I obeyed, watching her hands. There was something about her technique, small quirks in how she formed certain letters…
You have questions,she signed. Her hands moved with more confidence now.
Not trusting her intentions, I put down the glass.Many,I admitted.Starting with how you survived direct sunlight.
Her lips curved in what might have been a smile.What if I told you I wasn’t really Lady Ilyana Krudelbach?
My heart skipped a beat.
I would say, why are you telling me this?I signed back carefully.
Her gaze lingered, not idle, but probing. She didn’t speak, didn’t blink, just watched. The corner of her mouth twitched, and a pulse fluttered at her throat.Tell me,do you remember learning sign language as a child?
The question caught me off guard.Of course. Old Henrik taught some of us servants. Why?
Do you remember a girl who could never get the sign for “church” right? Always signed “chocolate” instead, no matter how many times Henrik corrected her?
A chill ran through me. There had been only one person who’d made that mistake consistently, despite Henrik’s increasingly frustrated corrections. A dhampir girl who’d practiced signs with me in stolen moments between chores.
Yet that was impossible. That girl had disappeared years ago, presumably escaped or dead in the hours after Prince Lazrael’s murder.
She couldn’t be here, wearing another woman’s face. Could she?
She stood and pulled up her sleeve, then reached for her bracelet and pulled it off. I thought she was going to offer it to me as a bribe.
A glamor fell away from her like a waterfall. The haughty, high-cheekboned face of Ilyana Krudelbach dissolved, replaced by the freckled nose and fierce, determined amber eyes of the girl I grew up with. Sidney. Her features were gentler than Ilyana’s but not untouched by her bloodline. A trace of her grandmother lingered in the cut of her chin, an echo of the woman who'd tormented me my whole life.
Her auburn hair caught the faint light, and the scars on her fair skin mapped a life I knew. She stood tall in a long-sleeved dress that clung in all the right places. The sleeves did little to hide the subtle definition of her arms, the quiet power beneath her elegance.
She’d grown up. The girl I remembered had been replaced by a woman who carried herself with a quiet confidence, a grace that made it impossible to look away. She was more beautiful than I’d ever imagined she could become, every feature sharpened and refined with time. Longing stirred in me at the sight of my first and only crush, an ache I thought I’d buried years ago.
Her chest was more than enough to fill my hands if I dared to reach out, if I could convince my suddenly clumsy fingers they remembered how to function. The gentle curve of her hips transitioned seamlessly into a figure that could draw the attention of the most disciplined soldier.
Holy shit,I signed, forgetting to be polite. My hands twitched. One wanted to reach out, to confirm she was real, while the other wantedto clench into a fist.
“Sidney,” I breathed. I hadn’t said it aloud in years.Is it really you?
She nodded, and for the first time since I’d seen her in the courtyard, she smiled. Really smiled, not in the reserved manner of Lady Ilyana.
Hello, Finn.
A thousand emotions crashed over me at once. Joy that she was alive. Anger that she’d left us behind. Relief that she’d somehow survived. Hurt that she’d never tried to contact me. Affection that had never quite died.
I wanted to leap up and embrace her, to demand answers, to rage at her for disappearing. Instead, I just sat there like an idiot, staring at her face.
You left,I signed.We thought you were dead.
Pain flickered across her features. She signed back, fumbling slightly:I had to. There wasn’t time to?—
I know,I cut her off.I am not blaming you. Just… Gods, Sidney, do you have any idea what it has been like here?
Some,she signed.I can see what they did to you.
The words struck me, causing me to step back. She could see my pale skin, my fangs, the way I moved with inhuman grace. The curse carved its way across every inch of my transformed body.
Drink,she signed, handing me the glass again.
I took a sip and nearly gasped. Rich, warm, intoxicating like liquid sunlight if it could flow through my veins instead of burning them. It slid over my tongue like honey compared to the typical thin gruel of a servant. Every cell in my body sang with gratitude.
