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The moment he goes, the deck breathes again.

So do I. I don’t notice I’ve been holding my breath until my lungs decide for me.

Ryven says nothing. Neither does Seren. My cousins never do after he’s been here.

They saw the bruises before I learned to hide them properly. They heard enough through closed doors to stop asking questions. My father isn’t a man you stand in front of. Not if you intend to keep breathing.

They hate him anyway. For me. But that doesn’t matter either.

Soon enough, I'll belong to a prince from another planet. Dad calls it a treaty. I call it a prisoner transfer.

Sometimes I catch myself thinking a cell on another planet might be the first one he can’t enter. But then again, no door has ever stopped him before.

“So soon.” Ryven studies the glass rather than me. “You’re really going to marry a man you’ve never met?”

“The fuck I am.” I set the empty glass on the rail. “They’re marrying me off to a treaty. He just happens to be attached to it.”

“If it helps,” Seren says, “I heard he’s very attractive.”

I look at him. “Fuck off.”

His mouth almost twitches. Then he looks away.

I’d rather he laughed.

I drop my gaze to the hall one last time, searching for anything that might pull me away from my own thoughts.

That’s when the intake finally becomes interesting because one candidate does something the others haven’t.

The far doors open, and the last shuttle load files in. They’re the tail end of the intake, all in cheap jackets and travel dust, and nobody is worth a second look.

Until him.

Nothing about him should stand out. He’s small beneath a pack too big for him, hood back, soaked through. He holds a bottle of water in one hand and stares at it as if no one has ever handed him anything for free.

He’s prey. Standard prey. I’ve priced ten thousand of them, and I could price him in my sleep.

Except he stops. Five hundred bodies move through one room under guard, and this one plants his feet in the middle of them as if the hall owes him a minute.

The line bends around him, but he stays put, studying the hall. His gaze tracks the guards, exits, balconies, and cameras. Maybe he’s mapping the damn mess.

Smart. I’d check the exits too.

Then he turns to the banner. His lips move over the words twice. His pale skin pales further under the lights. I should have looked away by now.

And fuck me, he’s pretty. But pretty is nothing. Pretty gets bid on by the crate every season. Pretty has never once made me lean on a rail, until now.

A guard barks at him to move. He obeys and glances back at the banner once before disappearing into the line.

“Ash?” Ryven asks, following my gaze. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing,” I mumble. But I watch the blond shoulder his ridiculous pack and move deeper into the machine, toward the gates, the scanner, and a week that will teach him exactly what he volunteered for.

He doesn’t look up again. Even when his gaze reaches the balconies, he checks the exits, not the faces.

Up is where the glass is, and the glass is where I’ve been standing the whole time. I know his face now. He only knows the banner.

Do not romanticize the stock, Asher.