“I’m quite aware.”
“But if youwereto talk, give up the whereabouts of said fugitives, I might find it in my heart to be lenient. My solstice gift to you.”
Baz wanted to laugh at that. As if he would ever trust the Regulators to show any semblance of leniency toward him in this matter.
“We can keep doing this little dance of ours, Drutten, but my answer hasn’t changed from all the other times you interrogated me.” Baz held up three fingers, taking one down for each statement he made: “Yes, I was the last person to have seen my father at the Institute. No, I did not help him or Kai escape, and no, I haven’t seen or spoken to either of them since. So unless you have solidproof to dispute all of this—which I know you don’t—I’ll be going now. Enjoy your banquet.”
Baz walked past Drutten without a second glance, surprised at his own brazenness. This blatant disregard for authority was still unfamiliar to him, despite everything he’d gone through these past few months. He felt a bit like a child about to be scolded by his mother for reaching for the cookie jar before supper, though the stakes were much higher.
But Drutten did not reprimand him. He only called after him with a falsely cheery “Give your parents my best.”
Baz only dared to throw a look over his shoulder when he was about to round a bend farther down the corridor. Drutten’s attention was no longer on him; the Regulator was shaking hands with Dean Fulton, who wore her usual tweed suit, evidently not yet ready for this evening’s banquet. She had a friendly smile for Drutten, but it wavered when two more people joined them.
Baz’s stomach dropped as he recognized Artem Orlov, dressed in an expensive fur-trimmed coat, red hair blazing like a torch. At his side was Virgil Dade, another member of the Selenic Order, who had been close to Artem’s sister, Lizaveta, before she died. Virgil was also dressed to impress, which reminded Baz that a select few students were always invited to the donor banquet. It was the school’s attempt to show off its best and brightest.
Virgil, it seemed, had all but replaced Keiran as Aldryn’s golden boy—as well as Artem’s lapdog.
Before either of them could spot Baz, he disappeared down the hall. Another look at his watch told him he would just barely make it to the station on time. Though trains to Threnody left every hour, he needed to be onthis onespecifically.
Magic thrummed at his fingertips, eager to be used.Not yet, Baz thought as he picked up the pace. He would reach for it only as a last resort.
Give your parents my best.
His blood boiled at Drutten’s lingering threat, his hollow offer of leniency. Once, Baz might have been naive enough to believe Drutten had his best intentions at heart. But Drutten was like every other Regulator, upholding a legal system that made it a point to spit on justice when it came to the Eclipse-born. Something Baz had been forced to come to terms with after he and Jae had taken their case to a trusted attorney, who’d presented their accusations against Keiran Dunhall Thornby, Artem Orlov, the Selenic Order, and the Institute at large to the courts of Elegy.
The only hard evidence Baz and Jae had had was what little they’d managed to take from Artem Orlov’s office the day they helped Kai and Theodore escape from the Institute: ledgers that detailed how both Artem and Keiran had used the former’s status as a Regulator to harness silver blood from Eclipse-born who’d Collapsed—blood they then used to create synthetic magic wielded by the corrupt secret society known as the Selenic Order, of which they were both members.
But as incriminating as their evidence was, the Institute’s corruption—and the Order’s power—ran deeper than they could have imagined. All that proof was written off as inadmissible. The case got thrown out before it could even go to trial.
All that planning, all that hope that they would finally get justice for the Eclipse-born, and it had amounted to nothing. Artem walked away with his head held high and his job as a Regulator intact. Keiran’s name remained unsullied, and his and Lizaveta Orlov’s deaths were ruled as tragic drownings—the same way Emory’s disappearance was declared a casualty of Dovermere. Three more souls lost to the Belly of the Beast, nothing more. As if one had not disappeared through a mythical door to other worlds after the other two had all but tried to kill her for her Tidecaller blood.
Baz nearly collided with a group of students gathered in the cloisters. They were exchanging last-minute gifts and farewell hugs before leaving for the holidays. A feeling of yearning smacked him like a tidal wave. Once, Baz would have given anything to be as alone as he felt now, with the Eclipse commons all to himself and no one to disturb his peace. A ghost meandering about, flittering unseen between the shelves of Aldryn’s many libraries. But things had changed. The Eclipse commons were like a crypt without Kai, unsettlingly quiet. The Decrescens library felt like it was missing a vital piece of its soul whenever he looked up at the empty spot Emory would have sat in. Even Romie’s greenhouse had lost all its appeal after a Sower professor cleaned it out and repurposed it for her first-year students.
For the first time, Baz was well and truly alone. And so very starved for connection.
He pushed past the students, mumbling apologies as he went. The skies above were a threatening gray, the air crisp with the coming of snow. Baz hoped the storm would hold off until he got to his destination. The weather had been unpredictable of late, something that experts blamed on a disturbance with the tides. Massive flooding of coastal towns, beached ships that affected commerce, a record number of drownings due to flash swells—and this was all over the world, too, not just Elegy. A phenomenon that had started soon after the door in Dovermere was opened.
An eerie coincidence, perhaps.
Baz reached the bustling station just as his train started to pull away. He cursed Drutten’s name—if it hadn’t been for his interruption, Baz would have made it on time. Now he had no choice but to give in to his magic.
Huffing a swear, he grudgingly reached for the threads of time. The world around him came to a halting stop. The sea of students stilled; the whistling of engines quieted. Baz wove through theplatform trying not to think of howeasythis was. He hopped on the train, brushing past the frozen porter who hadn’t fully closed the door yet, and with a breath, Baz let go of the threads of time.
The world resumed its motions, oblivious to the fact it had ever stopped at all.
Baz plopped down in his seat and flexed his hands, trying to shake off the unsettling ease of what he’d done. He hadn’t gotten used to his Collapsed magic yet, despite having lived most of his life with it.
The Collapsing was what awaited Eclipse-born who used too much power, an implosion of the self that there was supposedly no coming back from. But Baz had discovered that to Collapse did not mean inevitably succumbing to the dark curse that was said to await them. Instead, it was meant to broaden the scope of their power, making it feel almost limitless.
Though the knowledge of his condition opened many doors—too many he didn’t want to consider, the idea of such power at his fingertips making him nervous—he didn’t feel different in the slightest. Perhaps it was because he’d kept this limitless power in check all these years without even knowing, for fear of reaching a limit he had unwittingly already reached.
Then again, he wasn’t exactly pushing himself to see how deep his Collapsed power went, either. Still the same scared boy, never reaching further than he thought he should. Cautious to a fault.
As the train pulled out of the station, Baz thought of Drutten’s threat again and smiled to himself. At least his ruse was working. He’d known full well the Regulator would expect him to head to Threnody. Where else would he be going for the solstice holidays if not home?
Buthomehad lost all meaning to him. His childhood house hadn’t felt like one in years, and though the Eclipse commons hadbeen a refuge to him in the past, they were too empty now to soothe him the way a true home should.
There was no going home for Baz. So he was going somewhere no one would expect him to be.
