The Blood Spell (Ravenspire, #4)(88)

“Always.”

Who do you want to kiss?

He stayed quiet.

She smiled, wide and triumphant. I knew it. There is someone you want to kiss. Wait. Have you already kissed her?

“I am not discussing kissing with my little sister.”

But I want to know!

“We don’t always get what we want.”

She rolled her eyes. Who do you want to tell your darkest secrets to?

“Who says I have any dark secrets to tell?” he said, though Blue’s eyes, filled with understanding as he unburdened himself to her, filled his thoughts.

I’m your sister. I know you have secrets. All right, last question, and this is most important.

“Hit me with it.”

Which girl would you die to protect?

He quit trying to get Blue’s face out of his head. She’d taken up residence when he hadn’t been paying attention, and now it seemed impossible not to think of her with every question Nessa asked.

Well?

“I’d die to protect you,” he said, and meant it with every fiber of his being. Pulling her into a quick hug, he said, “Thank you for your help, little bird, but I’m afraid you’ve missed one very important thing.”

What did I miss?

“I don’t get to make this decision based on who I love. I have to decide what’s best for our kingdom. If I’m lucky, my emotions will follow my decision like it did for our parents. If I’m not lucky, well, then at least I’ll have brought peace and prosperity to Balavata.”

But what about you?

“What about me?” He pulled back to look at her. At her nimbus of curls and her big brown eyes. At the dimple in the corner of her left cheek and the joyful energy that radiated from her.

You deserve to be loved. You deserve someone who would die to protect you.

“Then let’s hope the girl I choose eventually feels that way. Now, off to bed with you.” He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek and watched her leave his room. And then he blew out the light beside his bed and lay in the dark for hours thinking of bones, magic, and kissing Blue.





THIRTY-SIX

BLUE ROSE WITH the sun, though it took immense effort to force herself out of bed without Dinah’s furious prodding. She wanted to leave the house before Dinah or the girls woke and began giving her a long list of chores to complete. Or worse, before Dinah decided she needed yet another spell of Mama’s and made Blue go back down into the root cellar again.

Dressing in one of her plain gardening shirts and pants, she wrapped a blue headscarf over her twists and crept out of the bedroom. Halette turned over as Blue crossed the threshold into the hall, but the girl remained asleep.

Pepperell meowed, twining around her legs, and she hushed him. Scooping him up, she hurried down the hall, careful to miss the boards that creaked. When she got to Papa’s office, the room Dinah had claimed as her own, she froze.

The door was already open. The blankets Dinah used as she slept on Papa’s sofa were tossed carelessly onto the floor. Dinah was already up.

Blue’s shoulders slumped, and she pressed her face against Pepperell’s fluff as her plans to escape early and spend the morning with Grand-mère discussing the wraith, her magic, and Kellan dissolved into a weary resignation.

Pepperell purred, digging his claws into her shoulder as he kneaded happily.

“Watch yourself, you great lug,” she said as she moved down the stairs. There was no point in avoiding the creaking boards now. Dinah would be waiting in the kitchen for her breakfast or pacing the little parlor with a list of tasks in her hand. Not tasks for her or her daughters, of course. Just for Blue.

For what felt like the thousandth time, Blue wondered what Mama had been thinking. How had she ever been close to a woman like Dinah? Had Dinah changed that much in the sixteen years since the guardianship agreement was signed, or had she simply fooled Mama into thinking she would be the motherly sort?

They were useless questions. Mama wasn’t here to ask, and Blue had to either find her own way out of this or endure it until her next birthday. She’d thought Dinah would be satisfied with the spell she’d given her. Dinah had said she’d leave Blue alone once she had what she wanted, but it had been several days, and Dinah showed no signs of leaving yet.

Resolved to ask Dinah about her plans to move herself and her daughters out of the farmhouse, Blue rounded the bottom of the stairs and peeked into the parlor. Empty.

She sighed. That meant Dinah not only had a list of tasks, but she also wanted breakfast. Blue trudged into the kitchen, Pepperell hanging over her shoulder like a sack of bolla roots, and then stopped. It was empty too.

Slowly turning in a circle, Blue held her breath and strained to hear anything. The house was quiet. Was Dinah in the garden? On the porch? The root cellar? Blue eyed the door that led to the cellar and then backed out of the kitchen.

If Dinah wasn’t present to force Blue into doing her grunt work for her, Blue certainly wasn’t going to seek her out. Grabbing her gathering basket, she hurried outside.

No Dinah on the porch, in the yard, or in the garden. Blue didn’t wait for her luck to change. Hurrying through the garden, ignoring the buzzing of magic in her veins as the plants reached for her, she moved into the orchard.

Yesterday’s trip west was at the center of Blue’s thoughts, a sharp-edged knife worrying at her seams. She’d found Ana, though now she wished she hadn’t. She’d seen the horrifying proof that someone was feeding the wraith. She’d nearly kissed the crown prince and still wished she had, though she knew it would break her heart.