The Luna Choosing Game

I’ll leave you two to chat, Julian said, tapping Nicholas on the shoulder.

Side by side Julian and Nicholas were of comparable height, with Nicholas an inch or two taller. They

looked similar too, though Julian’s features were somewhat softer than the hard angles of Nicholas’s

face.

Nicholas wasn’t saying anything. His expressionless gaze shifted from me to Julian and back again.

Julian laughed on his way out the door and well down the hallway. I could hear echoes of it long after he

was gone

I thought Nicholas might leave too. Had he only come to look for Julian? Despite Julian’s teasing, it seemed impossible that he would have been searching for me.

Yet when Julian left, Nicholas stayed in my doorway, fixed and unmoving like a statue.

Under his unwavering stare, I began to get nervous. Did he overhear something that Julian and I had

talked about? No, we’d been speaking softly. Even from the door, he wouldn’t have been able to hear.

So what did he want?

I waited out his silence for as long as I could manage before I finally broke.

to talk?” I

did not look away.

Did we?

were standing very close just

want to know what we had been talking about. As far as I was concerned, Nicholas could

I gave a non–committal

close during archery practice, as

totally avoided so much as glancing at me during the archery event. Even when I had been with his group,

did you two become so close?” Nicholas

remembered me from

forced a smile, but it was uneasy. I felt like I

me further into disfavor

time with? Unless he was worried I had turned my machinations on Julian since

you were doing just now?” Nicholas’s eyes narrowed, his focus intensifying.

nerves. “No, I, um… Julianer, Prince Julian and I had

matters to discuss.”

grave, but if he kept

one point, I would have found

from me and to the sewing machines I’d had

machines, the threads, and the swatches of

my