Lili St Crow - Nameless

Right now, though, that wasn’t her problem. You keep picking fights and the Family might do something big to you . “I w-wish you’d b-be c-careful.” Rain swept the window, restlessly, false summer fled as if it had never been. Ellie was grounded again, the Strep using some bullshit something-or-another; Ruby’s grandmother had caught her sneaking out of her window at midnight so she was grounded too, and Nico was . . . Nico.

“Your tang’s all tungled again.” Nico propped his head up on a pillow dragged from his hacked-up bed and waggled his eyebrows. His suite had been in dark green, a Family Heir’s traditional color. Nico, however, had taken black spray paint and an edge to pretty much everything, and after a while Papa had told Marya not to repair or redecorate.

Marya obeyed, of course. But she also tried sneaking pillows and pretty things up to make Nico happy. Cami could have told her it was useless. When he was determined to be an ass, there was just nothing to be done about it.

“You’re mean .” At least she didn’t stutter over that . It was all she could say.

He ground out the Gitanelle and curled up to sit cross-legged, his eyes dark. “I’m sorry.”

It was the same conversation, started so many years ago. You’ll never be a pureblood! I hate you!

You’re m-mean, she’d yelled back, shocked at her own daring but on fire with the injustice. They were the first words she’d spoken since coming to live in the house on Haven Hill, and Nico had balled up his small fists. Coming home from yet another expensive boarding school for the winter holidays and finding everything suddenly arranged around another child hadn’t been high on his list of favorite things, and he’d even shown his baby fangs.

But Cami had flinched, her eyes widening, and Nico had immediately dropped his hands. He had stared, horrified, as she shrank back, his mouth falling open and his fangs retracting. Don’t . . . hey. Oh, hey. Don’t cry. Drawing himself up, little-boy proud. You don’t have to cry. I don’t hate you.

Marya had found them an hour and a half later, curled up together in a faded-rose, velvet-curtained window seat in the dim whisper-haunted library, Nico stroking Cami’s long black hair soothingly, both of them sleepy-eyed. Cami had blinked, slowly, and said M-m-Marya, pointing like a toddler.

That’s right, Nico had replied. Marya. Book. Candle. Nico.

M-Marya. B-book. C-c-c-candle. Nico.

“I’m sorry,” he repeated. “Mithrus. I don’t mean to be. Not to you.”

Everyone else, but not me? “I kn-know.” She was curled in the one leather chair he hadn’t taken a straight razor to, her special chair in his room. Big and wide, and deep enough for both of them as children, it was a smaller ship to sail rougher seas now.

Thunder muttered in the distance. The storm was sweeping in. Nico sighed, hauled himself up, and turned out the electric lights. He moved around, lighting candles and sticking them anyhow in a collection of holders or just in built-up wax charm-softened with a muttered curse.

Family didn’t Twist, like fey. There were other dangers—the sickness of too much Borrowing, the Kiss finding one of them unworthy, a faust’s terrible fire-breath doing what the sun couldn’t to daywalkers and Unbreathing alike. Also like fey, their Potential was a part of what made them . . . different, and they swam in it without worrying about anything toxic.

Except the Waste. They were human enough to have to worry about that, at least.

He knocked a chunk of wax down from his scarred wooden dresser, kicked it skittering across the room. Why shouldn’t I ruin things? he’d said, bitterly, once. None of it matters. It’s just stuff.

It m-matters , she’d replied. It’s b-b-beautiful .

Not to me . And there they had left it.

When he had enough candles lit to suit him, he crouched in front of the chair, watching her, mossy eyes dark. They played the game, holding eye contact for as long as possible, until their breathing melted together. When he shifted his weight she shifted too, and in a little bit he let out a long sigh and settled down on his knees. He leaned into the chair, and Cami stroked his hair, pushing her fingers through the dark waves. The candleflames danced like charmer’s foxfire, and when she shivered he did too.

“Book.” His tone was soft, thoughtful.

“B-book.”

“Candle.”

“C-c-candle.”

“Nico.”

“Nico.”

“See? All better.”

Even if it wasn’t a real charm, it worked. “You’re so angry.”

“Born that way.”

Maybe you were. “We l-love you.”

“ You do. Them? I’m just another piece to shove into the Seven.”

“They may not. If you . . . ” Her throat refused to fill with the words. She couldn’t imagine what they would do to him, but it would be dire. The “punishments” administered when he incurred Papa’s displeasure were bad enough.

“So what? They fire me from the Seven. From being the Heir. We go to the Island.”

Another childhood game. So he wanted to be kids again tonight. She gave him the next line, gently. “And h-how will w-we eat?”

“You’ll pick fruit. I’ll hunt. At night we’ll share, and you’ll be Family.”

I can’t be Family. I wasn’t born in. But she still smiled. “How?”

“I’ll find a Waste-witch to make you. Or we’ll get my heartstone and make you into a leman; I’ll hunt for you, and you can Borrow from me. Then we’ll live until the Kiss comes, and we’ll be Elders together on our very own island. Move it.” He clambered up, and they squeezed together in the chair. Rain poured down the windows. His breath was hot on her neck, and she closed her eyes. This was part of the game too, relaxing until they were one heartbeat, and the flutter inside her skull was the silent brush of his strange dark fiery thoughts. He shifted so she wasn’t hitting anything sensitive in his lap, and she fought back a hot blush.

“Where will we l-live?” she whispered.

“We’ll build a hut from palm stuff. Like in Crusoe the Man-eater . We won’t need it, though. It’s warm on the Island.”

She could almost pretend to be nine again, small and safe. “Trop-pical r-rains.”

“The jungle’s thick. We’ll be okay.” He paused. “You really are upset.”

Now she could tell him. He wasn’t likely to go flying out to find the wooden man and do something awful. “The w-wooden m-man. At L-l-lou’s.”

“Wooden . . . oh, that ? He was probably just a drunk jack. I was there, right?”

Do you think I would go there alone? “His eyes. B-blue.”

“Lots of people have blue eyes, babygirl.”

“ R-r-really b-blue. L-l-like m-m-m-m—”

“You’re not a jack. Or a Twist. You’d be one by now, if you were going to.”

That’s not what I mean. He recognized me from somewhere. She made a helpless movement.

But he just forged on ahead, as usual. “I don’t care where you came from. You’re with me. That’s all.”

“S-something’s h-happening.” It’s not just the wooden man. It was his eyes. And something else. Everything’s wrong. She’d felt this when Papa first took to bed in the Red Room months ago, a strange shifting sensation like the ground crumbling beneath her.

And it was getting worse.

“It’s Papa.” For once, he didn’t sound bitter. “He’s really close. And you think without him . . . Christ, Cami. Don’t worry so much. Family doesn’t give up what’s theirs.”