Aaros would be wringing her neck right about now. Kallia knew she shouldn’t joke. Demarco could very well do it, though his brow seemed to harden at the suggestion.
“When confronted with fire”—he spoke calmly, as if beginning a lesson—“the first instinct is to conjure water. Even the tiniest amount, if you have the strength. Instead, you chose the riskiest, most dangerous option.”
“And it paid off.” They should be thanking her, honestly. “I can’t see why you’re trying to twist this into something it’s not. Everyone came out of that room intact, yet you cast me as the villain.”
“Someone has to be.” His gaze never wavered. “A fire like that doesn’t come out of nowhere, and it sure as hell didn’t feel like an accident. Either someone was hoping to shake the other competitors, or someone staged it to show off.”
“You really think I would’ve done all of that to show off?”
“That was quite a trick at the end. And from what I’ve observed, your style is all about the showstoppers.”
“Don’t act like you know anything about me just because you’re some big stage name with a fancy family.” She scowled. “But consider this my lesson learned. I won’t lend a helping hand the next time there’s trouble. Not if it only brings overprivileged beasts like you to my doorstep.”
To Demarco’s credit, he stayed silent. Simmering.
“And before you criticize me any further, Mister Demarco, I hope you realize a competition like this will only get more cutthroat. That fire was just the first baring of claws.” Kallia tossed him a devious smile, relishing the challenge. “And if you can’t handle that, clearly you didn’t think this through when you signed on to become a judge.”
“There wasn’t much choice,” Demarco muttered, anger clipping his tone. “But if I’d known I’d be stuck in a group like this, I wouldn’t have left my home.”
Liar. She smelled it as strongly as the smoke still clinging to his skin.
“And yet…” Kallia drawled, pushing off the wall to circle him. “You’re still here.”
He watched her, unflinching. “Because of the damn contract.”
“No.” Head tilted, she drew closer until she was right up against his chest. “You’re about as much like those other judges as I am my competitors. But I have a prize to win. You, however—a glorified prince of magicians…” She stroked a finger under his chin. “I heard you withdrew from performing years ago. So what exactly is drawing you back?”
And what made you leave?
It surprised her, that she even cared to know.
His throat bobbed under a hard swallow. Tables turned. But to his credit, he didn’t stay caged. Didn’t even move away. He leaned in intently, letting her finger brush down his neck. Her pulse leaped as their eyes met. “It’s none of your damn business.”
Interesting. Kallia almost regretted having to squash the flare of curiosity inside her. “Excellent. How about you stay out of mine, then?”
She pulled away and turned swiftly to her door, slamming it shut in his face.
13
Daron rarely slept the next few nights. Not when the echo of that slammed door kept pounding in his ears, forming its own mad song. All beat without melody. It haunted him even more than the accident at dinner.
No, not an accident. Someone had toppled those candles, raising their flames higher than men. All of them would’ve been consumed by the blaze if Kallia hadn’t—
The door slammed in his mind.
Again, and again.
Somehow she’d gotten inside his head, and the bloody show had not even begun yet.
In all their meetings afterward, the ice between them had not subsided. Kallia continued about her business with an indifferent air toward him. Daron had much more difficulty doing the same, for she was impossible not to notice. Always firing off comebacks or dressed in bold colors, a strike of paint against white canvas. Sitting at the hotel’s café with her assistant, or laughing down the street with a Conquering Circus performer at her side.
Kallia was everywhere. And everywhere he saw her, he heard her suspicions tolling in his ears. Her curiosity. The absolute last thing he needed.
Someone looking at him, sharp enough to see through it all.
See him.
“No, no, no,” Erasmus tutted a few mornings after the dinner, pacing in the Alastor Place. He cut off Daron’s suggestion with a furious wag of his finger. “I don’t care who you are, Demarco. You’re not getting rid of my star. Besides, you can’t—she signed my contract!”