In an instant, I know my aim is true. He looks away from me, but through our bond, I sense his amusement flicker briefly into annoyance. We can play this game from both sides and sometimes, just sometimes, I’m the one who wins.

The hint of his irritation disappears, and he settles back into his cool demeanor. Careful, Talin, he tells me before looking away. Remember who drapes you in wealth.

I look down at my new outfit. Where before I wore the somber and refined sapphire uniform of Strikers, now I have clothes dripping in foreign luxury. Black wool and leather layered underneath with fine linen and trimmed with silver fur now covers me from neck to toe, and over my ornate sleeves are armguards fashioned in the strongest, most beautiful black steel I’ve ever seen, all branded with the Federation’s seal.

Constantine wants his war machine to look good.

Did they dress up Red in fancy things like this too? Had he been paraded around like a puppet before he managed to escape? I find my thoughts drifting, as they often do, to the memory of him at my side. His figure, strong and seemingly invincible, crouching protectively behind me. His face, outlined by late-afternoon light in Newage’s bath halls.

Is Red thinking about me out there?

I pull my thoughts harshly back. Let myself go too much, and Constantine will sense the twist of my feelings. He’ll know I’m dwelling on Red again. I’d learned this the hard way early on, when I was still recovering at the National Laboratory and wept an entire night, yearning for Red. The next morning, Constantine had shown up in my chambers, interrogating me on whether I’d felt Red’s location. He’d sent Caitoman scouting in the woods where I thought Red might be. I’d been wrong, luckily—my transformation had put me in such a state at the time that my mind was a haze. But it was enough of a warning.

I’m relieved the Premier can’t yet compel me to obey him. The Chief Architect, the one responsible for my transformation, tells me you can’t erase someone’s mind without also destroying it. The kind of obedience Ghosts show so quickly to the Federation is more difficult to replicate in the mind of an alert, intelligent human. The Architect hasn’t figured it out yet, but her teams are working on it.

Still, the Premier knows there’s more than one way to control someone. He showed me that the day he brought my mother before me, bound and gagged, a knife at her throat. I follow his commands not because I must but because I fear what could happen if I don’t.

My mother remains under guard at all hours of the day and night. Constantine has her moved to a new location every two weeks, depending on my behavior. If I am obedient and do as he says, she will spend those weeks in a luxurious place. If I displease him, he will move her somewhere much worse.