That feeling would pale in comparison to the first moment she locked gazes with the Grand Minister.

Cushing saw him first. The orderly had been on lookout since the start of his shift, moving through the halls at double his normal snail’s pace, his thick arms swinging by his sides while his eyes darted to and fro, scanning faces and windows with equal intensity. Lu had been avoiding him as she always did, but the moment she heard his shout from near the loading dock doors, she bolted, anxious to get a glimpse of the infamous GM before he entered the building.

Among a chorus of aggravated protests, Lu pushed to the front of the small crowd that had gathered at the wide double doors that led from the interior hallway of the Hospice to the outside dock area where the delivery trucks unloaded their goods. Through the round scratched windows, she saw a group of men in simple, severe black suits garnished with white armbands emblazoned with the IF’s sun symbol huddled around the rear of a van that had its back doors open. The men seemed to be trying to remove something from the van, but Lu couldn’t make out what it was. She stepped to one side to get a better look, and as she did, found herself staring into a face so familiar she was momentarily paralyzed by déjà vu.

But it couldn’t be. She’d never seen this man before in her life.

He, too, wore a simple black suit. More correctly, he wore a jacket and trousers that had been altered to accommodate his two missing legs and one missing arm. He was missing an eye as well—the hole was covered by a black patch, lending him a sinister, villainous air—and he was being carefully lowered by his companions into a waiting wheelchair. He was frail, with wispy white hair and a shrunken chest, the one hand like a skeleton’s, yet there was nothing frail about his energy. He looked up and caught sight of her, and Lu took an involuntary step back.

His one eye—blue and cold as an arctic sky—fixed on her with the ferocity of a hungry lion.

She felt pinned in place. She felt, for a moment, that the earth had stopped spinning beneath her feet and she might at any moment shirk the bounds of gravity altogether and go shooting out into space.

Because in that fleeting look, she saw recognition.

Recognition, and rage.

Gasping in shock, Lu spun and flattened her back against the door. She was quickly pushed aside as others surged forward, but her knees wouldn’t stop trembling, and she had trouble regaining her balance as she fled back into the kitchen. She looked wildly around for someplace to hide, quickly realizing the stupidity of that plan. The only thing to do, the only possibility for getting out of this situation alive, was to remain calm. Panicking wouldn’t help. And if she ran, her father . . .

She wouldn’t think about what would happen to her father if she ran.

So she leaned against the stainless steel sink with her eyes squeezed shut until she could breathe again.

Lars pounded down the hallway outside, cursing in German at the staff to get back to their posts. He burst into the kitchen, flailing his arms and shouting.

“Lumina! Lumina, where in the hell—”

He stopped short as he caught sight of her. “Oh. There you are. Where’s Liesel?”

Mute, she shook her head, eliciting a dramatic moan from Lars. He thrust his hands into his hair. “Well, find out! I’ve got to finish the sauerbraten—”

“Forget the sauerbraten!” snapped a female voice. Lu and Lars turned to find the Administrator, grim faced and tense, standing stiffly near the six-burner stove. Mathilda Gruenborn was tall and bone thin, with a schoolmarm’s fashion style and a sense of humor that could only be described as missing. At the moment, her pinched face was the exact color as her lumpy sweater: gray.

“You know the protocol: Assemble in the main hall and wait for me there. I’m going to greet the Grand Minister—”

“But the sauerbraten!” Lars cried. “If I don’t time it just right, the meat will be—”

The Administrator shrieked his name, her face flushing a deep berry red. Lars snapped his mouth shut, lifted his chin, and without another word, marched out of the kitchen. The Administrator breathed loudly for a few seconds, then nodded at Lu, her jaw tight. She spoke through clenched teeth. “You, too, Bohn. Don’t make me ask twice.”

The itch in Lu’s palms, so irritating before, grew now into a hot, throbbing imperative. In an attempt to relieve it, she smoothed her hands down the front of her jacket, a motion which the Administrator mistook as an attempt to straighten any stray wrinkles in the fabric of her coat. She nodded, pleased, then turned and left without another word, leaving Lu to stare after her.

After several moments of heart-pounding silence, Lu walked slowly out to meet her fate.

THREE

The main hall of the Hospice was thick with silk plants and brightly lit in a failed attempt to deflect attention from its startling similarity to an enormous cage. The requisite game tables, craft areas, and “meditation zones” on the second floor competed with the IF-approved library for title of most depressing, while the portrait gallery on the third floor—featuring grim gilt-framed oils of the Federation’s top leaders leering down at the guests in the main hall below—beat out everything in terms of sheer creepiness. Above the third floor were the “residences,” where Hospice guests would spend their final days in rooms so small one could almost touch both walls when lying in bed.

Trying to look inconspicuous, Lu edged into a corner behind a fake giant philodendron so dusty it made her sneeze.

“Better to be front and center than let them think you’re hiding,” scolded Liesel softly, coming up behind Lu and taking her arm. “You know what a cat does when it sees the mouse run?”

A question that required no answer. Lu let herself be led away from the comforting cover of the dusty plant to the terrifying center of the room.

Near the entrance and off to the side of the sea of dining tables where guests ate all their meals, the staff had lined up in three rows according to seniority. Administration and managers in front, clerical and support staff behind, then the orderlies with the kitchen and laundry staff. As always, Cushing stood a little apart and ahead of the rest of his line, convinced he shouldn’t have to stand with such plebs.

The moment the Administrator entered the main hall with the Grand Minister, Lu’s nervous system went into overdrive. With the approaching hum of mechanical wheels, her heart twisted, her breathing increased, all the little hairs on her body stood on end. Every minute detail of the room honed to brilliant, blinding focus, and she felt for a split second as if an animal sleeping just under her skin had awoken, bristling, hissing a warning into her ear.

Enemy! Enemy! Enemy!

Her palms began to itch so violently it was all she could do to stand still. Up on the third floor, one of the paintings lifted briefly from the wall, falling back with a clatter.

Then he was before them. A mangled body, a face full of rage, a white arm band with a brilliant yellow sun emblem, sinister for all its simplicity.

“Good evening,” said the Grand Minister in a surprisingly gentle voice, squaring his wheelchair in front of the lines of staff. There was a murmured response, then silence.

Two black-suited men the size of small buildings took positions a few feet behind the wheelchair with their hands clasped behind their backs, legs spread. Their eyes roved over the group with unblinking intensity. A swarm of others lurked in her peripheral vision, moving to guard exits and hallways, to flank the entrance doors. The Administrator stood several feet to the rear of the Grand Minister, her hands clenched to fists at her sides, her face now bleached from gray to white. Lu felt the blood drain from her own cheeks as well.