27

Abrilliant symphony swept everyone up in a spinning, graceful dance, the room unrolling in hypnotic vistas: drunken constellations, exuberant colors, and wisps of magic twinkling in the air. And beyond all this starry excitement stood Apollo, devastatingly handsome and dangerously heartbreaking.

He wore a loose night-blue shirt with matching formal trousers and a half cape that slinked a little rakishly over one of his powerful shoulders, as though someone had tried to undress him but had been suddenly interrupted. I knew this was the fashion of the North, but I was still mad with jealousy for this supposed someone who'd dared to put their hands on him.

Locks of dark hair fell over his eyes, yet I could still discern them perfectly, even in the hazy distance—wild and heart-rending, they took me in and didn't let me out.

Fire crackled within me, and he knew it. He knew exactly what he was doing to me, staring like that. His lips, after all, were on the verge of smiling.

I was fairly certain that a man had approached and invited Thea to dance because I felt her warm hand on my forearm and heard her feather-soft voice asking, "Is it okay if I dance for a little bit?" But I could only nod in response, lost in that blazing daydream Apollo's eyes shared with mine.

Then—bam. A hard shoulder collided with mine, and the butterflies the Queen herself had bespoke on my dress startled and flew away, scattering straight up to the ceiling before exploding in tiny balls of glitter.

The room snapped into focus—the masterfully strung music, the brilliant garments, the chatter and laughter—and the tall, lean man next to me who was murmuring his apologies.

I blinked. And I blinked again.

Pure, utter shock bestirred me so hard that I lurched back a step.

"Ryker?" I gasped as he swayed to steady me with an arm around my waist.

It seemed impossible, fanciful, inconceivable, and yet… there he was. Ryker, with his big brown eyes and curly dark hair, pouty lips, and crooked nose, staring at me open-mouthed, just like he had that very first day we'd met: two strangers hurtling down Diagonia Alley, busy looking elsewhere and inevitably colliding with each other.

It had not been love at first sight. In fact, I could not recall when it had become love at all. When had we crossed that invisible but formidable line of friendship and courtesy to meaningful smiles and stolen kisses in the dark? The lack of remembrance as he stood before me now, like some dream creature that'd sneaked out of my subconscious, bothered me. Although I had such a hard time remembering the things that had brought us together, I already knew that I would not forget my days with Apollo so easily. My affections would only be nurtured in his absence, in all the things left unsaid, in all the daily scenes left unshared. This would be a love thriving in the distance.

"What—When—How?" Ryker stammered, incoherent in his astonishment.

I shoved off his arms, blurting out, "What are you doing here? I thought you were East."

"I was," he muttered, rubbing at his forehead the way he always did in moments of awkwardness or tension. "I'm just serving an apprenticeship with Lord Dunver." He gestured toward an older man in silver-grey garments, currently chatting with the King and Queen across the room. Isa was among them, in a gorgeous purple gown. She caught my eyes and waved at me, smiling brightly.

I managed to smile and wave back despite my frightfully discombobulated head, and tried to regather my reeling thoughts. If Ryker was here in the North, did that mean…

"You're learning magic?" I demanded, unable to hide the shock in my voice.

Ryker had always been disinterested in magic. There had been nothing I'd hated more than the way he would dismiss me whenever I tried to talk with him about it. "Can we please discuss this later, dear?" he would suggest with his glacial gaze and veiled indifference, and I would nod in compliance, feeling irrelevant and small in his presence, and watch him—him, who cared about all the important things in the world—tolerate me while I chased after my daydreams.

"Politics, Nepheli," Ryker clarified, a little offended at my suggestion in that too-serious tone of his.

I nodded a bit spasmodically. "Right. Right. Yes, I remember you saying something about that."

Ryker inched closer, his cheeks flushed and his voice urgent."Nepheli, for the love of the sky, what are you doing here?"

"She's with me." Apollo's deep, dark voice sounded behind me, and before I could even turn to face him, he flung an arm around my shoulders and pinned me to his side.

I'd been confident that nothing could ever feel more uncomfortable than falling from the sky, or being mentally tormented by evil faeries, or having a group of bandits attack you the same day you almost died from dragonfly fever, but evidently, I'd been gravely mistaken. This was worse.

Ryker's face turned a disconcerting shade of red, and Ι didn't have to look in the gold-framed mirror on the wall next to us to know I looked no better. "Prince Apollo. Welcome back. It's an honor to meet you," he said graciously, bowing at the waist.

Apollo stared him down with his unwavering nonchalance. "And you are?"

Ryker offered his hand. "Ryker Leonos, Your Highness."

To my utter dismay, Apollo didn't shake it. He only removed his hand from me, his eyes narrowing into twin slits of darkness. "Ah, I see," he said with a noncommittal lilt in his voice. "The fiancé. Well, that's a rather fortunate turn of events, isn't it, Little Butterfly?"

"I—"

"Wait a second," Ryker interjected, outraged. "You're the Starshine Princess? You're engaged to him?"

"No!" I blurted out, loud enough for a few heads to turn in our direction. Apollo grinned and bowed at them in mockery of respect, and they immediately veered their heads, whispering in a scandalized manner to each other.

"We're not engaged," I hissed, irritation rising in my bloodstream. "It's just a ridiculous rumor."

"Of course," Apollo drawled. "Can you even imagine our darling Nepheli being engaged to a heartless rake like me?"

"Your Highness, I didn't mean—"

"Don't fret, Mister Leonos," Apollo cut him off with a gruff little tut. "Nepheli Curiosity remains all yours."

The second he finished that sentence, the tips of my ears started to burn. Heart pounding. Blood boiling. Who did he think he was, telling Ryker that I remained his? As if I were an object that he owned and could decide its fate, just like that!

I swiveled on my heels, ready to give him a piece of my mind, and damn me if I cared who listened.

But Apollo was gone, his massive frame cutting through the party.

Oh, no. You'll have to walk faster than that to get away from me.

I fisted my skirts and started after him, but a hand around my elbow stopped me abruptly.

Gods. I forgot about Ryker.

"Nepheli," he pressed, his eyes pleading with me. "Can we talk for a moment?"

I checked over my shoulder at Apollo's shrinking silhouette. I wanted to follow him. I wanted to fight him. I wanted to scream at him.

I wanted to kiss him until he had a heart again.

"Sure," I croaked, trembling as a nerve-racking combination of anxiety and anger took over my body. "We can talk."

Ryker guided me through the party to one of the quaint little balconies that overlooked the Palace's sprawling gardens. Above, the stars were a spatter of treasure on a velvet map, and the moon was a crooked grin, cunning and insidious. But what captivated me the most was the view below. Behind a cottony veil of mist, tall, thick hedges adorned with opalescent blossoms formed a massive, intricate maze shaped like a seven-pointed star, with each point serving as a secret exit.

I put my hands on the cool, sleek balustrade and basked in the night for a moment. The evening chill stroked over me, the kind of cold early spring clung onto before the swift, sun-dazed shift into summer, and my teeth started to chatter.

"Here," Ryker said as he stripped off his jacket to drape it over my bare shoulders.

"Thank you." I smiled a little distractedly at him, my eyes falling off the balcony again, to the captivating maze.

"Nepheli, what are you actually doing here? What happened to the Shop?"

"That's a very long story," I sighed.

He seized my shoulders and spun me around, his expression as chilling as the night. "Can I get your attention for one minute, please? You owe me that much."

"Owe you?" I scoffed in as much bafflement as fury. "I don't owe you anything, Ryker. We took our separate ways. It was your choice to leave Elora, remember?"

"And it was your choice not to come with me," he bit back. "Yet here you are, in The Faraway North of all places. You said that you could never leave the Shop. You asked me not to expect this sacrifice from you. Was it all an excuse? Were you just trying to get rid of me?"

"I wouldn't use the Shop as an excuse, Ryker," I said firmly. "Circumstances change. People change."

He laughed under his breath, the sound mirthless and self-deprecating. "But you couldn't change for me, right?"

"That's the point!" I snapped. "Don't you understand? If I leave the Shop and start a new life somewhere else, I will do it for me. Not for you. Not for my parents. Not for anyone. I will not follow someone else's path and hope to find myself along the way."

"You followed him here," he accused, his face heated.

"No, I didn't," I gritted out. "But that's the problem. That was always the problem with us. You see me as someone who would drop their entire life to follow a stranger to the other side of the world. You have no idea how much I respect the life I have in Elora, and all the hard work my parents have put into the Shop. You've no idea how much I've struggled with letting go of this responsibility and allowing myself to grow into who I am meant to be."

"Nepheli—"

"I'm happy for you, Ryker," I cut him off before he said something he'd regret later on. "I really am. I mean, look at you, here in the Dreaming Palace." And indeed, in his stately silk suit, with his confident posture and bold expression, he looked nothing like the polite but reticent boy I'd once loved. "Can't you be happy for me too?"

His face softened with understanding, slowly, like water slipping through the drain. He let out a breath. "Of course, I am happy that you're going after your dreams, Nepheli," he said as he cupped my cheek with his soft, lean hand. I consciously allowed him this small comfort, this indulgence in the familiar, knowing his next words. Knowing mine too. "I just… I've missed you."

"Ryker," I exhaled. "You don't know me well enough to miss me."

His hand dropped from my face. He took a staggering step back, looking hurt and offended. "How can you say that? We've spent years together."

"Time doesn't determine how deeply you know someone. Time isn't a measure of love," I said as I shrugged off his jacket, and gave it back to him.

Warily, as though it were some lethal weapon, he took it back, frowning in contemplation. "You sound so…" He struggled with the word, his throat bobbing to push it out. "Different."

"I know," I whispered. "It's been quite the journey."

Below, a tall, dark figure emerged from the nightly mist, heading toward the maze. I narrowed my eyes at the powerful shoulders, the elegant waist, the strong thighs. I remembered how Apollo had said earlier that he would recognize me anywhere, and I wondered if that was true for me too. Would I recognize him even if he were a shadow, a mere outline of a body in the night?

Ryker seized my arm to draw my attention back to him. He didn't seem jealous or upset. He looked genuinely worried for me as he lowered his voice in a warning, "Nepheli, please be careful. I've heard terrible things about him."

I found the scandal in his tone so amusing that I started to think that Apollo had indeed been a terrible influence on me. In mockery of gossip, I leaned closer and crooned, "And to think that some of these things are actually true."