by Ally Carter
“Was she really lost?” I ask in disbelief.
Ms. Chancellor considers this and answers carefully. “Yes. In a sense.”
“They lost a baby?”
“No. The elders hid a baby. There were four baby girls born to Society members that spring — all at about the same time. Their mothers brought them to the headquarters that night and the babies were wrapped in identical blankets. And then five Society members took daughters home, the idea being that no one would ever know exactly which child was Amelia.”
“Hush, little princess, wait and see. No one’s gonna know that you are me,” I sing. “Princess. Not princes. Jamie was right. I did always get the words wrong.” I have to laugh a little. And then, desperately, I want to cry.
Ms. Chancellor shrugs, smiles a sad smile. “It’s just a nursery rhyme. But all nursery rhymes begin with a kernel of truth.”
“What does this have to do with my mother?” I ask, spinning on them. I’m tired of playing games.
“Now, Grace, you must understand that your mother was only interested in the history — the overwhelming historical significance of Amelia’s story. She didn’t know what she would find, or that it would lead to any of this.”
“Tell me!”
“Amelia didn’t just survive, Grace. She lived. She grew into adulthood and married and had a child of her own. And that child had children and so on and so on. And now it’s too late to change what has happened — to change what your mother discovered.”
“Tell me,” I say, because I know there’s more; I can see it in her eyes and feel it in my gut. I think, deep down, a part of me has always known it.
“Ms. Chancellor, tell me!” I demand, but before she can say a word, Alexei appears in the doorway and says, “The helicopter is here.”
He and Dominic pick up Jamie’s stretcher and rush him up the stairs to the embassy’s roof. The wind is strong here. I can hear the flag flapping, the chain pinging against the metal pole. Overhead, the helicopter’s blades keep whirling, not slowing down. There isn’t a minute to lose, I know.
“Get in!” Dominic orders Alexei, who doesn’t argue. He’s sitting by Jamie’s head like an anchor, refusing to let his best friend drift away. “Both of you,” he tells me, but I look back at Ms. Chancellor.
“You have to go with him, dear,” Ms. Chancellor says.
“Tell me!” I demand one final time.
The Scarred Man is the only one who’ll meet my gaze. For years, I saw his face in my nightmares, the shadow in my dreams. Three years ago he came to my mother’s shop, but that wasn’t when this started. No. Our path was set ages ago, wrapped in a blanket and carried away. A secret hidden for centuries.
“Grace Olivia,” the Scarred Man says, “you are the lost princess of Adria.”
Before I can ask a question, say a word, Dominic pushes me into the chopper then follows, slamming the door.
I feel the helicopter rising, floating above the embassy. It’s like this secret has been weighing us down for years and now, without those lies to tether us, my brother and I are floating free, weightless and directionless like balloons released into a strong wind.
The embassies recede. The great wall of Adria grows smaller and smaller. And smaller. It feels like maybe I’ve jumped again, but this time I do not fall; I just keep rising.
Behind us, the sun is coming up over Valancia, casting the city in its golden glow. Ahead of us, the blue waters of the Mediterranean stretch out to the edge of the earth.
I hold my brother’s hand. I look into Alexei’s eyes. And we keep flying.
Suspended somewhere in between.
ALLY CARTER is the New York Times bestselling author of All Fall Down, the first book in the Embassy Row series, as well as the Gallagher Girls and Heist Society series. Her books have been published all over the world, in over twenty languages. You can visit her online at www.allycarter.com.
Copyright © 2016 by Ally Carter
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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data available
First edition, January 2016
Cover design by Yaffa Jaskoll
Cover art © 2016 by Kenneth Choi
e-ISBN 978-0-545-65488-3
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