Chapter 5 #3
Glenora turned a scowl on Bressen. “Unfortunately, this one and the gargoyle somehow learned you were in trouble and arrived in time to save both you and my husband.”
It hurt more than I thought to hear Glenora admit I was nothing to her. There’d been a brief time in those first couple weeks at the Citadel that I’d actually liked the lady and felt sorry for the way Ursan treated her.
“What does Magdalene want with me?”
“I told you, I don’t know,” she said, giving her tea a stir. “I didn’t ask, and she didn’t offer.”
I eyed her closely, but her skin remained pale.
“Did you know Magdalene was a syphon?” I asked.
Glenora’s head snapped up, and I now had her full attention.
“Magdalene is a what?” she asked.
I felt a small sense of triumph at having surprised her. “She’s a syphon like me. What did you think she was?” I asked.
“I…don’t know,” Glenora said. “We didn’t use our powers much whenever we met. I suppose I thought she was an elemental.”
“Why did Magdalene break Sandrian out of prison?” I asked.
Anger flashed across Glenora’s face, and she took a sip of her tea to buy herself a moment as I’d once done with a real cup of tea.
“I don’t know,” she said finally. “Presumably it’s nothing I can help with since I’m still here.”
I almost laughed. Glenora was bitter her friend hadn’t broken her out of Revenmyer as she had Sandrian.
I sobered as I remembered Magdalene could still get into the prison anytime she wanted. Bressen and I really needed to find a way to replace the wards. Perhaps I could add a layer of my own wards on top of the ones currently here.
“Cyra, let’s go,” Bressen said from behind me. “It’s clear she doesn’t know anything else useful.” There was still an edge to his voice.
“Do you know anything else about Magdalene or Sandrian we’d want to know?” I asked Glenora pointedly.
She considered for a moment.
“Magdalene has always struck me as…ambitious,” she said.
“But not overtly so. I don’t doubt Sandrian hopes to retake Rowe and probably conquer Thasia as well, and I’m sure he thinks Magdalene plans to help him.
She’s not that magnanimous. If she went through the trouble to break him out of here, she needs him for something. ”
We already suspected as much, but it was good to get confirmation.
I rose from where I sat, and Glenora looked up at me in alarm.
“You’re leaving already?” she asked. “There’s still much to discuss.”
I stopped. “Like what? Do you have more information about Magdalene and Sandrian?”
Glenora waved a dismissive hand. “No, not them. How is my stepdaughter doing?”
I furrowed my brows. “Stepdaughter?”
She nodded. “Yes, Reena…Your lady’s maid,” she prompted when I continued to frown at her.
Understanding dawned. Raina. She meant Raina.
“She’s none of your concern,” I said as I turned toward the door.
“Has she spoken to her mother recently?” Glenora asked, and my insides went cold. I swung back around. “Why? What do you know of Raina’s mother?”
Glenora didn’t bother to hide her smile as she shrugged. “I know her mother was fucking my husband behind my back, all while serving me as my lady’s maid. I hope you’re able to trust your friend more than I was able to trust her mother.”
“Did you do something to Raina’s mother?” I asked. “Where is she?”
“I never touched the woman,” Glenora answered. “How am I supposed to know where she is right now?”
“Those are evasions. Tell me what you know!”
My eyes must have flared red because Glenora’s own eyes widened, and she lurched back across the floor.
“You…,” she said. “You’re…you can’t be.”
“Tell me what you know,” I repeated. “We had a deal.”
Slowly the fear left Glenora’s face, and her smile returned.
“Our deal was that I’d tell you anything you wanted to know about Magdalene and Sandrian,” she said. “Raina’s mother wasn’t part of it.”
I raised a hand toward Glenora – intending to do what, I wasn’t sure – but Bressen was at my side a second later, pressing my hand back down.
“Cyra, let’s go,” he said. “We’ll find out what we can about Raina’s mother on our own.”
Bressen slipped his arm around my waist and turned me back toward the door.
I let him steer me until Glenora’s voice once again rose from the floor, this time in song.
“Though it waxes and wanes among the stars,We feel its tug, a tether between our souls.A beacon in the dark, a promise keptTo find each other and again be whole…”
I jerked around again to look at her. “How do you know that song?” I asked, pulling out of Bressen’s hold to stalk toward Glenora.
My heart thudded in my chest as I loomed above her.
“It’s just something I picked up,” she said. “Do you like it?”
“Cyra?” Bressen said. He was next to me again. He curled his hand around my arm, urging me back toward the door, but I didn’t move as I stared down Glenora.
She hummed as she went back to preparing another cup of tea. I started to question her again, but Bressen gave my arm a gentle tug, and I let him lead me away.
Glenora’s voice rose again as I crossed the threshold, and her song followed me out the door.“Though it sets each eve, closing out the day,We trust its rise again upon the morn…”