CHAPTER 32 #2
The technology may be outdated, and the materials may be long retired, but not the presence inside.
The statue is the only part of the room that feels alive.
As I stare up at Ernest’s face, I see Edmund too—in the proud set of his forehead, in the carved lines of his jaw, in the way the statue stands, chest held high, as if it refuses to yield, even now.
I’ve never seen a photo of Ernest when he was young, but I realize that Edmund shares more with him than a last name.
My gaze lowers to the badge I gave Edmund, pinned carefully to the tunic, and a stab of pain shoots through my chest. The badge shouldn’t be there. It belongs on the flight jacket Irene will hand over only if Edmund trades himself in exchange.
As I stare at the legacy of the man Edmund is trying so hard to redeem, the pain rises and spreads through my body like a familiar bruise.
I know that kind of love, the kind you’re sure you’d give your life for.
But the difference is that I’ve never been asked to prove it as Edmund has. I’ve never been forced to choose.
I reach out and brush the wings with a fingertip, then step back, telling myself it’s enough. I need to leave before—
“You shouldn’t be in here, broad.”
I spin so fast my earrings lash against my neck.
Dickie watches me from the doorway, one eyebrow cocked high, like he’s caught me pocketing Edmund’s Blood Ring.
“I can tell,” Dickie says. “I should tell.”
I step toward him, hand extended. “Please don’t.”
“If I don’t, it’s gonna cost you. Big.”
“Seriously, Dickie?” I drop my hand. “You can’t keep one tiny secret?”
“Sure, I could. But as a wise man, I don’t waste my aces.” He leans in, his flame-orange hair flashing in the light. “Highball… you’re gonna play it with me. Twice a week. Until the end of the year.”
The tension slides off me like a wet towel. “That’s all?”
“Let’s see if you’re still saying that after you’ve played, broad.” Dickie jerks his thumb toward the hall. I grab my canteen from the dresser and follow him out.
“This room isn’t for snooping,” he mutters.
“I know.” Mom’s warning about prying is already ringing in my ears. “Do you think Edmund will notice?”
“Doubt it. But his broad will.” Dickie puffs out his chest as we walk, trying to match my height. “Every time she swings by, she combs through this place like a Copper at a crime scene. If there’s even a whisper of perfume in the air, she’ll catch it—and then she’ll beat Ed with it.”
I picture Irene overturning drawers and stripping the bedsheets, tearing the room apart in search of another woman’s scent.
The image fits. She offered to spare my life on the off chance I might stumble onto whoever Edmund is cheating on her with.
If he really has mistresses, I doubt he ever lets them near his bedroom.
Dickie veers left toward the fencing room, where the clang of graphene still echoes down the hall. Edmund and Jack have been training like war dogs for weeks. Come May, they’ll face off in the Mensur above the Luminescent Lake, with the entire first-year Blue and Green Fraternities watching.
Dickie walks through the door, but I don’t follow. I stay in the corridor and clutch my canteen to my chest, my heart kicking every time the blades ring out. Watching Jack fight is easy. Watching Edmund isn’t.
I missed it the first time, in the video of the duel in the Tangerine Tree. But now that I’ve seen Edmund fence in person, up close, there’s no denying how familiar his style is.
His advances roll cleanly off the ball of his foot, while his retreats are timed with a deceptive delay to draw out a premature attack.
His blade work is pure distance and control, beating in four to bait, then slipping the disengage into octave to land the touch.
Rather than brute-forcing his way in, he builds the attack from a shift in tempo, lunging the instant his opponent’s weight settles on the heel.
I’ve fenced this style before.
Charles Blackwell fought like that.
In the semifinal at the Junior Fencing World Championship, Charles cornered me again and again, cutting the piste in half as if it belonged to him.
He forced rushed parries from me, took the blade before I could even establish the line.
I had to claw for every point, breaking rhythm and leaving openings I’d never normally risk. He nearly beat me.
Edmund is quicker and more reactive, with a much longer reach, but the resemblance is still there in the gliding footwork and ruthless efficiency. It almost makes me wonder if they were trained by the same hand.
So I wait. Eyes closed, hands clamped over my ears, breath held through every strike behind the door.
Because if I watch, I won’t just see Edmund.
I’ll see the Blue who ruined everything.
I wait until the hiss of graphene sliding into scabbards fades before I enter the fencing room.
The air is thick with sweat, and so warm that the ice melts from the windows into slushy streaks.
Jack is draped over the sofa’s armrest like a used towel, chugging from a half-empty pitcher.
Water spills down his chin, darkening the front of his training vest.
“I’m starting to figure out your inside line, Ed,” he says. “Always flirting with six, then cheating on her with octave.”
Edmund gives a short laugh. “Guess I’ll have to find a new girl, then. Julian always said predictability will get you killed.”
Edmund grabs a towel and wipes sweat from his body. It streams down his face and shoulders, running in rivulets along his collarbones before soaking into his long-sleeved, padded training suit. His chest rises and falls with heaving breaths, slower than Jack’s but deeper.
The sight of him, slick and panting, makes me wish the room were cooler. But I’m soon distracted by the fact that his skin is unmarked. There isn’t a single scar. Most fencers, especially those with his level of experience, keep an honor scar to commemorate the duel they consider most worthy.
Jack notices me and tips his head back with a wink, his lip split and bleeding where Edmund’s blade must’ve nicked him.
Edmund notices me a moment later as he tosses the towel onto the sofa.
He straightens quickly, and a bright smile breaks through the sweat, as if he’s been waiting for me all morning.
I return the smile, meaning only to keep it polite. But I’m too happy to see him, and my smile stretches until it betrays more than I intend.
Jack offers the pitcher of water to Edmund, but Edmund steps closer to me instead and nods at the canteen in my hand.
“You mind?”
“Sure.” I pass the canteen over.
His gaze catches on the daffodil charm hanging from the cap before he unscrews it and drinks deeply. When he hands the canteen back, he looks directly into my eyes, and his finger slowly brushes my hand, from my thumb to my pinky.
My heart races, heat flaring across my skin. Before I can stop myself, I slide my nail lightly along his knuckles. His breath stutters. He flexes that hand as he pulls away.
The moment is brief, probably invisible to Jack and Dickie. Yet I feel locked inside it, pinned by the intensity of Edmund’s attention, his gaze holding me so steadily that I wonder if he’s imagining my lips on his as vividly as I’m imagining his on mine.
“Thank you,” he says, wiping water from his chin.
“You’re welcome.” I clench the canteen to ground myself, because all I can think about is sipping from it, my mouth touching the same part of the rim where his did.
Edmund steps away, flexing his hand again as he moves to the corner. He pulls his suit jacket from the bench and slips out his Altimor watch. He checks the time once, then again, as if counting seconds.
I get the sense he’s waiting for someone. If it were Irene, he would’ve warned us. He always does.
Jack stands, pushes back his sweaty hair, and tosses me a grin. “You up for a spar, darling?”
I keep my tone casual as I sink onto the sofa. “Trust me, it would be quick and boring. I don’t fence.”
“Ha,” Dickie pipes up from the corner, where he’s elbow-deep in a cabinet of gear. “The devil, you don’t.”
I glance over, still calm, but my pulse kicks up a notch. “How would you know?”
“The same way I know Lady Charlotte couldn’t duel a fly in a web, and I’ve never seen her handle a saber. It’s in the way you move, just like Ed and Jack.” Dickie stops rummaging and faces me, a slow, smug grin creeping across his face. “Not wanting to be seen doesn’t make you hard to read, broad.”
My fingers tighten on the armrest, only slightly, but Dickie notices. I drop my hand, realizing those beady eyes—usually preoccupied with food and video games—see everything, especially what I’d rather keep hidden.
“I used to fence,” I admit. “But not anymore.”
Edmund and Jack turn in sync, with the same slight tilt of their heads. Until now, they believed I’d never touched a saber, and I can feel them rewinding the tape, searching for the frame Dickie caught at first glance.
Edmund slips the Altimor into his pocket with a frown. “Why’d you tell me you don’t fence?”
Shit. I’d completely forgotten I’d lied to his face, saying I never learned because I didn’t like fencing. It’s one of the many lies I’ve stacked so high I can’t always remember which are buried in the pile.
I sit up a little straighter, though every muscle wants to curl in.
I had a script prepared in case I ever needed to explain that I used to fence and why I no longer do.
Charlotte helped me write it. But the script is another lie, and not a small one.
It’s a complete rewrite of the truth. And now that I’m sitting in front of Edmund, Jack, and Dickie, all eyes on me, I don’t know if I have the guts to tell another lie.
None of them is looking at me like they want a story, a Tattletale-worthy scrap of gossip to pass around later. They’re watching me the way you watch someone cross a frozen lake, quiet and tense, bracing for the sound of a break.