“Why do you think the prime minister would sabotage the ship or try to have me killed?” Alana clung to Ice’s hand as he led her into the palace. His frown had only grown deeper since they were attacked. Ice’s hands had been so gentle on her face as he’d asked if she was all right. And his relief had been palpable. But he still appeared tense and maybe even angry at what happened. His hand held hers fast, and Alana was grateful for it.

Ice had stressed repeatedly that all his hopes for Crimean survival were pinned on Alana. What possible reason could the prime minister have for wanting the mission to fail? Why would he want Crimeans to die out? It didn’t make any sense. “Doesn’t he want the population to grow?”

“He has always believed in Arcana. Some share his view that Arcana simply needed to be fixed, not destroyed. I think the idea that people would start falling in love again and feeling strong emotions goes against what he sees as the best course for the people of Crimea.”

“But that doesn’t make any sense. It’s better to feel nothing and watch the population shrink than to make a change?”

The pod in Alana’s hand vibrated and a digitized voice said, “Take the corridor to your right.”

Ice pulled her gently in that direction. “Some of the elite believe that complete intellect with no emotions or other concerns at all is the highest state of being achievable. For them, Arcana didn’t go far enough. Even people who continued to have wild emotional swings were executed as disruptors.”

Alana had thought it sounded like a dystopian nightmare when people were just “corrected.” Executions over emotions were a next-level kind of horror she didn’t even want to imagine. No wonder people suppressed their feelings and stopped connecting with each other.

The pod gave further directions. Soon they were descending a long, winding staircase, going even deeper into the bedrock. The stairs flowed into a large chamber with several tunnels leading away from it.

“I didn’t even know this was here,” Ice said, mystified. The Dowager Empress stepped out of the mouth of one of the tunnels.

“Hello, Alana Watson.” She nodded at each of them. “Minister Silverkiller. It’s nice to see Winter Silverkiller’s son up and about. You do have your mother’s eyes.”

Ice inclined his head in respect. “I was told she insisted on that feature when my parents submitted their request to the genetic designer.”

She laughed. Her voice sounded like a mellifluous song bird. The empress wore a long, flowing, silvery robe like her attaché had, clasped at her neck. Alana couldn’t decide if she looked like an icy superhero or a villain. Marvel would love her as their new character.

The prime minister stepped out of another tunnel, a weapon of some type in his hand. It was shiny metal but shaped more like a water pistol from earth than something threatening. When he fired it at the empress, barely missing her as she dropped and rolled, Alana realized it was the same kind of charge someone had fired at her earlier.

Ice rushed toward the prime minister, but Storm came from behind them and reached him first. The prime minister got off one more shot that glanced off Storm’s shoulder, taking a chunk of his uniform and what looked like a layer of skin with it. The panic on the prime minister’s face made it clear he hadn’t expected a soldier. As Storm slapped the weapon out of his hand, blood coursing down his arm from the shoulder wound, Prime Minister Hallow reached inside the closure on the front of his shirt and pulled out a short, wide blade.

Storm grabbed his wrist with one hand and the prime minister’s throat with the other. A few shakes, and the knife clattered to the ground.

Ice and Alana helped the empress to her feet. She was shaken, but lifted her chin and narrowed her already narrow eyes at the prime minister.

“You were warned,” she said cryptically.

Storm managed to get both the prime minister’s wrists behind his back to hold him firm. The prime minister laughed bitterly. “How can you condone this?” he asked. “Humans will destroy our culture, water down our bloodline. Crimeans will become as lazy, ignorant, and self-satisfied as those on the Old Earth. Our intellectual destiny will be thwarted. Think, Empress, of what we could achieve. We’ll figure out the population problem another way, through technology.”

His voice went from snide to pleading, and the empress looked at him with something like sadness.

“You’re wrong. We have been wrong. I’m remedying that now.” She turned to Alana and motioned for her to walk toward a blank wall between two tunnels. “My son has told me of your breakthrough. You and the Minister.”

Alana’s face heated up at the idea that the royals of this planet took such an interest in her sex life. It made sense, under the circumstances, but she’d never really considered that it would get discussed by so many other people. “I see,” she said simply.

She gestured for Ice to join them. “Minister, you told my son you were surprised at your reaction to Alana when you’ve never felt interest in a Crimean woman before.”

“Yes, Empress. I can find no explanation for it.”

“And you feel new things for Alana. Not just physical, but emotional.”

Alana swallowed hard as Ice turned to her and said, “Yes. Your happiness…pleases me. When you were attacked in the garden, I…was furious and frightened all at once. I couldn’t imagine what it would be like to lose you. I would be utterly devastated.”

The prime minister groaned as if in pain. “You see, Empress? Anger. Fear. You’re about to push us into an age of barbarism the likes of which Crimea hasn’t seen since—” He stopped, as if he’d almost given something away.

The empress regarded him for a moment, then finished his sentence. “Since humans landed on this planet thousands of years ago and colonized it.”

Storm and Ice exchanged a look. Alana thought they both showed shock and disbelief. The prime minister hung his head. Obviously, it was true.

“I think I can help you figure out why you were so attracted to Alana but no one else,” the empress said. “Thanks to Arcana and a focus on intellectual pursuits, we evolved without the urge to feel emotions. It’s ingrained now, and was even when babies were still born naturally to couples. We drummed emotions out of the populace, and learned to live without them.” She lifted a hand toward Alana. “But she feels. Human emotion. The same emotions that Crimeans used to have. Alana, humans are our ancestors. You represent a primal version of Crimeans, and your feelings and urges have sparked an awakening in Ice of who we used to be.”

The empress touched the wall and a panel slid to the side. Glass or thick crystal blocked their entry, but visible behind it was what looked like a large book. It might not have been paper, but it was shaped the same and clearly very old. Most of the writing Alana had seen in Crimea looked like Egyptian hieroglyphics. The collar she wore allowed her to understand speech, but she hadn’t been able to read anything. The front of the book was the first thing she’d been able to read since arriving—a single number: Eighteen.

“Minister, this crystal wall was built and cured thousands of years ago to protect the historical relic that details the true history of our people. You won’t find this information in the libraries. I’m sure you can set your scientists and archaeologists on the task of excavating it so that its knowledge can be shared with the people of Crimea.”

“No,” the prime minister whispered.

“Yes,” she replied. “The people have a right to know where they came from and how their ruling class has led them astray.”

“Eighteen?” Alana asked. “What does that mean?”

The empress turned to speak directly to Alana. “In the year three thousand one hundred on earth, unpolluted resources were dwindling. The organization known as NASA sent a ship on an exploratory mission to find another planet where humans could survive. One hundred scientists and engineers were sent out on a ship. Eighteen survivors—great, great grandchildren of the scientists who originally set out—landed on this planet. From those eighteen humans, Crimea was born.”

Alana swore she could feel Ice and Storm resisting this information. One could cut the tension in the chamber with a dull knife. But as fantastic as the story was, it couldn’t be possible.

“We’re still a thousand years away from the year three thousand one hundred, Empress. You must be mistaken.”

“Oh, child,” she said. “At this moment, everything you know from earth is long gone by thousands of years. When the Campania traveled to earth on its mission, it was sent through a timeshift.” When Ice shook his head, the empress said, “A wormhole. I suspect it was part of the prime minister’s sabotage. He didn’t count on the wormhole remaining stable long enough for you to return through it.”

“We would have known,” Storm said. “How did we not know?”

Ice rubbed the bridge of his nose, and despite the circumstances, Alana was charmed by the gesture. “We were suspended when it happened,” he said. “The computers could have been programmed to erase all traces of the jump. That explains why the clothing and currency we’d been supplied had been so wrong. We were prepared for earth as it is now, not as it was.”

Alana felt dizzy at the idea that she was now several thousand years in the future from the year 2017, when she’d left earth. Everyone and everything she knew, gone.

“Is it still possible to go back to my time?”

Ice looked at her, an unreadable expression on his face. “The wormhole will decay eventually, but it may be stable enough for another trip through, maybe a few more. I take it you still want to be returned to your home, your time.” His voice tightened, and it was clear he wasn’t asking. He assumed he was right.

Alana realized she did, but only to say goodbye to the people who were probably panicked at where she’d gone. “To tie up loose ends, if it’s possible. But…I want to come back here to stay. With you.” The truth of it hit her as she said it. She wanted to be with Ice. “I think I might be…falling in love with you.”

Ice smiled at her. His face simply broke into a smile filled with so much happiness, it brought tears to her eyes to see it. She touched his face and laughed. “You’re smiling.”

Ice blinked a few times, and touched his own face as his smile grew. “I guess I am. And this feeling…the need to be with you, to see you happy…am I falling in love with you, too?”

Alana’s heart tumbled in her chest, and she laughed. “I think you might be.”

A silence fell over them until the prime minister spoke, his voice thin and shaky. “What have you done?”

The empress approached him. “I believed as you do, all along, Hallow. We will destroy ourselves if something isn’t done. And this is the best way. We were wrong, Prime Minister. But it’s not too late to save ourselves.”

He straightened but didn’t try to pull away from Storm’s grip. “I will not stand by and watch our people tainted by humanity. Especially not from a detention center.” He took a deep breath and looked at the empress defiantly. “Begin final sequence now.”

“No,” the empress said, grabbing his shoulders. “No, it’s not necessary. We can—”

Storm pressed Hallow to the floor, patting all over his body. “Where is it?”

The prime minister closed his eyes. Storm flipped him onto his back and tore open his shirt to reveal a small circle the size of a quarter blinking in the center of the man’s chest. It shone brightly, then went dark.

Prime Minister Hallow was dead.

“He would not let go of the idea that Arcana was flawed, but necessary.” The empress stared down at him, shaking her head. “He needn’t have died like this.”

“You believed that, too?” Ice said, his arm sliding around Alana’s waist to pull her close. She leaned into him, grateful for the contact.

“I did, Minister. We all did, except my son. He began changing our minds over time, stressing the necessity of keeping our population strong, vital.” She straightened her shoulders. “He knows some of our true history, but he does not know of this relic. I didn’t bring him here, because I feared treachery, and our emperor must survive to lead us into this new era.”

She shook her head at Hallow’s body and sighed. “I regret the deception, and I will apologize to the people for it. But regardless of the consequences, they have a right to know.”

Storm moved to stand next to Ice and Alana. “So the people are to know what took place here?” He glanced at the body on the floor. “All of it?”

“Yes. We will live in the truth from now on, and I’m sure it will lead to a better world for all our people.” She took Alana’s hand in her cold one, and seemed to be trying to smile at her, ever so slightly. “Thanks to you and your discovery that humans can affect change in our people, I think we can find our way back.” She patted Alana’s hand. “Once the relic is recovered, we will begin the process of explaining to the populace where they really came from, and why more missions to earth are needed to strengthen our civilization.”

“I’ll have my people begin excavations immediately,” Ice said.

Storm stared at the book behind the crystal. “The emperor will want us to arrange another mission as soon as possible. I’ll consult with him right away.”

The empress wasn’t listening. She was enraptured watching Ice’s smile. She squeezed Alana’s hand and tilted her head. “I hope you can teach me to do that.”

To genuinely smile?

For the first time since she’d been whisked away from her bridal shop and everything she knew, Alana felt confident that she could.