Tempt the Stars

didn’t think a flimsy piece of wood was going to hold them off for long. But it felt good to slam it, so good that I almost opened it and did it again.
    I settled for glaring at Pritkin as he glared back, and dared him to say it. Dared him to tell me off for doing the
exact same thing
he’d done for me. Dared him to say
anything.
    “You broke my node!” Casanova screeched.
    “You brought her here!” Pritkin said viciously, his eyes never leaving my face.
    “Not willingly, you insufferable—”
    “Where’s Rian?” I demanded, cutting him off, but staring at Pritkin. He looked different. The hair was longer, to the point it could actually be styled like a normal person’s. He was shaved and his skin looked soft, with a slight shimmer to it like the people’s downstairs. He was wearing some flowy, desert sheik caftan thing in a dark green that highlighted the breadth of his shoulders and brought out his eyes.
    He looked terrible.
    Pritkin’s idea of a beauty regimen included soap and deodorant; I’d never even smelled cologne on him before. But I was smelling it now, something wild and seductive and—and wrong. Pritkin smelled like
sweat
. He smelled like burnt gunpowder. He smelled like nasty potion ingredients and too-strong coffee and those little licorice candies he snuck around to eat because he didn’t want to set a bad example for my sweet tooth.
    Only not now.
    Now he smelled like this place.
    Now he smelled like
nothing
.
    “Where do you think?” Casanova said bitterly. “She told me we were coming here to look for John, but as soon as we arrived, she started asking after Rosier. When I demanded to know why, she left me and went to look for him on her own. And stupidly, I tried to warn—”
    “I knew it was you,” Pritkin told me, quietly furious. “Before he said a damned word. As soon as I heard the bells, I
knew
—”
    I slapped him. Hard. It came out of nowhere, to the point that I didn’t even realize I was going to do it until his head snapped back, until he was glaring at me over the imprint of my palm on his left cheek.
    “I—we’ll talk later,” Casanova said, and slunk off somewhere.
    “How’s it feel?” I asked, voice low and shaking. And I wasn’t talking about the slap.
    “You—” Pritkin cut off and clamped his lips tight, as if he was afraid if he started he wouldn’t know where to stop. Which was fine by me. My adrenaline was pumping, my pulse was pounding, and anything he could throw— just
any damned thing—
    Except that, I thought, as I was dragged against a hard chest.
    “You son of a
bitch
—” I began, only to have my voice choked off by something caught in my throat. It wasn’t sentiment. It was too dark for that. I thought it might be hate.
    Yes, that was it. I
hated
him.
    “Did you hear me?” Caleb barked, from across the room.
    “What?” I snapped. And finally looked up. And blinked. Because a prison cell this wasn’t.
    Instead of the cramped, potion-filled, messy room in Vegas, which even on a good day looked like it was inhabited by a cross between a hyperactive toddler and Rambo, this place was . . . beautiful. Graceful. Perfect.
    It was huge, with couches and pillows and rugs scattered around, and a bed big enough for seven or eight people. And maybe designed for it, considering where we were. There were arched doorways on either end, leading off to even more space, but the big story was the balcony, which was easily as wide as the room and ran its entire length.
    Pierced bronze lanterns swayed softly on silken chains, surrounded by geometrical halos. A breeze sent long white curtains wafting languorously into the room, so diaphanous the stars could be seen through them. Their edges caressed diamond-shaped stones on the floor, in every possible shade from honey to palest gold. I stared at them, trying to wrap my head around the idea of Pritkin living in a palace instead of the middle of Dante’s tacky clutter, of him wearing fine, embroidered clothes instead of old, scratched leather, of him inhabiting a space as beautiful as it was alien, with nothing, not a book, not a vial, not a picture,
nothing,
to remind him of the world he’d lost.
    As if it hadn’t mattered. As if he hadn’t even missed—
    “Cassie!” Caleb said, more urgently this time. “Look at this.”
    I ran over to the balcony, which gave a pretty good view along the side of the cliff and over the sprawling city. But the twinkling lights didn’t hold my