Kin

ONE

NEW HAVEN RECLINED UNDER THICK SUNSHINE AND fluffy cotton-wool clouds, isolated trees turning to autumn flames early this year. The rest were still that peculiar darkening green they wore right before dressing up for Dead Harvest.

Less than a week of freedom between the end of summer classes and the beginning of the last year at St. Juno’s, which meant that if you wanted to have some fun you had to grab it with both hands. It was even better when you had friends to help with the grabbing and pulling.

Which sort of explained why Ruby de Varre was sitting cross-legged on her Semprena’s still-warm bonnet, at the park on top of Haven Hill, completely alone. Summer was stuttering to a stop, so it was still warm in the sunshine, but here under a huge spreading oak tree that probably predated the Reeve there was an edge to the breeze. This tree hadn’t started turning yet, still green and vital, the sound of its leaves rubbing against each other a snakescale whisper.

Cami and Ellie had both promised to meet her at Stellar’s to get milkshakes before figuring out how best to waste this pretty nice day together. After fifteen with no sign of either she’d bailed, because who had time to wait around with so little summer left?

That just meant she was up here all alone, staring at New Haven spread out below the Hill like a fresh banquet in front of a glutton too stuffed to eat another bite. All that excitement, all that life pulsing under the ribbons of pavement, from the blighted core to the Moving Wall that separated city from Waste . . . and here she was, in jeans and a red tank top instead of school uniform but nobody to talk to. Nothing to do.

Maybe she could have stayed and waited.

Why bother, though? Ellie was always on about Avery this and Avery that, and talking about the scholarships lined up with the help of the Fletcher charm-clan. Her Potential had settled and her stepmother’d been shipped off to a kolkhoz, and that was just fine by Ruby on both counts, but every other word coming out of Ellie’s mouth was about the boyfriend nowadays.

At least Cami didn’t talk about Nico much, but she’d been even quieter than usual lately, something about etiquette among the Seven. The Families ruled New Haven but continually jostled each other, and there was some slight or another that required some diplomacy and extra gatherings. Of course, Cami as la Vultusina had to organize a few of them as neutral ground. So she was always looking off in the distance, probably worrying about caterers or how to keep Family members from drawing any blood.

Literally.

Ruby sighed, leaning back on her hands. The smell of hot earth, the tang of the trees beginning to turn, exhaust from engines throbbing all through New Haven, pollen, cut grass somewhere. If her nose had begun to tingle, she could follow it and find some fun.

There was just no fun to be scented today.

She couldn’t even bask, because she’d parked in the shade, as usual. Cami didn’t complain about sunshine, but why take chances, right? Now that Cami was . . . whatever she was, with Nico Vultusino finally stepping up and sharing his family’s, well, peculiarities with her, she liked to keep out of the sun’s eye. I’m not going to c-combust, she’d said, trying to explain it to Ruby. It’s just . . . uncomfortable.

So parking in the shade made her more comfortable, and Ruby was in the habit of caring about things like that.

She squinted, and could barely see, in the hazy distance, the gray bulk of St. Juno’s. Just yesterday she’d squeaked through the High Charm Calculus final, mostly thanks to Ell’s patient tutelage and a healthy dose of luck. That caught her up after all the skipping; Mother Heloise had called all three of them into her office and told them to stay out of trouble in the upcoming year.

Last year of high school. Which meant the last year before she had to Take Responsibility. Oh, there was Ebermerle Charmcollege to attend, but a Woodsdowne girl had Duties when she turned eighteen. To the clan, to the kin, to the world. As Gran was always reminding her.

You could grow into anything, given enough time. It wasn’t Gran’s fault Ruby was lagging.

She sighed again, shaking her head, and hopped off the Semprena’s glossy blackness. Her key ring jangled as she spun it around one finger, and she caught herself grimacing. Most of her summer wasted, and her two best friends standing her up. Fifteen minutes wasn’t forever, but still. It was the principle of the thing, that was all.

No, it’s not. It’s the collaring.

The thought stopped her in her tracks. She stared up at the oak’s whispering leaves. Her skin itched a little, all over. A few deep breaths and that deep persistent scratching faded.

Gran couldn’t have meant it, could she? Collaring was for kin who couldn’t control themselves, not for girls who didn’t do what their grandmothers wanted. Right?

I should collar you, to save you from yourself. Gran’s mouth a thin line, the disapproval emanating from her in waves. All because Ruby had wanted to dance out the door without doing the dishes, and moaned theatrically when Gran called it to her attention.

Well, maybe that wasn’t quite it. She’d moaned, and stamped into the kitchen, and accidentally bumped a coffee mug into the sink. Where it shattered, and Gran maybe thought Ruby had done it deliberately?

You cannot control yourself!

It wasn’t fair. She had plenty of control. To prove it, Ruby put her hand out into the sunlight, past the dappled leafshade. Concentration made a knot behind her forehead, and the smells around her became sharper, more vivid, bursting in through her nose and painting pictures.

The rippling under her skin intensified. Like little mice, mus, the root word for muscles. A stippling, and a few scattered, fine golden-rust hairs sticking up.

Not quite painful, more like a stinging sunburn, the spots of fluid moving shade farther up her forearm a shielding coolness, twitching against her nerves.

Her nails lengthened, translucent tips hardening. Wicked-sharp, her wrist bulging oddly on one side as her hand became something . . . different.

Ruby exhaled, sharply, and forced it down. There were prickles of sweat along her lower back and under her arms, despite the breeze. Easy-peasy. Nothing to it.

She wasn’t even angry. Well, maybe a little, but that—

The cramps hit, right below her ribs. Ruby doubled over, denying the dry-heaving, shoving the sensation away. It was dangerous to shift partway, because everything in you would cry out for release.

Stray curls fell in front of her face, their red-gold burnished by more sunshine, because she’d stepped out in the full flood of it. The stinging all over her drove her into a crouch, and her palms met warm pavement with a jolt. It was work to tip her face up, her closed eyes filling with rubescent glow, lips skinned back from teeth. Finally, breath coming fast and hard, she levered herself back up and examined her hands.

Tanned, and human. She was Woodsdowne rootfamily, she was kin, and she was in control. Gran couldn’t mean what she’d said about collaring Ruby to calm her down.

Except Gran rarely said things she didn’t mean. Rarely was something of an understatement. It was more like, well, never.

Ruby swore, softly, and picked up her keys. There was nothing to do and nowhere sounded interesting.

Might as well go home.

“I’m heeeeere!” The door to the garage banged shut, and Ruby prance-galloped through the utility room as if she was six again. She danced into the living room, the tapestry with a charmer’s sun-and-moon whispering as its threads shifted, the sun’s broad smile turned knowing and friendly. Every chair and couch was overstuffed, and the place would have looked cluttered if not for Gran’s ruthless organization. Everything had a place, and there were boxes and baskets and dishes to hold everything. Gran did her active charming in a workroom off her downtown office, but she charmed at home, too. So there were the sealed bottles of charmahol and sylph-ether in the utility room, and jars containing small things—feathers, bones, brass discs, other tiny items that could hold a charge of Potential or finished charm.

Everything was jewel toned, but the shades were dark and restful. Royal blue, deep hunter green, accents of gold and thin threads of crimson, everything placed just-so.

Gran was in front of the fireplace, just straightening and brushing her hands as if to rid them of noxious dust. Crackling Potential limned her—the kin didn’t often throw high-powered charmers, but she was one of them. Oh, sure, every kin could charm a little, especially since the Reeve, but not like Gran. She could probably even set Ellie back on her heels, and Ell was a prodigy.

For a moment Gran’s gray eyes glowed with their own internal light, and her parchment hair, braided and pinned with ruthless precision, caught the radiance of the tall bronze lamps with their rice-paper shades. Afternoon sun pouring through the wide front windows almost seemed to go through her, despite the cheerful colors of her dragon-patterned housedress.

Edalie de Varre, who controlled import and export through the Waste outside New Haven, wrinkled her aristocratic nose slightly as Ruby came to a skidding halt before her and dropped a tolerable curtsy.

“Good afternoon, Granmere.” Cheerfulness dripped from every syllable, the camouflage old and comfortable as a pair of worn trainers. “Charming as always, I see.” The air around them both rippled with Potential, waves Ruby could almost-see, the smells of hay and fur and food comforting and familiar. There was beef under a defrost-charm in the kitchen, one corner of the High Charm Calc equation unknotted so the temperature would equalize swiftly, shaking off ice and keeping the meat safe. Maybe Gran planned stew or stir-fry tonight.

Gran’s mouth twitched. On another person, it would have been a fleeting expression, too small to be seen, but on her it was loud as a shout. Ruby, relieved at this sign of forgiveness, threw her arms around the older woman and hugged—gently. Gran wasn’t fragile, by any stretch of the imagination . . . but still.

Edalie patted Ruby’s tangled hair. “Good afternoon, child. I was experimenting with live flame and a Beaudrell’s charm.”

“Ellie would know if that’s a good thing or not.” Ruby shut her eyes for a moment, breathing in safety and comfort. There was a black ribbon of burning, the thread stitching together every other scent that made up home. That was funny; a Beaudrell’s charm was supposed to be odorless.

“You should know too.” Gran didn’t sound precisely disappointed, but it was close.

I do know. It’s not a good idea, but if you’re an active and experienced charmer, you can escape having it blow up and singe your eyebrows. “How am I going to be a disappointment to the entire clan if I know things like that?” The instant it was out of her mouth she regretted it, but said was said.

Gran’s hand merely paused before continuing. “Is that your goal?”

Don’t be ridiculous. “Of course not.” I just don’t see how it’s not going to happen. “Beaudrell’s Charms can be used to control open flame, but the secret of precisely how died with Beaudrell himself.” She made it into a singsong, letting the history lesson jump out hopscotch-quick. “Anton Beaudrell, died in ’56, famous for his control of fire and the advances he made in preservation charms. Married into the Creighton charmclan of Manahat Province, it was also whispered he had a touch of the fey in his veins—”

“Untrue. I met the man once, and was not impressed. He was no Child of Danu.” Gran’s arms loosened, and though Ruby wanted to hold on, she knew better.

So she loosened up, and made sure she was smiling. “You’ve met everyone.”

Gran stepped carefully away. “Living does tend to bring the world to one’s door.”

“I thought it was ‘travel makes you meet interesting people.’”

“I dislike travel.”

“You don’t like driving long distances, and you hate trains.”

A pained expression flitted across Gran’s familiar face. Were the wrinkles getting deeper, or was Ruby just looking more closely now? “We’re meeting a train tomorrow.”

“Really? A business contact, or what?”

“Kin, my child. It’s time.”

Huh. “For what?”

“For you to see him again.”

Kin. Not anyone interesting. She’d planned tonight to maybe see one of her regular boytoys before the moonrunning anyway. Toy was the only word that applied, since a Woodsdowne girl couldn’t afford to go Too Far. Besides, they were all so weak-smelling. Easily roped in, and just as easily discarded.

Still, she feigned some interest. “Who?”

Maybe she’d see Brett; things hadn’t heated up to their inevitable conclusion with him yet. Which meant him wanting to go further than making out, or thinking he could pressure her into it.

There was only once she’d been tempted to go Too Far, and it hadn’t been with a mere-human. That one hot fullmoon night, strawberries and the musk of a kinboy, Thorne’s fingertips, dyed with strawberry juice, feathering around the outside of her lips. Maybe she would have let him do what he wanted if they hadn’t been interrupted by Hunter’s approaching footsteps.

It was probably for the best. The two of them were always at each other in that way only boys who had grown up together could manage, with the added spice of kinstrength and claws.

Her grandmother made a small, dismissive sound. “A rootfamily boy from Grimtree clan. He’s arriving tomorrow on the seven o’clock from up-province.”

For a few moments it didn’t make sense. The meaning of the words arrived, thunder after lightning, and Ruby almost rocked back on her heels. “I’m not even out of high school yet!”

“You wouldn’t marry him right away.” Gran apparently considered that to be the final word, and turned toward the kitchen. “Besides, you may not find him pleasing.”

“I don’t find any of this pleasing. It’s medieval, to parade me in front of—”

“Oh, no. In those days, the males would have fought to submission or death to mate a kingirl, even if she evinced no interest. Times have changed.”

Great. You sound like Oncle Efraim. “Is that supposed to be comforting? Jeez, Gran.”

“His name is Conrad. Surely you remember?”

Conrad, from the Grimtree. It rang a bell. She’d been told the story a million times, how she’d whacked him on the head with a stuffed rabbit when he’d announced she was pretty. “I was three.”

“I knew you would recall it.” Mithrus Christ, Gran sounded pleased. Before she vanished into the kitchen, she tossed one more little tidbit over her shoulder. “Also, your friend Cami called. She sounded quite worried, and hoped you were all right. I thought you were meeting her?”

“She didn’t show up,” Ruby managed, through numb lips. Of course Gran would think Ruby had lied about where she was going.

Wild kingirls sometimes did.

A guest from out of town meant that she’d have to give up almost her entire week to showing him around, acting like she was interested but not too interested, and pretending to be a little downcast when he left. With Gran watching every moment, making decisions. It’s for your own good, child.

It always was. Tonight was moonrunning, too, and everyone would be asking her questions unless she avoided them. That avoidance would be judged and weighed, too, because kin meant together. Even solitaries craved the company of their own when the Moon rose full.

So much for the last week of summer. Ruby sighed, groaned theatrically one more time, and stamped for the stairs.

TWO

AN HOUR LATER, A CHARMBELL TINKLED SWEETLY, and Ruby, furiously working at a wad of choco beechgum, whipped the front door open to find her best friends on the step, the green tangle of the garden under thick gold sunlight behind them.

“There you are!” Cami looked a little pale, but maybe it was just the deep voracious blue of her eyes. She even smelled worried, a tang of bright lemon over a deeper well of ancient spice and healthy young girl. “We w-waited for an hour!”

Which was worse, to admit she’d only hung around fifteen minutes, or to let them think she’d blown them off? It was one of those unanswerable questions, like where the Reeve started or whether lightcharms worked more like particles or waves. “I thought you’d forgotten, so I left.”

“Got caught in traffic.” Ellie, her wavy platinum hair pulled back, tipped her sunglasses down. It was kind of a shock to see her in jeans without holes and a decent pair of boots, a luckcharm bracelet tinkling sweetly on one wrist. She wasn’t as pale as Cami, and she’d put on a little weight, thank Mithrus. She’d been scary-thin when summer classes started, and scary-starey-eyed as well. “You okay?”

They depended on her to be the perfectly unreliable one, quelle ironique. “Come on in. Sorry, I thought you’d bailed to spend time with the boys. Or, you know, study or something.”

“Why would . . .” Cami halted midway, stepping nervously over the threshold. Normally Ruby would have assumed the stutter was giving her some trouble, because she never used to be able to get a whole word out without trying a couple times. Ever since she’d disappeared last winter, kidnapped by a nightmare below New Haven, and been rescued, speaking had been easier. She was the closest thing to a sanity-anchor Nico Vultusino had, which was great—that boy needed something to put his brakes on, and Cami had quietly but definitely been moderating him even more lately.

Then there was Ellie, who glided into the front hall like she was on rails. Enough Potential to light up the city, a mad talent for charming, her real parents dead and her stepmother half-Twisted and shipped out into the Waste to a kolkhoz, good riddance and goodnight. Except Ell had disappeared for a while too, hanging out with some fey thing living near St. Juno’s, and that hadn’t ended well.

At least they were both still alive. A bit wide-eyed and twitchy, but alive.

It was a change to be considered the most drama-free of the three of them, and one Ruby wasn’t quite sure she liked. Still, if she was going to start being responsible, better get used to it, right?

“I’m sorry.” The words felt a little weird. There never used to be anything to apologize for, really.

Or had there, and she just hadn’t noticed? Lately, she’d been asking herself that a lot.

“No problem.” Ellie swept the door closed. “What do you want to do? If Avery drives we could even make a club tonight. You know, a grown-up place.”

For what value of grown-up, if they’ll let us in through the door? Still, the idea was powerfully attracting. “He can go out after curfew now?”

A shrug, but Ellie’s eyes were dancing. “He’s got the permit.”

Which means we’d have to take him. “That would have done us some good a few weeks ago.”

Ellie, ever the overachiever, looked a little horrified. “We were in school then.”

Because Cami lost a ton of class time during the winter, and then you disappeared and we skipped everything to go around looking for you too. “Oh yeah. That means no fun, ever. Forgot about that.”

Well, it had sounded funny in her head, but neither of them laughed.

Uncomfortable silence filled the hall to bursting, sloshing against the walls. Gran’s cottage was in the heart of Woodsdowne, prime property, but it was small. You could tell she’d never expected to have company in here, much less the baby of a kingirl who wasn’t ever spoken about.

Sometimes Ruby wondered about her mother. It would have been nice to know something more than the handful of whispers she’d managed to gather around the edges.

Whispers like she was so beautiful, and Wild too.

Really Wild, not just halfway there like Ruby. Maybe that was the trouble; she was watered-down instead of the real deal. If she was really Wild, she probably wouldn’t have cared what Gran thought. Or maybe Gran would respect that, the way she respected Cami’s quiet strength or Ellie’s smarts.

Gran never spoke about Ruby’s parents, except to once remark that Ruby looked like her mother, and confirm that her mother’s mate was outclan. So she didn’t have to worry about mingling with the closer branchkin.

Marrying too close wasn’t good for the kin.

“You’re angry.” Cami folded her arms. Even on the hottest days she generally wore long sleeves, even though her scars had vanished.

A habit that old was hard to break.

“I am not.” To prove it, she folded her arms too, and took a deep breath. Gran could probably hear every word, no matter where in the house she was.

“W-we didn’t mean to be late.” A small vertical line had developed between Cami’s perfect coal-arc eyebrows, and Ruby was abruptly conscious of her own wildly curling, uncombed hair, bare feet, chipped nail polish. Cami always looked so damn put-together. “What’s wrong?”

She would be the one to notice any little thing, too. Since she didn’t talk much, it was easy to be surprised when she made an observation.

Oh, nothing. I’m just probably going to be married off or collared because Gran thinks I’m too Wild. After expecting me to be Wild enough to qualify as rootfamily for years. When really I’m not Wild enough, and not sub enough to be calm and collected. Stuck in between. No big deal. She dredged up a smile, searching for her old familiar I-couldn’t-give-a-damn voice. It came, like it always did, an old reliable friend. “Not a thing, sweets. I just can’t go out tonight. Clan stuff.”

Cami’s face fell perceptibly, and Ellie’s eyes darkened a shade or two. But Ell, as usual, immediately shifted to solve-the-problem mode. “Well, let’s go have some fun now. I’ll drive. And we can figure out what we’re doing each day this week before school starts and write it down.”

It’s just so like you to plan out everything. “Houseguest.”

“What?” Sudden changes in direction always threw Ell off, especially when she was arranging things.

Ruby felt a little guilty, but only a little. Disrupting the planning mode had a charm all its own. “We’re getting a visitor, tomorrow. Some guy Gran might marry me off to once I’m out of charmcollege.”

The announcement had its intended effect. Both of them looked thunderstruck. The line between Cami’s eyebrows went away, and her cherry-glossed lips parted a little, as if she was working on a knotty High Charm Calc problem. Ellie actually rocked back on her heels—the boots were PaxGrecas, and well worn, so they still said money but they did it in a couth whisper.

“It’s about time,” Ruby continued, hoping Gran was listening. “Gotta be more responsible, right? Last year of high school and all. So anyway. Where are we going?”

In the end, they couldn’t decide where to go, so they flopped down on the living-room couches, the conversation turning in lazy circles as the tapestry’s threads made that maddening little sound. There was a sort of perverse pleasure to be had in shrugging and saying, “I don’t know, it’ll depend on the visitor” when Ellie tried to time out the next week in precise increments. Cami watched both of them, her expression a mix of concentration and worry, just as it had always been.

It was almost a relief when Ellie sighed and glanced at the clock. “I’m due home for dinner soon. Ruby, is there any time at all that we can hang out before school starts?”

Well, wasn’t that guilt-inducing. “I’ll try. I just . . . you know, Gran wants me to do things.”

“I know.” Ellie rose in one fluid motion, her Potential a brief, sparkling arc for a moment as the atmosphere of another charmer’s cottage changed around her.

Cami followed suit, more slowly. “I’ll have a c-car tomorrow.” She spaced the words out carefully, brushing back a few glossy strands of raven hair. “Nico ordered it special from overWaste. A Spyder. So whenever you call, I can come.”

“Well hot damn. That’s great news.” There was a funny little tickle in Ruby’s chest. She and Ellie wouldn’t need rides home from Juno anymore, being Year 12s and able to drive on their own. That had been Rube’s job for forever. “What color?”

“Sort of cream, I guess. He tells me Spyders are p-pretty safe.”

“Safe?” Ellie’s eyebrows nested in her hairline. “I guess, if you overlook that made-of-charmfiber-and-goes-like-the-wind thing. Hey, when you get it, can Ave look at the engine?”

The urge to roll her eyes was immense. It was Boy Mentionitis in a big way—every other sentence was about Avery. Ell hadn’t even noticed boys existed before, so it was probably a natural stage in her dating evolution. Even an idiot could tell Ave was serious about her, which was nice to see. It meant one more person keeping her out of trouble.

“I guess.” Cami crossed her arms as if she was cold, rubbing at them through her sleeves. “Maybe I can even find out how an engine works. Fun.”

“You press the accelerator and it goes.” Ruby bounced up from the couch. “What more do you need to know?”

“How to keep it going, how to brake, how to—”

“I’m not stupid, Ell. It was a joke.”

More uncomfortable silence. Finally Cami cleared her throat, a small soft sound. “Today’s not a good day. I’ll call you both d-day after t-tomorrow. And we are going to hang out.” Polite but very definite, with her blue eyes level and serious, she suddenly looked less like a little girl playing dress-up and more, well, adult.

It happened to everyone sooner or later.

“Yes ma’am.” Ruby sketched her a cheerful salute, but her heart had fallen right into her guts with a gurgling splash. “I’ll even wear heels.”

“We could go shopping.” From Ellie, that was a peace offering—her stepmother had worked in couture, and going into boutiques and ateliers turned Ell an interesting shade of pale sometimes. “Anywhere you want.”

It shouldn’t have stung, but it sounded like offering a bratty five-year-old a treat. Ruby pushed her temper down with an almost-physical effort. “I’ll make a list.”

It wasn’t until they were safely out of the driveway—the sun blazing down despite fat-bellied shadows drifting over the city from fleecy clouds, gilding the primer-splotched Del Toro Ell borrowed from Avery Fletcher whenever she felt like it—that Ruby’s shoulders unknotted. She’d played the holy terror for them again, and also gave Gran a few indications of responsibility.

If she could just keep this balancing act up, everything would be easy.

THREE

WOODSDOWNE PARK, A GREEN BEATING CHAMBER IN New Haven’s slow ponderous heart, always filled slowly with summer dusk. Here the trees hadn’t started to turn yet, not even a few, and she wouldn’t have put it past them to petition Gran for permission before they started to paint themselves. Summer lingered longest here in the hollows and dells, and once or twice in the middle of icy Nonus or even Decius, close to Mithrusmas, Ruby could swear she’d seen flashes of green, gone as soon as she turned her head.

Some things you just couldn’t look at straight-on. Especially if you had any Potential at all. Ruby’s was respectable, but it hadn’t settled yet. She wasn’t as high-powered as Gran, or Ellie, but she wasn’t low on the gauge, like some branchkin.

Stuck in the middle once more.

“You’re quiet. What’s up?” Hunter crouched easily, his seal-dark head cocked to catch every sound. As usual, he was a little too close, crowding her personal space.

Ruby finished tying her trainers and didn’t answer.

It was Thorne, as usual, who caught on. “He’s coming, isn’t he.” A lock of wheat-honey hair fell across his forehead; he shook it away with an impatient toss. A flash of white teeth as he grimaced, and Ruby straightened, stretching.

Hunter did too, in a rush. “Who?” He followed as she hopped down from the fallen log, verdant moss blurring its outline. “What?”

“Grimtree clan, one of their brothers. Clanmother’s been looking for an alliance for a while now.” Thorne wasn’t looking directly, but he was keeping very careful track of her in his peripheral. Again, just as usual. He’d always been the watchful one.

Like Cami, he watched. Of all the clan, he was probably the one who suspected the most about her—so she kept her distance.

It wasn’t easy, when you’d grown up with a pair of boys, to keep them at the right orbit—not too close, not too jealous, not too far. A balancing act, just like the rest of them, speeding up in increments year by year until she looked around and realized the blur was making it harder to keep up.

It didn’t help that Thorne was . . . well, difficult.

“Bunch of posers. I hear their Clanmother lets her enemies live.” Hunter’s laugh was a sharp spear in the gathering dark.

“She’s modern. Not like you.” Thorne got the idea Ruby wasn’t going to take the bait, so he tossed out another piece. “Do you remember him, Rube?”

She let it go, touching the closest tree trunk—an old black elm, like the ones near St. Juno’s. Leaves rustled, sounding like the tapestry in the living room.

Hunter, of course, couldn’t leave it alone. “What was his name? Started with a K, right?”

“Conrad. The older twin, by a couple minutes, at least. He’s a Tiercey, I think, that’s their rootfamily.” Thorne’s dark eyes gleamed, and he jostled Ruby. It wasn’t accidental. She elbowed him back, catching him off balance and slipping away from between them and the tree, their unwitting helper in trying to surround her.

Kinboys liked to fence a girl in. You needed to be quick as a minnow to slide through. Sharp as a shark when they pushed it, too, like they all did.

It wasn’t their fault girls were so few. Before the Reeve, they’d been born more often than boys. But when the Great War knocked whatever metaphysical cork loose and Potential spilled out to drown the Age of Iron, something happened, and now girls were increasingly rare among the kin.

In the old days, the problem had been mere-humans fearing what they didn’t understand and killing what they could. A frightened mere-human was a deadly one, just like the Elders said. Now it was looking like evolution, or Potential itself, was going to do what the Age of Iron couldn’t—erase the moon’s children.

Behind her, Hunter shoved Thorne, who rabbit-punched him—light taps, one-two, on the arm. They were excited, full of healthy high spirits, just like before every full moon.

“Maybe he’ll fight for her.” Hunt sounded a little breathless.

“Who cares?” Thorne, bitterly, but Ruby didn’t want to deal with his temper tonight. Well, she never did, she hated the constant back and forth, as if she was a bone.

Just one more thing about kin and clan. She lengthened her stride, leaping a bracken-fall, and they hurried to catch up.

The last fingernail-paring of the sun slipped below the horizon, and Ruby took a deep breath. The Park inhaled too, little creaks and crackles in its depths as more cousins arrived. There were a few catcalls from other parts of the Park, the deeper growl of males and six or seven lighter, higher girl-voices. One sounded like Cherry Highgier, who dyed her hair with feyberry red, as if that would make her root instead of just a branch. She went to Hollow Hills instead of Juno.

All the other kingirls did. She’d never had the courage to ask Gran where she’d graduated from, or why Ruby wasn’t sent to Hills. It wasn’t a bad school, but Juno was the school for New Haven aristocracy, at least the charm and mere-human ones. If Cami had been born into Family instead of adopted, she would have gone to Martinfield like all the other Family girls. Ruby had once or twice wanted to ask her if she’d ever longed to belong with the kind that raised her.

That wasn’t a kind question, though, and she was glad she’d reconsidered, for once. Considering how things had turned out.

Ruby hopped, lightly, testing her trainers. Just right, bouncy in the heels and light in the forefoot. You wanted a broken-in pair, comfortable but with some life left, for this sort of thing. Heels for hunting, boots for tracking, and trainers for fullmoon.

A silver thread ran through the night sky, and like she did every time, she ducked her head and picked up the pace, searching for the right beat.

She settled into a long easy lope, but she didn’t follow the thread. Instead, she aimed the long way down the Park. The rest of them could bunch up tonight, but she wanted space and no awkward questions or narrow-eyed judging. Of course, what you wanted and what you got were two different things, even on fullmoon.

The others would ride up the thread like it was a silver rail, pulling the circle tight. You weren’t quite helpless in the face of the moon, but sometimes it felt like it. Rootfamily means freedom, they said, the strains of the moon’s blood in yours stronger, the kin unraveling in branches out on either side.

Freedom? Sure, to a certain degree . . . until responsibility closed in, and your duty to the clan reared its ugly head.

Why are you so Wild? Ellie had asked, once, and Ruby had just shaken her head. Adulthood meant freedom to her friends, but Rube only had a little time before she became a Clanmother-in-training, trying to breed more girls after college so the moon’s kin didn’t die out, learning diplomacy and how to navigate her clan through alliances, keeping up with Gran’s import-export business to keep Woodsdowne a power in the city, and just generally doing everything she disliked until she died.

Ruby sped up. The silver thread widened, and behind her the boys’ footsteps fell away. They were branch, too; their mothers had married outclan. Hunter had siblings, all boys, but Thorne was an only. It was probably why he was angry. Without siblings, you didn’t have anyone to help take care of your children, and inheritance might pass to a branch with more members after you died. Cubs need siblings, the Elders said.

Continuance, every clan’s obsession. How many other Wild kingirls felt this desperation? She couldn’t just come out and ask do you ever feel like just a walking incubator for more kin? None of them had ever been friendly, and Gran sending her to different schools hadn’t helped.

Nobody had ever been quite friendly, except Cami and Ellie. Even then, she didn’t talk about being kin. There was no point, and the habit of secrecy from the Age of Iron was old and strong. They sort of knew, but they didn’t talk about it. Not like Cami and the Family.

Cami considered them normal, and let little things drop. Of course, it probably helped that Nico’s father had treated her just like a born-in daughter. It used to make Ruby feel a little funny to visit and see the way the entire Vultusino house sort of revolved around her friend, with Enrico Vultusino clearly thinking she hung the moon and Nico always glowering if he thought someone had messed with her.

Come back to the now, Ruby. You’re running.

Hop skip and jump, trainers lightly touching a moss-covered rock, branches whipping by, more sensed than seen. She leapt, ducked, and settled into another lope when she was certain there was a nice, comfortable distance between her and anyone else.

In the distance, the song began. High trillings and long modulated notes, a chorus of communion. Mere-humans would fear the sound, hearing fur and teeth in it, but there was really nothing to be afraid of. It was when the kin were dead silent that you had to worry.

Ruby sank her teeth into her lower lip. A bright scarlet star in her mouth, copper-tasting, the smell maddening and rich. Behind her, Hunter’s cry was an orange rose opening against the deepening sky, and Thorne’s fierce quiet a song all its own.

When had she started to listen for that silence? Did he guess? Probably not.

Hopefully not.

The end of the Park was coming up. A steep bramble-covered slope studded with stumps and ancient oaks, their leaves rattling as the breeze came up from the bay. Beyond it was the very edge of Woodsdowne, where other suburbs began—Hollow Hills and the Market district, not technically a suburb but still not a place to go traipsing while the moon’s gift was at its peak. The shift would be on her soon. Already her skin was rippling, a bittersweet pain below the flesh.

He’s coming on the train. Furious negation burst out of her, a high chilling note crowding her throat to spillskin fullness, and every kin in hearing distance replied. Harsh, fierce music. Mere-humans used to bolt their doors at night, thinking the moon’s children did awful things. They’d more to worry about from each other than any of Ruby’s kind, and if you didn’t believe that, just look at the tabloids full of mere-humans and charmers doing things to each other kin would never dream of.

All this flashed through her and away in a moment, skating the edge of rage. The red was all through her now, deep like a rosette on the sheets the first morning you wake up with cramp-aches, your body unfurling a scarlet pennon signaling the end of everything good.

Ruby put her head down. Her feet sped up, knowing each dip and rise, the hidden traps in the thornbrakes. A line of fire on her wrist, her cheek, she was going too fast to slow down even as the branches clawed at her.

Another cry, rising from deep inside, and the hill unspooled underneath her. A low stone wall at the top was the boundary, the absolute edge. It wasn’t permissible to go past it on fullmoon nights. Woodsdowne was theirs, but outside was the realm of the mere-humans, and on fullmoon, they didn’t mix.

Last shot, Rube. You gonna go for it?

Of course Gran said they’d send him back if she didn’t like him. But Ruby had a duty. A responsibility.

Why are you so Wild?

They all asked. Why explain?

Breathing hard but smoothly, air like dark red wine, legs full of youth and her jeans shaking off slashing brambles, soles skritching over the top of a stump that still cried out at the loss of its height, a tongueless imperative. A leap, hands catching, bramble tearing . . . and she was atop the low stone wall, as the moon’s call sent a secret subtle thrill through all of New Haven, from the sky-scraping piles of rot at the core to the outermost Moving Wall against the Waste, from the highest house on the Hill to the deepest sunken sewer. The bright face and the dark face, and Ruby on the thin edge between them, vibrating, leaning forward, ready to leap—

—and hot iron-strong fingers around her ankle, she fell backward with a blurted cry, all the magic of running draining away.

Back into her life.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Thorne, his own skin blurring and the words strangely slurred as the shape of his jaw changed, hissed as Ruby and the brambles both clawed at him. “You go beyond bounds and it’ll—”

“FOUND YOU!” Hunter crashed merrily through a wall of greenery, colliding with Thorne. The sound, meaty and solid, would have been hilarious if Ruby hadn’t been so stunned. She gathered herself and surged to her feet, juicy needle-fingered vines clutching all over her shirt, weaving in her hair. As if the hillside had come alive, and wanted to eat them all.

“Idiot!” The word spiraled into a thrumming growl as Thorne moved, quicker than quick. The knot of thrashing ended with a flat smacking sound, and Ruby inhaled sharply. They were both on the edge of the shift as well, bulking up and furring out, claws piercing fingertips.

The smells—broken plants, green sap, the baked dryness of stone—held a serrated edge now. Musk, and copper, and spikes of dominance. They both struggled upright, vines hanging overhead like fingers.

“Ow.” Hunter shook his head, and there was a flat shine to his dark eyes, visible even in the deepening dusk. “You bastard.”

Thorne shrugged, and opened his mouth to say something else, probably dismissive.

Unfortunately, Hunter’s fist caught him right in the face, and there was a moment of silence after that crunching blow before both of them erupted. Not into vociferous argument, which would have been okay, but into almost-silent motion.

On a fullmoon night.

Great.

Ruby opened her mouth to yell at both of them, but they crashed down the hill in a knot of low deadly noise. Potential sparked: suddenly every vine on the hill wanted to wrap itself in her hair, and the dusk became a spreading bruise.

By the time the others converged on the spot, drawn by that low un-noise of violence and dominance, she had managed to untangle herself and had hauled Thorne back, keeping Hunter down with a stare and a snarl, her lip lifted and teeth tingling. The moon rose higher, a bleached bone dish; for the rest of the evening’s run every cousin took turns keeping the two boys apart, and Ruby right in the middle of the pack.

So much for running alone.

FOUR

“UNACCEPTABLE,” GRAN SAID SOFTLY. “YOU’VE GIVEN both of them false hope.”

Way to slut-shame, Gran. Ruby’s lower lip jutted; the Moon was high overhead but the run was done, the shift receding into the place it lived except on special nights. Potential sparked and fizzed between them, describing the arcs of their personal space. Gran’s was the glow of an active, powerful charmer.

Ruby’s was vivid, sharp-edged, not-yet-settled charm energy pushing against her grandmother’s. High emotion disturbed the sea of Potential everyone was swimming in, and it fueled some types of charm, but those were dangerous.

Those were dark, even if not-quite-black charming, and you messed around like that at your peril.

Deep breath, Ruby filling her lungs so she didn’t yell in response. When she could talk without screaming, she did. “I have not. They’re cousins, Gran. We grew up together. You wanted me to spend time with—”

“I had thought you would settle with one of them, yes. Obviously that is not going to happen.”

So what, if it had, what then? “So I have to get married and start squeezing out cublings right this second? What about getting an education? Am I just going to school so I can be a better barefoot pregnant—”

As usual, Gran took refuge in propriety. “You have a duty to your clan!”

“Why don’t you just collar me and chain me in the basement? You could have the boykin take turns and get me knocked up! Then you’d have everything you wanted, right?”

The words bounced around the living room. The tapestry shifted, shifted. Gran had gone white, to match her parchment hair, but the incandescent outrage filling Ruby to the brim didn’t permit a step back.

They faced each other, young woman and old, and Gran’s shoulders dropped. “I’ve only ever tried to do what’s best.” Quietly, as if defensive. But that was ridiculous, wasn’t it?

Gran never needed to be defensive. She made the decisions, and everyone fell into line.

Ruby’s jaw ached with denying the shift. “Oh, I know. For the clan. The clan this, the clan that. It’s all about the clan!” A blockage in her throat, a reek of sour salt. Her skin was too sensitive, every edge scraped hard, even invisible air. “Fine! Okay! Fuck the clan!”

She didn’t mean to scream it, but she did. The buzzing all through her was the shift trying to burst free. Her bones crackled, zinging electricity popping and sparking from her fingertips, her scalp tingling as her hair tried to stand straight up.

Gran actually blinked.

Fury evaporated, leaving only a thin ringing hopelessness. Uh-oh. Really gone and done it now.

“I certainly hope you do not mean that.” Edalie de Varre drew herself up. “The clan birthed you, has raised you, protected you, given you every advantage.”

You raised me. I don’t know who birthed me. I don’t even know if you’re my real grandmother, but we all know I’m root and not branch, I’ve got to be. Right? The hollow place inside her gave no answer. “So squeezing out babies as soon as I get out of college is a small price to pay for all that, right?” Her hands were fists, to disguise the bulging along her wrists. To shift in front of the Clanmother during an argument, well, you just didn’t. “Got it, thanks.”

“Ruby—”

“I’ll be up in my room, preparing to meet my future impregnator. I shouldn’t even go to school at all, you know? It’ll only give me ideas.” She turned on her heel—her trainers were still full of leaf mold and black Woodsdowne dirt—and stamped for the stairs.

“Ruby!” Score one point, at least—she’d managed to make Gran raise her voice.

If it was a victory, it was an empty one. Dirt clumped and scattered from her trainers, all over the hardwood of the stairs on her way up. She’d charmsweep later.

Did I really say that to her? Mithrus.

Her room closed around her with its usual comforting mess, clothes scattered strategically to hide the books underneath, papers stacked to confuse any searcher. Nobody ever noticed the textbooks or the fact that she kept all her school notes and reference papers. She should clean the whole thing up and reorganize it now, since she wasn’t supposed to be herself anymore. Or even the self she’d made for everyone else.

A bright, careless, exacting child was what Gran had wanted, and Ruby had done her best. Except now they wanted to flip a switch and have a docile breeder. Doing that sort of 180 was enough to make a stomach rebel and a head spin. Even if you were used to flipping around and spinning at a moment’s notice for everyone else.

Just thinking about the whole mess made her want to slide the window open and slip out, climb down the plane tree outside her window—an old childhood friend—and then . . . what? She could call one of the boytoys, hit a club, or even just walk aimlessly.

On any other night, maybe. Not fullmoon. Even Thorne wouldn’t dare to sneak out and wait around in the Park to see if she was in a mood to run. And if Thorne wasn’t coming out, Hunter wouldn’t be either.

She flipped the lock on her doorknob, as if Gran couldn’t break whatever small pin held the thing in place with a simple flex of her wrist. She was much, much stronger than she looked.

Ruby, although she was kin, was . . . not.

That was the biggest secret of all. Oh sure, physically she was fine, a true daughter of the moon: she could run faster than pretty much anyone, she didn’t get sick, and she bounced back after any injury with little trouble.

Gran’s strength had a completely different dimension. One Ruby, no matter how hard she tried, couldn’t make herself own, too.

She flopped down on her bed. The shaking in her arms and legs just wouldn’t go away. Neither would the knot in her stomach.

Here, in this white-walled room with its crimson bedspread and heavy red velvet cushions, she was relatively alone. Only relatively, because every cough, every move, could be heard.

A strong kingirl wouldn’t feel this sickness all through her. A good kingirl wouldn’t have gone for the boundary wall. A real kingirl would not have shouted fuck the clan at her grandmother.

She was the last hope of the Woodsdowne rootfamily, and all she wanted to do was run like a coward.

No wonder Gran was disappointed.

FIVE

HAVEN CENTRAL STATION HADN’T MOVED SINCE THE Reeve; the true iron in the tracks and trains kept the worst shifting and Twisting of Potential at bay. You could see pre-Reeve leftovers everywhere, but they never gave Ruby quite the same satisfied feeling as the tingle all through her bones as true iron tamed the often-invisible flux that had drowned the world at the end of the Great War.

Snowflake-cinders spun lazily down as the train heaved itself to a stop, its blunt nose searching through a cloud of smoke. The platform conductor was sing-screaming the names of other stops along the line—New Avalon to the north, Pocarello and points south—and the breakwheel made a grinding noise as layers of heavy-duty, heavily regimented charm parted. A delightful, shivery pulsing against all her skin, even under her clothes, and Ruby was hard put not to shudder. Gran was a straight, slim iron bar of icy silence beside her, a veil obscuring her face and her hat perched just-so, only a few hints of parchment hair escaping from under its jaunty tilt.

Ruby was in her dirt-caked trainers, again, a pair of ratty jeans, and a faded, scoop-necked Phib sweater of cerise silk yarn that was nevertheless last year’s fashion. No guy would get the nuances. Ellie, of course, would know exactly what last year’s sweater meant, but she wasn’t here.

Thorne stood just behind Gran and to her left, his position as an only child among the branches brought home by his place at the sinister side of the root-mother. Gran didn’t hold with much superstition, but she was definitely making a point.

Hunter was right next to Ruby, tucked behind her half a step as diplomacy demanded, the bruising on his face already faded to a yellow-green shadow of itself.

Kin healed fast.

Thorne, scowling under slicked-down gel-darkened hair, couldn’t have looked any more mutinous if he’d tried. Still, neither could she, she supposed. Hunter just looked a little sullen.

“BREEEEAK NOOOOOOW!” the conductor yelled, and rivers of charm parted. You couldn’t see the charm-symbols outright, but the train blurred and wavered under them like pavement under heat-ripples. Billows of steam rose, metal glowing red and the cinders whisking themselves into strange angular cloud shapes before blowing away.

She watched as they began to file off the train, disheveled, with red eyes—recycled air wasn’t good for anyone’s tender tissues. Still, it was better than maybe getting a lungful of spores or Mithrus alone knew what from the Waste. Part of the high price of interProvince passage, for those who couldn’t afford to drive or didn’t want to take the risk, was the cost of sealing the iron bullet.

The rest was overhead, and indemnity in case there was a derailment. Sometimes even a lot of iron didn’t help out in the Waste. All that Potential slopping around without charmers to shape and tame it, bleeding off the excess, made the risk of Twisting exponentially worse.

Not only that, but there were things out there. Dangerous, uncontrolled things, untamed Potential even corkscrewing the flora and fauna. That was why they called it the Waste.

A shape looming through the steam. Her spine knew before the rest of her, a zing like biting on tinfoil all the way down her back. Ruby inhaled, sharply, and Thorne tensed beside Gran. Having them both here was vintage Gran—she thought it would give them a lesson. Friendly rivalry was okay, but anything even a fraction of a step above that was frowned upon.

Because it could hurt the clan.

He was taller than her, ink-black hair cropped aggressively short. A strong jaw, the familiar high cheekbones, and a kin’s supple movements. There was an oddness about him, rasping against her instincts, but then, he was from another clan and would naturally smell a little . . . strange.

Did he feel the trap closing around him, too?

A flash of mellow gold. Even among the moon’s children his gaze would be called spectacular. Sun-eyes, too warm and deep to be yellow. Bad-luck eyes, glowing like the Moon’s sister-enemy.

Uh-oh. She tried to remember if anyone had said anything about that before. He had a brother; did they have the same eyes?

He carried a single large dun-colored duffel, easy grace and broad shoulders handling it like it weighed nothing. A wilted blue button-down, sleeves rolled back to show tanned forearms, a pair of jeans just as thrashed as hers, and very nice boots. Ellie would know the brand off the top of her head, but Ruby just took in the quality of the stitching and nodded internally.

There was a clan cuff on his left wrist. Wide age-darkened leather with silver snaps, the Grimtree crest stamped deeply and creased. Something about the cuff seemed a little weird, but he bowed properly to Gran, just enough insouciance mixed with the respect to denote strength.

He was definitely dominant. Just how dom remained to be seen.

“Clanmother de Varre.” A nice deep voice, and Ruby’s entire body flamed, a scalding icebath. “Grimtree sends greetings, and respect.”

The veil stirred at its edges, either from a slight movement or a stray bit of breeze. When Gran spoke, it was just above a formal murmur. “Woodsdowne returns the regard. You have changed much, young Conrad.”

“Almost fifteen years will do that. Except to you. They say Woodsdowne is as beautiful as the Moon.”

Ruby’s jaw almost dropped. Was he flirting? With Gran? The boy straightened, and boy was a relative term. He was nineteen, but damn if he didn’t seem, well . . . pretty effortlessly self-possessed.

“Some branches are always blessed. Thorne, please take our visitor’s bag. Ruby.”

“Gran.” She kept her feet right where they were, although she was supposed to step forward to greet him as well.

That golden gaze turned to her. Cheeks hot, her messy hair every which way, why had she deliberately not even combed? Or washed her face? There were probably crumbs on her chin from dinner or something.

His pupils dilated a little. Ruby watched, fascinated, as her tiny image in those black holes vanished behind the shutters of his eyelids. He even rocked back a little on his heels, and the whole rest of the train station went away. For that moment, there was just the two of them, and a broad white smile rose on Conrad Tiercey’s face, a crescent of perfect teeth.

His bag dropped with a thump, almost as if he couldn’t hold onto it any longer. “It’s true,” he said, just to her. “More beautiful than anything.”

It should have been cheesy. It should have been a warning.

A tightness she hadn’t even been aware of loosened in Ruby’s chest. The smile on her face felt dopey, but she didn’t care. “Hello.” Oh, my God, is that really all you can say? Good one, Ruby.

He swallowed, visibly. “Hi. Ruby, right? Conrad.”

She held her hand out. He stepped forward and took it, gently, strength underneath. His skin was warm, rougher than hers. A slight movement, as if he wanted to kiss her knuckles, but that was old-fashioned. So they just stood there until Gran coughed.

Ruby found her throat was dry. “Moon’s greeting,” she managed, traditional words of welcome. “How was your trip?”

“Boring.” The smile returned, a private joke. “I had to make my own fun.”

She grinned back, and it felt completely natural. “I’ll bet.”

“You are most welcome here.” Gran took a single step forward, and Conrad dropped her hand. “Our guest is no doubt exhausted. Thorne—yes, thank you. Hunter, please take word to your mother that he’s arrived safely; the Elder Circle will want to know.”

“Yes ma’am.” Hunter bumped into Ruby as he went past—not hard, but not accidentally either. There was a line between his eyebrows, and his mouth was pulled tight. “See you later, Rube.”

“Sure.” Later, she would think back and notice how he’d looked worried. The breeze shifted, and she caught a good whiff of healthy male kin, a fascinating new scent without the underlying musk and black earth of Woodsdowne.

There was a harsh angry undertone that should have raised her hackles, but all Ruby felt was a raw unsteady relief.

Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.

SIX

“WHAT’S HE LIKE?” ELLIE’S BREATHLESSNESS WASN’T about the news, of course. Rube got the idea she’d almost forgotten about today’s Big Event, and it had taken a little while for Ellie to run to the phone. Which meant some uncomfortable small talk with Avery Fletcher while they waited for Ell to show up and release them both from torture.

It wasn’t that she didn’t like Fletcher, it was just that . . . well, he wasn’t Ell. Or Cami.

He wasn’t safe. No mere-human really was, but her friends were . . . safer. At least, she’d always thought so. The thought that she might not be safe for them was uncomfortable, and it kept circling nowadays, just like everything else.

“He’s tall.” Ruby twisted the cord around her fingers. Her closet was small and stifling, but carrying the phone in there was such a habit she barely noticed anymore. It was dark, and color-coded outfits—she kept the closet door closed to hide its neatness—brushed her head. “Nice smile.”

“Okay. But what’s he like?”

She could imagine Ell hopping with impatience, the phone to her ear and her pale hair a wind-rippled drift over her shoulder. It was almost white now, and some of the girls in summer school thought she bleached it. Ruby could have told them she didn’t, that the color had been drained somehow . . . but why bother? Let them gossip. “He went straight to bed. Still sleeping. I don’t know yet, but he seems . . . nice.”

The line crackled with a short silence. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say that about a guy before.”

That’s because most of them aren’t. “Well, Gran plans to marry me off to him, I might as well look for something to like.”

“Yeah, about that.” Ell’s tone dropped, became worried and confidential. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

Danger, kiddo. If she drew Ruby into talking, Ell would figure out a few things, not the least of which that she was terrified. Really, Ell didn’t need that kind of thing when she was settling into her nice new life with the Fletchers. Mithrus knew she deserved all the help she was getting now, just for suffering through the hell that had been her stepmother.

So Ruby put on the cheerful, careless voice again, familiar as an old coat. “Whoops, gotta go. I can’t make our date today, got to show him around town. Tell Cami, will you?”

“Ruby—” Ell didn’t give up easily.

“Maybe tomorrow. Ciao!” She hung up and shut her eyes. Comforting darkness, fabric softener and her own scent, familiar as that lying, cheerful voice. Conrad was in the spare room next door—had he heard her? Had Gran? God, this place was so small.

Gonna have to get used to it. Collaring made the world even smaller. They were made in two parts, collar and key, and if you were good your keyholder would let you take the thing off for short periods. She’d seen collared kin before, the thin, liquid-silvery gleams cinched tight around their vulnerable baseform throats. Thin and nervous, with a haunted, faraway look, denied the shift and a kin’s sensory acuity.

Would Gran actually, really do that to her?

If I disappointed her enough, maybe.

She used to be so sure. Petted and told she was the rootfamily’s hope, Gran’s heir and bright star, given primacy among all the cousins as a matter of course . . . and there was this looming thing in the distance that she hadn’t really thought about as a kid. Hope depended on her marrying, spawning, and taking Gran’s place.

Maybe she’d just had too good a time and now had to pay for it. Was that what adulthood really meant?

Nothing was certain anymore. First Cami had started acting odd and vanished into that nest of pale, dripping foulness under New Haven, then Ell had fled her stepmother and ended up with that fey thing, and neither of them were the same even though they’d been dragged back. There were shadows in dark corners, and Ruby was always saying the wrong thing.

Try not to be a selfish bitch, Ell had flung at her, last school year. I realize it’s your default, but just try.

The worst thing, the thing that hurt the most? Ellie was right. If Ruby wasn’t so selfish, she wouldn’t be feeling this way. She’d be grateful for the clan, and it would be small potatoes to give back to it. Clan is kin and kin is clan, as the old saying went, and you were nothing without that net.

She should have been grateful. She should have been just aching to get her marriage settled, get through college, get knocked up and assure her place in the whole goddamn thing. You weren’t a real Clanmother until you had at least one kid. You could be just a regular old Tante, but the clan would be adrift after you died until the Moon gifted one of the branches with a sign of Her favor.

“It’s going to be fine,” she whispered to her clothes. She wanted for nothing. Gran’s allowance for her was really comfortable, to say the least, and Ruby never even had to whine to get what she liked.

A cage with a nice lining was still a cage. Still, she owed Gran, didn’t she? She owed everyone. Because the clan had birthed her, raised her, protected her—the list went on and on.

Clan. Like adulthood, it was one of those words that seemed cool when you were a kid, but then it shifted and ran around howling.

Movement elsewhere in the house. She strained her ears, listening. Footsteps too heavy to be Gran’s, not as precise.

He was awake.

The padding footfalls paused outside her door. Ruby gapped her mouth, breathing silently. Would he think she was weird? Her door was solidly closed, but could he sense her in here? Nobody else hid in closets just to talk on the phone, did they?

He kept going. Down the hall, familiar squeaks and creaks odd now that someone new was making them. If she was a good kingirl she’d probably have been downstairs already, making breakfast. She’d probably already know how he liked his eggs, too. She’d be making him feel comfortable and doing all the boring hospitality stuff.

Did she want to impress him? Or did she want Gran to send him back to his clan and maybe pick someone else? Maybe even someone old enough to be her father.

She’d worked up the courage to ask Gran directly about her father only once, but the old woman simply pinched her mouth shut and shook her head, slightly. The way her steely eyes lightened was enough to warn Ruby off the subject for a good long while. Oncle Stephen had been buzzed at a barbecue later and told her that her father was really outclan, which was probably true. Stephen wouldn’t say more, and none of the other kin could be induced to talk about it. Except for Gran once saying that he was outclan, and that Thorne or Hunter weren’t close enough to give the bloodline problems.

If Hunter knew, he’d probably tell her; Thorne wouldn’t be able to stop tormenting her about having a secret. It was more likely that even the branchkin just didn’t talk about it.

Ruby eased out of the closet. Her room, with its new and unfamiliar neatness, closed around her. She hadn’t even made her bed yet. As a delaying tactic, that kind of sucked, because it would only take three minutes.

Then she would have to go downstairs and make small talk.

She waited, listening, heard a formless murmur of conversation. Footsteps again. He was wearing shoes, sounded like boots. The front door swung open, then closed with a quiet, definitive thud.

Wait, what?

The kitchen was neat as a pin, the only marker of Conrad’s presence a cereal bowl in the sink. He must have scarfed it pretty quickly, but probably with good manners, seeing as how Gran was at the kitchen table, frowning at a layout of playing cards. Kings, queens, jacks, and charmers, red and black and white, familiar glares on the slick much-handled surfaces. Her braid was perfectly in place, but there were shadows under her eyes. Her dragon-patterned housedress was almost long enough to conceal her embroidered slippers, and her back was ramrod-stiff as always.

“Good morning!” Ruby chirped. “Is he up yet?” As if she didn’t know.

“He said he did not wish to intrude upon us this morning, and left to visit with kin.” Gran’s mouth was a straight line while she finished a thought, the lines bracketing it deeply graven today. “He remarked that you might be . . . shy.”

For a second Ruby just stared, the words refusing to make sense. Then a laugh slid out sideways, hiccupping in the middle as she tried to pull it back. Gran’s barely noticeable frown deepened.

Still, she couldn’t help herself. “Well, at least he’s polite.”

“You are not shy.” The old woman looked down at her cards. Sometimes charmers could see things in the patterns, though Ellie often sniffed and called such divination unscientific.

At least Gran was talking. Maybe she’d forgiven Ruby for the other day. “Not with people I know.” Nettled, Ruby swung the fridge open. “Or people I want to know. What do the cards say?”

“Not much.” Gran’s strong, slim fingers moved quickly, brushing the laminated rectangles together into a neat stack. “Sometimes they are silent.”

She snagged the orange juice. His fingers had touched the milk carton. At least he didn’t hang around and try to be awkward or funny with her in the morning. He was giving her a little space.

Maybe this whole thing was just as weird for him as it was for her. What if she didn’t measure up? Sending someone back was one thing.

Being rejected was something else entirely.

Guess that makes me shallow. For once, she didn’t drink straight from the carton. She also wondered if he’d looked for the glasses, if he’d opened this cabinet or that one. If Gran had told him, To the left of the sink, young man.

She took a deep breath. “Do you like him? Will he do?”

Gran eyed her for a long moment, as if Ruby had started shifting right in the middle of the kitchen. “Do?”

She kept an eye on pouring into her glass, pretending to be absorbed in the simple task. “Yeah, are his clan connections good enough? Will he negotiate passages and tariffs well? Do you think he’ll be an asset?”

“Such questions.”

“Well, that’s the whole point of this exercise, right?” She concentrated on pouring. “To further the clan. So, do you think he’ll be an asset? He’s got a twin brother, right?” So there’ll be even more of a bond there to ally us with the Grimtree, which will make intercity trade easier. Might shave a few points off tariffs.

“This is quite a change.” Did Gran actually sound uncertain? Nah, couldn’t be. “Might I ask what brought it about?”

“If you don’t like it, I can go back to being a brat.” She shrugged, and popped the fridge open again. “Seriously, though, you’re right. I owe the clan everything. I could have died as an orphan for all I know. So if what it takes is me promising to marry this guy, okay.”

“You are no orphan.”

Did you adopt me? You never talk about it, and nobody else will either. “Hey, when is he coming back? I should drive him around. Or should I go wherever he went? He’s probably visiting the Ardelles first, you think? Didn’t they have a Grimtree marry in?”

“I am surprised you remember.”

Ruby took a deep breath and tried again. “I remember lots of stuff. Anyway, yeah, there was a Grimtree girl who married in. Sonja. Car accident, when I was eight. Everyone cried, and you led the run through the Park.”

There had been gossip afterward, too. That Efraim Ardelle had threatened to collar Sonja, and that it hadn’t been a car accident, but an escape attempt. She’d been heading for the province border, if the whispers were true.

Which was really interesting. Oncle Efraim was a lean, dry-eyed, hatchet-mouthed kin, and some whispered that he believed his nephew Peter should resurrect the old, old ways and share his mate with the head of his branch—at least, as long as they were childless.

Poor Sonja, everyone said. And, It’s a good thing Tante Rosa isn’t here to see this. Tante Rosa, Efraim’s mate, had passed on after a long, mysterious illness, and sometimes Ruby caught whispers about that, too. Rosa had been held to have certain relationships with the fey, and some of Efraim’s hardness and lack of kinfeeling was blamed on that.

The end result of all that clan history brought up a new, uncomfortable line of thought. A handsome young Grimtree wasn’t the worst that could happen. What if there was a way-older guy in another clan seeking alliance, one bitter-mouthed and stone-hard like Oncle Efraim? There might be overriding reasons to promise her in marriage to someone else.

There was always Hunter, and Thorne. It hadn’t been until middle school that they started the rivalry dance. If all else failed, maybe she could take one of them? Since she had to put up with someone. Maybe Hunter. He was pretty easy to redirect, not like Thorne.

Thorne had never been easy. And if she was honest, she liked that he wasn’t, even if she would probably pick Hunter just to make things . . . safer. Smoother. Less intense.

Gran sighed. Of all her sighs, this one was the most patient. “Sonja was . . . fragile.”

I know how you feel about weaklings. “Everyone says she was nice. But seriously, should I go over to the Ardelles’? Or should I wait for him to come back? What’s the etiquette? I know I should know, but I don’t.” At least I know not to ask him about dead kin. Awkward.

“Either is acceptable. Ruby, I know you feel our clan way’s might be . . . old-fashioned. I don’t wish for you to think I’m blind to the fact that the world has changed, and the kin must change with it.”

What did that mean? Orange juice, tart and cold, slid down her throat in long swallows. Was it Gran’s perennial, It could be worse, don’t complain? Or maybe it was, There’s a way out, I won’t force you.

Who knew? Gran almost never changed her mind, and she had said out loud it was time for Ruby to start thinking about the future. Her future. The clan’s future.

And other things. I should collar you, to save you from yourself. It echoed in the space between them, where before there had been only comfort and warmth. Sharptooth words, snapping and silent growling.

Ruby rinsed the glass and gave her best, sunniest smile. “We’re all modern now. I’m going to go see if I can catch him at the Ardelles’. You going into the office today?”

“Yes. Ruby, I wanted to ask you—”

Mithrus Christ. I’m doing what you want, all right? “Yes, I’ll do my chores, yes, I’ll be nice to him, and no, I’m not going out with Cami and Ellie. That about cover it?”

Gran’s shoulders relaxed a trifle, though she looked like she wanted to say more. “I suppose it does. Be careful, child.”

“I’ll be with kin. Nothing’s going to happen to me.” She blew Gran a kiss and danced out of the room.

Being responsible and cheerful was exhausting, and she wasn’t anywhere near through yet.

SEVEN

SHE DIDN’T HAVE TO GO FAR TO FIND HIM. HE HADN’T gone to the Ardelles’ at all.

Cami and Ellie often professed amazement at her ability to simply find things, whether it was the “in” accessories each school year or the honeywine coolers nobody else could score. It made her writhe a little inside each time, first with embarrassment and now because when it had really, really mattered, she hadn’t been able to find either of them.

Ellie had been the one to find Cami with that dowsing-charm of hers, and later, it was Avery Fletcher who had found Ellie with that fey creature. Both times Ruby had honestly tried, running all over town, sometimes with the cousins and other times alone, searching for the tingle that would lead her to her friends, the worry under her breastbone a deep tar-black pool. She could find a pair of shoes, a missing kitten, the best accessories every school year, but when it counted, she’d come up empty.

In other words, she’d failed them both. Just like she was probably going to fail the clan.

It was a relief to follow her nose and pull up at the edge of the Park, and a double relief to see Conrad’s short black hair. He’d hopped up on the near wall, a thigh-high tumbledown stone affair facing onto Tooth Street. He sat, broad shoulders hunched, and something inside Ruby tightened a little.

She knew what that felt like.

He didn’t turn around when she cut the engine, or when she got out. The Semprena gleamed, its finish charmwash glossy, its windows blind eyes. It was a lovely little car, with sinuous black curves and comfortable bucket seats in front. The shelf serving as a backseat wasn’t huge, but that meant more speed, and she liked that just fine. Ruby could still close her eyes and see Gran’s face as she handed over the keys the day after she passed her initial driver certification. This is . . . an heirloom. Treat it well.

She had. It wasn’t just four wheels and an engine, it was freedom, of a certain type. Maybe Gran had understood that.

She settled on the wall next to Conrad, not too close but not too far, her back to the Park. That way he wouldn’t have to look at her, either.

Neither of them said anything. The silence wasn’t dangerous, but it was taut. A faint breeze whispered through the trees, redolent of the knife-edge between late summer and the beginning of harvest season. A dry brown scent, not juicy green like summer’s height.

Finally, he shifted a little. “I should be visiting kin, shouldn’t I.”

“They’ll still be there tomorrow.” She kicked her feet out, lazily, staring at her shoes. They were cute little Sendij strappy sandals, really darling, and the crimson polish on her toenails wasn’t chipped at all. The fashionably frayed jeans and her crimson tank top might send the wrong message, but she looked all right.

Fat lot of good it did, since he kept staring at the Park with those sun-colored eyes. “I might not be.”

“Going home so soon?” Didn’t he like her? He’d called her beautiful. Her stomach knotted itself up.

“Maybe. Maybe I’ll strike out into the Waste. Better than sitting around, waiting for the axe to fall. Letting them run my life.”

Did he mean his clan, or just elders in general? Either way, she couldn’t argue with the sentiment.

Or was he saying she wasn’t enough to stick around for? Just making conversation? “Would you really?”

“Shit. I’m sorry.” Now he looked at her, sideways but still a long, lingering glance. “That’s really insulting, isn’t it.”

“Yeah, but I understand.” Her legs dangled, shorter than his. “I don’t want them running my life either. But what can you do? It’s the clan this and the clan that, and everything just . . .”

“Closes in on you. Like a collar.” A thoughtful nod. “Until you have to do something. Anything, to get away.”

Thanks for mentioning a collar. There was no way for him to know about Gran’s threat. Maybe someone had thought he was troublesome enough to be threatened with it, too. “Yeah.” She stared at the Semprena’s curves. Both Ell and Cami thought she drove too fast, took too many chances. How could she ever explain to them that behind the wheel was the only place she felt like she might actually have a shot at escaping?

“You’re not what I expected,” he continued. “I thought, another spoiled kingirl. Instead, you’re, well, different.”

Thanks. “I’m plenty spoiled. Just ask Gran.”

“Everyone’s afraid of her.”

“Well, yeah. She doesn’t control trade through the Waste by being cuddly.”

“Guess not.” He was still as a stone. “Do you like her?”

She caught a breath of well-oiled leather from the clan cuff, his healthy musk, the angry smoky smell underneath. Something about that low burning set her on edge, but she couldn’t pinpoint why. Maybe it was just that he was from another clan, or maybe it was because he was taller than her, and heavier.

She wondered if Cami or Ellie ever felt small around Nico, or Avery. “She’s my Gran.” She’s all I’ve got.

“But do you like her?”

“Most of the time.” No point in lying. Sometimes I don’t, but I still love her. “Don’t you like your Clanmother? She’s your grandmother, right?”

“Her? I hate the bitch.” Softly, but it sent chills down Ruby’s spine. There was a snarling under the words, not quite dominance but not quite rage either. “Always ordering people around.”

None of the Woodsdowne cousins would ever talk this way. At least he was being honest, not pussyfooting around how he felt. Still, Ruby had to close her mouth with a snap before she could find something to say. “That’s sort of her job, though, right?”

“Not when her orders are stupid. And my parents just go along with her, and . . .” He shifted slightly, as if he wanted to lean toward her. Went back to stillness. “Look, you don’t have to pretend. You know, be nice to me. I’ll make it clear it’s not your fault if I leave.”

I don’t know what’ll happen if you leave. “Like anyone will believe that.” Her palms were wet, and her heart pounded. “I’m sort of a problem.”

He turned his head, and his eyes were darker, and hot. The look was a physical weight along the side of her face, but she kept staring at the Semprena. Sunlight rippled in its paint, hazed off the pavement in the distance down Tooth Street, tingled against her skin. As long as she wasn’t shifted, it was a good friend.

The smoke underlying Conrad’s scent faded, whisked away on the breeze. “Me too. Hey.”

She waited, but he said nothing. Maybe he’d used up a significant proportion of his courage, and it was up to her to take the next step.

So she did. “What?”

“You know how to drive that thing?”

She tried not to roll her eyes, and only halfway succeeded. “No, I just sit in it and look pretty. Of course I do.”

A flash of something dark marred the handsomeness for a moment, but she didn’t see it. “Smart girl. Where do you want to take me?”