Nameless

cheerfully announced, and tripped out the door to fetch them. The guard—a lanky young mere-human who looked like Trig—glanced in, dropped his gaze. He actually blushed whenever he had to speak to her.

“Ma’am? I gotta visit the little boy’s.”

She tried not to grin. Ruby found this endlessly hilarious. “Go ahead.”

When the door opened again, she turned away from the window, her question and any amusement forgotten when she saw . . . him.

Tor hunched his shoulders. The bruises had faded, but their yellowgreen shadows lingered. His hair, shaken down over his face, was still defiantly messy and coal-black. He’d lost some weight, and his cheekbones stood out startlingly.

Just like hers. Just like his eyes, no longer black but bright starving blue.

“Your eyes,” she blurted, and could have kicked herself. Way to go. That’s nice.

He sucked his lips in for a moment, nodded. “Yeah. Surprised me too.”

They regarded each other. The air was suddenly full of sharp surfaces, pressing against her skin. Each scar on her twitched, and she wondered if his were doing the same.

“I came to apologi—” he began, at the same moment she said, “I’m sorry, I—”

The silence returned.

He wet his lips with a quick nervous flicker of his tongue. “I came to apologize. I stole those presents for you, I didn’t know. You’ve got to believe me. I wanted you to notice. I wanted you to . . . ” He ran out of words, stared at her.

“I wondered about that.” The words came easily now. Still, she used them slowly, carefully, since they could turn at any moment and knot up.

“I was eight when I ran away. I don’t remember a lot, I was too busy staying alive. But she was sending little things Above, trying to find you. I stole the pin from a Twist pawner in Simmerside, and things started happening. I got hired. I saw you. It was like . . . ” A helpless shrug, his hands spreading. “I can’t say what it was like. Then . . . she . . . ” He spread his hands. “She called me down there. Into the dark.” The scuffed, battered leather jacket creaked a little as he moved. “I’m sorry.”

“Okay.” It probably wasn’t the most helpful thing to say. “You . . . the mirror. You broke it.” You stabbed our mother in the mirror. She couldn’t bring herself to say it. If the Queen hadn’t switched favorite-husbands, Cami might never have been born. And there was no way to know how their fathers came Below, what they had run from, who they had been.

“It was the only thing I could think of. Look, princess—”

“It’s Cami.” It burst out, surprising her. As if she really owned the name. She crossed her arms, defensively. Healing scrapes were rough under her fingertips, and the scars were easily visible. It probably didn’t matter—his were at least as bad as hers. Still, she felt the old prickle. “Don’t call me princess, okay? It’s insulting.”

A ghost of a grin flashing under the healing bruises and scrapes. “No stutter.”

So you noticed. Big deal. “So what are we gonna do? You, and me.”

He nodded, like she’d just said something profound. “You’re safe here. I’ve got to go. That’s also why I came. I’ve got to . . . I killed a Queen. They won’t let me live.”

“There are others?” She went cold all over. God, couldn’t this just be over?

“Stands to reason, doesn’t it? She had to come from somewhere.”

“We had to come from s-s-somewhere.” Dammit.

“I just got a feeling. Plus, with your boyfriend around, it’s not too safe here.”

“Boyfriend?” He means Nico. “He’s not . . . it’s complicated. I don’t even know if he’s going to want me around. Ruby’s grandmother, she said she could send me to another city. Maybe.” Ruby won’t talk about it, but if I can get out to Woodsdowne, well, we’ll see, won’t we? If Cami could walk halfway across the city with the White Queen’s hounds searching for her, what else could she do?

What else would she want? Now that she was alive. It was a puzzle, and one she didn’t know how to even begin piecing together.

“We c-could go together,” she offered, tentatively. “You. And me.”

Tor grimaced slightly. “He’ll want you around, princ—ah, Cami. Trust me on that.” He took a step back, glanced at the door. “I should go.”

Don’t. If he left, would she ever find him again? Her scars ran with pain, and she saw his answering flinch.

He knew what it felt like, because his scars were hers too. “Tor—”

“I don’t belong here, Cami. Not like you do. I wish . . . ” But whatever he wished was left unsaid. He shook his hair down, the glower closing over his face like a mask. Who else would see the fear behind it?

Maybe nobody but her now.

“You b-belong.” Her tongue tried to knot up, but Cami swallowed hard, and all of a sudden the words tumbled out. “You have me. We’re the same.” We have the same scars.

Is it enough? It is.

It has to be.

The silence between them was a thin ringing, but it was no longer stretched over a black abyss. Instead, it was a fragile, delicate thing, like a thin crystal wineglass tapping her teeth. Gentle, and careful, and something inside that quiet stretched between them. A hair-thin line, unbreakable and humming with force.

Blood always tells.

“Family.” Very slowly and clearly, so he couldn’t possibly misunderstand. “Us. You have m- me.”

Torin’s scowl turned into a fleeting grin, and he winked, one blue, blue eye twitching closed for a half- second. “Likewise. Take care of yourself.” And with that, he was gone out the door, his hair flicked back with an impatient toss of his head.

When Ruby came back, a pair of trainers dangling from their laces in one crimson-fingernailed hand, she sniffed deeply and gave Cami an odd look. But she didn’t say anything, and Cami didn’t volunteer.

It was, she reminded herself, a Personal Choice to speak, or not.

The distance inside her, where there used to be a huge black fear, was now just . . . silent.

Empty. A hiding place.

So some things had to stay secret. Even now.

The last of the ice had washed away on a flood of spring rain, and the trees were budding green. Every window on the house was painted gold with late-afternoon sunlight, and the limo pulled to a smooth stop. Trig and two of his scrubbed-clean new security boys were in a black car right behind them, a small fish swimming after the sleek black shark Chauncey piloted.

“Home, Miss Cami,” he said, through the pane of lowered bulletproof glass. “And glad you’re here, if I may say so.”

Me too. She ducked her head, the habit of hiding a blush hard to shake. “Thanks.”

It was Stevens, gaunt as ever, his hair threaded with rivers instead of trickles of gray now, who came down the stairs one by one and opened her door.

“Miss Cami,” he said, and his hand was dry and warm, hard as a stick. “Welcome home.”

She swallowed, hard. Was this home? Or were the dripping tunnels—flooded now, but cleansed by the Family, Trig had informed Ruby in a low tone when he thought Cami couldn’t hear—really home? Would she be shipped off to a boarding school now, sent through the Waste on a sealed train, or—

“Naughty!” Marya shrilled, and Cami was enfolded in a bruising-hard hug, right there on the steps. The feywoman’s cameo dug into her collarbone, and Cami realized with a start that she was taller now. “Naughty little thing! Worrying us to death, naughty little wandering thing, bad little sidhe! And so thin!”

“M-Marya!” It wasn’t the stutter. Instead, it was half a sob, caught in her throat. The dam broke, and she