“What did they say?” I ask, stepping closer to my sister but still keeping a distance.
“They refuse to follow any master but their queen.”
“But Rosie?—”
“We told them all about Rosalina,” Delphia continues. “They said it was a rumor. Especially when I couldn’t lead them to where she was.”
“Rosalina will come back,” I say.
“Statistically, the odds of surviving the Below are low,” Nori says. “Especially under a thralldom bargain. I mean, even the queen herself has been down there for twenty-five years. Rotting alone in the dark…”
“Eleanor,” Delphia hisses, smacking her on the shoulder. “You’re talking about his mate and his mate’s mother.”
“Right.” Nori looks at me unbothered. “Which is why, because I’ve met Lady Rosalina, I do believe she’ll return. It’s unfortunate it wasn’t before we found the Queen’s Army.”
“But Rosalina is not without allies. Matron Valeria wanted you to have this.” Delphie reaches into her satchel and pulls something out. It’s a magnificent horn. She steps closer and drops it into my palms.
The body is gold, polished to a soft, sunlit glow. Silver metalwork twists over the surface, curling like vines, inlaid with delicate roses. The mouthpiece is shaped in the form of an open bloom, the bell flared wide.
“No matter where they are in the Vale, the Huntresses of Aura will hear it,” Delphie says. “And they will come.”
The weight of her words settles between us. It’s the kind of thing that could change everything. “I’ll take good care of this,” I promise. “And now that you’ve returned, I have to head out.”
“To Autumn?” Nori looks up.
It would be nice to see how Farron’s doing in his quest to push back the goblins of the Briar that leak into Autumn. “Spring first,” I say. “Then Autumn.”
Delphia turns to go but looks back at me over her shoulder. “When you return, I want to see you, Day. It feels like you’ve been avoiding me.”
I swallow in a dry throat. “I haven’t, Del. I’ve just been so busy restoring Hadria.” A lie she sees right through. But keeping my distance from the last blood family I have is the only way to keep her safe from me and the monster I’ve become.
Delphia nods, then raises a dark brow. “When are you finally going to sit on it?”
I shrug. “Was thinking about it. Still feels like Dammy’s. Fear I’d sit down and hear him laughing at me from the world beyond.”
Delphia shakes her head, but Nori looks me straight in the eye with that familiar Autumn gaze. “I don’t think so.”
“You didn’t know Damocles very well.” I grin.
“No,” Nori agrees, opening her bag and swapping her book for a small leather notebook. “But he knew you.”
“What are you holding?”
“A diary Farron kept during one of the summers he spent here, years ago,” she says, flipping through it.
My cheeks heat. “Are you sure you should be reading that? Because I’m betting it’s not exactly suitable for children—” I cut off, thinking of all the very inappropriate things Fare and I have done in Summer.
Nori’s scowl deepens. “First, I’m not a child. Second, I’m only reading because I wanted to learn all I could about Summer to help in its restoration. My brother happens to be painfully detailed.”
“That’s true,” Delphie says. “Best way to fall asleep after a long day. She starts reading one of his eight-page descriptions of a weed bursting through the cobblestone or the meaning of a statue and I’m out.”
It’s so classically Farron. The shy Autumn boy kissed by Summer’s heat. It’s like remembering someone who doesn’t exist anymore.
“Third,” Nori continues, “I know how intercourse works, but thankfully the most vivid my brother got in his description was something about how his untouched petal bloomed and opened, spread apart by the sea’s crushing waves.”
“I threw up in my mouth a little at that part,” Delphie says.
“Okay, okay,” I say, waving my arms. “Enough of that. Why did you bring this out?”
