ensing

l was small, minimalist, and secured

e the base of my steel desk lamp. A low electromagnetic frequency hummed into existence, establishing an invisible fifty-

bottom of my wardrobe, opened the encrypted

rp, high-definition feed of Karl si

," Karl greeted, bowing

he bored, impoverished student persona vanished, replaced instantly by the

ancial dossiers onto my screen. "The local sovereign corporate arm, Beaumont Global, controls fifty-one percent of the r

ing. "Damien doesn't take meetings with foreign ventur

th supply line before the Continental Council conve

But stall the negotiations. Keep him occupied

r Northgate's physics complex has cleared the state treas

oo

cepted an encrypted priority packet that was accidentally bundled into Beaumont Global's public

k from Damien? He doesn't ma

ty detachment, Mistress. The file was

d against my spine. "Decrypt it a

through Beaumont's military-grade firewalls. Within t

hitched

ographs of me. Me walking out of the campus dining hall. Me reading in the c

was a handwritten note, rendered in jagged, lethal call

CORA KE

ORDIAL KENSI

LASSIFICATIO

HAL CONTAINMENT. CAPTURE HER ON SIGHT AND

owing letters for

ed

identified me as his predestined queen. And instead of keeping his distance, the ar

, a dark, dangerous laugh sli

nail lightly tracing Damien's sig

ered softly into the quiet room, my violet ey

and