Page 89 of What Blooms from Death

“What do you mean bysuspicions?” I asked. “And why haven’t you mentioned anything about them before now?”

She didn’t reply, instead returning to her task of assessing and adjusting her staff’s gems.

Farren and Rowen tensed and sat up straighter, their fingers dancing over the hilts of their sheathed swords.

Zayn rose from the chair he’d been carelessly lounging in. He was still smiling as he stepped toward Thalia, as per usual, but this was the sharp, slightly feral smile that usually came before he pounced on an unsuspecting victim. “I think we’ve all had enough of your half-truths and evasive answers to things.”

“I’m taking you to better answers,” she insisted, leveling a glare on him. “But there were things I needed to arrange, first—and none of those things can be spoken of in any detail as long as we’re here.” She lifted her chin. “If it makes you feel any better,that’swhat Kaelen and I were arguing about as well—myhalf-truths and evasive answers. I wouldn’t tell him everything he wanted to know. Which is why I’m sure he plans to keep Nova here as long as he can, to bleed what truths he can from her.” She fixed me with a hard stare. “And you shouldn’t have let her out of your sight.”

“I am not her bodyguard,” I growled, despite the uneasiness the words caused me.

Iwasn’tresponsible for her.

But I couldn’t deny the regret and concern settling heavily in my chest.

I shouldn’t have let her go.

I stood, carefully slipping out of my coat and sliding it underneath Red’s head to keep her from waking. Pacing the yard, I tried to come up with a rational next move. It had been a well-honed skill of mine, once upon a time—the ability to make plans in the face of any disruption or danger. But now…

I felt unbalanced.

Even when she wasn’t close to me, her infuriating chaos persisted.

Farren started to offer up a plan, only to be interrupted by a low growl as Nova’s ghostly dog rose to his feet. The beast sniffed the air, his body rippling with dark energy, the solid form underneath growing more and more fluid. The distress rolling off him was palpable. The heaviness in my chest grew worse as I watched him, wishing I shared Nova’s ability to hear his thoughts.

He stayed in his dog-like form but grew larger, his chest rumbling with another restless growl. His pale eyes shifted in my direction, staring without blinking, as if trying to force whatever he needed to say directly into my mind.

“…Something’s happened to her, hasn’t it?”

He let out a low whine.

In the same moment, the flames in the torches along the manor’s face began to flicker, to dance and fluctuate and eventually flare brighter.

Thalia stared at the flames, wincing at their brightness, her face finally betraying a hint of emotion—fear.

“What does that mean?” I demanded.

She took a deep breath, as though preparing to plunge into deep water. “It means go grab your things. Quickly. We need to find Nova and get away from this place.Now.”

While Rowenand Farren collected our belongings and followed Thalia out of the city, Zayn and I made our way through the manor’s grounds, scrambling to keep up with Phantom as he tracked his master down.

Thalia had taken Red with her, instructing us to meet them at the northern gate of the city. She’d given us hasty directions, an even more hastily-drawn map, and we’d parted ways before anybody could second-guess our escape plans.

The sky was the color of dark rust. The air smelled like the smoke wafting off the blue flames all around us, and it seemed to sizzle with something volatile. I pressed against a rough stone wall of the manor’s dead gardens, watching shadows flicker and warp in the light of the shifting fires—fires that were suddenly brighter, just as they had been in the courtyard.

“Is it just me,” I began as Zayn caught up to me, “or does every damn day in this realm somehow end up worse than the last?”

“We’ve made our way through more dire things than this, surely,” he said.

Ever the fucking optimist.

“Have we, though?”

“All this sneaking around actually reminds me a bit of home.”

“How could itpossiblymake you think of home?”

“The countless times I snuck my way out of whatever boring duties they tried to saddle me with…this labyrinth around us reminds me a bit of the gardens in the Graystone District, even. Don’t you recall any of our late-night escapades into the seedier sections of Solaryn?”

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