Twenty-One

When the mist turned to dark gray fog, Safire looked up. For a single fleeting moment, the sky was deep black and littered with stars. So many stars. Brighter and clearer and closer than ever before. So close, Safire lifted her fingers skyward, convinced she might touch one.

And then, quite suddenly, the fog dispersed. In its absence came the sounds of the night market they’d left behind. Warm bodies jostled Safire. The smell of sugar and flowers enveloped her. Music played by multiple stringed instruments beat loud and strong in her ears.

“Hells,” Eris cursed, materializing beside her, their fingers still entwined.

“What just happened?” Safire asked, looking around them. Skirts twirled and ribbons fluttered as couple after couple spun or stomped past them, lost in the throes of the music. The girls all wore flower wreaths on their heads and their smiles were brighter than stars.

A tightly packed crowd ringed the dancers, watching and cheering them on.

“I was so desperate to leave that alley . . . ,” said Eris, looking around, too, the anguish clear on her face. “. . . I was thinking more about it than the place I wanted to go to.” She shook her head. “The crossing got muddled. So now we’re back here.”

None of that made any sense to Safire.

“Where is here?” she hissed.

“It’s a betrothal dance,” Eris said, watching the particular steps of the dancers now. Her grip was getting increasingly tighter by the moment. Safire looked from the rosy-cheeked couples spinning around them to the ring of spectators closing them in. All of them laughing and singing and shouting encouragement.

It was suddenly familiar. They’d passed this way not long before, she realized. But they’d been outside this dancing circle then. Now they were inside it.

One by one, the gazes of the crowd fell on the only couple standing still within the circle: Eris and Safire. Their brows furrowed and their lips moved. Someone held a flower wreath out for Eris to take, misunderstanding their reason for being there.

Safire looked beyond them, farther out in the square, where Lumina soldiers rushed by, stopping revelers to question them, shouting for other soldiers to help in their search for the fugitives.

Eris must have seen it, too. Because suddenly she was sliding the throwing knife from the knot of hair at the back of Safire’s neck, making her hair fall loose around her face.

“What are you doing?” she whispered as Eris took the flower wreath, then set the ring of blue forget-me-nots on Safire’s head.

Eris’s arm slid around her waist. “Pretend you’re hopelessly in love with me,” she murmured, eyeing the soldiers out in the crowd. “And follow my lead.”

Before Safire could protest, Eris was leading her in the steps of the dance—while the Lumina hunted for them just beyond this dancing ring. Normally, Safire’s uniform would have given her away. But she was still in the unmarked clothes she’d worn to spy on Jemsin in the Thirsty Craw. There was nothing to distinguish her as the visiting dragon king’s commandant.

Someone gave a whoop of encouragement. Safire looked to find the crowd cheering as she and Eris joined the betrothed couples. Most were pairs of men and women—except for one pair of young men on the far side, beaming at each other, both wearing wreaths on their heads. Eris tipped her head at the man who’d handed her their wreath. But Safire could see her eyes searching the square beyond, keeping her attention on the Lumina—none of whom thought to check the dancing circle. Why would they? They were looking for a dangerous fugitive and a disobedient soldier, not a lovestruck couple.

Safire should have stopped Eris. Should have dragged her out of that circle and brought her to the searching Lumina. But she’d seen the look in that man’s eyes. He’d wanted to hurt Safire in the same way he’d hurt the one she saved from him.

She remembered Eris’s account of the night the scrin burned.

What if she was telling the truth?

Most of all, though, this wasn’t Firgaard. Safire didn’t know the punishment for directly challenging—worse, attacking—one of the empress’s soldiers. Safire might be the commandant of a visiting king, but she didn’t know how much that would count for.

Safire had very little power here. And Eris had saved her—how many times now? She’d lost count.

In a strange turn of events, one thing was certain: she trusted Eris. At least for the moment.

So, as Eris counted out the rhythm of the steps for her, Safire followed her direction, helping them blend in. At least until she could figure out what to do.

It was a strange sensation, letting Eris lead. It made her palms sweat and her pulse hum.

Soon, they were breathing as hard as the other dancers. As the caller shouted directions—ones Eris understood but she didn’t—Safire’s loose hair began to stick to her sweaty skin. Every once in a while, after a rosy-cheeked Eris scanned the perimeter, she would glance back at Safire, catch her gaze, and grin.

Like a shared secret, that grin made Safire’s heart beat too fast. It made her duck her eyes, trying to crush whatever warm thing was stirring within her.

Suddenly, the music stopped and Eris caught Safire hard around the waist, keeping her close. Their chests rose and fell with the breaths they took, and for a moment both of them looked beyond the circle. The Lumina were moving on. Only a few soldiers remained behind, speaking quietly with one another near one of the flower stalls.

Safire heard the crowd rumble around them as the caller—the man who’d handed Eris the wreath—shouted one last instruction. Eris went rigid, snagging Safire’s attention. She looked away from the Lumina and back to the circle.

Shouts of encouragement rose up around the ring. Safire looked to find the young man next to them reaching for his partner, then kissing her hard on the mouth. Safire glanced to the other pairs of dancers, all of them locked in intimate embraces.

Soon, the gazes of the spectators fell once more on the only couple not doing as instructed: Safire and Eris. The crowd began to chant as the caller repeated his final instruction, this time just for them.

Safire glanced to Eris, who was staring back at her.

The chanting grew louder. The Lumina soldiers glanced up from across the square, searching for the source of the increased noise.

Seeing it, Eris’s warm hands slid across Safire’s jaw, bringing her attention back. Safire looked up into her soft eyes.

“Ready?” she whispered.

Safire opened her mouth to say, You can’t be serious.

But Eris was already tipping Safire’s head back.

Already kissing her.

Cheering erupted around them.

At the touch of her lips, Safire’s nerves sparked. Sensing her panic, Eris’s thumb gently stroked her jaw, her throat. Soothing her. Coaxing her deeper into the kiss.

“You’re okay,” she murmured. “Just follow my lead.”

So Safire relaxed, doing just that.

Eris tasted like a storm. Like thunder and lightning and rain, all mixed into one. Safire reached for her shirt, needing an anchor against the tempest rising in her.

A tempest woken by Eris.

Eris smiled, her mouth curving against Safire’s, her hands sliding to her hips, drawing her closer.

Safire knew right then that if she didn’t pull away now, she might never pull away.

The thought frightened her.

She stepped quickly back, breathing hard.

The moment she opened her eyes, a glint of gold caught her attention. She tore her gaze from a startled Eris. She glanced beyond the circle, and found a young man watching her. His golden tunic bore the crest of a dragon twined round a sword, and his brown eyes were full of shock.

Dax.

He’d seen the whole thing.

Safire suddenly remembered herself. Remembered who she was with and what they were capable of. She’d just kissed the Death Dancer—the girl who’d stolen a jewel out of Dax’s treasury, one meant to assuage those hit worst by the scrubland blight.

The girl planning to hunt down Asha and deliver her to Jemsin.

Safire turned quickly back, reaching for Eris—to stop her from leaving. To make this right.

But Eris was already gone.