“You can’t keep stalking me like this,” Rylin retorted, her mood buoyed by her good news.
Cord grinned. “If I wanted to stalk you, trust me, I could do better than the school’s front office.”
They both fell silent. Rylin willed herself not to look at him, to look down at her tablet, at the stupid posters on the wall with inspirational quotes and images of mountains, anything but at Cord. She lasted a full eight seconds.
When she couldn’t take it anymore and turned in his direction, she caught Cord staring at her, with an expression of mingled wariness and curiosity and—she hoped—a glimmer of attraction. For a moment it seemed to Rylin that no time had passed, that it was the olden days again, back when he was deciding whether or not to trust her the first time. Back when Cord hadn’t been a wealthy, arrogant boy set to inherit billions and she hadn’t been the girl who cleaned his bathrooms—but instead, somehow, they were just a boy and a girl, talking in quiet tones about the losses they had both suffered.
She wondered if they would ever be that way again.
“How did your fencing match go?” Cord asked.
“Oh, you know, I’m ruthless when it comes to fighting,” Rylin teased.
She’d meant it as a joke, but Cord didn’t laugh, and Rylin wondered if she’d hit too close to home. After all, the things she’d said to him the night Eris died had been cruel, and ruthless.
“What are you here for, anyway?” he went on, after a moment.
“I’m here to meet with the dean.” She couldn’t keep the pride from her voice. “I’m missing a week of school for a work-study program with Xiayne. I’ll be a filming assistant on his new holo.”
“I thought you were here on scholarship. Shouldn’t you be studying, not jetting off to LA?”
Rylin recoiled at the harsh phrasing. “This is a great opportunity. It’s rare that students our age get to actually work on set, get hands-on experience.”
“Or maybe it’s a chance for Xiayne to get some free labor. He’s not paying you, is he?” Cord said, and she was surprised by the venom in his tone.
“Actually, he is.” She hated how defensive she sounded.
“Well, I’m glad he’s taken such a special interest in you.”
“Cord—” Rylin broke off, not quite certain what she was about to say, but the dean’s door swung open before she could answer.
“Rylin Myers, sorry for the wait! Come on in,” his voice boomed.
Rylin looked searchingly at Cord, feeling both saddened and hurt. But he was shaking his head. “Whatever, Rylin. God knows you don’t owe me an explanation. Have fun taking teacher’s pet to a whole new level.”
Suddenly Rylin’s mind was able to form sentences again. “Not everyone is as cynical as you are, Cord. You should try being happy for me sometime.”
She squared her shoulders and walked away before he could reply.
CALLIOPE
CALLIOPE WALKED EAGERLY through the Nuage lobby, which on this sunny afternoon was all soaring white and blue, making the hotel live up to its name. She felt like she was floating through the center of a cloud, maybe of Mount Olympus.
In the nick of time she remembered her fake limp, for the benefit of the front-desk managers. The last thing she and Elise needed was to start being charged for the room they had no intention of paying for. But Calliope could hardly think straight; she was heading to afternoon tea with her mom, and her stomach was bubbling with a pleasant sense of anticipation. For Calliope and her mom, afternoon tea always meant something.
She turned into the hotel’s formal dining room, which was lined with gilded paneling, its delicate tables covered in wisp-thin linens and set with antique Francis I sterling. Young girls in bright pink bows squirmed in their seats, accompanied by harried moms; groups of women clinked champagne glasses; there were even a few tourists, eyeing the society crowd with trepidation and a degree of envy. Calliope found her mom at a table in the middle of the room. Of course, Calliope thought, unsurprised and amused. All the better for being admired.
“What’s the occasion?” she asked, settling into the opposite seat.
“The occasion is, I’m taking my daughter out for tea.” Elise smiled, looking cool and careless in a printed sheath.
Calliope leaned back. “Every time we do this, it reminds me of Princess Day,” she said, her tone reflective, but not quite wistful.
Calliope had been obsessed with tea ever since she was a little girl, when she and her friend Daera would put on Justine’s hand-me-down clothes and serve each other water in plain white mugs, calling each other made-up names like Lady Thistledown and Lady Pennyfeather. Elise had picked up on the fixation and started an annual tradition, just her and Calliope, called Princess Day. It instantly became Calliope’s favorite day of the year.
On Princess Day, Elise and Calliope would dress up—sometimes even carrying Mrs. Houghton’s purses, or wearing her scarves or jewelry. It was the only occasion when Elise would let them do so—and go to the Savoy Hotel for its expensive afternoon tea. Even at that age, Calliope had known that it was willfully stupid of them to do something so extravagant, something they clearly couldn’t afford. But they needed Princess Day. It was a chance for the two of them to escape their routines and step into someone else’s life, just for a moment. And Calliope could tell that her mother loved it as much as she did: being the one catered to, for once, rather than the other way around. She loved being presented with a silver tray of delicate little sweets and being asked which she would like, and she would lift her ring-crusted finger and say in an imperious tone, that one and that one, and also that. Commanding someone else, the way that Mrs. Houghton constantly commanded her.
Calliope would never forget the way her mom had turned to her, that first morning on the train to Russia, when their old life was long gone, and their new one just unfolding. “It’s Princess Day, sweetheart,” she’d said.
Calliope shook her head in confusion. “But we had one a few months ago.”
“Every day is Princess Day now,” Elise had said with a smile. Not the pinched, forced smile she’d worn for so long, but a genuine, easy smile; and Calliope saw that her mother was shedding some terrible skin she’d been forced into, and becoming someone new. As the years went on, she would realize that Elise had never been happy in London. It wasn’t until their life on the road that she’d seemed to find her true calling.