The Fiery Heart

I shivered and tugged my coat around me as Abe deliberated. At last, he said quietly, “I’ve already gotten more knowledge than you might think. I know that Sydney Sage, do-gooder and darling of the Alchemists, is working on clandestine affairs that go against her order’s directives. That’s more than payment enough. Give me your blood. The samples, I mean.”

I knelt down on the ground and opened the crate. “What are you going to do with that knowledge?”

“I’m not going to announce it to the world, if that’s what you’re worried about.” He paused and laughed to himself. “But of course you aren’t. You never would’ve asked for this charm if you thought I’d give you away.”

I found the two capped vials of Moroi blood and handed them over. I needed only one but didn’t want the other to go to waste.

“No,” I agreed. “I didn’t think you’d tell on me. I didn’t even think you’d be shocked.”

“I’m not. Surprised, but not shocked.” He held up one of the vials, and I could see lines of concentration deepening on his face as he focused on it. I sensed nothing with my human skills, and this type of earth magic spoke directly to the substance of the blood, meaning there was no flashy burst of fire or water like you’d get with one of the other elements. “There.” He handed it back to me and focused on the other.

“You didn’t answer my question,” I reminded him.

“Because I don’t know,” he said several moments later. I accepted the second vial from him. “Ultimately, I imagine it’ll go toward serving the same thing it always does.”

“Yourself?”

“My loved ones.”

I fell speechless. That certainly wasn’t the answer I’d expected from Abe “Zmey” Mazur. He took a step closer so that he could look me more squarely in the eye.

“You think I’m so manipulative and scheming, Miss Sage? It’s all for them. For my loved ones first. My people second. And yes, I suppose I’m in the mix there too, but don’t think for an instant I wouldn’t sacrifice myself if it could save someone I love. And don’t think for an instant that I wouldn’t do terrible, unspeakable things if it could save someone I love.” When he backed up, I noticed I’d been holding my breath. “Good luck with your experiment. Let me know if I can be of any more assistance.”

I watched him walk off into the night, his words replaying in my mind. When he’d disappeared into the darkness, I returned to my room with the crate. And there, the ominous meeting with Abe vanished from my mind because I amazingly had bigger problems that came crashing back down on me.

Adrian.

Adrian, who’d withheld the knowledge that he’d taken advantage of a human girl.

Adrian, whom I’d trusted.

I threw myself on my bed and waited for the tears to come. They didn’t. The storm of emotions I’d felt earlier had simply gone numb. I was left with a cold, empty hole inside my heart and the gears of reason turning in my brain. Was Adrian right? Was it wrong to hold him responsible for something he’d done so long ago? We both were different people, and who was I to judge others when I’d orchestrated an act of revenge that had cost Keith his eye? I was no saint.

But Keith had committed a terrible crime, and the girl Adrian had drank from had done nothing except be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Why did it have to be that? Why the blood? The thing that played the most upon my fears?

He texted me three times on the Love Phone, asking me if he could come over and talk. I didn’t answer. At least he had the sense not to barge on in. I spent my entire break lying on the bed like that, with Hopper curled to my chest in statue form.

When I returned to the palace later, I felt more in control, mostly because I’d shut down almost all my feelings. The scene I walked into was similar, though a few people had left for the break. Adrian and Nina were sitting and talking together. She looked radiant, and although he was smiling, I knew him well enough to recognize when he was faking it. Our eyes locked for a few brief moments and then I marched back up to my table.

The rest of the procedure was simple: adding the blood to the suspension I’d created. The liquid turned silver, earning a surprised grunt from Abe.

“Shouldn’t it be gold?”

I hesitated. “That’s the one part I changed. Silver’s more in tune with Moroi magic. I thought it’d be better.”

Sonya’s eyes widened in alarm. “The spirit’s leaking out now that it’s out of the case! Help me!”

Nina and Lissa hurried beside her, looks of concentration on their faces. They were using their magic to try to protect the vial, I realized. I didn’t know how successful they were, but I knew enough to realize we couldn’t waste time. “Hurry up,” I told Horace the tattooist.

He had a machine similar to Wolfe’s and loaded the ink into his needle. Neil sat down beside it, and Olive hovered near him. “Does it have to be the face?” he asked.

I shook my head. “No. We just do that to identify ourselves.”

After a moment’s hesitation, Neil pulled off his T-shirt, revealing a well-muscled physique. He pointed to his upper left arm. “Here.”

Horace brought the needle down and then turned, puzzled. “What am I drawing?”

There were a few moments of comical silence. “Whatever’s fastest,” I said.

“I kind of wanted a cross,” said Neil wistfully. His stoic mask fell into place. “But do whatever you need to.”

“Do a cross with simple lines,” Adrian said unexpectedly. “I’ll design more art to go around it later, and you can just get regular ink to embellish it.”

Even I was surprised at the offer, considering how much Neil usually irritated Adrian. Horace was already at work. Even with a simple design, tattooing wasn’t something that could be done in a hurry. He was obviously moving as fast as he could, but I could tell by the spirit users’ strained faces that they were still losing ground. I grew so caught up in the drama that I actually forgot about Adrian. My world narrowed down to each drop of ink that went into Neil’s skin.

When Horace finished, everyone looked ready to faint from the exhaustion of stress. Lissa rested her head on Christian’s shoulder, and a paler-than-usual Sonya sank into a chair. “There was still magic in the ink when you finished,” she said. “But I don’t sense it anymore. I have no way of knowing if it worked—aside from the obvious.”

I was struck by the parallels between Neil and Trey. Both were now marked with experimental ink to protect them from insidious powers . . . but nobody truly knew if the procedures had been effective. The potential to solve Trey’s mystery was in a crate back in my room. The answer to Neil’s, unfortunately, was in the teeth of a Strigoi.

Sonya closed her eyes and rested her hand on her forehead. I could only imagine what she was feeling. Protecting Moroi from Strigoi had become an obsession for her, a project with very personal implications. This had to be monumental for her, the potential conclusion to her work. Suddenly, she opened her eyes and fixed them on Adrian as a revelation seemed to hit her.

“Why didn’t you help us? We might have saved more magic. You did nothing.”

“She’s right,” Lissa said, clearly surprised. “I didn’t realize it until now. It was just the three of us.”

We all looked at Adrian, and even I was astonished. This had become a personal mission for him too, especially considering his monumental role in saving Olive’s blood. Why would he shirk helping now? Indecision warred on his face. At last, he sighed with resignation.

“I didn’t help . . . because I can’t.”

Lissa straightened up from where she was resting against Christian. “What does that mean exactly?”

He gave her a rueful smile. “It means, cousin, that I’m going on my third week of mood stabilizers and no longer have access to spirit.”

My heart stopped.

“Why . . . why would you do that?” Lissa asked.

“You tell me,” he replied. “You did it once. Or something like it. I wanted my life back. I didn’t want spirit to control me anymore. You know what it can do.” He looked at Lissa, Sonya, and Nina in turn. “You all know.”

From their chagrined expressions, they did know. But it was clear they were also confused.

“Why would you do it now of all times?” exclaimed Sonya. “When you knew we still needed you?”

He focused back on her, holding his ground. “Did I know that? I did my part—a big part. I had no idea it’d come to this. Besides, what time should I have waited for? When I was about to jump off a bridge?”

The words hit Sonya like a slap in the face. “Of course not. But . . . there are other ways to cope . . .”

Adrian laughed. “Yeah? Alcohol poisoning? Cutting? Turn-ing Strigoi?”

It was a cruel thing to say to Lissa and Sonya, but neither of them could muster an argument. Nina was the one who spoke up, confusion in her gray eyes. “But how can you stand to be away from the magic? The rush? Don’t you miss it?”

“Yes,” he said bluntly. “But other things in my life are more important.”

My legs grew weak, and I backed up, settling down into a plush armchair. I clasped my hands together to stop them from shaking.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t help this time, but none of you have the right to judge me,” Adrian added. There was a strength and conviction in his voice that I doubt any of them had seen before. “This is my life, and there’s nothing you can say to change my mind—unless Her Majesty wants to give a royal command for me to stop.”

Lissa blanched. “Of course not.”

Everything was kind of weird after that.

I kept my distance from the others, and this time, no one seemed to notice or care. Adrian became the new attraction. Sonya and Lissa apologized, and Nina tried to engage him about what it was like. He shot me another pained look from across the room, and I had to glance away because my confusion was too great.

And as the night progressed, it became clear to me they weren’t going to give him up anytime soon. The spirit users wanted to know more about Adrian and the pills. Everyone else wanted to know what the next step with Neil was. My role was done, and when exhaustion began weighing me down, I quietly slipped out of the room to go get some sleep. I knew travel arrangements were being made for later tomorrow, so no one would need me right away. The nice thing about being forced onto this schedule was that I was so legitimately tired that my body wasn’t going to let my mind keep me awake with questions. And believe me, I had plenty. I needed to understand the Adrian of long ago. I needed to understand the Adrian I loved. And I needed to understand why he hadn’t told me he was facing one of his greatest fears by taking a prescription.

Tears sprang to the corner of my eyes and then began to freeze. I stopped in the middle of a walkway leading through some ornamental trees and tried to wipe my face as best as I could.

“Hey, are you okay?”

I jerked my head up at the unfamiliar voice. Well, not entirely unfamiliar. A young man materialized from the trees, and a moment later, a second joined him. Tired and emotionally frayed, I didn’t recognize them at first. Then, I realized they were Adrian’s friends—or, well, ex-friends—from the café. I stiffened, suddenly wide awake and alert.

And terrified.

“Sydney, right?” It was the guy who’d first spoken. “I’m—”

“Wesley,” I said. “I remember.”

“You do? That’s great. Then you must remember Lars too.”

The faint light of a lamppost a little ways away filtered through the branches of a tree above us, lighting up his face as he grinned in what he probably thought was a friendly manner. I didn’t need him to get any closer to know he was drunk—just like he had been yesterday. Was that what Adrian used to be like? Waking up and going from one state of intoxication to another? It was a pathetic, dismal life.

“Where are you headed?” asked Lars. “You need directions?”

“I’m just going back to my room to get some sleep.” I pointed at the building, which suddenly seemed very far away. “Right over there.”

“Sleep?” Lars laughed. “That’s right. You’re on a flipped schedule. Look, why don’t you come out with us? Live it up while you’re here. We’ll get you some caffeine and hit some parties.”

“Or if you want something quieter, we could just go back to my place and talk.” That was Wesley, and he seemed to be having a difficult time sounding serious and responsible. ns class="adsbygoogle" style="display:block" data-ad-client="ca-pub-7451196230453695" data-ad-slot="9930101810" data-ad-format="auto" data-full-width-responsive="true">