Perry glanced to where Aria waited, then back at Reef. “You know what?”

“What?” Reef snapped.

“You’re a terrible judge of time.”

Reef smirked. He ran a hand over the back of his head and sighed. “So I am.” When he spoke again, his voice had lost its bite. “Perry, I don’t want to see you make this mistake.” He nodded at the chain. “I know what that cost you. I don’t want to watch you lose it.”

“I know what I’m doing.” Perry gripped the cool metal in his hand. “I’ve got this.”

2

ARIA

Aria stared at the trees, listening to Perry’s footsteps grow louder as he returned. She saw the gleam of the chain at his neck first and then his eyes, flashing in the darkness. They’d come together in such a rush before. Now, as he strode toward her, she took her first good look at him.

He was impressive. Much more than she remembered. He’d grown taller, as she’d first thought, and more muscular through the shoulders, settling into his lanky height. In the dim light she saw a dark coat and pants with fitted, clean lines, not the battered, patched-up clothes of the hunter she’d met in the fall. His blond hair was shorter, falling in layers that framed his face, so different from the long twisting waves she’d known before.

He was nineteen, but he seemed older than her friends in Reverie. How many of her friends had been through what he had? How many had hundreds of people to look after? None. They came from totally different worlds. Aether, she thought. That was the only thing Dwellers and Outsiders had in common. It threatened them both.

Perry stopped a few feet away. Pale light fell on the strong planes of his face, and she noticed shadows under his eyes. He ran a hand over the fine scruff on his jaw. The brushing sound was so familiar, Aria could almost feel the gold bristles beneath her fingertips.

“Sorry about Reef.”

“It’s all right,” she said, but it wasn’t. Reef’s words echoed in her mind. Dweller, he’d called her. Mole. Bitter insults. Words she hadn’t heard in months. At Marron’s, she’d fit in like she belonged.

Her gaze dropped to the ground between them. Three paces for her. Two for him. Moments ago they’d been pressed together. Now they stood apart like strangers. Like everything had just changed.

A mistake. Reef had said that, too. Was he right? “Maybe I should go.”

“No—stay.” Perry stepped forward and took her hand. “Forget what he said. He’s got a temper.... Worse than mine.”

She looked up at him. “Worse?”