sign.
for her to reclaim it a second later. “Leave me!” I demand. “I can find my
way from here.”
I say, voice rising as I pull away a second time. “Why do I need guards,
anyway? Who would dare harm the
than to argue with me. Arguing is pointless. I am stubborn and selfish, and
once I’ve made up my mind, I will not be swayed.
For a moment, I feel bad for taking my anger out on my only friend,
but soon I’m too distracted by the pain in my toes to think of anything else.
My slippers are too tight. I told Needle they were too tight, but she
insisted they were the same size I’ve worn for a year, and shoved them
onto my feet. Now they pinch so badly, I’m hobbling by the time I near the
royal garden. I stop, bend down, and rip them from my feet with a growl
that turns to a moan of relief as soon as my toes are allowed to spread on
the cool stones.
into the flowers lining the path.
“Good choice,” comes a voice from high above, making me draw a
surprised breath. “Who needs shoes in a soft world like this one?”
“Gem?” I ask, though I know it’s him by the pronunciation of the
word “shoes.” His accent is changing, but still, no one else under the dome
sounds like him. “Where are you?”
“In my new room,” he answers. “New
“They gave you the apartment overlooking the gardens?” I ask, tilting
my face in the direction of his voice.
I gave the order for Gem to be transferred to the soldiers’ barracks a
few days past. I requested that the apartment with the view of the royal
garden be converted to a cell—Gem mentioned that he’d like to see the
roses again—but there was some grumbling from Junjie about whether
such a prime space could be spared.
I told him to find a way to spare it and left it at that, but I wasn’t sure
he’d take my order seriously. Junjie seems to treat my commands as
suggestions he’ll take into consideration. If he remembers. If he approves. If
it’s convenient.
“They did,” Gem says. “Thank you.”
“You like it, then?” I ask, craving approval in this night filled with
condemnation.
“I do. Very much.”
“I know there are still bars on the windows, but …”
“It doesn’t matter. The view is nice. And I like the books,” he says,
before adding in an almost shy tone, “I’ve been trying to read them. My
mother taught me your letters and the sounds they make. It’s not as
difficult as I thought it would be.”
“I’m sure you’ll figure it out soon,” I say, feeling a little envious. “I
wish I could read. Being read to is wonderful, but I always thought the
stories would go faster if I could see the words myself.”
“I’m not very fast.”
“You will be. You’re clever.” He is. More clever than I could have
imagined before we started working in the garden together. The past two
weeks have only confirmed how foolish I was to underestimate Gem. He
has a vast knowledge of plants, speaks our language with the fluency of a
noble, and has more stories memorized than I’ve had read to me in my life.
“Soon you’ll have even more stories to add to your collection,” I say,
trying to smile. “You’ll have to tell me your favorites.”
“Of course,” he says, before adding in a softer voice, “What’s wrong?
You don’t sound like yourself.”
I lean against the retaining wall, and reach out, running my fingers
over the wilting petals of the last of the autumn clematis. “I’ve done foolish
things tonight.”
“What kind of foolish things?”
“I was mean to Needle,” I say, tears stinging my eyes for the millionth
time since my father died. “I shouldn’t have been. She’s always so patient
with me.”
“She’ll forgive you,” he says, the lack of judgment in his tone making
me feel even worse.
“I know,” I mumble, wishing I hadn’t said anything. No matter how
well we’ve been getting along, or how much more human Gem is than I
could have dreamed a Monstrous would be, it was stupid to start
confessing things to him. He’s not my friend; he’s my prisoner.
“What else?” he asks.
“Nothing,” I say, lingering when I know I should tell him good night
and be on my way. But I’m not in any hurry to return to the tower or
Needle, who I know will be waiting by the door with her sad sigh, ready to
gently remind me of everything I did wrong tonight.
I know I have to apologize and endure the reminders, but I’m not
ready. Not yet.
“I don’t believe you.” Gem’s voice holds a challenge I refuse to take.
“Tell me a story,” I say instead, forcing a smile. Storytelling is what
built the bridge between Gem and me in the first place. I began it as a way
to break the strained silence during our first day in the garden, but Gem
soon took the lead. He is a gifted storyteller and obviously appreciates a
receptive audience. He has never refused me a story. “A happy story,
please.”
“What kind of happy story?”
“One of your people’s legends. One with wind in it.”
He falls quiet, but I don’t repeat myself. I know he’s putting his
thoughts together and that it will be worth the wait. Gem’s stories are
always wonderful, mysterious and magical and eerily familiar, stories my
heart swears I’ve heard before even if my mind can’t remember them.
“Once, long ago, in the early days of my tribe, there was a girl who
loved a star,” he begins, summoning a delicious shiver from deep in my
bones. I pull myself up to sit on the edge of the wall and draw my legs to
my chest beneath my dress, grateful Needle gave me a full skirt rather than
one of the narrow ones that make me teeter when I walk.
“It was a summer star,” Gem continues once I’m comfortable. “And it
appeared in the sky just as the summer grass turned brown. It burned a
fierce orange and red, and spent its nights boasting of all the worlds it had
known and the creatures who had loved it.
“All the girls in the tribe enjoyed gazing at the star, but one girl,
Melita, was captivated at first glance,” he says, the lulling rhythm of his
words easing the last of the tension from my shoulders. “Every evening, she
would creep from her family’s hut and lie down in the grass beneath the
star. They would talk late into the night, telling each other their secret
hopes and dreams, their messages carried between land and sky by the
west wind.
“The girl told the star how she wished to journey beyond her tribe’s
lands and see things no Desert Girl had ever seen before. The star told the
girl how he yearned for someone with arms brave enough to hold him,
strong enough to wrap around him at the close of the day and hold on until
morning.
“Eventually, the two grew so filled with longing that the star’s wish
was granted. The girl opened her arms and called him from the sky, and
with a sigh, he fell, burning a trail through the night as his flame went out,
leaving only his bone-white body behind.”
I drop my chin to my knees and close my eyes, suddenly feeling shy
of this story.
It’s a love story. Gem has never told me a love story. It feels more
intimate than his other tales. Sadder, too. I haven’t imagined the
Monstrous loving the way we love, but I suppose they must. It makes me
wonder if there is someone Gem left behind, a Monstrous girl whose arms
he imagines holding him until morning.…
“The next morning, the girl awoke to find the star weeping in the
grass,” Gem continues. “He had already grown tired of the girl’s arms. He
craved the eyes of every creature of this world and the next and the next.
He mourned the loss of his spark and shine and the glory of burning
brighter than anything else in the night. He cursed the girl, blaming her for
his fall, and left her so he could find his way back to the sky, abandoning
her long before the girl’s belly began to round with the new star he had put
inside her.”
I blush so hard, my cheeks tingle. Heat spreads from my face, down
my neck, to make my skin itch beneath my clothes.
of his hoe as it breaks up the soil that has proven
too stubborn for our plow.
I follow behind him on my hands and knees, gathering clumps of
grass, rocks, and springy roots in my giant pockets. Needle stitched me a
new pair of overalls—in mourning green—but I wear them only out here, in
the loneliest corner of the city, by the Desert Gate. I like it out here. It’s
quiet and peaceful, and the guards hardly bother Gem and me at all
anymore.
After a month with no show of claws, the soldiers began taking turns
at Gem’s side. After eight weeks, they watch our progress from chairs at
the edge of the field. Bo tells me one of them always has a blow tube and a
sedative dart ready, but I’m not so sure. I catch snippets of their
conversations, and it sounds like they’re more focused on card games than
protecting their queen.
No matter how valuable my life is to the city, boredom eventually
won out over duty. Knowing Gem as I do, I’m betting that’s part of his plan.
He has a plan. A secret. I’d bet my hands on it. I know him better
than he thinks I do. You don’t spend every afternoon with
someone—listening to his stories and teaching him songs—without
learning a thing or two about the way his mind works.
“The herbs can be put off a month or two, but not the bulbs.” Gem
speaks our language like he was raised in the city now. There is nothing
growly or rough about him. He is the perfect gentleman. Gentle-Monstrous.
“We need to get them into the ground,” he continues. “They should
be planted while it’s still cold.”
“It will be cold forever.” A part of me believes it. Spring is a promise