The Breaking Light (Split City #1)
Heather Hansen
CHAPTER ONE
Arden ignored the knife pressed to the fragile skin of her neck. She could feel its bite and the wet slickness of blood pooling in the hollow of her throat. Whenever she shifted, the cool metal tightened with the promise of death. Yet she also felt hesitation from the boy holding it, and that more than anything made her curious enough to remain still.
He faced her. His right hand grasped the knife, while his left gripped her hair. He exhaled in fast pants, gulps of air pitting his lungs. He acted like he knew how to use the knife, yet the stress lines grooved in his forehead made her question whether he’d ever taken a life. The boy was missing the hardness that came with life-altering decisions.
She made these observations in a detached way, while unconsciously focusing on his lips. Not that she would ever admit that to her closest friends—the embarrassment would be too much. Yet his mouth enthralled her. How his lips moved slightly with each breath he took. How he tried to catch himself from showing indecision and when he did, his lips pressed shut, only to fall open a second later. Now they were molded into a frown, but they’d transfixed her when they’d been relaxed and achingly kissable.
She could see his features well enough in the dreary light that filtered through the static cloud as it mixed with the glare of the city. It created a diffused glow that made the boy appear even more mysterious. And she liked that, the hint of delicious danger.
Something shadowed the boy’s expression, his chocolate-brown eyes full of unanswered questions. She looked straight into them, wanting to understand why she found him so fascinating. He was certainly handsome. Long blond hair dipped over his forehead. His face still held a bit of youth, though hardened angles had taken prominence. He was striking in a way she might have feared if she were a different sort of girl.
The boy swallowed.
She watched his throat work, finding herself drawn to his sun-kissed skin, dusted brown from real sun, not from regulated time in a sun booth. She wanted to press her hand against it to see whether it felt as warm as it looked. Very few people could claim to have seen the sun, for there wasn’t direct sunlight to be had, unless you lived in the sky.
She felt as if she were alone with him in this moment even though they stood at the edge of a busy street. Enclosed in a private cocoon of interest and curiosity, and a little bit of lust. Because who wouldn’t look at this boy and wonder who he was?
Arden had waited until he moved to the edge of the street before she’d made her move. Beyond them, the city rattled with people, bustling as it always was. But she let the chaos fall away as she focused on him. It wasn’t difficult. He held her attention simply by being so different.
“You tried to rob me,” the boy said. His voice was measured, yet confident. It sent warmth coiling through her.
She had, in fact, been at that very task, when for some reason he’d felt his pocket being picked. She must be slipping. She hadn’t been after his money, though. It had started off as a mercy mission: to help a lone sky boy who was wandering the streets without protection. It was laughable. She’d meant to scare him enough that he’d take better care next time.
Her duty meant she should have murdered him, to honor the blood feud between their families. He was lucky she didn’t care for taking lives. But that didn’t mean she could let it go if she were placed in a situation where she couldn’t ignore him. If she’d been with companions today, she would have been forced to kill him.
Arden frowned, feeling a twinge of sadness. Taking his life seemed wasteful.
Not wanting to tip him off and make the situation into something worse, she blanked her expression and softened her body to appear nonthreatening. His body was larger than hers by two spans. It was not often she felt tiny, as she was tall for a girl. Arden found she liked the illusion of being delicate far more than she should. The image of an innocent girl who conveyed a graceful feminine charm was wholly unrealistic to that of any girl she’d ever known.
“I didn’t try to rob you,” she said while maintaining eye contact to cement the lie.
His brow arched. “I imagined your hand in my pocket?”
“Perhaps.”
The boy made a face as though he’d eaten something sour.
She wanted to laugh at his offended expression. It was adorable. Arden lowered her face to hide her eyes behind half-raised lids.
His fingers subtly relaxed against her head, perhaps due to confusion, or maybe lapsed concentration. Either way, it meant that it would be easy enough to break his hold when she wanted to leave. But right now, she settled in to dig for information. He could know something useful. Though truthfully, she was having a lot of fun teasing him.
As she spoke with him, she made mental notes of each of his features. Of anything that would set him apart and could be later referenced, especially the black tattoo on the left side of his neck just behind his ear. A design she knew without close inspection: a simple black sun, its center a perfect dark circle. Eight spokes surrounded the nucleus at equal intervals, the four points of the compass longer than the others. These spokes did not touch the center, leaving a rim of tanned flesh to break up the design.
It was a label that said he was off-limits. That he was set apart from those not rich enough to flaunt the laws. People like her still broke them, but with consequences. The tattoo was a visible sign that the Solizen wore to warn others not to mess with them. Though often, especially to her gang, it did the opposite. What it did now was help to remind her that this boy was not for her and to focus her wandering thoughts.
His gaze dropped away from hers. His lip pulled up at one corner as his eyes narrowed. “You have a blackout band?”
Even as she was caught up in studying him, apparently he had been doing the same. His attention now focused on the two-inch-wide dull black metal band circling her left wrist. He looked intrigued, his lips now moving into a full smile that flashed straight, even teeth.
Arden’s eyes widened with surprise as she flicked the cuff of her cloak over the item in question. The band was designed to cover the implanted data sensor the govies said they used for identification and banking. In reality, they used it to track every citizen’s movement, logging the collected information into a database. Breaking the signal was necessary to remain undetected and, needless to say, completely illegal.