“You’re a brat,” I say.

She smiles, because even if this Esther doesn’t know me, she knows what it sounds like when someone gives in.

“What, exactly, do you think I can do for you?”

* * *

MR. CHEEKS GOES to free Daniel from the supply cabinet, and the rest of us wait in his office.

“You shouldn’t stay,” Nik Nik says. “It’s not safe.”

“Have to.”

“You haven’t seen what he does to you here.”

“I can guess.”

We’re standing too close in a corner. His voice is low, but Esther is only pretending not to hear the conversation.

He looks at me, which makes it feel as if he’s moved closer even though he hasn’t. “Then why stay?”

“Because she asked me.”

“And she means something to you? Like I did?”

“She’s my sister.”

Esther’s illusion of disinterest shatters, and she looks over quickly. “Truly?”

She doesn’t look disgusted, only interested. I wonder if she used to wonder what it would be like to have a sister. The way I used to, until I found out about her.

“And you know her?” Nik Nik asks Esther.

“She’s my husband’s mistress. And his spy.”

“That’s Nelline. Not me. I would never sleep with the emperor,” I say. Nik Nik looks at me pointedly. “I mean, not this emperor, obviously.”

Mr. Cheeks and Daniel are back. Esther feels so familiar I can’t help but search Daniel’s face for something recognizable, some spark I can cling to. But he’s a void.

    “She really isn’t Nelline,” Esther says.

Daniel shakes his head. “How can you be sure?”

“The way she speaks. Carries herself. I know the woman.”

Daniel looks at me, then away. “Careful you aren’t letting your hope lead you into gullibility.”

Esther lifts her chin, looking older, much older, than mine but just as strong. “Careful you don’t let your pessimism drown your faith.”

Daniel’s face goes red. He’s petty, this version of Daniel. Weaker, without Mel to prop him up. He’s nothing like the tower of warmth and goodwill I know.

Daniel looks to Nik Nik. “What do you think?”

“I believe her,” he says.

Back home, Esther is Daniel’s most trusted adviser. He would never take the word of some man over hers.

“I can prove it to you,” I say, not realizing the words are true until after they’re coming out of my mouth. “Your wife, did she die here? When Michael and Esther were two?”

“Adra’s always known that, and I’m sure his spy does too.”

“But does he know there was another woman? About a year later while you were preaching. She invited you in and you went. And afterward, you had a choice. You could follow through with the light you saw in her, marry her…or you could never look back, and dwell in your guilt.”

He’s gone ashen. Good.

“I live in a world where you married her, and it made your followers trust your words of redemption. You took in her daughter and raised her as your own. Where I come from, you smile all the time and you look five years younger than you do here, all because you weren’t a coward.”

He takes a while to respond, and when he does his voice is quiet.

“She died,” he says.

“I know.”

He blinks first. “Our parishioners tell stories. I never believed them. A person from another world dropping down in the desert, then disappearing. In the stories it was a man. Are there more of you?”

    “We rotate. This is my first time here. The man who used to come retired. The girl who came before me was…let go.”

“You make it sound like a job,” Nik Nik says.

“It is. My job is the only reason I’m here.”

They all seem deflated by that. I’m not sure what they thought I was, but they find employed a letdown.

Esther overcomes her disappointment first. “Miracles can be found in the most inglorious places.”

This is not a miracle, but she’s got that preachy look on her face, so I know it’s useless to correct her.

“You’ve seen worlds where Nik Nik is emperor? You’ll testify to it?” she says.

“Testify to who? I can’t be on record. My work gets most of your official documents, and I’ve broken enough rules already.”

“Nothing official, just a group of people who aren’t happy with the way things are, but don’t have the imagination to see the alternative. They’re coming here, and you can tell them Nik is better than his brother. Tell them they should support him.”

It all starts to make sense. Why Nik Nik would hide me, why he would ask me to confirm the truth: that his brother committed regicide. It would make his rule illegitimate. This is a coup. And my na?ve little sister is running the campaign of the usurper. Esther with her too little sense and too much faith, even in a man like Nik Nik.

“How do you even know he’s better than his brother? He might just be more polite,” I say, an accusation I never thought I’d lay at Nik Nik’s feet.

Nik Nik hears the challenge in my voice, and responds the way he would on any Earth. He squares up.

“I’m better than the man you knew, and he’s better than my brother.”

“You don’t know that. Even I don’t know that. I haven’t seen your numbers.”

    “Numbers?”

“Numbers. Your population, how many sick you have, how many are working, how many suffer, how many don’t have to die but do.”

“You can compare these numbers to other worlds? To prove concretely that we are worse off?”

It takes me a moment to realize what he’s asking me to do: analyze. He’s asking me to do the work of an analyst. The same thing I’ve been failing at on Jean’s quizzes for weeks.

I look down at my cuff. I’ve taken ghost copies of data from all the worlds I collect so I could compare them…except I’ve never pulled from here before. I’d have to go to their port. And it’s a bright day.

“I have the information from most other worlds, but not this one. I’d need to go to a port, but that’s outside of downtown Ash.”

Mr. Cheeks is looking at me like I’ve lost it. “There’s no port in the desert.”

“Not that kind of port.” I hold up my hands like it will help me explain it, then I shake my head. “It’s not a place where boats from other places come in, it’s a place where data from other places comes in.”

“Maybe tomorrow?” Daniel says.

“I can’t stay another day,” I say.

“Even if she could, the people are risking enough gathering here tonight. We can’t ask them to do it again. It’s only a matter of time before Adra links her escape to me, if he hasn’t already,” Nik Nik says.

“Does he believe she’s from another world?” asks Daniel.

“No, this is worse. He thinks we have his spy,” Nik Nik says. “I’ll go to this…port. I’ll get the information and be back by nightfall.”

“No, I’ll go. Even if you could find the port, you don’t know how to access it,” I say.

“Then I’ll assist you,” he says.

“No offense, but at least if you were cruel you’d be useful. You’re not even that here. I’ll take your runner instead. We’ll dash out and be back in no time. I’m guessing he has a vehicle?”

    Though the prospect of sitting in a runner’s ride twists my stomach.

Mr. Cheeks sucks in air through his teeth, but Nik Nik calms him with a raised hand. He turns back to me.

“Even if I would order him from your sister’s side, I doubt he’d listen. He’ll remain here until Adra isn’t a threat to her.”

I study the pretty runner anew. It’s an interesting match—my stained-glass sister the star on the throat of a killer with the face of a doll.

“Fine.”

“We’ll still need to find a way to convince the others that she’s genuine,” Esther says. “She looks just like her. They’ll think she’s just pretending.”

“I can handle that,” I say. “We’ll just need to make a slight detour after the pull.”

* * *

WE LEAVE AS soon as we can round up the gear, but it’s not soon enough. Really, it’s been too late since sunrise. Even under the reflective tarp, my cheeks and forehead begin to burn.

“Not far.”

He yells it like there’s a risk I won’t hear him, but the world is so still it’s like the sun has an invisible hand pressed down on us and not even air can rise. A bright day is as soundless as the hatch. I can hear our boots on sand and our rough breath. The tarp blocks everything from my vision except my feet and the ground slightly ahead, and the goggles turn even that into shades of red from blood to blush where true sunlight creeps in along the edges. If I threw all this off, I would see the truest, brightest white of my whole life…for a few brief seconds before everything went black for me forever.

This is what it’s like to love Dell.

She’s unattainably bright. It makes me want to touch her even if it takes my fingertips, to see her even if I’ll see nothing after. And if I ever dared cross that line, if I ever got close enough to stand in the full light of that star, she’d request a transfer, or order one for me, and everything would be dark thereafter.