Balthazar by Claudia Gray

child’s. Like Charity’s.
    Strangers were rare in this part of the world, the only part Balthazar had ever known; perhaps that was why he became suspicious so quickly. He hurried down to Charity’s side.
    â€œYou would look enchanting in green,” said the man holding the reins. He was a handsome man, and Balthazar would’ve known it even without Charity’s adoring gaze to guide him. His hair, his skin, even his eyes all seemed to be touched with gold, and he had a fine, patrician profile. His clothes seemed well made, and the new, uncracked leather of his boots shone. “Ah, and who have we here?”
    â€œMy older brother, Balthazar More.” Charity went up on tiptoe to confide, “He’s not as strict with me as my parents.”
    â€œThen perhaps he will not mind an introduction,” said the blond-haired woman, whose locks would have looked lustrous if she had not been sitting next to the strangely dazzling man. Perhaps they were brother and sister as well. She was beautiful in her statuesque way, but there was something avid about the way she looked at Balthazar. It was the way some of the ruder men looked at women whose hair was not partly covered, or girls just leaving childhood whose skirts were not yet fully long. He hadn’t known women could look at men this way, too.
    If it had been Jane looking at him so hotly, Balthazar thought he might have liked it. But she wasn’t Jane.
    â€œGood day to you, sir,” Balthazar said, turning his attention to the man. “Forgive my sister. She is eager to make friends.”
    â€œHow wise of her,” the man said. “Call me Redgrave. I think we shall be very good friends indeed. Don’t you agree, Constantia?”
    â€œOh, I do,” Constantia whispered, leaning past Redgrave’s shoulder to peer at Balthazar again, the sunlight catching her hair—
    â€œBalthazar?”
    He tensed as the phantasms of the past vanished, leaving him back in his own mind, in the here and now. He still knelt in the snow, the taste of blood fading on his tongue. Skye’s face was pale with worry.
    â€œHow long?” His voice croaked as though he hadn’t spoken in months. “How long was I … out?”
    But Skye said, “Maybe a minute and a half? I don’t know. Are you okay?”
    â€œI think so.” What the hell had just happened to him?
    The smell of smoke and gasoline reminded him where they were; at the sound of distant sirens, she looked past him. “I don’t want to leave Mr. Lovejoy—we have to stay—but how are we supposed to explain this?”
    â€œLeave it to me.” Balthazar summoned all his strength of will to stand upright again. “I’ve got a lot of experience in covering this stuff up.”
    The police were told that Skye had been walking home from school, and that Balthazar was headed toward downtown, when they separately saw the explosion. Mr. Lovejoy’s car had then jumped the curb; no doubt he’d been startled. Another car had sped away afterward, but they couldn’t say what it had to do with the explosion. They were bewildered, innocent bystanders, no more.
    â€œI still can’t believe they bought that,” Skye said as they walked away from the scene, smoke still thick in the darkening sky overhead.
    â€œWhy not? It’s actually more plausible than the truth.” Balthazar glanced back at the police cars behind them. None of the officers suspected they had any greater involvement. It was frightening how good he’d become at lying over the past few centuries.
    â€œI just—I feel awful. Mr. Lovejoy’s all banged up, because of me—”
    â€œIt’s not your fault.” He spoke so forcefully that she stared at him, but it was important that she understand this. “What happened is not because of you. It’s because Redgrave and his crew came after you. All of this is their fault.