Page 113 of Adversary to the Villain

None of them spoke. Until Tatianna chimed in, looking suspiciously glassy-eyed. “Where did you move the window?”

Clare gasped and then sighed, appearing as if she’d connected two dots. “Don’t tell me, Trystan.”

“Don’t tell you what?” Blade asked, folding his arms.

“You know about the box?” Trystan assumed.

Tatianna raised a polished pink fingernail. “Mayweknow about the box?”

“When I took apart the window, I shipped it away.”

Kingsley held up a sign.

Who?

“To Arthur.” Clare said their father’s name with a detachment he knew she needed. “Trystan sent it after he escaped Benedict and became The Villain with a note that said, ‘This is all you’ll ever have. The broken pieces.’”

A whiff of vanilla candy pummeled him as Sage popped into the room with a grin. “That’s adorably dramatic.”

“Evie!” Everyone fussed around her, crowding her, though the first person to hug her was Clare, much to Blade and Tatianna’s disgruntlement.

“Oh, hello,” Sage said to the group, then gave him a look over Clare’s shoulder, her eyes comically wide. “I missed you as well.”

“I’m so sorry,” Clare burst out, taking Sage’s hands with a sincerity Trystan had rarely witnessed in his sister. She had been different lately. Someone unafraid to be human. “I was cruel and scared you off. I knew you were frightened, and I reacted so badly, and you—”

“Whoa!” Sage grabbed Clare’s arms, giving them a gentle squeeze. “I was already going to run. I needed to. You need not be sorry.”

Clare hugged her again, and Tatianna looked amused.

When Clare finally released her death grip, Tatianna and Blade swooped in for their turn, exchanging warm words and embraces.

“I adore this dress,” Tatianna praised, scanning it. “Though it doesn’t appear to hide the bite marks on your neck.”

Sage slapped a hand to the area, and Trystan slapped a hand over his eyes.

“Where did Arthur put the box, Clare?” Tatianna asked, looking at Trystan with a self-satisfied grin.

Clare remained silent, and Trystan knew whatever the answer was, it was going to be fucking inconvenient.

And still, the truth was worse.

“When Mother told the village you had, um, died”—she flinched—“there was a tree planted in your honor and a ceremonial burial beneath it.”

“Considering I am standing aboveground, I’m going to guess what they buried instead.”

“Arthur thought it was just random bits of glass!” Clare defended their father, but there was no need. Trystan wasn’t angry; he was thrilled.

“Where is the tree planted, Clare?” Sage asked.

“The Garden of Rennedawn.”

Trystan’s eyebrows climbed his forehead. “I beg your pardon. How did they manage that?”

“Why is that shocking?” Sage tilted her head. “Is there a corpse waitlist?”

“It’s a sacred space,” Tatianna explained. “Where people in our village often went to pray to the magical gods. One cannot even enter unless it’s for a burial.”

Trystan could not believe what he was about to suggest. His sister was going to murder him. Though he supposed then at least he’d get into the garden anyway. “Father’s funeral is in one week’s time, Clare. Instead of a burial at sea, what say we, as his children, insist on an alternate location?”