“There was, however, one thing unusual about this takeover,” the Resistance member says. “Many of the technicians the king let go were dazed.”

“What do you mean by ‘dazed’?” Will asks.

“They were confused. Couldn’t answer our questions.”

“Any ideas what might’ve happened to them?” I cut in.

The voice on the other end pauses. “None except the most general.”

“And what would that be?” I press.

“They lost their memory.”

The next day a knock on my door signals that it’s time to go. I sit alone in the barracks, fingering my mother’s necklace around my neck. I’m already wearing one of the dresses that Lisa tailored for me.

I despise the thing.

The door opens and Will pokes his head in. The sight of him brings me back to last night’s conversation with the Resistance. The king’s overtaken the Panama Canal; no wonder the WUN’s folding. The war’s ending soon if they’ve wrangled control of it.

And the hospitals … everywhere the king goes, he infiltrates the labs first. Initially we’d thought it was to decimate any chance of medical relief—and yes, he does do that. But when stories of his unusual research trickled in, we began to take note.

“Mind if I come in?” Will asks. His eyes widen as they move over me.

I motion him inside, banishing thoughts of the king. “What are you doing here?” I ask once Will closes the door behind him.

“I wanted to say goodbye to you,” he says. He shifts his weight, sliding his hands into his pockets. His eyes flick over me again. “You look really nice.”

I snort. “Yeah, if by nice you mean I look like a giant peacock,” I say, picking up a piece of the dress and letting it flutter back to my side.

Will sits down next to me. “You make it look good,” he says, his eyes full of that same intensity I’d seen him wear earlier.

Suddenly I get the impression that this isn’t just a friendly goodbye. Will’s not looking at me like I’m the soldier who fought alongside him. Nor is he looking at me like the friend who would stay up late talking about anything and everything that crossed our minds.

He’s looking at me the way a lover should.

“Serenity, you’re going to save our country,” he says, clasping my hand.

I shake my head. “Don’t put that on me, Will. We both know how this ends.”

“No,” he says, squeezing my hand tightly. “We don’t. And the representatives wouldn’t send you if they didn’t think you’d sway the king.”

The king. I’d have to speak with him, smile at him, pretend that he didn’t destroy everything that I held dear.

“But more than that, you have to come back because I’ll be waiting for you.”