The second I made a noise, he released me, and I rested my hands on my knees, breathing hard. Being exhausted was not helping my stamina. For the next half hour, Jack taught me how to break someone’s fingers and exactly where on the shin to kick so it’d hurt the most.

   And then he pulled out a knife. I reached into the pocket of the sweatshirt I’d left lying on the floor and pulled out my own.

   “Like we talked about last lesson, the knife should be your last resort,” Jack said. “It’s a risk.”

   “A tactical risk,” I remembered. “Only do it if I have to, because bringing out a weapon escalates a fight.”

   Jack nodded. “And it would be best for you to err on the side of caution.”

   I looked down at the knife and nodded.

   “Where did we leave off?” Jack said.

   I held out my blade like he’d taught me and rotated my wrist inward.

   “Good,” Jack said. “Now strike like I’m attacking you.”

   When he came at me with his knife, I jumped back and my knife fell to the mat. “Sorry,” I said as I bent to pick it up. “Sorry. Again.”

   Jack came at me again, and I held on to the knife this time, but still flinched.

   “Everything okay?” he said. He reached for me, but paused, glancing up at a small glass dome in the ceiling that was probably a camera. His hand dropped to his side.

   “It’s like I forgot how to do anything,” I said crossly. “Go again.”

   We kept sparring, but my heart wasn’t in it anymore. “Can we do something else?”

   His eyes softened. “You really are doing well.”

   “No I’m not. I never do well with the knife. If someone was actually trying to kill me, I’d be screwed.”

   “No, you are.” He glanced up again, subtly, at the camera overhead. “It’s just . . . you could use a little help with your grip.”

   He came behind me and wrapped both arms around me, taking my hand in his. “Like this,” he said, drawing me closer so I could feel the heat of his chest on my back, and I leaned into him, relaxing a little. I knew I was worried about more than the training, and so did he. “Your fingers go just here, like this. See, you’ve got it. It really is going fine, I promise.” He squeezed my hands, subtly enough for the cameras to miss. “All of it.”

   I took one more deep breath. I hoped he was right.

   Then I tightened my grip on the knife, and without any preamble, I twisted away and pointed the tip at Jack’s chest.

   The surprise took a second to drop from his face, but when it did, he raised his hands in surrender. “You win.”

   I dropped the knife to my side, and Jack’s eyes glowed with a look so affectionate, I wished more than anything I could at least hug him. Instead, I said, “Let’s go to Venice.”

 

 

CHAPTER 7

   The moment the plane landed in Venice, everyone’s phones were buzzing. My father frowned and started making calls. Lydia was on her phone, too.

   Once we were on the tarmac, I took advantage of their distraction to catch up to Jack. He, too, was staring at his screen. “What’s going on?”

   His face was a terrible mix of shock and sadness. “It’s Dev Rajesh,” Jack said. “He was found dead early this morning. They think he was poisoned.”

   My body went hot, then cold. “Oh no. No no no.” Not only was I failing my mom, I was failing the Circle. “It’s my fault.”

   “It isn’t your fault. It isn’t our fault. It’s their fault. They’re terrorists,” Jack said, but he looked just as gutted as I felt.

   I wrapped my necklace around my fingers and followed Jack to a waiting car, the knots of security around me noticeably tighter than they were yesterday. With all the Saxons on their phones, Jack and I ended up alone in a car together, and he draped his jacket in such a way that we could pretend to ignore each other and the driver couldn’t see us clinging to each other’s hands.

   • • •

   There were no cars in Venice. Starting at the edge of the city all transportation was by boat, down the wide, rippling Grand Canal running through the middle of the city or one of the small side canals that led to residential areas. Once we got to our hotel, I took a quick shower, and Lydia was waiting with her entire hair and makeup arsenal when I got out. Tonight, though, I didn’t feel much like getting ready for a party.

   “Dev wouldn’t want you to be deterred by this,” Lydia said. She was dragging a brush through my hair, expertly pinning it into an elaborate updo. “He’d want you to get married and stop the Order. All the boys who have been killed—they’d want their sacrifice to make the Circle stronger.”

   I raised my eyebrows at her in the mirror. I somehow doubted that anyone’s response to being attacked would be to hope I’d marry someone else. I guess I still had a lot to understand about the Circle. “It’s weird,” I said. “The Circle is so strong in every other way, but . . .” I didn’t know if I should say it. If she’d be offended. “If the only thing they can do about the assassinations is hope that some girl getting married to one of them stops it . . . Doesn’t that seem strange? It’s like the Order makes them weak.”

   To my surprise, Lydia’s mouth curled into a smile. “It’s interesting that you see it that way. I disagree. You may not be able to tell yet, but the Circle is headed toward being stronger than we’ve been in a long time.”

   “What do you mean?”

   “The Order hasn’t always been this powerful.” She pinned two braids together at the back of my head, and I watched to make sure she gathered up the section of hair that had been cut short at the wedding. I hated looking at it. “We’ve haven’t faced obstacles to our rule for centuries. It’s made us complacent. Do you know what first brought the Order into our consciousness again?”