She could not have hurt him more if she’d planted a knee where it counted. Nigel backed away at once, his arms dropping to his sides, his head suddenly heavy on the end of his neck. He turned away from her, guilt weighing down his shoulders. Because he had done what he vowed never to do—he had taken advantage of her. He knew it now. He saw it clearly in her eyes.
But she wanted it!a voice in his head protested.She wanted those kisses!
What difference did that make? He had wanted Jastira’s kisses, hadn’t he? He’d allowed the woman in authority over him to draw him in, to manipulate him, and he’d been all too eager to be drawn, to be manipulated. He’d gone slavering to her side like a dog, ready to roll over and do her bidding.
Was he really any better than Jastira in the end? Grabbing his paid employee, forcing his passion on her, making excuses all the while?
“You shouldn’t go,” he growled one last time, too ashamed to address the words directly to her.
Luna was silent for a long moment. Then, very softly she whispered, “I know.”
With that, she spun in a whirl of skirts and coat, yanked the door open. A chorus of tinkling bells sang out in warning even as she plunged into the darkness of the street.
Luna hastened down the sidewalk, the heels of her boots ringing out against the cold pavers. But no matter how quick a pace she set, she could not outrun the storm of feelings swirling in and around her. The night had grown bitter cold, and she was glad of that. The sharp sting of wintry air on her cheeks, particularly after the balmy sweetness of that Fool’s Spring day, was, at least, a partial distraction.
But as she reached the end of Addle Street and arrived at the turn onto Jolly Pidgeon Way, which led to the warehouse district by the docks, she paused. Though the cold air knifed in her lungs, she forced herself to drag in a deep breath. Then exhaled in a rough gasp of words, “Oh,whatare you doing, Luna Talbot?”
Truth be told, she didn’t have an answer. Yes, of course, she was worried for Tobias. The boy was an utter idiot, but she didn’t want to see him slaughtered by some nameless Dark Sorcerer simply for trying to earn a little pocket cash. That didn’t mean she should be going anywhere near anything to do with sorcerers and sorcery. It wasn’t safe. For her.
For the world.
Luna sniffed hard and bit her lip, rocking on her heels uncertainly. She couldn’t bear to go back now. Not after her vehement defiance of her boss. She couldn’t go back and . . . andfaceMr. Grimm.
“Oh, Green Mother,” she whispered, and squeezed her eyes tight, tucking her chin down into her buttoned-up coat collar. How had it all gone so horribly sideways? Sheknewshe shouldn’t kiss him. Sheknewit. It just made everything so complicated, especially considering how much—how very, desperately much—shelikedthose kisses. Gods on high, did that man ever know what he was doing with that dangerous mouth of his!
This was bad. Very, very bad. Because Wednesday was coming, but she still had to get through Tuesday first. And somehow, she had to do so without entangling her heart in something she couldn’t bear to leave. She already felt as though she would have to rip out that essential organ and leave it in a bloody mess behind her just to board that train. And now that she knew how he felt? Now that she’d seen his face in the thaumagraph? Now that she’d experienced the passion of his kisses and his hands and his gasping breaths and his beating heart?
This was going to kill her.
Quite literally, if she wasn’t careful.
Perhaps she should tell him the truth. The whole truth, not the little partial half-truths she’d admitted along the way. Maybe if she told him everything—her real name, the reason behind her fugitive state, who it was who dogged her every footstep—maybe he could help her. Maybe.
Or maybe she’d just get him killed too. Like her parents.
The truth had nearly killed her aunties. If she hadn’t abandoned them when she did, they would not have survivedmuch longer. But Mr. Grimm was not like the aunties. As powerful as Auntie Apolonia was, she couldn’t ultimately contain Luna, not once Luna had determined to leave. She had only wielded Green Magic, and Luna had been able to elude that. Auntie Apolonia wasn’t a Dark Sorcerer.
But if Mr. Grimm decided to hold onto her, how could she stop him? Even the Sovereign Troth wasn’t the protection she’d imagined, for he had all his little workarounds. No, it was better if he didn’t know. Better if he didn’t try to protect her.
There was no other way; she’d seen the truth, long ago. Scried a vision in her teacup as a young teenager, back in the early days of her training, back before her aunties forbade her from looking into her own future. She’d obeyed their injunction, but obedience hadn’t changed the reality of what she’d already glimpsed.
A dark slab of stone. A circle of black-robed figures, arms upraised like cormorants, chanting in an ancient and long-damned tongue.
And herself.
Bound, gagged.
Struggling helplessly as a great, gaping Void opened in her chest, andsomethingpoured through, something twisted and malevolent and burning with clouds of anti-glitter.
Auntie Apolonia had seen it too. When she snatched the teacup roughly out of Luna’s trembling hands, she’d gazed inside, and her wrinkled face had turned ghostly pale. But when she’d looked up and met Luna’s terrified, tear-swimming gaze, she’d said, “Now, now, child. Don’t take on. Remember what Extremely Great Aunt Amelia used to say.” Then she’d placed a comforting hand on Luna’s shoulder and enunciated firmly,“Fate’s my bitch.”
But even Extremely Great Aunt Amelia hadn’t been able to stop the future. She couldn’t. The future was a cold inevitability.The best one could manage was to avoid it for as long as possible, but eventually, it always caught up. It always won.
Mr. Grimm wouldn’t accept the truth, however. He had dedicated his life to manipulating the essential whatsits of whosimacallit. He would believe, in his Dark Sorcerer’s madness, that he coulddosomething. That he could make a difference.
And he would die for that belief.
Just as her father had.
