Page 120 of Last of Her Name

She swallows. “Yeah, of course. This place is creepy, that’s all.”

Suddenly Pol’s head jerks. “Did you guys hear that?”

“Hear what?” I ask.

“I didn’t hear anything,” Mara says.

“Something hit the station. I heard a thump.”

“There are probably a hundred Prisms bouncing off this thing every hour,” I point out. “They’re like gnats out there.”

“No, this was different. Heavier.” He frowns. “It came from the docking bay.”

Riyan stiffens. “Natalya.”

“Wait,” I say, before they can charge off. I shut my eyes and press my hand to the control, then attune to the flow of Prism energy running through the wires and circuits beneath it. This was something I practiced on theValentinaduring the brief journey to the Vault—following Prism currents and learning out to read them, drawing data directly from the ship’s computers. My sense is still hazy, and I have to focus hard in order to read the messages the current is bringing me now.

What I find makes me suck in a breath, eyes shooting open.

“There’s another ship. The dock next to ours has been activated.” I meet Pol’s eyes. “Someonefollowedus here.”

“Could it be Volkov already?”

“Why would he bother docking? He could just—”

I’m interrupted by the pulse of a gun behind us, and Pol and I whirl to see Riyan slump to the ground, unconscious.

I freeze as my eyes rise slowly to Mara.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers, raising the gun to me. Her eyes glisten with tears, but her hand doesn’t waver. “I really am. But I can’t let the Committee get control of this place.”

“Mara,” I say very carefully, “what did you do?”

“What I had to, for all our sakes.”

Footsteps sound down the corridor, the unmistakable heavy plod of space suits, moving quickly in our direction. Pol curses, his hand flinching as if he might try to grab his gun. It’s still holstered; he had no reason to draw it when we landed. We were supposed to be the only people around for a hundred light-years. But I shake my head at him, not doubting that Mara would drop either one of us as easily as she did Riyan.

“You never deserted,” I whisper. “You were spying on us all along.”

She shrugs. “ ‘Go along with the princess’ were my orders. No matter what you did or where you went. Waiting for you to find the Firebird, only to find out youarethe Firebird. I was just doing my job.”

“Youhelped us escape Zhar in the first place!”

With a sigh, she shakes her head. “That was my father’s plan. He didn’t tell me about it until we were already aboard theValentina. I never intended to let you off the base, but then my father hit me with that sleep patch.Youwere the ones who signaled the Committee and got my people captured. You’re the reason my dad died back there.”

She has no idea her dad survived the Union’s attack, only to die in the Autumn Palace. I decide now might not be the best moment to inform her of the truth.

My mind races. If I could reach the control panel, I could tap into the Prism energy fueling the station and knock out the lights like I did in the palace. It’s just out of reach, but Mara could drop me or Pol before I made it one step.

Before I can conceive even half a plan, it’s already over.

Loyalists swarm around us, twenty or more of them; it’s hard to keep count. Their faces are blurred behind their helmets, their voices muffled as they shout. But it’s clear what they want—an easy surrender. I can’t even make it to the wall before they’ve hemmed me in, so there’s no hope of shutting off the power. I can’t connect with the Prism network unless I’m physically touching a machine fueled by it.

Pol puts up his hands, his face rigid and eyes blazing.

Riyan is quickly bound, his hands placed in a special cuff to keep him from tessellating when he wakes. They strip Pol of his gun, then bind him. I wonder what happened to Natalya. Stars, if they killed her …

“ZHAR!” I spot her bringing up the rear. Seething, I try to push through the Loyalist soldiers, but they hold me back. “You don’t know what you’re doing! You have no idea—”