“There’s another Zodia here with him,” he whispered.
“Which one?” I asked, every muscle in my body taut.
“Virgo,” he answered.
I didn’t necessarily breathe a sigh of relief at the news, but I wasn’t overly worried. I was pretty sure she wasn’t going to try to shred me, but I still didn’t like her.
Xavier walked over to where I leaned against the balustrade and pulled a piece of paper from the inner pocket of his coat. The slip of torn, wide-ruled paper rattled in the wind as he held it out to me. Across it was printed: Somehow, we have to talk privately.
My heart dropped at the same time my hackles raised. I wondered what was going on and how we would possibly manage to evade the mass of Guardians long enough to speak.
“We’ll figure it out,” he said so quietly I almost didn’t hear him.
Our silence, as well as our whispers were bound to draw attention. “Was Kes upset when he came to get you?”
“He wasn’t thrilled, to say the least, but it didn’t seem like anyone had a say in it but Aries.” There was a sharp glint in his eye. I imagined a spark of hatred looked the same before it spread and consumed.
“So, where’s your room?” I asked, hoping to redirect the conversation away from the celestial beast upending our lives.
“Nowhere near yours,” he answered with a grin that quickly fell away. “He wants me close, but not too close.”
The multitude of questions swimming in his eyes nearly took me under. I knew I couldn’t answer them now, but then again, I wasn’t sure if I ever should. I trusted Kes and he looked out for me, which was why I needed to heed his guidance and not tell Xavier anything.
Was this a test to see if I was loyal, or was it exactly like Xavier said? Maybe Aries finally realized the pledge was making him crazy; that he shouldn’t waste his time personally guarding a girl he barely knew. Kes never specified that Aries had to be the one to watch over me. He just asked him to guard me and keep me safe above all others. I pinched my eyes closed, wishing he’d never said those words. If something happened to any of his people while he was busy trying to keep me safe, I’d never forgive myself.
“Do you want to go inside?” Xavier asked, hooking his thumb back toward the door. “You’re shivering.”
I hadn’t realized it until he pointed it out, but I was. “Yeah,” I agreed absently, following him to the door.
“There has to be something to do around here,” he mused.
As long as his search didn’t include dark lairs or beautiful libraries, we were safe.
So why did I have that dreadful feeling in the pit of my stomach, the same staticky feel I got before the world fell apart and the Zodia awoke?
Kes appeared in my room as I was getting ready for a dinner to which Xavier and I had been summoned. I scraped hanger after hanger over the metal bar in the closet, unsure what to wear. My fingers fell over my prom dress and I quickly brushed it aside. I was never wearing it again.
He cleared his throat behind me.
My hand paused half-way across the closet bar. “I know you’re here.”
“Then why are you ignoring me?”
My hand tightened on a red sweater for a second before I pushed it aside. “Why didn’t you tell me Xavier was moving in?” I volleyed.
“I didn’t know until Aries gave the order to retrieve the boy and not tell you beforehand.”
I turned to face him. “Why would Aries care if I knew? I would obviously find out when he showed up anyway.”
Kes shrugged. “I have no idea, but I have to do what I’m told.”
“It must be exhausting.” I turned back to my clothes, angrily raking garment after garment across, metal screeching across metal. It was an oddly satisfying sensation since I knew noises like that bothered Kes. I could almost hear his teeth grind.
“What must be?” he asked after a long pause.
“Constantly having to do what you’re told. Never having your opinion matter,” I answered, shrugging a shoulder.
“My opinion is valuable to Aries.”
I rolled my eyes, fully aware he could sense the movement but not bothering to turn around so he could see it.
I mean, Aries did as Kes asked in one circumstance – honoring the right he invoked. Other than that, Kes was like Cinderella. Kes do this. Kes do that. Well, what if Kes thought what he’d been ordered to do was wrong? It wouldn’t matter, because he’d been ordered by his maker to do it.
His glacier eyes watched for a reaction as he said, “I was going to tell you that Helena is coming over to help you dress.”
“I’ve been dressing myself since first grade, but thanks,” I quipped, wishing he’d leave already but also wishing he wouldn’t. I was mad at him, but I hadn’t seen him all day. Even if I was irritated at him, Kes was someone I could count on in a world where no one could be trusted.
“Aries has requested that you and Xavier, along with everyone else in his kingdom, dress traditionally so that for the time being, you might be more difficult for the other Zodia to pick you out of a crowd.”
I turned around at his choice of words, quirking a brow. “Traditionally?” I deadpanned. “Which means…?”
“You’re not going to like it,” he warned. “And you’ll definitely need help dressing. How long did it take you to get that prom dress on?”
Ugh. I mean, technically, it took me longer to get it off than on, but if Kes said I wouldn’t like it, he was probably right.
“Will it just be the four of us at dinner?” I asked, infusing too much hope into my voice.
“Five,” he answered, squashing said hope.
I bet the ethereal Virgo was staying for supper. Lovely.
Two taps came at the door and Helena stepped in. She was dressed in leather pants and an off-white, cashmere sweater that fell off one shoulder, with smoky eyeshadow that was on point. If this was traditional dress, count me in. She glanced between the two of us. “Should I come back?”
“No,” Kes said. “Please come in. I was just leaving.”
I tried to give Helena a smile as Kes vanished between us. She pushed her long, lavender bangs back. “Okay,” she drawled. “So, what color do you want to wear?” She looked around the room and gestured to the wall. To the deep teal and gold… “Are these your favorite colors?”
I nodded. “Yes.”
She opened the bedroom door and tugged in a small, wheeled cart filled with mountains of fabric swaths. Her hands gravitated to the deep teal color of my walls. “An exact match,” she mused. “I think Aries favors you in this color.”
“I don’t care what Aries favors,” I snipped.
A knowing grin slid over her lips. “Then let’s make him regret providing the color.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be on his side?” I mean, she was a Guardian, which meant she was beholden to him like my brother was. Without responding, she began gathering swaths of fabric. I wasn’t sure how she could possibly turn them into a dress in time for dinner, then she made the first knot. “You’re knotting my dress… Wait – am I going to look like Virgo?”
The last person in the world I wanted to dress like was her. She was perfect and I was definitely not. If we twinned, it would only highlight my laundry list of flaws.
Helena laughed and it made something akin to happiness flutter through my veins. “Virgo barely shows any flesh. She’s the proverbial embodiment of modesty and purity,” she mocked. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think you want to project the same image to Aries. I think you want to make a statement. Not only to him, but to all of the Zodia.”
“All two of them?”
She shrugged her bare shoulder. “Word travels fast among them, despite alliances. And there will be three attending tonight’s dinner. Aquarius just arrived.” She walked to the cart and grabbed a h
andful of thin, golden strands. “Aquarius will particularly enjoy the gold we’ll embellish you with. He’ll enjoy it enough to set Aries’s teeth on edge.”
“Why are you so keen on helping me torture Aries?” I asked warily.
She told me to strip, and as I peeled my shirt over my head, she answered, “My girlfriend plays violin. Last night, she said Aries couldn’t tear his eyes off you, and you don’t even want to hear the words she used to describe how he looked when he ordered them out of the room. He was more knotted than your dress will be.” Her fingers worked deftly and fast. “And that’s saying something.”
She wasn’t kidding. She made a knot, pulled the rest of the swath through, grabbed another piece of fabric, somehow wove it in, and then tied it into the other. Soon, a blended cross-hatching of fabric and space between had formed.
“I’m sorry if I was less than friendly yesterday. It’s just… my life was upended, too. You know?”
I nodded. The Guardians all had lives, people they cared about, hopes and dreams. They didn’t expect the Zodia to awaken. They weren’t ready, either.
“Aries created us before he put the others to sleep. We built the temple to hold them,” she admitted. “He was kinder than the rest, though always the clear leader among them. His feelings were always transparent, before and after the slumber. Until he pledged to you, he wore his heart on his sleeve.”
“Where does he wear it now?”
She smiled. “He doesn’t; you do. Stretched ‘round your little finger.”
I shook my head, tugging off my jeans. “I don’t think he feels that way. He’s made it abundantly clear how much he wants to push me away.”
She gestured to my bra and panties. “Those go, too.”
I paused.
She stopped knotting the scrap of fabric. “Meek or bold. I can’t choose for you.”
“Bold,” I said, meeting her eyes and unclasping the bra at my back.
Helena nodded her approval. I turned when she asked me to, and she fitted the fabric to my body. My breasts were strategically held up by two wider pieces of fabric, Helena knotting below them and at my collar bones. She interlaced wider panels to cover my bottom half in front and back, leaving both my sides bare. I’d opted for bold, and bold was what she provided.
She clamped long golden beads engraved with slash marks along the sections where the fabric was twisted into rope. Then she reached into her bag hanging on the far end of the cart. “Raise your arm.”
I raised the left one and let her clamp a piece of gold jewelry onto my bicep. Not a cuff, but a series of chains, each longer than the last that dangled to my elbow. She clasped another on the right arm and stood back, an assured gleam in her eyes. “Would you like help with your makeup?”
“Yes,” I said quickly. I needed her help. Her mocha skin glowed, her wing-tipped liner, taupe shadow, and highlighter flawless. And don’t even get me started on how pretty her lips were.
She laughed and grabbed her bag, and I sat as still as possible on the bed while she made me over. When she pointed to my mirror, I stood and gaped at my reflection.
“How do you do it?” I marveled. She was amazing. My lips were the color of a juicy red apple. My skin shimmered, a slice of peach over my cheekbones, and my eyes… gold in the inner corner, fading to chocolate at the outer corner. Winged, just like I’d hoped.
She laughed. “I’m a little obsessed with all things wardrobe and makeup.”
“Why aren’t you wearing the traditional garb?”
She sighed dramatically. “I love my leggings, but alas, I will have to change, as well.” Just then, her eyes flew to my door a second before Kes knocked and barged in.
His eyes narrowed at my outfit, then at Helena. “What have you done?” he accused.
“She’s dressed traditionally and is ready for dinner, just as you asked,” she offered sweetly. “Now, hold the door open so I can wheel this thing out.” She sauntered right past him, the wheel of her rolling rack squeaking all the way down the hall.
Kes scrubbed a hand down his face.
“What’s your problem?” I asked.
“This shows more skin than your prom dress did, and you saw how he reacted last night!”
He didn’t know the half of it. He was escorting Xavier home during the most intense part. “I know it must not have had much of an effect if he invited Xavier to be my ‘companion’, and invited Virgo over to spend the day.”
“Virgo and Aries aren’t… intimate,” he defended.
“You don’t know that.”
“Actually, I do,” he said, refusing to elaborate. “I know everything about Aries. You see, he doesn’t expect me to be his Guardian without sharing everything with me. You saw me offer him my memories, but did you know he also gave me his? Every single one. Since he was created. He shared that with me so that he and I would be as equal as possible. He shares them with me still. Every evening.”
I was taken aback. I had no idea Aries shared everything with Kes. My face heated at the realization that my brother was, in fact, aware of all that happened between me and Aries in the dining room.
“So believe me when I say that while he respects Virgo, he does not care for her. And he never will.”
I swallowed thickly, thoughtful as I studied the design stitched onto the front of Kes’s tunic. Tonight’s embroidered pattern was made up of a series of constellations… Aries, Virgo, and Aquarius, of course. “How’d you get the tunic made in time?”
He rolled his eyes. “I can tug you through space and time. Rearranging a few thread patterns is much simpler.”
“I bet it doesn’t hurt the thread,” I grumbled, looking back into the mirror. I reached into my jewelry box and pulled out a pair of golden threader earrings, a tiny bar at each end. I put them on as Kes waited impatiently.
“I hope you know what you’re doing,” he said quietly, spearing me with a look through the mirror.
“I’m going to dinner.”
He shook his head and gave a mirthless laugh. “You’re going to get me killed.”
“I can handle myself,” I said, turning around to face him.
Xavier appeared over his shoulder, his mouth falling open when he saw me. “Damn.”
Kes slowly turned toward him.
Xavier put his hands up. “Sorry, man, but she looks hot. Smoking hot, Larken,” he said directly to me.
I smiled. “Thanks.”
I walked around the bed and threaded my hand through the crook of Xavier’s elbow, Kes cursing as he closed the door behind us.
ARIES
When she walked in, I nearly snapped the table in two in my effort not to run to her and remove the hand she rested on Xavier’s arm. I immediately regretted bringing him here.
She held her chin and shoulders proudly, but the scraps of dark teal that knotted to reveal her form nearly unraveled me.
A smile stretched over Aquarius’s face as his eyes traced the beads and chains of gold appreciatively.
Virgo was the only one among us not smiling. She appraised Larken shrewdly, then turned dismissively away.
Larken’s sweet scent was too much to bear.
And speaking of baring… The outsides of her thighs were exposed, the fabric between them swaying with each step. The skin peeking out glowed luminously and her feet were bare against the stone.
The wood beneath my fingers popped loudly.
Aquarius turned his golden eyes to my hands with a raised brow. I released the table.
17
A loud popping noise filled the air. I paused and looked around but didn’t see anything out of place. Kes didn’t even acknowledge it. He moved to pull a chair out next to Aries, but I shoved Xavier toward it and took the one between Xavier and Aquarius, across from Virgo, whom Kes would sit beside. She, of course, sat at Aries’s right
hand.
I didn’t look at Aries for a very long time, but I felt the warmth of his stare and a tingle on my hip where his mark was.
Our cups were filled with sparkling water and woodsy, scented red wine. “Madame?” the Guardian with the blue mohawk asked, holding a bottle and glass.
“No, thank you,” I declined graciously.
“She’s far too young for wine,” Virgo said sweetly.
“I’m not too young to die, so if I want wine, I’ll have some, thank you. I’m just not in the mood.” I raised my brows to let her know she had no business telling me what to do. It was the same look I fed my folks when I was being a smart-ass.
They hated it.
So did Virgo.
She quickly recovered, placing her delicate hand over Aries’s. Her claws weren’t dipped in starlight. They were a peachy-pink, nearly translucent, though nothing as beautiful and dark as Aries’s. But they would cut the same, I bet.
Kes stared holes into the side of my head, so I turned my attention from her to him. He gave a fractional shake of his head. Don’t, his eyes said.
I reconsidered the glass of wine, but dinner was placed in front of me, consisting of a plate of steaming hot vegetables, a small cut of steak, and sweet dates.
Xavier nudged me. You okay? he mouthed.
I nodded, looking up to find Aries watching us.
Aquarius had golden teeth with a matching tongue and throat, but they all worked. Unlike Aries, he had no problem using his utensils despite having claw-tipped fingers. He sliced through his steak like it was a piece of butter. I imagined he was just as good with a sword or dagger.
I need a weapon.
I remembered the strangled feeling of being held beneath the water, my lungs burning. If I’d had a knife to use, I would’ve stabbed and stabbed until either I drowned, or Pisces let me go. I imagined the feeling of my blade sinking into her invisible fish flesh, her blood flooding the water around us, blinding us both.
I could steal one of these steak knives… but wasn’t sure where to hide it in this ‘dress.’
Things That Should Stay Buried Page 17
