“I’m sure Sara could tell you about her, if they were best friends.”
“Sara Skonos can’t speak, Mare.”
“At all?”
Cal continues slowly, in the level, calm voice his father uses. “She said things she shouldn’t have, terrible lies, and she was punished for it.”
Horror bleeds through me. Can’t speak. “What did she say?”
In a single heartbeat, Cal goes cold under my fingers. He draws back, stepping out of my arms as the music finally dies. With quick motions, he pockets the speaker, and there is nothing but our beating hearts to fill the silence.
“I don’t want to talk about her anymore.” He breathes heavily. His eyes seem oddly bright, flickering between me and the windows full of moonlight.
Something twists in my heart; the pain in his voice hurts me. “Okay.”
With quick, deliberate steps, he moves toward the door like he’s trying very hard not to run. But when he turns back around and faces me across the room, he looks the same as usual—calm, collected, detached.
“Practice your steps,” he says, sounding very much like Lady Blonos. “Same time tomorrow.” And then he’s gone, leaving me alone in a room full of echoes.
“What the hell am I doing?” I mutter to no one but myself.
I’m halfway to my bed before I realize something is very wrong with my room: the cameras are off. Not a single one hums at me, seeing with electric eyes, recording everything I do. But unlike the outage before, everything else around me still buzzes along. Electricity still pulses through the walls, to every room but mine.
Farley.
But instead of the revolutionary, Maven steps out of the darkness. He throws aside the curtains, letting in enough moonlight to see by.
“Late-night walk?” he says with a bitter smile.
My mouth falls open, struggling for words. “You know you’re not supposed to be in here.” I force a smile, hoping to calm myself. “Lady Blonos will be scandalized. She’ll punish us both.”
“Mother’s men owe me a favor or two,” he says, pointing to where the cameras are hidden. “Blonos won’t have evidence to convict.”
Somehow that doesn’t comfort me. Instead, I feel shivers run over my skin. Not in fear though, but anticipation. The shivers deepen, electrifying my nerves like my lightning as Maven takes measured steps toward me.
He watches me blush with what looks like satisfaction. “Sometimes I forget,” he murmurs, letting a hand touch my cheek. It lingers, like he can feel the color that pulses in my veins. “I wish they wouldn’t have to paint you up every day.”
My skin buzzes under his fingers, but I try to ignore it. “That makes two of us.”
His lips twist, trying to form a smile, but it just won’t come.
“What’s wrong?”
“Farley made contact again.” He draws back, shoving his hands into his pockets to hide trembling fingers. “You weren’t here.”
Just my luck. “What did she say?”
Maven shrugs. He walks to the window, staring out at the night sky. “She spent most of her time asking questions.”
Targets. She must’ve pressed him again, asking for information Maven didn’t want to give. I can tell by the droop of his shoulders, the tremor in his voice, that he said more than he wanted to. A lot more.
“Who?” My mind flies to the many Silvers I’ve met here, the ones who have been kind to me, in their own way. Would any of them be a sacrifice to her revolution? Who would be marked?
“Maven, who did you give up?”
He spins around, a ferocity I’ve never seen flashing in his eyes. For a second, I’m afraid he might burst into flames. “I didn’t want to do it, but she’s right. We can’t sit still, we have to act. And if that means I’m going to give her people, I’m going to do it. I won’t like it, but I will. And I have.”
Like Cal, he draws a shaky breath in an attempt to calm himself. “I sit on councils with my father, for taxes and security and defense. I know who will be missed by my—by the Silvers. I gave her four names.”
“Who?”
“Reynald Iral. Ptolemus Samos. Ellyn Macanthos. Belicos Lerolan.”
A sigh escapes me, before I feel myself nod. These deaths will not be hidden. Evangeline’s brother, the colonel—they will be missed indeed. “Colonel Macanthos knew your mother was lying. She knows about the other attacks—”
“She commands a half legion and heads the war council. Without her, the front will be a mess for months.”
“The front?” Cal. His legion.
Maven nods. “My father will not send his heir to war after this. An attack so close to home, I doubt he’ll even let him out of sight of the capital.”