My power surged and then, like a backfiring car, cracked.
Power shot back up my arm, making it tingle like it had fallen asleep. “Ah!” I gasped, and shook it out, annoyed. Amador merely lifted her chin and walked away from me, unaffected.
I regretted my reaction a second later.
Nix grabbed me by the arm and carted me deeper into the garden.
My arm still tingled and my blood boiled, but Nix’s grasp on me was firm, and the farther we got from Amador, the better I felt. My power roiled out of me like waves, and the air around us smelled like sulfur, turning acrid as my bitterness ate away at my heart. I didn’t mean to do it, but my power was erratic and unpredictable and something to be embarrassed about. Exactly like Amador had said.
I couldn’t entirely blame her for what Lucas had done to me. She was the one who’d told me the truth, even if I hadn’t wanted to hear it. She was the one who’d said from practically the momentI met her that they were engaged. I might hate Amador, but she wasn’t the one who broke my heart.
Nix waved her other hand in front of her face, dispelling the rotten-egg smell. If she hadn’t known about my power, she would have thought I’d farted, but she didn’t say anything about it.
By the time we reached the edge of the garden in the shadow of the palace, I was exhausted. Trying to use my power so much had drained me.
“Just ignore her,” Nix said. “Leave Amador alone.”
That took me by surprise. “You almost sound like you’re defending her.”
She rolled her eyes but didn’t deny it. “It’s just more distractions. Maybe you should think about moving on from Lucas. It’ll only get worse the longer you think about him.”
Deep down, I knew she was right. I may have been queen, but who was I to tell him who he could and couldn’t marry? Wielding my authority like a leash, punishing those who didn’t bend to my will—that would go against everything I believed in. If Lucas had loved me, he would have stayed true.
I forced myself to take another deep breath and gazed up at the shining towers of the palace. My home. The one place I belonged.
“I’ve never been dumped before,” I admitted. “This sucks. I’m sorry I’m in a bad mood.”
“I get it.” She looked out across the garden, and then she said, “Could you imagine Amador rolling around in the mud with pigs?”
A smile made its way across my mouth. “If only I had the honor of pushing her in myself.”
2
That night, inthe dark, starlit sky, I flew.
The stars shone bright, and the air was thick with the promise of rain. I soared, swooping and gliding above the palace towers. I was free, finally, and because of that, I knew that I was dreaming.
The crescent moon offered a little light, but I didn’t need it to see. My dream-eyes could pierce through the darkness, seeing the world as if it were bathed in red. The world thrummed with life. I could sense it all around me, how it shifted like a ripple in still water. Biringan City was resting, but its pulse kept beating.
I spotted my shadow when it cut across the roof. There I saw the unmistakable shape of wings sprouting from my back, and I somehow looked smaller. My wings buffeted the air, carrying me into the sky, but all I could think about was the pain. It felt like I had torn myself in two. A hunger, desperate and furious, burned through me, and it made my limbs twitch and my throat seize up. I tried to cry out, but it came out like a mangled rasp. I could fly, but there was a price.
I was starving.
My eyes snappedopen, and I was in bed.
It had only been a nightmare.
I held my head in my hands and curled into myself, waiting to calm down as the details of the dream started to fade, but my heart raced like I’d sprinted a mile. I forced myself to breathe.
Usually my nightmares were about school or running from a mambabarang, but this one had felt so real. It scared me.
I lifted my head and looked around, grounding myself in reality. I was in my bedroom fit for a queen. My four-poster bed draped with sheer lace; my settee, where I napped; my bookcase and vanity, all neat and organized; the privacy screen covered in painted jasmine flowers, where Jinky dressed me every day—nothing out of place. I was home. A relieved sigh melted out of me, but the dream had shaken me too badly to fall back asleep.
After another hour of twisting and turning in bed, I gave up and went for a walk. Naturally, I stopped by the kitchens to grab a snack, then navigated my way to the astronomy tower.
Scientists used to work here, foretelling the future in the stars, but a new astronomy tower had been built in Mount Makiling, leaving this tower abandoned. It was a perfect getaway from the hustle and bustle of the palace, where nothing ever seemed quiet and peaceful.
To my surprise, I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t sleep. Nix was already here. She was sitting on the tower’s balcony, cocooned inside a down duvet and peering through a telescope, nestled inone of two beanbag chairs we’d set up here at the beginning of summer, our own little hideout. Her face brightened in the glow of the firefly lantern when she saw me come in.
