Dark Heart of Magic (Black Blade #2)(8)

Blake looked back and forth between the three of us. He scoffed and opened his mouth—

“Hey! Felix! Devon! Blake! Deah!” a cheerful voice called out.

Startled, all five of us turned to look at the girl who came bouncing up to our hostile group, wondering who would dare to include Devon and Blake in the same sentence.

The girl was gorgeous. Seriously, model gorgeous, with dark red hair and the biggest, brightest hazel eyes I’d ever seen. She was one of those petite people you’d describe as a whirlwind of energy—a real dynamo, despite her small size. She smiled at Devon, revealing a perfect set of dimples that made her even prettier.

I didn’t know who she was, but the others did because they all nodded at her, even Blake and Deah.

The girl wore a green peasant blouse and black shorts with cute, strappy black sandals. An emerald solitaire pendant glinted in the hollow of her throat, the stone sparkling in a way that told me how real and expensive it was. Oversize sunglasses perched on top of her head, while a green handbag dangled off her right arm.

I focused on the sword belted to her waist, admiring the wolf scrollwork that covered the hilt. A black blade like that was worth even more than her necklace. And the girl carried herself in a confident manner that said she knew exactly how to use the weapon.

Devon smiled back at the girl, and the two of them exchanged a quick hug. “Katia. It’s nice to see you again.”

Deah noticed me frowning at them. She raised her eyebrow and smirked, clearly realizing that I was jealous. I ignored her.

Katia turned to Felix and gave him a slow, lingering smile that deepened her dimples. “Hey, Felix.”

“I . . . uh. . . .” Felix’s mouth kept opening and closing, and opening and closing, as though the sight of her stunned him so much that he couldn’t form a single coherent thought.

Something that made Deah frown and me smirk at her.

“Hey, Katia,” Felix finally mumbled.

Despite the fact that his clothes were still slathered with persimmon pulp from our encounter with the tree troll, Katia went over, opened her arms, and enfolded Felix in a tight hug that went on . . . and on . . . and on . . . before she pulled back and kissed his cheek.

Deah’s expression cranked up from frown to all-out glower. I smirked at her again, and she focused her glare on me for a moment before turning it back to Katia.

But Katia didn’t seem to notice the other girl’s hostile expression, and she nodded at Deah and Blake. A wink of light caught my eye, and I realized that Katia was wearing a silver cuff stamped with a wolf’s head. So she belonged to the Volkov Family. Weird. I’d never seen her around before, and I’d made it a point to know all the guards and important members of the Families, so I wouldn’t be tempted to steal from the wrong person when I was picking pockets on the Midway.

Devon realized that I didn’t know who the girl was, and he held out his hand, pointing to her, then me. “Katia Volkov, this is Lila Merriweather. Lila, Katia.”

“Nice to meet you,” Katia said, smiling.

I nodded. “You too.”

“Katia lives up north in New York, near Bigtime,” Devon explained. “Carl, her dad, is Nikolai Volkov’s brother. Carl and Katia head up the Family branch where they live.”

“A much smaller branch, from the rumors I’ve heard,” Blake piped up. “It’s just you and your dad now, right?”

Katia’s smile slipped a bit. “Yeah. Just us now.”

“Come to town for the tournament?” Devon asked.

Katia’s unease melted away, and her face warmed again. “Yep, representing the Volkovs. Are you competing again this year?”

Devon nodded. “I am.”

Blake snorted. “Not that he has any chance of winning.” He slung his arm around his sister’s shoulder. “In case you all have forgotten, Deah is the defending champion, and she’s the favorite to win the tournament again this year.”

Deah shrugged off his arm, then looked at Katia. “But you gave me a really good fight last year.”

Her voice wasn’t unkind, but Katia’s smile vanished, and she didn’t respond. Nobody liked to be reminded that she’d lost.

I hated to be a totally clueless tourist rube, but I had no idea what they were talking about. “Um, what tournament?”

All five of them looked at me like they couldn’t believe I’d asked that question.

“The Tournament of Blades,” Devon said. “The Families sponsor it every summer.”

“Yeah,” Felix added. “Several people are picked from each Family, and they all compete out at the fairgrounds until there’s just one person left.”

“Oh. That.”

I did know what they were talking about—I’d just never actually gone to the tournament. I’d asked my mom once if we could go, the last summer she’d been alive, but she’d told me no, that there was too great a risk of someone from one of the Families recognizing her. She’d left the Sinclairs and Cloudburst Falls before I’d been born, and she had never let anyone except for Mo know that we came back to town every summer.

After she’d been murdered, I’d been so busy getting shipped from one foster home to another, then striking out on my own and trying to steal enough to make ends meet, that I hadn’t paid much attention to the tournament, except for all the extra tourists it brought to town, giving me more phones and cameras to swipe and take to Mo to fence.