‘I left her napping. She – didn’t sleep well last night.’
That, Nicole knew. Despite being in different rooms, she’d awakened several times thanks to her sister’s gasps or worried whimpers, her heart racing, her senses scanning for danger. After painting, Nicolecould only relax enough to fall back to sleep after mentally double-checking that she’d locked every window and door in the sprawling manor, and reminding herself that her sister’s dreams and night-time visions couldn’t hurt her physically. The mental strain though? Nicole tried not to think about it.
She groaned as she bit into her breakfast’s light, buttery pastry, dusted with pepper and chives. Nicole wiped away some of the runny egg.
‘Perfection,’ she said around a mouthful. ‘You should be pleased that I’m always complimenting your baking.’
‘You made the same declaration about that random lollipop from one of the petrol stations on the way here.’
‘That thing was freakishly delicious. It tasted like sunshine and happiness.’
‘It tasted like someone electrocuted my tongue.’
‘I didn’t realise you were so dramatic.’
Again, a smile to ease the worry in her chest.
But that was one of the other developments after her transformation: a heightened sense of taste and smell so acute she could almost taste emotions on the air. She knew the biological reason was because both humans and creatures secreted hormones when feeling different emotions. Fear, love. Things that helped her body distinguish between someone killing out of malice or self-defence. But it hadn’t made it any more natural to try to explain that Bells’ laughter tasted yellow.
The idea of seeing Kyan again, of being able to appreciate all his details anew … she firmly pushed that concept back into the mental box where she’d locked everything else to do with him. So she didn’t worry; didn’t need too much.
She glanced at Dylan’s pocket, the place he kept the slip of paper with Callum’s number on. It was worn tissue-thin from the way he checked it daily, as if to be certain it was still there. The muscle in his forearm flickered as he checked it again now, as if he was as tempted to use it as she was.
Noticing her glance he stopped and squeezed his fingers into a fist before sliding a glass of water towards her small feast.
‘You all right?’ he asked softly, leaning on the counter and taking a sip of his own coffee: some kind of bulletproof concoction.
‘Areyou?’
His eyes flickered. ‘Touché.’
She smiled slightly. ‘Do you want to talk about—’
‘Any updates on your list?’
Nicole hesitated. Nearly pushed, but let it slide. Opening up her notebook she looked at the points she checked every morning: the clues her mother had hidden in theDantepainting’s code. Nicole had written her research in code as well, but kept the lists cycling through her mind daily – they were too important to risk writing down in a way just anyone could read.
•The Wake’s true leaders are creatures, but we don’t know what.
•Only Empyreals can defeat them.
•The oath means any bound Empyreals can’t physically kill or hurt a member of the Wake.
•Thus, a cure for the oath must be found, but may only lie with the ‘God of Oaths’.
•Three ancient ‘goddess-blessed’ items may help destroy the Wake: a painting, an artefact, and ‘something of divine provenance’.
•These must be used in conjunction with the ‘Siren’s Instrument’.
•The last lead for the items is hidden with Mum’s painter, Elisabetta Sirani.
Several questions had arisen, which Nicole had been theorising over ever since:
•Who/what are the Wake?
•What specifically are the three items? Would Elisabetta know?
•Or, more importantly: where can we find them?
