Chapter 56
Trystan
Trystan had heard many reasons over the years for why his manor was being invaded.
At the behest of King Benedict. To protect the innocents from evil. For revenge.
But “Fate made me do it” was a first.
“What happened to your shirt, boss?” Blade emphasized the word, because apparently he wanted Trystan to kill him.
He’d forgotten the garment hung in tatters around his shoulders. When they’d thought the manor was in trouble, Sage went off to search for Lyssa in the kitchens, and he went right for the main offices.
And regretted it.
Immensely.
He’d found Blade, Rebecka, and Tatianna examining the book opened upon his desk with rapt attention, barely acknowledging when he came in the room. “I was in an altercation, and it tore.”
Tatianna narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “Was the altercation named Evie?”
“Out!” Trystan barked, pointing toward the door.
“Wait!” Tatianna objected, handing Trystan the children’s book. “My Love My Sun. We found the passage and a drawing of it, but it isn’t anything we’ve seen before.”
“You’re telling me that Keeley left in search of a children’s book…and returned with one of the most powerful beings in existence?” Trystan remarked, composing himself remarkably for having just bolted up the stairs, fearful that someone was dead.
“I thought she was a librarian!” Keeley defended herself with a slash of her hand.
Clare’s reply was instant: “Same thing.”
A croak from Alexander was confirmation. He was back in his frog form, and Trystan swore the animal version of his friend seemed different now from the last time he’d turned amphibian.
Probably the lack of crown.
Trystan removed the golden headpiece from his pocket and placed it gently atop Kingsley’s head. The frog looked up at him, then scribbled something down on a sign.
Thief
Trystan chuckled darkly. “I found it in an escaped prisoner’s pants pocket. Must have swiped it from my room. Apologies, but to be fair, half the time it would be far too small for your head.”
Kingsley croaked and leaped onto his desk to be closer to eye level with the rest of the room, putting his webbed foot atop the children’s book, and when Trystan took a closer look…he gaped.
“I’ve seen this.” Walking toward the open window that angled in his favorite direction, he put out a hand and brushed his fingers against the frame. “It…it was here. That window. When I first found the manor.”
Kingsley wrote down two words on two different signs.
You’re
Sure?
“I remember it distinctly because I hated to look at it. Something about it was very unsettling.” He’d lived with it staring down at him for the first week and then made the executive decision to never see it again.
Until now.
“Where sunlight shines the purest,” Clare murmured. “If we reconstruct the window and, in the sunlight, we bring together the guvre venom, Lyssa’s starlight, your magic, and Evie’s, it would fulfill the prophecy.”
“Probably,” Blade added carefully. “There’s no way to know for sure.”
“No,” Trystan rasped. “I’m sure.”
Kingsley furiously wrote something down.
How
“Where sunlight shines unvarnished. The purest. That stained glass covered the window, shining into my office every day…right where Evangelina sat.”
He didn’t look at any of them when he tilted the chair toward where the light hit. “I fell in love with her in that light.”
None of them spoke. Until Tatianna chimed in, looking suspiciously glassy-eyed. “Where did you move the window?”
Clare gasped and then sighed, appearing as if she’d connected two dots. “Don’t tell me, Trystan.”
“Don’t tell you what?” Blade asked, folding his arms.
“You know about the box?” Trystan assumed.
Tatianna raised a polished pink fingernail. “May we know about the box?”
“When I took apart the window, I shipped it away.”
Kingsley held up a sign.
Who?
“To Arthur.” Clare said their father’s name with a detachment he knew she needed. “Trystan sent it after he escaped Benedict and became The Villain with a note that said, ‘This is all you’ll ever have. The broken pieces.’”
A whiff of vanilla candy pummeled him as Sage popped into the room with a grin. “That’s adorably dramatic.”
“Evie!” Everyone fussed around her, crowding her, though the first person to hug her was Clare, much to Blade and Tatianna’s disgruntlement.
“Oh, hello,” Sage said to the group, then gave him a look over Clare’s shoulder, her eyes comically wide. “I missed you as well.”
“I’m so sorry,” Clare burst out, taking Sage’s hands with a sincerity Trystan had rarely witnessed in his sister. She had been different lately. Someone unafraid to be human. “I was cruel and scared you off. I knew you were frightened, and I reacted so badly, and you—”
“Whoa!” Sage grabbed Clare’s arms, giving them a gentle squeeze. “I was already going to run. I needed to. You need not be sorry.”
Clare hugged her again, and Tatianna looked amused.
When Clare finally released her death grip, Tatianna and Blade swooped in for their turn, exchanging warm words and embraces.
“I adore this dress,” Tatianna praised, scanning it. “Though it doesn’t appear to hide the bite marks on your neck.”
Sage slapped a hand to the area, and Trystan slapped a hand over his eyes.
“Where did Arthur put the box, Clare?” Tatianna asked, looking at Trystan with a self-satisfied grin.
Clare remained silent, and Trystan knew whatever the answer was, it was going to be fucking inconvenient.
And still, the truth was worse.
“When Mother told the village you had, um, died”—she flinched—“there was a tree planted in your honor and a ceremonial burial beneath it.”
“Considering I am standing aboveground, I’m going to guess what they buried instead.”
“Arthur thought it was just random bits of glass!” Clare defended their father, but there was no need. Trystan wasn’t angry; he was thrilled.
“Where is the tree planted, Clare?” Sage asked.
“The Garden of Rennedawn.”
Trystan’s eyebrows climbed his forehead. “I beg your pardon. How did they manage that?”
“Why is that shocking?” Sage tilted her head. “Is there a corpse waitlist?”
“It’s a sacred space,” Tatianna explained. “Where people in our village often went to pray to the magical gods. One cannot even enter unless it’s for a burial.”
Trystan could not believe what he was about to suggest. His sister was going to murder him. Though he supposed then at least he’d get into the garden anyway. “Father’s funeral is in one week’s time, Clare. Instead of a burial at sea, what say we, as his children, insist on an alternate location?”
He waited for Clare to hate him, for her to be disgusted and storm away. But instead, his little sister’s eyes flashed with respect. “I think…” she started.
He braced for her to continue.
“We have some inquiries to make.”