Allies in powerful places.

My stomach turns with a sickening lurch. No, it couldn’t be. Caitoman and Constantine have an unspoken language between them. They care about each other. Constantine had allowed Red to escape in order to save his brother. And Caitoman …

But Caitoman doesn’t care about others. Even Constantine had confirmed that. And that means Caitoman doesn’t care for Constantine, either, even if his brother might pity him to some extent. Caitoman is a monster. I have seen it enough with my own eyes.

That means Caitoman is part of the rebellion.

I am working on the same side as him.

The Chief Architect and Mayor Elland are planning to dethrone Constantine. But they’re not going to overthrow the Federation.

Instead, they’re going to help Caitoman take the throne.

30

RED

When the Federation first arrested me, they took my father and sister. I still remember seeing the carriage pull up in front of our home, and my father stepping before me to greet the guard dressed in white. My father had walked around me so smoothly. He’d bent down to my ear as he passed and said to me the last words I ever heard from him.

“If you fight them,” he’d whispered, “make sure they don’t see it coming.”

Even now, I think back and marvel at the straightness of his shoulders and the lift of his chin. He knew why they were there, and that he had no way of protecting me and my sister. He could only tell me to find a moment—any moment—to escape.

His final words echo in my thoughts as we hide in the outer limits of Cardinia at dusk. Here, the city dwindles, the storefronts and apartments and parks making way for large factories and turbines. Massive waterwheels churn against the side of the inner walls, powered by a series of irrigation canals running over the top of the walls that pour water endlessly over the wheels. Billows of steam and smoke rise from the factories.

Here, there are no spectators, no crowds on the streets. Instead, I see workers dressed in gray and black, faces smeared with sweat and dirt as they walk in steady lines between buildings inside the factory grounds.

My father had always told me and Laeni to stay away from the edges of Cardinia. This is the prison district, and it runs in a large ring around the city. Criminals deemed unworthy of use in the lab complex come here instead. They are charged rent for their prison cells and must work to pay it off. The numbers never quite add up, though, so you always end up earning less than the rent of your cell costs. Some families manage to scrounge up enough money to pay the debt and help a prisoner finish their sentence. Most never do.

Even without the lengthening evening, we are swathed in shadows from the moment we draw close to the prison district. Towers loom high over us, spewing their steam, and enormous gears churn, generating the electricity that keeps the light bulbs burning bright throughout the city. Most of the workers have cloth draped across their heads to protect themselves from the constant rain of soot that stains the streets.