Page 47 of City of Secrets and Shadows
“I don’t want to lose you,” I admitted quietly.
Tarshi’s expression softened. He stepped forward, cupping my face in his hands. “You won’t lose me. I knew what I was gettinginto with you from the beginning.” His thumbs brushed my cheekbones gently. “But I can’t pretend it doesn’t hurt to be sent away like this.”
“I’m not sending you away because I want to,” I said, leaning into his touch. “I’m afraid of what might happen if he finds us together.”
“I know.” He pressed his forehead to mine. “That’s what makes it worse. Even here, even now, my people are never safe. Always hiding, always less than.” His voice tightened. “Always expendable.”
“You’re not expendable to me,” I whispered fiercely.
He smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “Then perhaps someday you won’t feel the need to hide me away.” He kissed me once more, softly, before stepping back. “But I understand the world we live in. The choices we must make to survive it.”
I reached for him, not wanting him to leave like this, with this wounded acceptance that felt worse than anger. “Tarshi—”
“It’s alright, Livia,” he said, already moving toward the door. “We play the roles we must. It’s how we’ve both survived this long.” His hand rested on the latch. “I’ll adapt, as I always have.”
“I don’t want you to have to adapt,” I said, frustration and guilt twisting inside me. “I want things to be different.”
“As do I.” His smile held genuine affection now, though tinged with sadness. “Perhaps someday they will be. Until then…” He opened the door a crack, checking the hallway. “Until then, we take what moments we can.”
He slipped out as silently as he’d arrived, leaving me alone. I sank onto the edge of my bed, guilt washing over me in waves. I hadn’t handled that well. I’d hurt him, justified it with practicality, with mission necessities. But the truth was more complicated. Part of me had wanted Septimus to come tonight. Had wanted to explore what had begun between us earlier today.
And that meant I’d chosen Septimus over Tarshi, at least for tonight. Not because I cared for one more than the other, but because... because what? Because Septimus demanded it? Because I feared his reaction? Because it was easier to appease the dangerous one?
What did that say about me?
I lay back on the bed, staring at the ceiling. The fine linens felt suddenly abrasive against my skin, the luxury of the room oppressive rather than comforting. I had become what I needed to become to survive, to pursue my mission. But at what cost?
13
Islipped out of the academy like a ghost, my footsteps silent against the polished marble. The hallways were deserted, most students either asleep or engaged in late-night study sessions or revelry behind closed doors. Only the occasional guard stood watch, and they paid little attention to a slave leaving after duties were complete. The night air hit my face like a slap, cool and bracing. I welcomed the sting of it. Better than the hollowness expanding in my chest where Livia’s words still echoed. Fear for what Septimus might do.
I understood her reasons. Of course I did. Survival in the Empire demanded compromises, especially for those of us born with the wrong blood. But understanding didn't lessen the ache.
“Always last,” I muttered, kicking a stone and watching it skitter across the cobblestones. “Always fucking last.”
My feet carried me without direction, away from the academy district with its clean streets and imperious architecture. Down, always down, toward the lower quarters where the stink of the tanneries and fisheries mingled with the sweat of the desperate. Where Imperial guards ventured only in pairs or more, andwhere those with Talfen blood could sometimes, briefly, forget they were conquered. These places struggled and gasped for air beneath the Empire’s boot.
My boots scuffed against loose stones. I hadn’t paid attention to where I was going, simply putting distance between myself and the academy. Between myself and Livia, waiting in her room for Septimus. Septimus would be there by now, his arrogant hands claiming what moments ago had been mine. I could see her in my mind, opening the door to him, letting that stola slide off her shoulders, revealing the hard, strong beauty beneath. I could almost see the smug look in his eyes as he watched her. My mind twisted like a knife in my own gut, forcing images I couldn’t escape. I could see it with sickening clarity — his fingers tracing her skin where my lips had been, his mouth on hers, tasting me without knowing it. Would he fuck her roughly? Would she fake her pleasure, those soft sounds she made with me now performed for him? The thought of him inside her made me want to vomit, to scream, to put my fist through stone. I hated him with a fury that burned like acid in my veins. Hated that he could walk through the front door while I skulked through servants’ passages. Hated that he didn't have to savour each moment with her because he assumed there would always be more. Bastard. I wanted to tear that smug satisfaction from his face, to make him bleed, to make him beg. I quickened my pace, bile rising in my throat, my jealousy a living, breathing monster clawing at my insides.
Marcus would have understood if he’d discovered Livia and me together. There would have been confusion and maybe disgust, but he was not cruel and he’d always treated me as human. Had I been found in Livia’s bed by Marcus, we would have eventually reached some kind of understanding, I was sure. But Septimus...
My hands clenched involuntarily at the thought of him. Septimus, with his perfect chiselled jaw and cold eyes. With a strong athletic body like one of the gods. The one who’d escaped the arena the same as I had, but whose human blood meant he could walk freely in daylight while I remained a shadow. A slave to my bloodline. We’d both worn the same chains, felt the same lash on our backs, but his light brown skin, the white of his eyes, the rounded tips of his ears; all of these had given him something I could never claim — acceptance in any kind of society.
I hated him. Hated his casual cruelty toward my people. Hated the way he looked through me rather than at me. Hated how he claimed Livia as if she were a possession to be owned rather than a woman to be cherished.
Yet beneath that hatred lay something disturbing — a current of tension whenever we occupied the same space. A violent energy that hummed between us. Sometimes I imagined confronting him, alone, away from Livia and Marcus. I imagined the hatred between us exploding into something physical — fists and teeth and blood, pain transforming into a different kind of release. The thought both repulsed and compelled me, like pressing on a bruise to feel its boundaries.
What did that make me? To hate a man and still feel this pull toward him?
I found myself in a small square, its centre marked by a fountain that had likely been grand once. Now it gurgled weakly, water trickling from a cracked stone basin. I stared into its shallow pool, finding my reflection in the rippling surface.
Short white hair — the colour all Talfen were born with, a stark contrast to my ebony skin. Sharp features that humans sometimes found beautiful and sometimes found alien. And my eyes — solid black pools that betrayed my bloodline more clearly than anything else. No whites, no visible iris. Just darkness.
My mother had called my eyes “night mirrors,” claiming they reflected the eternal darkness from which our ancestors had emerged. “You see differently because you come from the stars,” she would say, stroking my hair as a child. My heart ached for her suddenly, my memories of her always tainted by the memory of her body, battered and bloody after the Imperial soldiers had violated her over and over until her body finally gave out.
If anyone understood Livia’s need for vengeance it was me, and the more she spoke of it, the more I envied her drive for it. I had never even considered it, too beaten down, too despairing, but Livia gave me hope. Hope for the blood of the man who tormented those like me.
But now, staring at my reflection, I felt a momentary, shameful wish — what if my eyes were normal? What if I could walk the streets without immediately being marked as other? What if Livia didn’t have to choose between me and her safety?
