22

“HARU.” HIS NAME WAS LIKE poison on Lottie’s lips. “I’m so glad you’re okay. What . . . what happened?”

“I got back last night.” He looked away, as if embarrassed, and she so easily could have believed him, if she hadn’t known better. “I don’t remember what happened.”

How stupid did Leviathan think they were? It was pathetic.

“What happened to you guys?” Haru asked, and she could almost have believed he was genuinely concerned.

“We were rescued by strangers, but we never saw their faces.” Lottie didn’t falter as the lie rolled off her tongue. Sayuri had told her to keep the story simple, leave Haru frustrated, and, by the way his lip twitched, it looked like it had worked.

“We’re glad you’re safe.” Jamie’s voice was low, barely audible through his labored breathing. But even in his weary, confused state, there was a hint of a smile, a smile of relief for Haru.

She was so angry and frustrated. And sad. Sad for Jamie, to see how much it meant to him that Haru had returned unharmed, and to know that she couldn’t tell him for fear of putting them all in danger. Jamie was too fragile; it was impossible to tell what he’d do if he found out, and, most importantly, they’d promised Sayuri not to say anything.

“Haru, I would like a moment alone with my Partizan.” She didn’t ask. She was telling him to get out. To her relief he didn’t protest but sent one of his fake summer-breeze smiles to Jamie before making his way out.

They all stared at Haru. Anastacia, Ellie, Saskia, Lottie, and Sayuri—five girls in a blockade against this creature who was sneaking around Takeshin.

“I’ll see you guys in a minute,” Lottie said, sliding the door shut behind her. She caught Sayuri’s eye, and this time she was sure of it. Sayuri was definitely worried.

Lottie took a seat, not daring to touch Jamie in case he recoiled. “How are you feeling?”

Closing his eyes, Jamie turned a little, the pink flush still strong in his cheeks. “Not good. Could you pass me some water?”

She picked up the plastic cup on the bedside table, holding it out to him, and his hands trembled as they went to take it. His fingers brushed against hers, feather soft and too warm, a furnace of sickness under his copper skin.

His sips were small, mouselike, a strange juxtaposition with his huge body.

“Jamie . . . do you remember anything about last night?”

Slowly, with no indication that he’d heard her, he handed back the cup, but as she went to take it he dropped it, his fingers curling around hers instead, squeezing tight.

“I remember it all,” he said at last, not letting go. “How did you find me?”

Lottie gulped, knowing it would be impossible to explain, to tell him that she’d been led to him by the school, that Takeshin had saved him. It was absurd, and the thought made her want to check her phone again to see if there was any word from Binah, until she remembered that she’d smashed it in a fit of fury.

“You said . . .” she began, “that you met him. You called him the Goat Man, the Master of Leviathan.”

Finally he let go of her hand. “Yes, I did. He was wearing a mask. Ingrid was there . . . I think I took one of her knives . . .”

Lottie nodded. They’d found it in his robes when they got him to the infirmary. That black spider curling around the handle of the blade, an evil little thing.

The door slid open, a nurse appearing with an extra pillow and a thermometer.

“I’ll be back later, Jamie,” Lottie whispered, standing up. He needed to rest. “I promise.” And she meant it.

Stepping out of the room, she was confronted by three faces. “Guys!” She pushed them back, closing the door behind her gently. “What are you doing?”

“So it’s really true?” Ellie began, chewing her cheek. “The Master really made a move on him?”

“Yes . . .” Lottie felt her voice fade away.

Sayuri was gone, only the memory of that look on her face remaining.

“Lottie”—Saskia cast a quick look at Anastacia, who nodded at her to continue—“I want to help.”

“What? You’ve done plenty, Saskia. It’s fine—”

Saskia cut her off. “No. I want to help you figure out who the Master of Leviathan is. I’m ready.”

They waited five days until Jamie was well enough to go back to his own dorm. Armed with a pencil and sketchbook, Saskia and Lottie sat on each side of his bed, waiting for him to finish sipping some water.

He was sitting up with mountains of pillows behind him like a plush throne, decorative blankets with woven stories covering his legs. He was a little too big for the setup, and his strong body and energy clearly didn’t deal well with having to rest. The room was much like any of the other dorms, wood paneling and paper screens, raised platforms where the futons lay, but Jamie’s room had the distinct smell of cinnamon. The screen had been pushed open to let a breeze through, giving a perfect view of the pond sparkling orange in the evening sun.

“Okay!” Jamie sighed, cutting right to it as soon as he placed his water bottle back on the tray. “What are we doing?”

“You and Saskia are going to piece together everything you can remember about the Master of Leviathan, and I’m going to try and sketch him,” Lottie said frankly, opening her rose-covered notebook to a blank page. “We need to find out who he is before they use the Hamelin Formula for something awful.”

A harsh exhale hissed through Saskia’s teeth, while Jamie simply looked accepting. The bruises under his eyes had almost completely faded, proof that he was fighting whatever he’d been through.

“I didn’t see his face,” Jamie said bluntly, staring off at the dwindling light behind the screen, haunted by a memory Lottie couldn’t begin to know.

There was something about the Goat Man; he had a way of getting into people’s heads, and Lottie was going to make sure it didn’t happen to anyone else.

“So you really spoke to him?” Saskia asked, trying her best to stay calm, and Lottie noted a subtle glint in her eye that hinted at danger.

“Yes, well, he mostly spoke to me.” A steady hand reached for his forehead, rubbing his temples uncomfortably. “He wore a goat mask, with huge horns like a demon, and he had two other masked people with him, a bird and a rabbit. I cut the bird in the stomach with Ingrid’s knife, but I doubt it was a deep cut.”

“They only wear the masks when they need to hide their identity; I saw him without it only once.” Saskia’s voice cracked and she looked away.

“Saskia,” Lottie began, gently placing a hand on her knee. “You’re not in Leviathan anymore, remember?”

Her wide brown eyes darted between Lottie and Jamie. “I’m fine. It’s just . . . You don’t know what he’s . . . the things he can do.” Shaking her head, she looked down at Lottie’s hand as if it were a foreign object. “I was so scared to disappoint him.”

“Disappoint him?” Jamie asked, a connection being made. “He used the same word when he spoke to me. I understand the effect he could have.”

Lottie clung to his choice of words: “could have,” not “did have,” not “can have.”

“He didn’t mention you.” His words were sharp and quick like a knife.

Saskia recoiled. “I expected as much,” she said, a sour smile crawling onto her lips.

“He doesn’t care about any of the kids he tricks; there was never anything you could have done to disappoint him, because he doesn’t care, but he’s exceptionally good at making you think he does. I nearly—” Jamie cut himself off. “He said he wanted to be a ‘father to the world,’ that everyone should have a choice about how they live. But he acted more like a god.”

Saskia nodded, opening her eyes again, shoulders lifting like she was shrugging off whatever nasty creature from Leviathan had been clinging to her back. “I know that. I needed to hear it.” She sniffed, attempting a weak smile. “Thank you.” She gave herself a final shake, her hair springing out of its knot. “He has dark brown hair, long, and he’s tall, pale skin, a little jaundiced.”

It took Lottie a moment to realize Saskia was describing the Master of Leviathan, something they’d been trying to get her to do for over a year. She pressed her lips together in concentration, readying her pencil as she let the image take over her mind.

“Ingrid used to tell me he’s very handsome, sharp jawline, heavily lashed eyes, like a stag she said; I think she was trying to shove it in my face that she gets to see him.”

“They’re based in Japan,” Jamie added, which reignited Lottie’s worries that they’d tampered with her grade, with an even darker thought trailing its fingers through her mind. What if that girl on results day with the red nails really was being controlled by them?

Could the Master of Leviathan really be manipulating everyone that much?

“His accent is hard to place, like a mix of many different ones, and his voice is low.” Jamie chewed the thought in his head for a moment. “It’s almost pleasant, oddly familiar.”

“Familiar?” That seemed completely absurd, and Lottie was sure she’d heard him wrong.

“Yes,” Saskia added, thinking hard. “‘Familiar’ is a good word.”

“I’d guess, from the way he spoke, he’s in his forties.”

“Agreed,” said Saskia. “From the brief moment I got to see him he had frown lines and crow’s-feet, curved eyes and sharp bones, but he was in shadow. Everything about him looked harsher, darker.”

Lottie let the two of them hash out what they could remember of their mysterious foe, jotting everything down while trying to form an image of him on the paper.

Long dark brown hair

Frown lines

Crow’s-feet

Tall

Handsome

Pale

Aging (forties?)

Sharp features

Looking back at her from the paper, a face began to emerge, one that was so completely ridiculous it made Lottie choke involuntarily. She realized the portrait held a remarkable resemblance to Ellie’s dad, an idea so nonsensical she nearly laughed.

Beside the drawing she made a note of his attributes.

Strange accent

Familiar?

Petty, and has a God complex

With one last look at her notes she added:

Possibly obsessed with the princess of Maradova and her Partizan

“Did either of you get a better look at his eyes? Any scars or markings?” Lottie asked, not looking up from her sketching. Silence met her question, so deep it made her snap her head up to find their stares locked on her.

“Hazel.”

“Green.”

They spoke at the same time, the words blurring together, but it wasn’t the mixed messages that caught her off guard. Both of them were looking so intently at her that it made her feel like a puzzle, as if something about her was sparking a connection.

“They’re the opposite of yours,” Jamie said.

Lottie didn’t know how to respond, while Saskia slowly nodded, still not looking away.

“Okay. I think we’ve made a good start here. We should go and let you have some rest, Jamie.” She smiled, pretending not to notice the strange way he continued to stare at her. She imagined a red rope between them, a line of fate holding them together, tightening with the memory of his fingers clinging to her wrist, begging her to stay.

Saskia, thrilled to leave, gave Jamie a reassuring pat on the shoulder before eagerly heading out the door, while Lottie lingered. They needed more information, and they needed it soon, but until Sayuri shared what she knew, they were on their own.

Lottie started to walk away in the now-dimming sunlight, and she turned to see her shadow stretch, melting into Jamie’s in the middle of the amber glow.

She didn’t want to leave and, strangest of all, she felt that he didn’t want her to either, waiting for something more from her, though she didn’t know what.

“Keep rested, Jamie,” she whispered. “I promise we’ll find out who he is.”