Page 108 of Unraveling Fate

“If I picked you anything like that, I’d kick myself out. It’s hideous.” Cadenza took the dress and hung it back up, then looked Reyna in the eyes. “I’m serious though. How are you doing?”

Reyna stopped rustling through dresses. Sucked in a long breath through her nose. Examined the place inside her where her feelings for Canon had been. She mourned his death. He was a person—or had been. But she wanted to be mourning him as more than just a person, even if he hadn’t returned her interest. She wanted to be hurting more.

“I’m fine.”

“Reyna—”

“You remember what I told you after I broke up with Noah?”

Cadenza nodded.

“As soon as Canon refused to go through that door with me to help you, whatever I felt for him was gone.” Reyna abandoned any pretense of searching through dresses and dropped into a chair, wishing to whatever gods or Fates that were out there that sheweren’tfine. A lump hardened in her throat, remembering a time of dead coals, a cold forge, and her will broken.

She hadn’t explained this out loud before; she’d never had anyone she could explain it to. Eyes closed, she spoke around the echo of ice and stillness. “I loved a man. He broke my heart.”

It sounded so simple. Those words couldn’t contain the fire she’d felt. Fueled by the heat of that love, she had created more during that time than she’d ever created before. None of those pieces had been sold at Columbia. They’d been too unique, too beautiful for money. Instead, she’d found people who neededher creations and given them away freely. Gifts. Like her heart. The tuning fork was the only piece from that time she had left. It was meant to be a gift forhim, to represent all the resonance and potential of their future together.

Turned out he didn’t want that future. Reyna’s fire had died. Not been banked. Died. She’d had to use everything she had already stored in the tuning fork to reignite her will, and afterwards she reclaimed that piece as her own—to represent all the possibility and potential ofherfuture.

But she’d never intended to create that future alone.

“And now, if anyone gets close to doing that again…” She shrugged wearily.

Cadenza sat next to her and squeezed her hand. “And you can’t reclaim those feelings?”

“Not even if I want to. Which I do. At least, at some point. I don’t want to be ‘fine,’ Iwantto be able to feel that connection, you know? When Canon told us he’d been spying on Drostan, I figured I’d lose whatever I felt for him then. But I didn’t. And I thought, you know, maybe?”

“Maybe it was going to work this time?” Cadenza said softly. “Maybe that heartbreak had finally healed?”

Reyna nodded, swiping her cheeks with the back of her hand. “I mean, what am I if I can’t feel what I want to feel? Some kind of sociopath?”

“No.” Cadenza dug a tissue for her out of her purse. “Not remotely. Reyna, you are amazing.”

Reyna searched her friend’s face, wanting to hope in her words.

“I mean, you forge these incredible, powerful objects with your bare hands,” Cadenza went on. “You sing, you smith, you’re kind, you’re resourceful—all of this oracle stuff is due to you—you’re the one who found out all the info we needed, on your own, with no frame of reference for your powers. Reyna”—Cadenza looked her in the eye, her words washing over Reyna like heat from the forge—“you are a wonder.”

Reyna laid her head on Cadenza’s shoulder. “Thanks.”

Cadenza squeezed her shoulders. “Hey, what kind of new best friend would I be if I let you think awful things about yourself, right?”

Reyna laughed and blew her nose. “Well, right now you’re the kind of best friend who got engaged yesterday and needs a wedding dress fortonight. So, we better get shopping.”

“Yeah.” Cadenza snorted. “When you put it like that maybe I’m not such an awesome best friend after all.”

Reyna pulled a face, laughing. “I know, who makes their best friend pick out a maid-of-honor dress on such short notice, right?”

Ten minutesof browsing produced a selection of gowns to try, and the clerk set them up in a changing suite.

“Ok, option number one.” Cadenza swished into place in front of a half circle of mirrors. Six reflections of herself stared back, empty space next to all of them.

Reyna examined Cadenza in the dress and toggled her hand back and forth. “Not bad.”

Cadenza rolled her eyes. “That’s encouraging.” She adjusted the bodice for a better fit and one of the glass beads shattered, slicing her finger.

“Porca miseria,” she cursed, yanking her hand away from the silk to avoid dripping blood on it, while the clerk ran to get a band-aid. Her throat swelled shut, not with earthsong but with simple tears.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” Reyna asked.