Gilded Cage (Dark Gifts #1)(80)

Zelston looked like a man close to death. His whole body was trembling, and sweat stood out on his forehead. It would be ironic if the man had a heart attack the minute before his tragic beloved woke up.

What must it be like, to have wanted something so much, for so long, and be finally about to receive it?

Silyen stood beside the bed, one hand steady against the table. Despite himself, Gavar watched with fascination as his brother’s eyes rolled up, their blackness replaced with blank whiteness.

Silyen’s relationship with his Skill was something Gavar had never understood, or recognized within himself. Gavar’s own Skill felt like a barely contained force, one that blew straight through him with little or no direction or control.

He assumed that was how it was for most of them, although he’d never really asked. It wasn’t polite to go enquiring about other people’s ability, just as you’d never pry about the contents of their bank vault. Skill was exactly like money in that respect. You didn’t need to ask, to know who had lots of it.

Except Silyen’s Skill wasn’t a strongroom stuffed with bullion. The boy himself was pure gold. Right now, Gavar could almost see him shine.

Zelston made a noise like a wounded creature, and Gavar realized his mother was crying.

Aunt Euterpe had opened her eyes.

It all became rather embarrassing rather quickly after that.

Zelston appeared to be having some kind of full-on breakdown. He’d taken Aunt Euterpe’s hand. It was small and pale, cupped in his large brown palm like a tiny fledgling in the nest, too weak to fly just yet. The Chancellor’s other hand was stroking her hair.

‘You’ve come back to me, my darling,’ Gavar heard him say. ‘You’ve come back. And I’ve waited.’

It seemed to Gavar that no one should be here watching this. No one but Mother and the Chancellor – the two people who’d been with Aunt Euterpe when she’d first gone under. But Father had his reasons. This wasn’t only about showing off Sil. When Zelston broke apart, he wanted as many people as possible to see it.

The Chancellor was doing his best to oblige. Tears were coursing down the man’s face, soaking the coverlet. Aunty Terpy’s last bed bath. It looked like he wanted to get up beside her and take her in his arms and never let her go again.

A whisper came from the pillow, so faint it seemed to reach them from very far away. A quarter of a century away, he supposed. His aunt had lain asleep for Gavar’s entire life. A tiny part of him envied her. Twenty-five blameless years in which she hadn’t made a single mistake or disappointed anyone.

‘Winter?’ said a voice no louder than the rustle of sheets. ‘Tally? I’m sorry I’ve been gone so long. I’m back now. Silyen’s explained everything.’

Her head turned and looked for Sil. And would you believe it, he received her first smile. Something uncertain but full of familiarity, as if spotting an old friend by chance in a foreign country. Silyen smiled back.

They knew each other, Gavar realized, the back of his neck prickling. Wherever Aunt Euterpe had been all these years, Silyen had been there too.

A few of Mother’s invited guests were openly weeping. There was Lord Thurnby, who’d been a great friend of her parents, elderly now but his face full of wonder that he’d lived long enough to see this. Cecilie Muxloe, a childhood playmate of both girls, was staring at her old friend as if she was a child’s beloved toy, misplaced then retrieved long after it was believed lost.

Euterpe was struggling to sit up, and the Chancellor did rise from his seat, then. He sank into the yielding whiteness of the bed and put both arms around her. Everyone in the room saw the fleeting, electrifying moment when the Skill coursed from him to her, strengthening and reviving. It was the most intimate act there was.

‘I think we’ve all seen quite enough,’ someone said loudly. ‘We should leave them to it.’

It was only when Father turned, his face purpling, that Gavar realized the speaker was him.

Father’s mood had revived by the time of the afternoon meeting. No Skill was required to pep up Lord Whittam, just the prospect of conflict – and victory. All through his childhood, Gavar had thought that fights and arguments just happened around Father. It had taken him this long to realize that the man created them: one face-off after another, after another, because he knew he would win every single time.

He was going to win this one, too.

The study’s glittering windows looked out across the Long Walk. But by ten to four, it was impossible to admire the view because the room was packed with people. All the usual suspects were there. Father’s favoured cronies, Gavar’s soon-to-be wife and humongous father-in-law, their perpetual hanger-on Lord Rix and Bouda’s little clique. All five of those who had been present at Aunt Euterpe’s awakening were there too. Several more besides. Father had been a busy bee.

Gavar rested his backside against the heavy leather-topped desk and made some calculations. By his reckoning, the people gathered here were enough to carry with them the necessary two thirds of parliament.

Father was going to pull it off.

Gavar foreswore the Laphroaig that night – he wanted a clear head for what tomorrow would bring – though he did have a few more lessons for the new heiress. Rowena, wasn’t it? Or Morwenna?

Then all too soon, he awoke to his last day as a free man.

The din in the Long Gallery at breakfast was even louder than before. Equals were in high spirits, talking of an afternoon to be spent horse-riding, shooting or fishing after the Proposal had been quickly quashed. Gavar wondered how long Father’s ‘any other business’ would take.