“Who’s that?” Levi asked, nodding to the stage, where a young woman ascended the steps.
Enne almost didn’t recognize Poppy, dressed all in black, her eyes downcast and bloodshot. She looked as though she’d come straight from her father’s funeral.
“That’s Prescott’s daughter,” Enne answered quietly.
There was an obvious shift in the crowd upon her arrival, from chatter to whispers. The image of a grief-stricken daughter could move the heart of anyone, even those who’d disagreed with Worner’s politics. Harrison Augustine was being sworn into office across the city, but Enne was willing to bet far more spectators had come here.
“I bet they won’t let him fall,” Levi said darkly. “I bet they’ll let him choke.”
Grace and Roy had returned to the Ruins District with the rest of the Spirits to recover in their own home. Sophia had retreated back to Luckluster. Lola and Tock were elsewhere. Which left Enne and Levi to attend the execution.
“I hope you’re wrong,” Enne whispered. They’d both seen far too much death last night for such a gruesome display today.
“I’m not.”
Unfortunately, Enne agreed with him. The city hadn’t come to watch a clean death, and the wigheads would want make a spectacle of this. Last time New Reynes went to war, each of the lords had hanged. This wasn’t just a sentence—it was a promise.
Enne hadn’t only attended for Jonas’s sake—this was a promise to herself, too. Considering the haunting message Bryce had left them and the dangerous rhetoric on the radio, Liberty Square seemed a likely fate for them, too. So she would watch Jonas die. She would surround herself with hateful stares and morbid anticipation.
And she would make a promise to herself that her story wouldn’t end here. Not hers, not Levi’s, not anyone’s she cared about.
“Did you mean it?” Levi asked suddenly. “Did you mean anything you said yesterday at St. Morse?”
Enne’s breath hitched. “I meant... I meanteverything—”
“But Vianca told you to fix things between us.” His voice was frighteningly cold.
“She did,” she answered softly.
“Then...” His expression darkened. “I guess we’ll never know, will we?”
Enne gaped at him. She knew he was grieving, but she had seen him grieve Reymond. He hadn’t sounded like this.
“I’m telling you I meant them,” she said, fighting to keep her voice steady. “Don’t you believe me?”
She reached for him with trembling fingers, but Levi stiffened and turned away.
“Vianca told you to break me. But she didn’t tell you how,” Levi said. “You almost murdered in cold blood before. Killing Jac... The thought came fromsomewhere.”
Enne was so horrified that she could think of nothing to say in her defense. Was that what he truly thought of her? That she was a monster? That she’d devised this?
“You don’t mean that,” she said quickly.
“I keep wondering... Do you wish you’d killed Owain that day? That Bryce hadn’t fired first?”
Enne didn’t like the coldness in Levi’s voice. It didn’t sound defeated, like it had last night when she’d told him about Jac. It sounded heavy and resolute, like he’d already made up his mind. As if she didn’t already relive Jac’s death every moment she closed her eyes. As if she hadn’t spent all night awake with guilt.
“Now that I know you’d hate me either way,” Enne said softly, “I guess I do.”
Levi was prevented from responding when Jonas was brought to the stage, a dark hood over his head. Enne’s breath hitched at the sight of him. He was limping, and though most of his skin was covered, violet bruises peeked out below his sleeve. When they pulled off his hood, Enne felt her blood run cold as the crowd sneered. He’d been beaten until he was almost unrecognizable, and someone had carved “Scar Lord” into his forehead with a blade. The skin around the words was oozing and raw.
“Jonas made his choice when he killed Worner Prescott,” Levi said. Even so, Enne found his fate difficult to stomach, and all the more so when she considered how her and Levi’s ends could be the same.
Jonas looked up through swollen eyes and scanned the crowd. Enne swallowed as his gaze fell on them. Jonas mouthed something to them that she couldn’t make out.
“Do you know what he’s trying to say?” Enne asked. She had to force the words out, force herself to speak to Levi. If he truly felt as he’d told her, that she’d conceived the idea to kill Jac herself, then how could he bear to stand beside her?
“I think he said, ‘I’m sorry,’” Levi answered. “I don’t like this. We shouldn’t have come.” But Enne stayed rooted where she stood. She needed to watch, no matter how much it hurt. Maybe Levi thought otherwise, but she wasnotheartless.
