When they wrapped around her throat, she didn’t register the threat—not until they cut off her airway, fingertips digging into the tender flesh over her pulse so hard she couldn’t even gag. Caris grabbed frantically at Nathaniel’s hand, eyes shocked wide as the hum in her ears drowned out the rabbit-quick beat of her heart.
She panicked, black spots already dancing at the edge of her vision from the limited air left in her lungs, chest aching. Nathaniel’s breathing remained calm in her ears, and he said nothing as he sought to choke the life out of her. It made no sense, and all the desperate protests trapped behind her teeth would stay there if she didn’t act. One didn’t grow up in the Eastern Basin without knowing how to fight when necessary. Being the heir to a barony didn’t change that.
Caris kicked out with her leg, high enough her boot caught against the edge of the worktable. She shoved with all her might, succeeding in making Nathaniel stagger back a step, though his grip on her throat never lessened. Her panicked, broken threads of thought crystalized into a single one.
Not like this.
Caris’ lips parted, no air coming in or out as Nathaniel did his best to kill her. And perhaps he would have if she wasn’t everything everyone else believed her to be.
Caris flexed her fingers, calling forth the aether in its hottest, purest form. Starfire exploded around them like a whirlwind, catching everything on fire, not unlike how she’d experienced it so long ago in the Eastern Basin to hold off a revenant attack. Only her parents weren’t here, and the one seeking to do her harm was supposed to love her.
She squeezed her eyes shut, bringing her arm down and back, starfire curling around her palm with a ferocity that never touched her skin. It latched onto Nathaniel’s clothes instead, eating away at them, and the shout he let out was full of pain. She could feel the heat of the starfire burning between them, and it was that threat that finally got Nathaniel to release his grip on her throat.
Caris wrenched herself away with a ragged gasp, chest heaving as she struggled to get air into her lungs. She stumbled forward, needing to use the worktable to hold herself up. Black spots still ate away at her vision, but the darkness was receding. Or perhaps it was the dearth of starfire that burned so bright and hot around them that aided her vision.
Nathaniel writhed on the ground, trying to put out the starfire eating away at his clothes, but it wouldn’t be put out. It couldn’t be—not unless Caris ordered it otherwise. Breathing rapidly, with a throbbing in her temples she wasn’t sure was her heartbeat or the start of a headache, she knew she had to act. If she let the starfire burn uncontrolled, it would bring the garage down upon them both, destroying all the vehicles housed inside it and the miniature death-defying machine they were trying to build.
They’d lose whatever edge they hoped to gain against Eimarille, because the Daijalan queen saw her as a threat, Caris realized with a bleak sort of horror. How else to explain Nathaniel’s treachery?
The garage door had starfire burning over it, but that didn’t stop someone from banging against the hot metal with something heavy. “Caris!”
Blaine’s voice broke through her fear, making her jerk into motion. She straightened up, still dizzy from the lack of air she’d suffered through, to say nothing of the smoke beginning to build up. She thrust an arm out toward the starfire raging around her and clenched her hand into a fist, thinking about the way a spigot would be turned off, the flow of water choked to nothing, just like the star priest had taught her in secret when she was younger.
She hadn’t thought she’d ever need the lessons, warned as she had been to keep the starfire a secret. Only it didn’t matter anymore, not after the riot in Amari. Not after this assassination attempt from someone who was supposed to be on her side.
The starfire went out almost instantly, the energy that powered it reverting back to the aether. Caris’ head felt heavy, and her knees were weak, but she was on her feet when Blaine wrenched the garage door open and came barreling inside. She watched him race to her in a daze, not quite processing everything clearly yet. She tried to speak, but her tongue felt swollen in her mouth, and her throat protested any attempt at making sound.
“Caris!” Blaine called again, reaching her side in seconds. His hands went to her shoulders, then her face, tilting up her jaw to get a look at whatever bruises were blossoming on her throat. “Whathappened?”
She swallowed, the motion like eating glass, and forced herself to speak when she’d rather be mute. “Nathaniel.”
His name came out as a croak, her voice raw and ruined. Blaine’s gaze wrenched away from her to where Nathaniel lay on the floor, groaning as the guards who had followed Blaine inside circled him, their pistols drawn.
Nathaniel’s clothes had burned on one side, the charred edges of his shirt falling open around his torso. Caris sucked in air and nearly choked on the pain of it, her eyes caught on the damaged curl of blackened cloth peeling away from his skin, revealing the raw, puckered scar of arionetka.
She made a sound, she knew she did, but she didn’t know she was crying until Blaine folded her into his arms, turning her head away from the horrible sight before them.
“Shh,” Blaine said, trying to soothe her, but there was no making this nightmare better. “I have you. We’ll figure this out.”
If he thought his words were a comfort, they weren’t. But when he tried to guide her away, to spare her, she dug in her heels.
“How did we miss this?” she got out through the rawness of her throat.
“I don’t know.” Blaine sighed quietly, glancing over at where the guards had secured Nathaniel. “Stay here.”
He walked away from her, and Caris followed after him, morbid curiosity pricking at her thoughts, refusing to let go. Blaine knelt in front of Nathaniel, studying him for a moment before reaching to snag the edge of the blackened fabric that wasn’t part of his shirt. He tugged at it, and a hint of jagged light shimmered over the unburned portion of it, dying out against the burned edges. His fingers traced their way over the shape of it, snagging on something embedded in Nathaniel’s skin that Caris’ eyes wanted to move past.
“Someone sewed a veil into his body to conceal the scars,” Blaine said after a moment.
“Sir? What do you want done with him?” one of the guards asked.
Blaine straightened from his crouch, stepping back to Caris’ side so he could wrap an arm around her waist. She couldn’t help but lean into his support.
“Don’t kill him,” she begged.
Blaine’s fingers tightened on her hip. “Put him in one of the storage rooms in the basement under round-the-clock guard.”
“Sir,” the man said with a sharp nod.
