Slowly, she got to her feet. Her body dragged with exhaustion, but she knew she couldn’t rest. Three Catresou breaking into Lord Ineo’s home. Were they the only ones?
Farther down the corridor, she saw the body of the person they had killed. Slowly, she walked toward it: not a guard, but a servant. An old woman, with gray in her hair. She didn’t have any weapons. She couldn’t have hurt them, and for a moment Juliet felt sheer rage at the men she had killed. There was nothing around here except storerooms and sleeping people; they had come here for no reason but slaughter, to kill those who couldn’t defend themselves—
Or they had come to cause a distraction, while their friends attempted to free the prisoners at the other end of the complex.
Juliet knew she could feel someone acquire blood guilt from that far away, even if the pull to avenge wouldn’t be as strong at that distance. But she’d felt nothing. So there weren’t any other intruders—or they hadn’t yet shed Mahyanai blood.
Which meant she had a chance to help her people.
Juliet fled. The guards would arrive any moment, and there would be questions that she couldn’t afford to be asked yet. She couldn’t afford the slightest chance that Runajo would be with them, because then she would be given orders again.
As soon as she got out in the open, she clambered up onto the roof and charged straight across the compound. The night wind blew in her face. Her heart pounded against her ribs.
Runajo had ordered her not to release the prisoners or assist them in escaping. But Juliet was not going to do that. She was going to save the lives of the Mahyanai guards, and then she was going to fight the Catresou intruders.
Side effects of those actions were not her concern. At least, not enough to awaken the magic written on her back.
Runajo had thought she’d been careful with her commands. But she hadn’t lived her whole life under obedience. She didn’t really understand how to think about these things.
Juliet went more carefully as she got closer. She slipped down off the roofs and into the corridors again. She paused and listened: silence.
Most of the Catresou prisoners had been locked up by the City Guard. It was only those of interest to Lord Ineo, or those who had been deemed too old or too young for common prison, who were kept here.
So there were only a few guards.
Most of her training had been with the sword. But Juliet had studied unarmed combat as well. She knew how to choke someone unconscious.
The trick was doing it without the person seeing her.
The first guard went down easily. The next nearly saw her, and then nearly broke loose from her grip. She managed to slam Juliet against the wall before she went limp.
The noise brought the third guard running.
Juliet ducked back around the corner just in time to avoid being seen. She heard the steps pause, a soft exclamation—the guard was checking his fallen friend—and she darted forward.
Speed was her only hope. As he looked up, she slapped him across the eyes to blind him, and then she was safely behind him and getting a grip on his neck.
Then he was down.
Juliet stood, panting for breath. She had done it. All the guards were unconscious, which meant they were safe, which meant she could fight the intruders without any Mahyanai getting hurt.
In complete obedience to her orders.
And there were the footsteps of the approaching Catresou.
She drew her sword. She told her heart not to break. And she went to meet them.
There were three, all men, all wearing Catresou masks. When they saw her, they stopped dead. Two raised their swords.
Juliet didn’t.
“You know how fast I can kill you,” she said. “But I don’t have to. None of you have shed Mahyanai blood yet.”
For the first time in weeks, she was terribly aware of her naked face, and she tried to make it into a mask. Tried to ignore how the words hurt in her throat.
“But if you come forward,” she went on, “I will have to fight you. I’m under orders.”
The tallest of them—a pale-haired man, the oldest of the group and also clearly the leader—sighed.
“Well,” he said, “we have orders too, Lady Juliet.”
His voice was soft, almost polite, but the words burned like hot iron.
Her fingers tightened on the sword hilt. “The guards are unconscious.”
One of the others—a boy, probably no older than her—sneered. “You want us to think you’re helping?”
“I was protecting them,” said Juliet. “I can’t aid you. If one of you comes forward, I will have to fight him. But I haven’t been ordered to win.”
7
SHE WAS FIRE AND DEATH and starlight. She was all the glory and all the terror in the world.
She was Juliet, and she was no longer his.
“The guards already found one of your squads,” she said. “You don’t have much time.”
Romeo stared at her, this girl who had been so many times betrayed, and who was still trying to save everyone. He wanted more than anything else in the world to tear off his mask and say how much he loved her, that he would do anything to save her.
But he couldn’t save her. And she no longer wanted his love. If she knew that he now served the Master Necromancer, she would surely want him to die.
All he could do for her now was fight for her people. And tonight that meant fighting her.
He didn’t know if Gavarin would consent to the plan. He didn’t dare ask for permission, because if Juliet heard his voice, she would certainly know. So he drew his sword and charged.
Her blade met his. For a moment they were caught, barely a stride apart, nothing between them but two swords and one mask.
Two swords. One mask. Two clans, two vows, and a river of blood.
Juliet broke the standoff, shoving his blade aside and dodging back. Romeo followed. She kept up a steady retreat, blocking his strikes but not returning them, until they were outside in one of the courtyards.
Then she attacked.
They had never crossed swords before. But they had met across the sword: on the Night of Ghosts, when she had performed the sword dance before her assembled people, and Romeo—wearing a mask for the first time—had caught the blade when she flung it up in the air, and danced with her.
They had danced, and when it was over, his heart, which had been hers, was twice hers. Perhaps in that dance, this duel had become inevitable.
That dance had been a game: sheer joy and delight, shared between enemies. For all that Juliet wasn’t trying to win, this duel was no game. Her face—when stray lamplight fell on it—was grim. Romeo could see the grief and fury in every movement that she took, as she drove him back through the complex—she was drawing him away from the others, he realized, so that if they were seen, they would be a distraction from the raid. It meant he was more likely to be captured, but it also made the Catresou more likely to escape.
He didn’t mind that.
He thought he could make it better.
The next time she lunged, he ducked backward, jumped up onto a low stone wall, and then hauled himself onto the roof. He turned to her, extending his blade in silent invitation.
She grinned.
And Romeo’s heart broke. Because that was the joy he remembered, the ferocious delight that had been in her eyes, in her hands upon the sword, the first night they had danced.
He could only give it to her now in battle and deceit.
She followed him onto the roof. Now the alarm was beginning to spread. Vaguely, Romeo could hear shouts and clatter below. But he couldn’t afford to pay attention, and it hardly seemed to matter.
Because the duel was still not a game, but it was starting to be a delight. Up here on the roofs, alone with the wind and the stars and Juliet—it felt like those moments they had once stolen together, just the two of them, creating their own secret world where love was possible and duty would not betray them.
Romeo’s arms burned with exhaustion; he knew his strokes were becoming slower and clumsier every moment. If this had been a fight to the death, by now Juliet would certainly have killed him.
But when he stumbled back, gasping for breath—when he stumbled, and started to slip off the roof—