City of Bastards by Andrew Shvarts

Author:Andrew Shvarts
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Disney Book Group
Published: 2018-06-04T16:00:00+00:00

At some point in the night, the tents started to blur together, but that was also possibly because I’d had two more Sinners’ Secrets and their sweet, sweet liqueur. Still, if I was trying to run the leisurely marathon of a golden buzz, Lyriana was sprinting hard toward sloppy drunk. Every time I looked away, she had another goblet of yarvo in her hands, and by the time we left the Tent of the Sexy Dancing Guys, she was wobbling on her feet, her cheeks flushed, a dopey grin on her face. “This is so much fun!” she yelled. “Did you see those guys?”

“I did, yeah,” I said, forcing a smile. Look, Lyriana’s life was her own, and if she wanted to get drunk, who the hell was I to stop her? But honestly? I hated dealing with her like this. It’s not just that she was annoying, although yeah, she was pretty annoying. It’s that even as much as she acted like she was having fun when she got wasted and danced on a countertop and went home with a turd pocket like Jerrald, there was something else in it, that core of pain she was shutting out, that Ellarion had asked about on the balcony at Vale Manor. She was trying so hard to show the world how happy she was that it just called attention to the dark pit of whatever-it-was eating her up. It set off every mother hen impulse I had, even as I had to plaster on a smile and join her for another round.

“Look! Look!” she shouted. There was an enormous tent at the center of the plaza, the size of five of the smaller tents put together, with a dozen billowing flags on top. Music spilled out, a loud boisterous jig that had me tapping my toes, and through the canopy flaps, I could see a bunch of people dancing inside, performers and guests alike. “Can we go? I’m gonna go!”

“Maybe we should—” I started, but Lyriana tore off before I could finish, pushing her way into the circle and almost knocking over two of the other guests. With a sigh, I began to follow, when I heard a raspy voice bellow out from behind me, at once unpolished and yet oddly confident: “Praise! Praise! Praise the Titans!”

I turned around. The words hadn’t come from a tent, but from a small crowd of guests behind me, where apparently some kind of commotion was taking place. I took one more glance at the big tent, making sure Lyriana was happily dancing, and then went the other way, toward that crowd. At the center of it, in a small circle, was an old Heartlander man in a pleated golden robe, his white beard twisted together with a pair of silver beads. A priest, then, doing some kind of street preacher routine. I’d seen them before, standing on corners, ranting on about the wisdom of the Heavens and the glorious future we’d all ascend to. That didn’t make it any weirder seeing one here, though.

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