Page 104 of Heart of Thieves

“But we need to sleep before round three.”

He turns away, wooden. “Anywhere else.”

He’s afraid if we return to the Brig, he’ll have to face Soren, Arden, Jade, and Isla again. Or, perhaps worse, maybe they won’t be there.

“Why don’t we get a room at the motel across the street from the Liar’s Den?” I suggest, forcing a cheery tone in spite of my own grief. “Maybe we’ll be able to scope out whatever Nocturne’s up to from the window, see if any players show up early, that sort of thing.”

He sags. “Sounds great.”

I hail a cab, trying not to think about the way the man who has spent so long running from being a ghost now seems uncannily like one.

As soon as we get to our room, he sinks into the pillows, flickering into noncorporeality as he drops off into slumber. As much as I’d like to join him, I still have to make sure round three is set to go. I wait until I’m sure he’s asleep before slipping carefully back out into the city, praying he won’t wake until I return.

I draw in his magic. It resists, and when it finally fills my veins, it’s slow. A trickle.

This is to be expected, I reassure myself. We’ve drawn a lot of magic out by now. Of course there will be less of it.

Our plan is working.

When I reach the Liar’s Den roof, Estelle is already maneuvering the lumenoring equipment into place. As soon as she sees me, she rushes over, eyes gleaming. “The voratium,” she whispers. “It’s starting to glow!”

“Yeah, and their magic is lessening,” I tell her. “Do you think they’ll notice?”

“As long as they don’t figure out why before it’s all over, I don’t think it matters.”

“You’re probably right.” I manage a smile, moving the voratium into its place at the center of the setup.

“What’s wrong?” she asks, scrutinizing me.

I sigh. Estelle has always been far too sharp to miss anything. “The Tentacles left.”

“Left? As in . . . gone?”

“Yes. They think I’m up to something.” I flick dirt off the voratium. “And some of my father’s minions recognized me, so there’s a good chance he’ll do something stupid like show up with an army of bouncers to beat everyone to a pulp tonight.”

“Just what we needed. More bouncers.” Estelle angles a mirror up to the sky. “What are you going to do?”

“There’s nothing I can do, really,” I say. With Enzo asleep, the chasm of his grief is subdued, but it’s still there, dragging at me like fatigue alongside my own pain.

I hope Jade will forgive me. I hope they all will, once this is over.

“What about the Liar?” Estelle asks after a moment.

Nic’s face, so raw and unguarded before Ostena and Forsyth attacked, flashes across my memory.

“That’s complicated,” I say. “Can someone sedate me until this ends? I want a nap.”

“Unfortunately, you’re Nocturne, so . . . no, actually. No sedation allowed.” Estelle winks.

“Ugh, you’re such a killjoy, Estelle.”

She grins. “I know.”

Once everything is where it needs to be, I unravel Nic’s wards so people will be able to enter the casino for round three. Then, with fatigue and guilt and desperate hope eating at me, I trudge back to the motel room where Enzo is still sleeping soundly and collapse into the bed next to his.

As I drift into slumber, I try not to think of thieves or liars or shadow goddesses, but all three haunt my dreams, splitting my heart into smaller and smaller pieces until it stops beating.

And then they die.