Sky Without Stars

by Jessica Brody

  “The Ministère oversees the Policier, which means it is my business.”

  Limier cut his gaze to Marcellus. “I’m afraid not this time.” He snapped his fingers and pointed at the boy, who was trying to crawl away. One of the droids easily seized him and carried him down the corridor with Limier. The boy fought the entire way, one leg kicking the air, the other dragging uselessly behind him.

  Marcellus felt anger course through him. Anger at Limier for dismissing him so callously. But mostly anger at himself for not fighting harder, pulling rank, and demanding they release the boy. Even though Marcellus had only met him once, he felt oddly protective of him.

  But then the three remaining droids turned their attention to Marcellus, and he suddenly remembered the shirt tucked into his uniform. It felt heavier than it did ten minutes ago.

  As one of the droids scanned his body to assess his injuries, Marcellus was certain the shirt would be discovered, and Marcellus would end up occupying his father’s now-vacant cell.

  Or Mabelle’s.

  “Contusion. Left frontal lobe. Med cruiseur requested,” the droid announced its findings.

  No mention of the shirt.

  Marcellus breathed out a sigh of relief. That is, until Inspecteur Limier stalked back down the corridor toward him, and his chilling robotic gaze raked up and down Marcellus’s body, as though he, too, were performing a scan of his own. A secondary check.

  Marcellus felt himself stiffen, which he knew would only make the situation worse. Cyborgs were designed to interpret body language. He reminded himself to relax. As a Ministère officer, he was ranked above the inspecteur. He shouldn’t be afraid of him. And yet, at this very instant, his heart was beating faster than a voyageur engine preparing to launch into space.

  “We have been looking for you, Officer. Pity you couldn’t be bothered to join us in the Marsh.”

  Marcellus winced at the jab. He knew the inspecteur was referring to the fact that Marcellus had fled the scene the moment he’d been injured. Like a coward. He had done exactly the opposite of what a commandeur of the Ministère should have done. Exactly the opposite of what Commandeur Vernay would have done.

  Injured or not, Vernay would have stayed and fought. She would have made the general proud.

  Like she always did.

  Until she was shipped off to Albion to fight for Usonia’s independence and returned in a box, leaving Marcellus to try to fill her very unfillable shoes.

  Marcellus steeled himself. “I apologize for leaving my post, Inspecteur, but I—”

  The inspecteur’s hand suddenly jutted into the air, silencing Marcellus.

  Marcellus watched the circuitry in Limier’s face flash as his sensors processed some new piece of information. Marcellus swallowed, the lump in the front of his uniform suddenly feeling like a lump in his throat.

  The inspecteur lifted his large, aquiline nose into the air and sniffed a long, curious sniff. If it weren’t for his circuitry, which was blinking even more furiously now, Limier would have looked just like one of the Patriarche’s hunting dogs when they’d caught the scent of fresh game.

  Marcellus had never seen anything quite like it. It chilled him to the bone.

  “What is it?” he asked Limier, fighting to keep his voice from cracking.

  The inspecteur didn’t move and seemed, at first, not to hear Marcellus’s question. But then, after a few more sniffs at the air, he shook his head and muttered, “Nothing. Just an old scent I lost a while back. I thought I caught a trace of it again, but I must have been mistaken.”

  “The med cruiseur has arrived,” one of the droids announced, cutting through the tension in the air.

  Limier’s gaze slid to Marcellus again, and his orange eye zeroed in on the wound on Marcellus’s forehead. “Med cruiseur?” he asked curiously. “For such a small scratch?”

  Marcellus opened his mouth to defend himself—even though he hadn’t the slightest clue how he was going to do it—when three médecins arrived and lifted Marcellus onto a stretcher. That’s when Marcellus remembered he had bigger things to worry about. Like the fact that he was carrying a secret message from a sworn enemy of the Regime.

  - CHAPTER 16 -

  CHATINE

  THIS IS WHAT YOU GET, Chatine said to herself as she was loaded into the patroleur parked outside of Fret 7. This is what happens when you forget your place. When you forget how the Regime works. When you’re foolish enough to try to help an officer of the Ministère.

  She pounded her fist against her numb leg, trying to urge the blood to flow and the feeling to return. It was no use. She knew that. The paralyzeur wouldn’t fully wear off for at least another two hours. And by then she’d probably already be halfway to the moon.

  She had no doubt the inspecteur was taking her to the Vallonay Policier Precinct, where she would await her passage to Bastille. They’d clearly reviewed the footage from the morgue security microcams. They knew about the leveler. Marcellus Bonnefaçon had probably turned her in himself. That’s why his hand had immediately reached inside his jacket the moment he’d seen her. He’d been calling for backup on his TéléCom.

  And no doubt Inspecteur Limier was overjoyed by the turn of events. If he was even capable of feeling joy. The fritzer had been after her and her family ever since they’d first stepped off that bateau from Montfer. Chatine was a big score for the head of the Vallonay Policier. Something to brag about to his friends back at the Precinct. Today, I bagged a Renard.

  She glanced across the seating area of the Policier patroleur, where Inspecteur Limier sat. His head clicked toward her and his icy orange eye met hers. Chatine felt the urge to look away, but she held her ground.

  “So, what will you charge me with?” she asked. “Theft? Breaking and entering? Insubordination? Lack of hygiene? The options are plentiful.”

  The inspecteur didn’t respond. He just continued to stare at her, his circuitry hard at work.

  “I’m just trying to figure out how long I’ll be gone. I have some appointments I’ll need to reschedule.”

  More silence followed.

  Chatine tried again. “Are we talking months? Years? Life?”

  The inspecteur still said nothing. She gave up and turned her gaze out the window. They were whizzing alongside the edge of the Frets and past the huge transportation fabrique where patroleurs like this one were made. It would have been much quicker to pass straight through the Marsh, but Chatine wondered if maybe the inspecteur wasn’t even taking her to the Policier Precinct. Maybe he was taking her straight to the prisoner transport center.

  As she stared up at the dull gray sky, Chatine tried to picture the giant prison of Bastille, somewhere up there beyond the clouds. Her future home.

  She thought about all the men and women up there right now, tirelessly digging in the freezing exploits, their bodies heavy with fatigue and decay. Their fingers black with rot. Just like the man she’d seen in the morgue today.

  The prisoner.

  The one Marcellus Bonnefaçon had come to see.

  Was that man really his father?

  Angrily, she pushed thoughts of Officer Bonnefaçon from her mind. The man had betrayed her. She would not allow him to also occupy her thoughts.

  She refocused on the scenery outside the window, quickly noticing that none of it looked familiar. She’d assumed they were circling around the Frets to get to the prisoner transport center, but it suddenly occurred to her that they were no longer anywhere near the Frets. They were now racing past rows of hothouses. Chatine could just make out the colorful glow of fresh peaches, apricots, and oranges growing on trees behind the endless plastique windows.

  She flashed an accusing look at Limier. Where was he taking her? Maybe he had simply decided to bypass punishment altogether and take matters into his own hands. Maybe he planned to activate the kill setting on his rayonette and dump her body in the icy tundra of the Terrain Perdu where it would never be found. She certainly wouldn’t put it past h
im.

  “Where are we going?” Chatine asked, feeling prickles of fear cover her body.

  Once again, the inspecteur didn’t respond. Chatine noticed something that looked like annoyance pass over his face.

  She was just about to ask the question again when she felt the patroleur tilt backward and start a fast climb up a steep hill. Then, a few moments later, a flood of bright, dazzling light blinded Chatine. She whipped her gaze back toward the window, and suddenly she couldn’t breathe. Her whole body seemed to feel the effects of the paralyzeur in her leg. She was completely numb at the sight that lay in front of her.

  It was brilliant. It was breathtaking. It was more beautiful than she’d ever imagined.

  A luminous blue sky spread out before her, as far as the eye could see. Blue! Chatine had never experienced such a color. Her entire life had been a constant canvas of gloomy grays and murky blacks. And now it was as though she were swimming in color. She pressed her nose to the window and strained to see all around her. The patroleur turned right, and suddenly Chatine was shrouded in a delicious golden glow.

  She looked up and her heart stopped. For the first time in nine years, her body felt warm. Her skin felt alive.

  There, in the distance, hanging in the azure sky like priceless medallions, she saw them.

  All three of them.

  A giant shimmering white orb, flanked by two much smaller and dimmer spheres on either side—one a reddish gold, the other a pale blue.

  The Sols.

  They were magnificent. They were radiant. They were . . .

  “Fake,” the inspecteur spoke for the very first time since they’d boarded the patroleur. Chatine cut her eyes to him and noticed he was watching her with an amused, mocking expression. “You do know that, right?” he asked, as though he could read her very thoughts.

  The realization of the truth collided into her, and she suddenly felt foolish and naïve. Like a child. She silently berated herself for her unguarded reaction. For letting any emotion show in front of the inspecteur.

  Of course they were fake.

  She knew that. She wasn’t staring at the Sols. She was staring at the infamous TéléSky. They had obviously entered Ledôme, where the artificial Sols shone over the First and Second Estates 408 days a year.

  But why? she immediately wondered. Why had the inspecteur taken her way up here of all places? If there was anywhere on Laterre where Chatine Renard did not belong, it was inside Ledôme.

  The vehicle drifted to a stop, and Chatine noticed they had paused in front of an enormous pair of ornately sculpted gates, which were swinging open to let them in. As they glided through, the solid titan shimmered silver and white and almost blue in the fake Sol-light.

  The patroleur swept down a wide avenue, flanked on both sides by grass so green that it almost hurt Chatine’s eyes. Spread among the grass were statues carved in bright white stone and fountains thrusting litres and litres of bubbling turquoise water high into the air. And everywhere along the avenue—and down the countless paths that jutted out from it—there were flowers. Crazy and ridiculous in their colorfulness.

  Just when it seemed the gardens had no end, a vast building came into view, looming large in the distance. It was easily the size of five Frets pushed together. The walls were gleaming white, punctuated by a hundred windows, each of them tall and arched and reflecting perfectly the sky above and the flowers and grass below.

  The patroleur finally pulled to a stop in front of a huge door, capped by an elaborate crest. Chatine squinted up, trying to make out the shapes carved into the polished stone. She could swear she saw two lions facing toward each other, claws outstretched. But she knew she must be mistaken. That was the crest of the Paresse family. The First Estate. The Patriarche and Matrone themselves. She couldn’t possibly be looking at their coat of arms. That would mean that they were at the . . .

  Once again, the inspecteur seemed to be seeing her thoughts as though they were being broadcast right onto her Skin.

  “Welcome to the Grand Palais,” he said with a sneer.

  - CHAPTER 17 -

  MARCELLUS

  THE REARING LIONS OF THE Paresse family crest greeted Marcellus as the med cruiseur swept toward the Grand Palais. Marcellus felt his chest squeeze at the sight of them. He still had his father’s shirt tucked into his uniform. Incredibly, none of the médecins had taken note of it as they cleaned the wound on his head, patched it up with biosutures, and gave him a strong injection that had instantly eased the throbbing in his temples. But Marcellus knew he couldn’t count on his luck to last much longer. He was about to enter the heart of the First Estate carrying a message sent to him by a traitor.

  Mabelle is in Montfer. Go to her.

  All the way back from the Marsh, Marcellus had fought against his feelings of relief in learning that Mabelle had escaped from Bastille. He still had regular nightmares about her rotting away in that cell.

  He would not go to her, though. That much was obvious. Mabelle was still a Vangarde spy. Still an enemy of the Regime. Her escape from prison confirmed that.

  The cruiseur pulled to a stop in front of the entrance to the Grand Palais, and Marcellus immediately jumped out and hurried into the foyer. He had to get to his rooms and hide the shirt until he could figure out what to do with it. He could not be caught with it on his person. If he was fast, he could make it to his rooms in the south wing in just a few minutes. He headed across the vast foyer to the imperial staircase, but he halted when he saw two men in dark green robes rushing down the steps toward him, one on each of the two curving stairways.

  Marcellus sucked in a sharp breath as the titan medallions hanging from their necks flashed in the light of the chandeliers.

  Advisors to the Patriarche looking for him?

  That can’t be good.

  “Officer Bonnefaçon,” announced one of the robed men when they reached the bottom of the stairs. “You are needed in the Imperial Salon.”

  The Patriarche’s advisors weren’t droids, not even cyborgs. But sometimes they seemed so cool and impassive, so starched and coiffed, that Marcellus wondered if they were fully human.

  “I will be there as soon as I have freshened up,” Marcellus said, gesturing toward his raincoat, which was still bloodied, wet, and dirty from the Frets. He tried to squeeze between the advisors, but they each took one step closer together, blocking his path.

  “You are needed now, Officer.”

  “I will take your coat, monsieur,” said a servant who’d just appeared from the hallway.

  He should have known it was a lost cause. The Patriarche didn’t wait for anyone.

  “Of course.” Marcellus forced a smile to hide the panic that bloomed in his chest as he stripped off his coat and handed it to the servant, making sure his uniform jacket was still buttoned all the way up. Even though he knew there were no microcams in here—the First Estate would never allow it—it still seemed as if the Grand Palais was full of eyes. Always looking, always assessing, always probing.

  He followed the two advisors out of the foyer and into the Hall of Reflections, with its three hundred titan-trimmed mirrors. As he walked, Marcellus snuck glances at himself. Dirt from the Frets still covered his face, and his uniform looked bulkier than normal. He wiped at his cheeks and smoothed down the front of his jacket. The shirt stuffed inside suddenly felt like a boulder as opposed to just a threadbare piece of cloth.

  When they finally reached the east wing and entered the Imperial Salon, Marcellus froze in the entryway, taking in the chaotic state of the room. He’d never witnessed such a scene inside these walls.

  The Matrone lay sprawled across a sateen chaise, the silk of her dark gown billowed up around her like a giant rain cloud. Utterly silent, she stared at the ceiling. An empty champagne flute dangled in her limp hand, while a dozen attendants surrounded her like a gaggle of exotic birds, whispering and fluttering and weeping into their embroidered handkerchiefs.

  At the other end of the
salon, the Patriarche was pacing and ranting seeming nonsense to the pack of green-robed advisors who flurried behind him, trying to keep up. “Traitors! Murderers! Find them! Now, I tell you, now! Didn’t I say this would happen? No one listens! And now my child is gone.”

  Marcellus suddenly felt as though he’d been punched. Somehow, in the midst of the riots and the mysterious girl in the Frets, and the message from his father, he’d managed to forget about poor little Marie. But now the grief flooded back over him.

  “Marcellus!” The Patriarche’s booming voice made Marcellus jump and clutch his chest. “It’s about time one of you Bonnefaçons showed your face around here.” The bitter way he pronounced his last name made Marcellus’s throat tighten.

  “I’m sorry,” Marcellus began, his voice shaky and his words stilted. “I was on duty in the Marsh when the news of the poisoning . . . my deepest condolences, Monsieur Patriarche. Your daughter was . . . it’s just so awful and . . .”

  Marcellus cringed and gave up. He was babbling like a Third Estater drunk on weed wine. At this rate, he would never be named commandeur. He could barely even speak a complete sentence to the Patriarche; how was he ever supposed to lead the entire Ministère?

  But the Patriarche didn’t seem to be listening. He waved away Marcellus’s words as if they were an irritating fly. “Where is your grandfather?” he demanded. “We need him here. Now.”

  “I . . . ,” Marcellus fumbled again. “I don’t know. . . .”

  Marcellus immediately noticed the look of irritation on the Patriarche’s face. It was no wonder the Patriarche rarely ever spoke to Marcellus. He clearly saw Marcellus as the incompetent child that he was. The lesser Bonnefaçon.

  Marcellus swallowed, trying to organize his thoughts and think like a leader. Like Commandeur Vernay. “I will message him right now,” Marcellus said, clear and decisive. He reached into his pocket for his TéléCom.

  “Don’t you think I already had Chaumont try that?” the Patriarche roared, flinging his hand toward one of his advisors, a small man with protruding eyes and a well-groomed moustache, who was buzzing around the Patriarche like an insect.