Mal’s features melted into shadow and then formed again like a face from the mist. Pale, beautiful, that thick shock of black hair, the perfect sweep of jaw.
The Darkling rested one gentle hand on my cheek. “Soon,” he whispered.
I screamed. He broke into shadows and vanished.
I scrambled out of bed, clutching my arms around myself. My skin was crawling, my body quaking with terror and the memory of desire. I expected Tamar or Tolya to come bursting through the door. Already, I had a lie on my lips.
“Nightmare,” I would say. And the word would come out steady, convincing, despite the rattling of my heart in my chest and the new scream I felt building in my throat.
But the room stayed silent. No one came. I stood shaking in the near dark.
I took a shallow, trembling breath. Then another.
When my legs felt steady enough, I pulled on my robe and peeked into the common room. It was empty.
I closed my door and pressed my back against it, staring at the rumpled covers of the bed. I was not going back to sleep. I might never sleep again. I glanced at the clock on the mantel. Sunrise came early during Belyanoch, but it would be hours before the palace woke.
I dug through the pile of clothes that I’d kept from our journey on the Volkvolny and pulled out a drab brown coat and a long scarf. It was too hot for either, but I didn’t care. I drew the coat on over my nightshift, wrapped the scarf around my head and neck, and tugged on my shoes.
As I crept through the common room, I saw the door to the guards’ quarters was closed. If Mal or the twins were inside, they must be sleeping deeply. Or maybe Mal was somewhere else beneath the domes of the Little Palace, tangled in Zoya’s arms. My heart gave a sick twist. I took the doors to the left and hurried through the darkened halls, into the silent grounds.
Chapter
21
I DRIFTED THROUGH the half-light, past the silent lawns covered in mist, the clouded windows of the greenhouse. The only sound was the soft crunch of my shoes on the gravel path. The morning deliveries of bread and produce were being made at the Grand Palace, and I followed the caravan of wagons straight out the gates and through the cobblestone streets of the upper town. There were still a few revelers about, enjoying the twilight. I saw two people in party dress snoozing on a park bench. A group of girls laughed and splashed in a fountain, their skirts hiked up to their knees. A man wearing a wreath of poppies sat on a curb with his head in his hands while a girl in a paper crown patted his shoulder. I passed them all unseen and unremarked upon, an invisible girl in a drab brown coat.
I knew I was being foolish. The Apparat’s spies might be watching, or the Darkling’s. I might be seized and hauled away at any moment. I wasn’t sure it mattered to me anymore. I needed to keep walking, to fill my lungs with clean air, to shake the feeling of the Darkling’s hands on my skin.
I touched the scar at my shoulder. Even through the fabric of my coat, I could feel its raised edges. Aboard the whaler, I’d asked the Darkling why he’d let his monster bite me. I’d thought it was out of spite, so I would always wear his mark. Maybe there had been more to it than that.
Had the vision been real? Was he there, or was he something my mind had conjured? What sickness was inside of me that I would dream such a thing?
But I didn’t want to think. I just wanted to walk.
I crossed the canal, the little boats bobbing in the water below. From somewhere beneath the bridge, I heard the wheeze of an accordion.
I floated past the guard gate and into the narrow streets and clutter of the market town. It seemed even more crowded than it had before. People hung off stoops and overflowed from porches. Some played cards on makeshift tables made of boxes. Others slept propped up against each other. A couple swayed slowly on a tavern porch to music only they could hear.
When I came to the city walls, I told myself to stop, to turn around and go home. I almost laughed. The Little Palace wasn’t really home.
There is no ordinary life for people like you and me.
My life would be allegiance instead of love, fealty instead of friendship. I would weigh each decision, consider every action, trust no one. It would be life observed from a distance.
I knew I should go back, but I kept on, and a moment later, I was on the other side of the wall. Just like that, I’d left Os Alta.
The tent city had grown. There were hundreds of people camped outside the walls, maybe thousands. The pilgrims weren’t hard to find—I was surprised to see how their numbers had increased. They crowded near a large white tent, all facing east, awaiting the early sunrise.
The sound began as a swell of rustling whispers that fluttered on the air like the wings of birds and grew to a low hum as the sun peered over the horizon and lit the sky pale blue. Only then did I begin to make out the words.