“There’s a reason I needed to keep her away,” he continued. “And from how you guard her, I’d guess this isn’t the first time something like this has happened.”
“Her being attacked by monsters?” she bit out. “Yes, that was the first.”
“Her hysteria, Jan. She was wielding without control. I had to contain her. When I brought her in, she asked for her sister, and I called for Finn. He recognised her. Then I saw what I’d missed. Your foresight, the signs I ignored. I asked if she still had her ring. She said she lost it in the forest.” He exhaled, remembering the night. “I went back searching, but I only found it days later, on my birthday. Before that, Finn was nearly spent keeping hercalm and contained. I couldn’t risk the court officials seeing her in that state and deciding to imprison her. Without the nullifier relic, I couldn’t tell you. I wouldn't risk letting you near her. But when I saw you that night, I wanted to tell you. I should have, and I am sorry for that.”
Jane’s head shook faintly, as if she didn’t know she was doing it. Did she even hear his apology?
“She said you grabbed him by the collar and yanked him from her. That you killed the Strzyga. That’s when his heart failed.” She looked at him, eyes narrowing. “You treated her like a prisoner. You left her freezing in that bloody tower.”
The words struck deeper than they should have. But it had been months since he’d heard her speak to him like that.
“The tower was warm,” he said quietly. “Safe. I wouldn’t let her freeze. Gwinifer and Finn were checking on her. But apparently, she doesn’t remember the truth, not all of it. I didn’t kill the Strzyga. I pulled your father out of her flux and warded us. She assumed the rest.”
Jane went still. “You’re saying my sister did it? And Gwinifer and Finn knew?”
“Yes. Can I take this off now?”
She pressed her fingertips to her temples, voice stumbling through disbelief. “What…what you’re saying is impossible. How could we have never known this?”
He unhooked the hairpin, the rune’s pressure releasing him, and stepped closer. “Because of the rings. Was it your father who gave it to you? Or your mother? Did any of them tell you not to take it off? Perhaps so you wouldn’t lose it.” She didn’t answer, seeming to deliberate. “If you need proof, bring her to dinner. We’ll talk. We’ll test both your access.”
Her hand found the stone sill beneath the window, gripping it hard enough for her knuckles to pale. She looked through the glass, at her sleeping sister.
Reagan sighed and moved closer, enough that his chest hovered a breath from her shoulder.
Her faint scent, like cherry soap, clung to her hair. It dragged some restless need from his body. He inhaled deeper, fighting the stupid urge to nuzzle his face in the crook of her neck.
“Tell me you’ll both come to dinner,” he murmured. “We’ll talk. And then you and I will talk.”
She looked up from beneath her lashes, wary but softened.
It hadn’t been long since she’d reciprocated his feelings, slipping beneath his skin in a way that left no going back. He ached for her now, for that nearness. But the silence between them had grown thick, like a wall he’d need to break down brick by brick.
“We’ll come,” she said.
Relief eased through him.
She didn’t add anything more and started to turn away.
“Your father said something before he collapsed,” he told her quietly. “He told your sister, ‘Find her. You’ll be alright.’”
Chapter 2
Jane
The vital-signs orb pulsed in rhythm with father’s heart, its steady beat pounding until it blended with my headache.
A strange little thing. Not like the monitors I’d seen in human hospitals, with no wires, no screens with jagged lines, no numbers ticking up and down. Just a white, circular case with a clear panel and a narrow sound port. Healer Hildegard had said that if his heart rate faltered, the orb would change rhythm and colour. She’d shown us how it linked with the band around his arm, how the mana read his pulse, how it would hum faster or slower depending on his state.
It never did change. Not once in four days.
The sound had become maddening, but if I hadn’t been glaring at it for hours, I might never have noticed the sharp scalpel lying near its base yesterday. Might never have asked my closet for a small object like a hairpin and decided to turn it into something useful, despite Reagan’s chiding about it being forbidden. Based on what I’d read, it was forbidden when used against someone's will. And in court.
I had idle time sitting here, counting seven days since Father had fallen unconscious.
Healer Hildegard had informed us there was no harm to his body, no lasting injuries. His mind, though, that was the uncertain part. He would wake, she said, only when his body deemed it safe, fully rested and ready.
My spine ached as I sat in that damned chair, eyes fixed on that blasted orb as it beat, beat, beat. The air was dry, smelling faintly of herbs.
