He can’t possibly know anything. He just doesn’t trust me because he’s a bigot.

“And stay away from Hypatia,” he growls.

“She’s my friend.”

“Make new friends.” He moves closer, crowding my space. I instinctively step back, hitting the desk behind me. His eyes are hooded, and I suddenly feel like an entirely different kind of prey.

“What if I don’t?” I breathe.

“Little Weed, why are you trying to provoke me? You need better survival instincts.” His silky words waft in the air between us, and his arms cage me against the desk, causing my pulse to quicken.

“I’m not scared of you,” I say, my voice sounding braver than I feel.

He takes one more step, removing the last of the distance between us. He’s so close I can smell him. Of course he smells amazing, like leather and spice and seduction. His eyes bore into mine, unapologetic and calculating. He leans toward me, and I stop breathing as he whispers in my ear, “You should be.”

I feel his breath on my skin with a heat that chills me. A muscle in his neck tightens as he swallows. The gust of his exhale blows a tendril of hair out from behind my ear, and he reaches toward my face as if to tuck it back, but then drops his hand and clenches it into a fist. I see confusion spark in his eyes before he turns and surges out of the room.

He’s out the door before I finally gasp air back into my lungs, my heart pounding so hard it might bruise my chest out of fear… and something else entirely as well.

11

Later when Hypatia comes to drag me to the hover park, I almost don’t go. As cool as hoverjousting sounds, I’m not here to have fun, and I was planning to flip through the anatomy book I’d been given in one of my classes this morning to see if there are any leads for what my next steps in looking for a cure for Grandfather should be. But then I remember Rafe telling me to stay away from Hypatia, and screw him, I’m gonna go learn to hoverjoust with my friend.

I follow Hypatia through the mists of the forest to where Georgie is waiting for us at the entrance to a clearing. Georgie’s holding something that looks a lot like a snowboard, and I rush over to examine it, my excitement rising. I love snowboarding. It’s something I’m actually good at, and—oh, this is so much cooler than any snowboard. I feel my chest expand with appreciation as I take the hoverboard from her. Of all the things that I have seen since I came to this place—flying origami pigeons and the rearview of hot guys in breeches included—nothing holds a candle to this.