The guard who had been ordered to watch me stood nearby, stiff and watchful. His eyes swept through the crowd like a hawk, but he underestimated me. He underestimated Tala.
One heartbeat, I was standing under the lantern light; the next, we were swallowed by the festival chaos.
It wasn’t until he reached the exact spot he’d left us that he realized he was standing alone.
Silence wrapped around him. His face paled as he spun, searching frantically, tearing through the crowd.
He grabbed random strangers, yanking their faces toward the torchlight as if one of them might magically become me. But every second bled into minutes, and every minute was another nail in his coffin.
Fear rolled off him in waves. His trembling hands betrayed him—he knew the truth. He had lost me.
And worse, he
