Stella Luminara had entered the intergalactic fashion court's crown contest, and the entry ended in six days. She just had no way to leave her planet. She pressed her pink hands against the heart-shaped window of her purple home and stared up at the empty sky. Somewhere past those stars, judges were already crowning the season's first beauties. She meant to be one of them. She had the gowns. She had the poise. She had no ship. She had built her whole life around this dream. Her white hair reached her waist, brushed a hundred strokes each night. Her closet in the little pink workshop held forty outfits, each sewn by hand. But talent meant nothing here. No one on this quiet world had ever seen her walk a runway. She was the most beautiful girl no one could see. Then a streak of fire tore across the sky. Something heavy slammed into the meadow behind her workshop. The ground shook. Her flower boxes rattled. Stella grabbed her skirts and ran. Smoke curled from a cracked metal pod. A boy climbed out, coughing. His skin was blue, his white hair a wild mess. He wore a black leather jacket, torn at one shoulder. His dark eyes swept the meadow, then landed on her. He smirked like the crash had been part of some plan. "Nice yard," he said. "You got a mechanic?" "I have a needle and thread," Stella said. She folded her arms. "That your ship?" "Was." He kicked a smoking panel. It fell off. "Engine's fried. Hull's cracked. I need parts and a place to work." Stella looked at the broken pod. Then she looked at the stars. Her heart pounded. A ship. A real ship, sitting in her own meadow. Fate had dropped it at her feet. "I'm Stella," she said. "You fix that thing, where does it fly?" "Anywhere. Once it flies." He wiped soot from his cheek and left a gray streak. "Name's Kade. Why?" "Because I need a ride," she said. "To the fashion court. And you need help. So we trade." Kade laughed. It was not a kind laugh. "You? You'd get in the way." Stella walked to the pod and touched the cracked hull. "You crashed on my world. My tools. My workshop. My wire, my glue, my hands." She turned and met his black eyes. "No ride, no help." His smirk faded. He studied her, then the useless engine, then her again. He needed her more than he wanted to admit. "Fine," Kade said. "Deal. You get me parts. I get you off this rock." Stella smiled. She had her ship at last. But as Kade turned away, she saw the ugly truth. The engine was in pieces. Neither of them knew how to fix it. And the contest closed in six days.

Lady Celestia lifted one gloved hand and beckoned. Stella crossed the stone path toward the fountain. Her heart slammed. The noblewoman's silver necklace shimmered at her throat, the green star charm catching the fairy lights. One wrong word about who Stella really was, and the guards would drag her out before she ever touched it. She stopped an arm's length away and dipped her head, the way a guest of rank might greet a host. "I don't know your face," Lady Celestia said. Her black eyes swept the sharp purple gown. "And I know every face here." Stella smiled. She did not name a house or a home she could not prove. "You know the faces that repeat," she said. "I'd rather be the one you can't place." She kept her voice slow and warm, the pageant voice, the one built to move a room. "Your necklace found me from across the garden. I had to see it up close." The noblewoman's guarded look softened into pride. She loved the piece more than she distrusted the stranger. "It was made for me alone," she said, and turned the charm so it flashed. That was the opening. Stella stepped in as if to admire the star. She let one hand rise to the clasp, praising the metal, the cut, the glow. Her other hand slipped a second necklace from her sleeve, a replica she had strung the night before from Zara's scarf beads. She unhooked the real clasp with two fingers while Lady Celestia watched her own reflection in the fountain, not Stella's hands. The swap took three breaths. The true necklace slid into Stella's palm. The fake settled against the noblewoman's throat, close enough to fool a proud woman who never doubted her own jewels. "Stunning," Stella said, and meant the theft. "Wear it well tonight." Lady Celestia touched the fake and smiled at it. "I always do." She drifted off toward her other guests, none the wiser. Stella walked out through the guarded gate with the star charm hidden in her fist. The moment she cleared the lights, Kade pushed off a wall where he'd been waiting. His white hair fell over black eyes. He wore trouble like a jacket and never took it off. "Well?" he said. Stella opened her hand. The green star glowed against her pink skin. Kade almost smiled. At the edge of the garden, Zara stepped from the dark. Short white hair, purple skin, arms crossed, watching like the theft had been her own. She held up the battered blue power cell, its light pulsing in the black. "You actually did it," Zara said. She traded the cell for the necklace. "Now fix your ship and get off my planet." Stella closed her hands around the cell. The crown was one working engine away. But Zara's smile lingered too long, and Stella knew a woman who dealt in stolen things never let go clean.