Page 29 of Spearcrest Saints

“Theodora Dorokhova.” He speaks my name solemnly, like a vow. His face is inches from mine. Is he going to kiss me? I dread a kiss—I long for one. My heartbeat is the flapping wings of a trapped butterfly. I hold my breath, suspended between hope and terror.

Zachary’s words brush against my lips, more intimate than any kiss. “My beautiful nemesis. My formidable adversary. My dearest rival.”

Kiss me, I want to tell him.Kiss me open, Zachary Blackwood, and take all my darkness and cold and pain away.

He doesn’t, and in the end, I’m the one who whirls around in the darkness and runs fearfully away through the trees.

But when I revisit it that night in my dreams, he does kiss me. He kisses me deep and wet and tender and lays me open on the forest floor to fill me with him like Danaë’s golden rain, and I wake up in a shock of loneliness, hot wetness between my thighs.

Chapter 13

Left Hand

Zachary

Inthebriefsummerof freedom between the end of GCSEs and the start of A-levels, I readPeter Pan.

It’s better than I imagined it would be, but reading it is nevertheless a joyless task. I annotate it obsessively, scrutinising every line for insights into Theodora’s mind.

By the time I finish the book, the fore-edge is a dense forest of tabs.

Amongst the forest, the red tabs reign supreme—they are the tabs I used to denote passages regarding James Hook.

In the drunken mist of that evening in the woods—the search for Theodora amongst the trees, the heavy drinking afterwards, egged on by my friends, then glimpsing her gliding fey-like away from the bonfire in a flutter of feathers and skirts—one memory stands out among the rest.

Theodora’s pretty smile emerging from the shadows to tell me she had a childhood crush on James Hook.

It was the first time Theodora ever told me something conversational, pointless—personal. Every time I speak with Theodora, it’s to debate or argue or discuss. She never just tells me things about herself. I could teach an entire curriculum of Theodora’s debating style, her oracy, the words, terms and arguments she favours, the philosophers and historical figures she draws inspiration from.

But if I were to sit down and write a list of facts about her, I wouldn’t even get past the basics. I have no idea what month her birthday falls in, what her favourite colour might be, or if she likes animals. She might be a single child, or she might have many siblings—I would never know.

So this unexpected reveal about Hook isn’t just a random fact. It’s a precious nugget of knowledge, a treasure I never hoped to gain. And now I have one, I want more; I want a treasure chest full of glittering nuggets of information.

I re-read Hook’s death scene several times over.

Irrational anger fills me with every quote. Quotes like “That passionate breast no longer asked for life” and “Not wholly unheroic figure” seem to taunt me. Tragedy and dignity, elegance and despair—this is my impression of the death scene. Is that what appeals to Theodora?

I re-read the chapter, angrily seeking signs of myself in Hook.

Zahara enters the library—which is more of a mixture of a home office and a lounge but gets its nickname because it’s furnished floor to ceiling with bookshelves filled to the brim. She’s home from Sainte-Agnès, the private girls’ school she’s attending in France, although she’ll only be home for a few days before she goes off to some summer camp.

Every time I see her, she looks less like the little girl of my memories and more like a stranger.

She’s taller now, graceful as a dancer, dressed in the preppy style of a private school girl. Her hair is long, well past her shoulders, a nimbus around her head, then looser curls down her back, the black streaked with warm shades of caramel and russet.

“I thought I’d find you here,” she declares. “What are you reading now?”

I lift my book to show her the cover. Her eyebrows shoot up. “Peter Pan? Didn’t think that would be your cup of tea.”

“It’s not,” I tell her, snapping the book shut. “Do you think Hook is an attractive character?”

She smirks. “I suppose—dangerous man, tragic figure… that hook. Every girl loves a villain.” She perches herself on the leather-top surface of the enormous desk and frowns down at me as I let my head roll back into the desk chair. “What is this about? Homework?”

“No, not homework. There’s this girl in my year—it’s her favourite book.”

“Oh, Theodora?” Zahara gives me a pointed look and rolls her eyes. “You can just say her name, you know. It’s not like you ever talk about anybody else.”

“She’s the girl who keeps tying with me for top of our classes.”

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