Lili Crow - Wayfarer

There. She’d done it. She’d thought about him again.

Ellie sagged into the seat and closed her eyes. They let her pretend she was asleep until they reached Perrault Street, and she was through the high iron gates with the Strep’s Sigil worked into them before Cami could struggle out of the Semprena’s backseat. The door slammed, Ruby gunned it, and she’d switched the radio on, because the thudding of the bass suddenly thumped out from the little car as it arrowed down Perrault to turn on Woodvine and head for the Vultusino castle.

Ellie stood in the sunshine, little tremors like a bird’s heartbeat running through her bones, and felt cold all the way through.

SPRING BREAK WAS TRADITIONALLY AROUND FISH DAY, and the Friday before it started was full of fertility-festival jokes. Women young and old were buying swellfree tea or anti-conceive charms; Ellie could have made a pretty penny down on Southking if she hadn’t been trapped in the stone workroom every moment she wasn’t at school or allowed to sleep.

The shoes were still selling. Beribboned red pumps with lightfoot charms, cushioned platform wedges with chips of glitter imbedded in the heels and weight-balance charms to keep the wearer upright, boots and more boots, brown and black and red and sky blue, some with heels, some without, all with tinkling music-step charms, a whole series of black patent-leather shoes with supple brass scales holding minor lift and attraction charms . . . It was endless. Homework blurred together inside her head, her tongue jumbled, and if Cami hadn’t covered for her in French the results would have been dire indeed.

As it was, there was hour upon hour of charming after said homework, because Laurissa would drift past the door of the blue bedroom every fifteen minutes or so. How much longer, little Ellen? There’s work to be done . . .

The ledgers were still there behind the glass door. She tried to plan a way to get to them, maybe find out what the Strep was hiding, but every second she wasn’t working had to be used for sleeping, and it was never enough. Her brain would just shut down, the plan never quite taking form.

She regularly fell asleep in High Charm Calc now, but the equations had stopped being troublesome. Often she’d wake with a jolt to find her pencil scratching through a test or a pop quiz, writing equations and solutions in a cramped version of her usual slanting narrow handwriting. She got most of them right, too, only fudging the ones she was awake enough to unwork.

It figured.

“No plans for Break?” Ruby kept asking. She also didn’t poke the radio into full blare until after dropping Ellie off, probably so Ell could snatch a few minutes of rest. Cami gamely tried to keep up Ellie’s part of the conversation as well as her own, and her leftover stutter had largely vanished. Maybe the extra practice was greasing the words free or something.

Today, Ellie sighed, looking down at the linoleum as the flock of girls freed from Juno’s restrictions for a whole week spilled for the front door. “Another party,” she managed. Her tongue didn’t seem to want to work quite right. “I guess.” She has Rita doing the cooking, and the maids were cleaning top to bottom again.

“Is the Strep still trying to catch that Fletcher kid?” Ruby kept asking about him , too.

The sharp jolt behind her breastbone woke her out of her daze, briefly. Be cautious. “Don’t know. Don’t care.”

Cami was silent, and Ellie didn’t realize trouble was coming until they hit the front door instead of the side doors. Later she thought maybe Cami had been steering them that direction, or maybe it was just habit. In any case, Ellie dug in her heels, but it was too late.

Because down at the bottom of Juno’s wide granite steps, oblivious to the girls milling around and whispering and some of them doing everything but pointing at him, was Avery Fletcher, the gold in his hair throwing back sunlight with a vengeance. He stood there like he had all the time in the world, and he was looking right at her.

Oh, Mithrus . Ellie let herself be carried down the stairs. It was too much effort to protest. Maybe he’d just see she was tired and leave her alone?

No such luck, because he brightened visibly the closer she got. Then he looked puzzled, eyebrows coming together. By the time the trio hit the bottom of the steps, his expression had changed. The brightness rubbed away, and his jaw was close to dropping.

Ruby popped her gum, hopping off the last step. “Hey, Fletch. You’re persistent, I’ll give you that.”

“You look awful ,” he returned, and for a lunatic instant she thought he was telling Ruby that. It would have been worth a chuckle or two, except he was staring at her , and all of a sudden every rubbed-bare, worn-through, shabby or broken spot on her started to throb painfully. “And . . . Christ, have you been on charmweed?”

Ellie found her tongue. “You’re an asshole.”

“Young love!” Ruby addressed the air over Avery’s head, obviously delighted with this turn of events. “It’s shameful how you two carry on—”

Cami stepped forward, grabbed Ruby’s arm. “Shhh.” And wonder of wonders, she actually shut Ruby up . “Maybe you can t-talk some s-sense into her. It’s her stepmother.”

“Choquefort?” His nose wrinkled. “Yeah, she’s a piece of work; Mom says she’s a barracuda. But . . .” He stopped, a curious look spreading over his face. Ellie swayed, wishing Cami was still holding her elbow. It was somehow easier to move with the two of them bracketing her—and when had she become the meat of the sandwich? That was always Cami’s job. “Huh.”

There, in front of the school and everyone, he stepped forward. Ellie almost flinched, but his fingers were on her cheek, warm and gentle. He stared into her eyes for what seemed an eternity, and she had time to see the threads of gold in the dark forest-green and brown of his irises, and the faint dusting of freckles across his tanned nose. Even his skin held some gold, and she felt a dozy sort of surprise.

“Mithrus,” he breathed. “I think I’d better take her to a stitcher.”

“Is it that b-bad?” The fear in Cami’s tone mixed with a tide of whispers and pointing.

Ellie didn’t care. Some strained muscle inside her had been tearing, and when it finally gave way she leaned forward with a sigh, and her forehead hit Avery’s shoulder. He was solid and comforting, and for a moment she wondered how the weedy little kid she’d known had turned into this wall.

There was a subtle click , as if the world had stopped, some linchpin dropping into place. Ellie exhaled, and maybe Fletcher was stiff with shock. He just stood there for a moment, and she heard Cami speaking. It wasn’t important. What was important was that the spinning had stopped, and for a moment she could really, truly rest. The inside of her skull wasn’t full of noise now. Instead, it felt like her head was full of brain again. A heaviness, meaty and comforting.

Just a little unwelcome, too, because it meant she had to use the heaviness to think, to plan. Something . . .

Something is very wrong with me.

“You can follow if you want.” Avery sounded amused, and very calm. “But I plan on driving pretty fast, de Varre.”

What am I doing? Her entire body ached, and the little tingles all over her were a product of his nearness. Why did he do that? Was it just because he was a charmer from a pretty powerful clan, or was it something . . . personal . . . about him?

Did it matter? So far, the Strep hadn’t twigged to the fact that Ellie had tampered with the blacklove charm. If she did find out, or if she got any breath of Ellie hanging out with Avery Fletcher . . .