She leans back a little in her seat and I think I actually managed to make her uneasy. I doubt she expected her tyrannical husband to see her side.

“Have you been in the Sleeper?” I ask.

“Montes,” she warns, “I’m never going in there again.”

Her tumors are growing, the cancer has spread to her brain, and while I’ve been recovering, she grows closer and closer to the grave.

“You are,” I insist.

“I will shoot you again before that happens.”

She doesn’t realize it, but she just sealed her own fate.

I reach out and cup her face. For a girl who has lost much, she seems awfully entitled. Queenship suits her all too well. “You won’t shoot me again,” I say, my thumb rubbing the corner of her mouth.

She glares at me, her lower jaw working. She might as well have just agreed. Whatever proclamations she’s made about her lack of a conscience, hurting me cost her.

I frown to keep from smiling. I’m pleased beyond measure. I never meant to tame this creature, and to some extent she’ll always be a wild thing, but she’s given in to me—to us—far more deeply than I initially imagined she would.

A knocking on the door interrupts us.

“Come in,” I say, not bothering to look away from my wife.

“Your Majesties,” the soldier bows low to us, “I have word on your former advisors.”

My mind is still a bit foggy from the effects of the Sleeper, but it sharpens at that statement.

“What about them?” I say.

“We think they’re attempting to take over South America.”

SERENITY AND I storm towards my conference room. It doesn’t slip my notice that she’s having trouble keeping up. She may be in denial, but I’m not. Her body is shutting down; her muscles and organs aren’t working as they should.

Her illness has robbed me of the last of my fury. I cannot find it in myself to be angry with her when I fear for her life. I have no intention of punishing her, but what I do intend—she’ll think it punishment.

I’ve been in denial, thinking that because Serenity acted strong she physically was. But no longer. As soon as I deal with this freshest calamity, I’ll deal with her.

When we arrive at my conference room, several of my aids have already pulled down a large screen from the ceiling. A slideshow of photos and grainy video clips stream across the screen, many of them capturing my advisors in the middle of treasonable tasks.

Some of these men had been on my council for decades. We shared more than power and ambition.

Over the next twelve hours we hear from the band of traitors. The message is written in red. South America’s militia and the Resistance turned on my soldiers. My government officials have almost all been summarily executed.

Serenity stumbles back when she hears the news that the Resistance has sided with my councilors. She should know by now that the Resistance holds no allegiance to her, that they crave power just as much as I do. Just as much as my former advisors do.

I rub my mouth with one hand and cradle my elbow with the other. I’ve nearly worn a hole in the rug where I’ve been stalking up and down. It’s taken me most of the day to grow detached. Strategy doesn’t come to those blinded by emotion. My young queen knows that on the battlefield, but she still struggles with it inside these walls.

I stop and stare up at the footage still being projected on repeat.

“Ready as many troops as you can—I want them coming from the air, the water, and the land,” I say. “We’ll need to disable their lines of communication first—satellites, radio towers, and whatever electronics we can. And then we’ll descend on them.”

This needs to be stopped immediately.

Serenity

IT’S NEARLY FOUR in the morning by the time we finally make it back to our bedroom. I roll my shoulders. My muscles are tight from holding them rigid for so long.

Just when the king thought his pretty war was over, it reared its ugly head again. And for once, the king didn’t orchestrate the bloodshed. In fact, most of the violence that occurred since the war ended has been reactionary, and all these events have been set off by a single catalyst—me. The moment the king found something other than his power to care about, the world began to plot.

One of the king’s hands touches the back of my neck and he rubs the base of it. I lean into his touch.

My eyes fall to the bed. I’ve been running on nothing but caffeine and adrenaline for the better part of the day. My body still buzzes with the need to do something. It doesn’t understand that in this situation, I can’t fight or flee. Instead I have to watch from afar as more men fight and die senselessly.

The last thing I want to do right now is sleep.

Montes’s hands slide down my back. He kisses the juncture where my neck meets my shoulders as he squeezes my waist.

My mind still remembers all the black deeds he’s done, but my body is pliant beneath his hands, and my heart forgives, even though it shouldn’t. Even though it knows a man like Montes never changes, not really.

I’m someone who will never really change, either. And what we have, it works. This twisted love that’s endured so much more than it ever should’ve.

“Are you tired?” he asks.

It’s a loaded question. I already know where his mind is.

“No,” I say.

Montes’s fingers grip the edge of my shirt and, pulling it over my head, he trails kisses along my now bare shoulders, and then my arms. He removes my bra and his hands smooth over my skin.