Heart of Iron

by Ashley Poston

  “Great,” replied Ana, and without even a good-bye, she followed the woman out of the moonlily grove.

  She’s definitely adapting quickly for a girl found in an escape pod, he thought—before he realized exactly how his father’s pendant had ended up around her neck.

  The screens on the Tsarina’s engineering console.

  The ejected pod.

  Goddess’s spark—his father’s missing brooch. It had been staring him in the face this whole time.

  His father had sacrificed his life to save Ana.

  But if the Metals who had ignited the North Tower had been destroyed, as Rasovant claimed, then why hadn’t his father and Ana escaped to the rest of the palace, like Rasovant? What were they running from? And if Metals had burned the tower, why had his father trusted D09? And if that malware was a Metal from the Rebellion, then how had it survived?

  Ana was right.

  Rasovant had lied.

  Ana

  The last time Ana visited a shrine, Messiers tried to kill her, and this time she willingly accompanied the woman who’d almost handed her a death sentence.

  If the Goddess had a sense of humor, Ana didn’t see it.

  Inside, long stone pews stretched up to the pulpit, and behind it towered a statue of the Goddess, twenty feet tall. Ana searched the face of the Goddess, trying to find herself in the nose, the cheeks, the lips—but the face was as foreign as the rest of the palace. The statue loomed over them, lit with the glow of nine hundred and ninety-nine candles, one for each year that had passed since the girl of light drove away the Great Dark.

  The Grand Duchess made a crescent shape across her chest and kissed her palm. Ana did the same, and took a seat beside her on the first stone pew. She hoped she hadn’t made a mistake by inviting herself here.

  “This place brings me peace,” the Grand Duchess said, her lips perpetually curving downward into a scowl, accenting the lines in her tired face.

  “I . . . guess,” Ana replied.

  “You do not remember me, do you?”

  Startled, Ana turned to look at the Grand Duchess. “What?”

  “Do you remember anything?”

  She shook her head.

  “Perhaps it’s for the best,” the old woman said. “I was not the best grandmother, and when our family died, I was the only one left. I am an Aragon by birth, married into the Armorov family, so I could not wear the crown. I was never supposed to rule.” Taking a locket out out from underneath her collar, she pried it open with her long nails and offered it to Ana. “This is the last picture of our family and you.”

  At first, Ana didn’t want to take it. She didn’t want to look at a family that wasn’t hers. But curiosity got the better of her.

  The portrait was so small she had to squint. The Emperor, clad in royal purple, had a hand on his wife’s shoulder. He looked like all the pictures she’d seen in the newsfeeds. Golden-brown eyes and rich brown skin, like the Grand Duchess, a full beard over a strong face. Beside him, his wife, the Empress, smiled out of the portrait, brown curly hair and Valerio-blue eyes. There were three boys in front of them, all with heads full of dark curls. The youngest had his mother’s eyes.

  Tobias, a voice in her head whispered. Rhys, Wylan, and Tobias.

  Names she’d heard on newsfeeds before, in articles, passed around on people’s lips with “Goddess bless them” and “tragic loss.” They were names that still meant little to her, and that made a hollow part inside her ache.

  She was supposed to remember them, and she didn’t.

  Beside the youngest boy stood a girl. Dark hair and warm bronze skin, as though an expert painter had taken the best colors from her paints to make her, with eyes that Ana had seen every day of her life. She stared hard at the locket, trying to find herself in the picture, to remember that scratchy dress, the way it always pinched her under her arms—

  She handed the locket back quickly. “I’m sorry that you lost them.”

  “They were a good family,” the old woman said, staring up at the overpowering statue. “I should have looked for you—but I left you in this kingdom alone to fend for yourself against those heathens—”

  “They were kind and they loved me. Captain Siege—”

  The Grand Duchess tore her eyes away from the statue to gaze at Ana in horror. “That criminal?”

  “I love her,” Ana said, wishing she could go back in time and apologize for yelling at Siege outside the infirmary. Instead, Ana would have let the captain hug her, and cried into her shoulder. She would have apologized, over and over, until her voice went hoarse. “She raised me and she loved me—”

  “She did not love you,” the old woman replied, her voice lower, quieter. “She probably knew who you were. That was why she kept you hidden. As ransom, or bait, or—”

  “She wouldn’t do that. She’s my family—”

  “I am your family, Ananke.”

  A flash of anger lit inside Ana. She jerked to her feet. “I’m not Ananke.”

  “You are the first daughter born to the Armorov bloodline in a thousand years,” said the old woman, and the gleam of the candle lights showed the desperation in her eyes. “You are most important—and you are the one who survived. You will fight the Great Dark.”

  “The Great Dark doesn’t exist,” Ana argued. “It’s just a story.”

  “All stories are built from the bones of something true. You are the daughter of iron and stars. You are the symbol of hope in a time when light only shines from things that burn.”

  Ana gritted her teeth. “The Armorovs burned. So are you saying that was hope? That they burned?”

  “It was a tragedy I will forever mourn, but we finally saw those Metals as the heartless beasts they are—”

  “Metals are not heartless,” Ana snapped.

  “Do you truly believe that when you look at your face, my darling?” asked the Grand Duchess, raising a hand to Ana’s scarred cheek.

  Ana slapped her hand away. “I’m going to bed. Good night.” Then she turned out of the shrine, but she couldn’t escape the Grand Duchess’s words quickly enough. Metals were not heartless.

  She knew it firsthand.

  Di was not evil.

  Somehow, she found her way to the great hall, and the gilded doors she had come through earlier that day. Beyond them was the courtyard, and then the gates, then freedom—it seemed so far away.

  Two Messiers stood on either side of the door. They turned their heads toward her, watching, as she approached. Guarding.

  But this was her palace. If she was the the heir, she could go wherever she wished—anywhere in the kingdom.

  She reached to open the doors when one of the Messiers grabbed her wrist. Not harshly, but just to stop her.

  “It is not safe outside,” it said, and let go of her wrist.

  The other one added, “It is best you stay inside.”

  “But I want to leave,” she argued.

  “It is best you stay inside,” the same Messier repeated. “It is pleasant inside the palace.”

  She took a step back. Then another, a knot forming in her throat.

  Robb was mistaken. The Messiers were not here to guard her. They were here to keep her inside. To keep her prisoner. They didn’t report to her at all, but she was certain who they did report to—Rasovant.

  While she was inside this palace, she was a sitting target for the malware from the Tsarina—and whoever was truly behind the Rebellion seven years ago.

  Jax

  Jax stood in a hallway in the East Tower, positively lost. He hadn’t moved since Lady Valerio told him to stay put, but still he was lost. There were too many hallways, and too many rooms. He leaned against a window that looked out onto the moon garden, tapping his gloved finger impatiently on his forearm. A few moments ago, Ana had fled the shrine, and he watched as the Grand Duchess followed, as slow and steady as a funeral procession.

  A Messier stood like a statue outside the room Lady Valerio went into—she was
meeting with Lord Rasovant. She tried to keep it a secret, but honestly, he was a prisoner, not stupid.

  The Messier’s blue eyes didn’t flicker as it stared straight ahead. Even Di’s eyes flickered.

  He tugged at his voxcollar.

  Of all the ideas his pretty little brain could come up with, this was the best he could do? Offer to read Lady Valerio’s stars in exchange for . . . Oh, it didn’t matter now.

  “However, I do not trust you’ll keep your word,” Lady Valerio had said. “I knew your father, after all, so to ensure your end of the bargain, I will agree on one condition.”

  He had not thought that condition would be to wear a voxcollar and be at the lady’s personal beck and call.

  With a silent sigh, he leaned farther out of the window, to soak in as much starlight as he could. It made him feel better. The palace was cold and drafty—downright spooky, really. Eros loomed outside the window like a monstrous shadow, a ring of light surrounding it, shifting shadows across the hallway.

  If he closed his eyes, he could feel the stars rotating, spiraling, across the great black expanse. And if he concentrated further, he could feel the blackness itself. Encroaching.

  Ah ba’tha nazu mah, the Darkness whispered, like a sigh. Ah ba’tha nazu morah.

  I am coming from the edges, it translated from the Old Language. I am coming from the end.

  The call was stronger tonight. It was stronger than it had ever been. Was it that close already—how could he not have heard it?

  Because you never wanted to, he thought bitterly, clenching and unclenching his gloved hands into fists.

  When he opened his eyes again, something in the moon garden caught his eye. A distinct, bright flicker of red. A pair of eyes.

  The hair on the back of his neck stood on end—

  “Well, look who I’ve found. The star-kisser.”

  He glanced over his shoulder at the familiar voice. Erik Valerio smiled.

  Robb

  He made his way down a darkened hallway in the East Tower, back toward his room, when a voice caught his ears, low and quick, coming from around the corner. Erik.

  Of course Erik had to be at the palace, too.

  “So how do you do it, then?” asked his brother. “Do you suck blood? Sacrificial ritual?”

  Who was he talking to? Cautiously, he peeked around the corner. Erik had Jax up against the sill of the window that looked out onto the moon garden, his fingers wrapped beneath the voxcollar. The Solani’s red-violet eyes snapped to Robb’s, first frantic—and then stone.

  Erik went on coolly, “Admit it—you can’t do it. You’ll tell my mother the truth—”

  “Leave him alone.” Robb stepped into the hallway.

  Erik unraveled his fingers from around the collar. “Oh, look,” his brother drawled. “It’s the spare, on time to ruin my fun as usual.”

  “Leave him alone, Erik.”

  His mother wouldn’t let the Solani out of her sight unless she was indisposed.

  Erik shrugged. “Why’re you so defensive? I simply found a friend in the hallway and decided to say hello—we are friends, aren’t we, star-kisser?”

  The Solani glowered at him.

  “Leave,” Robb said levelly.

  Erik’s eyes sparked. “Ooh, I hit a nerve.”

  “LEAVE!”

  “I’m going, I’m going.” Erik raised his hands in defeat. As he passed Robb, he paused and bent close to whisper, “But you know I’ll always end up breaking your toys.”

  Then his brother was gone, down the hallway and out of sight.

  Jax

  Robb was a terrible sight for sore eyes.

  Jax tugged at his voxcollar, wiggling it back into a comfortable position from where that egomaniacal lord had messed it up. The collar was already rubbing a rash on his neck. He didn’t need permanent scarring, too.

  Then—remembering—he glanced back into the garden, but the red eyes were gone. It couldn’t have been a trick of the light, could it?

  “Are you okay?” Robb asked. “Did Erik hurt you?”

  Jax turned a glare back to the insufferable Ironblood.

  “Oh—right. You—the voxcollar. Listen, I . . .”

  Jax waved his hand dismissively. He would rather not have pity. Groveling wasn’t all that attractive, anyway. Besides, Robb was the last person he wanted to see. If it were up to him, he’d toss the Ironblood out of the window, but then he was sure Lady Valerio wouldn’t keep him around. He wasn’t here for his own revenge fantasy, and remembering that made Robb a little more bearable.

  Until, of course, Robb fell to his knees and pressed his head against the floor. “I’m sorry,” the boy said. “I’m so sorry. I’m going to get you out of here. As soon as I can. I’m going to—”

  He was what?

  Jax grabbed the Ironblood by the shoulders and dragged him to his feet again, glaring at him with all the hatred he could muster. “No,” he mouthed, “you won’t—”

  The voxcollar zapped, and he flinched away from Robb. The sting went all the way down to his toes. He bit his tongue so he wouldn’t make a sound.

  “Please,” Robb said desperately, “let me help.”

  And ruin his plans? Oh, Darkness damn everything.

  He shoved the Ironblood backward.

  Robb stumbled but found his footing. His face fractured with hurt before he could reel his emotions in and hide them behind that charming stoic Valerio mask. Good—emotions didn’t look nice on Robbert Valerio, anyway.

  “I will get you out of here,” he said with conviction. “I promise you. On iron and stars.”

  About to shove the Ironblood away again, Jax froze. His hands began to tremble.

  The door opened again and Lady Valerio stepped out, pausing when she noticed Robb in the hallway. Her eyebrows rose just a fraction. “Dear, did I not tell you to go to bed?”

  A muscle in Robb’s jaw twitched. “Yes, Mother.” He bowed to her and left without another glance.

  Jax watched him go, the sound of the unbreakable vow ringing in his head, sweet and strong, like a gold chain woven through strings of glass.

  Ana

  The next few days were filled with classes and lectures and learning. The gray-mustached steward from the other day rattled off her schedule while Mellifare poured a cup of morning tea. Ana hadn’t even gotten out of bed yet, her eyelashes still crusted with sleep. The steward seemed to think that she was as dumb as rocks. No, she’d never been to school before, but she was not illiterate.

  The Dossier was where she’d learned. Her maths were made up of the perfect calibration for Riggs’s mechanical leg. Her words from pages and pages of Di’s favorite books and Wick’s word-scramble games. Her history lessons were learned in every world they visited, every city they slept in. Her decorum from every shore leave on Nevaeh, every waystation hustle.

  The steward told Ana that she had to learn the proper history of the kingdom. No less was expected of a future Empress, as if everything she’d learned as an outlaw was inferior and dangerous. She needed to be taught. She needed to be groomed and polished, like silverware to set a table.

  “You only have a handful of days before the coronation,” the steward went on, “so if Your Grace has any questions, I would be more than happy to answer them.”

  “Have you heard anything about the Dossier?” she asked, surprising him. It wasn’t the question he was expecting, but it was the only one on her mind. Robb had said he had overheard his mother talking about how her guards lost the ship and ended up in a mine on Cerces.

  He looked happy. “Absolutely nothing. If we’re lucky, that old ship is finally done. You see, it’s been a pain in the kingdom’s rear for quite some years, Your Grace.”

  “Oh,” she said.

  It felt like a story now, those years on the Dossier when she had been happy.

  The Grand Duchess had ordered Viera to be her personal shadow. So Ana did the only thing she could think of—she made the Royal Captain swear her
loyalty under penalty of death. Since Viera didn’t seem like the kind to break her oaths, Ana only mostly believed her.

  The Royal Captain was merciless in her job as she followed Ana around the palace. Between classes, between meals—everywhere. Ana couldn’t even shake her to go exploring.

  “You have tutoring beginning in a few minutes, Your Grace,” said the Royal Captain, following Ana down another long and winding corridor toward the North Tower. “We should return before your tutor informs Her Grace of your tardi—”

  “Lord Whatever-His-Name can wait,” replied Ana, coming to an intersection. She watched the lanterns bob above her. They seemed to turn left, so she did, too.

  “Understanding Iron Law is a crucial part of ruling, Your Grace.”

  Ana rolled her eyes. “I’m a criminal. I think I know something about Iron Law.”

  “Learning to evade the law isn’t the same as learning to pass judgment inside it,” the Royal Captain replied. “At the Academy, we spend years going over the doctrines. There are intricacies and amendments that take years for scholars to understand—”

  “You’ve never broken the law, have you?” Ana stopped, turning back to face her bodyguard.

  “I’m not like Robbert Valerio.”

  “I bet he knows the law better than you. Captain Siege always taught me that you learn the law so you know how to break it.” She paused, looking down an adjacent hallway. It was a lot wider than the others, and at the end stood an intricately carved set of doors that were padlocked and sealed tight.

  Two Messiers guarded the doors, one on either side. She started to turn down the hall when the captain stopped her.

  “It’s the North Tower, Your Grace,” said Viera.

  “Why’s it still closed off? It’s been seven years.”

  “Lord Rasovant thought it best that the North Tower be kept as is, a monument to what we lost.”

  “Even the Metals?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Are the Metals who burned my family still in there, too? Since none survived?”