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Lysander nodded. “Krylovan is predominantly a community of witches,” he said. “You’ll be fine.”

But he didn’t mean Riven like her, but Resonants. Witches the order tolerated, and controlled.

He bundled up his own belongings and left her alone.

A metal bar clanged from outside the front door. Trying to open it would be futile. She’d walked right into a larger cage. She went to a nearby window, and thought it would open, but it was useless. Lodamante bars criss-crossed over them. Lance wouldn’t be able to fit through. She stared at the hearth until her vision blurred, then she shut the curtains, trapping what heat she could.

The bed was a four-poster draped in brocade, but there were no spare clothes, no food. She pressed her hand to the front door. The Lodamante throbbed against her skin like a living thing.

Idonea curled her fingers into a fist and stepped back. She would not, she thought, sleep yet.

She pivoted in the centre of the cottage. The Lodamante in the walls dampened the Current; she couldn't reach for it the way she would've at home. But she still had eyes and hands. Her father had been in Krylovan longer than anyone. He had been married to a woman who hid things. If anything of her mother's had ever moved through this village, some piece of it might have stayed.

She started with the bed. The mattress was thin, and the frame was plain. Nothing under it, or in it. The pillow held only its straw. She lifted the rug at her feet and found nothing beneath but stone. She opened the chest at the bed's foot and found bed linen, folded clean, and nothing else. Her fingertips raked along the back of the inside wall, chasing the desperate hope of a false panel. There was none.

She moved to the shelves. Books in three categories: Templar liturgy, the kind any cottage of this kind would have; a few practical volumes on cold-climate husbandry; one slim devotional in a hand she didn't know. She opened each, fanned the pages, looked for marginalia. There was no marginalia. There was nothing pressed between any of the leaves. The books had been read by no one who cared.

A cursory glance in the cupboards showed nothing of immediate interest. Her mother's traces were not here. They were probably not in this village at all. But she would have to keep looking, and she'd start by knowing what she'd already excluded.

She sat at the table at last and let her hands rest on the wood.

“I hope you didn’t lie to me,” she whispered to the empty house.

Chapter 13

Idonea was sinking into the claw-foot tub when the front door groaned open.

She surged from the water, limbs scrambling. She yanked a towel tight around her torso, heart pounding. Her hands fumbled for her glasses, smearing the lenses as she jammed them onto her face.

Lysander strode in, eyebrows rising at her appearance.

Heat slammed into her face. Wonderful. Lysander looked entirely unbothered. Naturally.

He held out a folded bundle. “Clothes. For you.”

Lysander wore a black wool shirt beneath a fur-lined vest, his cloak still dusted with snow.

“Leave them on the bed,” she said. “And, thank you.”

“After you’re dressed, your father wants a word.”

She raised an eyebrow, water dripping from her hair to the floor. “Are you going to stand there?”

He smirked and turned. “I’ll wait outside.”

The door clicked shut behind him.

The clothes were warmer than anything she’d worn: a tan wool dress that brushed her ankles, black blouse, leather underbust corset. Stockings, gloves, scarf, and cloak. If they didn’t keep her warm, she wasn’t meant for this place. Draugaros never saw snow.

Outside, Lysander leaned against the stone wall. He straightened when she emerged, gaze lingering a beat too long. Across the square, Templars watched from their posts. She followed him without a word. The door to the two-storey house creaked open under his hand.

He stepped aside. “He’s waiting for you.”

She stepped over the threshold and Lysander shut the door behind her. The scent of vanilla filled the air. In the increased warmth, Idonea shrugged off the cloak.

Alcaeus sat by the fire in a high-backed armchair. “I trust you slept.”

Idonea ignored the pleasantry, lowering herself into the seat opposite. “You know I’m not staying long.”