Jade
I should be using my Sunday off to catch up on reading.
Instead, I’m in the greenhouse with a knife and a pumpkin, pretending my life is normal.
Because that’s exactly what you do after your secret whatever-he-is tells you he wants all of you and then shuts down completely—you carve vegetables and pretend everything’s fine.
“Your design is incredible.” Evie peers over my shoulder at the intricate pattern I’m engraving. “How are you getting those curves so precise?”
“Years of wire work.” I complete another swirl, my knife moving with the same precision I use when setting tiny stones. “Jewelry making, remember? Same principle, different medium.”
The pattern emerging on my pumpkin is inspired by the Tower card in my Crystal Visions tarot deck. Lightning bolts striking a crumbling tower that reminds me of the Drowned Tower, surrounded by an angry ocean, all of it carved into thick orange flesh.
I’m deep in focus mode when Oliver’s knife slips, and he stares at the gash on his pumpkin for a moment too long before forcing out a laugh.
“Guess mine’s going for the battle-scarred look,” he jokes, adding another gash for emphasis.
He smiles, looking around to make sure others are laughing with him, but there’s a sadness in it.
Like he’s looking for something he’s lost.
He’s been distracted all afternoon. But that knife slip? Oliver’s been training with weapons for years. He doesn’t just “slip.” Something’s bothering him, and I have no idea what it could be.
I glance at Evie’s pumpkin next to mine, searching for something to lighten the mood. “Evie’s looks like she used a protractor,” I say, giving Oliver what I hope is a warm smile.
“She probably did use a protractor.” He turns his attention away from his disaster of a pumpkin and focuses across the table on Evie. “Remember when you mapped out your Halloween candy route with graph paper?”
“I was eight!” Evie throws pumpkin guts at him, which he easily dodges. “And it was efficient!”
Avery giggles from her spot next to Oliver—across from me—her laugh light and musical. “I’m guessing you got more candy than anyone else?” she asks Evie, her voice so carefully cheerful it makes my chest hurt.
Oliver nudges Avery with his shoulder, and a flush blooms on her cheeks. “She did. And most of it went to me.”
Their enthusiastic chatting continues, the rest of the greenhouse buzzing with activity.
Felix works near the fountain, conjuring tiny fire butterflies. They’re beautiful, ethereal things that dissolve into sparks when they land on his pumpkin, leaving artistic scorch marks in their wake.
“Show off,” Lauren calls out to him.
Felix shakes his head at her and makes his way over to me, leaning over my shoulder and lowering his voice so the others can’t hear. “So, the Halloween ball. Are you going with Oliver?”
“He hasn’t asked—”
“Please. The way he was looking at you at dinner last night?” He creates another butterfly, this one landing on my pumpkin and leaving a perfect scorch mark in the shape of a star. “Everyone’s talking about it. Nina’s even taking bets.”
“She’s what?”
“Current odds are three to one that you say yes. I put fifty dollars on you saying no, by the way. Don’t let me down, Harrington.”
“Great. No pressure or anything.” I focus on my carving, trying to ignore the weight of expectation. Although I guess it explains why Oliver seems so nervous, or anxious, or whatever it is. “What happens if I just... don’t go at all?”
“Then I lose fifty dollars and Nina wins by default,” he says cheerfully. “So please don’t do that.”
“You’re all insane.” I roll my eyes as he compliments Evie’s far-from-artistic pumpkin, adds a few butterflies to it, and makes his way back to the fountain.
When he’s settled again, I glance at where Nina sits at the far end of the table, her own pumpkin barely started. She has that black notebook open beside her—the same one she’s always scribbling and sketching in—but she looks tired today. Haunted, even.
After our little heart to heart on the day we dueled in the Smoke Spire, part of me wants to go to her and ask her what’s wrong. Maybe I should? But I don’t know. Nina doesn’t look like she wants a pumpkin carving buddy right now.
I’m still contemplating it when Alessandra’s voice sounds through the greenhouse. “Callie and I are going to look amazing together!” she says from three tables over, where she’s holding court with her usual crowd. “Our costumes are going to be legendary.”
Callie, on the other hand, is notably absent.
Is she with Logan? Is that why he was so eager to give me a day off? Margot said Callie was looking for him, and suddenly he’s rushing off to be at her side?
No. I need to stop my mind from going there. After all, he said nothing was happening between them, while we were in the observatory under the Perseus Double Cluster. He couldn’t have lied in there, right? Wasn’t the cluster supposed to reveal our truest, deepest emotions?
My chaotic feelings swirl faster and faster inside me like a growing storm, electricity buzzing beneath my skin, trying to force its way out.
Dizziness washes over me, and my heart races.
Because it’s too much. I feel like I might burst from it.
And to make it worse, I know that if I gave in and let it out to wherever it wants to go, it would feel so much better. I’d feel so much better.
But I don’t. Instead, I picture the glass sphere and contain the silver currents.
After all, I haven’t been training for weeks just to reveal my dangerous, forbidden magic during a pumpkin carving session.
“Earth to Jade.” Oliver waves a slimy, pumpkin-guts-covered hand to get my attention. “You’re staring into space and gripping your knife like you’re planning murder.”
“Sorry.” I shake it off and refocus on my carving. “Just thinking.”
“About?” Evie glances at the greenhouse door for what must be the tenth time in twenty minutes.
“About how you keep checking the entrance like you’re expecting someone.”
Pink blooms across her cheeks. “I’m not—“
“You absolutely are.” I set down my knife, studying her. “Who are you hoping shows up?”
“No one.” She attacks her pumpkin with renewed vigor. “I’m just... people watching.”
“You realize that’s pretty creepy, right?” Oliver breaks in. “Switch those two words around, and you’re watching people, like some sort of psychopath. Same thing, different phrasing.”
“Shut up.” Evie scowls at him and returns to her pumpkin.
“Hey.” I bump her shoulder gently. “You know you can talk to me, right? About anything?”
She manages a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “I know. Same goes for you.”
If only. If only I could tell her about the electricity humming under my skin.
About Logan’s hands on my face in the starlight.
About how I’m supposed to take tonight off from training when all I want is to be in those secret tunnels with him, finally finding out what it feels like to have all of him.
But no. I’m stuck here pretending everything’s normal while my insides are being twisted into knots.
How long can a person fake it until they finally crack? Until the glass shatters and everything they’ve been hiding spills out for the entire world to see? Because I’m not sure how much longer I can keep it contained. I’m not sure how much longer I want to keep it contained.
Unfortunately, I haven’t been given much of a choice. Well, I technically do have a choice—we all have options, even if we don’t like any of them—but I definitely don’t like the ones being presented to me.
“Speaking of the ball,” Oliver says, pulling me out of my swirling thoughts, “we should coordinate meeting times. The Phoenix Hall common room at seven?”
“Sounds perfect.” Avery beams at him, then glances around at the rest of us. “That works for everyone, right?”
“Absolutely.” Evie’s checking the door again, and at this point, I’m tempted to drag whoever she’s waiting for in here myself just to put her out of her misery.
Oliver looks to me for my answer next.
“Can’t wait.” The lie tastes bitter, but I force enthusiasm into my voice.
At least it sounds like Avery and Oliver are going to the ball together.
Emberlinked partners going together will be a scandal, but Nina’s lost her stupid bet about whether or not Oliver will ask me.
After all, he can’t ask me if he’s already going with someone else.
Needing to return to doing something with my hands, I twist my pumpkin to attack a particularly stubborn section, determined to win this battle against produce. But the thick stem refuses to budge.
“Here, let me help.” Oliver leans diagonally across the table with his blade, his hands still covered with pumpkin guts. “We just need to get under—”
The stem snaps, and Oliver’s blade jerks sideways, slicing deep into my forearm.
“Shit!” I drop my knife, blood already welling up on my skin. There’s so much of it. Way more than there should be from a tiny knife.
Oliver’s face drains of color, as if bloodletting is triggering a past trauma. “We need to get you to the infirmary,” he says quickly, wiping his hands on a nearby towel.
“It’s fine, really…” I start, but blood is already dripping onto the table, and several people are staring. Plus, I can already feel that familiar tingle that means my magical healing is about to kick in.
I need to slow it down.
You control it, Logan’s voice echoes in my head, patient and steady from all those training sessions. It doesn’t control you.
Despite how frustrating it is to always have his voice in my head, I’m able to slow the healing down enough. Not totally, but enough.
“Oliver’s right.” Evie’s on her feet, ready to help. “I’ll go with you.”
“No.” Oliver’s already rounding the table, pressing the pumpkin guts covered towel on my cut. “I’ve got this.”
Avery drops her carving knife and glares at him. “Evie said she’s taking her.”
“I said I’ve got this,” Oliver snaps at Avery, then gives Evie a look that clearly says back off.
Weird. Since when does Oliver snap at Avery? Since when does he snap at anyone?
Avery’s fingers curl into fists before she forces them to relax. “Of course. Wouldn’t want to crowd her. I’ll just… clean up here.”
My heart breaks for her, but I let Oliver guide me toward the greenhouse exit, mostly because arguing would cause more of a scene. The last thing I need is to cause more of a scene.
“I can walk on my own,” I point out as Oliver tries to steady me. “It’s my arm that’s hurt, not my legs.”
He lets go—grudgingly—and I follow him out of the greenhouse as quickly as possible. Hopefully everyone’s too involved in their pumpkin carving competition to spend any time talking about me. Although knowing this place, there’ll probably be three different rumors by dinner.
Did you hear Jade bled all over her pumpkin?
I heard she fainted.
Someone said Oliver carried her out bridal style.
Kill me now.
By the time we’re outside in the crisp late-October air, I start to wonder—was this intentional? Oliver’s hand “slipped,” even though he’s trained with weapons for years. And he maneuvered us away from everyone else…
No, that’s paranoid. Oliver wouldn’t... would he?
He stops abruptly near the fountain, far enough from the greenhouse that we’re alone.
“Jade.” He takes a deep breath, and I have a horrible feeling that I know what’s coming. “Will you go to the Halloween Ball with me? As my date?”
My heart drops. The hope in his eyes makes this so much worse, especially because every thought of mine leads back to gray eyes, fire magic, and promises made under stars.
“I thought you were going with Avery?” I put as much lightness into my tone as possible.
“No. It’s not like that between me and Avery.” He rushes on, not letting me comment. “We’re just emberlinked partners. Nothing more. But you... you’re different. Special.”
Different.
Special.
If only he knew that “different” meant I could electrocute him if I lost control.
That “special” meant I was hiding more secrets than he could imagine.
That if the Council found out how different and special I am, I’d be whisked away from this place and brought to who the hell knows where to have whatever the hell done to me that they wanted.
“Can we talk about this after my arm stops bleeding?” I hold up my arm, where blood is still seeping through my fingers.
He looks at the wound like he’d forgotten it existed. “Right. Of course. But Jade...” His voice takes on an edge I’ve never heard before. “The ball’s on Thursday. I need an answer by tomorrow night, or I’ll have to ask someone else.”
I stare at him in shock. Because he’s giving me an ultimatum. Wonderful. That’s exactly what every girl dreams of—being asked to a dance with a deadline attached.
“Let’s just get to the infirmary,” I say, not wanting to deal with this right now. Or ever.
But at least my pumpkin turned out nice, bloody tears and all.
And that’s something, right?