My family and Leo’s both come to the airport to see us off.
Aunt Yelena looks pale and strained. I know she doesn’t want Leo to go to Kingmakers. She thinks it’s dangerous.
She would know—after all, she was Bratva. They send more children to Kingmakers than anyone.
It’s supposed to be a kind of sanctuary. A temporary detente between the grudges and rivalries of the various families. But for the children of criminals, rules are made to be broken. Even the school’s motto Necessitas Non Habet Legem means Necessity Has No Law.
Besides that, our acceptance letters came with a list of strict school rules along with their accompanying punishments. Our parents had to sign the contract for the Rule of Recompense, and so did Leo and I. We had to press our print in blood to the bottom of the page. It means that we submit to the authority of the school.
If we get ourselves in trouble, we’ll be disciplined by the Chancellor. He is—quite literally—judge, jury, and executioner. Our parents can’t intervene or retaliate.
As usual, Leo seems completely unconcerned by any of that. He hugs both his parents, lifting his mother off her feet and kissing her hard on both cheeks.
Aunt Yelena blinks like she’s forcing her eyes not to tear up.
“Be careful, Leo,” she says.
He shrugs that off, not even bothering to pretend like he’ll try.
“Love you, Mom,” he says.
Cara puts her arms around my shoulders and squeezes me tight, while Whelan does the same with his arms around my waist.
I feel the worst about leaving Cara. She doesn’t let many people in. I know she’ll be lonely without me, even if she never complains.
“Why can’t I go?” Whelan demands.
“Because you’re six,” my father says calmly.
“That’s not fair!”
“It’s the epitome of fair. You can go at eighteen, exactly like your sister.”
“It’s not fair that I’m not eighteen,” Whelan mutters under his breath, knowing not to push our father too far.
Whelan is the only one of us who got my mother’s freckles and green eyes. They look much wilder on him because he’s a little demon in human form. His copper-colored hair is always sticking up, and you can’t tell what’s freckles and what’s dirt on his face. Even though he’s stocky, he’s fast as hell and surprisingly strong.
Cara is slim like me, medium height, with pale blue eyes. She’s got darker hair than the rest of us, so brown it’s almost black. She didn’t speak until she was four, and even now you might be forgiven for thinking she still hasn’t learned to do it.
“Can you call me on the weekends?” she asks me quietly.
“I think so,” I say.
“Just write if you can’t,” she says.
“I will,” I promise.
My mother hugs me, too. She always smells clean and fresh, like the inside of a flower blossom.
“I’m starting to regret this already,” she says. “Because I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll try to find somewhere to practice on campus,” I say.
“I never had to worry about you practicing,” my mother says, shaking her head. “Sleeping, on the other hand . . .”
“I’ll try to find time for that, too,” I smile.
Leo and I board the plane, sitting next to each other in the second row of First Class. Nobody else our age is flying from Chicago to Frankfurt. We’re the only mafia children from our city going to Kingmakers this year.
We do know one person who’s already there: our cousin Miles.
He’s a year older than us and left last September. He came back home over the summer, but we’re not on the same flight going back out, because Freshmen start a week later than everybody else.
Technically Leo and I are cousins, though not by blood.
His father’s sister is married to my mother’s brother.
It’s complicated, and nobody at school could ever understand it when we tried to explain. They all just accepted that we were family, which was fine, because that’s how our own family views us. I’ve always called his parents Uncle Seb and Aunt Yelena, and he’s always called mine Uncle Miko and Aunt Nessa. He loves my little siblings and is the same toward them as he is to me: teasing, friendly, and occasionally exasperating.
Like right now on the plane. Leo seizes my packet of pretzels—having already eaten his own—and tears them open with his teeth.
“In your dreams,” I say, snatching them back. “I’m hungry, too.”
“Then why haven’t you eaten them yet?” He grins.
“Because I’m not a rabid animal that inhales food in five seconds.”
“You would if you were as big as me,” he says, trying to steal them back again.
He’s fast as fuck, but so am I. I manage to keep the torn packet away from his grasping fingers, just barely.
“Paws off,” I say. “And don’t be thinking you’re going to put your elbow over that armrest, either. I don’t care how big you are, you’re not using any of my precious personal space on this flight.”
“You’ve gotta be kidding. Look at these legs!” Leo cries, sprawling out his massive thighs, each the size of a small tree trunk. His leg presses up against the outside of mine, and I can feel the warmth of his flesh through my jeans. I shove him back, my face getting hot.
“Should have bought two seats, then,” I say.
“My dad’s too cheap,” Leo replies sourly. Then, grinning at me again, “Bet Papa Miko would have gotten you two seats if you asked him nicely . . .”
“Probably,” I say, “but I wouldn’t ask him, because I’m not a spoiled baby like you.”
I lift a pretzel to my lips and Leo manages to snitch it out of my hand, tossing it into his mouth. He crunches it up deliberately loud, just to annoy me.
“I’m going to flick you every time you try to fall asleep,” I tell him.
“No fucking way am I falling asleep!” Leo says. “I’m too excited.”
Ten minutes later he’s snoring with his heavy head flopped over on my shoulder.
Leo and I switch planes in Frankfurt with a six-hour layover. Refreshed from his nap, Leo convinces me to pop out of the airport so we can find a proper Biergarten, where he orders us two massive foaming pints and a sizzling platter of sausages served with thick black bread.
Once we’re up in the air again, the beer seems to hit me much harder than normal. My head feels pleasantly light on my shoulders, and I’m warm and relaxed.
I’ve got the window seat. The airplane seems like a ship floating over a sea of clouds with peaks tinged pink from the setting sun.
“Look . . . I say to Leo.
He leans across me so he can peer out the window. His shoulder presses against my chest, and his soft, dark curls brush my cheek. His hair smells nice, like sandalwood. Below that, I smell the richer and more dangerous scent of his skin. It has the same effect on me as other scents that are both stimulating and upsetting: smoke from a fire, iron and blood, spilled gasoline. It makes my heart rate jump.
“Beautiful,” Leo says, glancing back at me with his face right next to mine. The sun hits his irises, illuminating every fleck of gold in the brown. His eyes are lighter than his deeply tanned skin. He’s burned darker than toast after a long summer of boating and shirtless basketball games on the lakeshore courts.