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CHAPTER
10
COEN
The sky was churning with storm-bruised clouds by the time Rayna and her friends left the storage building an hour later, ducking their heads as they snuck back to their mansions.
I didn’t bother wiping the beads of rain from my forehead as I followed them through winding campus alleyways and past the courtyard in front of the Testing Center—never close enough for them to hear my trailing footsteps and look over their shoulders, but close enough to keep a lookout. To make sure nobody glanced their way too curiously, wondering why they weren’t with the rest of their sectors after such a strange Branding.
The last thing we needed was someone becoming suspicious about their whereabouts.
When Rayna and the others crossed the bridge and emerged onto Bascite Boulevard, however, almost every light in every mansion had darkened, the celebrations done for the night.
Crossing my arms, I watched Rayna and her friends bid the Shape Shifter goodnight, then kept to the shadows as I followed them to the ivy-tangled mansion, where—
The front door flew open, nearly smacking the black-haired one in the face.
“Where have you three been? I told everyone to stay put!”
Fuck. So much for keeping a lookout. Based on the details I’d siphoned from Rayna’s mind, this had to be the Wild Whispering princess of the year, a woman with buzzed hair and a menacing glower that I could see from all the way across the street.
“We…we just needed some fresh air,” Emelle began. “After—”
“—after such a shameful Branding for your sector?”
This interjection came from a new, rasping voice I’d never heard in person before, though I knew exactly who she was as she stepped up beside the Wild Whispering princess from the depths of the mansion. In contrast to the glaring fifth-year beside her, Mrs. Smetlar was all smiles as she stared down at Rayna and her friends, like a vulture who’d found a fresh carcass.
Seriously? Out of all the instructors for the house princess to fetch, it had to be this one?
“Your princess gave you a direct order that you disobeyed,” Mrs. Smetlar crowed happily, “and it is up to her to punish any transgressors. I hope the fresh air was worth it.”
Sighing heavenward, I speared toward the woman with my Mind Manipulating power. Seconds later, she blinked heavily, then refocused her gaze on Rayna and her friends with a confused pinch of her brows.
“Right. Off to bed, you three!”
The Wild Whispering princess uncrossed her arms and turned a bewildered stare at Mrs. Smetlar, but Rayna and her friends were already slipping past them, melting into the dim interior of the house.
Thanks for that, Rayna’s voice whispered in my mind. I froze up.
Anytime.
Now that she was safe in her house, my mind wandered back to the past hour, where we’d spent every minute of it discussing the technicalities of the loophole in detail—me talking into Rayna’s mind and her relaying the information to her friends, who came up with their own questions and speculations in turn.
You will bring me Dyonisia’s head within the next year, General Steeler. And within the same time frame, you will also kill every branded citizen under her rule. That wretched phrase had rebounded in my head for months like a hammer against my skull, but now it rang like a bell. A toll of both warning and hope.
The Sorronian word for ‘rule’ meant more than just ‘in charge.’ It meant ‘divine leadership’. A position that had to be rightfully won or granted. Simply killing Dyonisia wouldn’t necessarily eliminate her rule over the island, even posthumously, because the magic would still recognize her as the last rightful leader.
Unless someone else conquered her before her death.
Jagaros.
The first time I’d ever seen the tiger, I’d been in the stadium as a spectator at my last Branding ceremony. He’d emerged from the jungle like a long-lost piece of history, snarling and growling at everyone who gaped at him as he stalked up that aisle toward Rayna.
But as the crowd around me had stiffened, I’d relaxed… because that was the moment I’d known she was a Wild Whisperer. The pills I’d given her had worked properly. The random new girl who somehow had faerie blood in her would be safe for the time being—her innate magic suppressed while her gifted magic thrived— and I wouldn’t have another death on my shoulders. I wouldn’t have to care anymore.
Then, of course, Rayna had become the thing I cared about most.
After that, I’d seen Jagaros infrequently, and only ever to converse about keeping Rayna safe. With a mind like fire and ice, the tiger had let me speak to him mind-to-mind for that reason and that reason alone. Even I had never dared to venture further into his maze of thoughts that would both freeze and burn me alive.
