Cinder, Wolf, Thorne, and Iko flee through Luna’s underground tunnels. Cinder worries that their plan is already collapsing. They have lost Cress, and Levana suspects Kai.

At an empty shuttle platform, Wolf uses his status as a former Lunar Special Operative to activate a shuttle. Thorne directs them toward a waste salvage sector to avoid pursuit. During the ride, the group falls silent under fear, exhaustion, and guilt. Cinder keeps thinking about Cress and how much the mission depended on her.

Winter spends hours worrying about the girl she hid in the crate. Afraid that they are being monitored, she says little until she convinces Jacin to return to the docks. When they open the crate, they find only bottles and packing paper. Winter fears the girl escaped, was caught, or died.

Jacin guesses the missing girl is Cress. They search the control booth and find her curled inside a cabinet. Winter speaks gently to her, and Jacin realizes that she has been helping Cinder’s group control the shuttle system. Though he knows the risk, he agrees to hide Cress in his guard quarters and protect her as long as he can. They reassure her that the others have escaped.

Cinder’s group spends hours traveling through Luna’s outer sectors by shuttle and on foot while avoiding guards and cameras. Cinder sees how different these areas are from Artemisia. The tunnels are damaged, the people live in poverty, and guards patrol everywhere. Graffiti shows fear and anger. Cinder realizes Levana keeps the sectors isolated to prevent unity.

At last, they reach the mining sector RM-9, where Wolf leads them to the home where he grew up. Regolith dust covers everything, and Wolf warns that poisoning is common. They find his mother, Maha Kesley, alive. After the shock of recognizing him, she welcomes the whole group inside and shares that Wolf’s father died a few years earlier.

Jacin enters the throne room expecting Levana to accuse him of hiding Cress. Instead, she shows him footage of Winter wearing the twig crown. Bitter over Winter’s popularity and her refusal to marry Aimery, Levana decides Winter has become too dangerous to live.

She orders Jacin to prove his loyalty by killing her.

Horrified, Jacin begs Levana to spare Winter and offers other solutions, but she refuses. When she threatens his parents, the children from the video, and Winter herself, Jacin realizes he has no safe choice. In despair, he agrees.

Cress hides in Jacin’s private quarters, growing more anxious each day. She worries about her friends and hates being trapped, but she still uses Jacin’s holograph node to interfere with Levana’s propaganda. She does not contact Cinder for fear of being discovered.

When Jacin returns, he asks whether she can disable palace cameras. He reveals Levana’s plans to have him kill Winter and says he needs help getting Winter and Scarlet out that night. Cress chooses to stay behind so she can control the cameras and create distractions, giving them a better chance to escape.

Scarlet survives her imprisonment by refusing to react to the rude nobles who come to stare at her. When one man pokes her with an umbrella, she grabs it and smashes the handle into his face before calmly settling back down.

Later, Jacin visits her cage and talks about Wolf, Winter, and escape. Scarlet does not trust him, but he makes it clear that he wants to help because Winter cares about her. He asks whether Scarlet can fly a Lunar ship and tells her to be ready.

Winter meets Jacin in the menagerie, expecting a confession. Instead, he tells her that Levana wants her dead and has ordered him to kill her because she sees Winter as a threat. Winter quickly understands that he has been trapped and threatened into obedience.

She tells Jacin that she understands and that she has always loved him. She kisses him. Jacin kisses her back, raises his knife, and kills the wolf Ryu instead. He uses the blood to make it look as though he killed Winter, then tells her to wait until the lights go out and flee with Scarlet.

Scarlet senses that something is wrong before Jacin returns. When he appears with a bloody knife, she demands to know what happened to Winter. Instead of explaining, he gives Scarlet a security cylinder and a knife. He tells her to get to Artemisia Port E, Bay 22, and warns her not to leave Luna, suggesting RM-9 instead. Then he unlocks her cage and tells her to count to 10.

When the lights go out, Scarlet escapes and finds Winter alive but covered in blood beside Ryu’s body. Scarlet forces Winter to focus and helps her into the wolf enclosure so they can escape through the gamekeepers’ passage.

Scarlet leads Winter through the feeding halls behind the menagerie. A control panel displays a warning to be careful. Then it unlocks a door into a servants’ hallway while cameras shut down. Scarlet drags Winter through the corridor and asks her how to reach the docks.

When they meet a young maid, Scarlet threatens her with a knife and gets directions to the rail platform. In the shuttle station, they avoid notice and board a shuttle to Artemisia Port E with help from an unseen ally. Winter explains that Levana ordered Jacin to kill her. At the crowded port, Scarlet asks Winter to use her glamour to hide herself, but she refuses. A worker recognizes Winter and leads them to Bay 22, where Scarlet uses Jacin’s security clearance to enter a royal podship.

Scarlet and Winter escape Artemisia and head for RM-9. Winter fears that Levana will kill Jacin for helping them. During the flight, Scarlet asks why Winter refuses to use her Lunar gift despite the suffering her refusal causes her. Winter explains that she stopped using it after once using it to make a servant feel briefly happy, only to realize she had not truly helped the woman, who continued to experience suicidal ideation.

When Winter’s hallucinations worsen, Scarlet frees her from the harness and helps her calm down.

Back in Artemisia, Levana learns about glitches in the surveillance system but refuses to shift attention away from finding Cinder. Jacin reports that he killed Winter and Scarlet and disposed of their bodies. Levana is furious that he destroyed the evidence, but she still praises him. When Jacin asks to resign, she refuses.

Cinder and the others remain hidden in Maha Kesley’s small house. With little food and no word from Cress, they worry that time is running out. Without her, they cannot spread Cinder’s message across Luna. A palace broadcast announces that Princess Winter was murdered in the royal menagerie. As they react, Wolf catches Scarlet’s scent and races outside.

Meanwhile, Scarlet and Winter land in RM-9. Scarlet tries to guide Winter through the streets, but Winter wanders off. When Scarlet finds her, Wolf suddenly appears. After a moment of confusion, he rushes to Scarlet and kisses her. He tells her when he first started falling in love with her, proving that he is not a Lunar trick.

Cinder, Thorne, and Iko join them. Scarlet introduces Winter and explains that Jacin helped them escape. Winter recognizes Cinder as her cousin and calls her “Queen.” Thorne quickly herds everyone back to the Kesley home.

Wolf helps Scarlet clean up and bandage her injured finger while they talk about what happened during their separation. After Scarlet bathes and changes clothes, the group gathers for a small meal from Maha’s limited supplies. Scarlet and Winter explain how they escaped from Artemisia.

Scarlet reveals that Jacin gave her a security cylinder. When Cinder plays it, Cress appears in a recorded holograph. She says she is safe for now, explains that she stayed behind to help Winter and Scarlet escape, and leaves a program that can help the group use Luna’s broadcasting system.

The others argue over whether Jacin can be trusted, but Winter insists he is trying to help. Cinder asks Winter to appear in a video and tell the people that Levana tried to kill her, but Winter refuses because she does not want to endanger Jacin and Cress further.

Linh Pearl returns home angry and humiliated after weeks of fallout from Cinder’s actions. Since the ball, her social standing has collapsed, her friends blame her family, and she resents the chores and shame filling her days.

When she enters the apartment, she finds it destroyed and realizes something is wrong. A mutant soldier waits inside, and another blocks the door. Pearl panics and begs for mercy, but they do not kill her. Instead, they say they have orders to bring Pearl and her mother, Adri, alive and unharmed. The soldiers cruelly joke about eating Pearl later.

Thorne, Wolf, and Iko sneak to the RM-9 guardhouse to use the sector’s broadcasting equipment. Wolf knocks out the guard at the door and gets them inside, while Thorne puts on the guard’s uniform and takes his place outside. Iko uploads Cress’s program and prepares Cinder’s message.

Back at Maha’s house, Cinder waits for the signal. Once Iko confirms that the video is ready, Cinder and Scarlet leave to watch. When the workday announcement ends, Cinder’s recorded message appears across the sky above the sector. She reveals who she is, explains that Levana tried to have her killed to steal the throne, and calls on the people to join her rebellion.

Cinder and Scarlet watch as workers gather in the central square after the video ends. At first, the crowd seems uncertain. Guards try to force everyone home before curfew. When a miner refuses, the guards beat him. A woman uses her Lunar gift to stop a guard, and more civilians join her until they disarm the guards.

Cinder rushes forward and stops the crowd from killing them. She orders the people to take the guards prisoner. She admits that she is Princess Selene and asks them to join her. The crowd hesitates until Maha steps forward, announces her support for Cinder, and kneels. One by one, the others follow.

Kai remains trapped in his guest suite, growing more anxious as he waits for news. Guards finally escort him through the palace to a recording studio. On the way, he notices a holograph portrait of Queen Channary and sees how much Cinder resembles her mother.

In the studio, Levana forces Kai to sit beside her while technicians prepare a response to Cinder’s broadcast. She uses her gift to control him and records a message declaring that Cinder is a criminal impostor. Under her control, Kai repeats the lie. After the recording, he regains himself and angrily confronts Levana, but she dismisses him and sends him back to his rooms.

Levana goes to the control room after filming her message and demands updates on the unrest in the outer sectors. Officials report growing disorder, including disobedience, attacks on guards, and food theft. Levana orders them to send more security and crush the rebellion quickly.

She thinks about Cinder, Channary, and the threat to her rule. Aimery shares new lab results on a mutated letumosis strain spreading through Luna. Lunars are immune to the original letumosis strain, though not to the mutated disease, but the good news is that the antidote still works. Levana begins considering whether she can use the disease to force the people back under her control and win praise for “saving” them.

A worker finds surveillance footage from RM-9 showing Cinder in the square. Levana recognizes her at once and orders Aimery to send a team there, arrest her, and crush the uprising.