by Melinda Minx
“You’re bragging to me about being a puppet king?” I ask. “For real? My husband is a real prince, beholden to no one.”
“In this scenario,” Siegfried says, “your husband is dead. What do you think that makes you? You seduced Rikard for the throne, and what I’m trying to tell you is that if Rikard loses that throne...then you don’t have to seduce me. I’ll take you.”
I stare at him in astonished disbelief. He thinks I seduced Rikard just for the throne? He thinks I don’t actually care about my husband, that I don’t love him? That I’d just jump from one Nordgaard to another, so long as he had a crown on his head?
“Like I said,” I say it in a level tone, not wanting him to think I’m getting ‘emotional,’ “I’ll take my chances with Olmstead. And you talk a big game about killing Rikard, but you didn’t do it back in the restaurant when you had the chance. You care more about saving your own ass than anything else.
I lie back down on my uncomfortable excuse for a bed. Not because I’m tired, but because I’d rather look up at the ceiling than at Siegfried.
30
Rikard
“Well,” General Olmstead says, the image of his face huge on the war room screen, “I must admit, I did not order your good cousin to kidnap the princess.”
“You’ve violated the terms of the ceasefire,” my father says, sitting straight as a rod on his throne.
“As I said,” Olmstead replies, and the screen switches from his face to a dark dungeon.
The light is faint, but I can make out the dull gleam of the bars, and Siegfried is behind them, sitting on his bed and looking angry.
The screen cuts back to Olmstead. “As you can see, I’m taking his punishment seriously.”
My father’s knuckles whiten as he squeezes the arms of his throne. “Hand him over to us immediately, and we will take his punishment even more seriously. And Princess Jane, of course, must be returned safely.”
“Show her to me,” I shout out.
Father scowls at me. I’m not meant to speak, but fuck the rules.
Olmstead grins at me. “I’d not have done this on my own, but now that we have something you want more than Siegfried, I think we’ll need to renegotiate the terms.”
“The deal stands,” my father says. “Which is more generous than I should be with you after you violated the ceasefire. Even if Siegfried acted alone, by keeping Princess Jane as your hostage, you’ve all but endorsed his actions.”
Olmstead shrugs. “I’m a pragmatist, and I’ll use what leverage is available to me. For my country.”
I feel a sting when he refers to Sydia as a country. It’s part of our kingdom, but having Jane taken from me is much more than a sting. It’s a gaping, bleeding hole in my heart, and I need her back more than I need my kingdom to be whole.
“Return Princess Jane,” my father says.
“And what do I get for that?” Olmstead asks. “I think you should allow the will of my people to be realized now, and not one year from now.”
“I’ll look into it,” my father says, and he slams a button, cutting off the call.
“Father,” I say, rushing to his side.
“I don’t need to hear it, Rikard,” he says.
But I grab him by the arm, not letting go.
“Unhand me,” he growls.
“Father,” I say. “We’ll lose Sydia either way. Now or a year from now, it makes no difference.”
“No difference?” he snaps. “If we allow it to happen now, it will tell any other part of our kingdom that a hasty armed conflict will immediately grant them sovereignty! Waiting a year allows the process to be democratic, to show that militias and military strongmen can’t overpower the will of the people.”
“And yet,” I say, “you were going to raise the taxes to undermine the peoples’ willl.”
He grabs my wrist, squeezing me with every last ounce of his old-man strength. “Do not question my decisions, Rikard. I am still king, and until I’m dead and buried, you are just a prince. I will listen to your advice, but I don’t need you questioning decisions that are already made.”
“It will work out,” Magnus says.
We’re standing outside in the snow while Father makes his decision. The palace is behind us, and the castle is lit up once again on the hill in front of us.
“We’ll make it work,” I say.
“Rikard…”
I look at him seriously. “We need to get a team together. We ran a trace on Olmstead, so we know exactly where he is.”
“We don’t know for sure that Jane is there,” Magnus says.
“He’ll keep her close, especially when he has people like Siegfried disobeying him and acting alone. He doesn’t want someone to take her and use her to gain advantage over him.”
“That makes sense,” Siegfried says. “But what if we put her in even more danger by trying to rescue her?”
“If Father declares war,” I say, “then what chance does she have? If we sneak in like I’m planning to do, she at least has a shot.”
“You wanted war not even a week ago,” Magnus says.
I shake my head. “I was being naive, or proud―or both. Sydia is a lost cause, and we’re stronger as a kingdom without them. Better to split now and start working toward peaceful coexistence.”
“Would you say that if Jane wasn’t being held?” Magnus asks.
I look at him with a reproachful glare, and he backs off. I don’t know the answer to his question, but it doesn't really matter. I don’t want war. I want Jane.
“Do you think Karl and Nils would help me again?” I ask.
“The twins,” Magnus says. “I think they’re still scrubbing toilets from the last time they helped you.”
“Sounds like they’ll jump at the chance to get out then,” I say, grinning.
“This is the wraith,” Dr. Vogel says.
She’s brought the four of us into a big bay full of prototype vehicles. Many look only half-finished, with open panels and wires hanging out everywhere.
The wraith, however, looks so sleek that it seems it came from the future. It looks like it’s made of mirrors―I can see my distorted reflection along the wing. The thing is on some kind of train tracks, which makes little sense to me. Why does it have wings if it runs on a track along the ground?
“Wraith,” Nils says. “Like a ghost? This thing is stealth?”
“In every sense of the word,” Dr. Vogel says.
“Just because it looks like a mirror doesn’t make it invisible,” I add skeptically.
Vogel reaches into her pocket and pulls out a device that looks like a TV remote. She presses a button, and we watch in astonishment as the plane vanishes before our eyes.
“The mirror-like surface absorbs light on all sides, and it projects that light to the opposite sides,” Dr. Vogel says. “Move around a bit, and you’ll see it’s not quite invisible.”
The four of us walk around it, moving our heads up and down to get different angles of it.
I can see a slight bending and distortion where the plane is―especially along the edges. Still, if I wasn’t looking for it, and if I wasn’t five feet away from it, I doubt I’d notice it was there at all.
“It’s especially difficult to notice in the sky,” she says. “Of course, it’s shaped like any regular stealth aircraft, so it won’t show up on radar.”
“Can it actually fly?” Karl asks, pointing to the track. “Not much good being invisible if you have to follow a track.”
“It can fly,” she says. “But only one way.”
We load up into the wraith. It can seat five men with no equipment, but the four of us plus all our guns fills it.
Nils is the only one of us with piloting experience, so he sits in the cockpit while the rest of us are in back.
Dr. Vogel’s voice comes onto the intercom. “Mr. Nils, are you ready?”
“I thought I didn’t have to do anything yet?”
“You don’t,” she says. “S
o resist the urge to mess with the controls.”
As part of its stealthiness, the wraith has no engine or propulsion system. It’s a glider. The track is powered by the strongest electromagnets in the world. The track runs for only a kilometer, but it can accelerate the wraith up to high enough speeds to slingshot it into low-Earth orbit. From there, it can glide down anywhere in the world. It can reach Australia in just a few hours.
Just hopping over the border from Nordia to Sydia is next to nothing, and Dr. Vogel assures us it won’t even have to reach half of its max speed to do so.
“Launching in ten seconds,” she says. “Good luck.”
My father gave us permission to run this operation. Magnus asked him. I wasn’t planning on asking for his permission. He said that he was going to declare war anyway, so we might as well do what we can before everything goes to hell.
Since there is no track at the old castle where they are holding Siegfried and Jane, the wraith will be stuck there once we land. We’re meant to signal the capital once we land, and that’s when Nordia will attack―breaking the ceasefire.
The war erupting just as we rescue Jane should give us the cover we need to sneak back across the border, likely in a stolen vehicle. The main risk will be that someone from our own side shoots us thinking we’re part of the Sydian ranks.
A sound goes off from the cockpit―a loud, chirping beep―and then my stomach stays behind even as my body moves.
I squeeze tightly to my harness, and a weirdly smooth acceleration pins my back to the seat. There’s no hint of bumpiness or jostling, so it feels as if “down” has shifted from my feet to my back, and that gravity is getting stronger and stronger, pinning me harder and harder to the ground.
That’s just how it feels, but I know that in reality we are accelerating rapidly forward along the track. It’s completely dark―not even the cockpit has real windows.
Just when I think I’m going to be crushed entirely, the acceleration cuts out, and it feels as if we are motionless.
“Autopilot is taking over,” NIls shouts back to us. “Weird.”
“Don’t fuck with the controls, bro!” Karl shouts.
Then it feels like the plane is turning.
“That you?” I ask.
“I’m not touching shit!” Nils shouts. “Just the autopilot. Vogel said that all I’ve gotta do is land the thing! HUD says we’ll be there in four minutes. Let’s get our heads in the game.”
31
Jane
Just when I think I’m going to have to finally give in and use the hole in the ground to pee, I hear the door opening at the top of the steps. As it opens, I hear a loud alarm—it sounds almost like old alarm sirens from World War II documentaries―blaring loudly.
The door doesn’t shut, and the alarm keeps blasting as footsteps trot down the stairs.
Two guards appear in the hallway, and Siegfried grasps the bars and leans forward to get a better look. “What’s going on?” he shouts.
“Nordia didn’t agree to our terms,” one of the guards says.
“Let me go then!” Siegfried shouts.
“No can do,” the guard says. “Both of you just lost a lot of value, but we may need you later for some prisoner exchanges.”
“Fuck!” Siegfried says. “Let me fight at least!”
Siegfried promised he’d save me, but I don’t trust him very much. Still, if I at least pretend to let him save me, it might get me into a position where it’s just Siegfried who I have to escape from rather than a full squad of separatists lead by General Olmstead.
“Put your hands through the bars,” the guard says to Siegfried.
“Fuck off,” he snaps.
“We’re abandoning the castle―it’s too easy of an artillery target. We can leave you here, if you’d like. The dungeon will be safe; you’ll be sealed in here to die of thirst—”
Siegfried sticks his hands out, and the guard cuffs him.
Then everything around us starts shaking, and I hear the sound of an explosion from up above.
“Come on!” the other guard shouts, unlocking my cell.
He doesn’t cuff me, but he grabs my wrist and pulls me up the stairs. The other guard keeps Siegfried in front of him, a gun pointed at his back.
Another explosion booms loudly above us, and I see a key sticking out of the guard’s pocket who is standing in front of me. Without taking time to think if it’s a bad idea or not, I snatch the key out of his pocket and clutch it in my hand.
I expect a gun to jab into my back, or for someone to hit me, but nothing happens. I have the key, for all the good it might do me.
We clear the stairs, and there’s no sign of the artillery having hit the castle.
Olmstead’s men are grabbing everything they can, shoving it into briefcases and satchels.
Olmstead’s voice booms out across the main space of the castle. “That shot missed us by only a few hundred meters! We’re leaving in two minutes, so go, go!”
“So,” Siegfried says, using his sickly sweet voice he reserves for me. “It seems your Prince Rikard has abandoned you. He chose his war over you.”
I scoff at him. Rikard didn’t choose this, and if he did, he had a good reason for it.
The guards hurry us outside and toward the snowy rolling hills of northern Sydia. We’re on foot in the snow, and from the height of the castle’s hill we can see the roads leading north. I see Humvees and tanks lurching forward. Squads of soldiers march along the roads, while lines of civilians in tattered clothes march South. The refugees are all holding overstuffed bags and suitcases—they’ve taken what few things they can save, leaving the rest behind.
“Look what your prince did,” the guard says to me, shaking his head.
“You assholes started this,” I hiss. “In case you have forgotten already. Or is there some serious 1984 shit going on in your heads?”
“Quite a mouth for a princess,” the guard says, tugging me along. We’re heading along some path through the snow, made simply by many men walking along the same route. It looks like it’s leading toward the main road that is packed full of tanks and refugees.
The guard finally lets me go. “Keep walking forward. You’ve got a lot to learn, Princess. This war started hundreds of years ago, and we don’t forget.”
“Trace anything far back enough,” I say, “and you can find a way to blame either side in a conflict.”
“Romulus killed Remus, not the other way around,” the guard says. “There’s always a root cause, and someone is always the one who started it.”
I give up talking to him. Siegfried laughs. Does he not realize that he’s Romulus in this scenario? That he tried to kill his own cousins?
It feels like everyone has gone mad. Why didn’t the king agree to keep the peace? And wouldn't Rikard have fought to negotiate for my safety? Rikard wouldn’t just abandon me. So if he couldn’t convince his father to get me back peacefully, I need to assume he’s still coming to rescue me.
Unfortunately, we’re about a half mile from the main road, which is filled with soldiers and tanks. Right now at least, only two guards are watching over Siegfried and me.
I don’t know what Olmstead and the rest of his men are doing, but they’re still back in the castle. I look back over my shoulder to see an empty trail behind us.
Is Siegfried drawing the same conclusion that I am? Should I give Siegfried the key? Is it better to have Siegfried in control of me than these guards?
I bite my parched lip so hard it starts bleeding. Time is running out.
I yelp, lunge forward, and fall flat on my face into the dirty snow. As I fall, I toss the key behind me, making sure it lands in one of the footprints rather than in deep snow.
Both guards turn toward where I’ve fallen. The one watching Siegfried even lowers his gun, and both reach their hands out to help me up.
While they are distracted, I lock eyes with Siegfried, and then slowly lower and shift my eyes toward the key.
> I watch as he dives down, snatching it up with his hands still cuffed behind his back.
The guard turns back toward him, ignoring me then as the other one helps me to my feet.
“Get up!” he shouts at Siegfried, kicking him in his leg with the toe of his boot.
“You offer the princess a hand, and you kick me with your boot?”
“Up!” he shouts, pointing his gun again at Siegfried.
Siegfried gets his feet under him and rises up. I look down to see that the key is no longer on the ground. He got it, so now it’s only a matter of time. I have to be ready.
We keep walking, but I realize the guard is behind Siegfried, and even though he has the key, he can’t use it while the guard is looking right at him. I can’t exactly fall down again, even if my dress is covered in mud and soaking wet.
“C-c-c-can I have your coat?” I say, turning toward the guard following along behind Siegfried.
“We’ll be in a transport soon,” he says. “Heated.”
“She’s freezing half to death,” Siegfried says. “Just give her your coat? Aren’t you a gentleman?”
The guard grumbles, but he unstraps the gun from his back, places the stock onto the ground, and starts on his zipper.
I see Siegfried’s arms flex, and know he’s working the key. It should be any second now.
The moment I see the cuffs drop, I dive forward and grab the assault rifle from the ground. It’s the same model Rikard trained me to use, and I aim it up toward the guard who is still armed, and pull the trigger.
The shot hits him in the chest, and he crumples down as Siegfried tackles the other to the ground.
I consider just shooting them both, but I might need Siegfried to help me get across the border.
Siegfried brings the cuffs around the man’s neck and pulls. He digs the chains into his neck until it turns red, choking all existing life out of the guard. The guard’s body twitches a few times, and then it goes limp.
