Sin had to admire Celeste’s showmanship. The Aventurine Circle stood out radiantly against all the other magicians, an army with a weapon in plain sight.
Their weapon, the Rottweiler at the spoiled young prince’s feet, was glaring people away. Jamie was the only magician who did not have to make nice with the members of other Circles.
Occasionally he grabbed a handful of Nick’s black hair and yanked his head back to address a few words to him. Sin saw the strained line of Nick’s throat and the curl of his mouth when his head went back. He never answered Jamie.
They sat alone until the door of the ballroom opened and Mae walked in.
She was in white too, a shimmering dress tight as a bandage with her shoulders rising bare from the wrapped material, and wavering slightly in some of the highest heels Sin had ever seen. They seemed to be made entirely of glass and silver threads.
Mae pulled it off the same way she pulled off her pink hair, brushed now into shining perfection, looking ridiculous, appealing, and dignified all at once.
Mae’s faith in herself was as towering as those heels, and so she could walk into a nest of magicians not even able to run.
Now she had two girls to get out of here.
When Mae reached Jamie, she went and stood by the side of his chair like a sentinel.
Sin’s fingers bit into the edge of the rafter, splinters sinking into her skin. Mae couldn’t fake much. She certainly wasn’t faking this, the way even her face bent toward Jamie’s was loving, her neck a protective arch above him.
What if it was real? Sin thought with a sickening lurch. It felt for a moment like she was going to fall off the rafter, even though she hadn’t moved. What if she’d left the Market, no matter how temporarily, in the hands of a traitor?
Mae loved Jamie, she could see that much. If it was Lydie, so affected and addicted by magic, Sin didn’t know what she would do.
She couldn’t even really think about it. When she tried, the idea turned into a nightmare, a black cloud she could not hold on to or deal with but that diffused itself around her mind and made everything dark.
People approached Jamie then; they approached him through Mae. Mae smiled and shook hands, held brief conversations. She was acting in a way Sin could only describe as sophisticated.
Sin guessed it was a trick Mae had learned from her mother or a formidable headmistress or someone else in her rich world. She wished she could learn how to do it, and doubted she could pull it off. The best acts needed conviction behind them.
After yet another person had left, Jamie leaned back farther in his chair and said something to Mae. Mae hesitated for a moment, then slowly left Jamie’s side, one hand clinging to the chair back, as if it was the only thing keeping her afloat and it was being inexorably drawn out of her reach.
She clenched her hand into a fist when she finally let go, and offered her other hand to Nick. Nick glanced up at her and then stood, very slowly.
Once he was standing he loomed over Mae, tall, dark, and sinister like a villain in a pantomime about to crush an innocent, but he seemed like a villain who had forgotten his cue. He just stood there, and his complete lack of action looked almost like helplessness.
Mae stuck her hand out farther, persistently. When Nick turned his own hand palm up, moving as slowly as if he was a robot with rusting joints, Mae laid her fingers across his palm. He used her hand to draw her body in close against his.
Moving gradually into the center of the room, they started to dance. Mae’s skyscraper heels at least made her closer to Nick’s height than she usually was, so she could meet his eyes comfortably.
Sin couldn’t see either of their faces, but there was a solemn atmosphere about the moment, the song playing fainter than any of the other songs before. Nick’s hand was at Mae’s gleaming white waist, and her hand was gripping the shoulder of his black T-shirt.
The assembled magicians were staring.
Jamie stopped slouching and got up, slipping easily through the crowd.
Sin decided it was about time for her to go as well. There were a lot of people here, but none of them were Lydie.
She squirmed slowly back along the rafter, creeping backward rather than forward. She had a moment where she misjudged, not seeing where she was going, and found her leg sticking out into space. She pulled it back slowly, reanchoring herself and refusing to panic, then risked a glance down.
Apparently none of the magicians had been looking up just then.
Reaching the other room was such a relief, the dimness and relative quiet like being submerged in cool water after the hot lights and having to watch dozens of people act out a hundred strange scenes. Sin let her eyes shut for just a moment, and breathed out.
When she opened her eyes, she saw someone moving in the darkness below.
Adrenaline chased chills up her spine, straightening it and preparing her for action. The person below was wearing a long garment with a hood. She couldn’t tell if they were male or female, but Sin could get the jump on them, and that was all that mattered.
Then she caught the movement beneath the cloak, the very slight tell.
Sin let go of the rafter and stretched out an arm, wrapping just enough of the chain round her wrist around the rafter. She launched herself into space, the chain reaching its limit and her feet hitting the chair back at the same time so the impact was shared.
