Just as her mother had.
Luna blew out a slow, chilled breath, watching the air gently curl in the light of the corner streetlamp. “It’s better if you leave him,” she whispered softly. “Before it’s too late.”
He deserved a chance to make something of his life here in Ballycastle. It would be hard, yes. In fact, it might even break his heart. If she’d understood what she saw in his eyes today, what she’d felt while wrapped in his arms, as his mouth danced with hers—
“Miss Talbot.”
A little scream burst from Luna’s lips, as every tensed nerve in her body erupted. She pivoted on heel, searching for the source of the voice which had spoken close to her ear, but saw nothing. Nothing, that is, until, with a little shimmer of magic, Mr. Grimm appeared, slipping out of the celestial-embroidered dressing gown. Luna caught her breath, pressing a hand to the buttoned breast of her winter coat. “Mr. Grimm! You frightened me half to death!”
“I beg your pardon.” He spoke solemnly, not quite meeting her gaze. “That was not my intention.”
“What are you doing here?” Luna demanded. “Why did you follow me?”
“I came to let you know you can go back to the shop.”
“I already told you, Mr. Grimm, you don’t get to decide my—”
“Because I’ll deal with Tobias.”
Her breath caught. “What?”
“I’ll use the robe.” He shrugged. “What’s the point of having a robe of invisibility if one doesn’t take advantage of it now and then? I’ll find the boy, give him the heads-up about the wardsmen, offer him a fair chance to make the smart decision. I willnot,” he added sternly, “drag him home to his mother kicking and screaming.”
Luna nodded slowly.
“It is his choice what he does with the information I give him.”
“I understand, Mr. Grimm.”
“Good.” Her employer swung an arm, indicating the sidewalk of Addle Street behind him. “I would escort you back, but . . .”
“I think I should come with you.”
“What?” He shook his head, that lock of pale hair flopping over his brow. “No.”
But Luna found that, while the prospect of venturing down to the warehouse district on her own was unsavory, the idea of sending Mr. Grimm into a potentially dangerous situation, all for the sake of a cause in which he did not believe, was somehow worse. “It’s my fault you’re getting dragged into this,” she said. “The least I can do is—”
“Go back to Mrs. Goddard,” he said firmly. “You’ll do more good there than with me.”
“But if something happens to you—”
“Nothing will happen to me.” Mr. Grimm raised an eyebrow, the glow from the streetlamp casting the angles of his face into strange shadows. “I’m a Dark Sorcerer, remember? Nothing out here tonight is as scary as I am.”
“What about the other sorcerers?”
“I’ve only ever met one who caused me the least concern. And she’s dead.”
A shot of ice went through her soul.
He was talking about the Shadowbane Lady. The sorceress who killed his father.
Luna had often wondered about what had followed, whether or not Mr. Grimm had faced the dreadful Jastira himself. It was said the Shadowbane Lady was taken out in a great battle of sorcery the likes of which the world had never before seen. That the storm of anti-glitter had been visible from thirty miles distance, and the surrounding landscape had been utterly devastated, beyond recovery.
She’d never learned who the other sorcerer was.
Luna’s lips moved, beginning to form a question. A question to which she did not care to learn the answer, but which part of her felt she ought to ask even so. In the end, however, she didn’t have the courage.
“All right,” she said, dropping her chin and speaking to the middle button of his waistcoat. “All right, I’ll go. But please. Be careful, won’t you?”
