Page 97 of Last of Her Name

Then I realize the middle three are not vityazes at all. What I took for red fatigues are really red prison uniforms, jumpsuits with identification numbers stamped across the fronts.

My stomach drops into free fall.

“We found these three attempting to broach the outer shield,” says Volkov. “But for your sake, Princess, we took great care to bring them in alive, when it would have been much easier to simply shoot them out of the sky.”

I stare at Mara, then Riyan, then Pol.

They gaze back, silent and defiant. They’re a wreck; Mara’s braids are undone, her hair knotted and snarled. Pol has a fresh bruise on his jaw. Their hands aren’t even bound, so why aren’t they fighting back? Are they brainjacked too? I lock gazes with Pol, heart fluttering, trying to see if he’s still the Pol I know. He stares back rigidly.

Then Riyan’s eyes find Natalya on my left, and he stiffens. His lips part, and he takes a half step toward her.

“Natal—”

He cuts short as he suddenly topples over, howling with pain, and it’s then that I notice the thin black bands around each of their necks, the same as Dr. Luka wears.

The collars are wired with electricity.

Riyan curls up on the floor, gasping, his body jerking. Pol and Mara flinch but must realize they’ll only end up like the tensor if they move, because they freeze in place.

“Stop it!” I scream, lunging forward, but Volkov holds me back, his fingers digging into my shoulder through my gown’s thin fabric.

“Enough,” he says, and the vityaze controlling the collar releases the charge. I recognize the man from the attack on Afka—he’s the same one who stopped my family’s dory and escorted us to town. Judging by the bars on his uniform, he’s been promoted since then. At his feet, Riyan sags with a long exhale.

Through all of this, Natalya stands impassive, seemingly unaware that her brother is only steps away.

“What’ve you done to her?” gasps Riyan. “You monsters—”

Another jolt of electricity sizzles through him, and I struggle, trying to get past Volkov. Even the Committee is looking uncomfortable with the scene. Several of them look down at the floor; Commerce is pale and wide-eyed, and opens her mouth like she’s going to protest, but then Defense lightly touches her arm and she clamps her jaw shut. There’ll be no help from them.

Riyan is released again, and this time the vityazes pull him back to his feet. There he hunches over, watching Natalya with haunted eyes. Beside him, Pol and Mara exchange looks, and Mara’s hand moves to her collar, shaking a little. All three of them look traumatized, and I realize this mustn’t be the first time their collars have been activated since they were captured.

Tears trace burning lines down my cheeks. I feel utterly useless and sick with shame.

What were they thinking, coming here? That they could break into the most secure bit of space in the galaxy and just snatch me from under Volkov’s nose? I shake my head at Pol, my heart crumbling. He had to know this was impossible.

But he came, anyway.

Pol catches my eye, and the corner of his mouth quirks in the smallest of defiant grins, as if even now he is urging me to fight back. Saying this isn’t over.

But itisover.

Stars, it’s been over for longer than either of us knew. Maybe since before it even began. If this was where we would end up, why did we ever run in the first place? I ran and I ran and I ran, and still, I couldn’t escape this moment.

“What is this?” I whisper to the direktor. “Why are they here?”

“It’s time you accepted the truth of who you are,” he replies.

Volkov sets up a tabletka and projects a hologram of an aerial view of a battlefield. Hills and buildings spread over the great Solariat floor like a miniature world, seen through a slowly strafing camera. From this angle, it takes me a moment to realize what I’m looking at.

Afka.

I pull my eyes from Pol to stare at my home, which is now smoldering ruins, the slinke forests burning. My family’s vineyard is gone completely, nothing but a scorch mark on the face of Amethyne. Distantly, I wonder what happened to Elki and the other mantibu. All I can think is that I hope they were let out of the stables. Maybe they disappeared into the hills with their wild kin. I focus on that; it’s easier than processing the whole of the truth before me: that my home is gone.Obliterated. The hills where Pol and Clio and I— I wince, amending that thought. The hills wherePol and Iplayed are burning by the acre, most of the land blackened and prickled with charred slinke trunks. Of Afka itself, few buildings are still intact.

Volkov walks slowly through the hologram, his steps falling on the homes and fields of my neighbors. The hologram fractures into pixelated blocks of light around his polished shoes. His eyes never leave my face. “We’ve withdrawn our troops. Only a few Loyalist factions remain in Afka, but not for long. Before you can heal a wound, Anya, you must first cut out the dead tissue. As long as these dissenters remain at large, their poison will spread, infecting the whole of Amethyne and the galaxy beyond. Their violence and bloodshed must be confronted with definitive strength. And so we have ten interstellar Prismic missiles inside the palace armory, awaiting your order. They can make the jump in ten minutes, faster than any ship.”

He hands me a small transmitter; the screen on it displays the coordinates of Afka and the status of the missiles—armed and locked onto their target. Below that, a red button readslaunch.All it’s waiting for is someone to press it. There is no option to disarm the missiles or change the coordinates. Despite its small size, the device weighs like a brick in my hand.

“It’s not an easy choice,” says the direktor. “But it’s the right one.”