empties his wallet.
I take Margo’s hand in mine and point to the cathedral. There are so many bodies gathering for the Holy Day service that they block the paths. Leaflets flutter in the breeze and litter the sidewalks, advertising everything from weddings to the justice’s orders.
“There’s an entrance from within the cathedral that leads to the dungeons.”
Behind me, Sayida inspects her reflection at a stand of hand mirrors. She tilts one this way and that while Esteban holds the two paper cups of steaming café. To a casual onlooker, she looks like a vain farm girl, though even with her dust-covered clothes her features are breathtaking. But her black tourmaline eyes don’t fall on her reflection. Instead, they watch the alley directly behind her. Lowering the mirror, she leans in to the hairy vendor.
“Where is everyone going?” she asks sweetly, with a flutter of silky black lashes.
“The execution square,” the vendor says, leering at Sayida, who tenses just as I do. Margo and I exchange wary glances. “A pretty thing like you don’t need to see such a thing. You can wait right here till the crowds settle.” He pats his thigh and cocks a lascivious smirk.
Sayida sets down the mirror, hard enough to crack it, then stomps away into the alley while he’s too stunned to react. I grab her hand and we fold into the swell of people entering the market. As the vendor searches the rising tide of bodies for a guard, we slip away.
“The execution square,” I say, stopping at the mouth of an alley. I press my hands against my stomach to stop them from trembling. Behind me, rodents scavenge through piles of garbage and the hot smell of urine clings to the air.
“I thought—” Margo starts, but doesn’t finish what we all believed. The execution is supposed to happen tomorrow at dawn, not today.
Sayida looks grim, her eyes drawn to a rustle of parchment on her boot. A leaflet, the bottom half wet with sewer water.
I snatch the parchment from her hand, stained with oil and dirt, and there’s a crude drawing of a man with demon eyes and long fangs. At the top, there is a title: Príncipe Dorado Slays the Moria Bestae.
Skimming down the print, I realize it is an execution rhyme. The words jumble together, refusing to form sentences because all I can see is one name repeated over and over again in the ballad: Dez de Martín.
Andrés de Martín. I think his true name.
I crush the parchment in my hand, but we’ve all seen it. My mind is going to break open. I can feel the memories strain against my temples, each one a blade trying to cut its way out. Trust me. Trust. Me.
“Executions don’t happen on Holy Day,” Margo says. “We were supposed to have another day!”
“They knew we’d never surrender. Not even for Dez,” Sayida says.
Esteban makes a choking sound. “Think of the crowds. The people who will be present. Everyone from farmhands to lords all attending the same service. What better spectacle than to kill the leader of the Whispers?”
They’re going to kill Dez. The reality of it feels like that gut punch on the balcony. I’m desperate and need to breathe, but I can’t. Castian’s going to kill him because Dez couldn’t break out of his cell. Castian’s going to kill him because I stole Dez’s means of escape.
Trumpets sound in the distance, and this time, the four of us gather in a closed circle, while rivers of people make their way past the narrow alley and toward the cathedral to the execution square. Some carry baskets of rotting food, garbage not good enough for even rats to eat. Others clutch glass bottles of holy water blessed by the royal priest himself. Anything and everything they can throw, they bring with them.
“This changes nothing,” I say breathlessly. “I don’t care if I have to rip Dez off that platform and kill the executioner myself.”
Esteban balls his hands into fists. “Look around. We’ll never break through the crowds.”
“We don’t have to get through,” Sayida says, running to the dead end of the alley. I see what she sees. A metal drainpipe. “If we can’t walk the streets we will race across rooftops.”
In the dark shadow of the alley, we grab the rungs on the side of the pipe that empties out the eaves trough on the roof of the building, and climb up. Everyone is so preoccupied with the idea of a Moria Whisper’s death that