And with the swift flick of a blade, the driftwood man slices the skin over the embed at the base of my throat. “Congratulations!” he calls out, plucking it from my chest and holding it, bloody and blinking, in his open hand. “Welcome to the Race of Oblivion!”
Three
Since the day I signed up to race, everywhere I go, I feel the breath of Death on the back of my neck. But tonight is the first I hear its footsteps.
I notice them just as a thick cloud rolls across the sky, snuffing out the moonlight as abruptly as switching off a lamp. The night was dim before but now it’s truly dark, and not with the soft, velvety sort of darkness that fills a house when the doors are all locked. This is the sort of darkness that sends a shiver across your skin, even though the air is still warm.
I pause at the next corner, and I curse myself when I can’t help but glance over my shoulder. The streetlights throw meager halos of light. Whoever is following doesn’t mean to be seen.
Now I wish I’d never turned. What did I hope to see? A citizen of this quiet block, conscientiously sweeping her stoop after dark? It’s late, later than honest people walk the streets to do honest business. But if the footsteps belonged to a thief, wouldn’t he have made his move by now? Which leaves only one possibility. I feel Death’s breath once more against the skin of my neck, even if I know it’s just the warm breeze, and I realize it won’t matter if I hurry or if I drag.
If it’s them, there’s nothing I can do to escape.
I slide my hand between the silky folds of my skirt—the remnant of a once-fine tablecloth that caught too many spills—and close my fingers around the key in my pocket. As the moon slips out from behind its cover, the castle gate materializes in the distance, the black iron glowing silver. I’m almost there.
But then I hear my name behind me . . . Astrid. The voice is both soft and sharp, and it cuts right through me like a velvet knife.
I know the voice before I turn, and I can tell she is agitated and excited about all the wrong things.
“What are you doing here?” I glare at Princess Renya, intending to bore holes into her with my stare, but she doesn’t even flinch. “If you’re found outside the palace wall at this time of night, I may never recover from the lashing.” I spin back around to pour my full attention into opening the lock. “How did you end up behind me?”
“I came looking for you—”
“I said I’d be back by curfew, and there’s still an hour to go,” I say, trying to keep the fury out of my voice.
“It couldn’t wait. I had to find you before somebody else did—”
“Shh!” I pause, listening for guards patrolling beyond the wall. There’s only the weak breeze and the flutter of a solitary bat. “Just wait until I get us both inside—”
“No. We can’t. You can’t.” I feel the tension rise from Renya’s skin like mist rising from a lake. She leans so close her lips brush my ear. “They came for you.”
I pull back. “All right then.”
“You’re scared.”
“I’m not,” I lie. Maybe to myself more than to her. “Even when I heard your footfalls on the pavement tonight, I thought it might be them. I’m ready.”
“You say that only because you haven’t seen them. I have.”
I turn my attention back to the gate—this conversation is futile, I won’t be turned from my path—but my hand shakes so much, Renya nudges me aside and takes the key. As she does I feel her fear, cold and dark as the ocean. Of course, this close, I know she feels the same in me, though I can’t help but hope that mine isn’t so deep and lush.
“I’m glad you’re scared. You should be,” she says, pocketing the key somewhere in the layers of pale blue gauze that make up her dress.
“What are you . . . ?” I huff out a sigh. We’re so close to safety, but she keeps pushing it away. “Keys work better when they’re not in pockets—”
“We’re not going inside until I’ve talked you out of this,” she says, before stalking off into the dark. I have no choice but to follow her, and she knows it.
I might appreciate the princess’s lack of respect for authority if it didn’t affect me so directly. If the stories of her many rebellions weren’t written in the scars on my back. But they are, and my resentment of her grows a little deeper every time she refuses to conform.
She takes a narrow path along the base of the palace wall, to a place where a wild stretch of land slopes downhill, overlooking the city. It would be a gorgeous view if I weren’t so sick to my stomach. I hear her feet as she shuffles off the flagstones and onto the grass. “Renya?” I breathe. “Please stop.” When I finally catch up to her, she’s seated under an olive tree, the moonlight glowing in her auburn waves, which tonight are wild and messy. She smiles up at me, a sly, apologetic smile. I don’t return it.
“Do you think this is helping me? I need to go back. You need to go back,” I say. “Do you want me whipped on the night they take me?”
“I don’t want you to go at all! I’ve seen them, Astrid. Their long cloaks. Their hooded faces. The syringes in their hands.”
She doesn’t have to name them. I know she’s talking about the Asps, the men and women who administer the drug to the contestants in the Race of Oblivion. The drug that will knock me out. The drug that will rob me of my identity by erasing all my personal memories. Since I signed up to race, too many people have made a point of telling me how terrifying the Asps are, but Renya’s description goes a bit too far. “Syringes in their hands? Really? I find it hard to believe they walk around carrying them—”
“Stop making light of this!”
I’m about to plead with Renya again to lower her voice, but she catches herself. Casting a glance at the palace wall, she drops her voice to a whisper. “Do you even know why their faces are hooded?”
“Renya—”
“To protect their identities! Because when you come back to yourself—when you finally remember who you are and realize what’s been done to you—they could be the first on your list of targets for revenge.”
If I live to seek revenge, I think to myself. Fortunately, Renya can read my moods but not my thoughts. “I won’t need revenge,” I say instead, “because I intend to win.”
Renya climbs to her feet. “I know you think you can win because you have Cientia—”
“Renya, please. Please be quiet!”
“I can feel your confidence. How sure you are of yourself,” she says, but I don’t like the way she says it. Like she doesn’t share my confidence.
“It’s not just the Cientia. You know I’m a strong fighter—”
“I know you’ve been my sparring partner at Hearts and Hands—”
“I’ve been your sparring partner who beats you at Hearts and Hands.” Enchanteds are mad about Hearts and Hands, because it’s an intense test of fighting skills and magic. Renya and I practice behind closed doors, of course, and she’s gotten good, but I’m better. “I don’t just have Cientia. I have Cientia honed for battle. I’ve had the best training, thanks to you.”