Mr. Macaw met her eyes briefly but didn’t return her wan smile, his face reddened with exertion as he hauled the first specter wolf into place. Alora hated that the creatures responsible for killing a man and gravely wounding another would be immortalized before the mansion’s front doors. Because that’s all the Urchin was: wounded. Not dead.
He couldn’t be dead.
Alora stacked as many pieces of trim as she could comfortably handle before making her way up the steps. She spared a glance for the new topiary. It was still unfinished, as Mr. Macaw was now busy with other things, but the bottom half looked nearly complete. There were all manner of objects along the base, and they seemed to be trickling down from something, but that something was yet incomplete, and so she couldn’t be sure what it would eventually be.
Nothing, if she didn’t finish the room.
Except her mind was far from her project. She’d told the Urchin captain she’d become traumatized if he died in her arms, but in truth, she’d become traumatized already. She could think of nothing aside from what she’d done and how he’d felt, his body slumping to unconsciousness against her. She supposed they would have taken him out the back. He must have rooms similar to William. She hoped they’d found the healer who’d helped her.
Of course they will have.
She was being foolish. He was too young—too important—to let die. He was Master Merridon’s son, after all, though she couldn’t help but think of what little regard the man had seemed to spare for him. What if help had come too late?
Dammit, she shouldn’t care! He wasn’t a good person. How could he be? Good people didn’t skulk about bludgeoning others and spying for wicked men. They certainly didn’t command others to do so.
Except—
He’d saved her once, had helped her more than that. He’d saved Reginald. And he’d kept her secrets. All of them.
The trim was heavy, as quality wood often was. Alora was out of breath by the time she reached the darkened hall, and her arms were afire. Yet she refused herself a reprieve. She alsorefused to shuffle what she held in order to retrieve her lantern. She knew the way now regardless of light.
She regretted the latter choice a moment later.
“Miss Pennigrim.”
Alora stilled in the dark. “Who’s there?”
“I’m wounded you don’t recognize my voice.” She felt movement to her right and swung toward it, her eyes adjusting enough to make out the human shape. “Easy with those. I’ve enough bruises to contend with because of you.”
William.
Alora didn’t know it was possible to be both equal parts furious and frightened. Her voice dripped with vitriol. “How long have you been down here?”
“You’re angry I didn’t come to you sooner? I tried. You weren’t at home.”
Her entire body spasmed at his words. She yearned to lash at him until he was nothing more than pulp. Her leap to such imaginings scared even her, enough that she came back to herself. “That is not why I’m angry, and you very well know it! What were you thinking, coming to me after what you did? What you meant to further do?” She reached out blindly and murmured a blessing in relief when she found the knob. She swung the door in.
She could feel William follow her inside.
“Do you want an apology? Forgive me then, Alora. For not realizing you didn’t want things to progress between us. But need I remind how differently you behaved that day? The rules you disregarded. How you begged against my throat?”
“You drugged me with Lust!” She tossed the trim down and found the lamp. She felt like the Urchin captain, striking and breaking matches in her rage. At last, one caught and flared between them.
She gasped at what she saw.
“Ghastly, isn’t it?” William traced the split in his lower lip, though it was his eye that had apparently suffered the most. “The captain thinks he is quite the enforcer of expectation, but I think we all know his true motivation, don’t we?”
Alora turned up the lamp with shaking fingers. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Ihatefeigned ignorance.”
She looked up in time to see his eyes harden, his lips pressed tight. “Feigned ignorance?As you stand here and spout about your confusion in my behavior? You gave me an enchanted drink, William. Yes, I did not ask, but I should not have had to. You’re manipulative and entitled and I want nothing to do with you, not even a friendship.”
“Such harsh words! It seems I need to convince you otherwise.” His hand shot out to grip her wrist, and he tugged, meaning to pull her in.
But Alora leaned back and dug in her heels. “Letgo.”
“What is it? Is it because I am not my brother?” William’s lips lifted into a sneer, his eyes narrowed and flashing. “Should I pull on a hood and an atrocious leather coat to claim you?”
