They would all die.
He heard the ship landing, felt the vibration of the ground beneath his feet. His heart raced, and his mind whispered, family, blood, truth.
The shattered glass from the doors crunched underfoot as another set of guards arrived.
He turned and made his way to the stage.
There was a wet, red smear where his father’s body had been. Valen clenched his jaw.
Andi, he thought.
Her body was gone, too.
Dex, he thought right after. He couldn’t see them, but he knew they hadn’t escaped. Not in Andi’s condition. And not with his guards blocking every exit.
There were other, far more important things to attend to at the moment, however.
The crowd was just beginning to brew with the sound of voices. Questions. People staring at others around them, wondering what had happened, why there were soldiers guarding the doors. And yet, thanks to the bullets, they stayed mercifully calm.
Valen scanned the faces again, his eyes falling on Lira, the pilot. She stood beside Gilly, both of them staring silently.
Again, the tug at Valen’s mind came, and he knew his sister was close.
He faced the crowd, spreading his arms wide. “Look at me.”
His voice rang out steady and true, and when they looked at him, it was everything he’d ever dreamed of. Not quite adoration...but acceptance.
Valen without a shadow. Valen without the stain of his father beside him.
All eyes were on him, rapt with attention as if his voice was a magnet, and they were helpless to resist its pull. Behind him, the guards brought forward the leaders from the Tavina, Prime and Stuna systems. They stood to Valen’s right, silent as night.
“The time to choose has arrived,” Valen addressed the crowd. “Today, in this room, we will change the course of the future. We will turn our eyes to the one true ruler, instead of these feeble impostors.”
He lifted a hand toward the system leaders of Mirabel.
The room was silent, like the moment before a blade was drawn, before a bullet was loosed. Before a life was taken hold of and remade.
Before Valen asked the question, he already knew, with confidence, what their answer would be. He pulled his shoulders back. He took a deep, steadying breath and looked down at the people.
“Who is the rightful ruler of Mirabel?”
The answer came from a young child, standing closest to the stage.
“Nor Solis,” the child said.
Her mother patted her on the head. Her father smiled.
Other voices rang out, one at a time at first, then stronger, filling the room with the sound of the one true name. Valen saw Andi’s pilot and the young gunner, Nor’s name on their lips, as if it had been there all their lives.
The doors behind them opened. Valen heard the crunch of boots on broken glass. Soldiers jerked to stand upright as a hooded figure appeared, hands reaching up to pull the hood back and reveal red lips, dark hair and eyes as glorious as the setting sun.
“Bow to your queen,” Valen said.
The crowd bowed, reverent and ready, as Nor Solis, the Queen of Xen Ptera, the Savior of Olen, the new ruler of Mirabel, arrived.
Chapter Eighty-Nine
* * *
NOR
HER BROTHER HAD done his job perfectly.
A fine test for his first mission out in the field. She’d been wise to keep him in Lunamere for so long, tortured to near death. It had unlocked his compulsion ability, his true self. His birthright. That was when she had begun to visit him daily in his cell. Training him, guiding him, gaining his trust.
As Nor entered the building now, her two armies were already waiting. One dressed in the colors of Xen Ptera, red to match the horrors they would spread across Mirabel to those who rebelled. The other, her new army, adorned in gowns and suits and all manner of fineries that Nor would do away with.
Such fine things would be for her people, and hers alone.
They all bowed before her, heads tucked close to their chests, breath held as if she were a holy relic. She glided past them without fear, knowing that none would lift a finger to harm her.
Valen waited for her on the stage.
“Sister,” he said.
Nor stopped herself from curling her lip at the sight of his figure. Too thin, too angular, too pained. No member of the Solis family deserved such treatment. But it had to be done, to ensure that his survival instincts would kick in, to force his powers to unlock.
She would reward him later for his loyalty, perhaps with a crown of his own.
He was a prince of darkness. Her long-lost brother, finally come home to her side where he belonged.
But never her equal. She would rule alone.
“You have done well, Valen,” Nor said.
“The final step remains,” Valen said, inclining his head in thanks. “Should I leave the honor to you?”
Nor raised a sculpted brow. “I enjoy watching you work, Brother. I can’t have all the fun.”
He smiled at her, a new thing that had begun to pass between them only recently. She enjoyed seeing that smile.
He turned back to their new army. By now, all across Arcardius, a wave would be spreading as time-released explosives full of the silver liquid went off, bringing more to her cause.
“Followers of Queen Nor,” Valen said, his voice ripe with the new power she had unlocked in him. “We must eliminate the traitors to the crown.” He looked specifically to the old leaders of Mirabel. “Kneel before your queen.”
Their faces were calm as the three leaders knelt before Nor. She reached into her cloak and removed a freshly sharpened knife. Nor had used the whetstone on it herself, then polished the blade to a gleaming perfection.
“Your sacrifices, my queen,” Valen said as he stepped aside to give Nor space.
The words made her warm, light as air. She felt her lips pulling into a beautiful grin as she approached the leaders of the Unified Systems.
One by one, she ran her blade across their throats. Each leader that fell was a gift to her people.
Revenge, her heart sang.
And in that moment, Nor knew that her rule had begun.
Chapter Ninety
* * *
LIRA
LIRANA METTE FELT REBORN.
For so long, she had been blinded by darkness, by the lies of the Unified Systems. For so long, she had been unable to see the light.
The moment she rose to her feet, she heard a lingering whisper in her mind.
The True Queen, it said.
It sounded like Valen. The boy they had not rescued, as she’d previously believed, but stolen away from his queen. She knew Valen belonged at Nor’s side, just as much as she knew that the Unified Systems were her enemy. That her aunt would be a worthy sacrifice to the cause. She looked to Gilly and Breck beside her, knowing they also heard the voice in their own minds.
The True Queen, it said again. Protect her, honor her, worship her cause.
Lira’s eyes had been opened, after all this time.
She turned to look at Nor Solis, the True Queen of Mirabel.
The light had finally begun to shine.
Chapter Ninety-One
* * *
DEX