Free Burning Kingdoms by Lauren DeStefano Page A

damaged themselves forever trying to catch only a glimpse of it. But I wonder now if things on Internment were as bad as all that.
    I feel guilt for being so angry with my parents and brother, and it silences my thoughts.
    The doors open with a theatrical groan. Celeste rises, pulling me along with her. Her eyes are bright. “Your Majesty,” she says, with a nod that is the perfect mix of cool and cordial.
    The king, for all the grandeur of his home, is unremarkable to look at. He is short and slight with hair that is slicked back to curl up at the nape of his neck. He wears a dark suit with elaborate copper-colored lapels that disappear over his shoulders. While Nimble wears a pair of round lenses over his eyes, King Ingram has only one, attached to his pocket by a gold chain. He brings it to his left eye as he studies us.
    “I guess I’m in the presence of two princesses?” He sits at an armchair in a beam of light that seems all too planned.
    “You flatter me, Your Majesty,” I say, and the words are sour on my tongue. “But there is only one princess of Internment, and she’s standing beside me.”
    “Celeste Furlow,” she says. Her smile has gotten tight. She is accustomed to formalities, but even she can’t be sure what to make of this king’s behavior.
    I’m beginning to like him.
    “They’ve been our houseguests,” Nimble says, winking at Celeste when he thinks no one will notice. “And the princess was especially interested in helping with the war effort.”
    “Mr. Piper tells me you’re from the floating island,” King Ingram says, and waves for us to sit. “I’ve been out to see the thing that brought you to our humble kingdom. What kind of airplane is that?”
    After a silence, I realize I’m the only one in the room who can answer.
    “The professor has never called it an airplane, Your Majesty. Actually, that’s a word we don’t have on Internment.”
    “What she means, Your Majesty, is that we haven’t built any sort of aircrafts, yet,” Celeste says, eager to preserve our city’s integrity. I can hear in her voice that she’s embarrassed, and it angers me. Internment is a brilliant place, and she should be proud to have called it home. She should miss it at least marginally. How could she not? It’s a knife to the heart every time I look up and find that the clouds conceal it from my view. I feel ousted.
    “Internment had no intention of building an aircraft,” I say. “There are winds that surround our city, and anyone who tries to leave is either injured or killed.”
    “Nonsense,” the king says, though he looks at me with interest. “How are you here, if that’s the case?”
    I’m not sure I want to tell him about the rebellion, or the seedy behavior of King Furlow. I question Celeste’s motives, but I’m not ready to dismiss her claim that the two cities can work together somehow. So I only say, “It was an experiment several decades in the making. The professor devised a way to burrow through the bottom of the city. He doesn’t believe it would be possible to return. Not in his machine, at least.”
    Behind its lens, the king’s eye brightens with intrigue. And I realize that I’ve just said too much even before he says, “You all left Internment expecting to never see it again?”
    “What she means to say—” Celeste begins, but the king interrupts.
    “She doesn’t need you to speak for her. She isn’t a mute. Go on, Miss . . .”
    “Stockhour,” I say. “Morgan Stockhour, Your Majesty. And I only meant to say that—well, you could consider us explorers, I suppose.” It’s a weak attempt to bandage what I’ve done.
    Celeste moves in quickly. “We have scopes—much like the ones you use to see the stars and our island—and the kings of Internment have been studying your technology for generations. We felt confident that you would devise a way to reach us soon. We thought it should be time to greet you, so you’d know a bit about