Chapter 241

That went better than expected, Zoey thought as she walked down the hallways of the d’Celestin estate, headed for Rosalie’s room in the royal wing. She hadn’t necessarily expected disaster to come from a meeting with Enzo, but any conversation risked him finding out things she would rather he didn’t—most notably her relationship to Rosalie.

She wasn’t sure whether he knew more than he was letting on. For a man that controlled half the Fractures, she assumed he had to be perceptive. Then again, everyone had blind spots, and Rosalie seemed confident he was being kept in the dark ... but that just might mean he was Rosalie’s blind spot, rather than the other way around.

Regardless, it didn’t seem like Enzo knew the two of them were dating, much less up to all of the inappropriate things Zoey’s class demanded. But maybe he suspected some sort of romantic entanglement, nascent or burgeoning. She really couldn’t tell. He was a man skilled at keeping his thoughts his own.

Aria had returned to her room; she’d mentioned she would be perusing the temple district today, and while Zoey would like to join her for that, she had other more pressing goals. Sabina and Mel needed ‘new stock,’ to name one, and beyond that, Zoey needed practice honing her lightning affinity before they went out on their next shard. She wasn’t sure when that would happen, but knowing Rosalie, sooner rather than later. Her desire for progress had gone nowhere.

Among these thoughts, Zoey’s attention also wandered to bigger picture worries, prompted by Enzo’s request to speak with Ephy. It had been some time since she’d learned anything new about the shard-eaters, and more specifically, about the one who had taken an interest in Zoey. Surely she would be reemerging soon? Had she ever followed them in the first place? She’d received not a shred of evidence toward either theory, which was concerning.

In short, when Zoey arrived to Rosalie’s room, she was distracted by a number of topics spinning around inside her head. The large double doors were, strangely, already open, which gave her pause, but the sight of Rosalie standing on the far side of the room, staring out the window down the slope of Mantle dispelled any other thoughts. A smile quirked up her lips, seeing her.

Interestingly, she was wearing her hair in a bun. Rosalie normally swapped between a practical ponytail or keeping her long, straight platinum-blonde hair down, so Zoey wondered whether she was about to attend some special event—or if she was just trying something new.

Despite surely hearing Zoey’s footsteps—it was Rosalie, after all, the perfectly-aware warrior—the girl didn’t turn to greet her.

Maybe if Zoey had been less distracted by the day’s events and more importantly, the future’s, or if it hadn’t been Rosalie’s room she’d walked into to see a platinum-haired girl standing there, she would have noticed that there was something just slightly off. The woman’s build was the same, muscled yet lithe with curves in the same places, but if she’d been paying close attention, she’d have seen that she was an inch taller, with a little less curve in the hips and a little more in the chest.

But she didn’t notice any of that, besides the obvious change in hairstyle—which she chalked up to Rosalie trying something new, or perhaps that was her preferred style for an upcoming formal event.

So Zoey walked up, placed her hands on Rosalie’s hips, and leaned forward to rest her chin on the shorter girl’s shoulder.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Zoey murmured, lips tugging up into a smile. “Staring out at your city, all pensive,” she said. “It’s cute, Princess.”

Instantly, Zoey knew that something was wrong by the way Rosalie tensed, going rigid as a board. Confused, her head turned just slightly to meet Rosalie’s eyes, rather than looking out the window alongside the other girl.

It...

Was not Rosalie.

Far more than the slight height and build difference, or even the change in hairstyle, the face gave it away in an instant. Sure, there were stark similarities—the regal structure of her nose and chin, the eyes of pale ice, even her choice of attire. But Zoey had spent many mornings drinking in every detail of Rosalie’s features, the curve of her chin and the patterns of her irises.

“Remove your hands from me,” came a voice so freezing-cold it could have stopped lava from rolling down a hill, “before I remove them from you.”

Zoey’s hands snapped back like she’d touched a hot stove. She backpedaled even as the woman turned on her. A weapon coalesced in her right hand—unsurprisingly, a six-foot spear of white metal. She didn’t look pleased that Zoey had walked up and grabbed her, in the way a cat might ‘not look pleased’ about being thrown into a bathtub.

Zoey’s thoughts simultaneously shuttered off and were also running at a thousand miles per minute. Mostly, she blamed herself. She should have been able to tell. If not by the subtle differences in build, then simply by putting two and two together. Enzo had told her that Charlotte had returned to the estate, back from her wayfaring expedition, and had even told Rosalie to be expecting her. Yet Zoey had waltzed into Rosalie’s room wholly unaware that it wasn’t Rosalie standing by the window, but her sister. Yes, she’d been distracted, and yes, the two sisters were startlingly similar, but Zoey should have been able to tell.