The Hunt - Megan Shepherd Page 0,86

a while for the drugs to clear her system,” Cassian said. “A full day, perhaps longer. The Gauntlet arrives tomorrow, and the tests begin the day after that. That does not leave us much time. How much progress have you made teaching yourself to read minds?”

A thump sounded from beyond the alcove. The music outside stopped halfway through a song. Cora glanced at the slats, but dismissed it. Makayla must be taking her break early.

“I can see images sometimes in people’s heads, sense the feelings that go with them.”

“I don’t know how Anya goes about controlling minds, but my guess is you’ll need more than that. You’ll need to extract specific words, as a starting point. It isn’t like levitating dice, because there are no amplifiers built into the mind. You must probe beneath consciousness, like reaching into a murky pond and finding a stone at the bottom.” He took her hands, and she flinched at the sudden contact. He placed her palms on either side of his head, just above his ears. “Tell me what I am thinking.”

He closed his eyes.

She scanned his face, looking for any tells or clues that might give away his thoughts. The scar Mali had given him. The bump in his nose.

She concentrated on piercing his mind’s natural shield. She had only ever intentionally read humans’ minds before, and by contrast Cassian’s felt surprisingly chaotic. Thoughts were stacked in haphazard piles that must make sense only to him.

Out of the chaos, she sensed an image of his quarters, bare. The book he liked to read, Peter Pan and Wendy. Then a memory of the cage, of watching her from behind a panel as she found the bone he had planted in the desert. That memory seemed stronger than the others.

“The bone,” she whispered, and felt his head nod in her hands.

“Good. And what am I thinking now?”

She concentrated again, and pictured a black sky. A snow-covered hill that would have made her shiver, but in his memory, he didn’t feel the cold. One by one, lights appeared in the dark.

“Stars.”

“Yes. And now?”

He had tipped his head down, so their foreheads were pressed together. She pictured an image of her own face. She was driving in her dad’s car down country roads, singing softly to the radio. Her cheeks started to warm. His memories felt different when they were about her. They crackled at the edges, more alive. The image changed to waves lapping in the ocean, the two of them standing in the surf. In the memory, they were arguing. He was confused, frustrated, desperate. She had started to speak, but then he’d kissed her.

Her lips parted in surprise. “You’re thinking . . . of that day—”

And then, he was kissing her again. Not in a memory—in real life.

They were so close already that it had taken just a tilt of his head for their lips to meet. A current spread to her toes, and her hands instinctively slipped from the sides of his head to his shoulders. He kissed her deeper and she slid her arms around his neck. It was wrong, she knew. She’d sworn not to do this again. And yet ever since that day they’d pretended to dance together, she’d been unable to forget it.

Her hip bumped the table, and the cards fluttered to the floor. She broke the kiss and twisted to pick them up, but he held her tightly.

“Cora. Please. Do not push me away again.”

But it was too much—the kiss, what it meant, everything. She crouched down, hair falling over her face, thankful for the excuse to catch her breath. Her fingers curled around the fallen cards. She’d stand up. She’d face him. She’d tell him it couldn’t happen again. . . .

And then she realized that the Hunt had gone completely silent on the other side of the screen. No clinking glasses, no announcements from the stage. She glanced at Cassian and saw the same realization reflected in his own face.

The wooden screen jerked open.

Arrowal stood on the other side. “You. Girl. Come with us.”

The blood drained from her face. Surely he hadn’t seen the kiss. Behind him, Fian stood with two Kindred guards. When his eyes met hers, they flamed with warning.

Cassian was rapidly cloaking himself. “I have reserved this girl’s entertainment for the rest of the quarter rotation.”

“That is inconsequential,” Fian said. “There has been a murder.”

Cold fear crept up her body until she was nearly blinded by it. Arrowal didn’t take his eyes