Nate tripped on a pothole, stumbling to his hands and knees. Pain flared at his joints. Sighing, he scrambled back up and wiped his stinging hands against his coat.
Hurt made him maudlin and clumsy.
The horizon tilted, and his elbow scraped along the grime-smeared brick as he righted himself. His feet dragged, heavy. Uncoordinated. He couldn’t have jogged if he’d tried.
So much for keeping this pace.
At least he was close to where he needed to be.
On the stoop of Alden’s shop, he doubled over with dry heaves, suddenly grateful for his empty stomach.
“My,” a voice said at his ear. “A lost little boy.”
Nate jerked away, struck by the urge to lean in—and the revulsion that followed. “Alden, you rat.”
Alden caught his wrist and tugged him into his curio shop. “You should keep a better lookout when you’re wandering about.”
He scanned the street behind Nate and slammed the door, setting the chimes off so loudly it made Nate’s eyeballs hurt. Broken-glass suncatchers in the front window cast tiny rainbows all over the shop. Nate’s breath hitched softly, and he ached with more than sickness. Despite everything, the shop still felt like home. Having a real place to stay had been so much easier than scrambling to find safe hideouts with the gang.
“You look vile,” Alden said impassively.
He stood a head taller than Nate, willowy and graceful, black hair spilling down his back like ink. He’d been beautiful once, before he’d ravaged his body with chem. Alden wasn’t much older than Nate, but he carried himself like a man three times his age, as if the air around him weighed too much.
“I realize that,” Nate bit out. “I almost got smashed by a train. A girl pushed me out of the way, or I would have been a stain on the tracks.”
“Thrilling,” Alden murmured.
Alden’s grandmother came out from behind a woven curtain. “GEMs don’t grow up,” she announced, laughing like a gull and pointing a knotted finger at Nate. Fran’s face was so wrinkled the folds drooped over her jewel-black eyes. She wore her hair in a neat silvery bun at the top of her head.
“I’m not grown,” Nate said, unbothered by the sound of his secret. Fran’s mind had gone long before Nate had met her. No one would believe her if she claimed to know a fugitive GEM.
She poked his ribs and belly as if examining an exotic fruit before turning her attention to a bowl full of faded sequins on the counter. Embroidered robes swayed from her shoulders, hiding the frail angles of her body. Unlike Alden, she had always treated Nate like family—at least when she could remember who he was. His skin stayed warm where she’d touched him.
Alden locked the shop door. He swept his thin arm out like he was putting on a street-corner play, sizing Nate up with an elegant wave. The movement faltered, and he frowned. “You really do look dreadful.”
“I need Remedy.” Nate crossed his arms and sagged against the counter. “I’m tired.”
The weight of his understatement hung between them. This wasn’t normal exhaustion. He stared Alden down, daring him to acknowledge it. Wondering, for a sickening heartbeat, if he had a part in it.
“But I have guests arriving soon.” Alden curled his long fingers around Nate’s shoulders, his touch icy. “Impatient guests.”
“They can wait.” Nate didn’t want to think about the stuffy basement or Alden’s guests. Alden didn’t sell the moldy herbs in gleaming canisters or glass jewelry glittering around his shop. He sold high-quality chem to anyone with enough credits to buy a few minutes of peace.
Most of the time, Alden’s guests were sweaty and thin and haunted by their hunger. The worst were curiously well-dressed and lingered in the shop, touching everything within reach and sneaking glances at every dusty nook and cranny.
When those people came around, Alden made Nate hide in Fran’s bedroom, surrounded by her silky robes and mildewed books and baskets full of colorful yarn.
Nate squirmed, tugging his shoulders out of Alden’s grip, already feeling like he’d been here far too long.
“And what if I’m impatient?” Alden understood the needs of the fiends who stumbled wild-eyed into his shop—he looked the same way every morning.
His hungry gaze was the perfect cure for nostalgia. Nate fought the urge to storm off. If he did, he’d be dead in days. Maybe hours.
“You can’t make me,” he said instead.
“I can be persuasive, darling.”
“Not as persuasive as you think.”
