Page 149 of Storm Caller

“Or he left,” Henry says, voicing the thoughts I’ve been having trouble acknowledging too closely.

I shake my head. “He wouldn’t leave me.” My eyes burn. “He wouldn’t.”

Henry peers at me. “I know you care for him, and it’s obvious he cares for you, too.” He takes my hand carefully, almost as if he’s afraid I might break. “But he never belonged here. This isn’t his world. This isn’t his life.”

“I know all that, but he wouldn’t just leave me,” I insist. “He wouldn’t.” I tug my hand away, not in the mood to be soothed. “Will you help me look for him?”

“Poet,” Ada says. “Our priority right now is the cure and exposing The Shield. Rook is more than capable of taking care of himself.”

“That’s it?”

“We will do what we can, but we’re working with limited resources,” Ada says.

I want to keep arguing, but part of me sees her point. That doesn’t make it hurt any less.

“Sure,” I say, then without another word, I leave the room to find Domino seated on a chair, talking with some other members of the Fog.

“Is everything okay?” she asks when she notices me.

“They won’t help me find Rook.”

She stands up and walks over. “We’ll find him. I promise.”

I sniff and wipe an errant tear from the corner of my eye with the heel of my hand.

“It’s almost five. We need to get back for curfew,” Domino says, so we head back to Amery.

We aren’t questioned as we enter; they just let us pass, marking our names on a list.

The screens in the main hall are playing another news broadcast. Rook’s face flashes across them all, and it makes my chest hurt. He’s staring at the camera with that dark intensity I love so much.

The newscaster is saying there have been no sightings, and I wonder if Henry is right. Is he gone? Did he leave me? I don’t want to believe it, but I also want him to be safe. I can’t stand the idea of never marveling at the green and gold of his eyes. At never tracing my fingertips over his freckles. At never being held or feeling his warmth again. I don’t know what I’ll do without him.

The next days pass in a haze of classes and training, with Dean Withers determined to pretend everything at Amery is business as usual. I go through the motions, but my heart isn’t in it. Henry is quiet but sympathetic. In a low voice, he tells me they’re searching the tunnels for evidence of Rook, hoping to offer him a safe place to hide if he needs it, but he says they’ve found nothing to suggest he’s still in New Manhattan.

I start texting his phone. I know he can’t reply. He turned off his location tracking months ago, but I’m sure they’re monitoring his phone for messages.

Probably mine, too.

So I pretend that I’m writing him a letter.

me: I miss you.

me: I hope you’re safe.

I toss in a few lines to throw off anyone who might be reading.

me: Come back to me.

me: You’ll be fine if you just come home.

He won’t buy any of it. If he’s reading these, I hope he understands.

I talk about the birthday cake he bought me and how I can still taste it. I recall our night at Sogno when we danced and he took such tender care of me. I talk about his music and his books, carefully skirting around anything that reveals too much of the Veil.

If he left the city, these notes aren’t going anywhere. Just pinging into the ether, lost to nothing.

The thought of that splits my heart into a thousand little fragments.