Page 58 of Echo North

He wouldn’t look at me, his eyes shifting away to the queen and her visitor, a dark-skinned prince with silk robes so thin and white I got the idea they were made of spider webs.

I took a bite of tart. Its initial overpowering sweetness shifted strangely to strong spices burning in the back of my throat. “What did you remember?”

Hal brushed his finger along another orange slice but didn’t eat it. Sugar spilled onto his lap. He still wouldn’t meet my eyes.

“Hal. Let me help you.”

The earth shook with sudden thunder, and I slid off the bench to the ground. An arrow whizzed past my shoulder. It stuck quivering in the queen’s sleeve, pinning her to her chair. The spider-silk prince smiled.

Hal cursed, and hauled me to my feet.

“What’s wrong?”

“The story is changing again. Those two are allies. They get married and fight off an army of fire demons. They bring peace to the continent.”

But as I watched, the prince drew a dagger and slit the queen’s throat. Her head slumped forward, blood running down her neck and soaking her gown. Drops of red touched her tart.

Hal grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the pavilion. We ran until we’d left the castle far behind and pain made my side catch. And then Hal let go of me and I wished he hadn’t. I wheeled on him. “What is going on?”

“The books don’t change. Theynever change.Those are the rules. You can’t break the rules.”

My fingers felt colder apart from his. Behind us, the castle was burning. “Someone did.”

He cursed again; his hands shook. “You need to get away from me. You need to leave.”

“What?”

At last, at last, he jerked his face to mine. His eyes were hard as flint. “I’m going to hurt you, Echo. That’s what I remembered. I was always going to hurt you. You have to leave while you still can.”

His gazeburned.

I didn’t move. Smoke drifted toward us, the air grew thick with it. My thoughts were tangled threads, an impossible knot. “The books are enchantments. The only way they could change is if an enchanter changed them.” My eyes teared as the smoke came closer. I teased one of the threads loose. “Why is it that people who are … who are enchanted, can never talk about it?”

“I’m not enchanted, Echo.” He practically spat the words.

“How else could you be trapped in the books?”

Danger lingered in his eyes. He caught my hand, and drew me so close I could feel his breath on my lips, see the specks of silver in his irises. Awareness of him trembled through me. I couldn’t stop staring at the curve of his mouth, and I wanted badly, badly, to trace it with my own.

He put one palm on my heart. “You have to stay away from me.”

“Hal.”

“You have to stay away.”

And then he turned, and vanished.

Something rumbled through the earth; heat pulsed toward me. Acraaaaaaaaackfractured the stillness, fissures opening in the ground. Within them, fire raged.

A shape curled up from the fire, the outline of a woman sketched in smoke.

“He isn’t honest with you.” Her voice was like crackling flame tangled with the screech of an out-of-tune violin. “He hides things from you. He does not trust you.” She circled me, brushing fiery fingers across my shoulders. My dress smoked but I felt no pain.

“Are you a fire demon?” I asked her.

She laughed. “That is not the right question.”

“What is the right question?”

---