"Didimoi." Ascella hated the way her heart skipped a beat, the way her breath caught in her throat, the way her eyes clung to the zodio.

A year after her heart had been torn apart and she had cried herself to sleep, vowing never to feel anything for Didimoi ever again, the zodio still sent her composure into a flutter.

Did Ascella have no shame? Or perhaps her consciousness did, but her body was a primal thing that only followed its instincts, no matter how bad of an idea it was. It was ridiculous, but there was no denying it.

Didimoi was as beautiful as ever, her gaze as magnetic as Ascella remembered, but she wasn't the same person she was a year ago. She was no longer an innocent attendant who didn't know enough about the laws governing her to know that they couldn't be broken, not by love or lust or infatuation or foolishness or whatever had been between her and Didimoi.

Because of that, she pressed her mouth into a line and crossed her arms over her chest even though all she wanted was to run to Didimoi, but she wasn't deceiving anyone, not herself, not the zodio who stood at the other side of the room, watching her with eyes that had seen thousands of lives bloom and then wither from where she resided in the heavens.

Didimoi knew exactly what she did to Ascella because she gave her that half-smile that had started everything between them and ended it too, just as a crescent moon marked the end of the waning phase and the beginning of the waxing. "Ascella."

Ascella backed away as the zodio stepped closer, holding her knife between them. She had trusted Didimoi with her heart and even her life once, but now her blade quivered in her hand because she knew she couldn't trust Didimoi with any part of her ever again.

"Come now, Ascella." Didimoi raised her dark, perfectly arched eyebrows. She advanced, her gait as lithe as a panther's. "You know that dagger won't do me any harm, and what's more, you know that if I wanted to hand you to the guards, I would've done it already."

Ascella realised she had been backed into the wall with her trembling knife held between her and the zodio when the skywood's coolness collided with her back. Didimoi's eyes never left her, turning her as breathless as she had been all those nights they'd spent beneath the dark, starry sky.

Ascella pushed a strand of her wavy blonde hair behind her ear, looking away to break the hold the zodio's gaze had on her after all this time. Regaining the air to speak, she asked, "How did you know I'd come back?"

"There is nobody in Galakios who knows you better than I do." Didimoi turned away from Ascella, giving her space in which to breathe again.

She expanded into it, gulping at it as a thirsty person would at water and not caring what Didimoi would think of it.

Didimoi's approval had been everything to her once. She used to braid gleaming beads of sunlight into her hair because she knew Didimoi liked it, but she didn't care what the zodio thought of anything, not anymore.

"I knew you couldn't do this to Toksotis, to his entire house." Didimoi shook her head, still facing the glass doors that led onto the balcony overlooking Galakios rather than Ascella. "I was waiting for you to return and prove your innocence." Ascella would've known Didimoi was talking to her even if she didn't turn back to gaze at her.

Ascella lowered her eyes to her feet. It was the only way she could ensure she spoke sense. She sighed. "I'm a lowly star, Didimoi. None of the other zodia should even suspect me of being able to depose the most powerful of you, but they do."

She would be flattered by their assumption that she possessed such impossible power and skill if she wasn't so indignant about their preposterous accusations, if it hadn't meant the end of the life she had known and a bleak future ahead.

"But the other zodia haven't seen your soul as I have, agapití." Didimoi turned back to Ascella, dark eyes smouldering, unreadable.

There it was again, that flutter that made it impossible from Ascella to think about anything but it.

Ascella's mind went back to those times she screamed Didimoi's name into her shoulder while the rest of her trembled in ecstasy. She indulged in the memory for a moment until she remembered that she wasn't supposed to, so she exiled it from her thoughts.

"You don't have the right to call me that anymore," she said, her voice hardened as the rest of her did.

How dare Didimoi refer to her as beloved when she had withdrawn her love so many moons ago? Did she think it would be so easy to win Ascella over to whatever her whims were this time?

Ascella had been younger and less worldly then, but she would never forget her cruel lesson even if her willing teacher had.

Didimoi was right. Nobody else had seen so deep into Ascella's being. Nobody had ever counted her shuddering breaths. Nobody had seen her ignited and exploded, and nobody should've, Didimoi included.

There could be nothing between a zodio and an attendant but servitude.

Didimoi's mouth stiffened. She said nothing, merely turned away the way she always did when it came to truths she didn't want to face.

It was what she had done when Ascella had asked her to get back together and she had refused.

It felt like Ascella was being rejected again. The only feeling that could distract her from that was anger.

Didimoi had some nerve wandering back into Ascella's life, pretending to care about the fate that awaited her when Ascella was nothing more than a mere attendant in her eyes.

The zodio let a moment of uneasy silence pass before she spoke again, her voice ringing through the night like chimes. "Look, I know you're innocent, and I'm going to help you prove it whether you like it or not."

Ascella stared at the moonlight outlining her profile in starstruck awe until her shame blazed through her. She shouldn't admire her heartbreaker so if she didn't want to be hurt again. "I don't need you or your help."

Didimoi smiled as softly as she had once whispered Ascella's name into her hair. "I wasn't asking for your permission."

The zodio and attendant faced each other for a tense moment, the stars above them the only spectators to the conflicts within and between them. As always, it was the attendant who caved.

Ascella huffed out a breath as she resigned herself to Didimoi's request. "Why does this matter to you so much?"

She wasn't sure what she was hoping for. Perhaps that Didimoi would say she was doing it for Ascella because their separating was a mistake. Perhaps that she would admit that she had instructed Cervere to transport Ascella far out of range of the zodia's terrifying powers.

As always, Didimoi didn't follow the script in Ascella's head. It had been delightful before, all the surprises she had presented to Ascella, but now it was just infuriating.

"This matters because whoever killed Toksotis is a threat to the entire zodia council. Any of us could fall next, and where would that leave Galakios and the realms we guard?"

Ascella went cold just thinking about it. "Everything would crumble."

The zodia had ruled Galakios since the stars first existed. Forces as powerful but more malevolent passed through the galaxy now and then, seeking to destroy the planets under the zodia's protection either for pleasure or for resources. If this killer hunted down the zodia one by one, and there was nobody to rule their kingdom or defend their galaxy, nothing would be left of it soon enough.

It must be that future Didimoi saw as well because she nodded. "I want to find out who did this and help you clear your name, a-Ascella."

Ascella narrowed her eyes. She had been about to say agapití again, she was sure of it. Her suspicion of the zodio's audacity only fuelled her fury. "Why didn't you go to the other zodia instead? I think they're more worthy of your time and company than I am."

That was, after all, what Didimoi had implied when she told Ascella she didn't want to see her anymore and went for dinner with the ram-horned zodio Krios instead. Didimoi had said that for a zodio to be involved with an attendant disobeyed the will of the stars and dishonoured the power they had been gifted with.

Didimoi's jaw tensed, but just as quickly, her lips curved in her glib smile.

Ascella exhaled her frustration. Just once, she wanted Didimoi to tell her what she wanted to say, not what she thought was the right reply.

"Do you think any of the zodia would dare to wander beyond the security of Galakios's walls? Oh no," Didimoi answered for Ascella, her tone cutting even as she spoke of her peers. "They're too scared they'll fall victim to Toksotis's murderer if they step foot out of their houses."

It was a ridiculous fear, but then again, the zodia were ridiculous. Ascella couldn't resist rolling her eyes. The archer had been murdered in his own study, in the embrace of the security granted to him by the zodia council and the powers presiding over them. Nobody was safe anywhere until Toksotis's killer was caught.

Didimoi's eyes drew Ascella's in like gravity. Ascella only realised the power of the pull when their gazes collided.

"I need someone as thirsty as me for the truth, someone as eager to do the right thing."

Ascella raised her eyebrows. She had never considered Didimoi the type who did the right thing, or else she'd never have seduced a young attendant and then discarded her once she had grown bored of her, but she couldn't deny that she needed all the help she could get.

She had done many things on her own, but she didn't think tracking down Toksotis's assassin would be one of them.

"Fine." Ascella snapped out a reply, but she couldn't ignore how her stomach fluttered at the thought of spending more time with Didimoi.

She tried to talk some sense into herself.

She shouldn't want to see Didimoi at all after how sudden and hurtful their breakup had been, but she clearly liked pain. She always blamed the zodio for hurting her when she liked hurting herself as much.

Feeling Didimoi's expectant eyes on her, she said the first words that came to mind. "I have no idea where to start this investigation."

"Right here." Didimoi smiled, taking Ascella's hand that held the Chinese coin in hers.

How was her touch still so electrifying, so like the lightning that pulsed through the air bubble containing each planet in the galaxy?

"I believe the Chinese zodiac has some answers for us." Didimoi held Ascella's stare as if she had nothing to hide or be guilty of.

Ascella directed her gaze over Didimoi's shoulder and out of the window, even as her awareness of the zodio's hand cradling hers seared into her being. "None of us carries this currency." Ascella nodded as she followed Didimoi's line of logic. "One of them must've been here. Either they killed Toksotis or they know something about who did."

Didimoi's grin lit up the night. "Precisely."

That was all Ascella needed to hear. She broke away from the zodio and scurried to the secret passage in the wall that had been her entry point into this room.

"Where are you going?" Didimoi appeared beside Ascella, gaining more solidness and clarity as the version of her across the room faded.

That was why she was commonly referred to as the twins by those who knew the legends about her. The gods had blessed her with the ability to teleport in such a way that she could be in two places at once for just a moment until she materialised in her destination. Despite her nickname, she was only one person, and thank goodness for that. Two Didimois would mean double the trouble and double the heartbreak.

Ascella frowned up at her. "I'm going to the bridge."

There was no other way for the stars to reach the Chinese zodiac kingdom. What, did Didimoi expect Ascella to wait for her instruction?

She wouldn't know that Ascella was no longer the new zodiac attendant who needed guidance. She had learnt enough about this world to know how to make her way through it.

Time was of the essence. The longer they waited to start the investigation, the further Toksotis's murderer would get from them, and the longer they'd take to hunt them down if they even managed to find them.

"I know a shortcut." Without waiting for Ascella's permission, Didimoi pulled her to her by her waist, turning her breathless as she drew her close.

Before Ascella could protest, Toksotis's study fell away around them as the starry night rose to replace it.