Page 92 of The Grandest Game

A checkerboard.

A hangman’s noose.

And another game, a simple one.

“X’s andO’s.” Savannah scaled down the wall and strode toward him. “Tic-Tac-Toe.”

“Also known asNoughts And Crosses,” Rohan murmured. He looked to the checkerboard, which was set to play, its pieces, like theX’s andO’s, magnetic.

“Games on the wall. Rock climbing. Swords.” Savannah kept her summary of their surroundings brief.

“A lint roller,” Rohan added. “A birthday card. A vial of glitter. And a silk fan.” He opened the card, and music began to play—instrumental, the song familiar.

Opposite him, Savannah opened the fan. The stiff silk fabric was a dark, midnight blue, and there was a word embroidered on it in shining, silver thread.SURRENDER.

Rohan read the word out loud.

Savannah looked from the fan back up to him. “Never.”

He was taken back to the base of the flagpole. Now, as then, what she’d just said sounded tantalizingly like a challenge.

“Some of us don’t findsurrenderall that sweet.” Rohan leaned forward, closer to her and then a little closer still. “Some of us prefer the fight. I am not asking you tosurrender, Savannah Grayson. And if you think there won’t be other alliances coming out of this phase of the game…” Rohan played his trump card. “You clearly didn’t spend much time watching your brother and Lyra Kane.”

Half brother.Rohan anticipated the correction.

“Half brother.” And there it was.

Rohan waited. The ability to wait—in negotiation or in shadows—was one of his finest skills.

Savannah opened her mouth, but before she could say anything,darkness fell. Total, absolute darkness.The lights in the room. The strings of fairy lights on the shore. All gone.

There was a sound—the heater turning off.

“The plot thickens.” Rohan let his voice surround her. “It appears the game makers have cut the power.”

Chapter 66

LYRA

The sudden absence of light hit Lyra almost as hard as the words that refused to stop looping in her mind on gut-rending repeat.Last year, when I told you to stop calling—I didn’t mean it.

Of course he’d meant it. He was Grayson Hawthorne, and she was nobody. What did her tragedy matter to him? What didshematter?

And yet.

And yet.

And yet.

“Lyra.” Grayson’s voice was close in the darkness. “You’re okay?” He made that question sound more like a command: Shewouldbe okay, because he wouldn’t allow her to be anything else.

“I’m not scared of the dark,” Lyra told him. “I’m…” She almost saidfine, but that word felt loaded now. “I’m just dandy.”

“I’m not,” Odette said, strain audible in her voice.“Just dandy.”

Lyra remembered the old woman’s earlier pain, remembered that she was dying.

“What’s going on? Tell us your symptoms,” Grayson ordered.