The Young Elites by Marie Lu Read Free Book Online

a layer of velvet hiding secrets. He seats himself in a cushioned chair near the edge of my bed. Here he leans back and stretches out his body, rests his chin against one hand, and lets his other hand remain on a dagger hilt at his waist. Even indoors, he wears a pair of thin gloves, and when I look closer, I notice tiny flecks of blood on their surface. A chill runs down my spine. He doesn’t smile.
    “You’re part Tamouran,” he says after a moment of silence.
    I blink. “Pardon?”
    “Amouteru is a Tamouran family name, not a Kenettran one.”
    Why does this boy know so much about the Sunlands? Amouteru is not a common Tamouran surname. “There are many Tamouran immigrants in southern Kenettra,” I finally answer.
    “You must have a Tamouran baby name, then.” He says this casually, idle chitchat that sounds strange to me after all that’s happened.
    “My mother used to call me
kami gourgaem,
” I reply. “Her ‘little wolf.’”
    He tilts his head slightly. “Interesting choice.”
    His question brings back an old memory of my mother, months before the blood fever hit.
You have your father’s fire in you,
kami gourgaem, she said, cupping my chin in her warm hands. She smiled at me in a way that hardened her usually soft demeanor. Then she leaned down and kissed my forehead.
I’m glad. You will need it in this world.
“My mother just thought wolves were pretty,” I reply.
    He studies me with quiet curiosity. A thin trickle of sweat rolls down my back. I get the vague sense again that I’ve seen him somewhere before, somewhere other than the burning. “You must be wondering where you are, little wolf.”
    “Yes, please,” I reply, sweetening my words to let him know that I’m harmless. “I’d be grateful to know.” The last thing I need is for a killer with blood-flecked gloves to dislike me.
    His expression remains distant and guarded. “You’re in the middle of Estenzia.”
    I catch my breath. “Estenzia?” The port capital of Kenettra that sits on the northern coast of the country—it’s perhaps the farthest city from Dalia—and the place I’d originally wanted to escape to. I have an urge to rush out of bed and look out the open window at this fabled city, but I force myself to keep my focus on the young aristocrat seated across from me, to hide my sudden excitement.
    “And who are you?” I say to him. “Sir?” I remember to add.
    He bows his head once. “Enzo,” he replies.
    “They called you . . . that is, at the burning . . . they said you’re the Reaper.”
    “I’m also known as that, yes.”
    The hairs rise on the back of my neck. “Why did you save me?”
    His face relaxes for the first time as a small, amused smile emerges on his lips. “Some would thank me first.”
    “
Thank you.
Why did you save me?”
    The intensity of Enzo’s stare turns my cheeks pink. “Let me ease you into that answer.” He uncrosses his legs, his boot hitting the floor, and leans forward. Now I can see that the gold ring on his finger bears the simple engraving of a diamond shape. “The morning of your burning. Was that the first time you’ve ever created something unnatural?”
    I pause before I answer. Should I lie? But then he would know—he’d been there at my burning; he knew what I’d been arrested for. So I decide to tell the truth. “No.”
    He considers my answer for a moment. Then he holds one of his gloved hands out to me.
    He snaps his fingers.
    A small flame bursts to life on his fingertips, licking hungrily at the air above it. Unlike whatever it was that I created during my burning, this fire feels real, its heat distorting the space above it and warming my cheeks. Violent memories of my execution day flash through my mind. I shrink away from the fire in terror.
The wall of flames he pulled from midair during my burning.
That was real too.
    Enzo twists his wrist, and the flame dies out, leaving only a tiny wisp of smoke. My heart beats weakly. “When I was