Page 16 of A Heart of Bluestone

But I always thought it meant I was a little less pretty than I was meant to be. If I had been prettier, then maybe it would have made up for the deadblood shame.

I’m sure I bring shame to my family.

It’s a gut-clearing thought, one I throw away as quickly as it landed in my mind. Never let myself simmer in that.

I loosen a breath and blink back to my surroundings.

The gondola is only halfway up the mountain.

It’s starting to steam from the cold outside the higher up the mountain we glide. But I can make out the snow-dusted blur of Bluestone in the distance.

An odd structure. Somewhere between a chalet and a château. Restorations and expansions over the centuries have created this mansion of blackwood, of towers, of eight levels and spanning grounds.

I look at it now, and I should see the warmth of orange glows behind the windows, of lit lantern posts and excited students spilling out of the gondolas.

Instead, I see hell.

Icy prickles crawl down my bones, all the way to my toes. Instinct curls them in my boots.

I hug myself, the fur of my coat tickling my nose the way those tendrils of anxiety irk my insides.

Dread.

Pure, unfiltered dread flooding me.

And I can pin it all on the Snakes.

Dray, specifically.

I wonder if it wasn’t for him, would the others come after me as fiercely as they do? Or would I be subjected to mere pranks, little things like sticky, smelly potions poured into my backpack, or sweets stuck to my hair?

I let myself wonder, if he hadn’t triggered it all that very first day in the gondola waiting zone, our very first day at Bluestone, when we were thirteen—would my life be as miserable as it is?

The ache shreds my chest.

The memory is as fresh as yesterday, or even fresher, because yesterday I was shopping on Regent Street, and I have to concentrate to recall the shops I visited, but for the memory of Dray’s turn on me, I remember everything. The way the rain fell onto his tousled, sawdust hair, the glass-blue of his eyes softer in the striking backdrop of the Alps, the pink of his full mouth faded in the cold.

I remember the way he turned on me in the queue. The way he looked down on me, a furrowed crease between his brows, a mix of confusion and utter outrage.

Then the shove.

The slam of his hand on my chest that had me tumbling back—and I landed on my bottom in the snow.

“Waifs go to the back queue.”

The stares are forever burned into my mind. Etched into the curves of my brain. Serena, my friend, the closest friend I had, she just looked down her nose at me. Her expression was unchanged, unfazed, as though I was little more than a menu that was set down too loudly on a table at a restaurant.

Landon scoffed, and it jerked his shoulders.

My brother frowned. I thought—for a quick-to-die moment—that he was going to reach out for me, offer me his hand and help me up.

He didn’t.

He just frowned at me.

Now, I understand.

He was regaining balance in this turn of dynamics.

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