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My body was trembling, but I forced my other leg over the edge of the windowsill. I would fly to her… except I’d forgotten to grab my broom. I turned back and saw it leaning against the wall.

I muttered a curse before lumbering off the ledge and retrieving it. Once my broom was in hand, I turned around and came face to face with a wet white shape hurtling toward me. It barely cleared the sill before careening onto the quilt.

“Della!” I screamed.

I dropped the broom and scooped her up, cradling her in my arms. I had no idea how she’d even managed to fly. She looked less like a raven and more like a drowned rat.

A rat that had a gold coin clamped in her beak.

She was glaring at me with a fury I had never seen. I knew she was angry that I chucked Yves’s coin into the harbor. For throwing away the promise I’d made her. That if another option had presented itself to make money, I’d take it. And while I pursued the sale of a relic and gave my name to a man hell-bent on restarting the old war, my familiar had nearly drowned trying to provide us with another option.

Della hopped to her feet, then shook her body, flinging seawater across my face and over the quilt. Dropping the coin, she let out a single, ragged, disgusted croak.

“I know,” I said.

She croaked again, louder this time.

“I said I know,” I asserted.

I could, begrudgingly, admit that it was foolish to throw away a thing that could help us, especially after what just happened.

I used the edge of the quilt to wipe water off her feathers. As I worked, the tightness around my chest began to loosen. She was here. She was okay. “I can’t believe you went into the bay to get his coin. You could’ve drowned.”

“Another round! Another round!” she squawked.

The breath I’d been holding came out close to a laugh. “No, I said ‘you could’ve drowned’, you daft bird,” I said, shaking my head. “Besides, it was all for nothing. I have nothing to say to the Duke.”

She fixed me with another lethal look. Even though my familiar hadn’t been with me when I came face to face with this dark society of witches, she knew when I was lying. I did have something to tell him. Yves deserved to know about The Devouring’s plans.

That didn’t mean I had to like it.

Della picked up the coin and placed it into my hand. As I stared down at it, I remembered the way Yves had looked into my eyes when he’d explained how to summon him. The tenderness had nearly broken me.

I set the coin back on the quilt, stood, and made my way to the open window, where warm, salty air was coming in off the bay that had nearly taken my bird. “He’ll think I changed my mind about him,” I told the ocean. “He’ll get the wrong idea. And I just can’t…”

Behind me, I could hear Della preening seawater out of her wing. Her silence was its own kind of comment.

I turned and found his jacket hanging on the back of the door where I’d left it. I’d told myself a dozen times I was going to pluck the buttons off for Della, then sell it. I hadn’t done either of those things. I’d left it there. Letting it watch me undress. And sleep. And… I pressed my palm against my forehead and shook my head. This was ridiculous. I was acting like a besotted witchling, not a grown woman.

What was I so afraid of?

Men were either placeholders or playthings. That’s all. This particular man had his use: his power.

I returned to the bed where I found Della holding the coin in her beak, offering it to me. “We tell him, then we leave,” I said, taking the coin from her. “Understand?”

My familiar bobbed her head up and down. I didn’t like how easily she conceded. I let out a string of colorful curses and reached for the coin.

Closing my eyes, I whispered, “Yves.”

The coin grew warm, and I waited for him to appear with my heart pounding in my chest.

A rush of warm summer air rustled through my hair, along with the scent of aged oak and good wine. When I glanced up, I found the Duke of Valemer standing at the foot of my bed. He was dressed in the same clothes he wore earlier: black trousers tucked into tall black riding boots, a white cravat tied at his neck, and that careless strand of wavy hair had even fallen into his eyes again.

Every detail was the same, except his jacket, which was missing. Without it, the green of his eyes stood out starkly.

I was very aware that he was standing in my bedroom.

He glanced at the narrow bed, the low ceiling, then back at me. A smile flashed, showcasing his very white, very straight teeth. “That was rather quick of me, wasn’t it? I was afraid you might change your mind before I⁠—”