A hot wind rushed through the graveyard, carrying with it the smells of sausages-on-a-stick, chocolate lion heads, and buttery popcorn. From far away, children shouted and lively music pulsed. Bright red banners flapped from balconies and street lamps. Today marked the tenth year since the war with the demons had begun and a festival had been declared in memory of the soldiers that had fallen and those who had yet to fall. The bell in the tower atop the Larinlur temple had been sounding all morning, one ring for each human casualty. But no one listened; it could barely be heard above the clamor of the crowds, jostling for position at a game booth or demanding more sweet festival food.

Zidaiku stood with his hands in his pockets and felt everything fade away. The headstone rose a foot above the uneven grass, names etched in black against white granite. They reached out and stole the air from his lungs. He read them again, hoping he had made a mistake. "James and Sarah Paine. Together Forever."

No mistakes. There they were, written in stone. Permanent. Definite.

He had never allowed himself to believe that his parents were still alive. Thousands of graves surrounded him in the stone garden. With so many deaths, he knew his mother and father had to be among them. Still, he told himself, there were no guarantees that this was the grave he had hoped never to find. In a city of ten million, a simple last-name match couldn't prove a thing.

Zidaiku broke from his trance when he heard a scuff in the grass behind him. Angel stepped beside him, her platinum blonde hair and clean white shirt shining. Zidaiku took special notice of them; the way Angel styled herself was indicative of her stress levels. If her hair was loose or partially down, she was having a good day. If she had most of it pulled up, then Zidaiku knew to lie low. Angel had the body of a mannequin—perfectly proportioned and evenly toned. Her clothes fit like they had all been custom-tailored. She took great care to eliminate all wrinkles, but high stress levels somehow caused them to appear in her clothing.

Today, her hair was down, and her clothes fit neatly. She wasn't usually touchy, but because it was festival day, she rubbed a hand across Zidaiku's back. "There you are. We're going back to Main Street, if you want to come."

He swallowed. "Yeah. I'm finished here." He walked past her, hoping that she wouldn't notice what he had been looking at. When he didn't hear her fall into step behind him, he knew it was too late.

"Zidaiku, are these your..." She knelt down to touch the names. "I can't believe it. I thought you didn't know where they were."

He shrugged. "Must be a million different Paines in this city, Angel. They could be anybody."

She put a gentle hand on his arm. "We could find out. At the library, they have lists—"

"I don't care," he said, his temper flaring. "Let's just go. Please."

Her cerulean eyes flitted back and forth across his face. The concerned wrinkles between her carefully maintained eyebrows smoothed away. She sighed and gradually let go of him. "Okay. I'm sorry."

As they walked toward the gate, Zidaiku imagined the skeletons beneath their feet and wondered if they could feel the weight of his footsteps pressing down on their coffins through the earth. He wished he could make himself lighter. The church bell tolled in the distance, in sync with his awkward steps. One dead body. Gong. Two dead bodies. Gong. Apologies died in his throat as he remembered that there was no one listening.

When they reached the tall iron fence at the edge of the field, Zidaiku looked back at the sea of names and couldn't remember which of the ten thousand markers had been James and Sarah's. All the better, he thought. Until he knew who they were for sure, he didn't care to remember. Even then, he still wasn't sure he'd care.

The festival was in full swing when they approached. Main street, normally crowded with neon taxis and businessmen in dark suits, had been transformed into a carnival ground. Merchants sold trinkets from beneath red canopies. Food vendors shouted over each other for customers. Children and teenagers made up a significant portion of the crowd. The few adults roaming the booths were dressed in formal business suits. With holidays so rare, they had little use for casual clothes. The younger crowd stuck together in small groups, traveling from one game booth or ice cream stand to another. A few of the oldest teens wandered aimlessly with blank faces. The festival had a certain significance for them; before long, they might be part of the cause for this celebration. Zidaiku understood their anxiety. Although he still had a year before the exam that would determine whether he would become a normal member of society or a military pawn, he still felt a creeping fear in the back of his mind every now and again.

At the outer fringe of activity, Zidaiku felt a hand on his arm. He shot a glance at Angel, wondering why she was going overboard with the touching, but she was looking past him and smiling. He barely had time to recognize the flippy golden hair and sweetness of vanilla perfume before Melina wrapped him in an enthusiastic hug. Unlike Angel, Melina never ran out of affection and didn't hesitate to show it to those she cared for. Zidaiku held her tightly against him. Her body was small and her ribs felt fragile in his hands, like the stems of flowers.

A grin invaded his face. "Hey, Mel."

"Sorry we left you at the graveyard," she said. "You wandered off and we thought you had come here."

"It's okay," he said. He thought about telling her what he had found. While she had been at the cemetery with him, he had listened to her speak to her own parents' grave as if they had been sitting on the headstone. He couldn't understand how she was able to stay so optimistic, even with reminders of death all around her. Melina knew the fate of her parents. They had died of aeger, a disease that attacked your mind first and let the rest of your body fail soon after. All he could guess was that blaming disease for killing your parents was easier than blaming war. Or maybe it had to do with the fact that Melina's parents had only died four years ago, giving her thirteen years to know and love them.

This was dangerous territory. He forced himself to stop thinking and the moment passed.

"Where's Callao?" Angel asked.

Melina pointed to the queue line at a nearby hot dog stand. "I'm buying him some food. He says he doesn't want anything, but he needs to eat."

Zidaiku found Melina's younger brother standing four places back in the line, his arms jammed into the pockets of his light jeans. He kept his eyes down while he flicked his head to one side, whipping his chocolate-brown hair out of his eyes. If he wasn't eating, it could only mean that something was bothering him, and Zidaiku had a pretty good idea of what it was. Though they had left the cemetery, how could they truly ignore the constant ringing of the church bell? Callao had never dealt with the death of his parents as well as Melina had. He had been only ten years old when it happened. Melina had done a good job of caring for him, but Zidaiku knew all too well that it wasn't the same.

They stood next to him in line. When they approached the counter, Melina ordered a hot dog and counted out a small handful of coins to give to the vendor. As they walked away, she counted the rest of them. "Fifty left," she said. "That should get us through dinner."

Callao stared at the hot dog in his hand. His voice was quiet. "This was too expensive."

"I could practically hear your stomach growling," Melina said. "You're my brother. I can't let you starve."

His dark eyes glinted from beneath his thick bangs. "What about that bear you wanted?"

Zidaiku glanced toward the closest toy booth. An array of colorful stuffed bears lined the walls. He recognized almost all of them, but he noticed one that Melina had yet to collect.

She pushed the hot dog toward his face. "Stop worrying about me and eat."

He tore it in half and handed the larger chunk back to her. "Then you eat some too. I can't let you starve either."

She sighed and replaced her large chunk with the small one in Callao's hand, planting a kiss on his forehead during the exchange. "You're too sweet for your own good. Thank you."

A flurry of shouts caught their attention. Across the street and a little way down, two groups, one of teens and the other of adults, stood opposite each other and argued. The teens held picket signs calling for an end to the war. The foremost sign featured a crossed-out picture of the king with "NO MORE DEATH" beneath it in bold print. It wasn't hard to tell what they were arguing about, even without hearing the shouts.

"So we're supposed to let the demons overrun us?" one adult asked.

"This war is suicide," the first teen said. "The king won't let it end until every last human is dead."

Another adult put a hand to her face. "This is why I hate kids. You don't understand anything about politics."

"This isn't politics," a girl said. "It's human lives!"

It continued. Zidaiku knew better than to get involved, but he wondered what he would do if he were among the younger group. He could see a few of them gripping their picket signs so tightly that their knuckles were turning white.

He noticed something else, too. Each of the signs bore the stylized red-and-blue "VF" of the Vaskel Faction. The same symbol was printed on one boy's shirt and stitched into another girl's bag. Zidaiku was surprised to see members of the Faction involved in such a cause. Everything he knew about them—that they masqueraded as a support group for orphaned children but, in truth, caused a large portion Vaskel's crime—warned him to be skeptical.

Something moved quickly to the left. His eyes locked onto a pair of teens running past the glass windows and wooden doors of shopfronts at the side of the street, away from the escalating argument. One of them wore a black beanie and Zidaiku caught a flash of red and blue on it as he passed. He knew he had been right to doubt.

Without a word, Zidaiku left the others and gave chase. The runners noticed him and sped up. The one in back, wearing the beanie, called to his friend to run into an alley. They vanished behind a corner.

Zidaiku pushed himself faster and something switched inside of him. A cool liquid bubbled up in his heart and pulsed into his legs. They tingled with energy and he channeled it into movement, running faster and faster, wind blowing in his face and discarded wrappers spinning up in his wake. He took the corner at full speed, jumping up against the wall and taking a few steps before coming back down to the concrete.

The runners took another alley, heading deeper into the block. Zidaiku rounded the corner to find a dead end. He dug the soles of his sneakers into the concrete and skidded to a stop.

Beanie hit his friend's shoulder. "You dumb-ass! Look what you did!"

The friend, a pre-teen with an electric blue mohawk but no attitude to show for it, flinched away. A small leather pouch hung from his hand, its contents jingling.

As he caught his breath and the cool liquid faded from his veins, Zidaiku was suddenly aware that he was outnumbered. He could only hope that the others had followed and would find him shortly. Until then, he knew he needed to act tough. "That was a pretty smooth distraction back there."

"What are you, the police?" Beanie asked. The sneer on his thin face looked permanent and tufts of red hair jutted out from beneath his hat. He spat on the ground. "Look, the guy had three of these things just laying there. He was selling umbrellas, for Goddess' sake. Umbrellas!" He motioned to the distant sky. The usual thin gray haze shimmered above them, but rainclouds were completely absent.

Mohawk rubbed his arm. "You an orphan too?"

Zidaiku wondered how much information he should give and hoped Beanie and Mohawk couldn't hear the thumping of his heart. "Uh... yeah."

"Then you know how tough it is out here," Beanie said.

"We might as well be brothers," Mohawk added.

Beanie nodded. "And what's Umbrella Man gonna do with the money, huh? We orphans need it more than he will."

Zidaiku had chased after the two thieves intending to... what? Take back whatever they had stolen? Turn them in? It seemed like an act of betrayal now. An odd sense of trust crept its way into him after listening to them speak and he was no longer afraid.

He opened his mouth, but Melina's voice called his name, making him forget what he had meant to say. Beanie took the pouch from Mohawk's hand. "Fine, we'll do you a favor, since you don't seem to be the stealing type." He tossed it to Zidaiku's feet. Zidaiku cautiously picked it up, keeping an eye on the cornered Faction members. It couldn't be this easy, could it?

Angel called for him this time. He responded and waited for them to follow his voice. After a third call, this one near by, he turned and walked toward the sound.

Beanie gathered more spit. Zidaiku thought nothing of it until he felt something wet hit his back. He tried twisting his shirt to examine the spot, but a searing pain shot down his spine. The first thought that exploded into his mind was that the saliva had actually been some kind of napalm, but there were no fumes or smoke as the pain intensified. His legs gave out and he doubled over, struggling to reach the mystery substance, but it was continually out of reach and the pain made it difficult to concentrate. There was laughter, the jingling of coins, and then two pairs of escaping footsteps. He tried to lift himself, but his vision darkened and the burning overwhelmed him. He fell unconscious before his head hit the concrete.

Zidaiku snapped awake to another sharp round of pain, but this one lessened immediately. From behind him, Melina said, "Sorry!"

While the stars cleared and the feeling returned to his limbs, he noticed that he was lying on his stomach on a cool tile floor and Melina's weight pressed down on his legs. In front of him was the stained base of a porcelain sink. He remembered it from a day the week before where Angel became upset because the stains refused to come out. For a moment, he wondered why he was there, but images of his confrontation with the Faction members flashed back to him, making the pain in his back spike. "Goddess! What did that kid do to me?"

"I was hoping you could tell me," Melina said. "He was gone by the time Angel and I got to you."

"Isn't there a hole burnt in my shirt or something?"

Her weight shifted as she shook her head. "There's nothing. I was trying to look at your back and it woke you. Do you think you can get up?"

She climbed off his legs and he struggled to rise. When the skin on his back stretched, the searing pain shot through him again. He managed to get to his knees.

"Take a deep breath. This is going to hurt a little." Melina slipped her fingers inside the bottom of his shirt and pulled it up and over his head. She gave it space in the back, but even contact with the air made the mystery sore throb. She tossed his shirt aside and lightly touched the area around his wound. "It looks like a burn. What happened?"

"It must have been some kind of chemical," Zidaiku said. "He was a poison-user. That was no regular spit."

"He spit acid at you?" Melina asked. "What a creep." She paused. "I have an idea. Come here."

She helped him get into the bathtub before climbing in herself. Her legs slid out on either side of him. They were bare from the middle of her thighs down. She didn't wear shoes or socks in the apartment. Zidaiku felt his heart race. Melina put her hands on his bare shoulders; they were refreshingly cool. He tried to keep his voice steady. "Uh, what are you doing?"

"I'm concentrating," she said. Zidaiku waited patiently. Space was limited in the tiny bathtub, and there was even less with Melina's legs around him, but regardless of the discomfort, he couldn't keep himself from becoming aroused.

Her hands slid down his back to the area of his burn and cool liquid made contact with his skin. The shock made him arch his back, but the temperature soon became soothing. The water bubbling from Melina's hands streamed down his skin and crashed against the porcelain floor, but none of it circled around Zidaiku to the drain—it was quickly reverting to individual atoms of hydrogen and oxygen gases.

"How does that feel?" she asked.

He closed his eyes, focusing on the gentle pressure of the water. "It's perfect."

She kept the stream going for another few minutes, periodically mentioning the progress of his healing. When she stopped and the last of the water vaporized, she asked how his burn felt now.

He moved his shoulders and twisted from side to side. "The pain is completely gone. Thanks, Mel."

She moved her hands from his back to his chest, wrapping her arms around his shoulders. He pressed them closer against his skin and took in a slow breath of her vanilla perfume. He wanted to stay like this for a long time. Familiar images of longing came to him as he touched her. He saw her in a different apartment, one of their own, where she took off her own shirt and pressed herself against his back, her skin warm and smooth against his. She sighed happily and the sound rattled in his chest.

Suddenly, the sound of a key in the front door had Melina up and bouncing out of the room. Zidaiku's mind went dark. He opened his eyes and he was alone.

"Rusk! You're home!" she said.

The sound of Rusk's laughter drifted in from the living room. Zidaiku couldn't see them from where he sat in the bathtub, but he heard their lips smack together a few times.

"How was running the booth?" Melina asked.

Rusk groaned. "Goddess, what a nightmare. First the kid wants dipping sauce, then he wants it salted, then he just wants it plain. Can't make up his damn mind."

She gave a sympathetic "aww" and kissed him again. "Ready to go study?"

He sighed. "I guess so. I gotta piss real quick, though." He appeared in the bathroom doorway and froze. The usual spikiness of his short red hair had vanished and his muscular arms glistened with sweat, which was not an uncommon element to Rusk's body. His gym membership was his anger management, and he went so often that the people who worked there knew him by name. Fortunately, anger did good things for his looks; his strong jaw and fiery eyes were menacing. But when he smiled, as he was now, he simply looked goofy.

Zidaiku lifted a hand in greeting. "Hey."

"Usually, you're supposed to take off all your clothes before you take a bath," Rusk said.

Zidiaku felt his cheeks go red. "Yeah, I get that." Humiliated, he swept up his shirt and left the bathroom. He slipped it on as he crossed the living room and crashed onto the sofa. From the corner of his vision, he saw Melina sitting at one of the stools by the kitchen counter, but he avoided her eyes. He cursed himself for what had happened in the bathtub. Even more embarrassing to him now was the brief daydream he had allowed himself to have. He had forgotten about her relationship with Rusk. Even after two months, the ache he got in his chest when he saw them together never went away. Eager to distract himself, he picked up a book laying on the cushion beside him and he flipped it open without looking at the cover. The inside was geometry.

Melina said goodbye to him before she left with Rusk, but Zidaiku pretended not to hear. The door closed behind them and he sat alone, contemplating triangles.

Someone else came home a while later. Since the sofa faced the opposite wall, Zidaiku could only hear them cross the living room and stop at the bathroom door. "He must have woken up." It was Callao's voice.

Zidaiku raised his hand. "Hey, Callao. I'm over here."

Callao came over and sat down across the couch. He looked much more lively now than he had earlier and a cartoon lion had been painted on his face. "Are you okay? After we brought you back here, Melina said she'd watch over you and sent Angel and me back to the festival. What happened?"

"Apparently that Faction member who spit on me was a poison-user," Zidaiku said. "I got some chemical burn from it. But your sister healed it." He left out the rest of the details.

"What a creep," he said, just as Melina had.

"Where's Angel, then?" Zidaiku asked.

"She said she had something to look up at the library. She's been acting worried about you all day."

Zidaiku sighed. She could only be looking up one thing, and he wasn't sure how he felt about it. While he was still curious about James and Sarah Paine, he also wasn't sure he wanted to find out the truth.

The silence broke when Callao asked, "How do you know if a girl likes you?"

Zidaiku stammered. He would have expected a question about the festival or the war, but girls? "What do you mean?"

Callao's hands picked at a hole in the knee of his jeans. "I mean, if you like a girl, how do you know she likes you back?"

"You like someone?" A smile spread on Zidaiku's lips and he couldn't keep it off. Not only was Callao Melina's little brother, but everyone in the apartment thought of him that way. The idea that the youngest of them was finding romance was thrilling. "Who is she? What's she like?"

Redness flushed into Callao's face. "Never mind, it's nothing. Forget I asked."

Zidaiku saw that he'd gone too far. He cleared his throat. "No, no. I'm sorry." Trying to come up with an answer to his question, Zidaiku thought back on his own experiences. To his dismay, images of Melina were the only things that came to mind. Ignoring his personal feelings for a moment, he thought of the way she acted around Rusk. "Well," he said, "Melina and Rusk are always kissing."

Callao rolled his eyes playfully. "Duh. Everybody knows that one. I mean before that. What's normal with hugs and touching and stuff?"

Again, all Zidaiku could think of was Melina. He remembered the hug they had shared earlier at the festival, but equally as present in his mind was the way she had danced from the bathroom when Rusk came to the door. A sick feeling twisted in his stomach. "I don't know," he admitted. "Your sister is about as touchy with Rusk as she is with everyone."

"Everyone?" Callao asked. "Wait, you haven't noticed?"

"Noticed what?"

Callao's eyes were wide. "Zidaiku. The only reason my sister is with Rusk is because she can't be with you."

The air in Zidaiku's throat threatened to choke him. His mind went suddenly blank. "What?"

"That's what she told me," he continued. "You really think she's that affectionate with everyone? It's really obvious that she likes you."

A thousand questions flooded Zidaiku's mind. Everything in the room became more colorful and more present as if every detail of this moment were vitally important. "Woah, woah. She said she can't be with me? What does that mean?"

Callao laughed. "How am I supposed to know? That's just what she told me." He paused, thoughtful. "You know, I think I answered my own question."

"Glad I could help," Zidaiku said sarcastically.

He wanted to ask more, but the door opened and Angel swept in. She circled around the couch and came to a stop in front of Zidaiku, her chest heaving as she tried to catch her breath. Part of her hair was up in a ponytail and a small slip of paper dangled from her hand.

Zidaiku eyed it cautiously. She had found something.

"Z," she said, "you need to read this."

"Why did you go looking for that, Angel?" he asked. He simultaneously wanted to take it from her hand and run away without reading it. "I told you to forget about it."

"I know. I'm sorry. Maybe I should have left it alone, but I wanted to give you some closure."

"I have closure, Angel." He tasted the lie on his tongue. "I mean, they've gotta be dead. Everyone else's are. That's what happens when there's a war."

She shook her head. A painful expression drew her eyebrows together. "It wasn't the war, Zidaiku."

Curiosity finally won him over. He took the clipping from her as she sat beside him. With a deep breath, he began to read.

FACTION KILLS AGAIN—ROYAL KNIGHTS FEEL LOSS

James Paine, his wife Sarah, and their five-year-old daughter were murdered in their Eastern District home last night. Authorities say they have no definite suspects at this time, but they are confident that the Vaskel Faction is responsible for the murder.

James was a notable member of the Royal Knights and this, says police commissioner Peter Green, could supply a motive for this case.

"The Faction and the Knights have been on opposite sides of the law for years," he said. "We currently have no reason to believe it was any more complicated than that."

James and Sarah also had a three-year-old son, who was not present in the home at the time of investigation. His whereabouts are currently unknown and search parties have been sent out. Authorities say it was likely that the Faction kidnapped the toddler.

Police are currently investigating this murder and more details should become available soon.

Murder.

The word repeated in his mind like a bad song. His eyes jumped to it, unable to focus on anything else. "Murdered in their home." "Responsible for the murder." "Investigating this murder." Sickness rose in his stomach and his hands shook.

The Vaskel Faction. After what had happened earlier, he knew he could never trust them. But now, learning that they had killed his parents—and his little sister, if he truly was the missing three-year-old son—caused something inside him to break. Anger took control. He thought of the Faction member that had spit on him and wished he could have been there now. Instead of turning his back, he would have tackled the teen to the ground and pummeled his bony face until blood poured from every orifice. He thought of the protesters and their cries for "NO MORE DEATH" and longed to see them suffer for their hypocrisy. Even though the killing happened fourteen years ago and anyone involved would now be long gone from the orphan system, Zidaiku thirsted for vengeance. Someone needed to pay, and now, he had a name.

He carefully laid the clipping on the coffee table and stood, ignoring the worried looks given him by Angel and Callao. "I'm going out tonight," he said. "Don't wait up."