She let go of my hands, jumping up and down and clapping, as if we were twelve again.
“It’s going to be the most fun!” She pulled me into a crushing embrace.
I spluttered and laughed, my face full of suffocating curls. Wrestling free, I shook my head at her. “Shouldn’t two years at the University have sobered you a little?”
She laughed. “Mother says that nothing can do that and that Father should have known better from the start. But my brother never had a chance at coming first in any test, so I was his only hope. Which means he’s stuck with me.”
A raised voice from the market crowd drew my attention as more voices took up the cry, an excited rustle sweeping through the mass of people. If something had happened to catch the attention of everyone in the market, it must have been big.
“What’s going on?” I asked, my voice sharp.
Gina turned to follow the direction of my gaze, apparently not having noticed the change in the crowd. “Someone’s calling something. Can you hear what they’re saying?”
Without waiting for an answer, she dove into the crowd, and I hurried behind, trying not to lose her. Several steps ahead of me, she accosted a stranger, her face alight with curiosity as she asked what was going on.
“They’re saying there’s been another killing!” the woman exclaimed, eyes wide.
“Anotherkilling?” I asked, reaching their side. “You don’t mean another shrouded killing? It was the Shrouded Mage?”
The woman nodded. “That’s what they’re saying, but it can’t be true, can it?” She looked doubtful. “The Reds caught him!”
“I heard that was a copycat,” I said, but I hardly heard my own words.
A single, terrible, unendurable thought had caught my mind, making it hard to breathe.
I snatched at the woman’s sleeve, ignoring her horrified exclamations in response to my comment. “Where?” I asked urgently. “Did you hear where they found the body?”
“Just beyond the market, I think.” She pointed toward one of the market exits—the one that led deeper into the city, toward the area where the mages lived.
I took off running, Gina’s cries soon lost behind me. I pushed through the crowd with abandon, slipping under people’s arms and even elbowing people aside as needed.
Zak wasn’t with me. He was alone today. I wasn’t there to save him.
The thoughts ran through my mind on a never-ending loop, growing more and more frantic with each repetition.I hadn’t been there.
CHAPTER 11
The crowd grew more tumultuous as I approached the exit, shoving and pulling in all directions as some people pushed forward in curiosity while others tried to flee. I was jostled and buffeted on every side, but I didn’t stop. Ignoring the protests at my passage, I squirmed through any gap I could find, moving toward the place where the body apparently lay.
I couldn’t bear to see it, and yet I was desperate to reach it at the same time. Until I saw the victim with my own eyes, I could still cling to the hope that it wasn’t Zak. Foolish Zak who went out of his way to come to the Shrouded Mage’s notice.
“What a terrible tragedy,” a woman said to another as they moved in the opposite direction. “That poor young man.”
“And so handsome and nicely dressed,” the other responded, and my heart seized.
The words in my head reduced to a mindless stream.Nononononononono.
It was easy to see which side street to turn down, and I burst through a final wall of people, emerging into a small circle of open space. Someone—perhaps a resident of one of theneighboring houses—was kneeling beside the young man with a solemn expression, pulling a sheet over the body.
I leaned forward to get a glimpse of the face before it was covered, but I was too late. Something twisted and writhed in my chest, trying to crawl up my throat. I had to know.
I took a step forward despite the ring of watching eyes, when a voice called my name.
“Aria!”
Spinning, I gasped as my eyes fell on Zak’s tall figure. He stood against the wall of a building, as if pushed back as far as possible by the jostling crowd, and his eyes were fixed on me.
I ran toward him, the people between us giving way with unhappy mutters. Concern overlayed the sorrow and anger in Zak’s eyes, perhaps in response to my obvious agitation.
