She pulls out her holotab and taps an application, activating the miniature projectors lining the edge of the device. A data orb shimmers above the screen, which Victoria pokes with a silver stylus. It flattens into a square.

“You first, Miss Haverns. Hold out your hand.”

Glacia does as she’s told, and the projectors scan an image of her palm and fingers. Her face and name flicker on the holotab screen.

“Great,” Victoria says. “Arman, you next.”

We each hold our hands over the screen so the system can register us. After Michael finishes, Victoria logs the information and stands up.

“Follow me.”

She walks out the door and leads us to a stairwell a few yards down the hall. The room at the top is a sort of observatory. Sunlight brightens the floor and cool air pours from vents in the back wall. When we walk to the front of the room, Glacia and Ellin gasp, and John sticks his hands back on the window.

A city sits alone in the desert. It adorns the sun-baked plain, and it is the most magnificent sight I have ever seen.

The Undil Embassy.

Chapter Three

The hours I spent poring over Father’s portfolios can never compare to what I’m seeing now. The city’s triangular perimeter is filled with bronze buildings, black buildings, silver buildings, and glass buildings. The Crown, the most prominent tower in the Undil Embassy, rises from the center. Shorter towers stand at three other points, each representing the one of the Embassy’s most significant branches: Threshold, Horizon, and Shield.

The Main Throughway extends to an industrial complex several miles southeast of the city, disappears underground near the city, and reappears on the opposite side, running to a second outpost in the northwest. Other than that, the land is free of civilization for thousands of miles. Mesas rise from the crusty desert and dust swirls through the hazy air.

The land is dead.

A light shudder shakes the hovercraft when the thrusters rotate to stabilize the landing. Once we’re clear, Victoria steps away from the window.

“Ready?”

John jumps to his feet. “Are we ever?”

He ignores our confused looks and rushes down the stairwell, but doesn’t know the way from there, so Victoria slips past him and takes us to the exit. Outside, a hot wind mixes with the whir of the engines and drowns out the voices of other Officials who are boarding more hovercrafts. The heat quickly becomes a nuisance. For some misguided reason, I imagined the air would be cooler here than back home. I want to admire the city, but sweat slips down my face, and wiping it only stings my eyes. Victoria, on the other hand, seems fine.

“Morning, Lieutenant,” says a man with spiky blond hair who’s walking toward us. “Looks like we got ourselves a happy bunch this year.”