“I’m afraid I do not believe you. Words are not an effective atonement for this.” He glares at Claudia. “Miss Jolicoeur, I won’t tolerate your continued sabotage of our best student. If this continues, I will expel you with staggering haste. Do not forget that your position here is precarious at best. If you prove yourself to be a poison, rest assured you will never see this school again.”
She keeps her head down. She doesn’t know what to say. His words are like bugs in her ears—buzzy, unclear, menacing but unintelligible. His threats hardly register. In any other circumstances, she would be panicking at the idea of being sent away, of losing her magic, of her chance at the blessing being ripped away.
But now, Cassius is dying. Cassius is dying right now and he doesn’t even know. The next several minutes are a blur.
The High Sage escorts them out of the Astrologia wing in silence. He locks the gate behind them as they stand in the corridor.
“Next Friday, instead of attending the opera, you’ll both report to the white room for detention.” He turns to Cassius. “And you can consider our work suspended indefinitely until you can prove yourself responsible enough to handle it.”
Cassius clutches his chest as if he’s been shot. “Surely you don’t mean—”
“I certainly do, Cassius. You must master responsibility before you can earn power.”
He shakes his head. “But we’re so close, High Sage.”
“We were. But now I fear we’re further than we’ve ever been.” He points to the door. “Now, both of you, get out of my sight.”
Defeated, Cassius goes quiet. Claudia is caught in a daze. The two of them don’t speak for the entire walk back to Claudia’s room.
What is she supposed to do? What can she say?
His stars say death. They’re going to take him from her just like they took her mother.
And just like before, there’s nothing she can do. Lamour said it himself—death cannot be changed once it’s written in the stars.
She clutches her stomach, trying to keep herself from being sick. Her heart sputters and spits sharp blood through her body. Every part of her already aches with grief—for Cassius, some for her mother.
It’s happening again.
It feels like it’s all her fault, like her love is a curse. Is everyone she cares about doomed to die? Who’s next—Alistair? Lamour?
Herself?
Panic rises in her throat, threatening to make her scream. She bites down on the inside of her cheeks as hard as she can until they reach her room. When she opens the door and steps inside, she looks into Cassius’s eyes and finds them full of rage.
He takes a small step forward. “We shouldn’t have done that. We shouldn’t have done any of this,” he says. It feels like a slap.
“What?”
“The High Sage is right. I haven’t been myself since you arrived, and it’s costing me my future.”
This isn’t what she expected to hear. He’s not on her side. He’s blaming her as if he’s not equally responsible for everything that has transpired between them. “How amIcosting you your future?”
“High Sage Triche isn’t simply training me to replace him. He’s the one helping figure out how to break my family’s curse.And now he won’t. This night could’ve cost me all I’ve ever wanted.”
“Cassius, we have something bigger to discuss. I need to talk to you about what I saw.”
He clenches his jaw. “What was it?”
She takes a deep breath. “You—” A whimper cuts her off.
You’re going to die. You’re dying right now. You’re already dead.
“You’re not—” Her throat is too tight to finish the sentence.You’re not going to survive. Nothing can change it. No one can save you.
She looks down at the floor and waits for the terror to subside, but it doesn’t. It only gets worse. It feels like a monster in her body, clawing at the underside of her skin, choking her from the inside.
She looks back up at him, and her heart shatters.
