My name is strained upon his tongue. His voice is so heavy with yearning that it nearly cracks. My knees weaken as the shadows grow longer, and unseen hands wrap themselves around my waist. I barely manage a gasp as the hands—his hands—glide over my shirt and then slip underneath the fabric. With touch alone they set my skin ablaze.
Destiny’s design…
Nothing is real but his touch. The light of the roses has faded, and the eternal void envelops me. A vast expanse that demands surrender. Desire wells within me as yet more hands run over my calves, up my thighs, and land on my sex with a touch that makes my breath catch.
Clara, my Clara…
His voice is everywhere and nowhere, inside my head, pressed against my lips. There is nowhere the invisible hands don’t reach now. They caress me with a reverence that makes me ache. That draws a moan as they ease away every pain I carry.
“Kaelis,”I breathe, yearning—desperate to touch him.
Soon,this man, my destiny, promises. I feel lips brush against my neck, my collarbone, lower and lower.Soon…
“Clara?” A new voice jolts me awake.
I lurch forward as if I’d been slapped. Twino catches me so I don’t tumble into Arina, his hands steady on my shoulders. Concern is etched deep into his furrowed brow above his spectacles.
“Are you all right? You were making sounds in your sleep.” He glances away, and I nearly perish at the thought of what “sounds” I might have been making given where that dream ended.
“I’m fine.” I get control of my breathing by pressing a palm to my brow. A thin sheen of sweat covers my forehead. For a second, my focus is on my right forearm. The same forearm that the roses wrapped themselves around in my dream.
“A nightmare?” Twino asks. I hope it looks that way.
“Something like that…” I check Arina, but her still form shows no sign of movement. The blankets are still exactly as I’d settled them on her. Luckily, I didn’t disturb her.
With a hand at the back of her neck, Twino tilts her head and slowly pours a draught between her barely parted lips. The liquid is thin and pale and smells faintly of herbs. I almost ask if Jura was the one to make it, and my whole chest nearly collapses in on itself with a fresh wave of guilt and grief.
“What’s that?” I manage.
“It’s mostly liquid food,” Twino explains. “They’re hoping that with enough sustenance in her, she’ll begin to rouse.”
My first instinct is not to trust anything from anyone when it comes to my sister. But harming Arina wouldn’t be wise of them…not when they want my help so desperately. If I can’t trust a man, I know I can always trust his sense of self-preservation.
We both hold our breath as Arina murmurs faintly when he pulls away. But nothing. Twino sighs and returns the stopper back to the bottle.
“So…” I start. “Are you working with the Worldkeepers, then? That’s your choice?”
Twino pauses, the empty bottle still in his hands. He sets it down carefully. Every movement is as purposeful as the next word he chooses. “No.”
“No?” I can’t say I’m surprised, given his reaction to Gregor last night. But there’s a finality in his voice that catches me off guard. A sound that prompts me to ask, “Then it’s on to rebuilding the Starcrossed Club?”
“No,” he repeats, and as he brings his pained eyes to me, my stomach drops. “I’m tired, Clara. I am not even old, but I feel as if I’ve lived a thousand lives. I’m tired of revolutions, of schemes and heists, of waking up and wondering if it’s my last day to be alive and pretending I don’t care. Pretending I’m not afraid.”
I stare at him, struggling to process what he’s saying. What it means for all of us, for everything we’ve built together. “Twino…”
He takes my hand in both of his, meeting my gaze. For a moment, all I see is his younger self across the table from me in the original Starcrossed Club, ready and eager for our next mission. But that man is gone. In a blink, I see the man he is now staring back at me. I haven’t looked at him this closely in too long…he does look well past his years.
“I will always,alwaysbe your friend, Clara. I am not turning my back onyou;but I can’t keep going on as we have been.”
“I understand.” I smile, even though fresh tears sting my eyes. Because I do understand. I wish I could turn my back on it all sometimes, too.I wish Arina and I would’ve left through the tunnels and taken our chances with the desert and the border of Oricalis when we had the chance as girls.
Twino’s eyes shift. “I should say,we’redone.”
I follow his gaze. Ren has poked his head around the curtain. He steps toward Twino and me.
“You’re sure?” I ask Ren, already knowing the answer but needing to hear it anyway. If Twino’s mind is made up, then Ren’s is, too. They’ve been together long enough that they will move as one.
“I don’t want to die in some forgotten sewer,” Ren says solemnly. I look away, knowing exactly what he means.Like Jura…The words hang between us, heavy as the shackles around the wrists of Marked Arcanists sent to the mills. Ren crouches with a tired smile. “I don’t blame you, Clara. But what happened to Jura…it gave us some clarity. We’re not immortal. You might be the luckiest woman I’ve ever met, but even you don’t always get out unscathed. And if you can’t, how could the rest of us think we had a shot?”
