“You can’t do this, Aine. He’s my son as much as yours.My son!”
Mrs. Murphy directs us to her room where, unlike James’s, it’s a disheveled disaster. A hole in the wall. A broken picture frame with scattered shards of glass. Clothes strewn across the floor and a wide black trunk atop the bed.
“I’m sorry, James. I couldn’t get your father to leave this morning.” Mrs. Murphy stuffs clothes into her trunk, each fistful a punch to make it all fit. “But we’ll leave now.”
James and I stand there stock-still. My head hurts trying to comprehend. Nothing about the last five minutes feels right. Then it hits me. She wasn’t shocked about the gold. In fact, she seemed to expect it.
James seems to realize at the same time and his face turns stony. “Mom?” he asks quietly.
Mrs. Murphy sighs in relief. “I’m so happy you’re safe.” But she says this to me.Me.She hugs me then, much like the hug when dropping off James, as if we share a common goal. “Thank you, my dear. Thank you.”
“Farren.” James’s voice holds a warning. One I still don’t understand. “Mom, let her go.” Her arms clasp me tighter, that last little squeeze of reassurance, what feels like love.
“Mom. Let. Her. Go.”
Mrs. Murphy pulls away slowly, cradles my cheeks. “Farren, I’m going to need just a little more of your help. I need your help to save my boy.”
“How?” I ask just to keep her talking, to make sense of all this.
“I couldn’t get him to leave this morning. So buy us a few hours. Tell them it was John. All the evidence you’ll need is in the top drawer of his study.”
“Aine!” Mr. Murphy’s howls echo down the hall followed by a string of curses.
It clicks. Mrs. Murphy. She’s asking me to frame her husband. She wants me to lie because in reality… “It was you,” I say softly.
“What was me, dear?”
“You… all of this. You—”
James steps in between us, forcing away her hands. “You stole the gold,” he finishes for me.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVEWHEN YOU’RE BETRAYED
JAMES
“And you can craft gold.” My mother’s eyes water in sincerity. “I’m so proud of you, James. So proud.”
“You’reproudof me?” It’s not as if my mother hasn’t ever spoken those words before. But now they stick to my insides like tar. It was my father. My strict father who’s never complimented me. We were supposed to be against him. I was going to save my mom from this gilded cage. And now she speaks of gold-crafting like it’s an honor? I only have this ability because Farren was falling to her death. And now I know she fell on Mom’s orders. Nity died on her orders.
“Why?” Farren asks, tears also in her eyes. “Why did you kill Nity? Why did you hurt my father?”
Mom sighs and her face hardens in concern. “I’m sorry, Farren. The gold dragon was never supposed to be killed. Your father was never supposed to be hurt. Things got… out of hand.”
“Out of hand?” Farren echoes like she’s trying to understand why she almost died in my arms. Why I had to wait to see if she would wake up in the hospital and then tell her that Dr. Walsh was down the hall in critical condition.
My jaw clenches so hard I think I might crack a tooth. “She didn’t ask for an excuse or apology. You’ve never cared about metal. You don’t even like dragons. So why? Why did you do this?”
“Honey, let’s talk later. Right now, we have to leave.” Mom flips the trunk closed and buckles it with a clack of sound.
My mother always talked about leaving, returning to Hardsill and escaping Forsen. Even as she sat on the couch downstairs and agreed I should bail off Hort and pretend away my broken arm. She talked about leaving as much as she told me that Dad doesn’t mean what he says, that he just wants the best for me, would never hurt us. Even last night on the phone she reassured me she could make up a story about visiting Aunt Roisin in Hardsill if her diversion fell through.Your father won’t hit me, she’d said. No, he’ll just drive his fist into the wall beside her head. Smash glass close enough to cut. But after all these years, this is how she leaves? By destroying the last golden dragon. “How could you?”
“James, I will do anything to protect you.” Mom swings around and clutches my hands. “Anything.”
I drop out of her hold. “Don’t put this on me. Don’t you dare claim murdering Nity was for my sake. I never asked for anything like that.”
“You didn’t have to. I’d die for you. I’d even kill for you.”
“And now you have,” I say, and it comes out like my father, cold.
