I woke up in a room that smelled like vanilla and dead flowers.
My head throbbed—a dull, rhythmic ache from the gas. I blinked my eyes open, expecting the cold steel of a cell or the damp rock of a cave.
Instead, I was staring at a canopy of pink silk.
I sat up, gasping. The room was massive, decorated in sickeningly sweet shades of pastel pink and cream. There were shelves lined with porcelain dolls, their glass eyes staring at me. There was a white vanity table with a silver brush set.
It was a little girl's room. My room. Or what my room would have looked like if I had never been stolen.
I threw the covers off. I was wearing a pristine white nightgown made of heavy silk, buttoned to the chin.
"Cassian?" I whispered.
Silence.
I scrambled out of bed and ran to the window. It was barred with decorative ironwork. Outside, I saw the manicured gardens of the Governor's Estate. Patrols of National Guard soldiers walked the perimeter with dogs.
We were trapped.
