Kingmakers, Year One

3. Anna

3

ANNA

3 MONTHS LATER

I t’s my last night sleeping in my own bed at home.

Tomorrow I leave for Kingmakers for the entire school year.

Once we’re at the school, we can’t come home again until the next summer. It’s part of the security measures necessary when you’re bringing in children of rival mafia families from all across the globe.

There’s no cellphones allowed on the island. No laptops or iPads.

You can use landlines to call out or you can write letters.

It’s strange, and it’s old-fashioned—it makes me feel more like I’m going to another world, rather than simply to another country.

I’ve never been away from my family before.

We live in a mansion way out on the edge of the city. This house is already like our own secret world, away from everything else. The walls are so high, and the trees are so thick that you wouldn’t think there was anyone else within a hundred miles.

I love our house intensely. It has everything I need.

I’ve explored every inch of it from the time I was small. It’s so old that it has dozens of tiny rooms and passageways. I used to climb into the dumbwaiter and lower myself down all the way to the kitchen. Or go through the secret hallway that runs from my father’s office out to the astronomy tower. There’s laundry chutes and a hidden staircase from the ballroom to the wine cellar.

And then there’s the attic, stuffed with items left behind from five previous generations of occupants: tarnished silver mirrors, old gowns, record albums, jewelry, photographs, crumbling letters, yellowed lace tablecloths, candles melted away and chewed by mice, ancient cribs, and dusty bottles of perfume that still carry the remnants of fragrance.

I used to spend entire days up there, poking around in the moldy boxes, examining objects and putting them back again.

My younger sister Cara loves it even more than I do. She likes to go up there with a lamp and bag of apples so she can write in her little notebook in the middle of two hundred years of history.

Cara thinks she’s a poet or an author or something. She’s always scribbling away on some new project. She never lets us see it, though.

Her work is probably pretty good, or as good as it can be, coming from a fourteen-year-old. Cara is brilliant, though most people don’t know it since she’s so quiet. She got all of our mother’s sweetness, but not her friendliness.

Whelan is the opposite. He’s loud and outspoken and brash, and sometimes a little asshole. We all adore him regardless, ‘cause he’s the baby. But he can be sneaky and mischievous. His explorations of the house usually end with something broken, or him howling because he got his head stuck between the iron railings over by the old carriage house.

My room looks down over the walled garden. It’s a dark room with high gothic windows, deep crimson walls, a massive fireplace, and ancient velvet canopies around the bed. It was the room my mother slept in when she first came to stay in this house.

My father kidnapped her. Snatched her right off the street. Then locked her up in this house for months.

Slowly, bit by bit, without realizing or wanting it, he fell in love with her, and she fell in love with him. Simultaneous Stockholm Syndrome.

It’s a strange love story, but everything about my family is strange.

When you grow up as a mafia daughter, you learn the history of your people the way the Roman emperors must have done. You learn the triumphs and failures of your ancestors, their bloody struggles and their revenge.

My parents have never shielded me from the truth.

For that reason, I always planned to attend Kingmakers.

My mother told me that when she was kidnapped, she was an innocent. Deliberately sheltered from the reality of the criminal underworld.

Her father was the head of the Irish Mafia, but she went to a normal school with normal kids. She was completely unprepared to be abducted, held captive, and offered as bait in a trap intended to murder every last member of her family.

“I don’t want that to happen to you,” she told me, her green eyes clear and somber. “I don’t want you to be weak like I was. Confused and unprepared.”

My father trained me to defend myself. To understand the language, the negotiations, and the stratagems necessary to operate in the underworld.

In high school I may have looked like a normal girl. I ran the dance team, and I attended parties. But I was raised to be a mafiosa, not a ballerina.

I slip out from under the heavy covers and walk over to the window. I never bother to pull the drapes, so the moonlight is streaming in. I can look down to the overgrown garden with its stone statues and fountains, its cobblestone paths slippery with moss.

A tall, slim figure dressed in black walks from the garden into the glass conservatory.

My father.

I leave my room, running down the wide, curving staircase, then across the dark and silent main floor of the house, to the conservatory.

The house is still, other than the usual creaks and groans of old wood settling. It’s chilly, even though it’s the end of summer. The thick stone walls and the heavy trees all around keep it cool no matter the time of year.

The conservatory is warmer, still trapping the last heat of the day. The heady smell of chlorophyll fills my lungs. It’s dark in here, only tiny pinpricks of starlight penetrating through the thickly-crowded leaves. It’s two o’clock in the morning.

I can hear my father, even though he’s almost silent. I know how to listen for the sound of human breath.

Likewise, he hears me coming no matter how quietly I walk.

“Can’t sleep, ma?a mi?o?? ?” he says.

“Won’t, not can’t.”

“Why is that?”

“I don’t want to waste my last night at home.”

I’ve pushed my way through the trees and hanging vines to the bench where my father sits. He’s still wearing the cashmere sweater and slacks that are his usual work attire. With his sleeves pushed up, I can see the thickets of tattoos running down his arms, all the way across the backs of his hands and down his fingertips.

He’s told me what some of the tattoos mean.

And he’s added more, since I was born. Any remaining space on his body he filled with tattoos commemorating the dates of his children’s birth, tattoos for each ballet my mother choreographed, and tattoos that immortalize experiences between the two of them, unknown to me.

I have five tattoos myself: a swallow for my mother, a wolf for my father, a quote from my sister’s favorite book, a sprig of aconite for my brother. And a fifth that I’ve never shown to anyone.

“Are you nervous for tomorrow?” my father asks me.

“No,” I say honestly. “I am glad Leo’s coming, though. I’d be lonely without him.”

“I’m glad he’ll be there, too.” My father nods. “I know you don’t need anyone to protect you. But everyone needs allies. In your first week, be careful who you allow in your circle. Every bond you forge can open a door, or close another in your face.”

“I understand.”

“Don’t let Leo drag you into anything. He’s not strategic.”

“He leads with his heart,” I say. “But his instincts are usually good.”

“He has a temper.” My father frowns, his pale blue eyes narrowed and honed in closely on my face.

“Dad. I know what Leo’s like.”

“I know you do.” My father puts his arm around me, pulling my head against his shoulder. “I love you, Anna. And I trust you.”

My heart beats hard against my ribs. There’s something I want to say to my father, but I’m afraid…something I saw in my acceptance letter that I hardly dared believe.

I lick my lips, trying to find courage.

“Dad . . .”

“Yes?”

“In my Kingmakers letter . . . it said I was accepted to the Heirs division.”

“Of course,” he says, in his cool, clipped voice.

“Was that . . . did you . . . tell them to do that?”

He sits up, so we’re looking at each other once more. I resemble my father more than my mother. Same pale skin without a hint of freckles. Same blonde hair. Same glacial blue eyes.

Those eyes are terrifying when they’re fixed on you.

“You are my heir,” my father says firmly. “You’re my eldest. It’s your birthright.”

“But Whelan . . .”

“It’s my choice to consider gender or birth order,” my father says. “Before you were even born, your mother and I agreed.”

My heart stopped for a moment. Now it beats twice as fast as normal, trying to catch up.

“Good…” I fight to quell the slight tremor in my voice. “I’m glad.”

“It will all be yours if you want it,” my father says.

“I do,” I whisper. “I want it.”

My father nods. He puts his hand on the back of my neck, pulling me close so he can kiss me on the forehead.

“You will have everything you want in this world, Anna. I knew it from when I first held you in my arms. I knew you would take it all, and hold it tight.”

We sit quietly, not speaking.

I love my mother. I love her intensely. It’s impossible not to—she has all the good qualities I lack. Endless kindness. A complete lack of selfishness. An internal joy that lights the room, that buoys up everyone around her.

I’m not like that. Sometimes I’m sad for no good reason. Sometimes I want to sit in silence, thinking about the passage of time, and how painful it is to remember the best and worst moments that have come and gone so swiftly.

Then I’d rather be with my father, because I know he feels the same way. He and I are alike inside as well as on the outside. For better or worse, I’m not sweet and I’m not always happy.

The only time I see that part of myself in my mother is when she choreographs her dances. Then I see that though she may not be dark herself, she understands sorrow and fear. She sees the beauty in damaged and disturbing things. That’s why she understands my father and loves him. It’s why she understands me.

Dance is how we bond. It’s how I’ve channeled my worst and most destructive impulses. I keep control of them, so they don’t destroy me.

But there won’t be a dance team at Kingmakers.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do with the feelings that build up inside of me. They mess with my head. They make me want to do things I know I’ll regret.

“You should go to bed,” my father tells me. “You don’t want to be tired as you travel.”

“I can sleep on the plane.”

“Unlikely,” he says, “if you’re sitting next to Leo.”

I smile. Leo is always full of energy and excitement—particularly when doing anything new. He’ll probably talk all the way to Croatia.

“It will be difficult at the school,” my father says. “You can handle that. But if anything goes seriously wrong . . .”

“I’ll call you,” I promise.

We fly from Chicago to Frankfurt at ten o’clock the following morning, from Frankfurt to Zagreb, and then Zagreb to Dubrovnik.

My family and Leo’s both come to the airport to see us off.

Aunt Yelena looks pale and strained. I know she doesn’t want Leo to go to Kingmakers. She thinks it’s dangerous.

She would know—after all, she was Bratva. They send more children to Kingmakers than anyone.

It’s supposed to be a kind of sanctuary. A temporary detente between the grudges and rivalries of the various families. But for the children of criminals, rules are made to be broken. Even the school’s motto Necessitas Non Habet Legem means Necessity Has No Law .

Our acceptance letters came with a list of strict school rules, along with their accompanying punishments. Our parents had to sign the contract for the Rule of Recompense, and so did Leo and I. We had to press our print in blood to the bottom of the page. It means that we submit to the authority of the school.

If we get ourselves in trouble, we’ll be disciplined by the Chancellor. He is—quite literally—judge, jury, and executioner. Our parents can’t intervene or retaliate.

As usual, Leo seems completely unconcerned by any of that. He hugs both his parents, lifting his mother off her feet and kissing her hard on both cheeks.

Aunt Yelena blinks like she’s forcing her eyes not to tear up.

“Be careful, Leo,” she says.

He shrugs that off, not even bothering to pretend like he’ll try.

“Love you, Mom.”

Cara puts her arms around my shoulders and squeezes me tight, while Whelan does the same with his arms around my waist.

I feel the worst about leaving Cara. She doesn’t let many people in. I know she’ll be lonely without me, even if she never complains.

“Why can’t I go?” Whelan demands.

“Because you’re six,” my father says calmly.

“That’s not fair!”

“It’s the epitome of fair. You can go at eighteen, exactly like your sister.”

“It’s not fair that I’m not eighteen,” Whelan mutters under his breath, knowing not to push our father too far.

Whelan is the only one of us who got my mother’s freckles and green eyes. They look much wilder on him because he’s a little demon in human form. His copper-colored hair is always sticking up, and you can’t tell what’s freckles and what’s dirt on his face. Even though he’s stocky, he’s fast as hell and surprisingly strong.

Cara is slim like me, medium height, with pale blue eyes. She’s got darker hair than the rest of us, so brown it’s almost black. She didn’t speak until she was four, and even now you might be forgiven for thinking she still hasn’t learned to do it.

“Can you call me on the weekends?” she asks me quietly.

“I think so.”

“Just write if you can’t.”

“I will,” I promise.

My mother hugs me, too. She always smells clean and fresh, like the inside of a flower blossom.

“I’m starting to regret this already,” she says. “Because of how much I’ll miss you.”

“I’ll try to find somewhere to practice on campus.”

“I never had to worry about you practicing.” My mother shakes her head. “Sleeping, on the other hand . . .”

I smile. “I’ll try to find time for that, too.”

Leo and I board the plane, sitting next to each other in the second row of First Class. Nobody else our age is flying from Chicago to Frankfurt. We’re the only mafia children from our city going to Kingmakers this year.

We do know one person who’s already there: our cousin Miles.

He’s a year older than us and left last September. He came home over the summer, but we’re not on the same flight going back out, because Freshmen start a week later than everybody else.

Technically Leo and I are cousins, though not by blood.

His father’s sister is married to my mother’s brother.

It’s complicated, and nobody at school could ever understand it when we tried to explain. They all just accepted that we were family, which was fine, because that’s how our own family views us. I’ve always called his parents Uncle Seb and Aunt Yelena, and he’s always called mine Uncle Miko and Aunt Nessa. He loves my little siblings and is the same toward them as he is to me: teasing, friendly, and occasionally exasperating.

Like right now on the plane. Leo seizes my packet of pretzels—having already eaten his own—and tears them open with his teeth.

“In your dreams.” I snatch them back. “I’m hungry, too.”

He grins. “Then why haven’t you eaten them yet?”

“Because I’m not a rabid animal that inhales food in five seconds.”

“You would if you were as big as me,” he says, trying to steal them back again.

He’s fast as fuck, but so am I. I manage to keep the torn packet away from his grasping fingers, just barely.

“Paws off,” I say. “And don’t be thinking you’re going to put your elbow over that armrest, either. I don’t care how big you are, you’re not using any of my precious personal space on this flight.”

“You’ve gotta be kidding. Look at these legs!” Leo sprawls out his massive thighs, each the size of a small tree trunk. His leg presses up against the outside of mine, and I can feel the warmth of his flesh through my jeans. I shove him back, my face getting hot.

“You should have bought two seats, then.”

“My dad’s too cheap,” Leo says sourly. Then, grinning at me again, “Bet Papa Miko would have gotten you two seats if you asked him nicely . . .”

“Probably. But I wouldn’t ask him, because I’m not a spoiled baby like you.”

I lift a pretzel to my lips. Leo manages to snitch it out of my hand, tossing it into his mouth. He crunches it up deliberately loud, just to annoy me.

“I’m going to flick you every time you try to fall asleep,” I inform him.

“No fucking way am I falling asleep!” Leo says. “I’m too excited.”

Ten minutes later he’s snoring with his heavy head flopped over on my shoulder.

Leo and I switch planes in Frankfurt with a six-hour layover. Refreshed from his nap, Leo convinces me to pop out of the airport so we can find a proper Biergarten, where he orders us two massive foaming pints and a sizzling platter of sausages served with thick black bread.

Once we’re up in the air again, the beer seems to hit me much harder than normal. My head feels pleasantly light on my shoulders, and I’m warm and relaxed.

I’ve got the window seat. The airplane seems like a ship floating over a sea of clouds with peaks tinged pink from the setting sun.

“Look . . . I say to Leo.

He leans across me so he can peer out the window. His shoulder presses against my chest, and his soft, dark curls brush my cheek. His hair smells nice, like sandalwood. Below that, I smell the richer and more dangerous scent of his skin. It has the same effect on me as other scents that are both stimulating and upsetting: smoke from a fire, iron and blood, spilled gasoline. It makes my heart rate jump.

“Beautiful,” Leo says, glancing back at me with his face right next to mine.

The sun hits his irises, illuminating every fleck of gold in the brown. His eyes are lighter than his deeply tanned skin. He’s burned darker than toast after a long summer of boating and shirtless basketball games on the lakeshore courts.

I notice details. Things that make one person different from anyone else. Leo has a lot of things like that. More than anyone. There’s nobody who looks quite like him.

I push him off so he’s not so close to me. “Alright. Back to your own side.”

Leo brought a pack of cards. We play some ridiculous game that involves betting on a hidden card that your opponent can’t see. Leo’s good at trying to convince me of what he’s got, but I have a better poker face. It’s hard to keep from laughing too loud when the cabin lights dim and everyone else tries to get some sleep.

We have to switch planes again in Zagreb at some ungodly hour, and we both fall asleep on top of our duffel bags, barely waking up in time to sprint down the concourse to our last flight.

Sweaty and grumpy, we finally fly into Dubrovnik. It’s a port city on the edge of the Adriatic Sea, right at the very southernmost tip of Croatia.

The plan is to stay the night here, then take a boat to Visine Dvorca the following morning.

Dvorca is a tiny rocky island in the Adriatic Sea. There’s one small town on the island, with a few hundred locals scratching a living on the hillsides, raising sheep and goats, cultivating little farms and vineyards. Most of their produce is sold to the school.

My father told me that. He didn’t attend Kingmakers himself—he’s not from a legacy family. But his adoptive father Tymon Zajac was.

My father visited Kingmakers twice with Zajac, to meet with the Chancellor. He said he’d never been to a place with such a sense of history. The school has stood on the same spot for seven hundred years. The most brilliant and ruthless criminal minds of centuries have passed through those halls.

In fact, Kingmakers influenced my father to buy our house in Chicago. Both buildings are ancient, remote, and castle-like. And both are stuffed with secrets.

Because of the high rocky cliffs and the currents that dash against the island, there’s only one place where a boat can make harbor. And that’s what makes Kingmakers so defensible. You can’t sneak up on the island unannounced. You can’t approach the school without warning. You have to take the single wide-open road up to the front gates, just as we’ll do tomorrow.

For now, Leo and I will be spending the night in a hotel in the Old Town part of Dubrovnik. The Grand Villa Argentina is perched on the cliffs above the blue ocean. The red roofs of the Old Town are spread out below, leading down to the medieval-looking Ploce Gate with its squat stone towers.

“I wonder if they’ll let us come into Dubrovnik often?” I ask Leo. “There’s not much on the island. What if we need new clothes or something . . .”

We were only permitted to bring one suitcase each.

“You won’t need clothes,” Leo says grimly. “We’re supposed to wear those stupid uniforms.”

“It’s to prevent us wearing gang colors or whatever the fuck, I guess…” I shrug.

“That wouldn’t matter for you,” Leo says, “since all you wear is black. How are you gonna adjust to having to wear green sometimes? And gray and silver?”

The school uniforms are mostly black, with a few pieces in shades of charcoal, silver, sage, and olive. It’s all fairly muted, but of course Leo can’t resist an opportunity to give me shit.

“I don’t only wear black,” I inform him.

“Midnight and onyx are also shades of black . . .” he teases.

“Did you look those up ahead of time for that joke? Admit it, you didn’t know the word ‘onyx’ . . .”

Leo snorts. He loves trying to wind me up, but what he really wants is for me to hit him back. He wouldn’t respect me if I didn’t. Everything is a competition to him.

“There’s probably some other kids from the school here by now, don’t you think?” he says.

I wish we could have flown out with Miles. He would have been our guide the whole way. He could tell us where to eat dinner right now—he always knows the best place to get anything.

Of course Leo and I grilled him about what Kingmakers is like, but it’s hard to get a straight answer out of Miles. He’s sarcastic as fuck and not one to show emotion. He wouldn’t admit if something were seriously scary or difficult. He acts like nothing affects him.

I say, “We can’t be the only ones who got in today.”

After stowing our bags in our adjoining rooms, we head down to Old Town to look for someplace to eat.

Old Town sits within high stone walls, preserving the city in its original medieval state—or as close to it as you’re likely to find. It’s stuffed with Baroque churches and monasteries, and stone palaces with two-foot-thick walls. The streets are roughly cobbled, and the squares are paved with flat slabs of marble. The air smells of salt, thyme, wild orange trees, and the spray of dozens of fountains that keep the greenery lush.

We find a little restaurant with outdoor dining and sit down at the wobbly table shaded by a bay leaf tree. The waiter brings us hot tea and a warm basket of flatbread without us even asking.

Leo tears into the bread like he hasn’t eaten in weeks.

“What should I get?” I ask the waiter.

Enough tourists come here that he speaks English quite well.

“We’re famous for our seafood,” he says, proudly. “We have fresh-caught oysters, mussels, squid, and cuttlefish risotto. Fish stew—we call it brudet. Also beef stew—that’s pa?ticada .”

“I’ll have oysters, please.”

“Anything that isn’t fish?” Leo asks. He doesn’t like seafood.

“ Peka is baked meat and vegetables,” the waiter says.

“Sounds great.” Leo nods.

“He mentioned beef stew,” I remind Leo.

“I don’t like stew, either.”

“Can you bring us some sides as well?” I ask the waiter. “Whatever you think we’ll like.”

“Of course.” He hurries away to ring it all in.

To Leo, I say, “You picky motherfucker—what are you gonna do if they only have one option for dinner at Kingmakers?”

“Fucking starve, I guess.” Leo grins, without a hint of concern.

As we wait for our food, Leo leans back in his chair, long legs stretched out, arms crossed over his broad chest, surveying everything around us.

I like to look at the sky and the water, the orange trees and the stone facades of the buildings. Leo is primarily interested in people.

There’s a table of boys off to the left of us, laughing and joking. Some of them are speaking a language I’ve never heard in my life, while the others are Russian. I can understand a little of the latter—Russian is close enough to Polish to get the gist. Leo, I’m sure, is catching every word.

“Are they talking about the competition?” I ask.

He nods. “They all want to be Captain of the Freshmen team.”

Every year Kingmakers runs a competition called the Quartum Bellum— the War of Four. All four years of students participate, even the Freshmen. Of course the Seniors usually win, but not always.

Kingmakers is divided by year and also by specialty. Leo and I are in the Heirs division. There’s also the Accountants, the Enforcers, and the Spies.

The Accountants handle the finance and investment arms of the business, the Enforcers do most of the day-to-day operations and security, and the Spies are for subterfuge and subverting law-enforcement.

The Heirs, of course, are meant to be the bosses. But there’s no guarantee that you can become boss or stay boss even within your own family. The primary purpose of our training will be leadership. Because even after you’re appointed, you still have to convince your men to follow you.

To practice exactly that, we participate in the Quartum Bellum.

All you win is bragging rights. And maybe a plaque on the wall. There’s no real-world advantage.

But we all want it.

I know I do.

I can guarantee that Leo wants it worse than anyone.

The boys at the table seem to be boasting about their future exploits.

I can see Leo’s eyes getting bright. He’s dying to interject himself into their conversation.

Instead, the group turns their attention to the kid sitting alone at the next table.

He’s dark-haired, silent, hunched over his bowl of beef stew. His hair is shaggy, his skin deeply tanned, and his clothes are shabby. His sneakers look like he’s been wearing them about three years too long, the soles almost separating from the tops.

“Hey, Ares,” one of the guys calls. “What division are you in, anyway? Have they got one for chauffeurs and bag boys?”

Ares glances over at them, eyes narrowed.

“I’m not going to be a chauffeur,” he says quietly.

They asked the question in Russian, but he answers them in English, his voice slightly accented.

“I’m surprised your parents could afford the tuition,” another kid says. “How many goats did they have to sell? Hopefully not the one you use for a girlfriend?”

Ares stands up, pushing his chair back roughly.

The table of boys stands up as well, full of malicious energy and spoiling for a fight.

They might not have realized quite how tall Ares is—I see a couple of nervous glances as they realize he’s bigger than any of them. But it’s still six against one.

Until Leo says, in perfect Russian, “ V chem problema?”

The boys turn, startled. They probably thought Leo and I were just some American couple on vacation.

“ Bratva?” a black-haired boy mutters to his friend.

The second boy shakes his head. “ Amerikantsy,” he says. Americans .

“Didn’t you read the list of rules?” I say to them sharply, in English. “No fighting allowed.”

“We’re not at school yet,” the first boy says, smiling at me wolfishly.

He’s not one of the Russians—he was speaking the other language, the one I’ve never heard before. He’s got jet-black hair and a scar that bisects his right eye, and he’d be good-looking if his expression weren’t so arrogant.

“We will be soon enough,” Leo says. “So we should try to get along.”

Leo’s been in plenty of fights, but for all his cockiness, he doesn’t like bullies. He never has. He punches up, not down—it’s one of my favorite things about him.

“Who are you ?” the black-haired boy demands.

“Leo Gallo. My father’s Sebastian Gallo, head Don in Chicago.”

“If you’re Italian, then how come you speak Russian?” one of the other boys says, looking him up and down.

“My mother’s Russian,” Leo says.

The boys exchange looks. One of them mutters, “ Dvornyaga,” which I think means something like “ mongrel” or “ half-breed.” I see a spark of fury in Leo’s eyes, and I have to dart between him and the other boys to prevent him rushing forward.

The black-haired boy scoffs. “Is that your girlfriend?” he sneers.

“We’re cousins,” I say, before Leo can respond. “Who the fuck are you . . . Sagat ?”

The boy scowls, not understanding the reference, but one of his minions snorts. The black-haired boy silences the laugh with a look, then turns his glare on me.

“I’m Bram Van Der Berg, son of Bas Van Der Berg,” he says, haughty and proud.

Oh, Dutch. That’s why I couldn’t understand him—the Penose Mafia in Amsterdam is home-grown, and they speak their own bizarre cryptolect called Bargoens.

No wonder Bram is so high on himself. The Penose are known for being smart and vicious, and for holding a grudge until the end of time. That’s why nobody fucks with them—they’ll track you down and put a knife in your back ten years after you forgot you offended them.

I don’t want to give Bram the satisfaction of knowing that his family is just as famous as he thinks. But on the other hand, I can’t pretend to be that ignorant.

“Oh yeah,” I say slowly. “I’ve heard of your dad. Doesn’t he make waffles or something?”

Like most mafia families, the Van Der Bergs run an up-front business to help launder the money that pours in from less-savory sources. In Bram’s case, it’s a chain restaurant so successful that I’ve even seen them in America. The mascot is a chubby little Dutch boy proudly holding up a plate of syrup-drenched waffles.

“Were you the model for the sign when you were baby Bram?” I mock him.

Bram’s face flushes, and now it’s his friends who have to hold him back from taking a swing at me. I wouldn’t give a fuck if he did—I know I’m not as strong as these boys, but I’ve never met anyone with faster reflexes than me. Not even Leo can catch hold of me when I don’t want him to.

Leo knows that. He doesn’t jump to intervene. In fact, out of the corner of my eye, I see him grinning.

If I was going to guess, Leo’s favorite thing about me is probably that I don’t take shit from anybody. It feeds his desire for chaos. Plus, Leo’s a steamroller. He can’t be friends with anybody who gives in to him too easy—they’d be chewed up and spat out in his wake in a matter of days.

Bram is not nearly as amused as Leo. His top lip is curled, practically snarling at me. I can tell he wants to push this further. But the odds aren’t quite as good anymore—Leo, me, and Ares against Bram and his five buddies.

It’s Leo who speaks up first, cutting the tension.

“Why don’t you come sit with us?” he says to Ares. “I’ve never heard of—where did you say you were from?”

“Syros,” the boy says softly.

“Come educate me,” Leo says, his bright smile flashing in his lean, tanned face.

“Yeah,” Bram scoffs. “Go sit with the Americans. Maybe they’ll pay for your dinner.”

“You don’t have to pay for my dinner,” Ares says as he follows us back to our table. Glancing over where he was sitting, I can see that he only ordered a small plate of stew, and that he already ate all of it, not a bit left in the bowl. There’s no way that was enough food for a guy his size.

“We’re not gonna pay for your dinner,” I say, wanting to spare his dignity, “but you should eat some of our food. We ordered way too much.”

Sure enough, before we’ve even sat down, the waiter carries out a heavy tray full of mussels, Leo’s beef, and a half-dozen side plates of what looks like spinach pastry, marinated salad, pickled vegetables, and fragrant rice stuffed full of nuts and raisins. It smells phenomenal.

Ares sits across from me, looking awkward and embarrassed. He’s tall and broad-shouldered, lean and rangy. His skin has an olive tone, but when he looks directly at me, I see that his eyes are a surprising shade of blue-green, like a turquoise sea.

“I’m not afraid of them.” He gives a little jerk of his head back toward Bram and his friends, who are seated at their table once more, laughing and talking with obvious jeers in our direction.

“Of course not,” Leo says. “We didn’t come over to save you. Just the level of doucheyness caught our attention.”

Ares chuckles. “I was on the same flight over with them. Can’t say I was enjoying my first introduction to Kingmakers students.”

“Do you know anyone else coming?” I ask him curiously.

“No.” He shakes his head. “I barely know anybody. What Bram said is true—my family’s tiny and poor. Syros is tiny and poor. We’re mafia in name only. My father works as a tour guide. I only got accepted because the Cirillos have been going to Kingmakers since it was founded.”

“You’re one of the first ten families,” I say with interest.

“Yeah.” Ares shrugs. “The smallest and least impressive, though.”

“Who gives a fuck! That’s still cool!”

“Anna loves history,” Leo tells him. “She probably knows more about Kingmakers than the rest of us combined.”

“No, I don’t,” I correct him. “I’ve never even seen it, and I’m sure some of the other kids have.”

“Anyway, tell us more about Syros,” Leo says.

“It isn’t very interesting.” Ares takes an enormous bite out of a spinach pastry. “Just a little Greek island. Not as pretty as Mykonos or Santorini. You said you two were from Chicago?”

“Yeah.” Leo nods proudly. He loves Chicago more than any place on earth.

“Have you ever been there?” I ask Ares.

“I hadn’t even been on a plane before today,” he admits.

I can’t help laughing at that. “Are you serious?”

“Yeah.” He smiles a little. He has a nice smile—slow and warm. I think Ares is a gentle giant. I like him immediately, though I don’t know how gentleness will fare where we’re about to go.

“There must be something cool in Syros,” Leo says, spearing a huge chunk of beef and stuffing it in his mouth.

“Well, I really do have a whole farm full of goats,” Ares says. “But not for what Bram said. They’re fainting goats. If you startle them, they stiffen up like a board and keel over. It’s kind of adorable.”

“Do you have siblings?” I ask.

“Two brothers and a sister. I’m the oldest. I feel bad for leaving them . . .”

“Me too,” I say.

We talk about our siblings for a few minutes, while Leo listens, mildly jealous. He always says he wishes he had a brother, but I don’t know how he’d actually handle that, since Leo loves to be the center of attention at all times.

The waiter carries away our rapidly emptying plates, then brings out chilled dishes of ro?ata, which is some sort of custard pudding. Bram and his buddies got bored and left, so there’s no one throwing unpleasant sneers in our direction anymore.

We drink several cups of sweet, fruity brandy, the sky darkening and the ancient stone walls glowing from the row of lanterns all along the sea wall. The night air is fragrant with orange blossoms and sea salt.

Leo and I get a bit tipsy, pleased to finally be in a country with a reasonable drinking age.

Ares relaxes too, though he’s not drinking as much as we are. It’s funny that he’s named after the god of war. There’s nothing aggressive about him. In fact, without the candlelight brightening his face, I think he’d look sad and anxious. He’s probably nervous about sailing off to Kingmakers tomorrow, as we all are.

“Let’s get another round!” Leo says, finishing his brandy.

“The boat comes at seven in the morning,” I remind him.

“All the more reason to stay up all night,” Leo says. “I hate getting up early.”

“Your logic is impeccable.”

“Come on,” Leo coaxes me.

I glance over at Ares, who doesn’t seem to mind the idea of another drink.

“Alright,” I say. “Just one more . . .”