The Princess Trials (The Princess Trials #1)(93)

Gemini staggers to her feet. Blood seeps through her gown, which is torn in several places, and burns and bruises mar her bare arms. One of them hangs limply as though it might be dislocated or broken.

Her blue eyes focus on me, and she raises her left hand. “Zea, stay back.”

“What’s wrong?”

She parts her lips to say something else, but a bright light flashes from her mouth, followed by a loud bang. I twist and crouch with my hands over my head, and pieces of hot, wet flesh splatter down onto my dress.





Chapter 25





I can’t move. I can’t breathe. I can’t think of what just happened. All I can do is stare at blood-spattered pieces on the white marble floor, on my arms, in my hair, and on my gown.

The bodice of my dress tightens around my lungs and constricts my stomach, and the sour taste of half-digested burger and milkshake hits the back of my throat. I swallow hard, willing the contents of my gut to stay down.

Falling chandeliers don’t cause people to explode. They crush bones, skewer bodies, maybe even cause electrical fires, but they don’t fill a person’s throat with light and blow people into tiny bits. My gaze rises the stairs, where Prince Kevon stands, his body bent double by Lady Circi’s arm lock.

His gaze flickers from me to the chandelier wreckage, and then he lurches out of Lady Circi’s grip and down the stairs. Maybe he’s thinking the same thing. This is another two-pronged murder attempt. When throwing Rafaela out of a building didn’t work, her Amstraad monitor electrocuted her heart.

I stagger toward the group of shocked girls, shaking my head from side to side. How could anyone insert an explosive inside a girl? Why would anyone drop a chandelier on a girl when she’s standing among innocent people?

Prince Kevon emerges from around the girls and grabs my forearms. My head snaps up. His deep blue eyes are wide, frantic. His lips move, but I can’t hear a word through the ringing of my eardrums and the booming of my pulse.

I think he’s asking if I’m alright, so I force a smile and nod.

He crushes me to his chest, knocking all the air out of my lungs. The embrace should feel stifling, and I should struggle out of his grip, but Prince Kevon’s strong arms are the only thing keeping me together.

Heartbeats later, he draws back and guides me toward the steps. Queen Damascena and Ambassador Pascal rise from their thrones. Neither of them looks at the wreckage. The ambassador smiles down at us, but the queen glowers. Lady Circi descends the steps with her gaze also fixed on Prince Kevon and me, but I can’t decipher her expression.

Noises—screams, the trampling of feet, the rumble of chairs and tables hitting the stone floor—rush to my ears, and I blink myself back into awareness.

“Somebody call a medic,” Prince Kevon shouts to the side. The anguish in his voice makes me flinch. “Zea.” He cups my face and stares into my soul. “You’re suffering from shock. I’ll get you some medical attention.”

“I’m…” My voice comes out a rasp as though hoarse from hours of screaming. “I’m… You said she wouldn’t die.”

“She promised.” His voice breaks. “She said Gemini would be pardoned.”

“What about the chandelier?” The words tumble from my mouth.

Prince Kevon draws his brows together. “Do you think—” He stops, and his face turns ashen. “It’s just like Rafaela.”

“If the chandelier didn’t kill her, the explosion would,” I whisper.

Prince Kevon’s fingers curl around my arms in a grip that borders on pain. Above the sound of panic, he says, “Gemini Pixel wasn’t the target.”

A shaky breath escapes my nostrils. The moment that chandelier fell, a seed of insight formed deep in the back of my mind, but the shock of what happened to Gemini didn’t let it germinate.

Someone is eliminating the girls closest to Prince Kevon—at least those who don’t conform with the Chamber of Ministers’ choice. The only thing that kept me alive was Ambassador Pascal’s last-minute intervention.

Prince Kevon loosens his grip, and I turn around. There isn’t even a black mark where Gemini once stood. Orange flames spread over the chandelier wreckage, and black tendrils of smoke drift up toward the higher levels. Palace servants clad in four-cylinder extinguisher vests spray clouds of white dust from bell-shaped nozzles, but the action only stops the fire from spreading.

Montana stands at the other end of the dance floor, his black hair and tuxedo pristine. “May I have everybody’s attention, please?” he says in a well-practiced voice. “The lighting malfunction is no cause for panic, and as you can see, the fire is under control. As soon as our brave fire-fighters have extinguished the flames, we’ll retrieve the girls and send them to the Royal Hospital and offer them the finest medical attention.”

Applause rings out across the ballroom, and my mouth drops open. Doesn’t anyone care how much those girls might be suffering? What about Gemini?

“Zea,” says Prince Kevon. “Come with me.”

I pull my gaze away from Montana and frown.

Mouse.

Moments ago, Colonel von Mauser offered to keep me safe but wouldn’t explain why. I search around the emptying tables and chairs, and along the edge of the dance floor. There’s no sign of the so-called Amstraadi construction workers.