LITMIR.BIZ

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      Pretia shifted from foot to foot uncomfortably. She didn’t want these grown men and women at her feet. But they remained there, heads bowed, waiting—waiting for what? Pretia heard Castor muffle a snort.

      “Your hand,” King Airos whispered behind her.

      And for the first time, just like she’d seen her parents do thousands of times before, Pretia placed her palm on each of the Granics’ heads in turn, giving them her blessing. One by one they rose, then disappeared into the shadows of the Gods’ Eye.

      Janos approached, an imposing presence. He placed both hands on Pretia’s shoulders and stooped down so they were eye to eye. “Congratulations, favorite niece,” he said. “If your grana is as powerful as your parents’, that book will be one of the most important and interesting ever to be bound in Epoca.” He kissed her forehead. Then he looked at each of Pretia’s parents in turn. “And I thank you both for entrusting Pretia to my care. Tomorrow she will be more than the Princess of Epoca. Tomorrow she’ll be one of my recruits.” With a strong hand, he ruffled her hair. “But I hope you understand that you won’t be getting any special treatment,” he added with a wink.

      Pretia’s heart soared. She forgot about the book in her hands. Ecrof—that was the most important thing.

      Now Castor approached and stiffly shook Pretia’s hand. He leaned in to whisper in her ear. “You heard what my father said, no special treatment for you. Which means no more dumb ceremonies for me to sit through.” He squeezed Pretia’s hand painfully. “When we get to Ecrof, no more special Pretia.” They locked eyes and Castor raised his voice. “See you on the ship tomorrow, Cousin,” he said.

      It was like a balloon inside Pretia had popped—she had forgotten that Castor was also going to Ecrof. Of course he was.

      When Pretia and her parents were alone, Queen Helena glanced at the package in Pretia’s hands. “Aren’t you going to open it?”

      “I thought I’d wait,” Pretia said. She couldn’t admit to her mother that she was as afraid of her book as she was afraid of her grana. What horrible future might be contained in its pages?

      But Pretia knew her parents wouldn’t let her alone until she unwrapped the book. She slowly opened the blue cloth and took the book out. At first glance there didn’t seem to be anything extraordinary about it. It was about the size of an average book, perhaps slightly heavier, bound in thick pebbled leather. The front and back covers were marbled blue and purple, and the binding was gold. She opened it. The glossy pages felt heavy. There were no words, only images—detailed paintings in dreamy, gauzy colors that spread across both pages. She flipped through the book. It made no sense: imaginary lands, still-life depictions of strange objects—clocks, feathers, a glass of milk. One page seemed to be different flowers painted close-up. Another something that was either a maze or tree roots. She saw pages that could be the sea, or perhaps the sky, or something else entirely.

      She exhaled, relieved that nothing sinister seemed to jump out from the book. “It’s just a book.”

      “The magic happens when you learn how to use your book,” her mother said. “Until then, you’re right, it’s just a book. In time, your grana will guide you.”

      At the mention of her grana, Pretia’s stomach clenched, and for the hundredth, no, the thousandth time, the memory of Hurell’s blue flame and Davos flying off the cliff flashed before her eyes.

      The king drew Pretia toward him. “There’s something your mother and I would like to talk to you about before you leave for Ecrof. Something important.”

      What now? Pretia’s heart sank. Surely it was possible to have a life without everything being so important, so stately, so political.

      They led her to the edge of the room, to a small wooden chair, something a toddler might sit in. She sat, trying to make herself comfortable.

      “Pretia,” Queen Helena said, squatting down so she could look her in the eye. “Your father and I are wondering about your grana. You’ve never mentioned it. Has it really not come?”

      Pretia bit her lip. What should she say? If she told them the truth, that her grana had come, there would be endless questions about when it had started, how she felt, and why she’d hidden it. Pretia was sure the whole story about Davos and Dinara and the disastrous and nearly deadly game of tag in the clearing would come out. And once she admitted that, she’d have to mention what she had done in the Hall of the Gods of Granity. And she was never, ever telling anyone that she’d lit the flame of the Fallen God.

      There was no way for her to tell her parents that her grana was cursed, especially after the Ceremony of the Book. Everyone expected so much of her. She knew she’d disappoint them all.

      “We love you no matter what,” the king said.

      “But . . . ?” Pretia asked. She knew from the tone of her father’s voice that there was more to the story.

      “When the gods granted grana to the people, it was so we could rule ourselves with kindness and wisdom. We lead with our grana. Which means that in order to rule, a king or queen must have grana.”

      “So if you don’t—” the queen said.

      “I can’t rule.” Pretia finished the statement for her. She knew. She’d heard this hundreds of times in passing. But she’d never heard it directly from her parents’ mouths. She knew there were outcasts from society who’d lost or repressed their grana through various addictions—sweet wine and Somnium potions. She had also heard that every once in a while, someone was born without grana and was relegated to the lowest class of society. But she’d never dreamed she’d be categorized with these sorts of people.

      “So, please, Pretia, tell us the truth. Have you felt anything at all? Any change?” Pretia had never seen anything like the look in her mother’s eyes, desperate, pleading. “You are the Child of Hope. You must—”

      Pretia stood up. “I don’t even know what that means. I’m Pretia. That’s who I am. I’m not the child of anything. Stop forcing that name on me.” She began to run toward the stairs. But before she reached them, she whirled around and faced her parents. There were tears in her eyes. “And I don’t have grana.”

      Her kind of grana wasn’t what they wanted. Her grana was deadly, dangerous. It was cursed. And there was no way she was ever going to let anyone see it again. So what if she couldn’t rule? So what if she wasn’t everything her parents and the kingdom wanted her to be? She was going to Ecrof and when she was there she could figure out what to do about her cursed grana without having to worry about all this future queen of Epoca nonsense.

      4

      ROVI

      THE POOL

      Of the twelve members of Issa’s gang, Rovi was the youngest. He was also the only one who hadn’t grown up in the Sandlands. He’d grown up on Cora Island, home to the formidable Ecrof Academy, where his father had been the Visualization Trainer. But that had been a lifetime ago.

      Rovi remembered Ecrof but tried not to think about it. It was too painful, too sad. It was where his mother had died, when he was almost too young to remember. And where his father had been labeled insane and then fired. He’d wound up a Somnium addict on the foreign streets of the Sandlands, with Rovi trying to put food in both their mouths at the age of seven.

      But sometimes the memories came. Rovi couldn’t help them. Especially around the time of his birthday. He remembered the beautiful campus on a high plateau on Cora Island—the bleached-white cliffs, the perfect blue sea below. He remembered the impressive stadium that opened to the cliffs, that looked as if it were balancing on the edge of the world. He remembered the famous Tree of Ecrof, the school’s proud emblem and one of the Four Marvels of Epoca, that grew in the center of the stadium. He remembered the happy shouts of the students

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