Chapter 200: The Journey 3

LYSANDER

"Oh, it was," I answered.

She turned her head.

"It was not subtle either," I went on. "The hair. The put-together face. The good dress. The hug." I watched the last of the gate posts go by. "I know a final goodbye when I see one."

Her worry arrived a half second before she spoke, sliding across the bond and settling against the base of my ribs like a hand pressed to a window. She did not like that answer. She did not like it enough to say so.

"Not yet," I assured her. "No one in Lily of the Valley is going to be in danger today. Whatever she is planning, she will painfully find out she has not finished arranging it."

"That is a great deal of confidence."

"I do not think this has anything to do with confidence. I know my onions, and I can be just as vicious when I need to."

She absorbed it and didn’t argue, which was its own kind of worry. Her fingers had begun working at the fabric of her skirt, small pinches and smooths, the way she did when her mind was running somewhere ahead of her, and she wanted to hold it back.

"You should know something before we get there," I said.

"To Lily of the Valley?"

"Yeah... It is about Lily of the Valley." I leaned toward her, close enough that the driver would not catch it, and put my mouth near her ear. "The reason why I am so... confident is because we are not arriving there today."

She went still.

"We are spending today at a manor no one cares much about anymore," I whispered. "The family kept it for hunting and a private corner of sorts, years back. It has been shut up since my... since my mother died. But it has only one roads in and out, no neighbors, and a staff of six."

She pulled back far enough to look at me properly. Her eyes had gone wide, and the colour was back in her cheeks for an entirely different reason now.

"Why?"

"Because I want to see what will happen."

She did not laugh. She was doing arithmetic behind her eyes, and the arithmetic was not going well.

"What is to say we are not being followed already?" she demanded.

Her hands had stopped moving on the skirt. They lay flat against the green silk, pressed down as if the fabric might lift off her.

"Nothing," I said. "I would be surprised if we were not."

"Then you most likely also know it will not matter where we go. They will find us wherever we stop if they intend to hunt you down and hurt you."

"Even better."

Her head snapped round. "Better?"

"Yes. Even better."

She stared at me.

"You are going to have to explain that," she decided.

"Every attempt so far has been reactive," I replied. "Every single one. The library and my uncle. The infirmary. The Delicate. Each time, someone else decided when and where, and I spent the rest of the day catching up." I rested my head back against the seat. "If they follow us, they will be doing it in a place I chose, at a time I chose, with men I chose standing around them. That is the first advantage I have had since my uncle died, and I intend to spend it well."

"I do not know. I think that is reckless."

"Probably."

"You have no idea who is coming."

"I have several ideas."

"You have no idea how many."

"That is true."

She made a small, frustrated noise and turned to the window, and then turned back, because the window had nothing to offer her and I did.

"Risking your life is dumb," she informed me.

"It is."

"If you can admit it... Should you not make smarter choices? I decided to join because I want to see a pack in good light. Especially one I remember being so hellish. And here you are making plans that are not bulletproof."

"Yikes. You can be mean." I let the corner of my mouth go up. "But I do have you by my side, though."

She snorted, quick and sharp, before she could stop herself.

"I would not be so certain," she countered. "I might have been able to save you once. But you should also remember that I tried with your uncle and I failed anyway."

The car hit a seam in the road and the whole frame jolted. She caught herself on the armrest, and then sat very still, and I saw her swallow.

"You know," she added, quieter now, "I do not even remember much of that day after the attack. It is mostly a blur. And that is not normal for me. I usually have a good head for details. I always have."

I turned that over. "What does mean? You remembered the assailants. That you did attempt to save my uncle even after being attacked and what he told you about the night children. What do you mean mostly a blur?"

"I do not know how to fully explain it. It is like... I do remember the attack, and I remember him getting shot, me getting shot, and me trying to heal him... But... about the night children. That memory is vague." Her hands smoothed the skirt again. "It is like a page in my memory book got torn out."

I thought of the courtyard. I thought of her standing over Fia, hand raised, something else looking out of her eyes, and of her waking with no memory of the fight she had won.

"Like the courtyard situation?"

"Not entirely, but yeah. That does make sense."

"You should have told me sooner," I said.

"I never saw in that light until now if I am being honest. But with me literally losing chunks of memory... Can I even be a good healer?"

I sighed at the thought of it and then looked outside.

The trees had thickened and the road had narrowed. We had left the main way already, I realized, somewhere in the last few minutes, and the driver had taken us onto the long, badly kept lane that ran behind the ridge. The car rocked gently over the uneven surface. The light through the branches came down in coins.

"Bonnie."

She looked back.

"We also have a dedicated sentinel team riding behind and in front of us who have been briefed on the worst case and drilled on it multiple times," I said. "They are not decorative. Two of them came up under my uncle, and one of them is the only man in the estate who has ever put Bradley on the ground in a spar. If something goes wrong today, it will not be because no one was ready for it."

Something in her shoulders let go. Not all of it. But enough. The corner of her mouth lifted, small and reluctant, and the thread under my ribs eased a little.

"That is better," she decided.