Chapter 27

TESSA POV

"They retreated?" I asked, staring at my mother.

"Yes." She nodded, though something serious lingered in her eyes. "Because the president is awake."

I turned slowly toward Malcolm, sitting quietly across from me, his expression calm. My mind was still trying to fit all of it together. The war. The president. The accident. The coma. The secret. Everything seemed to connect, thread by thread, into a single picture I hadn't been allowed to see until today.

"Why would they retreat just because you're awake?" I asked.

My mother took a slow breath. "Because they believed the empire was at its weakest point. When the president had...