Winter (The Lunar Chronicles 4)

“Here.” Torin removed his tuxedo jacket and handed it to her. Cress hesitated, hearing Iko’s voice in her head—that doesn’t match at all!—before casting the voice away and allowing him to help her into the sleeves. She was drowning in the jacket, but already she felt more composed, less vulnerable.

“Thank you,” she said, finding an inside pocket and sliding the gun into it with an enormous sense of relief.

“His Majesty is expected to be in the main hall within the next two minutes,” Torin said, then passed his attention to a baffled Kai. “I’m confident I can delay them for at least fifteen more.”

Seventy-Six

Kai wasn’t sure if he or Cress was in the lead as they rushed through the abandoned corridors, their footsteps loud and brisk. When Cress started to fall behind, struggling to keep up, he forced himself to slow his pace.

“We’re going to try to accomplish this without the gun,” he said, as if they’d been discussing it, although they’d hardly spoken since parting ways with Torin. “We’re going to take care of this diplomatically. Or … at least, sneakily. If we can.”

“I have no problem with that,” said Cress. “However, I don’t think that just because you’re an emperor and you’re about to become their king they’re going to let you waltz into their broadcasting room and start fiddling with their equipment.”

Each door they passed had a different design carved into the wood. A beautiful woman holding up a long-eared rabbit. A falcon-headed man with a crescent moon balanced on his head. A young girl dressed in the mantle of a fox and carrying a hunting spear. Kai knew they were symbolic of the moon and its importance in Earthen cultures, many of them lost and forgotten. Even Kai no longer recognized the significance.

They turned down another hallway and passed over a skybridge made of glass. A silver stream passed beneath their feet.

“You’re right,” said Kai, “but I think I can at least get you inside.” He hesitated, before adding, “Cress, I won’t be able to stay. If I’m absent for too long, Levana will get suspicious, and that’s the last thing we need right now. You understand, right?”

“I understand.” She dropped her voice, although the hallways were empty—every guest, every guard, every servant waiting for the coronation to begin. “I suspect the door locks will be coded. The plan was to hack them, but Thorne had the portscreen with him…”

Kai unclipped his portscreen from his belt. “Can you use mine?”

She stared at the device. “You won’t … need it?”

“Not like you will. I couldn’t have brought it into the ceremony, anyway. All recording devices are prohibited.” He rolled his eyes and handed the port to her. Though it once would have felt like giving up one of his limbs, he’d gotten used to being without it after Levana had it confiscated.

Besides, a part of him was giddy with the knowledge that he was helping to undermine the queen.

“How do you know where we’re going?” Cress asked, tucking the port into one of the pockets in Torin’s jacket.

Kai scowled. “I had the great experience of partaking in one of her propaganda videos a while back.”

As they neared the palace wing on the opposite side of the lake from the great hall, where the coronation was set to start, oh, six minutes ago, Kai held up a hand, bringing them to a stop.

“Wait here,” he whispered, holding a finger to his lips.

Cress pressed herself against a wall. She looked tiny and terrified and preposterous in that poufy orange skirt, and some chivalrous instinct told Kai he shouldn’t abandon her here, of all places. But he shoved that instinct down, reminding himself that she was also the genius who had single-handedly shut down the entire security system of New Beijing Palace.

Straightening his patriotic sash, Kai stepped around the corner. This wing was sealed off, and as far as Kai knew, there was only this one door in and out. As expected, a guard stood in front of the door at mute attention. The same guard, Kai thought, who had been on duty when Levana had dragged him here before.

The guard’s eyes narrowed upon seeing Kai in his white silk tunic. “This area is not open to the public,” he said in a bored tone.

“I’m hardly ‘the public.’” Kai tucked his hands into his pockets, trying to look both accommodating and defiant. “My understanding is that the coronation regalia are held in this wing, are they not?”

The guard squinted suspiciously.

“I’ve been sent to obtain the Brooch of … Eternal Starlight. I’m sure you’ll understand that I’m rather short on time.”

“I’m sure you’re used to getting your way on Earth, Your Emperorship, but you will not be permitted past these doors, and to see the crown jewels, no less, without official documentation from the queen.”

“I understand, and I would gladly obtain that documentation if Her Majesty wasn’t at this very moment in the opposite wing of the palace, dressed in full coronation garb, having already been anointed with a concoction of sacred Eastern Commonwealth oils in order to purify her for the ceremony in which she will become empress of my country. So she’s just a little preoccupied at the moment, and I need to find that brooch before the ceremony is delayed even more than it already is.”

“Do you think I’m an idiot?”

“I’m beginning to, actually. Only an idiot would stall Her Majesty’s coronation. Would you like me to go to her now and explain how we cannot proceed because of your obstinacy?”

“I’ve never even heard of this ‘Brooch of Eternal Starlight.’”

“Of course you haven’t. It was designed specifically to represent an alliance between Luna and Earth and gifted to one of the queen’s great ancestors over a century ago. Unfortunately, as you may be aware, there hasn’t been an alliance between us in that time, so the brooch hasn’t been necessary. Until tonight—and the moron who was in charge of preparing the regalia forgot about it.”

“And they sent you to pick it up? Shouldn’t you be getting anointed with oils yourself?”

Kai let out a slow breath and dared to put himself in arm’s reach of the guard. “Unfortunately, I seem to be the only person on this little moon who has any clue what it looks like. Now—by the end of this night, I will be your king, and if you want to still have your job by tomorrow morning, I suggest you let me through.”

The guard’s jaw clenched. He still didn’t move.

Kai threw his arms up. “Stars above, I’m not asking you to open the door, close your eyes, and count to ten. Obviously, you’ll come in with me and make sure I don’t steal anything. But time is running out. I’m ten minutes late already. Perhaps you’d like to comm Her Majesty and explain the delay?”

With a huff, the guard stepped back and yanked open the door. “Fine. But if you touch anything other than this supposed brooch of yours, I will chop off your hand.”

“Fine.” Kai rolled his eyes in a way he hoped indicated a total lack of concern and followed the guard. Not that the guard was traveling far from his post—the vault that housed the crown jewels, when they weren’t being used for a coronation, was immediately on the left, behind an enormous vault door.