“Be angry with me. I accept it. But I did what I had to do and I’m going to make sure you win. That doesn’t mean I don’t care for you.”
Gods, he won’t even apologize. He doesn’t think he’s done anything wrong. It’s taking all her strength not to slap him again. “There’s only one reason you want me to win, and it’s not because you care for me.”
“Claudia, I swear—”
“Stop. Don’t speak to me right now.” She walks away but turns back. “No, no, actually, Cassius—don’t speak to me for the rest of the night. Pretend I’m just like the gods, because I don’t want to talk to you, either.”
His eyes flash wide and watery as her words hit him like bullets. She’s hurt him.
Good.
He hurt her, too. He hurt her first.
In their hands, their papers turn into ribbons. Cassius’s is green for Artemis. Hers is white.
“Where is my Iphigenia?” the game master calls to the crowd.
Claudia gives one last cutting glare to Cassius before charging up the stairs. The room is deathly silent when she ascends. She stands beside the man in the white mask. Up close, she can see his eyes. It’s not another set of black button-eyes staring back at her.
They’re green. Glowing green.
No. No, it’s not him. It’s impossible. This isn’t a nightmare. This is real life. Dorian can’t get to her here.
Can he?
“Are you ready, Iphigenia?” he asks, and that voice… Sheknows that voice. It makes her blood sparkle and sing beneath her skin.
Struck with fear, she can do nothing but nod.
The game master wears leather gloves, but Claudia can feel the chill of his body radiating through as he plucks her white ribbon from her hands. Cold as winter. Her panic-filled eyes search the room for Cassius, but among the sea of people, he’s nowhere to be found.
He left.
He left her alone withhim.
Trembling, she turns back to the man in the mask. The man with Dorian’s eyes. He doesn’t blink while he ties the white ribbon around her throat. Tightly. Too tight. Punishingly tight.
He steps back and lifts his hand. At his command, the door that leads outside opens up. From the ceiling descend orbs of white and lavender light, racing out the door like fireflies, illuminating the way forward and the dark world that waits outside. Below, footsteps sound as the students create an open pathway for her.
An aisle.
An aisle leading to her death.
“Who are you?” she asks over her shoulder. She can’t see the man’s mouth, but she can tell he’s smiling by the way his green eyes narrow.
He doesn’t answer her question. Instead, he says, “Run.”
Claudia takes off like an arrow, and the world outside is a menacing midnight blue. It’s dark and daunting and devastatingly cold, but the magical orbs of light allow her to see the way. Her heart-pounding fear is doing little to keep her warm, and her thin excuse of a dress might as well not be here at all. The length hinders her running. She needs to find somewhere to hide, somewhereto think, somewhere to shred the long skirt of her gown so that she can have a fighting chance.
An icy, wet wind licks her bare skin as she runs. Cygnus is supposed to be autumnal, always, but now the air feels like winter.
It feels like him.
Was that really Dorian in the mask? Is he chasing after her now? When she’s deep in the nearby woods, she realizes how much this scene looks like her nightmares—her, clad in white, running through the woods, monsters at her back, and every offer of salvation comes at a cost. With Dorian, it was a bite of her soul. With Cassius, it’s being a bridge to the gods. Both of these connections are tied up in her power. It’s starting to feel like all her gifts are turning into curses.
Maybe they always were.
The trees crack in the heavy wind as if they’re being uprooted. Sharp, dead leaves fall from the branches, scraping down Claudia’s body like fingernails. Above, breath-like clouds streak across the sky.
