Each building is surrounded by water or a stretch of green, and even the highways are tree-lined boulevards. At the far edge of the city stand the massive domes that make up the Botanical Gardens. The muscles of my chest tighten, and resentment closes around my throat.
Some days, it's hard to believe that people who live in such wealth and beauty are capable of atrocities. Today, it is not.
Prince Kevon brings our interlaced fingers to his lips and kisses my knuckles. “I saw the footage of your arrest. That officer who hurt you is now serving the rest of his career in a military prison.”
My mouth drops open, and I turn to meet his sad eyes. “You had him punished?”
He frowns and tilts his head. “He should never have put his hands on you, especially since you were the only reason I didn’t bleed to death.”
Prince Kevon wraps a strong arm around my shoulder, and the tightness in my chest loosens, allowing me to relax. This is the first time in my entire existence that I’ve heard of a guard being punished for the unfair treatment of a Harvester.
I wrap my left arm around prince Kevon’s front. The muscles under his thin garment feel more pronounced, as though he has been starving for the entire week that I was gone. My other arm slides around his back and hits something hard. I trace the object with my fingertips. It feels like a centipede along his spine with metal legs running along his ribs.
“What’s this?”
His brows draw together. “An Amstraad spine monitor for my autonomic nervous system.”
A shudder of horror sweeps through my body, and I snatch my hand away from the device. “What?”
He draws back and offers me a tight smile. “It’s temporary until the cardiologist deems my heart capable of beating on its own.”
My throat thickens. I know nothing about medicine or surgery, but I’ve seen how devices like these can malfunction. Even though Mouse helped me through that interrogation with his earrings, I still don’t know anything about the Amstraad Republic’s motives.
“What if someone accesses it through Netface?” My words sound stupid as soon as they leave my lips, but I don’t have the correct terminology or comprehension of the subject to express my concerns.
Prince Kevon pats my shoulder. “These devices work on a separate network.”
“Like the one that got Gemini Pixel executed?”
He winces. “I’m sorry about that. My mother assured me—”
“No.” I place a hand on his broad chest. “I know you tried your best for Gemini, and I also know the limits of your power. But if someone would assassinate Rafaela via her Amstraad monitor, couldn’t they do the same to you?”
His shoulders droop, and worry clenches at my heart. He nods. “Unfortunately, I don’t have much of a choice. The blade damaged my heart, and my mother agreed to a synthetic muscle-tissue graft to maintain its capacity and function. Until that tissue learns to move in sync with the rest of my heart, I’m dependent on this monitor.”
My mind goes blank. Why couldn’t they just sew up the wound? Why introduce artificial material into his body when they could have just repaired it? I wish I knew more about medicine, computers, and everything outside of growing tomatoes and corn. My education is lacking, and I can’t even ask the right questions without sounding like a superstitious yokel.
Prince Kevon places his hand over mine. “Please, don’t worry. My medical team chose the best option to restore my health and ensure that I live a long life.”
We sit in silence for a while with me resting my head in the crook of Prince Kevon’s neck. I have to trust that Queen Damascena cares enough for her son to take the best medical advice.
Leaves rustle in the breeze, and the scent of roses overpowers the lavender. The sun emerges from behind the clouds and drenches us with warmth and light. It’s so peaceful up here, surrounded by gorgeous plants and with the view of the lake in the distance.
Prince Kevon points out gigantic, tree-shaped structures that tower over a street of tall buildings. He explains that King Arias commissioned them when he turned eighteen, and they now provide enough solar power and rainwater to run the new juvenation hospital.
“I could stay up here forever with you,” I murmur.
He kisses my hand. “When I awoke and didn’t find you at my bedside, I thought you had left the Trials.”
I draw back and meet his sad, dark eyes. “I wouldn’t leave at a time like this.”
“But you wanted to leave,” he says.
I shake my head, even though the thought of returning to Rugosa fills me with relief. “The only thing I wanted to leave was the threats and the violence of the Princess Trials. Never you.”
Silence stretches out between us, only broken by the quickening of my heart. I hate myself for accepting his kindness one minute and rejecting him the next. Even when others might call me cold and ungrateful, Prince Kevon has only been patient.
I exhale a sigh. Navigating his mother’s cruel whims is like walking along the edge of a well-disguised pit.
“When you said that you could never…” His words trail off, and the pain in his eyes tells me that what I said to him in my room hurt more than Vitelotte’s knife.
The urge to tell him everything burns through my insides. If he knew Queen Damascena had threatened my family, he would understand why I’d been so cold, but I must remain silent. Prince Kevon isn’t himself right now, and if I spent eight days in a cell, there’s absolutely no way he would be in a position to send help to Rugosa before the queen’s people attacked.
I exhale a weary breath and try to phrase my next sentence in a way that would satisfy Queen Damascena and explain a little of my predicament to Prince Kevon. “Maybe
