“Very kindly,” Sydney repeated, climbing out of the window seat to pour herself more blood orange juice. It had been a breakfast meeting, and Laurent had provided a generous spread. “I’m sure.”
“Well, for certain values of kindly. But he was the one who explained things to me, so I didn’t feel so weird. And then, when I decided I wanted to jump into all of this—which took me, like, five seconds, because what fourteen-year-old boy doesn’t want to be a magician—he was the one who introduced me to people, who made sure I didn’t sit by myself at lunch when I started going to school with all of them. He made me feel like I belonged here.”
“All right, then. You do know I’m a better magician than he is.” She hadn’t seen Grey cast yet, but she didn’t need to. She knew what she was, what she was capable of. She wasn’t worried about someone who’d slid through life with the magical equivalent of a gentleman’s C.
“I know. And if it comes down to it, I won’t ask you to hesitate or hold back, but—he’s like family. So I’d like to avoid it.” Laurent shrugged. “I mean, the best that happens is you knock him out of contention, and then I’m the one responsible for taking away something he really wants. And he really wants this—he’s been getting ready for a Turning since Miranda disinherited him.”
“If a challenge becomes unavoidable?” No Houses were required to challenge each other, and in the early part of the Turning, before the duels became mortal, engagements could be declined, though doing so had dire consequences to the ranking of the House that did. The overall number of Houses generally held steady—there had been thirteen for the past three Turnings, and there were twenty-seven established and candidate Houses competing this Turning, so the rankings would matter in the early rounds.
After that, staying alive would.
Laurent blew out a breath. “Please keep the interaction nonlethal.”
She nodded. Again, in the early rounds that would be easy enough. The challenges were staggered—the early ones being showpieces for magical ability, nuance, and finesse. Mortality could be invoked if both parties agreed beforehand, but only the last round required that it be. Sydney was sure Grey would fall out of competition by that point. And if he didn’t, well, she’d discuss that with Laurent when she had to. “Of course. As I said, I’m better than he is. Is there anyone else I should be similarly aware of ?”
“No. All’s fair, right?”
“Something like that,” Sydney said. “How are we starting?”
“I challenged House Dee,” Laurent said. “It’s old and traditionally powerful enough that defeating them will make a nice splash. Strong enough magically that a victory will serve as a warning to anyone who sees me as an easy target.”
It was a good strategy, the suggestion that she would have made herself, and for those precise reasons. “Do you have a preferred method of engagement?”
“I’ll leave that to your discretion.”
Sydney smiled.
? ? ?
As she walked home in the greying late-fall light, Sydney considered whether there was anyone in her life whose friendship she valued as much as Laurent valued Grey’s, anyone she would consider sacrificing her goals for.
In her earliest days there, Shadows had lent itself only to survival. Friendship wasn’t even a word she knew, much less a concept she had felt. As she grew older, as it became increasingly clear that Sydney could take all the ways that Shadows tried to break her and transmute them into her own power, she became even more isolated, was kept separate from her fellow sacrifices. They were fodder. She would be a phoenix, made to rise from ashes.
A phoenix was a solitary thing.
A group of girls passed by her on the sidewalk, leaning into one another, as close as secrets. Laughing, smiling. Hands in each other’s pockets, arms slung around shoulders, heads tipped back, faces relaxed. No one wary, no one suspicious. The air between them soft and permeable, as if each of them might slip into each other’s life and rest there, safe.
They were so beautiful, so happy, it ached to look at them, and so Sydney turned away, walked faster, her shoes loud on the sidewalk as she passed their tight knot.
If that was what friendship meant, then no. She had never had it.
? ? ?
In a dark, quiet part of Central Park, one made darker and quieter through judicious use of magic, Grey stood over a body and curled his lip at the mess of it.
The girl hadn’t even been that pretty when she was alive. Not that it had mattered. Grey hadn’t chosen her for her looks. He’d chosen her—sitting next to her at the bar, buying her drink after drink, pretending like he was interested in what she said, so that she’d lean close, hold his hand, leave with him—for the faintest hint of magic that ran through her blood. Just enough to keep her in the Unseen World, not enough that she was important to it.
He’d learned the hard way that it was easier if they didn’t have a lot of magic. They tended to fight back, once they realized what Grey was doing, and the more magic they had, the harder they were to overpower.
The first girl, the one Miranda had disinherited him over, she’d had more magic than he’d thought. She had fought back. Had gotten away. Told people. There had been consequences. Consequences that had been unpleasant enough that he’d waited almost a year before trying again.
This one had not fought back. She had leaned against him, buzzed and smiling, as he’d kissed her in the park. Had giggled and pulled at his belt buckle as he’d moved her into the darkness, where they’d be less likely to be interrupted. Had blinked in confusion when his hands had tightened on her throat, when he’d spoken the words that pulled the darkness closer around them and kept them hidden, that kept her alive and immobile until the ritual no longer required that she be breathing. She was much less pretty, now that the ritual was finished.
He knelt by her side and used a knife to slit open the skin of her hands. Then he reached through still warm blood and muscle and pulled out her finger bones, using the knife again when he had to slice through tendons. Magic tended to concentrate in these bones more than anywhere else since the hands were so often used to focus casting. The last thumb bone came loose with an audible pop. The empty flesh splatted to the ground. Blood and dirt spattered across his shoes and cuffs.
“Oh, fuck this.” Annoyed, he brushed at his clothes, smearing the stains into the fabric. Whatever. It was dark. No one would see. He could wash them when he got home, throw them out if he had to.
He finished gathering the bones, tucking them in a bag that he stuffed into his jacket pocket, then squeezed the girl’s empty fingers to be sure he hadn’t left any behind. He was fairly certain this would give him enough of a supply that he’d have power until the challenges turned mortal. He’d see how things went—he didn’t like not having some in reserve.
Although—he could always get more. That was another thing he’d learned: There was always another girl no one would miss.
He cut a door into the air and stepped through, leaving the dead girl behind him.
CHAPTER FOUR