Hadrien shakes his head, looking solemn. “You don’t have to thank me for that. I care for every living person in this rich and beautiful land, Sparrow.”
I twirl away from him again, meeting his eyes from the distance created by our outstretched arms. His face is the only thing I see clearly amidst a swirl of colors and shapes. “You say my name a lot.”
He pulls me back to his arms, stumbling a bit on the impact of our collision. Quickly recovering his footing, he flashes a dazzling grin. “Maybe that’s because I like the sound of it.”
We dance for a few more minutes until someone—Hadrien, I think—presses another glass of wine into my hands. I’m losing track of how much I’ve had, and my stomach is churning, but the wine warms me all over, and the fiddlers’ music sings through my blood.
This is it.Living.
If only Evander were here to do it all with me.
I blink back the sudden tears pricking my eyes and look around for another servant bearing wine.
Hadrien’s hands are on my waist again. Now they’re cupping my face, pulling me in for a kiss, and I clumsily take a step back.
But before I can object to his apparent habit of kissing people without their permission, Hadrien’s face melts away, replaced by Jax’s in a single confusing blink. The sight makes me shiver. “Is that really you?” I demand, remembering the potion’s tricks even through the haze I’m in.
“You’ve either had too much to drink, or not enough.” Jax’s gruff voice and rough but steady hands assure me it’s him. “So the question is, do you need me to fetch you some water? Or something stronger?”
I rest my head on his chest, inhaling the now-familiar scent of his sweat. This is my last night before I enter the Deadlands. My last night to feel truly alive. I can’t stop now and head inside when the moon is paper white and young and full.
“Neither,” I say finally. “Let’s dance.”
We take it slow, though the music’s pounding beat is fast. As I catch sight of Her Majesty by the cake again, something Hadrien said comes back to me. “Jax?” I have to shout to be heard over the fiddles and pipes. “Did you notice someone looking for me earlier—a girl?”
Jax thinks for a moment, then grunts, “Dark red hair. Nice ass. I remember.”
“Did you get a name? What does she want?” The thought that someone I don’t know is looking for me sends a spike of cold into my chest. It must be someone with news from Kasmira, though she’s never sent a messenger to me before.
“Sorry, Sparrow.” Jax shrugs. “I was talking to Princess Valoria when she came by, and keeping up with her requires my fullattention. I’ll be damned if I understood half the things she was saying—something about flying.”
“Don’t worry about it.” I lean against Jax, letting him support most of my weight through the next dance. My legs feel like anchors, and even dragging my feet across the flagstones takes great effort. “If someone’s that determined to find me, they will.”
I’d keep wondering who it might be, if not for my blasted headache. Instead, all I can think to say is, “What was Valoria talking about?” More importantly, “You’re not going to breathe a word about her... projects, are you?”
Jax’s lips twitch, but instead of answering, he twirls me around.
As one song blends seamlessly into the next, Jax shrinks down several inches, his curly dark hair turning long and sandy blond. “Simeon!” I blink several times, and from what I can tell, it’s really my almost-brother guiding me through a complicated dance step.
“I’ve been really worried about you,” he says in a somber voice unlike his own. “Danial says you’ve been having night terrors. If you are, you know you can talk to me about them. I’ll understand.”
Of course he would. Simeon was found by one of the Sisters of Death, wandering the Ashes alone at only three years old, wearing a ring on a tarnished chain around his neck that must have belonged to a wealthy family. He’s held on to that ring all these years. And though he claims he doesn’t remember any of his life before the convent, he used to wake me in the night with his screams at least once a week. I don’t know what they were about, only that the nightmares still plague him sometimes.
But the potion I’ve been taking keeps most of my dreams away. “Everything’s fine,” I assure him. “I’ve got it all under—”
“Control,” Simeon finishes for me, flashing a tight grin. “That’s my Sparrow.”
He spins me around, and somehow, Simeon becomes Danial when I turn back to him. Then Danial turns into Evander, who turns into Jax again, faces and colors flashing too quickly for my eyes to keep up. My head throbs with a sharp pain like someone’s bashed me on the temple. Someone else reaches for my hands, but I jerk away. There’s an archway at the back of the courtyard that leads to the palace citrus and floral gardens, the one through which Duke Bevan so recently appeared as a Shade, and I stagger toward it until I can’t hear any voices calling me or see any shadows in pursuit of mine.
I gulp a greedy breath of cool air and sink to my knees beside some rosebushes, stars bursting behind my eyes. Suddenly, my stomach gives a painful lurch, but I manage to swallow the mouthful of bile before it leaves my lips. It burns all the way down.
The second time, I’m not as lucky. I just hope Prince Hadrien and the others can’t hear my sweet noises over the music.
Movement in the bushes deeper in the garden draws my attention. My heart beats a little faster as I slick back my sweaty hair and narrow my eyes at the spot where I think the soft rustling of branches came from.
“Death be damned,” I groan under my breath.
A rotting hand feels its way around a trellis, loose bits of mottled flesh washed with moonlight. The Shade is here. It must’vecrawled out of the Deadlands, though such a thing has only happened maybe once in all my years. Still, this can’t be another hallucination, because its stench overpowers the roses.
