Page 5

“Don’t go chasing ghosts,” Ma used to say. Back then, she meant dreams. Impossible futures. All the things people like us weren’t supposed to reach for. But then Sola disappeared, and ghosts were all I had left.

Right now, I should be at registration with Damaris. Instead I’m here, staring at the grainy photo on my holoscreen until my eyes hurt, my pulse still running too high from a memory that never knows when to let me go.

Sola has been gone too long. For years I’ve chased scraps and rumors—anything that might tell me where she went—and every trail dissolved the moment I reached for it. Then, just when I’d stopped letting myself hope, two things arrived at once: a place on the Noctis program at Caervast Academy, one of the most prestigious conservatories in the Reach, and a grainy photo of my sister standing beneath a ring of gold light in a bar called Black Chapel.

Is that coincidence? Or fate? Sometimes I tell myself it’s her doing, that she’s been looking after me while I’ve been looking for her. Then I remember the way she used to press her forehead to mine when I couldn’t breathe, counting under her breath until the world came back, and I think I might just be losing it like I always am.

It isn’t much to go on. But it’s the first lead that hasn’t vanished on me in years, and it was enough to bring me here before I’d even set foot inside Caervast.

Now I’m here, leaving Damaris to handle intake while I chase another ghost. He knew Sola too, but if this turns out to be nothing, another dead end I’ve convinced myself is different, I don’t want to give it a name.

I guess hope is a bad advisor.

The bar sits straight ahead of me and looks like it belongs to another world entirely. People move in and out through the front doors, but not many. Nobody lingers. Most arrive in groups and disappear inside as though they already know where they’re going.

For some reason, that bothers me more than the building itself.

Even online, nobody seemed willing to talk about the place for long. Every thread ended the same way, with missing posts, vague warnings, or somebody suddenly deciding they didn’t want to answer questions anymore.

Most places have stories. This one has silence, and the silence is worse. It means someone made sure there was nothing left to find. If Sola walked in there and the trail simply stopped, then silence is exactly what I should expect—and exactly why I can’t make myself walk away.

The bar is built from dark brick and black windows that don’t exactly scream welcome, its name picked out in narrow gold lettering above the door. Even from outside, I can hear music pulsing through the walls, deep enough to feel beneath my ribs.

A bouncer in black stands beneath the awning, glaring at me like he already knows he’s about to tell me no. Which, technically, is true. I’m twenty, and the minimum age for a place like this is twenty-two.

A few people linger beneath the awning, smoking and talking in low voices as I cross the street with my pulse hammering in my throat.

The bouncer looks me over, then says, “ID.”

I light my holoscreen with cold fingers and pull up my student file. He glances at it, then at me.

“I—” I stammer, then stop, because what am I supposed to say? Can I please come in for two minutes to see if my missing sister is here?

Before I can figure it out, he gives me a flat look, then steps aside. “Don’t cause problems.”

“Thank you.” I wince at my own voice and step inside, already nervous as hell.

A long bar runs down one side, bottles lined up behind it in gold and glass. Booths sit deeper in the room, half-hidden, full of people leaning close over their drinks like they don’t want to be overheard. Somewhere deeper inside, voices drift up from behind heavy velvet curtains.

The bartender looks up as I step in close. He’s handsome in the effortless way people on Sero seem to be, with dark hair falling past his collar, black ink disappearing beneath rolled sleeves, and a practiced smile. “Hi there, gorgeous. What can I get you?”

My mouth goes dry. This is my chance. “I actually wanted to ask if the floor show is tonight.”

His gaze drifts over me. “It is. Why?”

Fumbling for my holoscreen, I glance down at the photo again. “I’d like to get in.”

He laughs, filling a glass with water and sliding it my way. “Listen, gorgeous, the floor show is invite only. The bar, though? That’s open to everyone.”

“Thanks.” I hesitate. “I’m looking for someone.”

His mouth twitches at that. “That so? Aren’t we all?”

“No, I mean at the show.”

My head turns before I can stop it, drawn toward the center of the room, past the bar and the bodies moving too close in the low amber light, to the recessed floor below, where a ring of pale gold light hangs suspended in the dark, bright enough to catch from anywhere in the room.

The sight of it sends a jolt through me, my fingers tightening around the holoscreen as recognition hits. The ring from the photograph.