Page 201

‘Gods help the children of clever mothers,’ I said, sagging in my chair.

And that radiant look she gave me in response … it was so, so far removed from anything I’d ever seen in Editta’s eyes, so incomprehensibly different from everything I’d ever considered motherly love in my life, that I almost wept on the spot.

‘Don’t mind me trying to catch up,’ Agenor said with a sour chuckle, rubbing his temples. His glance at me was wryly resigned on the surface but hid something far softer below. ‘As I said, I do know where you got your brains.’

Only then did I realise it – that he had never been talking about himself at all.

‘Flatterer,’ Rosalind fondly said. ‘Are we all done arranging matters, then? Not that I don’t want you to stick around, Em, but we still have a fight to finish – and I presume Creon is waiting for you somewhere?’

I snorted a laugh. ‘I’ll see myself out, don’t worry.’

‘Oh, no, no.’ She jumped up from the couch, holding out her arms to me. ‘You know that’s not what I mean – we’ll see you tomorrow, alright?’

‘Yes.’ I rose, eyed her outstretched hands with a little suspicion, and added, ‘Don’t bite.’

She swatted at me, then wrapped her arms around me and pressed me close for a short moment. Even below the blood and sweat and mud, she still smelled like jasmine – that faint, sweet fragrance of peace.

‘Go enjoy your break,’ she murmured as she released me, hands lingering on my upper arms a moment longer. ‘We’ll be there.’

I nodded wordlessly and turned to Agenor, who had risen from his chair as well – still looking slightly thunderstruck and entirely unsure what to do with his hands. Ready to give me the usual awkward nod by way of goodbye, that ill-at-ease look of a male a little too conscious of his own dignity and a little too uncertain of the etiquette and conventions prescribed in the handling of daughters …

Oh, damn it all.

I flung my arms around him before I could think better of it.

He stiffened in surprise but didn’t dodge – standing paralysed in my embrace for an endless moment before letting out a dazed ‘Oh’ and cautiously wrapping his arms around my shoulders. His hands found their place on my back, hesitant and tentative. His palms half-hovered over my skin even then, as if he was afraid a firmer touch might break me.

It was a rather terrible hug. But he’d once been a rather terrible father, too, and even in this dumbfounded state, his arms were strong in a promising, reassuring sort of way; I dared to believe we’d get better at it with a little practice.

‘You’ll be careful?’ he muttered again, voice teetering on the edge of cracking.

‘Will do,’ I whispered into his shirt, and then, the word slipping out in an even quieter, reckless, unstoppable breath, ‘Father.’

He froze again.

Clutched against him, I could have sworn I felt his heart skip a beat.

‘You’ll be the death of me one day,’ he said quietly, releasing me – but he was smiling, no matter how much he was trying to compose himself, an irrepressible smile that lit up his eyes andstripped centuries of weariness from his face. Like magic. No,betterthan magic. ‘Off you go, then … daughter.’

Off I went.

But that last word lingered with me, glowing happily in my chest even as I closed the door behind me and hurried back into the White Hall’s cold and empty corridors.

Chapter 42

I found Creon onthe rooftop of the building, basking in the sunlight with his back against a chimney while Alyra darted tirelessly around him, chirping without pause, drawing more and more artistic shapes in the air. They both turned as I clambered from the open hatch and nudged it shut behind me.

‘Calmed them down?’ Creon said, looking rather unconcerned. He, too, had to feel the warmth still pulsing through my veins.

‘She turned herself into a vampire,’ I said, as if that was an answer to his question.

He snorted a laugh. ‘Did she tell him in advance?’

‘No.’ I grimaced, wiping my dusty palms on my skirt as I made my way towards him. ‘Hence the shouting. They were happy with the court plans, though. Are you ready to go?’

‘Always,’ he said, rising and picking up the bundle of dark fabric beside him – his coat, I realised only as he unfolded it and held it out to me, a motion so smooth I needed a moment to work out why it looked so strangely familiar to me.

The roar of flames. The stench of burning wood and plaster. That very first night in my burning hometown, as different from this clear, sun-streaked rooftop as anything could get.