, the symbol of Xen Ptera painted on their armored chests.