He looked back at the book he had spread open on the grass, and I tossed the baton up, catching it easily. “What are you reading?” I asked, and he raised his head, sunlight flashing off his glasses.

“Still looking through some of Saylor’s books for stuff about the Peirasmos.”

“Anything?” I asked, but he shook his head.

“Not yet. But Saylor had a lot of books.”

I kept twirling, but watched him out of the corner of my eye. “And you? You feeling okay?”

“Sure,” he said, the word clipped off and sharp in his mouth. He didn’t look up at me, and something in my stomach twisted.

“David,” I said, and he sighed, tapping his pen furiously against the page.

“It’s just irritating, that’s all. Being completely useless, power-wise. If I could just see something...” He broke off with a frustrated noise. “My visions might have been stupid before, but at least I could have them.” Shaking his head, he leaned back against the fence. “No idea why everyone is working so hard to protect me when I’m not exactly worth much.”

It was the second time he’d said something like that, and I still didn’t like it. Part of that, I knew, was the guilt. But warding him had been for his own good, I thought again. To keep him safe and keep him... well, him.

But I’d tried to ignore how that was making David feel, especially when he was all alone in Saylor’s house, with nothing but his own thoughts to keep him company. David was a smart guy, and ever since I’d known him, he’d had a bad tendency to overthink things. I knew he’d been sitting there at night, brooding over all of this.

Now, he tipped his head back and studied the sky, bright blue through the oak leaves overhead. “I’m trying to help by going through all these books, but nothing there is all that helpful, and I...” Trailing off, he pushed his hands under his glasses, scrubbing his face. “If something happens to you during all of this, Harper—”

I set the baton down and walked over to stand in front of him, catching his chin in my fingers and tilting his head up to look at me. “Nothing is going to,” I told him. “We got through Cotillion, and we’ll get through this, too.”

David’s eyes were nearly as blue as the sky above, and as they searched my face, I could tell he didn’t believe me. But he dropped the subject, picking up the baton I’d laid down on the grass.

“I’m still having trouble wrapping my mind around you twirling this thing in a pageant,” David said, idly toying with it as he stood up.