Julian opens his mouth to say something, but thinks better of it at the last moment and turns back to his books. “Mare, I wouldn’t exactly call what we do training. Besides, you looked very good in your session today.”

“You saw that? How?”

“I asked to watch.”

“Wha—?”

“It doesn’t matter,” he says, looking straight through me. His voice is suddenly melodic, humming with deep, soothing vibrations. Exhaling, I realize he’s right.

“It doesn’t matter,” I repeat. Even though he isn’t speaking, the echo of Julian’s voice still hangs in the air like a calming breeze. “So, what are we working on today?”

Julian smirks, amused with himself. “Mare.”

His voice is normal again, simple and familiar. It breaks apart the echoes, wiping them away from me in a lifting cloud. “What—what the hell was that?”

“I take it Lady Blonos hasn’t spoken much about House Jacos in Lessons?” he says, still smirking. “I’m surprised you never asked.”

Truly, I’ve never wondered about Julian’s ability. I always thought it would be something weak, because he doesn’t seem as pompous as the others—but it looks like that isn’t true at all. He’s much stronger and more dangerous than I ever realized.

“You can control people. You’re like her.” The thought of Julian, a sympathizer, a good person, being at all like the queen makes me shake.

He takes the accusation in stride, shifting his attention back to his book. “No, I’m not. I have nowhere near her strength. Or her brutality.” He heaves a sigh, explaining. “We’re called singers. Or at least we would be, if there were any more of us. I’m the last of my house, and the last of, well, my kind. I can’t read minds, I can’t control thoughts, I can’t speak in your head. But I can sing—as long as someone hears me, as long as I can look into their eyes—I can make a person do as I wish.”

Horror bleeds through me. Even Julian.

Slowly, I lean back, wanting to put some distance between him and myself. He notices, of course, but doesn’t look angry.

“You’re right not to trust me,” he murmurs. “No one does. There’s a reason my only friends are written words. But I don’t do it unless I absolutely need to, and I’ve never done it with malice.” Then he snorts, laughing darkly. “If I really wanted, I could talk my way to the throne.”

“But you haven’t.”

“No. And neither did my sister, no matter what anyone else might say.”

Cal’s mother. “No one seems to say anything about her. Not to me, anyways.”

“People don’t like to talk about dead queens,” he snaps, turning away from me in a smooth motion. “But they talked when she was alive. Coriane Jacos, the Singer Queen.” I’ve never seen Julian this way, not once. Usually he’s quiet, calm, a little obsessed maybe, but never angry. Never so hurt. “She wasn’t chosen by Queenstrial, you know. Not like Elara, or Evangeline, or even you. No, Tibe married my sister because he loved her—and she loved him.”

Tibe. Calling Tiberias Calore the Sixth, King of Norta, Flame of the North, anything with less than eight syllables seems preposterous. But he was young once too. He was like Cal, a boy born to become a king.

“They hated her because we were from a low house, because we didn’t have strength or power or any other silly thing those people uphold,” Julian rails on, still looking away. His shoulders heave with each breath. “And when my sister became queen, she threatened to change all that. She was kind, compassionate, a mother who could raise Cal to be the king this country needed to unite us all. A king who wouldn’t be afraid of change. But that never came to be.”

“I know what it’s like to lose a sibling,” I murmur, remembering Shade. It doesn’t seem real, like maybe everyone is just lying and he’s at home now, happy and safe. But I know that isn’t true. And somewhere, my brother’s decapitated body lies as proof of that. “I only found out last night. My brother died at the front.”

Julian finally turns back around, his eyes glassy. “I’m sorry, Mare. I didn’t realize.”

“You wouldn’t. The army doesn’t report executions in their little books.”

“Executed?”

“Desertion.” The word tastes like blood, like a lie. “Even though he never would.”

After a long moment of silence, Julian puts a hand on my shoulder. “It seems we have more in common than you think, Mare.”

“What do you mean?”

“They killed my sister, too. She stood in the way, and she was removed. And”—his voice drops—“they’ll do it again, to anyone they have to. Even Cal, even Maven, and especially you.”

Especially me. The little lightning girl.

“I thought you wanted to change things, Julian.”

“I do indeed. But these things take time, planning, and too much luck to count on.” He stares me up and down, like somehow he knows I’ve already taken the first step down a dark path. “I don’t want you getting in over your head.”

Too late.

SIXTEEN

After a week of staring at my clock, waiting for midnight, I begin to despair. Of course Farley can’t reach us here. Even she is not so talented. But tonight, when the clock ticks, I feel nothing for the first time since Queenstrial. No cameras, no electricity, nothing. The power is completely out. I’ve been in blackouts before, too many to count, but this is different. This isn’t an accident. This is for me.

Moving quickly, I slip into my boots, now broken in by weeks of wear, and head for the door. I’m barely out in the hallway before I hear Walsh in my ear, speaking softly and quickly as she pulls me through the forced darkness.

“We don’t have much time,” she murmurs, hustling me into a service stairwell. It’s pitch-black, but she knows where we’re going and I trust her to get me there. “They’ll have the power back on in fifteen minutes if we’re lucky.”

“And if we aren’t?” I breathe in the darkness.

She hustles me down the stairs and shoulders open a door. “Then I hope you’re not too attached to your head.”

The smell of earth and dirt and water hits me first, churning up all my memories of life in the woods. But even though it looks like a forest, with gnarled old trees and hundreds of plants painted blue and black by the moon, a glass roof rises overhead. The conservatory. Twisting shadows sprawl across the ground, each one worse than the next. I see Security and Sentinels in every dark corner, waiting to capture and kill us like they did my brother. But instead of their horrific black or flame uniforms, there’s nothing but flowers blooming beneath the glass ceiling of stars.

“Excuse me if I don’t curtsy,” a voice says, emerging from a grove of white-spangled magnolia trees. Her blue eyes reflect the moon, glowing in the dark with cold fire. Farley has a real talent for theatrics.

Like in her broadcast, she wears a red scarf across her face, hiding her features. But it doesn’t hide a ruinous scar that marches down her neck, disappearing beneath the collar of her shirt. It looks new, barely beginning to heal. She’s been busy since I last saw her. But then, so have I.