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“Maybe, but if anyone was a monster, it sounds like it was your dad.”
Thing’s eyes dart toward me at my statement.
“Was that you I heard whistling when I was walking this way?”
He blinks in confusion, so I clumsily whistle a few bars of the song I heard.
He nods. “Oh. I did not realize it was out loud.”
“I’ve never heard that song before. Where did you hear it?”
He shakes his head. “Just in here.” With the hand of his middle left arm, he points to his temple.
“You just made it up?” I smile at him. “You’re very talented. It was a beautiful song.” Beautiful but sad.
“You never studied music?”
He laughs at that. “We studied nothing but war.” His eyes shift away from me toward the wall and then they go distant. “And death.”
I don’t like the haunted look in his eyes. “Well now it’s the time for music,” I say gently. “And making beautiful furniture, it looks like. It’s your renaissance.”
He looks startled, then frowns down at the bedframe he’s working on. “Just wanted a real bed. I never had one.”
Well, shit, now I’m gonna cry. Maybe it’s the pregnancy, or just everything else, but I swear I tear up at the drop of a hat now. And for this big, scary teddy bear of a guy to have never been given a bed his whole life just really tears my heart out.
But considering how Abaddon responds every time I try to express empathy, I swallow back my tears and instead ask, “You wanna dance?”
By the way Thing looks at me, I may as well have just told him I come from outer space. And it’s official, I love managing to surprise one of them with kindness, when it’s so obvious they’ve all been met with only brutality their entire lives.
So I nod and step closer. “You hum what you were humming, and we’ll dance. I always wanted to dance, and I used to as much as I could before my limbs got too twisted. Even when they did, I was still the queen of the head bop and foot tap.”
Now he’s staring at me as if every word coming out of my mouth is gobbledygook. Which is fair. So instead, I just grin my face off, walk up to him and take two of his hands. He freezes for a second when I touch him, but a moment later relaxes… ever so slightly.
“Now whistle,” I instruct, but he shakes his head bashfully.
“Fine, then I’ll sing, but I’m bad at it, I’m warning you.” I open my mouth and start to sing a Taylor Swift song I always loved, about Romeo and Juliet. Almost immediately, I begin to tear up again. Not because of the song lyrics, but because my illness made singing difficult to impossible for so many years. I haven’t had the breath support, and it affected my speech patterns.
So, for a moment, I’m overwhelmed by that—being able to sing clearly—and being awash with gratefulness. And then I smile at Thing through my tears. He’s just watching my mouth as if mesmerized by the sound coming out of it.
“Now we dance,” I say quickly before picking up the melody again. I try to get him to move with me in a simple box pattern. He’s clumsy at first, not understanding how I’m trying to get him to move.
And then suddenly, it clicks.
I’m astonished—for such a large man, he really can move with a beautiful fluidity. But then again, that’s my fault for underestimating him.
After all, I’m dancing with Death.
I can’t help but laugh delightedly at the idea, and my laugh pings and bounces off the walls. It seems to elicit something in Thing as well, for if my eyes don’t deceive me, I begin to see the smallest of smiles appear on his face.
Chapter Forty-Seven
ABADDON
I left my consort sleeping peacefully upstairs. And with all I did to her last night before she collapsed in sleep, she should be out for a little while longer yet.
Plenty of time to bring Romulus down to the basement dungeon where no one can look on while we continue his scrying lessons.
There are no distractions here. No wind or noise, and he needs to focus completely.
It still stinks to high heaven, but considering he spent most of the past few centuries here, I assume it will not bother him much.
And as he sits in the center of the room, in the lotus position as he lifts his arm to begin calling the runes, he does not seem much disturbed by the stench or anything else.
Good. He is focusing.
“Remember to shield yourself.”
His face remains calm, eyes closed as he says, “Perhaps you should leave. I know what I have to do.”
A growl from low in my throat is my only response. “Just see what comes for us. And try not to get blasted into the wall this time.” At least there’s no furniture to destroy down here. “We must know who you saw when you last scried.”
