“You’re awake! Did you come to see the meteor shower, too?” she asked, pointing skyward. Sure enough, a handful of stars streaked overhead, leaving a glittering trail of stardust in their wake. Living in Biringan often reminded me just how far from home I really was.
“I’m here purely by chance, but what do the stars say?” I asked, taking a seat on the beanbag chair beside her.
Nix peered through the telescope. “Hmm,” she said. “They say, ‘Reply hazy; ask again later.’ ”
I laughed when she grinned toothily at me, and it made me feel immediately better, the remnants of the nightmare dissipating like smoke in the wind. I offered her some of the snacks I’d swiped from the kitchen, and she munched on some banana chips happily.
Instead of healer’s robes, Nix was in her pajamas—an old Lakers jersey she’d kept from her time in the human world and yoga pants. She opened the duvet for me and wrapped me up with her, stamping out the chill of the breeze coming from the ocean. Because we were so high up, it was a lot colder than usual, but it was warm and cozy by her side. Sometimes life in the castle was so stifling.
Jinky had scrubbed me down within an inch of my life with sugar and salt, shampooed my hair with sweet-smelling nectar, and slathered me in oils and serums that made me feel like I was an eel, slipping and sliding around my room while I got dressed for bed. My conversations with Lucas and Amador had replayedin my head over and over as I fell asleep, and my arm still ached from my magic backfiring. No wonder I’d had a nightmare. Even Jinky’s wonderful concoction of lavender-and-coconut sleeping oil couldn’t calm me down.
At first being queen was a dream. It was nice to have all my needs anticipated, never have to decide what to wear that day, always have Jinky do my hair, and awake to a hot breakfast, served in bed. But the novelty had started to wear off. I couldn’t so much as go to the kitchens to pour myself a glass of water without some dwende presenting one to me on a gold platter. Garnished with lemon and mint.
I knew I shouldn’t complain. People would literally kill me for my crown. But I was still a girl. I needed some semblance of independence, and being in the old astronomy tower with Nix, I could pretend like I wasn’t in charge of an entire island nation and act like a kid, even if it was just for a little while longer.
“Want to see what else I found?” I asked, grinning. Nix pulled her attention away from the meteor shower and raised her eyebrows expectantly. I didn’t wait for her to guess and pulled out two crinkly bags of neon orange cheesy curls.
“Cheetos!” Nix let out a shriek and made grabby hands to get one, then cradled the bag to her chest like a baby. “From the human world? Are you kidding? I’ve missed these! Where did you get it?”
I laughed. “If I told you, I’d have to let you in on my black-market dealings. So then I’d have to kill you.”
Nix tore into the bag and dug in, crunching loudly. I pulled my own open and savored every bite. If Ayo, my dwende butler, saw me eating junk food, let alone human junk food, I was prettysure he’d have conniptions and start foaming at the mouth. You didn’t hear it from me, but there was a thriving human junk-food market in Biringan City. It was entirely underground, seeing as most encantos rarely went to the human world without very good reason; otherwise they’d risk the safety of our people. But there were a daring few who ventured through the magical barrier separating our worlds to buy various human luxuries, like DVD box sets of American sitcoms and ballpoint pens. Most encantos kept them as collector’s items, but I had a different use for them. What was that saying about taking a girl out of the human world?
Sometimes I missed it; most times I didn’t. Growing up with my mom, always on the move, careful never to stay in one spot too long or risk my father’s enemies finding us, made for a terribly lonely upbringing. We hadn’t had a lot of money, and I hadn’t had a lot of friends. I was always the new girl, the girl with the wrinkled clothes, the girl with her wardrobe in a suitcase. My mom did her best protecting me in the human world, and I owed her everything.
My mom had gotten comfortable living in Biringan City, especially since I lifted the decree about humans being tricked into servitude and trapped here. She became an art and art history teacher at BANA—Biringan Academy of Noble Arts—and taught pottery classes to young encantos of all social classes, even taking curious encantos, with a security detail, to the human world for extended field trips to better understand humans as a whole. And now for the summer, while school wasn’t in session, she had taken her class to Paris, to see the Louvre and Parisian architecture. Before bed tonight, I had talked to her on the crystals—akind of video call with gemstones—and she’d looked so happy. I often wondered if she wished my dad were still alive so they could spend time here together. But of course, even though there was magic in this world, it still couldn’t bring back the dead. She’d only been gone a week so far, and I missed her.
I hadn’t realized I’d eaten the whole bag of Cheetos until I reached the orange dust at the very bottom. I’d been eating on autopilot, lost in thought, and I mourned the fact that I had completely forgotten to actually enjoy it.
I folded up the bag and stashed it under the beanbag chair so it wouldn’t blow away while Nix was still eating hers, gazing out across the roofs of the kingdom, colored blue in the moon and starlight. Strange—it looked so similar to my nightmare. But it didn’t bother me. Being with Nix had comforted me the most.
“Do you miss it?” I asked her.
“Miss what?”
“The human world.” I jutted my chin toward her Cheetos. “You know, the little things.”
“Not really.” She wiped her mouth clean with the back of her hand. “Being a runaway wasn’t exactly the easiest.” Like me, Nix had also been hiding from encantos. Though instead of them wanting to kill her, they were trying to bring her home. She’d fled the imperial palace on Jade Mountain and hidden in the last place anyone would look for her: high school. She wanted to be free, away from the confines of royal life.
Of course, like me, too, she couldn’t stay in one place for long and found her way to Biringan, where she’d lived ever since. Maybe that was why we became fast friends; we were kindred spirits.
“I’ve made friends here,” Nix said. “Met you. Met—” She stopped herself, and I thought maybe she was getting emotional, because she cleared her throat and said, “Met people I care about. This is my home now.”
I was following her gaze out across the horizon when I spotted a dark shape on a balcony below.
It moved. Something was there.
I looked up, wondering if it was just a shadow from some flying animal. But as far as I could tell, there wasn’t anything.
I scanned the nearby towers again, straining my eyes to peer through the dark, but then a different shadow moved on the tower next to ours, darting behind a balustrade and out of sight.
“Did you see that?” I asked.
“See what?”
I didn’t know. I tried not to panic, but thoughts of assassins rammed their way into my brain. I was a queen. I was young. I was vulnerable. Elias had warned me of this exact thing.
I was a target.
