“We need to hide him, fast!” Kalvin whispered, pulling the tapestry toward the recess the coldblood had been hiding in.

There was a door hidden in the shadows. Running toward it, I opened it, letting Kalvin drag the dead body over the threshold. Navan was out in the hallway, mopping up any evidence he could find with the edge of a curtain he’d torn away.

Beyond the door I’d spotted was a storage room. It didn’t look like the type to be frequented much—there was hardly anything in here, except for a pile of boxes—but that didn’t mean someone wouldn’t come in and find what we were trying to conceal. Still, it was our only option for now. The outside world was too far away, and we couldn’t exactly drag him through the main celebration hall.

Navan entered the room a moment later, and he and Kalvin hid the dead coldblood behind a stack of boxes. The corpse couldn’t be seen from the door, and discovering him would mean someone had to sift through piles of stock, but it did nothing to settle my nerves.

“We’re going to have to come back for him after the celebration, when the palace is quieter, and dispose of him properly,” Kalvin said. “Sooner or later someone will find him, especially when he starts to crumble.”

I frowned. “Crumble?”

Kalvin nodded, wiping a sheen of nervous sweat from his brow. “When coldbloods die, their bodies crumble to ash. The scent is overpowering—like pure ozone. We’ve got a few days before he starts to go, but who knows when we’ll have a chance to get back here.”

“It’ll have to do for now,” Navan said, dragging another set of boxes in front of the makeshift burial site. “We’ll be missed if we stay out here too long,” he added, glancing tensely at the door.

Leaving the coldblood behind, the three of us stepped back out into the hallway and closed the door firmly behind us. After dusting ourselves off, we returned to the main hall, though I didn’t think I’d ever be the same again. I was shaken, fear bristling in my veins, putting me on edge. Turning to Navan, I could see that he was feeling it too.

Kalvin hung back, and out of the corner of my eye, I realized he was discreetly forcing the knife through the soil of a nearby potted tree. He then covered it over, as though nothing had ever happened. A smart idea.

With that, we returned to the main room and headed for our seats, with Kalvin moving away from us to join a different table at the far side of the hall. The dancers had gone, but the music was still playing, with several coldblood couples taking to the floor. Everyone seemed to be in a celebratory mood, clinking glasses of red liquid and downing the contents in one swift gulp. I couldn’t help feeling disgusted, yet I couldn’t stop watching.

I stood behind Navan since I hadn’t been given a seat, and gazed out over the revelers, taking everything in. My senses were on high alert, suspecting everyone of knowing what had happened. It wouldn’t take much for the coldblood to be discovered, and then we’d be done for.

Navan was sitting at a table with a dozen or so members of the Explorer’s Guild, by the sound of their conversation. As much as I wanted to glean more knowledge about Navan and his prestigious position as a Chief of Exploration, I couldn’t fully concentrate. Every moment that passed, I was convinced we were going to be found out.

“How about you, Idrax? Looks like you found at least one interesting thing on your travels,” an older coldblood teased, glancing my way. My ears perked up.

“Not really,” Navan said coolly, casting a casual glance my way. “Picked her up from a little nowhere planet. Weak race, weak blood. Could wipe them out in one go if I wanted.”

“What is she?” another explorer asked.

He shrugged. “Need to go over the books in the library, see if she matches up to anything we’ve found before. Her blood tasted awful though—easily digestible, but made me feel queasy for a week.” The table erupted into laughter, and I realized everyone’s focus was on Navan. It was clear he was the “cool kid”, with all these other coldbloods trying to win his attention.

As the minutes ticked by into hours, I began to feel myself relax. A few more hours, and we could be out of here, getting that body far away from where anyone could discover it. Just a few more hours. I could manage that.

I spotted Kalvin at the opposite end of the room, in deep discussion with some of the others at his table. As they lifted their heads, I realized they were Nestor, Cristo, and the two shifters, now in the guise of Kiel and Grillo. A risky move, bringing the two shifters here. What if their façade slipped? What if their façade slipped, and someone found the body? Two strikes, and we’d be out.

A scream went up from the crowd, startling me. My heart thundered.

“He’s dead!” a coldblood waitress wailed, rushing into the throng, her hands covered in a dark substance.

All semblance of relaxation shattered.

Navan scraped back his chair and rose to his feet, as the rest of the room descended into chaos. People were screaming, everyone was running, and nobody seemed to know what was going on. Guards strode forward, brandishing their crackling pikes, their menacing eyes scanning the room for any sign of trouble.

“Who is dead?” a voice bellowed across the hall. Instantly, everyone fell silent. It was Queen Gianne, rising from her throne, her eyes livid.

The waitress turned, trembling. “There is a body in the stockroom, Your Highness. I was bringing out more glasses and… I found him!” she shrieked, sinking to her knees in front of her queen.

“Everyone, stay where you are! Anyone caught running for the exits will be killed on sight,” the queen roared, clearly infuriated by the interruption to her party. “Guards, follow this waitress! Search the area for the killer. Nobody leaves until this vulgar beast is found!”

To the chorus of marching boots, the guards swarmed into the hallway we had come from, the doors swinging shut behind them, leaving us with the uncertainty of their return. I wanted to grasp Navan’s hand, but I stayed put, knowing that any sort of affection would only get us into even more trouble. It was a waiting game, now.

In the distance, I saw Kalvin and the others get up out of their seats, deliberately keeping their gazes away from where Navan and I were standing. The looks on their faces didn’t exactly fill me with confidence. There was terror written on every single one.

“What is the penalty for a crime like this?” I whispered to Navan.

“A very brutal, very painful, very slow death,” he replied, his voice wavering slightly.

I froze, unable to speak. My mind was full of a thousand terrible executions. For myself, I knew it would be over with far faster than it would for the coldbloods, with their superior strength, but I wasn’t ready to die. Nor was I ready to watch Navan die. There had to be a way out of this. They couldn’t know it was us.

Ten torturous minutes later, the guards returned. One of them ran up to the queen, bending his knee as he neared her.

“Well, what have you found?” Queen Gianne demanded.

“Jora Razul, Your Highness,” the guard replied.

Queen Gianne’s cheeks flushed red with fury. “One of my most loyal subjects. A faithful friend to the one true crown!” she cried. “How did he die?”

“Knife wound through the neck, Your Highness,” the guard explained. “We didn’t find the murder weapon.”

Immediately, Queen Gianne’s gaze rested upon Navan, before floating down to me. Scanning the crowd, she sought out the faces of Kalvin and the others, too, her chest heaving with rage. “Fetch Navan and his pet to me, and those rebels too!” she roared, her voice shaking the crystal glasses.

The guards made a beeline for us, jabbing the tips of the bristling spears between our shoulder blades, the electric buzz driving us toward the queen. I felt like a cow on its way to the slaughterhouse, being cattle-prodded all the way. As we reached Queen Gianne, the guards shoved us downward, making us sink to our knees in front of her.

“How is it that there have been no murders like this committed since I have been queen—but, the moment you bring rebels across the threshold of my queendom, a loyalist winds up dead in a palace stockroom?” she asked, her words dripping venom, her gaze fixed on Navan’s face.

“I don’t know, Your Highness,” he replied quietly, keeping his head down.

“You think it’s a coincidence, Idrax?” she spat, her silver eyes burning with furious fire.

He shook his head. “I don’t know, Your Highness,” he repeated.

“It all seems a little suspicious to me,” she hissed, dipping low to his face. She snatched his chin up to make him look at her. “This was you, wasn’t it? This was your plan all along. You thought you could frighten me by ruining my celebration, and picking off those closest to me—is that it? Did my sister put you up to this?” I could feel the anger pouring off her, sending terror through my veins.

“No, Your Highness,” Navan insisted. “I had nothing to do with this. I don’t know how that coldblood died.”

“You got one of your little cronies to stab him, is that right? You want me to think my queendom isn’t safe, yes?” she snarled. “Well, it won’t work, Idrax! I will never be afraid. My queendom is solid, and shall forever stand, no matter how many rebels flock to my door, trying to take me down!” Her hand shot out and struck Navan hard across the face. His head jerked backward, the blow echoing across the silent hall.

Once again, it took everything I had to keep still, to stop myself from checking he was okay. A handprint was beginning to blossom against the ashen gray of his skin.

Queen Gianne was running scared; I could see it on her face. There was not only anger flickering across her features, but panic too. All of those things she had said were things she feared. It seemed the Queen was having a crisis of confidence, all smothered in a front of bravado. To me, it was crystal clear that she didn’t believe her queendom or her crown were safe. She was downright paranoid.

Slyly glancing to his side, Navan flashed me an apologetic look that made my pulse quicken in despair. With a sinking feeling in my stomach, I realized he was going to own up to it, to save us all.

“Your Highness, I—” Navan began.

“It was me,” a low voice interrupted, before Navan could say another word.

I turned sharply to see Kalvin kneeling at the end of the lineup, his gaze lifted to meet the queen’s. “I did it, Your Highness. I killed Jora Razul,” he said hoarsely, keeping his eyes on her.

Forgetting Navan, the queen whirled around and stormed toward him, bending low to his face. “Did my sister put you up to this?”

He shook his head. “Forgive me, Queen Gianne—the one, true queen of Vysanthe. Jora and I got into a fight about an old disagreement. I had stolen his girl, a long time ago, but he never forgave me,” he explained, thinking fast. “I’d been away so long, I thought he’d have forgotten all about it, but he sprang on me in the hallway, and I fought back in self-defense. I didn’t mean to kill him, Your Highness. He took me by surprise, and I retaliated. It was a stupid argument about a petty squabble, and it ended in tragedy—it was just the two of us, out there in the hallway, and I hid him because I was ashamed of what I’d done.”

I stared in open-mouthed disbelief, both at Kalvin’s swift-thinking mind, and at the realization that he was sacrificing himself for the sake of us. No, not us—Orion’s cause. All of this was for the rebel cause. If nobody took the rap for Jora Razul’s murder, then the mission stopped here. Still, I could hardly fathom how someone could believe so wholly in a cause that they would be willing to die for it. I had never been Kalvin’s biggest fan, but I couldn’t help but feel a deep, newfound respect for him. There was an incredible sense of duty in his character, even if it was tragically misdirected.

A sense of duty that I prayed had just saved all of our lives.

Queen Gianne seemed to consider Kalvin’s words, conflict moving across her face in a grim shadow. With my eyes upon her, I prayed the queen would be merciful.

“This is the truth?” she asked, her features softening.

Kalvin nodded. “This is the absolute truth, Your Highness.”

“Very well. A tragic accident, nothing more?” the queen mused.

“Nothing more, Your Highness. A silly mistake that cost a coldblood’s life,” Kalvin replied, a glimmer of hope in his eyes.

“Two lives,” she corrected, a cold smile on her face.

Kalvin frowned. “Two, Your…?”

The words died on his lips as a guard stepped up behind him. Queen Gianne flicked her wrist, and before my brain could even comprehend what was happening, the guard brought his crackling spearhead down, skewering Kalvin in one fell swoop. The sharp edges of the spear pushed straight through his spine and out through his ribcage. He gasped once in surprise, and then he was gone, his eyes fogging over.

As the guard removed the pike, using his boot as leverage to haul the weapon back out, Kalvin’s body slumped forward on the ground, his limbs splayed out at unnatural angles. I willed him to get back up, to take another breath, but it was too late. Kalvin had given his life for the rebel cause, and that was all there was to it. No fanfare, no ceremony, no high honor, just a body crumpled on the ground, his blood pooling out around him.

“Everyone may leave! The celebration is finished!” Queen Gianne boomed, turning around. Her attendants lifted her skirts as she sashayed across the hall and out into a connecting corridor. The party was over.

I couldn’t peel my eyes away from the sight of Kalvin, even as I felt the hot pressure of tears building behind them. I felt numb, the only thought running through my head being that he hadn’t deserved to die like this.

He may have been vulgar, but he had proven himself to be braver than every single one of us.

In Vysanthe, it seemed, bravery wasn’t rewarded.