The king knocks on the door. Giving my reflection one final look, I leave.

He waits for me on the other side clad in a tux. Montes leans back as I walk out, his gaze approving. He opens his mouth.

“Don’t say it,” I say.

“Can’t I give my wife a compliment?”

“I don’t want the compliment you’re about to give me.”

Montes comes to my side as we head downstairs. “Has anyone ever told you that you are a strange girl?”

“Because I don’t like being called pretty? You all can take your stereotypes and shove them where the sun don’t shine.”

“Mmm, I’d prefer to shove something else there.”

I glance sharply at him.

He looks unrepentant.

His hand falls to the small of my back. “You look lovely. I don’t care that you don’t want to hear it. I’m going to tell you over and over again.”

“You don’t get it,” I say to Montes as I fold myself into the car waiting for us outside. “I don’t want to be valued for my looks. That belongs to your world.”

He follows me in. “You now belong to that world.”

I think Montes enjoys having the attention on us. Not because he’s a narcissist—though he is—but because it gives him an excuse to exercise his chivalry on me. He knows I won’t fight him while we’re being filmed.

But I don’t. I belong to neither the old world nor the new one. I’m no longer one of the impoverished, but I’ll never be one of the rich.

I’m a woman with nothing to her name but a few memories and a few more dreams.

“ARE YOU GOING to deprive me of alcohol again tonight?” I ask as we step out of the car. Immediately camera crews close in on us. I squint against the flashing lights. The king’s guards step in and keep the media at bay.

“Yes,” the king says, guiding me forward.

So the king’s serious about preventing me from drinking. That’s unfortunate. Talking to these people sober is its own kind of torture. I’ll just have to snatch a drink or two when the king’s head is turned.

He keeps his body slightly in front of mine, and he angles himself protectively towards me, as if the cameramen might suddenly pull out guns and start shooting us all.

“Tell me again why this dinner is important?” I take in the jewels dripping from one woman’s neck as we enter the hotel’s lobby.

These people and their beauty.

“Despite what you might think, not all my victories are won on the battlefield. If you charm the right people, you can get just as far without the bloodshed.”

“Oh, so now you’re a pacifist?” A waiter passes by, and I make a grab for one of the glasses of wine.

Montes catches my wrist. “Threatening works well too,” he says, his eyes glittering. “No drinking, Serenity. I mean it.”

I yank my hand away.

It wasn’t the best strategy to go for it right in front of him, but I’m being slowly stifled to death by him and his rules.

“Or else what, Montes? All I hear from you are empty threats.”

He raises an eyebrow, the corner of his mouth lifting. I think he’s crafting some unusually painful punishment for me.

“So good seeing you both this evening,” an older couple interrupts us. “How are you enjoying your stay?”

This inanity begins again. I think I’d prefer the king’s punishment to it.

The couple eventually leaves, but not a minute later another couple takes their place, and then another. And so the evening goes.

My eyes drift away from one portly man’s account of his last big game hunt. They move aimlessly over the crowd. I notice Estes is chatting with some of the other political figureheads that were in session with me and the king today.

Scheming, scheming, scheming. These men are always scheming. Sometimes I miss the battlefield for this very reason. The enemy is pretty obvious when they’re shooting at you, and you have permission to shoot them back. Here the lines between friend and enemy blur.

I drag my gaze away from Estes. I’m about to check back into the conversation when I catch sight of a ghost.

I have to be mistaken. There is no logical reason why General Kline should be here in South America. And yet I swear it’s him across the room bearing a tray of hors d’oeuvres.

He wears the same attire as the rest of the waiters—a white shirt and suit jacket and a bow tie at his neck. He looks thinner than he has in the past, but maybe I’m just getting used to the curves of the people here.

His head swivels, and I blanche as, for a moment, our gazes lock.

It is him.

The last time I saw the general, I was in a cell, my memory wiped. That feels like a lifetime ago.

My breathing picks up, something the king notices.

“Serenity, are you alright?” He follows my line of sight, but General Kline has already disappeared back into the crowd.

“Fine. I just need some air,” I say, distracted.

I leave Montes’s side before he can respond, though I feel his eyes on me the whole time.

I head towards where I last saw the general. It’s slow going because, surprisingly, people want to talk to me. I nod to them, exchange a few words here and there, and push my way through the crowd. The entire time my eyes sweep the room.

I catch sight of the back of the general’s head as he enters the kitchens.

I pick up my pace, no longer attempting niceties. If I don’t want the general to slip through my grasp, I’ll have to move a little faster.

My palms slap against the doors to the kitchen as I barge in. Inside, steam fills the air, and the staff shouts out orders. Once they see me, they bow their heads and their shouts turn to murmurs of “Your Majesty.”

I stride past them, down the narrow kitchen aisle, following the retreating form of General Kline.

“General!” I shout.

Rather than slowing, he begins to jog deeper into the kitchens.

Damnit, this is why combat boots are far superior to heels. I pick up my skirts and run after him, accidentally elbowing some of the kitchen staff in the process. I don’t care that I’ve probably committed half a dozen faux pas, or that a multitude of people have heard and seen me pass through. My former leader, now a high up Resistance officer, is posing as a waiter at a party I’m attending. I’m not going to wait for shit to hit the fan.