He hurried down the ballroom stairs and nodded to a few Ironbloods who looked vaguely familiar, adjusting his dark frock coat as he went. The Aragon symbol was pinned to his lapel, and he felt too many eyes lingering on it as he passed. A Valerio who became an Aragon, who had inherited both houses after his brother met his unfortunate end.

Goddess, he had so much wealth he didn’t know what to do with it—and so much responsibility he got panicky just thinking about it.

“Thank you,” he said to a passing waiter, snagging two glasses of rose champagne—Suvan’du, from the Aragon estate itself—and made his way toward a tall and slender boy. He stood out against the sea of black like a star in the night, the orange-yellow lanterns above making his skin sparkle like sunbursts.

“Hey, Smolder!” Elara yelled from the refreshments, and she waved with a beignet. Xu stood beside her, looking quite dashing in a golden tux. They were still missing an arm from the battle in the square, but a new one was supposed to arrive at the palace any day now.

After Di had freed the Metals from the HIVE, the Metals had returned to themselves as if waking up from a long dream. He saw it firsthand, as one moment Viera had lunged at Lenda, and the next she had fallen to her knees on the ground, the sword skittering away across the cobblestones.

Lenda had whirled back to her, dagger at the ready, but at the same moment the other Messiers had dropped their weapons, too. Viera looked around in confusion.

“Where—where am I?” she asked.

Lenda, hesitant at first, sheathed her dagger and walked up to the ex–guard captain.“You’re free,” she replied, and stretched down her hand for Viera to take.

In the week following the death of the Great Dark, Ana returned to the Iron Palace with the crown, and she faced her people. She was met with so much love, she cried. She told the kingdom about Di, and how the HIVE had used him as a puppet Emperor. She wasted no time getting to work. Nevaeh was to be repaired, the Iron Shrine rebuilt, the garden of Astoria restored to its former glory. The dreadnoughts were quickly decomissioned. The special laws about “rogue” Metals were rescinded. She elected Xu as a liaison between Metals and the kingdom, and they had a chair on the Iron Council. So did a lot of other people who were not Ironblooded, and who did not come from prosperous bloodlines, but to Ana that didn’t matter. If she was going to exist in a galaxy where an orphaned rebel could become the Empress of the Iron Kingdom, she didn’t care about titles or bloodlines.

And quite frankly, Robb looked forward to the new dynamic in the Council.

Elara shouted with a mouthful of pastries, “You’re looking hot tonight!”

“That’s quite inapproriate to say at a funeral,” he called back.

“Good!”

Robb waved her off and slipped up next to his partner, handing him one of the glasses. “Champagne to dull the boredom, ma’alor?”