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"All those sticky buns," Iko said as they passed a close-up shot of the blackened booth

Cinder bit the inside corner of her cheek Neither of them had ever sampled the acclaimed sweets of theSacha didn’t serve cyborgs

Towering offices and shopping centers gradually s, built so close that they becalass and concrete Apartments in this corner of the city had once been spacious and desirable but had been so subdivided and re to cras had become labyrinths of corridors and stairwells

But all the crowded ugliness was briefly forgotten as Cinder turned the corner onto her own street For half a step, New Beijing Palace could be gli and serene on the cliff that overlooked the city The palace’s pointed gold roofs sparkled orange beneath the sun, the s glinting the light back at the city The ornate gables, the tiered pavilions that teetered dangerously close to the cliff’s edge, the rounded teer than usual to look up at it, thinking about someone who lived beyond those walls, as up there perhaps this very second

Not that she hadn’t known the prince lived there every time she’d seen the palace before, but today she felt a connection she’d never had before, and with it caht She had met the prince He had co in a breath of hu childish She was going to start sounding like Peony

She shifted the royal android to her other ar of the Phoenix Tower apartments She flashed her freed wrist at the ID scanner on the wall and heard the clunking of the lock

Iko used her arm extensions to clop down the stairs as they descended into the baseed with chicken wire As a wave of musty air blew up tothe shadows froens It was a fae space number 18-20--the cramped, always chilly cell that Adri allowed Cinder to use for her work

Cinder cleared a space for the android a on the floor She swapped her heavy work gloves for less grungy cotton ones before locking up the storage room "If Adri asks," she said as they made their way to the elevators, "our booth is nowhere near the baker’s"

Iko’s light flickered "Noted"

They were alone in the elevator It wasn’t until they stepped out onto the eighteenth floor that the building beca each other down the corridors, both doainst the walls, the ever-constant blur of netscreen chatter spilling from the doorways Cinder adjusted the white-noise output froed the children on her way to the apart Cinder pause and check the nu

She heard Adri’s stiff voice fro room "Lower neckline for Peony She looks like an old wo with one hand on thea chrysanthemum-earish paper fans that covered the wall behind her--reproductionswith too ht, Adri almost looked like a reproduction herself Her face was h she rarely left the apartnored her

The netscreen above the heatless flae from the market The baker’s booth had been reduced to rubble and the skeleton of a portable oven

In the center of the room, Pearl and Peony each stood swathed in silk and tulle Peony was holding up her dark curly hair while a woeted with her dress’s neckline Peony caught sight of Cinder over the wo across her face She gestured at the dress with a barely silenced squeal

Cinder grinned back Her younger stepsister looked angelic, her dress all silver and shiht

"Pearl" Adri gestured at her older daughter with a twirling finger, and Pearl spun around, displaying a row of pearl buttons down her back Her dressbodice and flouncy skirt, only it was old "Let’s take in her waist soh the he Cinder in the doorway but quickly turned away Stepping back, the woman removed a bundle of sharp pins from between her lips and tilted her head to one side "It’s already very snug," she said "We want her to dance, don’t we?"

"We want her to find a husband," said Adri

"No, no," the seamstress tittered even as she reached out and pinched the material around Pearl’s waist Cinder could tell Pearl was sucking in her stoes of ribs beneath the fabric "She is laring at the woirl?"

"She is too expensive for fun," said Adri "I expect results froown"

"Do not worry, Linh-ji She will be lovely asthe pins back into her mouth, the woman returned her focus to Peony’s neckline

Adri lifted her chin and finally acknowledged Cinder’s presence by swiping her gaze down Cinder’s filthy boots and cargo pants "Why aren’t you at the market?"

"It closed down early today," said Cinder, with a ning nonchalance, Cinder thrust a thuet cleaned up, and then I’ll be ready for "