Chapter 57
Evie
Two days before the funeral…
Lyssa still wouldn’t speak to her.
And Evie understood why. She’d broken a promise; she’d broken her trust.
She’d said she would never leave. Ever.
She’d begun to understand her mother’s pain at not being accepted. But unlike Evie’s mother, Lyssa could slam the door in Evie’s face every time she knocked—and she’d still keep coming back.
“Lyssa?” Evie knocked. “Edwin sent me with some biscuits, the kind you like. With the cheese?”
The door creaked open, and Lyssa appeared. Evie tried to maintain her calm. Or she’d scare her. But inside, her heart leaped.
“I am in the middle of teatime. But you…may join,” Lyssa said as benevolently as a queen, tipping the door all the way open to reveal Trystan sitting there in the large, feathered hat Lyssa had him wear during their first tea party.
“Good afternoon, Sage.” Trystan stood abruptly, giving her a deferential nod while he pulled out the empty chair for her.
She’d hardly seen him in the last few days. He’d been too busy, sending missives, consulting law books, and enlisting Tatianna’s seafaring father for a means to their village’s port. “Good afternoon, Lord Blossom.”
“I’m Lord Daffodil,” Trystan corrected evenly.
“I was talking to the snail,” Evie choked out, pointing to the small animal nibbling on a flower atop one of the tea saucers. “You’re letting her call you Lord Daffodil?”
Lyssa handed Evie her cup of tea with a tentative smile, and Evie swallowed her overbearing emotions, taking a hearty sip.
“It seemed prudent, considering I picked it.” Trystan took a bite of the scone just in time for Evie to scald her tongue.
“You picked… All right then.” Evie gaped, wondering if she hadn’t in fact woken up that morning and was still trapped in her dreams. “Lyssa, do you think we could talk for a few minutes?”
Lyssa gave Evie a strange look and crossed her arms. “We are talking.”
“I mean in private.” Evie’s eyes flashed to Trystan, and he stood immediately, clearing his throat.
“We’re out of sugar. I’ll fetch more—” Trystan started.
“There’s some right here.” Lyssa picked up a tiny cannister, and Trystan unceremoniously grabbed it and chucked the small pot out the window. He pulled at his collar when both Sage girls stared at him.
“There was a spider,” he said flatly. “Excuse me.” He sailed from the room, black cape flaring out behind him like wings.
And then it was just them.
There had never been a moment of discomfort like this between Evie and her little sister. From the time Lyssa fell into her care as an infant, the hierarchy of their relationship had always remained the same. Evie was in charge. Evie took care of them. Evie was always there.
But that illusion had faded. And this was what remained.
“Lyssa, I wanted to say—”
“I’ve been managing quite fine without you.” She cut Evie off with a succinct smile. “You need not worry.”
“I’m glad,” Evie said honestly, because she was. She wanted to beg for Lyssa’s forgiveness, to do whatever it took to regain their footing, because the truth was? She was running out of time.
Lyssa was growing up.
It was wonderful.
And depressing.
“Did you enjoy your time away?” Lyssa asked.
Evie had expected the question to be charged with resentment, but it was more careful. Fearful, even. “I wouldn’t say enjoyed…but I think in the state I was in…it was necessary.”
Her little sister gave her a tiny smile while she picked up her teacup. “I’m glad. You deserve some time for yourself.”
“Lyssa, I’m sorry!” The words burst from Evie in a trail of instant hysteria as she shot to her feet. “I know you’re angry with me, and you have every right to be, but please—I’d rather you yell than whatever this awkward politeness is.”
Lyssa stood up slowly, blinking as the words sank in. “Angry with you? I’m not angry with you.”
“You haven’t spoken to me since I got back! Every time I come to the door, you tell me you’re busy. When I come to bed at night, you’re already asleep. You’re up and out before I wake up. What else am I supposed to think?”
“I was trying to show you I could take care of myself!” Lyssa flopped on the ground dramatically, spreading her limbs like a starfish. She stared at the ceiling, and Evie stared at her, slowly meandering over and carefully laying herself down next to her, mimicking her stance.
“I know that you can,” Evie said, admiring the intricate architecture on the curved ceiling. “Lyssa, what is this about? Really?”
When Lyssa turned her head, silky strands of dark-brown hair lay next to her, brushing against Evie’s unbound curls.
“You’re always trying to make things easier for everyone else.
I just wanted to try and make things easier for you.
I thought if I pretended you leaving didn’t bother me, I’d feel like less of a burden. ”
“Lyssa Dorthea Sage.” Evie rose onto her knees, pulling her sister up with her hands. “You have never been a burden to me. Not for one single second of your existence.”
“But you didn’t get to do so many things because of me.” Lyssa’s voice was small, and her body language mimicked it as she tucked her legs into her chest. “You missed out on all the things I get to do. It’s not fair.” Lyssa stressed the words, and Evie rubbed a finger over the back of Lyssa’s hand.
Indeed, there were many things Evie would never get to do. Many things she’d missed out on. But she missed nothing.
“You’re right. There are lots of things you get to do that I didn’t.” Evie’s eyes welled with tears. “But I got to do something no one else ever will.”
Lyssa’s chin dipped. “What?”
Evie’s finger went underneath it, tilting Lyssa’s face up until their eyes met. “I got to raise you. And I promise you, sweet, that is the best thing I’ve ever done.”
Lyssa’s arms went around her neck, and she cried into Evie’s shoulder. “I hated pretending I don’t need you. Because I need you quite a lot of the time, it turns out.”
Evie combed a hand through her sister’s hair and said, “It’s just as well. I need you quite a lot of the time, too. I missed you the whole time I was away.” Her magic did, too, it appeared, spilling out of her fingers in wisps of smoke, wrapping around her hands.
It was the perfect time for Trystan to walk back in with fresh sugar, spy the scene before him, and come to a halt. “There’s crying. Should I leave?” he asked steadily.
“No, it’s happy crying!” Lyssa giggled, climbing to her feet and tugging Trystan back toward the chair.
“You’ve made up, then?” He grunted, taking his teacup with an upturned pinkie.
“Yes,” Evie confirmed with a smile, claiming her seat beside him.
“Thank the deadlands. That was a stressful few days,” Trystan grumbled. “Now onto more important matters.”
Lyssa clapped. “Oh yes! Evie.” She turned toward her sister with an earnestness that made her laugh. “We’ve discussed it and agreed you shall be invited to our tea parties so you may join the villain lessons.”
“Oh?” She lifted a brow in Trystan’s direction. “How so?”
“You’re still learning your magic, but you need to have the right attitude about you,” Lyssa replied. “You’re too peppy.”
“Hey!” Evie protested while Trystan turned his face away, shoulders shaking. “Did you put her up to this, Chuckles?”
“I wish.” He grinned, and she held his gaze for just a few seconds longer than necessary.
Evie leaned ever so slightly in his direction, but a child’s chair apparently couldn’t take even that much from her. There was the sound of wood cracking, and then she was falling to the ground on her arse.
“The chair broke,” she said, frozen in shock.
“It was already broken,” Lyssa said airily. “Lord Trystan fell off it when I asked if he was going to marry you.”
It was a very good thing Evie was already on the ground. Because the chances of that knocking her on her ass were high. “Oh?” she drawled. “And what was his reply?”
“He didn’t reply. He just fell over,” Lyssa whispered from behind her hand.
“I did not reply because that is hardly something your sister wants to be thinking about right now.” Trystan’s color was heightened, his hair mussed from running his fingers through it. He looked younger, unsure.
Evie knew that their lives and futures were still uncertain. But she was also coming to learn that it was better to enjoy her present moments of peace than be at war with a future she couldn’t predict.
“I think about it,” she murmured.
His head turned toward her so fast, she backed up an inch. “You…think about it?” His disinterested tone and the flatness of his expression were negated by the near-wild look in his eyes.
“All the time, actually.” She smiled shyly, feeling a bit like when she’d had her first crush. Bubbly but bashful. So nervous, each word out of her mouth felt like a match beneath dynamite.
“She does,” Lyssa agreed. “She named your children in her work journal.”
“Lyssa!” Evie screamed, arms flailing upward. “Wonderful. Now he’s going to think I’m a madwoman.”
He smirked, like this was a challenge being presented. “My taste runs toward madwomen, actually, so I find that suitable.”
Lyssa looked between them with a bewildered expression before settling her eyes on Evie. “He sniffed your pillow.”
“I did not!” Trystan objected angrily. “I was yelling into it. Per your instructions.”
Evie stared blankly, because she really was now convinced that she’d never woken up.
“He kept your scarf, too, Evie—from when you first met,” Lyssa pointed out.
“What is happening!” Trystan held a hand to his head, like he needed to hold his mind in place.
“So…” Evie felt that warmth in her chest, the kind that comes from allowing your worries to melt away, leaving them all behind…the kind of feeling she only got when she messed with Trystan Maverine. “You’ve been obsessed with me for a while, then?”
“Obsessed?” Trystan raised a sardonic brow.
“Pining. Desperate.” She sighed dramatically, hugging her arms around herself, pretending to preen. “Keeping a shrine to me in your wardrobe.”
“I held on to one scarf!” Trystan argued, rubbing at his temples. “That’s hardly a shrine.”
She booped his nose, and his response was to stumble back like she’d punched him. “Be honest. You’ve sniffed that, too, haven’t you?”
He scoffed, eyes darting side to side. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
Lightning flashed in the windows, and then thunder struck, and suddenly the sun had disappeared. “That’s odd. I didn’t see…storm clouds.”
Another crack through the window, and shuffling sounded in the hall…then screams.
“What’s going on?” Lyssa asked nervously.
A furious knock on the door had them all on their feet. “What?” Trystan barked.
Kingsley appeared when the door opened. Human Kingsley, that is. “We have a guest.”
His gravelly voice was calm, but it did not match his rumpled clothes and disheveled appearance. “Actually, two…large guests.”
Lyssa gasped, jumping up with a joyful screech. “The guvres!”