Mystic City (2 page)

When I was released from the hospital and arrived home, I was told of our engagement. I asked my mother why Thomas wasn’t at the apartment, why he hadn’t visited me in the hospital. “You’ll see him soon enough at your engagement party,” she said. “The doctors say your memory might still return—perhaps when you see Thomas, it will all come flooding back.”

And so here I am. Waiting. Watching for Thomas, so that I can remember.

Kiki must sense that I’m struggling. “Just give it some time, Aria. You loved Thomas enough to defy everything for him—for now, just trust in that.”

I nod at her good advice. But
time
is the one thing I don’t have. Our wedding is planned for the end of the summer. And it’s already almost July.

Guests move all around me, the women swathed in bright colors, parading their jewelry, tattoos, and mystic decals. The men are mostly tall and wide, with rough-looking faces and slicked-back hair.

A distinguished gentleman I don’t recognize approaches and extends his hand. His fingers are rough, calloused. “Art Sackroni,” he says.

Nod, smile. “Aria Rose.”

He is older, with a handsome, weathered face and the black vines of a tattoo creeping up his neck. The Foster family crest—a five-pointed star—is inked in navy blue above his left eye. “I hope you and Thomas will be very happy together, Aria.”

“Me too,” I say, half meaning it. Two incredibly large men—one black, one white—stand behind him with puffed-out chests, their bow ties looking ready to burst from around their throats. They, too, have tattoos that snake from under their collars.

“It’s not every day a young princess finds her prince,” Sackroni says.

It sounds corny when he says it like that, but I’m hoping he’s
right—that once I see Thomas, it will all come rushing back to me and I’ll be thrilled to be marrying him instead of terrified.

I think back to when I overdosed on Stic, an illegal drug made of distilled mystic energy. People take it to feel what it is to be a mystic, to experience super speed, incredible strength, a greater harmony with the world, for a fleeting few moments.

I was told that my parents found me unconscious on my bedroom floor, vibrating as if my body were filled with a thousand bees. I can’t imagine how I even got hold of the pills. None of my friends use. But I must have gotten them somehow, and leave it to me to screw things up. It’s so
embarrassing
. Rich people in the Aeries do Stic all the time. I can’t believe I was so stupid—and so unlucky—that the
first
time I tried it I ruined everything.

I remember almost everything else, like what I ate for lunch one day last month (oysters, flown in by my dad from the West Coast) and how it affected me the next morning (two hours hugging the toilet and tossing them all up). So why can’t I recall anything about Thomas?

Thankfully, there wasn’t any bad publicity. No one outside my immediate family, the Fosters, Kiki, and a handful of doctors and nurses know what happened. Apparently, while I was in the hospital, Thomas came to my parents and confessed that we’d been dating secretly for months. That we wanted to get married.

Now here I am. I should be happy. Overjoyed. But mostly I’m just … bewildered, especially about how well my parents took the news.

“There you are,” my father says, guiding me toward where my
mother is talking to Kiki. “Claudia, dear,” she is saying, “you look gorgeous. Truly ravishing.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Rose,” Kiki says. “You look stunning, as always.”

My mother gives a small, tight smile. Her hair is sculpted into a French twist, her normally blond locks now a mystic-infused scarlet so radiant I nearly have to close my eyes. Her face is slathered in makeup, designed to attract attention and inspire awe.

I look tame compared to her: my makeup is all neutral tones, my brown hair blown out and tucked simply behind my ears.

“You look good, Aria,” my father tells me. “Respectable.”

I glance down at my dress, the cream-colored silk, the neckline detailed with tiny blue and pink roses, exposing my collarbone and plunging toward my waist in the back.
Of course I look respectable
, I want to say.
I’m a Rose
. But others are watching, so I thank him politely. He nods but doesn’t smile. My father never smiles.

My mother’s eyes flash around the room, darting over the grand piano and the series of blue period Picassos, past the windows, whose curtains are drawn back to reveal a moonlit city. Then her face lights up and she sings, “Thomas! Over here.”

My
fiancé
.

Thomas happens to be gorgeous, with clear tan skin and short brown hair parted on the side. His eyes are dark, like mine, his lips full and inviting. I recognize him immediately from posts on e-columns and pap shots and whatnot, but he’s far more striking in person than on any TouchMe screen. He has a magnetic energy. Any girl in all of the Aeries would be thrilled to marry him. He’s worth billions, and one day he might even run the city.

My stomach begins to flutter. For a second something tickles the back of my mind: My hand in another person’s hand. A pair of lips brushing against mine. A feeling of … warmth.

Then it’s gone.

Thomas winks at me confidently. Staring at him now, I imagine how I
could
be attracted to him, how I should still
be
attracted to him, even though my memory gives me nothing. And so I pretend: I smile as my parents do, as Thomas does, as our guests do. Because this boy
must
be what I wanted—I defied my family for him, after all.

“Mr. and Mrs. Rose.” Thomas shakes my father’s hand, lightly kisses my mother’s cheek.

It’s incredibly disconcerting. When I was little, if I even
said
the name Foster, I was chastised and sent to my room. And now …

I exhale a long breath. It’s all happening so fast.

“Aria,” Thomas says warmly, pecking me on the lips. “How do you feel?”

“Great!” I say, squeezing my clutch and shifting my hands behind my back. They’re shaking, and I don’t want him to take them in his. “You?”

He narrows his eyes. “Fine. But I wasn’t the one who—”

“Overdosed,” I reply. “I know.”

This is it? Where are all the memories? I was supposed to remember meeting him, falling in love, and … Damn. I’m still a blank slate when it comes to Thomas.

My parents exchange a curious glance, no doubt wondering what I’m thinking, but then things get even stranger: Thomas’s parents appear.

“Erica! George!” my father says, as though they are his dearest friends. He draws Thomas’s father into a masculine hug.

“Everything looks
beautiful
,” Thomas’s mother says to mine. Erica Foster’s dress is an emerald green that matches the dozen or so delicate circles tattooed along her neck. “Absolutely breathtaking.”

“Thank you,” my mother says with a forced grin.

My father takes a champagne flute from one of the waiters and raises it. “Everyone! Your attention, please.”

When my father speaks, people listen. Guests stop talking and turn in our direction. The string quartet stops playing. Thomas slips his arm around my waist, and I am reminded of how oddly we are on display. It’s a show for all the most important people in the city, but also—maybe especially—for me.

“It is no secret that George and I have had our differences, and so have our families for generations,” Dad says. “But that’s all about to change. For the better.” There’s a quick burst of applause—people know what’s coming. “Melinda and I are proud to announce the engagement of our daughter, Aria, to young Thomas Foster. A couple has never been more in love than these two.”

There is loud and sustained applause—it goes on just long enough that my father has to fan his right hand to silence everyone. This, too, feels staged. I can feel Thomas’s hand on my bare arm. He rubs his thumb along the back of my elbow and my pulse begins to race.

“I’m sure most of you were surprised to hear of the engagement. Initially, Aria and Thomas hid their affair from all of us. But
admitting the truth had a positive effect: it forced our two families to … rethink our rivalry.

“We decided to bury the hatchet. No more will we fight among ourselves. Aria and Thomas have brought us all together using the oldest power in the book: true love. So, Thomas, thank you. And Aria, my dearest darling daughter, thank you, too.” My father kisses me on the forehead. I’m dizzy with the attention.

The applause this time goes on even longer, and it’s so strong it pounds against me and Thomas like crashing waves. We link our hands and raise them, inciting the crowd to even louder clapping. Thomas’s palm is sweaty.

My father’s speech has surprised me. He is a con man and a blackmailer, a leader of thugs. Head of a political party that controls half of Manhattan. To him, love is something you use to manipulate the weak.

But now he is saying that true love trumps all. Ha.

“Which brings me to my next point,” my father continues, the applause dying away. “There are enemies out there bigger than either of our families, and the only way to confront them is to follow the lead of these two lovers—to stand united! A radical mystic named Violet Brooks has been gaining power. The poor nonmystic families in the Depths mistakenly think she can offer them higherpaying jobs, and the registered mystics support her for obvious reasons: she’s one of them. This woman threatens to destroy everything we’ve built here in the Aeries. As you know, there hasn’t been a third-party mayoral candidate since the Conflagration.

“So tonight, in addition to this engagement, George Foster and
I are announcing our political union. In times of danger and mystic threat, we must all come together. Now that Mayor Greenlorn’s term is approaching its end, George and I will both be endorsing
one
candidate in the upcoming election: Garland Foster.”

Garland, Thomas’s older brother, appears next to us and gives a confident wave. He looks like a more mature version of Thomas, only with blond hair and a thinner and slightly more sinister face. At twenty-eight, Garland is ten years older than Thomas, but he’s still quite young for politics. His wisp of a wife, Francesca, stands slightly behind him, a delicate hand on his shoulder.

“So please,” my father finishes, “raise your glass and let us drink to the beginning of a new era: for my family, for the Fosters, and for this glorious city!”

The string quartet begins playing again, and my father whirls my mother into the middle of the room, which has been cleared of furniture for the party. George and Erica Foster follow.

My father’s words echo in my head:
mystic threat
.

Once lauded for helping to enhance and strengthen our city, mystics are now feared. Uncontrolled, a powerful mystic’s touch can kill an ordinary human.

Personally, I don’t understand what all the fuss is about. These days, nearly two decades after the Mother’s Day Conflagration, the mystic-organized explosion that took so many innocent lives, all mystics are required by law to be drained of their powers twice a year, rendering them harmless. Most live far away from us, among the poor, in the lower level of the city, known as the Depths—a place too terrible and too dangerous for anyone from the Aeries
to even visit. The mystics in the Aeries are servants or waiters or government workers who don’t care about revolution or power. All they care about is earning enough to survive.

But not all mystics are harmless, I know. There are those who went into hiding, who refused to register with the government and be drained of their magic. Who are lurking in the Depths. Waiting. Hiding. Plotting.

Thomas’s arm drops from my waist. “I haven’t seen Kyle yet,” he says.

“Neither have I.” My brother, Kyle, despises the spotlight. Parties are
not
his thing. He’s probably holed up somewhere with his girlfriend, Bennie.

“Would you like to dance?” Thomas asks. He looks like he really does want to dance, and too many people are watching for me to say no. I hand my clutch to Kiki and step into the middle of the room.

Thomas’s hands are slightly clumsy, as though they’re unfamiliar with my body. I suddenly wonder whether we’ve seen each other naked, and feel my cheeks warm.

“I was really worried about you,” he says, rocking us gently back and forth. His cologne smells of cedar and the slightest hint of vanilla. The quartet is playing something beautiful and slow by Górecki. “You hurt yourself so badly.”

“Other than some headaches, I feel completely fine.”
Except for the fact that you’re practically a stranger
. I push that thought away, letting the music fill me. Maybe if I dance long enough, I’ll remember what it felt like to dance with Thomas for the first time. Surely we’ve danced together before? My skin tingles with a feeling I can
only call anticipation. Thomas is eligible, handsome, and clearly attracted to me. If I’m as in love with him as everyone says, then I’m quite lucky.

“How did we meet?” I whisper so that no one else can hear.

He pulls back slightly. “You really can’t remember anything?”

I shake my head.

Ever since I was a little girl, I have wanted to fall in love. The love you see on TV or read about in books, where you find your missing half—the person you were meant to be with forever—and suddenly you’re complete. That’s the sort of love my parents say I share with Thomas. Why, then, when he touches me, does it merely feel like a touch?

I thought true love would sear me.

My mother appears, slipping her hand between us. “Aria, I need to borrow your fiancé for a moment. Governor Boch wants to speak with him.”

Thomas chastely kisses my forehead. “I’ll be back.”

I watch them go. Is this what my future with Thomas will be—business, meetings, and our parents? My chest suddenly feels constricted, like my gown is too tight.

I need to get out of here.

I scurry along the far wall and press the panel by the balcony. It reads my biometrics and the door disappears, then reappears behind me. Outside, it’s blazing hot. My arms and neck and legs are immediately damp with sweat.